Day 341 - Bird Bath Project

For several weeks Samson and I have been talking about building our own birdbath.  This came about largely because I am overly thrifty (cheap) and refuse to pay $100+ for some slab of concrete that the birds are going to splash and poop in.  So I researched and with help from the neighbor were ready to embark on this project with my excited 7 year old who loves birds and projects that are messy.  Five minutes before our start, the Amazon guy pulls into the driveway to deliver a lego Jedi Interceptor.  Needless to say, all interest in birdbath project was gone.  I did it without kids.  Then this morning I was in Samson's class and got a look at his journal entry.  It talked about his lego ship and how excited he was and finally said how proud he was of himself because he built it all alone because his mommy was out building a bird bath.  I can take this two ways.  I can assume the teacher now thinks I am a freak for buiding my own bird bath and feel guilty that my child had to put this lego thing together by himself or I can pat myself on the back for allowing Samson the freedom to really test his full lego building potential without me looking over his shoulder.  I'm going to go with pat on my back.  Now, the real question is will we end up with two bird baths because when I unveil my creation in two days the boys will clearly think it is so cool they want to make one!

Day 340 - The ultimate threat

I stayed up way too late last night getting out the kids summer clothes and swaping them out for the winter ones.  Based on past likes/dislikes witgh clothing, I made piles of clothes for them to put away.  Lukas had a bunch of t-shirts handed down (I think he is the 4th kid to wear most of them).  Samson historically does not like shirts with stuff printed on them, so he had 4-5 new t-shirts right out of the package.  So, although this is the way it has always been for several years, Lukas was screaming because he did not have any new clothes and Samson was screaming because he didn't have any cool t-shirts with Star Wars or Ninjago printed on them!  I stayed calm and with blinding speed told them both that if they did not like what they had, they could come shopping with me next week.  Suddenly everyone was happy! (for a few minutes until Samson asked why we couldn't just buy it all on Amazon prime).

Day 339 - What?

Was on the phone with my parents the other morning and telling them that I was already worn out.  They both laughed and said insinuated that it was my own fault because I play too much with my kids and now the expect it.  Wait a minute.  This is my parents saying this?  Did you not play with me?  Did you just send me outside to face the world on my own while you read the Sunday morning paper in peace?  I thought I was supposed to want to hang out with my kids.  I was shocked beyond words.  Then it occured to me....when you only get a couple of hours a day with your kids (working mom), their is an incredible amount of guilt when you are attempting to fix dinner and one of them says "Mommy will you please play  with me."  Guess now that I am home and spend most of their waking hours with them (at least in Lukie's case) I still have not gotten over that guilt.  Plus my kids are pretty darn cool.

Day 338 - So much for the environment

Thought we were being all clean and green last year when we gave up our yard service and bought out own electric battery powered lawn mower.  Actually giving up the yard service was more a decision based on my employment status vs enviro. friendly, but we certainly bought an electric battery powered over a gasoline mower for environmental reasons (or so we thought).  Very quiet, works well, easy to move around, not bad for the environment.  That was last year.  OK, it is still quiet, easy to move around and not giving off the biproducts of burning gasoline into the air, but currding the yard yesterday it died halfway claiming a low battery charge.  This thing has been sitting around charging in my garage for an entire week and it can't finish mowming my postage stamp yard.  No, I think the thing is malfunctioning and that we were suckers to pay to much extra money for it!  And I even like to mow the grass!  So I was able to mow my grass for a year with this thing without it acting up.  I wonder which is worse from a "green" perspective:  1) using a gasoline mower or 2) every two years having to throw my electric mower away because the crappy thing is too delicate and breaks when the grass is damp or too hard to mow?

Day 337 - Happy Mother's Day?

Hubby is flying to London in the early morning hours of Mother's Day, so for Mother's Day what I am really  getting is a week alone with by boys.  Part of this is good (cereal or pancakes for dinner and baths every 4 days rather than every two), but some is bad (nobody to do the dishes or distract them or talk to over the age of 7).  So when Doug asked "what should we do for Mother's Day," I quickly responded with "Take me to London of course."  I quickly came to my senses and realized this is not possible, I thought about it and decided I would go treat myself to a mani/pedi on Saturday before.  When I mentioned this Doug said, "Oh, well I need to get my bike ride in that morning."  He than asked if I had mailed a card to his mom.  No, she is not my mom and you saw her/gave her a gift in person earlier this week.  "No, I still need to get her a card."  So while I am getting your mom a card I might as well get one for myself (and let the boys sign it) and I'll get myself some flowers while I am at it!  At least they are not making me take them to a Civil War reenactment or the Air and Space Museum (again).

Day 336 - Its getting hot in here.

I do not feel it is my responsibility to physically dress my 5 and 7 year olds.  Rather I prefer to give them some basic guidance like "that looks really silly" or "everyone will make fun of you if you wear that".  Since I consider myself anything but a fashion expert (unless you consider t-shirts and Tevas high fashion of course), I do not actually give opinions or advice on how the boys dress.  It is one area I feel I can give them some freedom or control over their daily lives, but I do like to give strong suggestions when it comes to comfort and temperatures.  This seems only reasonable as I am the one who has unfettered access to TV and internet which provide a neverending (and about 1/2 the time actually correct) weather forcast.  So, when I tell Lukas that it is going to be 85 out and he needs to wear short sleeves and shorts, but he refuses and chooses to go to school in sweatpants and a long sleeved shirt, I feel my responsibilty as a parent has been fulfilled and some things just have to be learned the hard (and sweaty) way. Of course it got to 84 that day and of course based on our converstation Lukas refused to admit defeat and wore his sweaty little outfit all day on the playground and to the park, but he did not complain once (you have to admire that kind of stubbornness a little).  I did notice today he at least wore short sleeves.  Would it really hurt you so much to admit that Mommy was right?  Yes, apparently it would.

Day 331-335 - Computer Down Hard

Lukas was having his evening screen time the other night when he suddenly closed the lid to the laptop shutting down the movie he was watching.  I found this a little strange as 1) nobody had to tell him once, much less 10-20 times that his allotted time was up and 2) his time was not actually up and Lukie ending a screen session early is close to witnessing a miracle.  So I just asked Lukie why he turned it off and he shyly said it had just turned off on its own. This had me suspicious, so I a few more probing questions, but got the same type of answer about the show not being over, but it just turning off on its own.  Now I'm not saying I don't trust my kid, but I know Lukie well enough to know that if the computer had mysteriously shut down during the middle of his movie he would NEVER have calmly closed the laptop and moved on.  He would have screamed at the computer and anyone within a 10 feet radius that we were destroying his life because the stupid movie was off.  So in my doubt I opened the laptop to find milk spilled across the keyboard and a very guilty looking Lukie.  In fairness, the computer had been overheating anyway and the milk was probably just a good excuse for the thing to officially shut down (or fry the motherboard whatever that means).  So, sadly it has taken me 5 days to figure out how to access this page without the link that was on the laptop.  Parenting lesson - no before bed bowls of cereal should be eaten at the laptop.  In fact, maybe the laptop should be kept in a room other than the kitchen? Just a thought.