Benny

This evening, as I was tucking him in:

Benny: Mom I'm trying very hard to be like you, and the other adults. (If his behavior today is a manifestation of this attempt at mimicry, we adults are a bunch of little uncooperative shouting turds)
Me: Aww, Benny, you don't have to be like an adult. You can just be a kid. You're supposed to be that way.
Benny: But I've heard that if you're an adult, and you get married, then you get to have a baby.

Uhhhhh.... yes. That is true. And with that, I kissed him on the head, handed him his cat and went downstairs.

Pawprint

A "drain"!

Helper

Playing w/Ice

Freezer

Refrigerator

Guy on the phone: Did you know it is going to cost approximatly one million dollars for me to even LOOK at your crappy old refrigerator that came with your house? Before I even start fixing it!?

Me: No. I thought the whole thing would cost $100.

Guy on the phone: *THUNDEROUS LAUGHTER* Look here. Here's what you do. Look in the bottom of your freezer. Do you see a big block of ICE?

Me: Yes. Is that bad?

Guy: Take a hammer and break all that out. Don't go and kill the fridge, now. (?!??!!) At the bottom of all that there is a hole, and that is called D R A I N. (Thank you!)

Benny: (Loudly in my ear, holding a freeze-R-pop) What is this? What is this? What is this? What is this?

Me: SO WHAT DO I DO WITH THE DRAIN?

Guy: Make it hot so the water goes down it!!! THEN IT WILL NOT TURN INTO ICE IN YOUR FREEZER! THEN IT WILL NOT LEAK ALL OVER THE FLOOR!!!

Okay, he wasn't shouting. But I'm just saying... if it's that easy....

HERE I GO!

The Terrible Terrible Loss of it All

Benny has lost, through the commission of various crimes and misdemeanors, all of his privileges like TV, Playstation, and computer. All the electronic rectangles are gone, because of (bad) choices he made involving disrespect and direct disobedience. I don't know what has gotten into him today. Of course, it hardly matters, as he is now happily entertaining himself with a rubber snake and a song and has been for about an hour. But this morning, when the last electronic rectangle went the way of all flesh, he said, "OH MOMMY, DON'T LET TODAY BE THE DAY I LOST EVERYTHING."

It's so hard, in those situations, to not scream with laughter.

Bindi

You can't see it, but today he's wearing a sparkly bindi. Actually it's a sticker, but he feels things so deeply (isn't it obvious?) that I know it means more to him than just decoration.

Swimmers

Writer

Walk

Here we are setting out on our walk this morning with the Boston Terrier from the pits of the abyss. I have to assume that this is his origin because the gasses that have been leaking out of his back end can find their source only in the lakes of hell. I'm not going to say it's unprecedented stench, but its only precedent is other gas on other days from his particular backside.

Sadie toted her book along and when Benny asked her, a few blocks later, if she was reading Chicken Little, she answered, primly, "Yes."

What is it?

I'm deeply embroiled in a new sewing project -- making more reward ribbons for the winners of the 50 day practice challenge at the Academy of Music. You have to practice every day for fifty days. That's the challenge. So, I had 12 of these ribbons made, and was going to make 12 more, and am about half done with the other twelve, and today I found out only 11 children have earned the ribbon.

Which means I have 13 ribbons in various stages of construction that I don't really need. Something is making me try to finish them by Saturday anyway. Something horrid and smelling of Boston Terrier rump.

If I don't finish them, what do I do with all these limbs and organs?

Grill

Fire

Let's Get Real

This is a spandex dress. Spandex. I wore it when I was 22. That's only twenty more years than the number of children I have now. Which is the square root of pi times the size of my waist. Which is at least forty times the age of my dog. Knit one, purl two, subtract the number of days you stayed on the South Beach diet, and you have the reason I will not be wearing this dress again.

Unless the Firmness and Elasticity Fairy comes to my house in the night! Oh Firmness and Elasticity Fairy! I have a joooooob for yooooooooou!!

This has been a "Get Real" assignment from I Have To Say.

What's in your diaper bag?

Sadie

Dan

Boating

Escaping

More parade

Ice cream

Dog

Band

Parade

Benny

Benny just finished his math schoolwork for the day. His comment:

"Mommy! Happiness zero just came to happiness 100!!"

Little Blue Update

I updated my homeschool blog on the local paper's web site today. The entry is about yesterday when Veronica and I switched children again to do separate outings. Here it is on Little Blue School.

Borrowing & Carrying

School

Shoes

Appetizers

Appetizers: Goat cheese. Whole grain crackers. Apple.

Dan: "If you want to know what expired baby ear medicine tastes like, try eating some of that cheese on one of those apples."

Another fun conversation, from my husband who was playing rap music in the kitchen while answering emails at the kids' tiny table.

Me: *takes the lid off the cauliflower and drops scaulding water on the dog's head*
Dan: I'm totally blogging that. You scaulded the dog in front of PETA.
Me: You don't have a blog.
Dan: How long does it take for Dan to start a blog? One... two... *using the Tootsie Roll Owl voice*
Me: You would start a blog to report that I dropped cauliflower steam on the dog?
Dan: THREE.

Big

Boys

Starbucks drive through

Bird Show

Leroy

Bunnies

Girls

25 Things About American Idol

1. All the dead idols have come out in their heavenly raimant to join in singing these dreadful, painfully literal lyrics. Taylor looks like he just took a big slurp on a rat turd.

2. The O'Donahue twins stiff in Birmingham Alabama. Commander, permission to inject botulism? Permission granted.

3. WOW. SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE IS COMING BACK! I CAN LIVE. Dan, on the other hand, may not make it.

4. Live must be experiencing arterial bleeding if they're willing to come on this show. I do not think this blood type is a match.

5. Puck 'n' Pickler. Is this a pilot? They borrowed their background music from the part on The Sims where you're fixing the Sims' hair.

6. Meatloaf is having some kind of a McPhit. The phact that they're trying to really act out the song is making me McGrossed out.

7. It's about time for another Adam Sandler vehicle. This one with 100% less Drew Barrymores. Too bad.

8. The Golden Idols are only funny if the people are there to accept the award. Which they are not. Oh, wait. One of them is. Cut to commercial.

9. Coca Cola Blak is vile. Don't buy it.

10. More Puck 'n' Pickler. It was a pilot! Where is PETA when they would actually be useful? They could have saved poor Wolfgang Puck from gasping for air on the table while Kelly pokes at him for comedy.

11. It's the boys in black! Mutton Mouth Covington! Chicken Little Covais! Creepy Pink-nosed Ace! Barn-building Elliot! That bald guy from Live! And Taylor, the only one who actually owns that jacket. This is supposed to make me want to buy tour tickets. I'm just so afraid of Ace's giant face.

12. Dan totally loves Taylor Hicks. He is... like... a big fan. Sorry honey, I had to out you.

13. Elliot and Mary J. Blige is the only good performance of the night so far. He should have done this song (without her) during the competition, instead of that obscure old crap he was always trotting out. He totally killed on that number. And he probably can build a mean barn.

14. Pirates of the Caribbean trailer: AWESOME. CANNOT WAIT. MUST SEE.

15. Dan is secretly a huge Carrie Underwood fan. He has Carrie Underwood CHECKS. I can't believe it either, but it is true.

16. Nothing about this show has been funny, that was meant to be funny. The only thing that was funny was Meatloaf and Katherine McPhee being all "Oh we're fighting! Oh we hate! Oh we're making up! Yeah!".

17. What's wrong with Toni Braxton's mike/voice/wig?

18. Time for the girls' group number. I loathe all of these songs. I find myself asking who these people are? Lisa Tucker's eyebrows, fortunately, were able to fill me in. Dan says they googled "woman" to come up with this set list. But, he is a huge Mandisa fan.

19. Clay Aiken looks like a lesbian. Dan says that was the best double take ever.

20. I can suffer a lot of things, but not the Burt Back-a-rack classics. Fortunately there's a little button on the right that makes the Tivo do a mercy killing.

21. About halfway through the Brokenote Cowboy skit, one producer took a stern look at his soul and rethought the whole "Golden Idol" motif.

22. Prince is Paula Abdul.

23. Dan just said the words, "I'd kill my soul for you." We were talking about real estate, but still. I think that's the most romantic thing he's ever said, and it happened during a Prince song. While Prince was combing his... hair? Of course, he also just pondered aloud why he doesn't hear the song Boogie Shoes more often.

24. More literal soundtrack with "Time of my Life." Wait, are Katherine and Taylor getting married? It does beat last year's multiple repetitions of "Want To Cry Inside Your Heaven" or whatever it was.

25. Here's a Brit to certify that Ryan is inflating the number of people that voted, and the weight given to America's opinion by the producers of the show. And the winner is crowned.

american+idol taylor+hicks katherine+mcphee

Sadie and Barbies

Sadie knows just how she wants Barbies to behave. They have to be standing up -- no sitting or leaning or anything lowbrow like that. They need their arms straight out to the side. The person controlling the Barbie must hold the Barbie around the rib cage, preferably around her back. And they must be naked. Why Cinderella, I never knew! Poor Benny -- as if Zoo Tycoon isn't enough.

Playing Barbie with Sadie is mostly about her saying, "No, Mommy, like this!" Then when I finally get my act together, her Barbie tells mine, "Let's jump!" Then they jump until I need my technique corrected. Just Cinderella and Barbie, out for and afternoon jump on the sofa, in the buff, toes together and arms outstretched.

Leroy

Today when she woke up from her nap, Sadie called for Benny instead of Mommy.

Conversation between the spouses, via Messenger:
Lydia says:
leroy is farting
Lydia says:
bad
Lydia says:
bad farts
Lydia says:
loud ones you can hear
Lydia says:
he ate a whole piece of bread this morning
Lydia says:
and snarled at me when I tried to take it away
Lydia says:
and i spanked him and put him in his crate
Lydia says:
and he was very penitent
Lydia says:
but he had eaten most of it
El Gran Padre Blanco says:
you should shave him

Our First Fight

My little daughter is two years old. When she wakes up in the morning, her breath smells like cake frosting. She has the tiniest sticks for arms and legs, and silly little hands and feet, a big giant unruly head on top of a scrawny little neck you can sniffle in to make her laugh. Flossy hair, pearly teeth, she is a confection. She likes shoes, fairies, and ribbons, and puppies, and she asks strangers earnestly if they like her dress. She has never done anything to make me think she needed discipline, until last week. Last week, however, the "Time out" fairy came to call.

I recognized a while ago that I had a complete double standard with her and Benny. Benny had had plenty of discipline by age two, for hanging from the DVD tray, for dumping out the cat box, for purposefully and repeatedly ignoring my directions in dangerous and life-threatening ways involving electricity, heights, and strange dogs. I had to be more strict with him, somehow. Maybe because he was a boy. Maybe because he was just more nervy, more directly oppositional, more dangerous. I had seen myself draw the line with Benny and I thought I should do it with Sadie but when? So what if she threw a toy, or ordered me to get her book instead of asking… I joked that I was turning her into a tiny tyrant. My husband and I speculated on what my limit would actually be. What would she finally do that would push me into enforcing consequences?


As it turned out, I drew the line over a bare bottom. When she refused to put her diaper on. Last week Monday, she decided the diapers were an inconvenience she was no longer willing to suffer. I offered the potty as an alternative, and that was rejected. I offered pull-ups. Rejected firmly, with the tiny hands oustretched and a firm, “No, Mommy, NO.” Whenever I put the diaper on, she took it off. Well, in this era of peace and plenty, where the fruit snacks hang in clusters in the pantry and the apple juice flows like a river, you still have to put your waste in the right receptacle. We just had the carpet done, for heaven’s sake. So there was the battle. She planted her tent on the hill of the recalcitrant nudity. And I planted my tent on the opposite one. The one where little girls don’t tinkle all over the floor.

The battle raged for 45 minutes. It went like this: Clarify your expectations (pants). Clarify the consequences (time out). Follow up. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Sadie, I put you on the step because you wouldn’t wear your pants. Now it’s time to put them on. NO MOMMY NO. She howled, she wailed, she rent her garments, she put ashes on her head, but she stayed on the spot. She didn’t waver. Forty five minutes and almost 20 repetitions later, she finally gave in. I heard the magical words, “Okay Mommy.” We put the pants on, we had lunch, we played, we went down for a nap. And it was over.

Stupid, to wage such a war with a tiny little angelic button nose child, over wearing pants? No. The topic is irrelevant – what matters are the terms. When she finally tried to raise up her head and really oppose me, really test her strength, she could not win. If she wins the silly battles over pants, she wins the important ones about getting down off that ladder, or stopping on the sidewalk, or whatever. I’m not fooling myself – I know there will be other battles. I’m not done. But it’s good to know that the same resolve that has taken me through six years of Benny is still available for my sweet little candy-colored angel baby girl. She deserves it my A game, and I’m bringing it.

Tired

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Ride

"None available"

Done!

Sunday school

Karate Fun Friday

We planned a party for the kids at Benny's karate school... and it took place last night. Another mom, Lee, helped organize and arrange it, and Ahno also prepped some of the stuff and came to help with the actual party. It was last night. We lived. Lived to fight another day. It actually went GREAT. I was very thankful Ahno was there -- she made everything go very smoothly, and the kids just instantly listened to her whenever she opened her mouth. Lee was fantastic with her end of it -- her activities were wonderful. All the children had fun, no one cried, no one got hurt. The biggest surprise for me was that the sushi demonstration was enormously engaging for the children, and most of them actually tried the sushi, and some even tried their hand at making it. Amazing.



Here are some of the kids in their team headbands. Aren't they cute?!



Lee teaches at the university here, and she invited some of her Korean students to come and help. They were fantastic -- with the sushi demo and also this activity where they showed the kids how to do their names in Korean.



Here they are playing the card game. It went very well -- they understood it and played it enthusiastically. The cards around their necks are the Korean phrase cards I made them.



The end of the night was a puzzle tournament... we only got halfway through before the parents started to arrive and pick the kids up. So we didn't make it through the whole program.

A success.

New Post on Little Blue School

On my official homeschooling blog at the local paper, I posted a post about our experiences when Benny played his violin at the Stockley Gardens Arts Festival today. Yes, you can see pictures below that I posted from my phone. But you know you want to go here to read it, too. Here it is.

Going Boating

Solo

Sadie

More

Stockley Gardens

Gymnastics

Last One

ANTM

Here we are at minute 48 on the TIVO-d season finale. Now that Jade is gone, I don't care who wins. I just love Danielle and Joanie. They have been my favorites throughout. They both looked totally retarded and dear in the fashion show. Both of them have hideous teeth and neither can speak. I wish they could both win. There was not one other girl in this season worth a crap. Now that they're all shed away, that is obvious.

Dan and I are still reeling from the shock and joy of Jade being gone. Dan was accusing me of loving Jade, as he always does, and in reality we both violently loathe Jade. Dan said, tonight, that I was online trying to get Jade memorabilia, and Jade checks. Hehehe. As she went snapping out the door, down the hall, etc. whatever, we were so satisfied in seeing the ass end of her.

Danielle, I think, should win. She may be the prettiest girl they've ever had on the show. Prettier than Tyra. Tyra looks like a lunatic in that outfit.

Now I'm watching an ad for a movie called "Little Man" which is revolting.

Little Blue School: First Post is UP!

My first post in my new "official" homeschooling blog for the local paper is online. I would really appreciate if if you, personally, you, would go and register for the newspaper web site, and leave a comment now and then when I announce a new post is live. That would really be spectacular -- thank you from the bottom of my pulsing, salmon-flavored, coffee-stained, lint-ridden heart!

The art museum is the topic of the post for today.

Sadie Grace

Sadie: Oh, look! A baby spaghettio! Oooohhhh, he so nice. Oooohhhh, he so yummy!

First "Time Out

Plaster guy

School

Tooth

Here's my COMPLETELY DISGUSTING actual tooth (top pictures) along with my COMPLETELY CHARMING new gold tooth (bottom pictures). Whee -- I have a gold tooth! WHEE.

Tooth artist

Here's my dentist, looking haggard and wan after completing work on my fabulous gold tooth. I don't know how I got so lucky as to get a gold tooth, but I GOT ONE. HAHAHAHA!!! Here's a man who will be glad to see the end of me. I'm just too horrifying as a patient.

Violin

Carpet booties

Many Things

1. Today at 8 am our puppy Leroy went in to have his equipment dismantled. Benny has been very inquisitive as to exactly what is going on, and I refuse to tell him.

We keep having conversations like this:

Benny: Are they taking something out of him Mom?
Me: Yes.
Benny: Something he ate?
(He saw on The Dog Whisperer how some dog ate something and had to have it removed with an operation)
Me: No.
Benny: Something that's making him sick?
Me: No.
Benny: Well is he sick?
Me: Well he's going to be sick for a few days.
Benny: Why?
Me: I'm sorry, I don't want to bring this topic out into the light and dandle it on our knees. Go play with your magnets, child.

2. The man came and cleaned the carpet. Which means we can't go in the living room. The carpet is now SPARKLING AND LOVELY! All signs of puppies and children are gone. Hooray! Dan is ecstatic. He almost went so far as to have the suede chaise lounge cleaned but he isn't that much of an optimist. Not even standing in the glow of a freshly laundered carpet.

3. The man came and examined the strange nail holes that emerged in our perfectly painted den when the siding guys were hammering on the outside. Someone who plasters things is going to come tomorrow and fix it. Looks like it will have to be repainted. GREAT.

4. For mother's day I got a giant, heated, thumping machine that I can lie on and have it massage my back in the evening. It's GREAT and it doesn't even look much like a vibrator. Maybe a vibrator for a yeti. I also got a maid service! HOORAY! Not regular, but Dan will suffer them to come into the house on ONE OCCASION and clean it thoroughly, which is fine. He can't abide the thought of strangers touching our things -- I say this with complete lack of understanding or empathy, but apparently it is a real feeling that he does actually have. Whatever. They're coming AT LEAST ONCE!

5. Dan stayed home from work today because of the various exciting things going on and now we're sitting at our computers with Benny at his computer in the middle, trying to freak him out with spooky whistling. I miss when Dan worked from home.

Story

FULL TEXT:

THE EVEL SNAKE!

ONE DAY A MOTHER HAD BIRTH A SNAKE LIKE HER IT WAS CUTE BUT........ EVEL TO MEN. ANATHUAR DAY A MAN CAME. BAM! DOWN THE THROHT. HE'S CLOSED UP THEN BUSTED A FISH. THE END.

Happy Mother's Day

For all my motheriffic friends. You know who you are!

For Mother's Day I would like a whole day alone in the house. That would be a present I would truly remember forever. I would spend the day writing chapter four of my novel, without looking at the clock, or answering the phone or baby monitor, or pausing to enrich anyone's life in any way.

It may be ironic, but more probably it's just evil, that for Mother's Day I'd like my children to leave me alone for a while. I think as penance I have to go spend the rest of the day feeling crushing guilt over my hypothetical escape plans. ;D Or possibly I'll just put the baby to bed for a nap, be thankful that Benny is at Ahno's for the afternoon, and write for an hour while I can.

Children's chapel

Today the Sunday School kids sang in church - it was a delight. I stood there crying and taking pictures like an idiot. In all the pictures I took, the children's noses are all pointed politely at the leader except Benny, who is squirming around like his knees are on fire and also trying to urgently communicate to me that a pane in one of the stained glass windows is missing. It was taken down to be serviced in some way, however stained glass gets serviced, because it was getting bowed. Trust Benny to notice one missing pane among a thousand, because seriously, he will. At least he did not pick his nose. One glorious triumph for civilization.

Church

Coming Up For Air

Dan survived the first day of his scuba testing. I was perhaps irrationally concerned that he would possibly try to see out of his regulator and breathe through his mask. He didn't. He did everything perfectly as he always does and had a great time. We were all a little uncertain (even DAN!) because the water was 55 degrees, which is pretty cold. I stuck my feet in the ocean last weekend and it was no joke. He was told by his uncouth comrades to pee in his wet suit. This would require him to excrete waste, which is of course, not something we would ever expect him to do. So even that desperate route was closed to him. He said, though, that it wasn't that cold -- apparently whatever water gets into your wet suit gets warmed up and then stays there.

Anyway, he is all fine and is going back tomorrow to complete his test. What, scuba diving on Mother's Day? Yes, I am the coolest wife ever.

Poor Barbie

Barbie had her hair all fargled up in a "Brush Your Teeth!" sticker from Crest Toothpaste. After I yanked it out, pulled her hair up in a ponytail, and adjusted her velcro gown, I handed her back to my sweet, precious, adorable two-year-old daughter, who said plaintively, "You suck!"

She probably, definitely, absolutely meant to say something else.

Mr. Bob

Mr. Bob took us out to lunch while he and Ms. Verena were in town for a wedding. Bob and Dan spent some time squirreled away in the office in the afternoon then, while Verena and the kids and I went to the zoo. We love to see Ms. Verena -- she's charming and she speaks Spanish to us too!

Verena and Benny

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Swing

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Sadie

Name my New BLOG

I am going to be writing a homeschooling blog on the web site of the local paper. I need a name for this blog. To the person who gives me a good idea, or a brainstream that leads to a good idea, I will give a prize of vague and uncertain worth:



It is a copy of The Stepford Wives DVD. It is widescreen. It is accompanied by a matching issue of Home and Garden. The pair of them have been tied up with a fabric bow by my own dainty hand. I thought it was a crappy movie, but you might like it! Or your sister-in-law might! I will mail it to your house in a scented envelope if you help me name this blog. It's not a paid blog gig, but it might be kind of cool and it will give me a little cred in the local scene, at any rate. Maybe.

Here's what I want the name to say: We're not sitting around the kitchen table all day huddled around a pile of textbooks. We're not trying to create a shell for our kids to hide in. We're out and about. We're engaged. We're not homeschooling to protect our children from the world, we're homeschooling so that we can engage with the world more completely, and in a more real way. We don't send them to school because we think school is a waste of time. Learning is fun and active, play is essential and educational, and we want to fill our days with experiences -- at home and on the move.

So... in a word... that's.... ?

Can I, in fact, make a blog title out of a combination of two of these words?

headmaster, master, schoolmaster; headmistress, schoolmarm (or schoolma'am), schoolmistress; coach, guide, guru, trainer; mentor, tutor; drillmaster; dean, don, professor; pedant; governess, homeschooler; catechist, lecturer, moralizer, preacher, discharge, emancipate, enfranchise, liberate, loose, loosen, manumit, release, spring, unbind, uncage, unchain, unfetter, deliver, parole, ransom, redeem, rescue; disengage, disentangle, extricate, freeborn; delivered, emancipated, freed, liberated, manumitted, redeemed, released; unconquered, ungoverned, unruled, unsupervised; empowered, enfranchised; democratic, republican, collective, common, communal, shared; accessible, available, free; unregulated, elatedness, elation, exhilaration, exultation, intoxication; ecstasy, euphoria, heaven, rapture, rapturousness; delectation, delight, enjoyment, pleasure; cheer, cheerfulness, exuberance, gaiety (also gayety), gladsomeness, glee, gleefulness, jollity, joyfulness, joyousness, jubilation, lightheartedness; content, contentedness, gratification, satisfaction, blessedness, bliss, blissfulness, felicity, gladness, joy, apprehend, comprehend, grasp, know, understand; absorb, assimilate, digest, imbibe; ascertain, descry, detect, determine, dig up, discern, discover, examine, find out, hear, hit (on or upon), run down, scare up, search (for), see, track (down), tumble (to), unearth; major (in), study; memorize, coaching, conditioning, cultivation, preparation, readying; development, direction, guidance, nurturance, nurturing; edification, enlightenment, improvement, instruction, schooling, teaching, training, tutelage, tutoring, erudition, knowledge, learnedness, learning, scholarship, science

Museum Day

Here's a list of funny band names.

We went to the local art museum today. It was, as Sadie put it, "Gwate." We saw a couple of Monet and Renoir that we'd never seen before in a travelling exhibit that's ending on Sunday, and we saw another thing... Masterpieces from an English Country House... that was pretty cool. I got hollered at by a docent for taking pictures with my phone.

Benny's Favorite

Benny picked this for his favorite last time we were at the museum, and he remembered it and identified it this time too. It is, after all, a pattern. And pattern, as we all know, has three syllables.

Sadie McGrace

Benny

Here's Benny learning about how to make glass sculptures, along with a group of tourists. We always watch this video when we get to this point, and it is always entertaining, because the sculpture being made in the video (kind of a deer head on top of a pot) is sitting right there beside the movie.

"Gwate"

Museum

You see our pictures below of the Chrysler Hall excursion to see Beethoven's Ninth. We were somewhat farther back than we were for Sarah Chang, but it was still SPECTACULAR.

The cool thing about listening to Beethoven is that the music actually has a story -- there is suspense, and there are characters, and as it plays out over the four movements, it's like reading a good novel. Seeing it live, it was even more suspenseful. Although I know the music well, it was still a little surprising in the fourth movement when everything cuts out and then the woodwinds come in with that little marchy bit. Very beautiful. And then when the theme comes in first with the cellos, and bleeds across the orchestra, it was wonderful. I had a GREAT time. Benny was extremely well behaved. Before intermission they did a Bartok thing and it was fine, he drew pictures during that. During the Beethoven he was on my lap for most of it and quite riveted. By the end he was jumping up and down and conducting. I'm very glad we took him to this concert.

Somewhere down there is a picture of Spanish homeschool from the other day. I bought a Spanish workbook today that one of the moms recommended to me. It looks pretty easy but he might like it. It's rated for grade 1-3 but it's very beginner-y. Which is fine.

Today we took the car in and then went to the store for a thousand things. I probably forgot 900 of them. But... there you have it. We had no fruit in the house, and now we do.

Today I ate a bowl of hot and sour soup with half a cup of white rice, and a South Beach Breakfast Bar, and a small blueberry muffin.

Sadie

Warm Up

Rafters

Benny D'Art

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Day 7

Today's agenda is church, symphony, and then FELLINI'S.

I need a Fellini's greek salad. It's just what I need.

This morning during the regular Sunday School time there's going to be a meeting of the relevant people as to the next year of the children's program. I guess all of the moms are invited to this meeting. I need to tape my hands to my side so I don't volunteer for a bunch of stuff and get myself overextended and frustrated. Not that I would *ever* do that. Just every time I'm ever involved in anything in my whole life. So I have to take a stand. The children, while all the relevant people are engaged, will be playing "Episcopoly." Hehehe.

Then we're going to the Virginia Symphony's last concert of the season at Chrysler Hall -- they're doing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with the Virginia Chorus so it should raise the roof. There's an ice cream party on the plaza first, and if we wait to get our tickets until right before, they have a four-for-forty-four deal which is pretty sweet. Probably seats in the rafters but... you can't always be front and center. We'll probably leave at intermission.

Then Fellini's! Whee!

Boat Day Hooray

We went out on the boat today.

I drank coffee creamer, ate one egg, a "Frescata" sandwich and a small chili from Wendy's, and half of Sadie's plain sundae from McDonald's that she didn't want.

The boat was AWESOME!!! It was so flat, you could see the reflection of the big cargo ships in the water, like in a lake. I don't think I've ever seen it that flat. We were SAILING along on the bay, and then even in the Atlantic it was so calm it was amazing. No bumps. And the weather report said it would be rainy and windy. Peh.

We started the day with a bike ride around the neighborhood while Dad made a Home Depot trip, so everyone small (especially dog) would be nice and calm. Then we went to the boat.

I like to go out so far that we can baaarely see the shore and then we sit on the back of the boat and dangle our feet in (it was COLD today -- 55 degrees in the water) and pretend we live on a water world. With no other people. At all. It's when Dan and I allow our safely supressed anti-social tendencies to run riot. When you pretend there's nothing else but your boat, you feel very relieved and happy to see the dock hand, the gas station guy, the gross guy filleting his fish on the side of the channel, etc. on the way back in.

In one picture below, you'll see child is having a bit of a rest. Heh. In between torturing the dog and spraying a bottle of boat cleaner DIRECTLY into his sister's face (that was an exciting moment) he took a little nap.

Buoy

Boy and dog

Shore

Drive

Leroy

Boater

Sadie

Boat

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Spanish

Tunnel

B and W

Chase

Sadie

The reason

House is DONE

Below are pictures of the DONE house. Well, the shutters still need to go on. They will be black. I so love it with such shuddering passion. It's EXACTLY precisely what I wanted.

Happy Cinco de Mayo.

We are going to SPANISH homeschool park day later, it is hoped. Benny keeps saying, "But I don't speak Spanish!" Yes, well, my young turkey, we're going to LEARN it aren't we. The idea is that there are a bunch of bilingual parents who want their kids to also be bilingual, so they're gathering to speak only Spanish, and those who are trying to learn Spanish are also welcome to come and flounder along.

This morning I ate a piece of toast with butter -- oh -- wait -- this isn't butter? I can't BELIEVE it! Also coffee with creamer. Now I am eating a caesar salad from McDonald's and I'm unhappy to report I finished Sadie's plain sundae, and also stole exactly 15 fries from the children. TERRIBLE behavior.

I wrote a bit more of chapter 3 yesterday, but mostly I edited what I already had, because there was a paragraph too much in the first section, and I cannot shake my completely irrational need to have three sections in each chapter, each exactly three pages long. I can't reason myself out of it. It just looks wrong. Also dialogue looks wrong so I'm not writing any. I can't help it, so I'm just going to embrace it. If anyone can successfully talk me out of it I'll name a character after you.

Blue

Done

Happy Tales Book Club

Happy Tales Book Club went GREAT. There were lots of kids. About 10 of book-report-giving age and then lots of little brothers and sisters. The kids loved the houses (even the older ones, which surprised me) and decorated them with stickers and markers and stuff, then did their reports. I had a game to play with setting and a book to read aloud to them in which setting is important (Horton Hears a Who!) but by the time we finished all their reports it was 11:00 so we had a brief little talk about setting and then went outside to play in the glorious weather. It was totally great and fun, and I had a great time. Benny was very well behaved. I didn't take any pictures -- too busy juggling children and books.

Another Leroy

Hey, via Alicat on Flickr I found another Leroy who is a Boston Terrier puppy! Here is his blog: Sassy Puppy! That is so cool.

Tiny

Dog

Underpants adjustment

Stick bearers

Binky search

Noble dog

Zoo Tycoon

Is it right I should be getting birds and bees questions from Zoo Tycoon? Hehehe. "Mom, what's a mate? Is that a friend?" Hmm. If you want a baby moose in your exhibit, you need a mommy and a daddy moose. Two mommy mooses can't make a baby. So political for such an early morning! Mate in the Australian sense of course... totally different.

Day Three

Today I am still X-3. I have got to buckle down and get serious. No more of this Cheez-its and ice cream and whatnot. This is MAY MELTDOWN, not... like... Narnia or something.

At ten o'clock is the first meeting of Happy Tales Book Club at the library, a project my friend Veronica and I have cooked up. I was up late last night making house pockets out of cardstock for the kids to decorate and then embellish with the little flat wooden pets they earn for attending. I hope it all goes well or I will lose my mind. My typical great attitude. Yay. We'll see how it goes, trying to lead this, corral the two-year-old, and assuage Benny's sensitivities.

Today's lesson is setting. Here's a link to our web site for this homeschool book club.

In other news, the schedule is going really well. Benny is now totally in charge of it -- should have been from the beginning -- this is his thing, I'm doing it for him, he's the one that's supposed to be enjoying it (and he is) so why not let him totally own it? Yesterday he scheduled us down to 45 minute periods. Nice.

Day Two

Let's just say that for WHATEVER REASON, I am three pounds lighter than I was yesterday. This leads me to believe that something gastrological was going on that led to an inflated weight yesterday, and I should not take that as a starting point for my ten pounds. However, it was a number, and it was on the superfly digital scale that my husband bought to use for the 5 minutes that he perceived he was overweight (har har) and so I'm using it. I'm going to use that number (whatever it may be!) as X. So now i am X-3. There are decimal points involved (naturally because Dan bought the scale!) but I'm not going to report that unless I get desperate for progress.

In other horrifying news, I lost my purse yesterday, well, as far as I can figure out, I left it in a grocery store cart in the parking lot on Sunday night. Discovered it was missing yesterday at the zoo. I went back to the grocery store hopefully but it wasn't there, so I had the cards turned off, etc. and now I have to replace everything that was in it. Charming. No one had done anything "untoward" with the money card (the guy on the phone actually said "untoward" isn't that just a dream come true?) so I'm tempted to think it's somewhere around here and I just can't find it. It's possible Sadie Grace carried it off. But what can I do?

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Two Things

1. May Magic Meltdown. Every month of May, my friend Kristen and I lose 10 pounds. This May shall be no exception. This is our plan to retreat slowly and respectfully from our crap-I-had-two-kids weight gain, with lots of breaks to maintain, balance, introspect, and eat cheese and stuff. So, Kristen, bless her heart, started her own blog so I can pester her constantly, and here it is. Our plan is to have to blog what we eat, everything, even if we cheat, even if we eat half a brick of sharp cheddar, to be accountable. So, in the service of that, I will post a food post later which I will update throughout the day to include all my eatings. Kristen's blog is linked to my xanga blog which is a partial mirror of this one. Because you can never have too many blogs. Everything on that is on this, though, no need to check both. That one doesn't have all the phone pictures.

Intermission: There was a mouse in my sink yesterday. Thanks, stupid CAT. And Sadie fell asleep in the van with ogre Princess Fiona clutched in her paw, which I thought was hilarious.

2. Scheduling. Scheduling goes against my happy-shmappy go-with-the-flow philosophy of parenting and homeschooling, but I've read so much about how hyperlexic children just loooove schedules and just thriiiive on total predictability, that we're going to try it for a full month -- scheduling the day, the week, the month in advance. We started this morning -- I gave him some choices and let him fill in some of the slots... We'll see how it all goes.

Houses