Stupid Egg Laying Animals

           Driving with my kids in the car is always chance for conversation and questions. Deep questions that I have no way of answering even if my life depended on it because one question will lead to another which will lead to another. My sons will talk us in a circle and I rarely see it coming.

            For example, today we were driving to pick my oldest son up at school and I was asked what type of animal a bird is. I said that it is a bird, fairly simple I thought. Is it an amphibian I was asked again. No, it is not an amphibian, if you want to be more technical it can be called fowl, I replied. Could it be a reptile? (Amphibian and reptile? Where the hell is that coming from? Birds are not scaly or slimy and they don’t slither. Not amphibian or reptile! Jeez.) I answered that birds are not reptile or amphibian or mammals or fish or insects or whatever other type of animal they could come up with (those are all of the classifications, by the way.)

            It took only a moment for the conversation to continue. “Reptiles and amphibians lay eggs,” I was told. Indeed they do. “How can birds lay eggs if they are not reptiles or amphibians?” They had me there. I don’t know why that is but it’s just the way it is. I tried to explain that there are exceptions to every rule but that got me nowhere. We talked about how a platypus lays eggs but is a mammal but that did not explain the mystery of birds and their total lack of amphibian or reptile ancestors.

            I told them we would look all of this up when we got home hoping that they would forget, which they did. One day this conversation will rear its ugly head again but for now I feel that I am safe from answering or attempting to answer these species related questions.

            I don’t like reptiles or amphibians anyway and now I have one more reason to like them less. Birds are now on my list too. Stupid egg layers.

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Hey all! I've moved my blog to Facebook, I'm keeping this open too but thought that I'd see if any of you would like to follow me there. Survival of Motherhood is the name of the page and the profile picutre is of Trinity from The Matrix.

Love to you,

Carol

Mom in Training...With a Dog

          I used to have a little dog named Turbo. He was a mini Schnauzer and he died a few years ago. Adam has been talking to me about Turbo a lot lately and telling me how great it was that I got a puppy to help me get ready for being a mom.

            I did not get a puppy to help me get ready for being a mom. Adam can’t get his mind around the fact that I, in my younger years, didn’t like children and never, ever wanted any. I was almost twenty-eight when my oldest, Alex, was born and up to that point, I never wanted any kids. Ever. My oldest twin can’t accept that.

            We have talked many times about how having children made me a better person, the person I was meant to be, but I never had that inkling to be a mom. Adam is trying to find his way around this fact because he can’t see me as anything but his mom. I get that and that’s cool but his bargaining with me about why I had a dog is ongoing.  My children were planned out, (not necessarily having twins, that was hitting the jackpot-lucky) and I’ve told him that but he needs more.  

Nightly he brings up to me how nice it was that I had a little dog that I learned to feed and take care of so that I could learn to feed and take care of my babies. I’ve asked him if he recalls me putting him out in the yard to poop or remembers me pouring his food into a bowl in the corner of the kitchen. He does not recollect this ever happening and I tell him that it is because he was my baby, not my dog. I’ve tried to explain to him that taking care of a baby and taking care of a dog are two completely different things. He’s not accepting that. He remembers Turbo sitting on my lap and that he has sat on my lap before too. Okay, there is one similarity.

            I’ve been trying to tell my kid the truth, that people change as they get older and that’s what happened to me, a dog didn’t change me and I didn’t get a dog to teach me how to take care of my babies that I was never planning to have anyway. I got Turbo because he was cute and free and I liked him. He was easy to take care of and was not very demanding. I never got up in the middle of the night to feed him or change his diaper or his bedding when he’d had an accident. I just put him in the yard before bed and called it good.

            I guess I should be happy that my kid is trying to make me out to be a better person than I was. I should stop correcting him when he tries to make me out to be some kind of mom-saint person who took on maternal training early but I am nothing if not honest and I just can’t let him see me as that good all my life. I’m afraid that no other woman would ever compare to his momma and that will cause him trouble someday. I hope the girl he marries likes dogs, if not he might think she is a selfish young woman with no one to look after but herself…like his momma used to be, before I got a dog and a couple of kids.

Drool vs. Pee

          Shampooing the couch is not one of my favorite things to do. It’s microfiber and that means that it cleans up easily but it is also a light beige color and that means that it needs to be cleaned often. Especially with boys in the house.

            They are good boys and take their shoes off at the door, not because I demand it but because I feel that barefoot is the only way to go…and so do my brood. No, the crap that I have to shampoo off of my light colored couch is drool. My boys will fall asleep on the couch and drool in their sleep which inevitably ends up on the couch. Since the couch is so light in color, you see that little drool spot at forty paces. Oh, I try to ignore it, act like I didn’t see, try to convince myself it will go away without me having to drag out my shampooer and work up a sweat cleaning up. It never works and eventually I have to shampoo. However, as an added bonus to the scrubbing I get to do, I get to do the entire thing because it is such a light color that when you clean a section of it, it looks worse. Rather than looking like you spot-cleaned a little section, it looks like someone peed all over it and that I just stood by and let it happen. I have to literally clean the entire thing, top to bottom, back to front, to give it that seamless look of having not been urinated on.

            You might have guessed that I just got done shampooing that great behemoth that is twenty-three shades than I should have bought it in and you would be right. At least now that the whole thing is wet everyone is sitting on the floor and drool hides much easier there.

I'm Told We Need a Cat, or Two

            My husband is allergic to cats. My youngest twin loves cats. We do not have a cat but Drew would like to change that. He is usually very thoughtful in his commentary about cats and why we should get one and what that one, or two, should look like.

            We were house hunting a few weeks ago and Drew started talking about cats. Just out of the blue, no agenda or expectations, just talking. He mentioned that kittens that are white and orange striped are his favorite and that he would take very good care of that kitten, when he gets it. He would feed it and play with it and love it, when we get it. Then a thought came to him, again, out of the blue and totally hypothetical. He would not want his kitten to be lonely so we would need to get two kittens that are orange and white striped so that they would have a friend besides him. He kept talking and easing his way toward this being more than a conversation of suppositions. He then asked us if we would be getting this kitten, sorry, these kittens before we moved or after. Either was fine with him but if we got them before we moved we’d have to make arrangements to move them with us and that would also be fine.

            I can’t help but love it when he tries to manipulate us like this because it is really cute the way he tries to push his agenda. He’s going to either sell millions of cars or be a defense attorney.  

An Older Brother's Love

 

            Hey all. I know I’ve been gone from my blog for a while now but it isn’t personal. My family and I are preparing to move out of state and life has been a mess. I know that that is no excuse but it’s the one I’m giving so just go with me there.

            You might find yourself wondering what is causing me to write today and it is quite simple. My oldest child did a very sweet and caring thing today and I was so touched by his actions that I feel compelled to write about him.

            My oldest twin, Adam, has had a loose front, top tooth for some time now. We have all been wondering when it was going to give up and let go but nothing had happened, until today. While he was at recess he took a mitten to the face and that tooth flew out of his little mouth…and landed in the snow.  When I picked them up at 3:00 I was regaled with the whole story. Adam was on top of a heap of snow, playing King of the Mountain I imagine, and one little boy gave him a shove out of sporting fun and not malicious tooth-knocking-outedness. My twins took me to the very spot on the playground that this offense occurred but alas, we did not find that tiny little tooth in the vastness of the white snow on the playground. We even had a reenactment of sorts to show his exact position on the pile and the direction that Noah came at him at ultimately socked him. Nope. Nothing. We headed home.

            My oldest son, Alex got home from Jr. High a bit later and after talking to his little brother about his missing tooth Alex excused himself and returned shortly after. He explained to Adam that coincidently he happened to find a tooth on the ground on the way home. I heard Adam yelling for me as he barreled up the stairs to tell me the good news. He held in his little hand a top, front tooth. I looked at him and back at Alex in disbelief…and that was when it hit me. Alex took one of his baby teeth, making sure it was a top, front little tooth and gave it to his brother, explaining that he found what must have been Adam’s wayward tooth.

            Alex has never left his teeth for the tooth fairy. The idea of not having his teeth bothered him a great deal and so Alex and I struck a bargain. I would buy his teeth from him rather than leave the teeth under his pillow and he and I would then become co-owners of said teeth. We have every single tooth he’s ever lost.

            Well, we did…until today. I am very proud of my oldest son’s quick thinking and I’m okay with the fact that I am now short one of his baby teeth. Cheering up his baby brother is a much better investment.   

Snowmen Army

   My little boys are often times concerned with safety. I think that that's a healthy thing to think about. I am also very blessed that they are proactive when it comes to this idea of safety.

   Recently we had a good deal of snow dropped on us and that helped us greatly in our need for home protection. My young sons made some guards to watch over us...out of several eight inch tall snowmen. They were posted at various locations around our yard. I'm guessing that they made them small for many reasons. Firstly, if you make an army of little snowmen, it takes less time if they are little. Secondly, no intruder would notice little snowmen at various locations around our home, watching them, preparing to strike without warning. Lastly, they were really cute and cute is king.

   I appreciate the help, God knows I am a busy woman some days and watching out for bad guys can be overlooked by me. I am thankful to the army that protects this abode.