Mission Im-poo-sible

It all started with my cute little child toddling up to me and pointing to his butt and saying "Poo? Poo?" Thats his cute little alarm going off, telling me he stinks and requires my immediate attention. I threw him over my shoulder like I always do when I head to the nursery to change his diaper and laid him down on the changing table.
I have to do everything short of hog tying him to keep his hands out of his own doo, so we are wrestling and I get the dirty diaper off and think I have him cleaned up and then when I lift his legs up to put the new diaper on, I see a whole new mess now being ground into the changing table cover and up his back.
ACK!
I pick him up and clean him and set him down to run naked for a minute while I clean up the mess on the table. No sooner had I stripped the changing pad cover when my 4 year old comes down the hallway.
"Mommy! What is this? What did he do?? What is this?"
And I see my son in the doorway with BOTH of his hands covered in poop. It looked like he had been fingerpainting.
I gasped in horror and told him "DONT MOVE!" and grabbed his arms and guided him straight to the sink and as Im scrubbing his hands, he is explaining that theres more on the floor and on his baby brothers car in the living room.
Really? How the hell did this happen? There was no indication that the diaper boarders had been breached. No smears down the leg, no doo on the top of his shorts.
I went out into the living room and sure as shit (pun intended) there's a glob of doo dripping down the side of a toy car and another little dollop on the ground.
I cleaned up the mess and kept trying to figure out what exactly just went down.
Im still baffled.

Stiff drink please.

"Mommy, where did Daddy go?"
"He went to get himself a sandwich."
"But where?"
"He went to a place called Subway."
"Where?"
"SUBWAY."
"Is it called Chilis?"
"No, its called SUUUUUUUBWAAAAAAAAY."
"Do they have cannon balls?"
"No"
"I wish I had a cannon ball."

(Me too son, Id drop it on my head about now. It would be less painful than this conversation.)

How to Build a Bomb

Heres all you need:
1. A hot ass day
2. One small family room equipped with substandard air conditioning
3. Two small wired and bored children
4. Remove one father who is on the lake with a friend in a brand new ski boat and add one grumpy mom who is jealous and hating on removed father.
5. Throw in one toy that both kids want
AND RUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Mighty (long) Wind

Today we picked up my husband from the airport, and on the way my 4 year old asked me, "Mommy, why do cars have horns?"
My first thought was "It gets the attention of the a-hole who just cut me off so I can flip him the bird."
But seeing as how this was a small child (who I just finished writing about his innocence) I decided on a more appropriate answer. I explained that horns are good for alerting someone when they accidentally drive too close. I added that its also good for when the light turns green but the person in front of you isnt paying attention and wont move. You can honk the horn and let them know the light turned green and they need to get going.
He was quiet for a second and then said "That was a really long story."

Thanks, son.

After we picked my husband up, I told him what our son said about my not-long-at-all-thank-you-very-much explanation of the use of horns, and he looks back at him and says "Get used to it, son. She's got all kinds of long stories to tell you."

Thanks, honey.
Grumble.
Yo! Ive got something to show you! *whack!*

Forgive me while I get mushy

I was sitting here this afternoon listening to my son explain to me how mixing apple juice with orange juice will turn it into cherry limeade and as often happens when his stories spin out of control and he begins to lose his direction and start making up words, I wandered deep into my head.
I was watching his grand gestures and big eyes trying hard to convince me to let him mix the juice together and I couldnt help but admire his innocence. He is nothing more than a kid. He cant see beyond the moment he is in.
Whereas Ive watched more CNN and Nancy Grace than any human ever should, he knows only that Mickey Mouse can solve any problem with his Mouseketools. He gets excited when junk mail comes in that has a sticker inside. It could be a ladybug sticker, or it could be a free magazine offer sticker, but if it sticks, then its a present from the mailman worthy of an excited smile. Simple things like eating lunch in the backyard and decorating a card for Daddy are done with such happiness.
Im the over informed grumpy parent whose job it is to protect her offspring, and foresee any potential dangers that lurk with every move we make. My offspring however leap without looking and go headfirst into any and everything with out a care in the world.
Its really a neat thing to watch. I admire him for that.
And more than ever want to get that human sized hamster ball to keep him in forever so he will always make cherry limeade out of apple juice.

More lunchtime chit chat

(My 4 year old is observing me addressing my youngest who just chucked his pizza onto the floor)
"Honey, please don't throw your food."
"Why did you just call him honey?"
"I call all of you honey. I call you honey, I call him honey and I call Daddy honey."
"You do not call Daddy honey!"
"I don't?"
"No! You say 'Yo!' and he says 'What do you want?' and then you say 'Come here I want to show you something!'"

At this point I'm envisioning myself sitting on the couch with a beer in one hand and a big stick in the other.
Yo! I wanna show you something!....WHACK!


*For the record, I do not call out to my husband by yelling "Yo." So if you too had envisioned me sitting on the couch with a big stick and had your phone in hand with the C and the P already dialed and just waiting to finish reading this before dialing the S, be rest assured that is not how it is. I don't even own a big stick.

Aint No Mountain High Enough....

My son threw me a curve ball this evening when he asked me, "Can you, uh.....pee on a mountain?"
Sure thing. Right after I get done defecating on that bird over there I'll go tinkle on a hillside. Anything for my baby.

Would you like a megaphone and an airhorn next time?

I'm sure my neighbors appreciate that my husband leaves the bathroom window open all the time, so they can enjoy such wonderful mother/son moments like this one:

Mooooooommy! I'm done pooooooping!!
(ok, I'm on my way.)
I SAID I'M DONE POOPING!!!!
(I heard you. Stop yelling!)
WAIT!! I'M NOT DONE. I'M STILL POOPING!
(#$%&)
Why'd you say that bad word?........I'm done pooping now.

School Supplies

Army fatigues? Check.
War paint for face? Check.
Hard hat with little branches stuck to the top? Check.
High powered binoculars? Check.
Wire tap? Check.
Plausible story to give to police officer after I'm detained for hiding in the bushes outside my 4 year olds preschool class? Check.
Bail money for when the reason doesn't fly and contact number for my husband to pick up my 18 month old after I'm arrested. Check & check.

And you all thought I'd have a hard time with my child starting school. This is a cinch. Just takes a little planning.

Note to my 4 year old

My child. My wirey, cute, spaz ass monkey. Trust me when I say this: You will not spontaneously combust, implode, melt, drop like a fly or cease to be if you stop talking for one minute. It just wont happen. In fact there is a whole plethora of wondrous things to be gained by your ever elusive silence. Like a properly finished phone call, a complete episode of Friends watched without resorting to reading lips and maybe just maybe a small break for a little mind who is obviously overworked trying to come up with such witty things as 'do cars drive on wiggly waggly garbage roads?' and 'look at me I'm sitting upside down' or my favorite ' can you poop on a chicken?'
So please, dont hurt yourself trying to fill up each and every waking moment with sound.
I never have and will never be able to poop on a chicken. Let me get that out there on the record. Pooping on poultry. Not gonna happen. Ever.
I have already seen you sit upside down. Its great. You've got the trick mastered.
Im not sure why you think your toes are crying, and singing about poop doesn't make poop cute.
You know whats really cute though. Seeing your beautiful face smiling at me and winking.
Oh and your mouth is closed. Thats priceless.
I love you.
~Mom

Would you like seconds?

Im not a very good cook. Im not bad, but I would never host a dinner party.
My area of specialty is casseroles. Anything that calls for a can of cream of mushroom or cream of chicken soup. My poor husband is a meat and potatoes sort of man. I have prepared countless rubber pot roasts, flavorless meatloaves and dehydrated chicken dishes trying to appease him. But sadly I always retreat back to my safe haven of casseroles and what he lovingly refers to as "slop dishes".
Slop would be anything without a formal title that is prepared in one skillet. ;)
So in an effort to end the moans and groans, I flipped through my Rachel Ray magazine and found a recipe that sounded good and had no "cream of...." listed in the ingredients. And it was a 30 minute meal! Score!! That meal was a great success and my husband came home from work and sat right down and devoured it with a smile on his face. (He doesn't smile when he eats the slop dishes, rather sits somewhat resigned with his shoulders slouched. Its quite pitiful.)
Feeling a renewed sense of hope for my culinary abilities I pressed on and looked for more delightful creations. I found a recipe on line for a cabbage stew that sounded pretty good. It had beer in it. Cant go wrong with beer, right?
Here's where things get tricky. If the ingredients aren't specific and leave room for interpretation my mind is automatically wired to make the worst possible choice. I don't do well on my own in the kitchen. I need Chefboyardee or Betty Crocker to hold my hand through each step of the process.
Recipe just says "beer". Doesn't say what brand. Doesn't even specify if it needs to be light or dark.
So I took what could have been a pretty tasty cabbage stew with potatoes, and added a bottle of Guinness and turned it into a pot of vile crud that not even Farmer John would toss to his pigs.
Damn. Strike one. I had Coco Puffs for dinner that night.
The very next day, I found a recipe for Slow Cooker Short Ribs. I carefully put in a whole slew of tasty spices and things and then breaded and browned the short ribs and set them on low to simmer all day.
Come dinner time, I open the crock pot and to my horror I see a huge pile of overly breaded and now slimy looking ribs that do not taste like ANY of the ingredients I put in there. So not only are they incredibly unattractive to look at and have the feel of waterlogged fried chicken, they also have no flavor to them. Wow. Strike two.
I had a glass of wine for dinner and another bowl of Coco Puffs.
My husband asked me this morning what tasty treats he can expect to come home to this evening. I said "Something with cream of chicken in it."
He sighed and went to work.