WANTED! My sense of humor back

OMG. I grew up with the expression "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all."

This is the 21st century though, and we've got People magazine and Perez Hilton. So we can through that adage out the window.

Which actually brings me to the point. I've been finding it much much easier to skulk around other people's blogs lately then to keep the whitisms up on that one 'cause I'm feeling a bit stressed, possibly a bit more then usual. Maybe. Or maybe this is just my natural state, and I'm actually up to date with all my paperwork for a change so now I've got time to look at the heaps of everything else that I've neglected, instead of using those activities to distract me from stuff I didn't want to do.

Maybe.

Reading Nat's, Allison's and PC's blogs have given me reason to pause and find solstice in the blogging sisterhood. Last week I had a dental incident that still runs under par to what PC experienced, though kind of mimics the tone.

Earlier this week, I was advised that my office would be moving (a la Allison) to an inside channel (no windows, no longer) and that it would be cut in size to about half, or smaller. (Really no big deal on that one, as I felt I had a bit too much space to begin with. There are other issues that go with it though, including being partnered to sit next to the same colleague for the last five years. I really would like a change.) And then there's the whole change anxiety that Nat speaks of. All my change is happening while on French training. I get to come backto a changed/smaller office, possibly different duties and FRENCH TESTS at the beinging of April.

Meanwhile, I have yet to find some one who's transitioning children in school (I've got one going into secondary school, and one transitioning to the pre-preschool program); toilet training woes; any one dealing with another bout of "faux amis" (aka head lice); cabin fever nope - sorry - Jen's got that one covered - I too am looking at garden porn and dreaming of fresh dirt; and general anxieties for the five with whom I share my abode.

I think I need a drink. Thank goodness Mike's got that one covered!

Spring must be around the corner!

I saw the first really signs of Spring, and no it wasn't the red, red robin, who came bob, bob, bobbin along.

It was in Tony's Shoe Repair window!Tony's starting his tomato plans! Woo hoo! Spring can't be that far away now!!

No place is safe any more

I should have known that there is now no place that is considered a safe zone in my house when Child Unit 4 piled into bed between The Huz and me with his bag of marshmallows. I guess he don't need no stink'n security blanket! He's going hard core.

The change

I keep telling every one who will listen: "in six weeks everything will be better".

In six weeks we'll be in April. The weather should turn to be so much nicer. No winter shoes. No sneakers. No hats. All put away for another whole six months. Just long enough for me to start considering this paraphernalia is quaint.

In six weeks, the first of my four child units will officially become a teenager.

In six weeks, I might just put in my order for garden seeds.

In six weeks, I'll get a new haircut and go from looking like Lorne Elliot (the resemblance is uncanny sometimes) to more like Lyle Lovett.

In six weeks, I should be done my French language training. (I so hope to small gawds that I am. I'm so freaking overloaded, there are days I barely know my name.)

In six week, my soon-to-be-teenaged-child-unit's high school should be decided, and we should all be on the happy road to preparing a transition plan.

In six week, I will have a significantly lessened bout of cabin fever which is resulting in an extremely trigger happy fuse that goes off when there is any sort of vibration near me.

In six weeks, I'll be six weeks older, six weeks wiser.

Right now I'm trying to enjoy the minutes that are before me. I'm trying to be conscious of the my needs, even though it's soooooo much easier to help some one else out. It feels better and more fulfilling to project outwards, then inwards. It's a matter of course.

Valentine's SWAG

I'm almost post Valentines.

The hand-offs went ok. (I only saw the results of one of the kids, because the other two drop off into the abiss.

The SWAG that CU-3 came home with! OMG, you'd have thought it was Hallowe'en or Christmas or something.

I only did the paper maché heart thingy because CU-2 asked. (I've learned my lesson about volunteering my "talents"!) And still, the exercise wasn't without it's pains.

I like the other ideas you came up with - like Bliss suggestion to take the offending child out for a coffee, and try the old bait and switch, though, every time I do this type of project I think of some of the things you've done ... does Goldilocks ring a bell?

Jen, I don't know. Sometimes I think it's bribary.

Nat, if I could have found Scoobie cards, I'd have gone that way. I've got a varied collection of past partially used boxes of Valentine's - Calliou, Blues Clues, general bi-lingual animal ones, and my all time favorites the ones that depict wrestling sensation The Rock. (And I quote "Roses are red, violets are blue, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH. Happy Valentine's Day.")

I'm trying to coax the children to choose from these cards. Funny that the 12 year old won't choose Calliou eh? But he picked them out when he was four!!

What I do for love

I think I need an intervention ...


= Three nights of effort + paste encrusted fingers + wrecked "new" jeans + multiple grey hairs

to finally get this:

for 19. And that's for ONE of the kid's classes.

And I kept wondering why I wasn't sleeping well.

Weird

Ok. First day on the buses. Very weird feeling. The buses are almost empty. Very weird feeling. The Huz is on his new schedule and gets home before I do. Very weird feeling. I'm beginning to feel frustrated in my job again. Also very weird feeling.

That last one might just be a result of looking at this ad, except I have yet to daydream about punching small animals:

A site for sore feet

We have bus service! Finally.

I almost feel the same way when I get to put away my winter coat in Spring.

Influence

It's kind of neat to realize when you have influence over your children.

Today two things happened with CU-3 of which she self-reported. The first is that another little girl at school was feeling sad and was missing her mother. CU-3 went up to her and said "Cry. It's good for you." (That's definitely a me-ism).

The second one was tonight, while I was chasing the Hell-child all over the house (as he run buck naked too!), I'd made a comment about how I was unhappy about their shared room. When I came back, the floor was clear. CLEAR! (I almost fell to my knees and wept with joy). I look over at CU-3 sitting on her bed. She looks back at me and say "The cleaning fairies did it."

It's not much. It sure helped my evening go better. Maybe five will be a good year for us all.

Stages

The Huz reports that there are several distinct stages of putting Child Unit 4 to bed.

Stage 1: Denial
Includes massive bouts of denial, both verbal, and physical, including acts of wiggling and wriggling which, perhaps only a sumo wrestler could match.

Stage 2: Playing Possum
Includes closing his eyes, biding his time, waiting ... waiting for YOU to make the first move, usually out of bed.

Stage 3: Second wind
Includes crying to get you back for more attention, and attempts to break the sleep hold, but as a result of low coordination because he is tired, results are awkward and ends in a tightened grip of covers wrapped around him.

Stage 4: Submission
Includes marks of statue eyes (eyes rolling back into his head), and deeper breathing patterns, though, occasionally can be confused with Stage 2. Any attempts to leave at this stage results in Parental Whiplash, crying and throwing of covers.

Stage 5: Success
This stage is marked by regular deep breathing patterns and parental freedom. Any attempts to leave at this stage are successful.

Still working on that love list

In the meantime, here's a pop quiz. Can you tell the difference?

My anti-love list

Day 48 of the bus strike.

Balmy -25 degree weather.

French training.

Husband who pretends he's listening, then asks me a question directly related to what I just said to him.

Pre-adolescence.

Potty training.

Any time any one any where says "Oh oh."

Feeling that I'm in over my head. (I've joined a group and offered to be the Board Secretary. I've been getting a deluge of emails since. I'm wondering what the krunk I got myself into now!)

Maybe tomorrow I'll be in a better place and can post a love list. Any suggestions to get that one started?

Fall out

The fall out from the Terror Child's activities have finally been noticed, though I don't know that I really can call it fall out, more like a like sprinkling Spring shower.

CU-1: "Heh, who took my candy box out."

Me: "I don't know CU-1. I found it downstairs."

CU-1: Looks at me suspiciously.

Me: "Did you check out your locker? Do you see what was there?*"

CU-1 paddles off.

The end.

*At Christmas, CUs-3 and 4 got into his other Christmas candy, which I said I'd replace, which I did, finally.

Terror child update

These are of the Terror Child, in better times.

Funny, the side effects of the chocolate. It was the easiest evening in over two weeks that he went to bed with much less of a fuss.

Tonight it's back to the usual shenanigans and the running of the stairs. (The Huz is going to have a back side that can crack walnuts by the end of this.)

Living in this house should come with a WARNING

I've repeatedly told my children that they signed a contract at birth. They claim they don't remember. I tell them, that's their problem, not mine.

For example, when one child provokes the other, and I'm in my did-I-really-sign-up-for-this-I-can't-recall-doing-so moods, I'll tell the warring children that it's in their contract to annoy one another. Usually that brings a break in the proceeding, long enough for them to get distracted and leave one another alone.

Apparently my contract says that I'll have a steel-trap mind for stuff that lies around our home. Not a particularly useful super power until you get the desperate call at work from The Huz who's channeling an equally desperate kid who can't find his or her mittens-lunch-box-home-work-glasses-socks-shoe-favorite-lucky pencil.

I have to say I think it's really sad that I've got a response for him like "check the laundry room shelf on the right hand side, left side of that shelf, in the green bin, at the back, under the cotton wads). It's very sad.

Alas, it's not these common place occurrences that have triggered today's entry. No. I wish it were. It has more to do with siblings getting into places they're probably not supposed to be going into.

Take this evidence, for example:
When The Huz went upstairs for the eighth time this evening to try to put the Terror Child to bed, The Huz found chocolates, partially consumed, apparently not being of the liking of the immediate consumer.

This was never his box of chocolates to consume. The greater problem isn't trying to scrape the child off the wall after having consumed sugar, it's having to deal with the sibling to whom the box of chocolates belongs who isn't here to deal with the immediate disappointment.

Even more regrettable is that the child on the loosing end already had another candy stash broken into.

So here's my problem. Do I try to guess the number of chocolates post-consumed and replace those? Do I hide the box and pray to small gawds that he doesn't notice the box is missing? Do I even confess what the sibling did? Oh the choices.

That's minus honey!

Taken from inside the kitchen this morning at about 7:30 a.m.

A short post on anti-social vegetables

Perpetual Chocoholic (who's running a very good tutorial on drawing) guessed correctly about my reference to anti-social vegetables in the previous post. So here's the short version of the back story.

I've been working very hard to try to reduce, reuse and recycle (mostly ME). So that means many more vegetables and the like. For some, vegetables are a great thing. In our house, they're the anti-social element of the house and it kind of goes like this:

I make a modified version of the cabbage salad (aka known as a party salad or a chinese salad or the like). It's pretty good. Feeling peckish, and watching the Food Network (not a great combination), I serve myself a serving ... then another ... and then The Huz joins me. He's the one that kind of started the conversation. After he finished his serving, he said "oh, my body's not going to like me in the morning" to which I corrected him "No. Your colleagues at work won't like you."

So, the next day it was Pizza night in our house, and we've put on a ban of potty talk at the table (at my mother's request). I was talking about the great salad, that kind of had miserable side effects and refered to them as "the anti-social vegetables".

And dang, they sure are yummy.

Monday love list

Oh so many good things happen when so many bad things are going on. In a week we'll have an Obama-nation (and I consider that a good thing)!

Stealing the idea from Meg, here's today's love list:

• snow
• snow storms
• music I can sing too (AND remember the lyrics to)
• having a light bulb moment
• hair after it's been outside in the cold
• surprise rebate cheques
• boxes that come in the mail
• French class, especially when it's heavy with boy humor
• anti-social vegetables
  

Things I love a bit less

• hypocrites
• head lice
• dirtied diapers
• people parking haphazardly
• endless house cleaning
  

I guess locuses are next

As if I don't have enough to do, I was greeted by two members of the after-school staff asking me if I received the telephone call they'd apparently placed to me this afternoon.

It all started with itching.

Itching and small children are NOT a good thing.

I am so thankful for sympathetic teachers too, and heavy chemical shampoos, that don't do that much good, except possibly let me sleep tonight thinking that I've got a start on things.

Yes. We've got a wild case of head lice in at least two of the kids. I'll be checking the other two Friday, when they come home, because their father is usually in complete denial about things.

Hey PC, just to let you know, you've trained me well.

Nights like this, I ask "why me".

I so wish I was talking about the bear

Poo, not Pooh.

There. I said it.

A result of popular demand (yes, can you imagine I have had people say I should blog about this?) I'm am writing about Child-Unit 4's toilet training successes and failures. And, no, there won't be any pictures to go along with this story (only because they came out too blurry to post).

So, from this point on be warned. This is not a cutsie post about fluffy kittens and puppies. You probably want that anyway, then the stories that follow. Back track and click the link now, unless of course, you're a Mom, a former Mom, or a maybe a recovering Mom that needs to get over a baby sniffing addiction! ;-)

Toilet training the last of the family lineage has been, um, a treat. I'm told these stories I will be able to look back on and laugh off in a few years.

I don't think I can wait that long.

Toilet training, in earnest, started December 26.

After CU-4 received training underpants for Christmas (he was VERY excited Christmas morning when he opened the box, pulled them out and started jumping up and down saying "Bunny! Bunny! Bunny!") we warned him his diapering days were almost over.

Hour upon hour we trotted him back and forth to the toilet. For the most part, mostly misses. Occasionally he'd tease us, or our timing would be good enough and he'd relax and dribble into the toilet. Yeh! One for us. But those stories don't make for an interesting read. Oh no. I'm about to tell you three true stories:

#1 - the near miss
CU-4 was put on the toilet and The Huz got distracted, mumbled something to me about "boy" and "toilet" as he passed. I didn't think much of it until CU-3 started howling for me to come and see what CU-4 did. And there it was in all it's glory. About three feet from where it's final resting place should have been. That's when I got the camera out and throughly lost my "good parenting" points.

#2 - making the rounds
Since construction of the new part of the house last year, we've been re-blessed with having an extra two commodes added to our formerly humble abode. We'd started the training in the powder room (also know as A----a's bathroom - named after a former neighbour-child who used the facilities at g-r-e-a-t length). However, because of a hockey play-off with Canada and the Russians, CU-4 and his equipment was moved to the en suite, which was closer to the front room and the TV. It was at this location that the second story takes place.

While folding laundry, CU-4 was playing nicely with others, and occasionally amusing himself, though generally staying out of trouble until I see him skip past me for the third time.

After the first two times it didn't really click in that he'd been coming out of my bedroom, on the back loop, empty handed. (On my behalf I'll say I've been very under the weather during the holiday season.) The second pass I *think* he had a wooden toy figurine of a giraffe. The third pass through was with a Duplo block square. (I'd missed the original foray, it turns out. THAT was a piece of train track.) My gut suspicions were triggered. I'd followed him into the bathroom, yelling for support just in case I had to have a confrontation or an intervention.

Sigh. I caught him just after he'd flushed.

Oh, I probably shouldn't mention that earlier that day The Huz had caught him, em, testing the waters in that facility for potability. Ew ew ew ew ew. (Grandma Tim tells me that most children have done this at one time or another. Still, ew.)

#3 - the sink incident
The Huz is doing his regular rounds putting the CUs to bed. I get the bellow to hurry and hurry hard (I love curling terms, they're so cute!) The Huz was upset because it looked like CU-4 had done something to clog the toilet and it had backed-up into the sink.

Upon closer investigation, The Huz concluded that CU-4 had taken a sample and decided to wash his hands of it in the sink. (Update: Upon further reflection, The Huz believes that it may have just been a soil sample taken from one of the resident bathroom cacti, though the jury is still out on that one.)

#4 - the bonus story
First day back on our regular schedule, the CU fairs ok, not leaving anything behind when trying out his care giver's toilet, and sliding things in on the sly, during nap time. She instructs me to put him right on the toilet when we get home, which I do. Too late. The cold weather has already triggered a response. Ok, so we start again.

Every hour CU-4 is coaxed to park. Nothing as far as I can tell.

During the last park-and-ride, I'm trying to multitask and verify I've got sufficient ingredients to run a batch of cookies through when I hear the scream of the howler monkey. The last time CU-4 had reacted this way, I found him with one foot in the toilet bowl, and on point, kind of like a ballerina warming up at the bar. (Apparently he was trying to get off.) No such luck this time. For either of us.

No, this time he'd took care of business and all the formalities. He'd peed on his business twice. TWICE!

Cripes. Now how do I end a blog entry like this eh? Perhaps with a grateful sigh that we're done for today and with a big thank you to small gods that I got into a Mr. Clean 2-for-1 sale!