Wii Boxing Amateur Match #1

Sew What

Jason and I were finishing up the Polar Express when I got to thinking about Jake's Boy Scouts uniform and how it needs its patches sewn on. Not well skilled in the way of sewing, I asked Jason if I should take it to a tailor to have his patches sewn on. He laughed at me. I don't sew. Never have, never will. Jason tried to sell me on "that's what Boy Scout Moms do", but not this mom, so I suggested that he do it. To which he replied:

Jason: "Do you want your boys to grow up to be boys?"
Cori: "Yes."
Jason: "Then don't let them watch Daddy sew."

I think I'll have Oma do it while she's here.

The Calm

The house is quiet, except for the sounds coming from my laundry room. The boys are at grandma's. Jason is at work. I am home to clean and prepare for the storm* that is my parents' arrival tonight.





*Don't get me wrong. I like storms and I love my parents. Just saying here people, is that my house is now quiet, but after tonight, with 5 more people in it for the next 10 days it won't be.

This is how you repay me?

Around midnight last night I threw in the towel on cleaning in preparation for my parents' arrival today. (I still have quite a bit to do today, but am currently debating a Starbucks run in my jammies to fuel up for today's workload.) Every night before bed, Jason or I go check on the boys to make sure they are warm enough, that they are facing the right direction on their beds and that they aren't sleeping on the floor or in the closet. Last night Jason was out with a friend, so I went in to make sure all was right in their world.

As soon as I opened the door, my nose went into overdrive. Sniff, sniff, is that what I think it is? I hope not, sniff sniff. I go straight to Harrison and stick my nose to his bum. Yep, poop. Super. I leave to get wipes and a new pullup. Turn the closet light on. Then go over to begin the hazmat process of cleaning him out of his own filth and into something fresh. (I did think about leaving him in it to make him sore the next day - that'll teach him - but it was midnight and I wasn't in the mood for teaching lessons about personal hygiene to my 4 year old.)

So Harrison is lying on his right side, facing me and is wearing a one piece footed sleeper with dinosaurs on it. These jammies make this even more of a pickle than it already is because now I can't just slide his pants off and clean him up discreetly, I have to unzip, pull his arms out, pull his legs out and tear off the pullup to keep the #2 in place. I do all of that, holding his legs in the air, I turn to grab some wipes and, what's that? My thigh suddenly feels warm and wet and NOW I can hear the ssssssss sound that is Harrison's PEE escaping in full force. Yep, I'm being peed on. While having flashbacks of his newborn days, I quickly react by covering his offending tool with the wipes. All this does is cause the pee to go down and get his jammies and his sheets all wet. (Now I'm rethinking letting him sleep in it next time.)

Harrison, in his half awake stupor, lets me finish wiping him, but then immediately gets in the fetal position and tries to roll over and go back to sleep. I grab a towel from the closet, pull the jammies away, Harrison rolls again to try to go to sleep, I pick him up, lay the towel down to cover the wet spot (I draw the line here - I am NOT going all out to change his sheets too.) and lay Harrison back down, he rolls again to try to go back to sleep, I put him back on his back to get his clean pullup on and I give up on putting new jammies on him, so I cover him with three layers of blankets and call it a night.

Got Gas?

"Mama, if you put gas in your pants, would it make you fly?"

--Jake

Watch Your Fingers

I finally mailed my Christmas cards today in the blue post office box and I got to thinking....

.....I wonder what is the weirdest thing a mailman has found in a mailbox.

I could think of some weird things to put in a mailbox.

Monday's Many Faces

Yesterday morning Harrison was a puppy dog in his underwear.
Yesterday afternoon Harrison was telling us he wanted to get a motorcycle (to Jason's dread), but that he would be very very careful on it.
Today Harrison stared at the washing machine, yelling at it to "stop" or "go" as though he had the magic to make it happen.
Then he built the "leaning tower of pisa" out of his legos until it collapsed into pisa rubble.
Ten minutes later he was a bat.

Now he's a 4 year old boy watching the Grinch.

New Favorite Blogs

http://www.good.is/

http://overheardintheoffice.com/

http://brokershandsontheirfacesblog.tumblr.com/

http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/

http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/

my old favorite:

http://www.alphamom.com/smackdown/

and some holiday fun:

www.voodoosanta.com

www.elfyourself.com

Ridin' Dirty

I don't know how it escaped me. Not just for days or weeks, but months.....nearly six months to be exact.

I was enjoying a little chuckle from the hokey elves I created from the www.ElfYourself.com website today at work when my coworker, Nicole, walked by and asked if I knew my car registration and inspection were expired. She admitted that because hers were expired too that she's noticing that stuff on other people's cars too.

A conversation in my head went a little something like this:

NO! That can't be right. Jason always takes care of that stuff. I don't remember ever changing the sticker on my window or seeing the reminder come in the mail. Maybe Jason just did it and I never saw it. No that wouldn't happen either. Jason always makes a point to tell me when he's doing something for me, especially when it comes to my car, which isn't his and he doesn't feel he should have to take care of these things. I should go look at it. Nicole has admitted she has "old lady eyes".

I go outside to check my stickers. Sure enough - vehicle registration expired in JUNE! Inspection, thankfully, is still ok. It doesn't expire until the end of the month, so with the grace period I can still skirt by for about 3 more weeks on that one.

Back in the office Nicole is giving me the run down of where I need to go if I'm in Dallas County like her (which I am not) and that I can ride with her tomorrow when she goes to take care of her car registration. Since I am not in Dallas County and don't have a friendly sidekick to share my legal woes with, I research online where I need to go for Collin County and find that lo and behold! Its only 2.5 miles away! I'm excited by this, but also feel like even more of a loser for not doing this sooner since its in my back yard.

Upon announcing that fact, Joey, our copywriter, who has witnessed this discovery from his open office, encourages me to disappear to take care of it NOW because although I've gotten away with it for 6 months, now that I'm aware of it, I am GOING TO GET PULLED OVER. He's right. Its karma or dogma or murphy's law or whatever belief system you follow - its that.

I call the tax office to make sure the registration isn't paid and somehow my sticker just got lost in the mail. I'm still in disbelief that I've overlooked this very important annual update. Nope, I'm 100% expired, but with my insurance card and my checkbook (what? who uses a checkbook anymore?) I can get it taken care of prontisimo!

Now I'm thinking about my insurance card. Our insurance policy gets renewed every May and November. I don't remember putting a new card in my glove box. Ten bucks says that damn card is expired too! Back out to the car to confirm my suspicions........I pull out my recent oil change receipt, an old insurance card from May 2007, warranty receipt from my speaker replacement a few weeks ago (because getting a distorted speaker replaced is an URGENT matter), and yep, my most recent insurance card that expired on 11/20/08. DAMMIT!

Joey shakes his head at me and asks if my kids are still wearing burlap sacks as underwear. ???? I'm mildly embarrassed because this is shocking to me - I've never let this happen before (to this degree). Last time this happened, it was my expired inspection that was only about 3 months late and the nice policeman was the informant. He only charged me about $200 to tell me that.

Odds are he'll find me again in the morning when I'm on my way to the tax office on my way to work.

Make a Smilebox greeting

I'm Baaaaack

Thinking about getting back into blogging again. If you're receiving an email update about this post its because you've ridden my a%& in the past about not posting enough. 

If you've changed your mind, forgotten my number, forgotten my NAME or just decided that reading anything on the internet is a complete waste of time, please shoot me an email to "opt out" and I'll take you off my very long email list. Really its very long. I have a lot of readers and am very important. 

By the way, if you do want to "opt out", you won't hurt my feelings, so go ahead. Let me know. I can take it. Now's your chance. You've got about 12-24 hours before I press on, full speed ahead, so don't say I didn't warn you.

My Review of Fisher Price Imaginext Spike, the Ultra Dinosaur

Originally submitted at Toys R Us

He walks, he blinks, he growls: he's Spike, the Ultra Dinosaur! This remote-controlled robot dinosaur comes to life with the touch of a button. With the easy-to-use remote control, kids can make him stand on his hind legs, walk forward and turn right and left, open his mouth, and lie down. He ...

Fisher Price Imaginext Spike, the Ultra Dinosaur

I Was Surprised

By Harrison's Mom from Dallas, TX on 12/5/2008

 

5out of 5

Pros: Realistic Movement, Multiple Functions, Easy to Control

Best Uses: Young Children

Describe Yourself: Education Oriented, Parent Of Two Or More Children, Working Parent

This was a grandparent gift for my son's 4th birthday. I honestly thought he would think it was cool for 5 seconds and get bored with it. I couldn't have been more wrong. He treats it like a pet and he's made a bed for it and he's given it a personality - who it likes, who it doesn't like, who it wants to bite, whether it wants its teeth brushed or not, etc.
The remote control is perfect for little hands and very easy to use. Its not so great for big hands. Really, people with big hands should stay away from this delicate plastic machinery and NOT make it chase your spouse, significant other, mother in law down the hallway threatening to have your left butt cheek for lunch. The rechargeable battery is nice and it does shut off automatically after a few minutes of inactivity (he starts to snore as he nods off to "sleep", or was that Jason when he was sick? I'll need to run a test of the "snoring" again. I think it snores.) to save battery life.
Though I never would have forked over the money for this gift, it does make a great grandparent gift if you're looking for the perfect wow present and a way to outdo the other grandparents. :)

(legalese)

The Biggest Waste of Time

I'm sitting at the kitchen table, toggling between IM chatter, creating a sales presentation for a client and periodically checking my email, all the while I really have to go to the bathroom (#1, not #2 sickos), but can't seem to find a synchronous spot in my multitasking to break away.

I am dancing in my seat to music that doesn't exist. When I realize I look just like Harrison did about 3 hours earlier while he played with this toys on the floor, I put my grown up hat on and just go to the bathroom.

I sit down and I notice the very large mound of toilet paper that has been unwound from the roll and is lying in a heap on the ground just below the roll, held securely to the roll by several squares. I begin to reroll the toilet paper because its nearly a whole damn roll and as I'm re-rolling nearly an ENTIRE roll of toilet paper back onto the holder, I realize......

....this is the biggest waste of time ever. I have just lost 30 seconds of my life that I will never get back to save .75.

Wow.

My Latest Wo-mance

A coworker sent this link to me (click on the title) and I love this woman. 

Such a way with words.......

I think I should check my husband's trunk.

Not Rated E

Last week I received this comment about my blog from my good friend, Jennifer, "Oh my...almost peed myself reading your blogs...you are a great writer....very funny Cori! Love it!" (Sorry, Jen, for not obtaining your consent for the use of your comment as a blog testimonial, but well, these things just come to me and I gotta roll with it. I'll take it off if you really want to be a prude about it.)

Anyway, when I started this thing a couple of years ago, I had no idea I would develop a very short list of readers who actually email me looking for new material to read. The key to this post is that while the list is in fact, very short, these people get me and they encourage me to keep going. 

I really try not to offend people in my posts, but I do acknowledge that how I see (and write) things is not for everyone. While most of my posts do end up being about the boys, I try to twist it in a way that makes even people without kids want to read it, so its not just sappy mom speak that only my mother and me would appreciate. Who wants to read that crap?

I've been told I should be a writer and I have to admit I have contemplated the concept, fully knowing that NO ONE would really pay MONEY to read my thoughts, but its nevertheless a thought I haven't thrown out with the stinky garbage (just placed on a pile of "to look at later" material).  When my company launched a new corporate website, fully loaded with a blog that all employees were supposed to contribute to, I thought, well, I can do this.

So, I've written two posts, that remain as drafts, unpublished and now dusty. The first I tried to make it relevant to marketers and serious and professional and businesslike (even though we are promoting a new internal "antiboredom campaign"). The second, I wrote more like me, rants about my experiences as a consumer, but that too sits on the shelf. 

I try not to let it get to me, especially when comments like Jen's come through. It just makes me realize that I am not rated E (for everyone) and I don't really want to be.

Dr. Jake & Mr. Happy, Hug My Peet & Other Weekend Tidbits

Jake is a fantastic kid - smart, sweet, creative, quiet and imaginative. He has lots of friends and never seems to have trouble socializing in many kid friendly environments. This is why I was surprised to walk into El Fenix on Wednesday "enchilada night" and found Jake clinging in fear to Jason's leg, while he Jason and Harrison waited for our table. He only parted himself from Jason enough to move toward gripping my hips and hiding behind me. When I turned around to ask him what was wrong, his wide eyes would only look down until I forced him to look at me, and then he'd just look around me at the other groups of people waiting for their tables. He was very adamant that everyone was looking at him and it scared him. We only waited about five minutes before we had him secured in a booth, but he was so bothered by his trauma in the lobby that he wouldn't even eat. I had a hard time understanding this was the same kid who just the day before was leading his friends in pool races and fell down in silliness with his tongue hanging out when he got hit with a beach ball. Tonight Jake had Harrison laughing on the potty while he pretended to be a dog who kept running into the wall. Then he moved on to a new audience (Jason and me) while he threw his dirty socks in his closet, one at a time and said "score" both times. Jason and I laughed, both of us thinking, "where does he get this stuff?"

We know where Jake gets his potty mouth - definitely his mom. Yes, I'll admit it. I don't do much to filter my language around the kids. I'm trying to improve that parental failure, but we socialize so much at the house unexpectedly, it just comes out. I know, I know, bad excuse. So, this weekend when Jake was trying to turn the television on and couldn't do it, he blurted out, "This damn tv won't turn on." Jason corrected his colorful choice of words.....and then reminded me that "the boys are listening."

Harrison is a boy with spunk. He does his own thing and follows his own rules, which I keep trying to replace with my rules, but he's feisty and I dig it, because he's well, a mini me of me. Most of the time his energy is a Harrison-ized version of Jake's imagination, but sometimes he comes up with things on his own that make Jason and me look at each other in disbelief that he is really only 3 years old.  This afternoon we were all by the pool and someone wanted juice. Jason sent Harrison into the house to get juiceboxes for everyone. He didn't say how many, but just to get them. I was shocked when Harrison came out with 4 juices. I'm not claiming this makes him a genius or even on par with his peers, but it sure surprised me that he came out with 4 all at one time. I would have expected him to come out with two, hand them out and then realize he needed two more. Perhaps I don't give him enough credit. 

Then, on a lighter note, tonight at bedtime, Jason and I told the kids good night. We hugged, kissed and tucked Jake into bed and then moved over to Harrison. While Jake was lying head on pillow and body under covers, Harrison was lying on his back, crosswise on his bed with his legs in the air and he demanded that Jason and I give him "peet (feet) hugs" and "peet kisses". Then he wanted no covers and would not lie his head down on his pillow. His own rules......

My house

Its Saturday, 9:37am. 

I am sitting on my very very comfortable couch, laptop in lap, jammies on listening to my house.

The boys are upstairs playing. Nicely I can only assume by the occasional scream of excitement that escapes Harrison from time to time. Don't hear anything from Jake, but he's likely doing something to squeeze those screams out of Harrison.

When I started this, Jason was asleep and the house was otherwise quiet. Now, he's in the kitchen, running water for coffee, banging cups together while his barefeet slap slap slap on the wood floors. He clears his throat. Puts the unused coffee grounds back in the fridge and takes a long swig straight from the opened gatorade bottle he started yesterday. He is in his "sexy" blue satin boxer shorts that at some point had light silver hula girls on it, but through many washings they are simply blue boxer shorts. The hula girls have gone. Closer inspection from the couch reveals that they are also, in fact, inside out. He calls them "sexy". There's nothing sexy about his junk swaying unrestricted all over the kitchen. More clothes please. Please! On he goes to get in the shower.

(Harrison is laughing a deep throaty laugh that make you want to check on him to make sure he's breathing ok.)

Behind me, outside I can hear hammering of nails to wood on a house that is being built behind me.

The coffee maker gurgles. Steam. More gurgles. I smell my morning cup in production.

"Dad-dy," Harrison comes down the stairs and whines. Back to laughing. 

The world is right again.

Harrison Columbus Discovers A New World

Harrison and Jake are great brothers, but as any parent of multiple children will tell you, no two siblings are alike. 

Jake is sweet and gentle. Harrison is aggressive and rough. 

Jake is artistic. Harrison is technology savvy. 

Jake never played with himself unless he was "holding it" from going potty. Harrison has been playing with himself since he was an infant. Anytime his diaper was off, his hand went south. Sitting in the tub, he'd have one hand on himself and the other on a toy. He especially likes wearing underwear now because he can get a hold of it now whenever he wants it and its usually so often, I think he has to go potty all day and is "holding it" like Jake did. 

Nope. He just likes to make sure its still there.

Recently after a bath, though, he explored a little further into the Old World and discovered a New World. I dried him off in his bedroom and scrounged in his closet for jammies. Then I knelt down to help him get dressed. He was squeezing and twisting and moving his junk around so much and then began to look up at the ceiling in deep thought. "Mama, this is my penis," Harrison reminds me. "Yes, buddy, that is your penis," I say to enforce that I heard him correctly. Still looking up at the ceiling he says, "Mama, there's um, there's BALLS in there!" "Yes," I say through giggles, "there ARE balls in there. Now go tell Daddy what you found. I think he would like to know about your discovery."

Summon the Troops

The time is coming.

They are coming. 

We don't know how many or who they are, but it will be big.

Big driveway is coming soon. 

Kenny arrives on Saturday, March 29th from the Philippines.

Luke's arrival is imminent from Iraq outprocessing.

JJ is here from Pennsylvania and waiting.

The rest are waiting for the call. The call to action. The call to arrive.

iLove iPhone

I'm sitting here blogging, while watching Jay Leno's "headlines" and an iPhone commercial came on. 

I don't care how often I've seen the commercial, everytime an iPhone commercial comes on, I have to watch it from beginning to end. Its just a fascinating piece of technology.

I turned to Jason when the commercial was over and said, "I wonder how hard it is for people with fat fingers to use an iPhone. Wouldn't it get frustrating trying to push the little buttons if your fingers are fat? You know you would probably consistently push the wrong buttons by mistake."

Jason simply smiles and says, "Guess you won't be getting an iPhone."