I May Have to Change the Name of Our Blog...

to "Pirates and Pirates."

Mary Caroline Is 1

Unbelievably, my tiny little niece is a year old. So Libby and I hitched a ride with Poppa Keith and Grandma Betsy and headed to Virginia for Mary Caroline's first birthday party.

I was so excited for Libby to be there. My cousin Molly and I are also a year apart, and we were inseparable from the time we were babies. To this day, 30-a-lot years later, we are the best of friends -- in fact, now that I think about it, Molly is my oldest friend. And I soooo want that for Libby and Mary Caroline. MC is the only "girl family" Libby's got -- all the others are brothers and boy cousins. I want the two of them to spend summers traveling back and forth between each other's houses. I want them to read books together. I want them to go to horse camp together (oh, the stories...) I want them to spy on their siblings together. I want them to know each other's pets. Braid each other's hair. Respect each other's blankies. Have stupid girl squabbles and make up. I want them to write letters to each other during the winters. I want them to be able to call each other one day and say, "Can you believe what my kid just did?" I want them to have the comfort of their earliest memories including each other when they're older. In short, I want them to be able to say, "Look, I was there at your first birthday party. I know you."

The weekend was so fun. Everyone was there. All the aunts. The crazy uncle. Two sets of proud grandparents. Seriously, we've had very few major holidays with this kind of attendance. MC's birthday just about trumped Christmas.

I think the birthday girl quite enjoyed herself. When people ask me to describe Mary Caroline, the only answer I can give is "shriekingly happy." And that's just when she sees the picture of the baby on the Yo-Baby yogurt at breakfast. Put that baby at a party with a ball pit, cupcakes, adoring relatives, and a bunch of little munchkins at her eye line everywhere, and she takes it to a whole new level.

All too soon the weekend was over. Libby and MC had to go their separate ways for now, but I am hopeful that this was first of a lifetime of good times for the two of them.

Happy Birthday, Mary Caroline!

Are Those Flashing Lights in My Rearview Mirror?

Holy smokes. It's the Grammar Police! And they are after me. I was just idly re-reading my "About Me" section on this blog. To my shock and embarrassment, I realized I had written, "I keep this blog for a couple different reasons." And then I proceeded to list three reasons.

As most people in the English-speaking world (and certainly all former members of Mr. Webb's 8th-grade English class and most definitely *cough cough* former English teachers) know, "couple" means two, not three.

I am properly horrified with myself. Even more so because that error was out there for almost three months -- a few months, not a couple months.

Lieutenant Lexicon and Officer Oxymoron let me go with a warning and a promise to fix the problem immediately (I did). They knew I'd be harder on myself than they could ever be.

Oh, the shame.

Cooking for Troglodytes

I don't like to cook. No secret there. Strangely, though, I like to feed people, especially my family. I want to give them wonderful meals, but I don't actually really want to make them. It's like my hospitality gene only got half-baked. However, thanks to my now-indispensable cooking group, our family does have some seriously fabulous dinners on a regular basis. On the menu at our house this week have been such yummies as white turkey chili, garlic white lasagna, and even a hand-crafted-by-Alison-live-at-dinnertime saucy stir-fried pork. Stand back, Susie Homemaker.

Andrew's response? Tears and gagging.

Adam's response? "When are we going to have something good for dinner?" By which he means Kraft Mac n Cheese, Totino's pizza, and canned mandarin oranges.

Troglodytes.

Boy Mom

I grew up one of five sisters with one poor badgered brother stuck in the middle. Our house was full of girl stuff: ear-splitting squeals, Barbies, smocked dresses, Little House on the Prairie books, the more-than-occasional cat fight over bathroom space, and baby dolls everywhere. On some level I always expected that when I had children, they would be girls. I'm one -- and I like it! I looked forward to shoe shopping with my daughters, reading Anne of Green Gables together, getting their ears pierced, and guiding them through the intricate set of rules about how and when to wear white.

So I was pretty surprised six years ago, after some initial confusion in the delivery room, to find myself a "Boy Mom." And two years later, a Double Boy Mom. In a turn of events that my younger self probably wouldn't quite believe, I have found that I love it. In fact, when I was inducted into the "Girl Mom" club about 21 months ago, I couldn't quite remember what to do with a girl! (Libby has worn the uneven pigtails to prove it.) I love the boys' straightforwardness. I loved seeing my younger boys' little round selves clad in overalls. I love the absence of those high-pitched shrieks that only little girls can produce. I love that I no longer flinch when a small person dangling from a precarious spot wobbles and rights himself just in time. And I love the education I have received just by living life with my boys.

The things I never knew I never knew:

Mace Windu is the only Star Wars character with a purple light saber.

2 brothers + 1 toilet = tinkle lasers. (I really didn't want to know. You don't, either.)

How to spell, pronounce, and identify "Xenotarsosaurus," "Coelophysis," "Yingshanosaurus," and "Parasaurolophus."

The difference between a Velociraptor and a Tyrannosaurus Rex. (I could spot it in my sleep.)

Nothing trumps a bare bottom for high humor. Pants will be unashamedly dropped anywhere, anytime, and it will be the funniest thing that EVER happened.

How to tell a bulldozer from a backhoe. (Andrew, then three years old, had to labor intensively to get this one through to me.)

The blue cup is the best one. Whoever doesn't have it might as well be drinking dirt.

Keeping an empty water bottle in the car on long trips is of the utmost importance.

Even the unlikeliest of objects can become a gun or light saber. Just add the following sound effects: pyow pyow pyow pyow or zhoom zhoom.

Nothing mesmerizes like a fire truck...except roadkill.

Walmart, I Apologize

A few weeks ago, I may have made a disparaging remark about you on Facebook. I didn't understand why your evil minions greeters constantly targeted me, a normal mom clearly out just grocery shopping with my adorable baby, and would not let me leave the store without looking at my receipt and rifling through my bags to make sure I wasn't robbing you. I mean, really, ME? In my disgust, I may have accused you of profiling mommies.

Normally I would just take my toys business and leave, never to return to your (let's face it, kinda skeezy) store in response to this kind of treatment. I would love to make Harris Teeter my sole grocery store. Ah, to dream of carts that glide easily (it's like shopping on glass!), free cookies and balloons for the kids, and helpful teenage boys begging me with their cracking voices for the privilege of loading my ridiculously-priced groceries in the back of my minivan ALL THE TIME. But, darn you, Walmart, your low, low prices draw me back over and over again.

So today I visited you once more, prepared to hand over my receipt and be frisked at the exit. Libby sat ensconced in the cart, which was carefully covered with her horribly ugly but effective cart cover. At one point during our shopping excursion I handed her a bottle of dressing to play with. (Pretty ghetto. It would be nice if you'd throw a balloon the kid's way once in a while.) We finished our shopping and paid for our groceries. In hindsight, I should have been suspicious of Libby's good cheer throughout the checkout process. And for ONCE, I was not harassed at the exit. Your bouncer greeter just waved goodbye to me and my groceries. What an unexpectedly lovely time we had with you, Walmart!

Here is where we come to the apology. After unloading the baby and the groceries at the car, I pulled Libby's cart cover off the cart. What do you know? Out tumbled a bottle of Zesty Italian dressing. And it was RED HOT because we did not pay for it. We just walked right out the doors with that $1.50 bottle of dressing hidden craftily in the cart cover. My precious, adorable, innocent-looking baby is a thief. Walmart, you knew. All those times you held me up at the doors...you knew. It was not I you suspected...it was Baby Face Nichols. And you were right. I was wrong.

Anyway, it was raining and cold. I won't lie. I had a little argument with God about the necessity of me dragging the baby back out into the rain to go give you your $1.50 for the dressing. I lost. Your employees were extremely nice to me about the whole thing and graciously took my money. (They probably felt sorry for me, being the mother of a hardened criminal and all.)

So, Walmart, profile away. Those babies will rob you blind if you don't keep tabs on them. And lately I've noticed Libby casing the yogurt aisle for that sweet-looking organic Greek stuff...I wouldn't put anything past her. See you next week, Walmart.

Efficient Baby Strikes Again

Preschool day for Adam. He gets in the car at pickup time and proudly shows me his "prize" from his teacher: a fun-size Nestle Crunch bar. For a boy who loves chocolate the way Adam does, this is a prize indeed. He tells Grandma Betsy all about his "precious" (insert Gollum voice here) on the phone. He begs me to eat it then and there. Upon being told that he can have it for a treat after dinner, he pleads with me to make dinner then and there...at noon...in the car. Finally he accepts the decree that gratification will be delayed, puts the chocolate bar in a place of honor on the kitchen table, and settles in for the wait, telling anyone who will listen all about his prize in the meantime. He is positively chortling in anticipation.

4:00 pm. Enter Efficient Baby. Popping a square of suspiciously Nestle Crunch-y looking chocolate in her mouth, she walks into the dining room and efficiently hands me this:



And shows me this -- some chocolate stains that she will need to work on ASAP:

I quickly discard the empty wrapper (after snapping a quick picture, of course), wipe down EB's incriminating chocolatey mouth, and call Daddy (already on his way home) for an emergency replacement. Thank goodness for cell phones and corner grocery stores. Within minutes of "the incident," the candy bar is replaced, and Adam is none the wiser. Disaster averted.

Mommy is learning to be efficient, too.