ANTHONY TURNS 4

To my Anthony Thomas:

Last night, as we sat at the table coloring I asked you how old you were going to be tomorrow. To which you responded:

"I will be 'fow' Momma. And then comes five, and then comes one, then two, then 'free'..."

"Well, what if I don't want you to be four? What if I want you to still be three?"

"I have to grow Momma."

"But you are growing up too fast!"

After this comment, you gave a big sigh, looked up at me quite seriously and said:

"I want to grow."

"Why?"

"Because then I can be a Momma and a teacha. [teacher]"

You promptly went back to coloring your picture, which told me you were done with our little talk.

I sat giggling a bit, thinking of how sweet our conversation was. How sweet it was to hear you give your reasons as to why you wanted to grow up. How sweet it was to hear you count and get a bit mixed up, and to hear you mispronounce the same words you always seem to mispronounce. All of it was just so sweet.

I thought of how little moments, little conversations like these, are a part of every one of my days with you. Something that I very much look forward to. I know that these moments will soon end, as before I know it you will be counting to 100 without a second thought, pronouncing all of your words correctly, writing your name, tying your shoes, and doing all those things that you are just now practicing and slowly beginning to master.

I guess this is all just a part of you growing up. A part that your Momma has such a hard time with. But I must get over it, as like you said - you want to grow up and you have to grow up so that you can be a Momma and a teacher.

As much as I wish you could stay 4 forever and ever - I do have to say that I am so happy that you are growing, learning new things every day and becoming such a wonderful, giving, sweet little boy. I so look forward to you now being 'fow', then five, then one, then two, then 'free'.....

Happy, happy birthday. Momma "loves you to the moon, the sun, the stars, and everything else" my Anthony Thomas.

MY READING WHIZ

Lucas just came running in the house quite excited after getting off of the bus from school. He was clutching a notebook of some sort exclaiming "I won Mom, I won!"

Wondering what he had won, I decided to ask the ever obvious question: " Well, what did you win?"

"I was the best reader in our class, so I won a notebook and two coupons. One for a free ice cream cone at DQ and one for a free kids meal at Leo's!"

"Wow, that is just gr-"

" I want to go to Dairy Queen right now Mom!"

"Well, hold on, tell me more about how you won. I am so proud of you for doing such a great job reading at school, I am sure your tea-"

"I just read a lot and won, that's all. Now can we go to Dairy Queen?"

Turns out he really does not much care about how proud he should be for being the only one in his class to win this prize because of his reading skills. The only things that seems to matter is that coupon for a free ice cream cone [worth $1.25]. And I am thinking that this coupon will consume his thoughts until I get around to being able to take him there - actually, I am certain of it. Maybe we can hold off on that chat about being proud of himself and all that jazz until he has his ice cream cone in hand.

LUCKY GIRL....

The other day I found myself surprisingly full of energy. The kind of energy that makes you feel like cleaning the house from top to bottom, getting dinner prepared early, making a dessert, and cleaning out cabinets to boot. All before lunch time.

You can imagine getting all of this done results in not spending so much time with the kids. Alright, I must admit I was so busy I was trying to stall their requests to play Sorry, Star Wars guys, and to color by simply saying "hold on", or "one more minute" (which generally means about an hour).

Anthony finally gave up and decided to entertain himself in the playroom, but little Miss Liv is not quite old enough to do so, and was starting to get very frustrated with the lack of attention she was receiving. So much so that she was lying on the floor, at my feet throwing a tempter tantrum by the time I got to mixing up my batch of Godiva Brownies. I could not stand the thought of stopping and not getting to taste the deliciousness of this heavenly treat; so I decided to plop her in her highchair and let her have at the chocolate covered spoon.

And boy did that ever stop that tantrum of hers in its tracks. She sat quiet happily for 20 minutes licking away at that spoon. Now who would have thought she would have enjoyed that so much?

LIVS INTERNAL DIALOGUE ON THE EXPERIENCE:

Hey, what is this? It sure tastes pretty darn good....

Oops! I lost a little bit on my belly, looks like I will have to scoop it back up....

Whew, got it! I can't believe Momma gave me all this chocolate for myself, I just can't contain my happiness....

Oh goodness - in all of my excitement I did not realize how messy I was getting. It is all over my hands and arms....

Better lick my lips....

I can't get over how great this is!!

What? Why are you looking at me like that Momma?

What do you mean it is all gone???

Oh, I am so sad. I guess it was fun while it lasted, right?

It is a shame that I don't have spoons drenched in chocolate goodness laying around every time I need to get things done around the house, isn't it.

SAVING UP - ONE PENNY AT A TIME

Last week, I noticed a lull in the usual crazy loud action that is usually consuming this house and wondered what was going on. I decided to go in search of the kids to see what they were in to, as most often when it gets that quiet they are doing something they shouldn't.

I was successful in finding them in the playroom as a last ditch effort after looking everywhere else. They were all huddled in a circle in deep conversation. It seemed as if they were discussing something quite serious, so I thought I would stay back and see if I could not overhear some of what they were saying. I find that their little personal conversations (where they think I am not listening) are most often some classics. I managed to make out "let's all out our money together!" "Yah, that is a good idea, then we can get it sooner!" and " I don't know if I want to share my money." "But Anthony, it will be good, then we can all have a trampoline this summer."

And that is where it all came together. They had decided that they wanted a trampoline for the backyard, and that they were going to purchase it all by themselves by pooling all of their money together. I walked away from the door giggling, thinking how very sweet it was that they were coming up with a plan as a team in order for them to get something they all wanted.

So I sat down at my computer to do some work and waited. I waited for them to finish up their planning and come running to me in excitement to tell me all about it. It only took a few minutes for them to do just that. They quickly told me their plan, all of them talking at the same time barely able to contain their excitement. Ava even went as far as to say she would chip in her Target gift card, which she thinks is a credit card that can be used anywhere for anything.

After the explaining was done, they quickly asked for me to get all of their piggy banks down so that they were able to put all their money together. I obliged, gave them their piggy banks, and a large pot for them to store all of their money in as well. They sat in a circle for sometime shaking the living daylights out of those poor things in order to get every last cent out of them. They talked about their plan, about how fun it was going to be to have their very own trampoline, about how big it would be, and who they were going to let jump on it.... Then came the question I was waiting for. The question I knew was going to come, yet did not know how to answer: "Hey Mom, can we count our money? Do you think we have enough yet for our trampoline?"

Argh. I knew for certain they were not even close to having enough money for that trampoline now, and I knew they would not have enough by summer either. Problem was I did not have the heart to tell them that. They were working so well together as siblings, and were so proud of themselves for coming up with a plan of action in order to get the trampoline all by themselves. How could I tell them they would not have enough money by this summer, or frankly, by next summer either? They don't get that trampolines are expensive. And if you want to get a higher end, safe one, (which I do) they are even more expensive.

So what did I tell them? I said that I did not know if they would have enough by summer, but if they saved every penny and worked really hard around the house doing chores the next few months they might get close. And I also added that maybe, just maybe, if they asked Daddy really nice, he might just chip in a little (meaning a lot) to make it happen.

They seemed content with this answer and went back to shaking their piggy banks and daydreaming about that trampoline. I went back to working on my computer in the hopes that Daddy would indeed come through; as I sort of already told the kids he would. Oops!

LEARNING TO SKATE

On Saturday, the boys had their very first "learn to skate" class over at the local indoor ice rink. They both are anxious to start playing hockey (lord help us), but before they can start hockey classes they must take some basic skating classes in order for them to become more comfortable on the ice rink.

Anyway, before they went to their first class I emailed the skating director to see what they were supposed to wear. I know, it sounds weird, but I was floundering between sending them all bundled up in snowpants, jackets, hats and mittens, and sending them a little less bogged down wearing long underwear, sweatpants, sweatshirt, hat and light mittens. Details, details.

Quite promptly, I received an email in return stating that it was best to send them in snowpants all bundled up as they would be falling quite a bit while they were learning. She also mentioned that some parents chose to have their kids wear helmets.

A little background on my thoughts on helmets, knee pads, elbow pads, body armor, etc. for kids for such things as ice skating, riding bikes, riding scooters: I think they are ridiculous. When I was a kid I fell more times than I can count when I was riding my bike, playing outside with friends, ice skating, rollerblading and anything else you can think of. I fell, and I turned out just fine. Yes, I had bruises, bumps, and skinned knees, but that ia all a part of being a kid. To cover your child from head to toe in "protective gear" only seems to hinder them in learning the task at hand. At least in my opinion.

Alright, getting off my soapbox on helmets and back to the story.

So like I said, she mentioned some parents choose to put helmets on their kids. My thoughts? I am sure you can imagine. Hah! Helmets? Now why would I put my child in a helmet when all he was doing was slowly skating around the rink with an adult, learning how to skate. No hockey stick. No puck. No need for a Helmet. Right?

Needless to say, I did not buy the boys helmets, and they took off Saturday morning with Dad to have their very first skating lesson. About 5 minutes after 10am I received a text from the Mr. "Check your email" was all it said. So I checked my email and found an email that said. "Where is my helmet Mom? We are bad parents." Uh-oh. I hesitantly opened the file that was attached and found this.

Apparently he was on the ice rink no more than 2 minutes before he had fallen flat on his face. Apparently the ice at indoor rinks is a lot slicker than the ice at the outdoor rinks as they have that big zamboni thing that drives around in an effort to make said ice as smooth as a babies butt. Apparently this zambony things works well, very well. Apparently almost all the parents had their kids in helmets that morning at the ice rink. Apparently we did look like bad parents.

Anthony came home after class, weepy and saying he never wanted to go back there again unless he had a helmet. I admit, this sort of broke my heart.

Daddy took him out this week. $70 later, he has a hockey helmet, and is excited as ever to get back to that ice rink and learn how to skate. It was worth every penny.

I can say that I will never be one of those parents that covers their child from head to toe in protective gear in order to go out in the cul-de-sac to ride their bike; but I guess in this instance, a helmet was a good thing for Anthony to learn how to skate. You live, you learn, right?

DID I TELL YOU TODAY WAS A BIT CRAZY?

The kids were nothing short of wild today. Like bouncing off the walls-screaming-running around the house-crazy type of wild. I won't go into details as to why it was so crazy, so you can just trust me. It was.

Needless to say, bedtime could not come soon enough. So I cheated a bit on the time, and at the ever so late hour of 5:30pm I yelled my nightly it's-getting-close-to-bedtime-warning "Jammie time!!" The kids happily and crazily came running for their pajamas and made their way to the family room to get dressed. [As a side note, I have to say that it is nice the kids do not know how to tell time yet, 'cause if they did I am sure there would have been an argument over why they were getting ready for bed so darn early.]

Anyway, they all got their jammies on successfully, but I must say it was not with much speed, and it was not without a bit of the "crazy" I had mentioned above. They even decided to spice things up a bit and mixed in a little wrestling and rolling about on the ground. Heck, why not - right?

I made my way to the changing table to get Olivia's diaper changed and jammies on as they went about their business. After finishing, I put Liv down to go join the crazy's in the other room while I cleaned up. A minute or two passed, and suddenly I noticed it had gotten quiet. Very quiet, except for some giggling. I rounded the corner into the kitchen and found this:

Ava and Lucas with their pants pulled up so far I don't see how that could not be aiding in giving them a permanent snuggy, Anthony with his pull up on the outside of his pajamas, and if you look real close, you will see Olivia in the background standing on a chair in the middle of the kitchen. Rocking back and forth on the chair, just asking to fall face first onto the floor.

As a special treat, I decided to add a close up of Anthony (pull up on over the pajamas) in all his glory.

Just a glimpse at the crazy going on around the Shelton house today.

LOAFING AROUND

Let's just say I have been nothing short of lazy as of late. I like to blame it on this pregnancy as it makes me feel a little less lazy. Really, things have been getting a bit out of control around here. Some examples of my pregnancy induced laziness? Getting the kids on the bus and planting my butt on the couch (remote in hand) and proceeding to watch Tivo'ed shows all day long. Being tired all the time and lacking any sort of ambition to get anything productive done around here. Not wanting to cook a decent meal and resorting to chicken tenders, frozen pizza, PB&J's and grilled cheese every night of the week. Yes, it has been that bad - and this is just a sampling of examples - sadly, there are many, many more.

But for some reason this morning I got a bug up my butt to get some cleaning done. I vacuumed, emptied the dishwasher, did a few loads of laundry, and even cleaned the toilet. Now I realize this is nothing over the top, or anything that would really get my house truly clean. But it appears to be clean, and for me, at this point in my life, that is good enough.

As I was finishing up my vacuuming, cleaning and feeling good about having my butt unglued from the couch (at least for the time being), I found this:

Yes, that is Olivia, my 20 month old, laying on the couch, remote in hand....

Channel surfing in an attempt to find Dora.

Like Mother like Daughter I guess - and in this instance, I can say I am not very proud. No, not proud at all. I am thinking I may have to give up this lazy life I have been leading lately and get back to the daily grind.