Whew...

Holy cow, kids... Christmas is over!

Now, I love Christmas. It is, along with my birthday, one of my favorite holidays. This year, however, I felt like I was a little behind all season long... and I hate that feeling. I wasn't through with my shopping until late; my Christmas cards went out late.

Let's not even talk about Sam's birth announcements that are sitting, addressed, on the table.

We did have a lovely Christmas, though, in spite of my belatedness.

The pictures are of the kids in their superhero capes & masks (http://www.etsy.com/ -- seller name: superflykidz). Ethan and Laney love theirs... Sam, maybe not so much now... but he'll grow into it. If Santa had brought them nothing else this year, I am so glad he brought these because I laugh every time I see their little round bodies running through the house, capes flying, crashing into things because neither of the mobile ones know how to put the masks on without somehow impeding their eyesight. (Check out the pictures closely, and you'll see what I mean.)

Anyway, we coasted through a gaggle of family get-togethers and moved on to having my in-laws come for the weekend.

We also had an unexpected visitor.

The Virus.

I don't know what kind of creation this thing is, but it has hit all three of my kids -- Sam and Laney twice! --, Keith, and his mom. And let me tell you -- it's not pretty.

On Monday, I got a bit of advice from my girlfriend Azure to boil some Pine Sol on the stove to disinfect the air.

Now, if you read my little "About Me" section, you will notice that one of the first things that I am not is a good housekeeper. And I will readily admit that math and science are not my strengths either... but based on my limited knowledge of these areas, this suggestion immediately brought a couple of thoughts to the forefront of my brain:

1 -- Pine Sol cleans everything. This has to be a good idea.

2 -- Cleaning chemicals + extreme heat = blown-up house.

Now, I trust Azure, but I had to ask her, to be safe. She assured me that there was nothing to worry about... she had done the same at her house, and they were all still in one piece.

So I broke out my trusty bottle of Pine Sol, only to realize that I was almost out. I've been cleaning bathrooms and wiping down surfaces like a mad woman since we've been out of school, so I guess I used it all.

Hmph. Well, that's a first.

Anyway, I asked K to bring home a bottle on his lunch break, and being the well-mannered husband that he is, he did so... but not without asking me a bunch of questions first. Our texts went something like this:

Me: Can u pick up a bottle of Pine Sol on your lunch & bring it home?

K: Sure. Why? (Translation: Is this really something I have to do at lunch? Can't it wait until I'm coming home for the day?)

Me: I need it to disinfect the house. Azure says to boil it on the stove.

K: That doesnt sound like a good idea. (Translation: H-no! You've got to be kidding.)

Me: I know. I asked her tho & she said its fine. No worries.

K: I dont know. Kind of like our house as it is. (Translation: Whatever, crazy woman. I'm not going to do it.)

Me: Bring me the Pine Sol. (Translation: I'm about to go medieval on your tail. Would you rather me blow up the house or suffer my wrath?)

K: Ok. But I still dont think this is a good idea. (Translation: Ok. I'll do it... but you're going to blow up the house, and I'm going to say "I told you so" every day for the rest of our lives.)

So, a couple of hours and one massive low-country boil pot later, I get the stuff on the stove. It seems to be going well, until K looks in the pot and said, "What's this stuff growing on top?"

Hold up there, Tonto. What stuff?!?!
Sure enough, there's this foamy mass growing on top of the Pine Sol... kind of like mutated pond scum.

About this time, we also notice that the pleasant scent wafting through the air has gone from "essence de pine" to "pine forest in the house."

Oh my gosh - it was ridiculous. I have visions of the kids losing consciousness and me having to explain to the doctor that they are unconscious due to overexposure to Pine Sol.

I don't imagine that would go over well, so we start opening doors.

I text Azure, and she reminds me to turn it down to simmer after it reaches a boil.

Oh. I must've missed that part. Reason #776 that I should never have to use cleaning products.

So, I turn it down, and the smell abates a little... with the help of a pleasant breeze and 4 open doors.

By the end of the afternoon, I am so pleased with myself because I have disinfected the house AND the air that I voluntarily let K talk me in to beginning this crazy-A workout program that he did last year (with great results) in hopes of getting this body back into some sort of shape post-baby.

After the workout, we go to bed because I am pooped (cleaning and working out are not normally in my schedule these days).

I wake up yesterday morning, and guess what!

I'm sick.

I don't have The Virus, but I feel like crap, nonetheless.

I must've let something in while I was letting the Pine Sol out.

*Sigh.*
Such is the story of my life...

Early Morning Ramblings...

So, here I sit, at 5:21 a.m.

I think I may have posted that Sam often wakes up almost an hour or so -- to the minute -- before my alarm goes off, which totally starts my day with the unpleasant feeling of being gypped of an hour's sleep.

I dislike the feeling so much that I actually started setting my clock 30 minutes faster so I could maybe throw his evil baby mastermind off.

Guess what.

Sam now wakes up at 4 am instead of 4:30.

Sneaky kid.

Anyway, it's now 5:23 a.m., and I am awake because I just finished feeding Sam and my alarm will be going off for real in about 7 minutes.

While I'm trying to pass time until I feel like it's an appropriate time to get in the shower, let me tell you what happened to me last night.

I thought I was about to die.

K put Sam down kind of early, and by the time 11 pm rolled around, I was worn slap out. I briefly considered waking Sam up and feeding him, but that seemed like a much less appealing idea than actually just going to sleep myself.

So I did.

And Sam woke up around 1:30.... right about the time I hit a fat pocket of good sleep.

Nice.

I dragged myself out of bed, finally, and made a bottle for the screaming meanie. Seriously, it was one of the worst nights of babyhood I've ever experienced. Sam wasn't bad, of course, because he is the perfect child, but I was so exhausted that I could not stay awake, even though I was sitting up.

If we had a hidden camera in our den, the YouTube post would be hysterical because I was trying so hard to stay awake but kept failing miserably with some of those pretty impressive neck-snapping, bottle-propelling body jerks that happen when you fall asleep so suddenly that you lose all control of your limbs.

Sidenote: Watching people fall asleep TOTALLY cracks me up because usually, it's kind of a gradual thing where the person starts kind of slumping over until he/she reaches a point where the body might fall over, and that's when the jerk occurs, waking him/her back up temporarily. This was not the case with me last night. I was falling into deep sleep in about 1/10 of a second, so my torso kept pitching forward, simultaneously giving me whiplash and sending Sam's bottle flying across the room.

Anyway, Sam finally finished his bottle, and I put him down in the bassinet in the den. Seriously, I was so tired that I couldn't even make it back to the bedroom.

I had to lay down right. then.

Just about the time I rolled into Dream Land in my new Sleep 5.0, it happened.

The French doors leading from the breakfast area to the screened in porch blew open with a forceful gust -- only the deadbolt was latched, so they just really arched open into the house while sounding like the entire back wall of the kitchen was ripping apart.

Wind was whistling, the doors were blowing in and out, and I thought Armageddon had come and Jesus couldn't get the deadbolt unlatched.

I'm not kidding.

Ever been woken up from a dead sleep to what sounds like Attila the Hun attacking through your back door?

It's beyond terrifying.

In the split second that followed the stopping of my heart, I bolted up right, thinking 1,574,692 things all at once.

Can I get to Sam before whoever that is?

Why is my gun in the bedroom?

Holy cow! What do I do?

What if this person is bigger than me and I can't take him?

I think I'm going to pee on myself.

Can I get to my gun?

Is my gun loaded?

What if I shoot myself by accident?

How do I get Keith up?

Who am I kidding? Keith is going to sleep right through my slaughter.

I hope he remembers I don't want a funeral -- only a quick graveside and one mean party afterward...

"So," you're wondering, "what did you do?!?!"

I screamed, "OHMYGOSH!" and remained frozen in my just-woke-up-to-something-really-scary pose on the couch.

Good thing I'm not a superhero. My reflexes leave much to be desired.

After a few seconds, I finally -- like a moron -- ran to the doors. Now, if Roberto the Robber had really been trying to steal my impressive collection of laundry by the back door, me running to the doors probably wouldn't have been a good idea.

What was I going to do? Welcome him with open arms and remind him to wipe his feet before he came in?

Like I said... good thing I'm not a superhero.

Anyway, about this time, I realized that a small-scale hurricane was ripping through my backyard, and that Roberto the Robber was actually just Hurricane Roberto, blowing my doors in with one heck of a gust.

Apparently, we forgot to bolt the French doors back into place when we brought the Christmas tree in.

Sweet.

The thing is, you have to understand that someone breaking in is one of my irrational fears. We have an alarm system, and I have a gun, but my worst fear is just what happened -- that I will be so stupid with sleep that I won't be able to react.

I mean, you are reading the blog of a girl who used to lay in her bed when she was little and talk really loudly about going to rob other houses so that the (imagined) robbers lurking outside her open window would think that some really hard-core criminal -- much scarier than they ever had time to think about being -- was inside and that they should find another place to carry out their evil plans.

Thanks, Mom & Dad, for making me leave my windows open so that air could circulate for the attic fan. I'm sure that hearing a 6 year old girl's voice talking tough about knocking off the neighbors houses was probably a pretty-darn-effective burglary prevention system to scare off those ferocious criminals crouched outside our house.

Anyway, like I thought, K did not wake up, despite my rousing "OHMYGOSH!", and I had to resort to my really-angry-wife voice to rouse him from his sleep to get him to come lock the doors into place while I held them shut.

Meanwhile, my heart is beating, like, 42 million times per minute, and he comes stumbling out of the hallway, rubbing his eyes, mumbling stuff like, "Whasthebigdeal?" and "Whyyougotthedooropen?"

Um. Well. I thought that we were all about to perish at the hands of Bob the Burglar, thanks. Glad you're sleeping through the back of our house being bashed in.

We finally battened down the hatches and went back to bed.

As I crawled under the covers, I'm just chattering away about how my heart is racing and how I think my heart really may have stopped for like a full minute and do you think that could cause brain damage? and what if that had really been a burglar? would we have been able to tag team him?

K lay in bed silently until my chattering died down and said, "I don't know why you're so worked up. It was just the wind."

I seriously contemplated karate-chopping him in the throat.

Wow

Pardon the past two months of blog format craziness. I chose this morning to finally, actually, closely read the directions, and VOILA! Miraculously, my blog isn't hard to read any more.

My bad.

It's been a busy month around the Jennings house. I went back to work. Keith left for two weeks on a business trip, leaving me with three small children for the two weeks before we were to host Thanksgiving dinner.

I'll pause while you fill in the blanks with the mean things I thought but, of course, didn't say... :-)
Seriously, it wasn't too bad. I mean, other than spending two weeks sleeping upstairs in E's double bed sandwiched in between him and Laney -- as opposed to sleeping downstairs in my king-sized bed, still sandwiched in between them--, there really wasn't much difference... other than, obviously, K being gone.

I spent the weekend after his return in Charleston with my girl Melissa. Let me give you a little background on my friend M.

M and I met @ Clemson back in the day when we were both recruiting hostesses for our beloved Tigers.

Side note -- before you smirk and think that we were those kind of girls -- we became recruiting hostesses because of our love for football, not because of our love for big muscular men in tight pants. Seriously. I mean, those of you who know my dad know I wasn't allowed to date until I turned 30.

Nevermind the husband of almost 9 years and the three kids.

Anyway, I gave her a ride back to the football office (from where, I don't recall), and we struck up a conversation about one of our favorite topics -- Clemson football. (Shocking, I know.) During the course of the conversation, we discovered that we both *L.O.V.E.* Danny Ford.

It's almost like an obsession, but not quite.

And thus, our friendship was born -- kindred hearts bound by a slight obsession with a good ol' boy football coach who led our sweet Tigers to win the National Championship.

It's really a fairy tale-kind of start, I think.

Fast-forward more years than I care to admit have passed, and here we are today. M lives in Charleston, which is probably my favorite place on the planet. I look for any excuse to visit her... such as a much needed break after two straight weeks with the kids.

A few weeks ago, she messaged me about this upcoming party for a friend of hers... 30th birthday... fun people... like I'd need any kind of arm-twisting to get me on board for a weekend of fun times in my favorite city with one of my favorite friends.

The more I found out about the party, though, the more I knew I had to go. Turned out there was a theme involved... and wigs.

I love a good costume party.

I especially love a good funny costume party... like a redneck trailer trash 30th birthday party. Which, as it turned out, this one was.

My friend Lindsay loaned me her Amy Winehouse wig from Halloween, and I started putting together my costume.

Add one cut-up Tony Stewart racing shirt, one black tank top, one orange bra, one hot pair of jean shorts (otherwise known as jorts), one pair of tan pantyhose, one pair of black high heeled boots, a white leather patchwork purse, and one really hot, pink, flaming heart tattoo.

Throw on some blue eyeshadow, metallic blue liquid eyeliner, hot pink lipgloss, hoop earrings the size of a softball, and one big puffy white jacket, and you have the recipe for pictures that are going to embarrass my kids and husband for years to come.

Like these:

I know that, at some point, my kids are going to see these pictures and say, "Mom! What were you thinking?!?!"... at which time I will venture to explain that just because I am their mommy does not mean that I am not also a person with interests and friends and a life... which means that I have turned into my mother.

Now, I'm pretty sure Mary has never dressed up in any sort of racing shirt... or jean shorts... or sported a fake tat... but she did have black knee boots when I was growing up... (I know this because they were THE staple item in my Wonder Woman costume when I was little... that, a set of Wonder Woman underoos, and some tin foil...)

I find this disturbing.

I will say -- to her credit -- that she has pretty much let me talk her out of wearing any sort of seasonal sweater... but still...

Anyway, despite the fact that I am posting these pictures here and on my Facebook page, Melissa and I took great care to avoid any public appearances while in costume. Obviously, it wasn't quite so awkward once we arrived; the costumes were hysterical! (Think Hannah Montana wig cut into a mullet.)

The party was fabulous and absolutely hilarious (minus getting called out about driving a mini-van -- nothing says "Not a regular party goer" like pulling up to the bash in the MV), but on the way home, we were faced with a major delimma.

I was hungry.

After much debate, we decided to hit the drive through @ Taco Bell.

In line, we caused a little bit of a stir... Two hot redneck women belted into an even hotter mini-van, complete with a school magnet on the back... but this is truly what I found alarming.

The lady at the drive through window didn't bat an eye when we came through.

She didn't even give us a second glance, despite the fact that my wig was seriously almost as tall as I am.

Apparently, hotties like us are par for the course on the islands around Charleston...

Hi-ho, Hi-ho... It's Back to Work I Go....

which means blog postings will take for-flippin'-ever to finish. :-)

First, I am sooooo glad that this was a short week because I am soooo tired. My kids -- my school children, not my biological ones -- were so excited to see me, which makes what I do worthwhile... but still... a day full of very active teenagers followed by an evening of very active children makes me one tired and cranky SuperMom.

Speaking of Super Moms, I just got the capes and masks I ordered for the kids for Christmas, and they are freakin' hilarious. Can't wait to let them loose in the yard wearing nothing but their capes, masks, and under-roos... the neighbors will be totally alarmed...

Anyway... there are some adjustments to be made. First, I have to get up at the first hint of the butt crack of dawn (pardon the strong imagery there, but really -- it is earlier than I ever imagined I would voluntarily get up unless I was going somewhere fabulous...). I mean, the option has always been there for me to get up that early, but there just didn't seem to be a point in it when I could get another hour's sleep... until now.

Sam, who already pretty much sleeps through the night (from around 11 pm to 6 am... yes, thank you, he is the perfect child...), decided after my first day back on Wednesday that he'd start waking up at crazy hours of the night and keeping me up until literally minutes before my alarm was set to go off.

There's not really any feeling in the world like finally getting your child to sleep after a fun-filled two hours of nursing and baby talk only to realize that it is 5:29 AM... and you get up at 5:30 AM.

Moments like those are the reasons curse words were invented.

Second, I am trying to figure out this nursing thing. Gentlemen readers, please excuse, but this really is a conundrum. (I love that word, by the way.)

Ethan and Laney were both born in the spring, so I didn't go back to school until the following year... and by then, they were both on formula. I nursed Ethan for 6 weeks before getting sick with a vicious case of poison oak that required really strong steroids. Laney just wasn't having any of that nursing business, period. The Princess was much too impatient to wait for her meals to be delivered naturally; she preferred the bottle from the get-go.

Sam, of course, being the perfect child, is all about his mom, and so we're giving this nursing thing another shot.

So far, he has done incredibly well, but I've never had to actually pump at school... which I have to do now... which totally freaks me out, as the idea of that probably does most of you all.

The thing is, my room is practically a palace, so I don't have to go hide in the faculty bathroom or lock myself in the janitor's closet, like a lot of my friends have had to do... but still... there's something quite disconcerting about hooking yourself up to a machine in the middle of your classroom.

There are so many various and embarrassing options as to how this could turn out.
1 - Someone, like a co-worker, could let himself/herself in to get something out of my room. Now, I lock my door and cover all the windows (a little paranoid), but if you need a stapler, and you know I have a stapler, you're probably going to try to come in and get it. It's not like I want to post a big ol' sign that says "PUMPING!!! ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!" I mean, I do teach teenagers... No sense in asking for trouble.
2 - Someone, like one of my students, could try to get the door unlocked... I am a nazi about not letting people leaving things in my room, but on occasion, I have a soft moment and will let a kid leave books or a bag in my room. It would totally be my luck that one of those kids would have a desperate emergency that required retrieving possessions from my room while I'm exposed.
3 - The construction workers outside could somehow be able to see through the closed blinds and be getting a daily peep show. We have major construction going on at our school, and my room is right at the front corner of the building... which is right where one of the major building sites begins. Nothing says "Thanks for building our new addition!" like a full frontal flash...

A dozen other possibilities run through my brain on a daily basis as I sit there, trying to think about anything but whether or not there are hidden cameras in my room broadcasting this to the far corners of the earth....

Another adjustment is the sheer amount of stuff I have to do/have/plan in order to get through the day and still have any shred of sanity left.

I have to make sure lunches are made and coffee is set... clothes are laid out and bags are packed... cell is charged and plan is set for the next day....

There's a lot to think about...

and I am ADD...

meaning I foul things up on a daily basis.

So far, I've sent Ethan to school with a lunch that did not have an ice-pack in it... which sent him over his uptight, OCD edge... forgotten to set the coffee for K... and left my pump stuff @ home on the counter... which makes adjustment #2 very hard to take care of.

I'm sure that, at some point, this will get easier, like if I had a full-time maid, nanny, and personal assistant...

Boo. Hiss.

I have to go back to work tomorrow, and I am protesting.

You know, three kids really hasn't been so bad so far.

Now, there have been moments... like the week after we came home from the hospital and went to pick up Ethan at school... I had a horrible migraine-like headache, so my MIL (that'd be mother-in-law) was driving. About five minutes from school, Sam started crying... which made my head start ripping apart at the seams... and then Laney started crying... which made the skin peel off my face... and then Laney threw up because she got so upset -- about nothing serious, may I point out, because she just didn't want to put her drink in her cupholder... WHAT?!?! -- which made my gag reflex kick into super-turbo-overdrive.

On top of all of that, we still had to sit in line for 20 minutes with two screaming kids (one which reeked of barely digested Chick-Fil-A).

That was possibly one of the worst moments of my life.

Anyway, so far it has been relatively peaceful. Sam is growing so fast -- I can hardly believe he'll be five weeks old tomorrow!

Thankfully, he hasn't lost his sweet, laid back temperament yet... unlike his sister, who is, at this moment, flipping out -- full-on screaming and crying -- because it's not time for Dora yet.

Like I can help that.

Anyway, Laney and Ethan have been in rare form lately, and I'm beginning to wonder if, somehow, their bizarre behavior is not because we're their parents.

Now, some behavior, I will not take responsibility for. This morning, for example, at 7:45 a.m., Laney and I were driving back from dropping E off at school, and Laney starts chanting like Rainman that she wants to moo.

This is all my dad.

It seems that when my dad took Ethan to school, they would drive by the big cow fields (like there aren't fifty of those around our house). Toad would roll down the windows, so Ethan could hang his head out and yell, "MOOOOO!!!" at the cows.

When we'd pass the big fields on our way to or from anywhere, E would clamor about wanting to moo, and so finally, I caved... and it was hilarious!

Cows make me laugh anyway because they're kind of wall-eyed and bumbly... but their reaction to this big-headed kid hanging out the window of my MV yelling "MMMOOOOO!!!!" at the top of his lungs was so funny. They definitely didn't know what to think and were extremely concerned.

I imagine those cows on the California cheese commercials talking...

Since then, the kids -- both Ethan and Laney -- are obsessed with mooing... so much so that every time we get in the car, one of them mentions going to moo.

Now, we've probably single-handedly reduced the milk production around here by 50% -- the cows look absolutely disturbed and probably don't give any milk.

Anyway, here we are @ 7:45 a.m., and Laney is hanging out the window like a happy dog, hair unbrushed and wearing only a summer pajama shirt and pull-up because she changed her clothes in the middle of the night, yelling "MOOOOOO! MMMOOOOO!!!" at the top of her lungs.

I take no responsibility for teaching them that.

On the other hand, some things are my fault, like their incredible silliness, which I encourage because it makes me laugh.

Take a gander at these pictures:

These are Ethan & Laney's sketch-o Halloween costumes. This year, they are going as Velma and Freddy of Scooby Doo fame while Emma and Reece, their beloved cousins are dressing up as Daphne and Scooby. Sam, because no one makes Scrappy Doo or Shaggy costumes for babies, is going as the proverbial monster that must be apprehended.

Now, I knew it would be funny, but I had no idea how funny. Laney (aside from the dirty face) actually kind of looks like Velma, and while Ethan doesn't look anything like Freddy, the wig in itself is enough to crack me up for days.

I can't wait to see the whole gang together!

(And yes -- the MV is going to be the Mystery Machine... well, at least a modern version without the crazy paint job BUT including a nice ding on the side from the mailbox that I hit this summer. :-))

When I dress them up like this and laugh, I can't help but think they may be the way they are because of my distorted sense of humor...

The First Step...

I hear, is admitting that you have a problem.

My name is Amy, and I am a Facebooker.

Holy cow. I don't think I've ever been so addicted to anything besides that chocolate cake that my girl Kelley brought last week.

I didn't even have a FB account until this summer. After a dinner with my peeps Tanya (who lives in one of those states with lots of tornadoes) and Laura (who lives here with me -- well, not in my house, but in the area) and I decided that we were going to do a better job of keeping in touch.

They both had FB pages at the time, while I did not.

I tried to get in on the MySpace thing, but I never really got it up and going... too much work for me.

Sidenote to panic attack: The last time I got on my MySpace page, my cousin Lindsey (who is the apple of my eye) tried to help me find a background to suit. Since I l.o.v.e. shoes, I thought I'd find one with cute shoes.... and I did -- a leg/foot in a red stiletto on a black & white background -- very chic....

Or at least, I thought it was... until I posted it to my page and realized it was more Hooker-in-Red-Stilettos than I-Love-My-Red-Stilettos. When it posted, the little bitty thumbnail picture turned out to be a large picture of a lady's leg encased in fishnet stockings, standing in what appeared to be a very sassy pose in front of a man's pants legs.

About the time that I recovered from my shock and tried to delete it, the connection was lost, and I didn't get to take it down.

When I started this post, I remembered that, so I tried to log on. My school kids use MySpace all the time, and the last thing I need is for them to think their English teacher is some kind of dominatrix.

The problem started when I pulled up my page -- and the background was gone.

Now, that means one of two things:
1 -- I took the background off.
2 -- I have two MySpace pages, and I can only remember the log in to one.

I'm thinking it may be the latter because I am prone to forgetting log in info and then creating another account.

This makes me panic because you hear horror stories about companies and employers searching MySpace for their employees. Now, there's nothing on my page, but still... it's not like I want my students or co-workers or -- Heaven forbid -- my principal or superintendent to pull up my page and see that.

ANYWAY -- back to Facebook.

So, Laura and Tanya tell me I need to get a FB page, and I oblige. At first, because I didn't know how it worked, I wasn't too obsessed.

I checked it pretty much every day and doodled around here and there with games, but it all exploded when I got home from the hospital on maternity leave.

I think it's because I have had very little contact with adults other than K or my parents -- but I'm not really sure.

I also don't think it helped that we moved the computer downstairs... so now, while K watches 74 hours straight of TV, I can Facebook for 74 straight hours as well... and again when he goes to work... and again when the kids are napping... and again while dinner is cooking....

K, for the record, is annoyed. He has lodged minor complaints like, "Do you think you can get off Facebook long enough to help me load the dishwasher?"

No. Probably not. I might miss a chat.

To be fair, my contribution to household chores has significantly decreased since my obsession with Facebook began... not that my contribution was great, anyway.

I hate housework.

With a passion.

But still -- I don't see much difference between my obsession with Facebook and his obsession with TV... and movies he's already seen 97 times... or sleep.

I think we may have to sell our worldly possessions and become Amish in order to settle this fairly.

So, as it stands, I am addicted to just about everything. Gaming. Chatting. Messaging. So much so that I'm starting to recruit people to join FB just so I can talk to them.

Sigh.

I think it might be time for me to go back to school.

Excuses & Embarrassment

Well, I was going for a bigger record than 5 days, but then things started getting crazy...

On Monday, Clemson fired our head coach, Tommy Bowden, right about the time I started working on my blog. Needless to say, I totally got sidetracked and didn't make it past logging in.

On Tuesday, I went shopping with Mary, Laney, and Sam. By the time we got back and picked up Ethan from school, it was time to get ready for soccer. By the time that was over and the kids were in bed, I wasn't very coherent.

On Wednesday, Mary and I took Sam and Laney shopping again in order to finish picking up what I didn't get on Tuesday. Shopping with Mom & 2 kids sometimes takes longer than anticipated.

So here it is. Thursday. Let me tell you how my morning has started.

First, my house looks like one of those you see on "Clean House" or another of those intervention-type shows. After two days of shopping -- which involved carrying Sam in one of those baby-backpack type things and managing Laney the Diva--, I didn't feel like doing much... so I didn't. Last night, I decided that today would be cleaning day.

I intended for it to start early, but I fell asleep on the couch last night around 9:30. K apparently fell asleep shortly thereafter because at 3:30 this morning, Sam woke both of us up... and we were still on the couches.

K went to bed. I, having gotten 6 hours of sleep, was wide awake.

For the record, there's not much going on here at that time of night/morning.

So...I research nursery bedding (as we still haven't done anything to Sam's nursery) until my eyes cross and finally fall asleep somewhere around 5 am... only to have the cursed alarm clock go off at 5:30.

Have I mentioned that the alarm clock is on my side of the bed? That means I have to turn it off because nothing wakes up Narcalepto, my insanely sleep-talented husband.

About that time, Laney starts bellowing from the top of the stairs. She -- after a year of climbing up and down the stairs just fine -- picks this morning to develop a crippling fear of coming downstairs by herself.

BUT -- she fully intends to have someone come get her and bring her downstairs to get in our bed.

Any guesses who that someone might be?

I'll give you a hint: It was not Narcalepto.

Once we finally get settled, she snuggles up next to me and falls asleep (which totally makes me forget that she is a voracious beast because she is so precious when she sleeps)...right about the time I realize my arm is pinned underneath her.

I have no other choice but to try to fall asleep before my arm does because I know better than to risk awakening the sleeping goblin unless I want to wake the rest of the house as well.

I drift off to sleep, my sweet girl in my arms, only to wake up approximately 2.5 seconds later to the sound of the alarm, signaling time to begin the morning mission of ejecting Narcalepto from the bed.

I am only semi-conscious at this point, so I don't know if I said the nasty things running through my head or just thought them.

To make a long story a little shorter, I realize moments later that I had done nothing to get ready for today... so I had to squeeze last night's prep into this morning's lack of time and patience. After getting Ethan up, I proceed to break out my Super-Mom cape and find suitable clothes, make breakfast & lunch & coffee, sign papers, accomplish homework tasks, pack bags, brush hair & teeth, corral younger siblings, and get into the car.

Proud of myself, I glance at the clock as I pull out of the driveway to take E to school... and realize we may be late.

Unless I engage the turbo-boosters.

So I floor it.

The MV roars off into the sunrise as I try to dodge squirrels and morning walkers, and I think we may have made it as we careen into the school parking lot on two wheels, barely missing the crossing guard.

When we pull up to the drop-off area, other kids are getting out of their cars and going in... but the doors are closed and there are no adults there to greet them.

Ethan, the ever-eager beaver, hops out of the car and takes off for the door right about the time my inner-honor student kicks in, and I start to panic.

Should I walk him in? Is he going to get in trouble? Oh my gosh -- is he late or not?!?!

Still, other kids are skipping in with no parents, but Ethan is little. He's in kindergarten. What if he gets lost? Should I go in, just to make sure he's ok?

I cruise slowly by the front door, craning my neck to see if he's crying in the office or something while simultaneously holding up traffic. Finally, my inner-honor student wins, and I pull into a parking space to go check on him. I know he's already gone to class, but I just have to make sure I don't need to sign him in or something.

It is at this moment that I realize being late is only the beginning of my problems.

1-- I let Laney pick out her own clothes because we weren't going to be getting out of the car -- or so I thought. I can't, of course, leave her in the car while I run into the school. Not because I am responsible but because she follows directions about as well as the tree in our backyard, and I have no doubt that she would wait until I got in the school to let herself out of the van and go play in traffic.

I say all of that to say that Laney is wearing a long-sleeved, multi-colored, striped, velour shirt embellished with a butterfly. The top itself is cute, but when paired with plaid shorts that are too small so her belly hangs out over the top and scuffed white tennis shoes with no socks -- not to mention her CRAZY morning hair-- the look is not flattering.

2 -- Sam's blanket does not match his outfit. (While not a big deal to most, please remember that I am a little OCD about things matching or at least complementing... and the outfit/blanket faux pas is bad -- navy on the outfit while there's black on the blanket -- huge problem for me. I am president of the Black and Navy Do Not Go Together club.)

3 -- I have not brushed my teeth.

4 -- I have a ball cap jammed on top of my unbrushed hair...which I wore curly yesterday... which translates to a rat's nest today.

5 -- (This is by far the worst.)
I am wearing a Tiger Town Tavern tshirt.
Leftover from my 21st birthday.
Which was 10 years ago.

Now, I love this tshirt. It is one of the most comfortable items of clothing that I own. It is not, however, something I wear out in public. First, it is ragged. Second, it has holes. Third, the back is decorated with a large tiger lounging in an even bigger beer mug framed by the words "21st BIRTHDAY! I'M LEGAL!!!"

This is not the way I want to present myself to the office staff at my son's school.

I have no choice, however, because I am paranoid that he won't be admitted to school because we were late.

I take a deep (unbrushed teeth) breath and get out of the van. After I unbuckle Sam, who is unable to defend himself in light of the outfit/blanket fashion disaster, I get Laney the Ultimate Fashion Victim out of the car and start across the parking lot.

I'm pretty sure the other parents were staring, pointing, and taking pictures with their cell phones to forward to their friends.

I am mortified.

While I have relaxed my personal appearance standards since becoming a mom, I am not a sloth, and I do not make public appearances while inappropriately groomed. I brush my teeth. I at least pull my hair up in a casual-yet-somewhat-chic bun or ponytail. I don't put on full make-up, but I at least throw on some clear gloss and powder.

And I don't wear shirts with big beer mugs on them to any sort of school function.

Not only that, but my children look like I just picked them up from the homeless shelter... which is where I probably left them while I went out trolling bars and picking up ratty tshirts.

The walk across the parking lot is bad enough. I hope that I can just duck in and duck out without garnering any more attention, but of course, that would be too easy.

And, so, it gets worse.

The first set of doors of the school lead into a small foyer, where there are a second set of doors and a door to the office. The second set of doors stays locked during the school hours, so all visitors really have to go to the front office.... meaning there are about 10 people in the front office at this point.

We walk in, and all of them -- including the kids -- turn around and stare.

I'm not kidding.

After waiting in line for what seems like hours, it is my turn to talk to the staff.

I can almost see the fright on their faces.

I start explaining why I am there and, in typical Amy fashion, become totally flustered because a) I realize I sound crazy and b) I know that I -- as well as my kids -- look crazy... and the women behind the counter are looking at me like they are ready to call the police while using the tones of voice that crisis negotiators use to keep crazy hostage-takers from going over the edge.

I try to explain that I dropped Ethan off in the drop-off zone right around 7:50 and watched him walk into the school, only to realize I might need to sign him in... but I don't see him, so I'm assuming that he's made it into school...

And I realize that I sound like I pushed him out of the car while driving by but came back to make sure he actually went into school instead of playing hooky to burn down a local barn or something.

The secretary gives the school nurse a look, and they both start looking through their sign-in sheets and pass booklets, saying they don't think they signed him in.

I know they didn't sign him in because he went on into the school; I just want to know if I need to sign him in anyway.

So I start trying to re-explain, which only makes matters worse, and Laney is standing there, making loud sucking noises on her pacifier (which I didn't take away from her before we left because she'd just gotten up), looking like the poster child for a charity case next to her me, her mother, who looks like an illustration out of the Bad Mom manual that DSS gives out... and finally I just stop talking.

I realize that people in the office are looking at Laney and Sam and thinking, "It's not their fault, bless them. Look at their mama!" (In my head, I hear them saying this in Mary's voice because Mary has much sympathy and compassion for disadvantaged children and much disdain for lazy, good-for-nothing parents... and I'm pretty sure these people think we fall into these categories.)

I want to say, "Look. I wasn't planning on getting out of the car. I dressed in ratty clothes because I'm going home to clean house. My kids are not homeless or disadvantaged. I am a clothes-nazi, and they've never made public appearances before today in mismatched clothes or with unbrushed hair. I don't drink excessively in college bars while my kids sit outside in the car. I am a teacher, with a college education, on maternity leave because I just had my third child in 5 years because I am Fertile Myrtle, and I've been up all hours of the night because I couldn't sleep, and I am not irresponsible or a bad parent or a social derelict! I'm just having a bad morning!"

Right before I open my mouth to begin my tirade, I realize that saying all of this will only make me look more guilty... and so finally, with the school nurse looking at me with concern from behind the counter, I just mumble my thanks, back out of the office (so as not to give anyone behind the counter a full view of the Tiger in a Beer Mug graphic), and practically run to the car, Sam and Laney tow, cheeks aflame.

I'm not sure, but I'm thinking I won't be asked to be a class mom this year...

Things I Am Not Prepared to Deal With...

There are some things for which one can find little-to-no guidance in the parenting books.

Ethan, being the astute age of 5, is starting to notice and/or comment on sometimes funny, sometimes awkward things that catch us off guard.

I started noticing this around the time that Pop died.

I wasn't sure what, if anything, Ethan would understand or remember. As it turns out, he remembers a lot, and in the months that followed, he would ask questions or make comments about memories of Pop, the wake, or the funeral.

As it happens, I don't have great in-the-moment reflexes, so I'd start crying (because 1) that seems to be the one emotional reaction I really cannot control and 2) I really miss my Pop), and then K would have to explain all kinds of fun stuff about why Mommy acts like a moron.

I hoped he would outgrow this stage -- and he has stopped asking about Pop -- but now it manifests in different ways... like last night at bath time:

"Daddy, I think there's a hole in my hiney. I'm pretty sure that's where poop comes from."

Correct -- Yes.
Awkward -- Um hmm.

Thank goodness he addressed this one to K.

Sometimes, though, I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing... like this morning.

Ethan and Laney got up around 6:30 (see yesterday's post for important background). Sam woke up around the same time... which meant that I got up, too, while K slept.

Impressive talent, I know. I think he's part sloth because he's able to sleep for 47 straight hours.

Finally, after much breakfasting, cartooning, and talking, K joined us in the den.

Ethan: "Daddy, why don't you get up with the rest of us?"

K: (Momentary pause.)

E: (Staring at Daddy expectantly, waiting for an answer.)

K: (Finally) Because I'm lazy.

I, meanwhile, tried not to laugh out loud but wasn't terribly successful. I ended up having to fake a coughing fit.

The thing is, I need warning. I have what I call "Inappropriate Response Syndrome," meaning I usually react in the exact opposite way that I should... like when K practically dislocated his knee-cap on the foot board of the bed last week.

He doubled over in pain while I, again, tried to disguise my laughter as a coughing fit.

Didn't work.

I should mention that it absolutely infuriates K when my IRS shows up when he hurts himself. Two of the maybe three times I saw K lose his temper before we got married involved me laughing at the wrong time... once when he whacked his head on a nail at a public picnic shelter and once when he spilled an entire bowl of salsa in his lap at a restaurant.

I should also mention that the more angry he gets, the harder I laugh.

I really do try to stop, but it's like laughing in church or at a funeral. I just cannot control it.

This got me in a heap of trouble growing up... especially in church or when I got in trouble. Something -- usually absurd, like Fanny J. Crosby's name in the hymnal or the way my dad's eyebrow hair sometimes grows over his glasses-- would strike me as hysterical, and the laughter would just have to come out.

I thought maybe I would grow out of it, but it really seems to be getting worse and extending to other areas, such as saying things that I shouldn't... like telling Ethan to "clobber that kid next time he grabs your jersey."

I, uh, don't like for people to pick on Ethan. It makes me angry.

You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.

(Sorry. I couldn't resist. I loved The Incredible Hulk when I was growing.)

Anyway, I'm really not that scary when I'm angry, but I do have a little trouble controlling what I say -- or sometimes even coming up with something to say -- if I'm caught off guard. I think Laney may have inherited this from me because she, too, doesn't respond appropriately when angry or upset or startled.

Me: "Laney, would you rather eat your dinner or go to bed?"

Laney: "Go to bed."

Who chooses that option?

Me: "Laney, if you don't put these clothes on right now, I'm going to pop your hiney!"

Laney: "Pop me."

Hello?!?!? No one is supposed to ask for that!

Sigh. It's going to be a long rest of my life...

FIVE WHOLE DAYS!!

Well, now.

How proud am I of myself?!?!

Five posts. Five days. AND a new look.

I'm not sure if I'm crazy about it yet.... I love the background, but it's hard to find a text color that shows up across the page.

Hmm.

Anyway, here it is -- Saturday @ the Jennings' house.

Pretty dang eventful, if I do say so myself.

It started this morning around 7 a.m. when Ethan came downstairs and got in bed... where I was sleeping, sitting up, holding Sam because he refused to sleep in his bassinet for more than, like, 4.2 minutes at a time.

Next came Laney, just a few minutes later...Yes, that's right. 5 people in our bed. Not ideal conditions for sleeping, unless you are K, who just rolled over and continued his peaceful slumber while Laney and Ethan fussed and argued and wrestled for "sleeping" positions.

I say "sleeping" because neither of them slept.

Obviously, I didn't get to sleep either.

Ethan whispered to himself. Laney sang. I tried to pretend I was asleep until Ethan pressed his nose to mine, at which point my claustrophobic tendencies came out and I had to move away so I could breathe. That disrupted Sam's sleep, so he started snorting loudly and sort of crying.

Finally, I just said, "To heck with it!" and got up. (I didn't say it out loud, however, because it would be something Ethan would pick up and start repeating... like he did with "Dadgummit!"... in Sunday School... except it came out "Damgummit!" instead...)

K at least waited until we were all out of the bed before he sprawled out across the sheet, still sleeping.

So, I made breakfast for the big kids... fed and changed the little kid... watched some cartoons with all three kids and Lindsey, my favorite little cousin/au pair... and still, Keith slept.

I showered, got dressed, got Ethan dressed, refereed a couple of fights, had meaningful conversation with Laney... and still, K slept.

FINALLY, right before I took Ethan to the birthday party, K got up and moved to the couch... where he's been for most of the day, watching football, while I dropped Ethan off, came back, fed & changed Sam, left with Laney and Sam and Lindsey to go pick up Ethan, ran some errands, took Lindsey home, visited with my parents, came home, fed Sam, checked on Ethan, took Laney to the potty, and Facebooked in between.

K is not asleep at this moment, but he is laying on the couch.

Still.

And, since LSU doesn't play until 8 pm tonight, the couch is where he'll stay until late tonight.

I thought we might actually accomplish something last week because both Clemson and LSU had Saturday off... but he developed a short-term infatuation with the other 12 teams that were playing that day...

Don't get me wrong -- I love some college football, and I do enjoy spending the day watching games... IF I could actually watch the games in peace.

Have I mentioned that we have three kids and that peace is not really something we have a lot of around our house?

In addition to some rare form of narcolepsy, I also think K has incredibly impressive selective hearing... as in he only hears what's coming out of the TV.

I love him, but sometimes, I think I may have actually married Bernie... as in the dead guy from "Weekend at...".

I don't see how anyone can block out that much noise and mayhem unless he/she is actually lacking a pulse.

As a result, though, I have developed my own sort of malady which doesn't have a technical name yet, but I believe it is equally annoying to K.

I call it the I-Don't-Cook,-Clean,-Or-Do-Anything-Productive-While-He's-Watching-Football disease.

It's crippling, really.

I can't seem to find the energy (or will) to do anything remotely related to housework... which means that around 6 pm tonight, K will rouse from his stupor to ask, "What's for dinner?" to which I will respond with " " accompanied by a blank look.

This will annoy him beyond words... although not quite as much as the imprint of his body on our sofa annoys me.

Yeah... he's asleep again... rough life, camped out on the couch, eating pop-tarts and holding Sam (who sleeps 20 out of 24 hours in a day...)... has to require sleeping in and taking 47 naps in one day...

I may have to resort to fifth-grade slumber party techniques, like dipping his hand in water and freezing his bra....

Four days; Four posts!

I really do think four days might be a record of in-a-row posts, and I'm so excited that I decided to celebrate by having cookies for breakfast. Yum!

Now, these are not your average cookies.

(For the record, I feel that I should've taken a picture of cookies -- plural -- since I'm writing about cookies -- plural -- but... I've already eaten all but this one. Sorry.)

Anyway, these cookies are honestly the best cookies I have ever put into my mouth... and this girl has had her share of chocolate chip cookies.

My friend Lindsay made these as part of a dinner that she brought for us in honor of Swimmer's arrival.

Now, Lindsay is known amongst our friends as the cook, which is something because we have quite a few chefs among us.

No one ever misses Bunco at Lindsay's house unless it's absolutely neccessary because Lindsay always makes the best food (and she's a fabulous hostess).

When we have events that require us to bring food, everyone always asks what Lindsay brought, and whatever the dish, it always disappears pretty quickly.

Anyway, when Lindsay brought these (packaged in a stack wrapped in clear cellophane and tied with a blue bow -- typical Lindsay presentation that looks like it came straight out of a magazine), I knew I'd have a hard time keeping K out of them.

I do love a good cookie, but K is, like, Cookie Monster compared to me. The man loves his cookies and milk more than any preschooler I've ever met...

Anyway, he got into them within minutes of getting home, and he said, "Wow! These are great!" but I kind of took that with a grain of salt because 1) Lindsay made them, so I didn't expect any less, and 2) K loves cookies but I don't trust his taste buds' discernment. He also loves Oreos, which make me want to vomit.

Anyway, I held off until yesterday. I noticed that K had broken a cookie in half for Ethan for a snack before dinner the night before (yes, I know -- Parents of the Year material for feeding our kid a cookie before dinner...), and I thought, "Hm. I think I'll finish that off."

Let me insert here that I fully intended to save the other cookies for dessert for dinner tonight.

Now, let's go back to the top of the entry where I stated that I'd eaten all but the one lone cookie pictured.

Obviously, I finished off more than just that half.

Once I took a bite, those cookies became a sort of obsession. I kept thinking about them yesterday until finally, I ate another... and then another last night... and then finished them off for breakfast.

Sidenote: This is the second food obsession I've had this week. Earlier, my cousin Paige and her mom brought a delicious dinner complete with cupcakes decorated with monogrammed flags inserted into each cake. Now, I love monogrammed things, and I love cupcakes, so you can imagine my sheer ecstasy at having monogrammed cupcakes!!!! So excited that I ate, um, most of them.

So, here I am, at 9:43 am on Friday morning, having polished off the rest of these incredibly fabulous cookies and a Diet Coke for breakfast, and now I have a dilemma:

What am I going to tell Keith?

I mean, honestly, the man won't be surprised. He's been married to me for almost 9 years; it's not like my appetite is really a secret. It's just that he says I always finish off the good stuff... chocolate chip pizza, pizza, good leftovers... before he has a chance.

He's not going to be pleased about the cookies.

In my defense, I tell him that if he wants something, he needs to let it be known. If you don't put your claim on something in the fridge, I feel like it's up for grabs... and I'll probably grab it.

Maybe I can get Lindsay to send me the recipe, and I can make some before he gets home....

Three Days in a Row

I'm pret-ty proud of myself. I'm going for a bigger goal, but I won't say what... don't want to jinx myself.

Anyway, you might've noticed that I've added some stuff to the layout... like a "Followers" section (feel free to jump on the bandwagon) and a "Blogs" section. FYI, Clemson Girls -- Whoorl is pretty much back to her normal self.

At any rate, I'm sure I had something in mind to write about when I started, but this football game on tv is doing a number on my concentration abilities.

I may, at any moment, go into cardiac arrest if somebody doesn't do something soon!!!

Will write more tomorrow when I can focus...

Ahhh Yeah....

Two days in a row! I'm going for a record....

First, I have to laugh because I snapped this picture of Laney this morning:

I fell asleep last night after dinner, and I didn't see what she picked out to wear to bed. (Have I mentioned that she's a little headstrong and that we go rounds over what she wears in public? I have relinquished the bedtime battle as long as she's not spending the night away.)

Anyway, sometime during the night, she came and climbed in bed with K & me, but it was dark. This morning, sometime way before I wanted to get up, the alarm went off, and I began my daily routine of trying to oust K from the bed.

(It goes something like this:

The alarm goes off at 5:30-ish.... Keep in mind, I just went to sleep after feeding Swimmer. -- (Me): Keith, get up.

(Keith): *muffled snarffle*

I hit the snooze.

This repeats every five minutes until around 6:30, when I finally lose patience.

"Keith! Get up right now! It's 6:30, and you're going to be late for work!"

I won't type what I really want to say... and I've tried all the alternatives... Putting the alarm clock on the floor across the room... putting the alarm on his side of the bed... not waking him up... setting the alarm later since he never gets up the first 564 times I try... none of it works... I've decided this is my curse in life.)

After I FINALLY got him to get out of bed, I got up and started getting Ethan ready. Sometime between 6:30 and 7:15, Laney decides to wake up. I was fixing Ethan's hair in the bathroom, when I hear this really annoyed little voice demanding, "Whah's mah pink banket?!?!"

(Translation: "What did you peons do with my pink blanket, and why isn't it waiting on me when I get up?! Off with your heads!")

The princess has arisen. Let the bowing down begin.

I turn and see her standing on our bed, hands on hips, in a white tank top and a pull-up, hair all askew, pacifier in mouth.

"Uh, is she wearing a wife beater?" I ask.

"I don't know." K answers. He's obviously a morning person.

"Laney. What do you have on?" I ask.

"Shaht, Mommy. Wid pig." (That'd be "A shirt, Mommy. With a pig on it.")

Oh. Um. Ok. Now, she's worn this before, but it has a cute little matching bottom that goes with it -- as in a matching set of pjs. In that context, it is not wife-beaterish, at all.

When paired with a pull-up... it's a little scary... like she's going to be the cover of Gretchen Wilson's next single, "Redneck Princess."

So, knowing my semi-conscious state of shock at her wearing a wife beater, you can imagine how much more shocked I was to come into the den to find her wrapped up in our cheetah print blanket.

Now, I love this blanket, and -- until the kids got a hold of it -- it was a lovely accent piece. Like the cute pig tank, when used in this fashion, it looks a little park-ish.

And I don't mean the kind of park where we go to play.

I'm thinking Laney could be a regular on "My Name is Earl."

It's Me, Again, Margaret...

Did anyone else listen to Ray Stevens growing up? Ah, those were the days... riding to school with my mom and brother, listening to our favorite Ray Stevens' tape... My favorite song was "Clyde the Camel."

Little makes me laugh harder than Ray Stevens making camel sounds.

Anyway, I'm way behind, I know with the whole posting thing, but now... now I'm on maternity leave.

Let the posting begin!

Obviously, a lot has happened since that last post way back in August.

First and foremost, Swimmer has arrived!!! Samuel ("Sam") Keith is here, and Ethan in 2-0 for baby predictions! We're going to pimp his talents on ebay to finance college for our growing brood of children.















Anyway, Sam was the smallest of our three at birth -- 8 lbs. 3 oz. -- but he's gaining weight at an oddly rapid rate, so we're sure he belongs to us. He likes to eat like the rest of the family.

Laney and Ethan are adjusting well to his arrival, as are we. He is a great baby -- sleeps anywhere from 3-5 hours at a time, eats, and then goes back to sleep... loves to snuggle... doesn't cry unless he's hungry or wet. Now if we could only get him to teach the other two those behaviors...



















The hardest thing thus far is explaining certain things. Even with the other two, there are certain things I just haven't been prepared for... like Ethan wanting to feed Sam... from his own chest.

That's a moment they don't cover in the Mommy books.

Fortunately, the vague "Only mommies can feed babies" explanation seems to have worked. I didn't want to scar the kid for life.


Laney, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be too concerned about present technicalities but is more confused by the fact that Swimmer is no longer in my belly.


















She keeps trying to communicate with him via my belly button (which she learned from Ethan, who swears that's how babies hear when they're in the belly), and I'm like, "Hello?!?! He's in the bassinet, not in the belly." She gives me this quizzical look -- "Are you serious?" and then we repeat this at least once a day, every day. I hope she'll give it up before she goes away to college.


Other than minor issues as such, things are going well. On occasion, K & I look at each other and wonder what we've gotten ourselves into... like on Saturday mornings when all twelve kids come bounding in at once and climb in the bed with us... or when we try to go somewhere in public (like Wil's football game last night) because it seemed like a good idea at the time..., but for every "WHOA!" moment, we have many more "Sweet!" moments... like when Laney bumbles over to Sam, kisses him, and proclaims in her best Princess voice, "I wub Sam so!"... or when Ethan tells people that he's going to teach Sam to read and play football and soccer.


All kidding aside, we really are blessed with an incredible family as well as amazing friends and relatives who have gone out of their ways to make Sam's arrival unbelievably special. We thank God every day for our blessings. Since most of the blog readers are also our peeps, that includes you guys. Thanks so much for all of the love, meals, gifts, and well-wishes you all have sent our way. We love you!

Summer

is almost officially over for me.

Boo.

Winds of Change...

I cannot believe I have to go back to school in less than a week.

This is totally stressing me out.

There's actually a lot changing around here, and really, all I want to do is pile up on the couch, go to sleep, and pretend everything is normal.

I'm not against change; I actually like it, most of the time. It's just that there's so much going on. I need to be able to process, and apparently I don't process quit this fast.

For example, Laney is pretty much potty trained, with the exception of an occasional accident... which usually happens in public. I can now say I've been peed on by one of my kids.

For the record, I didn't like it.

I always have a change of clothes for Laney; I don't usually, however, carry one for myself.... little reminds you more that you are grown up and a mommy than walking around the grocery store with a pee stain the size of a beach ball on your shirt.

On the other hand, she is growing very, very, very, very independent.

I should really add a few more "very"s to that.

Her favorite phrase is "I do it myseeefffff!"

This drives me crazy on at least one occasion (usually more like 573 occasions) per day... like when she insists on buckling her own seat belt... at her own pace... which is 754 light years behind my schedule... OR when I try to dress her... Or put her shoes on... OR even pick out her shoes...

You get the idea.

I love that she is independent. It's just that she must realize that I am The Queen, and I make the rules.

Also, Ethan starts 5K in less than 2 weeks.

I had my first good cry over this last night.

I do believe K thinks that I am crazy and/or severely hormonal...

But in fairness to me, I am always this way when it comes to Ethan. I worry about him because he wears his heart on his sleeve, and his little feelings get hurt so easily... unlike his sister, who would just as soon punch you in the eye if you don't agree with her....

Anyway, it's just hard to believe that this time five years ago, he was just 3 1/2 months old... and now he thinks he's pretty much grown...

Sigh.

I know, I know. Moving on.

Of course, there's also the impending arrival of Swimmer... which will be on my birthday.

First, I'm still not sure about how I feel about the whole birthday bit. I, uh, am a bit of a birthday freak... as in, I l.o.v.e. my birthday. Love it. Love it. Love it. Neither being unconscious nor the idea of undergoing major surgery on my birthday ranks high on my list of "Favorite Ways to Celebrate."

Cake, presents, unlimited birthday attention -- YES!
Major incision where they take all of your guts out and make origami out of your insides -- Not so much.

On the other hand, I do think it will be totally cool to share birthdays with Swimmer for the rest of our lives. My dad, the ever-round and cuddly Toad, and my Pop share the same birthday, and I always thought that was really neat.

*For the record, I am very glad this kid isn't sharing K's birthday...which falls on or near Thanksgiving... because I'd never get rid of the whole "Thanksgiving feast @ our house" celebration.

Anyway, I am also so ready to have this pumpkin that I'd agree to any day, as long as it gets here soon. And, of course, it's not every day that you get a kid on your birthday. What an incredible present!

Kind of makes all other gifts pale in comparison....

(Remind me of that when he/she is 3 weeks old, not sleeping through the night, and colicky.)

AND on top of all of this, I go back to school next week, which means no more mid-day naps... no fun trips with the kids... no snuggling on the couch early in the morning...

I should probably be very pleasant next week.

Consider yourself warned. :-)

I'm A Little Disappointed...

that no one else seems to be amused by the mullet picture. :-( I still laugh every time I see it.

Anyway, life is just chugging along here in P-town.

I went to the doctor earlier this week, and all is well in Swimmer's world. He/she is -- as the doctor so politely noted -- "a chubby little thing," weighing in at 4.5 lbs. so far.

That didn't trigger any alarms until I got home and found out via internet that a typical baby at this point weighs about 3 lbs.

Shocking. Our other two kids were 9 lbs. and 8.5 lbs. respectively. I wasn't really expecting this one to be any different, but it's still slightly alarming to hear that your child is already in the 93rd percentile for size before he/she "really starts gaining weight."

On another note, we are trying to potty-train Laney. She has totally immersed herself in the idea.

We have yet to be able to convince her that she does not have to be one with the potty in order to successfully potty train.

This has resulted in a lot of gagging on my part and a lot of baths for her. (Yes, I threw away the comb as well as washed the dress and Laney in hot water with lots of soap. Our toilets are clean, but that doesn't mean we're going to bathe in them.)

Ethan has also chosen this summer to assert his individuality, which he often chooses to express through his choices in clothing.

We haven't been able to convince him, either, that items of the same color should not always be worn together, such as brown socks and brown Chuck Taylor's.

He usually responds to my gentle fashion guidance by saying, "Mommy, it will be fine.Don'tworry."

But I do worry... mostly that people are laughing at my precious little child.

Have I mentioned that two weeks ago he wore his bike helmet to the skating rink? "For protection," he said.

Yes; people did laugh. I was one of them.

Never a dull day...

I am impressed...

by me.

It's been a banner day in J-Town today, and it's only 8:36 a.m.

By the end of the day, I may have figured out the key to world peace.

This morning, bright and early, I saved a bird. It somehow mishapped into our screened-in backporch; by the time I realized it was there, the bird was seriously freaking out.

I am not scared of birds, but I don't really like sudden movements from wild animals that could poke my eyes out... so I've never really tried too hard to do more than appreciate them from afar.

(Random sidenote: we spent hours as children snuggled up in Granny B.'s back den, watching the birds at the bird feeder. We were probably the only people under 50 who could distinguish a goldfinch from a titmouse. Still -- we only looked at them from the window. No interaction.)

Anyway, when K. left for work, he wasn't too concerned. "It'll find it's way out," he said in his wise-sage voice... but it worried me that the bird couldn't seem to figure out that there was a big open space for escape (otherwise known as a door).

So, when he left, I took matters into my own hands.

Literally.

I tried, at first, to talk it out of its frenzy.

Much like my children as well as my students, it didn't listen... and my presence seemed to upset it more.

I tried opening the other door so it would have TWO avenues of escape, but that didn't seem to help, either.

Finally, I took a deep breath and channeled my inner-nature-girl.

At first, I contemplated pulling a Crocodile Hunter-like move: gently scooping it up into my bare hands and carrying it to freedom.

That vision was interrupted by a second vision of the bird tearing the flesh from my bones, so I scrapped that idea.

Finally, I settled on a compromise.

I cornered the bird into one screen pane with the mop, and then I used the dog food scoop to gently trap the frenzied beast while holding onto its tailfeathers (all the while thinking, "I am going to have to wash my hands in scalding water! Birds have all kinds of germs on their feathers!" Please remember I was raised by Mayree who harbors much disdain for all germs everywhere.).

In one swift, cat-like movement, I shoveled the bird from the screen to the open door and set it free!

(Cheers all around!)

At this point, I realized that I was stalking around my backporch in a large tshirt and my undies, so I decided to take the party inside before my neighbors called the police.

Once inside, after scalding the skin off of my arms up to my elbows to remove bird germs and celebrating my second calling as an animal rescuer, I decided to tackle another daunting task: figuring out how to connect my camcorder/digital camera to the computer.

I've been working on this one for a while, but seeing as how I misplaced some important stuff... like the instruction book, driver software, and USB cable... this has been difficult.

As of last night, I'd finally managed to gather what I thought was the right USB cable and the instruction manual.

This morning, fresh off of my bird victory, I marched upstairs to tackle the technological beast.

And I won.

Sort of.

I can at least upload pictures to my computer...

Like this one, which I snapped this weekend while on vacation @ Folly with the fam. Nothing says, "South Carolina beach" like a mullet blowing in the wind.

Now, I just have to figure out how to upload the videos. (The computer keeps saying some program doesn't recognize the video file. Pttthhhttt.)

Still, I feel like today has been a success.

Maybe not so much of a success that I'll clean out the bonus room, but still... a success overall.

Tah-Dahhh!!!!

Yesterday, we loaded up the fam -- both kids and my parents -- into the MV and went to a place called Vision of Life and proceeded to thoroughly invade Swimmer's privacy.


Now, I feel like this is the 50th ultrasound I've had, but really, it's only the 4th. I've already had on 3D-4D, but it's a little different having one done in a sterile doctor's office (although the tech and the doctor were both very nice and gave us pretty pictures). This time, we were able to sit back and relax and just check out Swimmer's behavior in his (or her -- we still don't know) natural habitat.


At first, he/she wouldn't move his/her hands, so it was difficult to get a good shot. (For the record, referring to the baby as a he/she makes me a little uncomfortable, but I guess that's my own fault, eh?)





And here he is, in all of his/her smiling glory. If the weirdness of this photo freaks you out, do not fret. It totally freaks me out, but I like it because he/she is mine.


That crazy stuff around his/her head is the placenta, in which he/she totally likes to burrow his/her head. That thing that could be mistaken for something gender-specific is actually the umbilical cord, which he/she also digs.


Both of these fascinations concern me a little, considering the placenta and cord deliver vital stuff to the kid, but I've been reassured that it's alright. Apparently, God figured the kids might play with that stuff and made both pretty durable.


I will say that Swimmer is currently pretty much folded in half, which was the case with Ethan... so I'm expecting him/her to be of decent size.


I will also say that K and I were kind of taken aback to see how much Swimmer resembles Ethan at birth. We have a picture of E, taken a few weeks after his birth, that we call the "Mad Monkey" picture.


(E spent a good bit of his first months looking like an angry gorilla. Fortunately, he outgrew this.)


Anyway, at one point, Swimmer ducked out from behind his placental hiding place, and my mouth dropped open.


He looks so much like E in the Mad Monkey picture... minus the scowl.


We did confirm that it looks like Baby Swimmer may look more like me (and the other two kids)... as the ultrasound man said, "The baby has a nice broad nose."


Thanks. Like I need any encouragement to be a little insecure about my appearance at this point.


Anyway, he/she has Toad's nose and what appears to be my lips. Since both of the other bambinos are blessed with K's beautiful eyes, I think Swimmer may be, too.


K was not surprised to find this out, although we were both secretly hoping this one would look like him. Not that having three miniature Toads is bad, but I wanted people to say, "Wow! He/she looks so much like K!" instead of "Wow! Your kids look so much like you!" or "That has to be Ken's grandchild! He/She looks just like him!" (Ken is Toad's real name.)


Of course, years down the road, this could be a curse, especially if the kids go to school here. Since most of the teachers that had me are still teaching, the kids may automatically get preferential seating to prevent them from talking....

A Veritable Smorgasboard....

Well.

How many of you are shocked that I haven't blogged in over a month?

Anyway, much excitement since the last entry... pictures will follow as soon as I figure out how to upload them from my new camera.

First and foremost, I am out of school for the summer.

Praise God! Hallelujah!

After much contemplation over the last days of school, I decided that high school students are crazy, as well as that I am insane for thinking that I like them. I am glad that it is summer; otherwise, I might not have been able to withhold the barrage of smart aleck comments that teeter on the tip of my tongue in response to their silly utterances.

Likewise, the district might not be able to withhold the immediate termination of my job were that barrage of comments to escape... thus, it is a fabulous thing that summer vacation came when it did.

Second, Swimmer is getting huge, and I am pretty dang cranky. More on that later.

Third, it is vacation time, which -- for the J-Town inhabitants -- means craziness. K and I took a trip to NYC to see my Yankees play in their final season at historic Yankee Stadium. Despite the drunk people sitting next to us (who weren't even Yank fans!), the game was *sigh* incredible.... as was seeing the city with my fabulous hubby (his first time!) AND not having multiple children in tow (besides Swimmer, who goes everywhere with us at this time...).

The kids and I just got back from the beach with my Clemson girls (as well as our 9! kids), which was -- as always -- lots o' fun. I do think I have heartburn, and I also hope that Laney has 12 kids just like herself when she grows up because I did consider selling her to the highest bidder on a couple of occasions. One of the highlights of this year's trip was NOT having car trouble.

(Feel free to browse blogs from last summer if you missed the short novella on all of the transportation issues we had on last year's trip...)

We have a couple of other trips planned -- including a brief outing with my family, which always promises good stories.... like my dad threatening to go home last year after I dared get bent out of shape that they (as in the rest of the family) were late, causing us to miss our reservation to the famed Lady & Sons restaurant after I had gotten up at the crack of dawn (because no one else wanted to do so) to secure the reservation.

Now anyone who knows me knows that Toad, my cute little round father, is the apple of my eye. As cute and cuddly as he is, Toad is not a man that I talk back to, nor is he a man that I would normally cross, because 1) he is my father, 2) he has a rather vicious temper (I might add that I inherited this from him), and 3) he is just crazy enough that he might do the things he says (like send me to a boarding school for troubled kids -- which was enough, as a teenager, to keep me somewhat in line... even though I wasn't troubled, and I don't think he really would have sent me... but he didn't seem to be kidding...).

When the family finally arrived AFTER our required check-in time, bumping us to the END of the long, long reservation list, I was livid... to say the least. If I could've poked every single person there in the eye, I would have.

And I would've enjoyed it.

(For the record, I didn't care one bit about going to this place, although I am a Paula Deen recipe fan... My mom, sweet Mayree, had been talking about going for months... it was really all that she truly wanted to do on the trip.)

So... after I got up earlier than I even get up for school.... after I traipsed through pre-dawn Savannah by myself while the rest of my family snoozed... after I had to wait in a long, long, long line (which I don't do -- ever -- unless it's for something REALLY good... like a 75% off sale)... I was more than a little irate that the rest of the family (being chauffered by K) didn't get there in time...meaning my entire morning had been a waste.

Now -- had my dad gotten up for this task, things would have been different. First, we wouldn't have been eating there because my dad does not wait in line. Period. Sale or no sale. Second, if the rest of us hadn't shown up at the right time, he would've turned red and ballooned up like a blowfish and possibly gone postal on the entire city of Savannah.

I felt that my seething rage -- which was pretty well contained -- was justified.

The rest of my family didn't seem to understand... which multiplied the rage like water multiplied the Gremlins.

They actually kept asking me what was wrong. My dad kept trying to get me to cheer up.(Valuable sidenote: it is not wise to continue to provoke an obviously angry person.)

Finally, I spouted off some furious blurb from between clenched teeth about how none of them (have I mentioned that?) wanted to listen to me (who had been to the restaurant and experienced the reservation process before) when I told them we all needed to go into Savannah early... and that I hoped they all enjoyed sleeping in because I certainly enjoyed standing in line alone like a beggar at a soup kitchen... and that next time we needed reservations to go somewhere, they could get up and get their own if they couldn't be anymore considerate.

I'm not exactly sure what I said... but it was something like that.

As soon as I said it, I thought, "Oh my gosh. My life, as I know it, is over because my dad is going to rip me apart, limb by limb, for talking to him like that."

It seemed like time froze... and it was on.

He started turning an odd shade of beet red... which morphed into an unhealthy purplish hue... while I waited, in horror, for him to snatch me up in the middle of Savannah in front of my children.

You can imagine my surprise when he just spat, "Fine. I'll pack my things and go home."

I was so surprised, in fact, that my tongue again began to speak without my permission.

"Fine, " I retorted. "Do what you gotta do."

I don't know who was more surprised -- him or me. I've always been much more vocal than my brother, so I don't think he was surprised that I had something to say... it's just that even on my worst day, during our worst disagreement, I've never been brave (or stupid) enough to say something that brazen.

Thankfully, he seems to have mellowed in his, um, older age, and he just stalked off a little ways down the street. I returned to glowering by a street lamp, and the possibilities of atomic hazard dissipated.

Mayree, as usual, was amazed that Toad didn't launch me into the river or at the least yell...

K, on the other hand, made a good point: my dad taught hand-to-hand combat in the Army, for Pete's sake. Why would I intentionally provoke him?!?!? (This might be a good time to add that K has a healthy respect/fear of Toad... or at least what he thinks Toad might do...)

Needless to say, after that, the mood was pretty much shot... compounded by the fact that the air wasn't working in the restaurant... and then that the power went out while we were eating... and then that it was 879 degrees in the shade that day.

Toad and I haven't spoken of that little exchange since, which is kind of our way... neither of us is big on apologies... especially when we don't think we're totally in the wrong... but you can totally see why you should wait with bated breath for stories from our upcoming vacation... right? :-)