MamaBloo » Stories

Will You Marry Me?

Kari at MamaBloo — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 14:04:42 +0000

Through a strange series of questions and topics while snuggling in bed with Ty last night, he informed Dave and me that he plans on marrying his little sister, Emme.

This doesn’t alarm me at all — I know that this is totally normal as kids grow up and explore family relationships and love. Often times a kindergartener will want to marry the parent of the opposite sex. Ty used to want to marry me, but I have been ousted for the new and improved model…little sister.

“Oh, Ty, I am so glad you love Emme so much.” Even as I say this I am envisioning the torment she put him through only hours before. How no matter what he wanted to play with, she snatched it out of his hands and ran off with it. Not really an inaccurate foreshadowing to marriage, but still…

But just to be silly I ask Ty, “Why don’t you want to marry Lily?” One of his older sister-cousins.

“Because, Mommy, she. wants. to. be. a. dentist!!!”

Of course, this makes perfect sense to me.

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Click here to learn more about why I don’t like the dentist.

The Most Efficient

Kari at MamaBloo — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 14:16:43 +0000

When it came time to graduate from Grad school, we needed a host or two for the program that my cohort was putting on to celebrate getting our Master in Teaching degrees. So, my friend Sarah and I decided, heck, we can host this thing — and so we took on the MC duties . We introduced the skits, the speakers, you get the idea. We were awesome. Professionals, really. But we were left out of one key piece to the puzzle. A small group of fellow grads wanted to give out awards — you know, “Most Inspirational” “Most Improved” things like that. We were not allowed to know the awards as we were included on the awards list.

But that didn’t sit well with us at all. So, we cheated. We went out for drinks one night at this wonderful place right on Puget Sound (Ray’s Boathouse Cafe for those of you in the area). And as the sun was setting over the water we were able to hold up the sealed envelope and read what we had been awarded. I didn’t like what I found. Probably because I am a cheater.

I was awarded “Most Effecient.” Seriously? That is about as sexy as a lump of coal. Especially in light of the fact that the man whom I would later marry was awarded “Most Charismatic.” Bah humbug. Efficient. Hey there, if you need something accomplished with a minimum of effort? With the fewest possible resources consumed? In a well-organized way? CALL ME…here is my number. Like I said, sexy as coal.

But it wasn’t long until I decided to embrace my efficiency. I think I came to realize that others saw something in me that I had yet to see in myself. When I was growing up I would loathe it when I was carrying groceries in from the car and my mom would say, “you may need to take two trips…” Uh, no, I do not take two trips, I would think to myself and shake my head at the ridiculous nature of that suggestion. Two trips? Whatever. Instead, I would load up 7 bags on each arm, creating red welts in my skin. But I only took one trip. So, maybe I did deserve the award.

Nowadays my efficiency looks more like getting all 7 of us to a location on time and with the required equipment. It means buying Christmas gifts in February. It means figuring out the fastest driving route to any location I may need to visit. Afterall, I only have so much energy and so I must use it very wisely.

My gift has grown with me, one could argue.

So, today I took it one step farther. I received a special notice in the mail from our local energy utility. They wrote me to inform me that I am WAY more efficient than my most efficient neighbors. I got two – count them — two smiley faces and was awarded the title of GREAT at being energy efficient. That my most efficient neighbors consume 1,593 something-rathers and my household of SEVEN only consumes 1,163. And I am even more energy efficient than I was last year.

Snap. Take that. No one who was awarded “Most Charismatic” ever got a letter from Puget Sound Energy.

Look who is sexy now….

Oh, and turn off your lights, why don’t ya?

Jonesin’ For Hot Chocolate

Kari at MamaBloo — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 14:00:37 +0000

My son is obsessed with Hot Chocolate. He has not had any since last winter and when he saw me come home with a box of Swiss Miss and a bag of marshmellows, he became focused on having that first yummy mug of cholately goodness.

It is a well known fact that Ty can negotiate just about anything. A friend and neighbor announced recently that he planned on having Ty — age five — negotiate the re-fi’s on his mortgage. I have to have nerves of steel and a heckofa line in the sand when Ty sets his sights on something. And recently he set his sights on that box of Swiss Miss and that bag of marshmellows.

For days now he has been asking me about the weather report. It took me a while to figure out why. His angle? Rainy, wet, or even snowy weather equals….Hot Chocolate. But I once I was onto him I could tell him, hey, it is not quite cold enough yet! He then turned to the “others” he figured would cave in or at least didn’t know the rules. He asked babysitters and friends for hot chocolate. Nope. No luck.

Driving home from school Monday afternoon he told me, Ah Mommy, I am soooooooooo cold.

I was distracted by a garbage truck and the rain. Ah honey, I am so sorry. What can we do to warm you up?

You see it coming, don’t you? Well, I didn’t. Moment of weakness, I guess.

I need Hot Chocolate. He says in his sweetest, I love you mommy, voice. So, I answered with the good ol’ mother standby. Let me think about it.

He smilled and then actually cackled. Because, basically, he knew he had me at “I’ll think about it.”

An hour later, out came the tea kettle. Out came the mashmellows. Out came the Swiss Miss. I even got out the whole milk.

Okay, bud, I said. You can have the hot chocolate on one condition. You have to let me take your picture while you drink it.

I am pretty sure that his internal dialoge goes something like this… “SUCKAAHHHH!”

I am doomed, aren’t I???

Number Five

Kari at MamaBloo — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:37:27 +0000

So, I have enrolled Emme in a baby movement class. It is a class designed to let one-year-olds move around on mats, jump over things, and crawl around. She loves it.

So, during our last class the instructor — who is young and skinny and way way too into this class — asked us what we hoped our kids would get out of it. What did we want from this class? The first mom talked about how she wants her daughter to experience peer interaction. The next mom mentioned a sense of structure. The next socialization. And so on. It sounded like a John Gottman seminar. As I listening, I realized that all the mom’s had only one kid — the kid in the class.

When it got to me. I looked the instructor right in the eye and said, “I just want her to be tired when we’re done.”

And that is what happens with number five.

Don’t Cry Over Spilled Milk

Kari at MamaBloo — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 14:00:06 +0000

In our house we have an epidemic. As much as I love each and every one of my kids, they spill. Like, a lot. So much so that we have a title that we pass around almost nightly. The title? The Spiller.

It goes like this. Izzy knocks over her milk and it spills everywhere and someone announces, “Izzy is THE SPILLER tonight!!!” She smiles. Ah shucks. I get to be THE SPILLER ? Cool.

We spill so much around here that also have an expression that immediately follows any spill. The glass goes over, water goes everywhere and I shout, “Mobilize the Spill-Unit!!!” Upon this command, Jade runs for paper towels, Izzy grabs plates and other gear out of harms way, Lily grabs napkins and goes low — mopping up the drips that are already hitting the floor, and Ty… well, we are working on him. Usually he helps Jade. I coordinate. In this fashion we get spills cleaned up and everything back in order in less than 90 seconds and dinner continues. We are a well-oiled machine.

Except for the time that Lily overwhelmed the Spill-Unit with FOUR back to back spills. No sooner had everything been put right when.. bloooppp… over went another glass. She spilled Jade’s milk, Ty’s milk and her own milk…twice. It was epic. We still talk about it when the conversation lags. Hey, remember that ONE TIME when Lily was like the Spiller-Extraordinaire? Oh yeah, we all say, that was epic! Then we sort of chuckle. But the chuckling doesn’t last because another spill is iminent and we have to be ready, on our guard for possible spill-unit mobilization.

Usually the SPILLER is Izzy. That girl could enter the Olympics if they had a SPILLER event and bring home the gold.

Last night Ty was the spiller.

The night before it was me. Like I said. It is an epidemic.

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Click here to see Emme and me during a Me Ra Koh photo shoot (last November) for her upcoming book!!!

The Pumpkin Patch That Kicked My…

Kari at MamaBloo — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 14:07:37 +0000

Normally, I love the Pumpkin Patch. But this year the phrase “pumpkin patch” should have been accompanied by a warning sticker…or at least background music that went “dum dum dummmm!” In years past, our beloved trip to the patch was at this lovely little working farm. We were the only school there, there was a worm barrel, a few animals to look at, and small little pumpkins to pick. It was, well like I said above… lovely. So, when our beloved farm closed its door to school pumpkin patch visits, our school was forced switched to another venue. A venue known as THE FARM — que music… “dum dum dummmmm…”.

With my previous paradigm in place of the lovely local patch, I decided that taking Emme (age 19 months) on Ty’s kindergarten field trip to THE FARM… dum dum dummm… was going to be just fine. It became immediately apparent after our 30 minute drive on fog infested country roads that this was not a farm. This was an amusement park. Designed by Stephen King. Luring peace and pumpkin loving parents to their doom.

The rundown looks like this. First of all, we were there with about 20 other preschools and kindergartens — so about two billion children under the age of 5. Making it a chaotic melee of children moving from station to station on THE FARM…dum dum dumm… while being shouted at by the “farmers” to keep moving, folks. The hayride scared Emme. While all the kindergarten girls picked out cute little purse pumkins, Ty picked out what felt like the world’s largest pumpkin. So I had to enlist our neighbor to carry it because with 28 pound Emme on one hip, the 30+ pound pumpkin was too freakin heavy and it didn’t fit in the grocery bag the school provided. Some may say, why did you let Ty get such a big pumpkin. I DON’T KNOW is the answer. It make sense in the intial nano-second and then I was committed. The picture doesn’t do it justice.

After the hayride and pumpkin search, there was a hay maze which ended in a slide from the top of the barn. The attendant asked for two parents to “man the slide.” After the first kids went down the slide, it became obvious that “manning the slide” was code for “try not to let any kids kill themselves while shooting off the end of the world’s fastest slide into a pile of hay.” These kids were like wellie-clad bullets coming off that thing. Ty stood at the top of the slide for quite some time before risking his life to exit the hay maze.

I can now feel my sanity exiting THE FARM.. dum dum dummmm… along with my sense of humor and the spring in my step.

We then went to the animal area. Emme loved the giant pig. Ty loved to climb on the tractor –which resulted in a perilous fall where it appeared that he cracked his head on the cement. After barking clone-trooper-esque orders at our neighbor to GRAB EMME, I ran to Ty’s rescue — all the while going over the signs of concussions in my head and calculating how far we were from the nearest ER. As it turns out he miracously didn’t hit his head, only his elbow … and his bum. But his bum was okay, he said, because he was “wearing really tough pants.”

We finally get to the picnic area where Ty is enjoying a POPSICLE of all things. I din’t even care that now we were injecting the kids with sugar, I was just relieved we had made it to a chair. It is at this point that my friend Kristi considers texting our friend Kim (who will be attending the afternoon session at THE FARM..dum dum dummm…) that THE FARM is almost as bad as Chuck E. Cheese. Now, I have a deal with my husband about Chuck E. Cheese. I will carry the children in my uterus for 9 months, undergo surgery to bring them into the world, and then nourish them off of my breast. But HE HAS TO GO TO CHUCK E CHEESE. And from now on he is on THE FARM.. dum dum dummm.. duty as well.

It is at this moment that some yells, “Hey come watch the PIG SHOW!”

Enough said.

A Phone Glued to Her Ear

Kari at MamaBloo — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 14:22:00 +0000

Emme is now officially 19 months old.

But she still doesn’t really talk. Her words still only amount to “uh oh” “night night” ”mommy” “daddy” and her newest word “HELLO”. Why, “hello” you might ask? Because she is obsessed with talking on the phone. Honestly, I don’t talk on the phone THAT much. I am more of a text-er, email-er kinda gal. But, nevertheless, she loves the phone.

Whereas Ty loved to turn everyday objects into a gun (click here to read that list), Emme prefers transforming whatever she can get her hands on into… a phone. Then, she holds said object to her and walks around all.day.long. saying …… “Hello!”

Here is the list of every day objects Emme has used as a telephone:

Baby Monitor
Remonte Control
A grape
A shoe
A sock
Sunglasses
Fork
Her sippy cup
A pad of paper
Car keys
Rolled up pair of socks
Star Wars figure
Calculator
Flashlight
Mint tin
Credit Card
Legos
A book
Granola Bars
A plastic plate

Oh, and of course, the ACTUAL PHONE.

Water, Water, Everywhere…

Kari at MamaBloo — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 14:00:08 +0000

On Saturday I came home from a scorching hot (74 degrees) soccer game to discover that Ty(5) and Lily(10) had embarked on a new money-making adventure.

They had set up a water stand.

And they were selling water.

From the tap.

Ty says, This is how we are going to get rich!!! Now, mommy and daddy, you need to buy some water and drink it.

Dave has never been able to pass up a stand where kids are selling things and so he diligently paid a quarter (even though the price tag said 1 cent) for a kid-sized cup of tap water. It had one ice cube floating in it. All eyes then turned to me. I said, hey honey how about buying me some water, it can be like a date.

Dave frowned and dug through the junk drawer and produced another quarter for my glass of water. I guess he had other things in mind for our date.

This money-making venture produced squeals of delight from Ty as he has huge dreams of purchasing the LEGO Death Star, which costs a mere 400 dollars. He then required that I buy another cup of water but this time I had to select the heart glass because, he said, mommy you love me so much.

Yes, I do. I am buying water twice to add to your Death Star fund. Water, by the way, that was mine to begin with. Or at least mine by marriage.

But I kept these thoughts to myself and enjoyed the joy of the little ones as they tallied up the 56 cents they “earned” and clinked it into their money banks. And the water tasted really really good.

Cheers!

Stinkin’ Literature

Kari at MamaBloo — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 14:00:43 +0000

The big English teacher dork in me is so super excited for Jade to be in high school (although she still attends junior high, 9th grade IS high school…). I was chomping at the bit to get ahold of her Language Arts syllabus and check out which novels she would be reading this year. She willingly handed it over:

OH, I exclaimed!!! Romeo and Juliet…. Lord of the Flies….Animal Farm….

My heart started beating faster. Ya know, I explained to her, reading this literature is so exciting. It enters you into a “club” of sorts, the club of “well-read” people. You will become more culturally literate, I tell her. I then go on to tell her story after story of how knowing the nuances of Romeo and Juliet and Lord of the Flies (especially the symbolism of that darn CONCH) will enrich and enhance her life for decades to come. That this is only the beginning of a thrilling literary thrillling thrill ride of thrills.

She looks at me.

And says, “I think I need to go put on some deoderant.”

I think I will take that as an endorsement to just how thrilling classic literature is. So thrilling, one needs to wear deoderant.

Yup.

Twas The Night Before Kindergarten

Kari at MamaBloo — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 14:00:27 +0000

We made our peace a long time ago that Ty prefers to sleep with mommy and daddy.

I think in Ty’s first week of life, we realized that this kid may sleep with us until he goes to college. No joke. College.

It complicates certain issues, surely, but, it also has its perks.

Last night I turned the light out and turned toward my sound asleep little boy who was starting kindergarten the next day. I looked into his slumbering face and marvelled at his perfection, his long lashes, his scraggly hair. I thought about how I was probably NOT going to cry when I dropped him off the next morning at kindergarten — really — but right now in the moonlight I wanted to memorize his face, what he looked like the night before. I cuddled in, I felt my heart swell.

My heart swelled just in time for Ty’s right arm to swing around and punch me smack in the nose.

His eyes then fluttered open and he said, “Oh, sorry mommy, I thought you were Lily.”

Holding Up "K's" For Kindergarden