Events of the Day

It's barely 5 in the evening, and I have to wonder how on earth I managed to get through this day alive.

• Medium Fry woke up, insisting that her tummy hurt.  Which we took to mean it was empty, because she was hungry.
• Large Fry was astonishingly ready early for school today (there's something that won't happen again for another two months at least).
• Small Fry had a follow-up doctor's appointment, due to the fluid in her ears from an ear infection at her well-child checkup back at the end of November (less than five days after being in urgent care for a nasty bilateral ear infection)...and then still having fluid in her ears last month.  Guess what.  She still has fluid behind her eardrums.  Another round of antibiotics!  Oh, and a referral to an ENT.
• I can make Microsoft Word turn into its own pretzel, but force me to deal with Publisher, and I want to cry.  But I have to submit an invoice for the contracted work I did over the weekend, so I'm trying to figure it out.  While catching up on my regular job.  While trying to get Medium Fry to eat some Cheerios.
• My boss emailed me about a change we need to make in payroll and billing, and I have no idea how to pull it off, since I was stripped of all magical powers and my wand when I flunked out of Fairy Godmother school.
• Medium insisted, after Hubby and Small got home, that her tummy still hurt, that she felt sick.  She still had no fever.  So Small stayed home with me, and Medium went with Hubby to H-burg so he could hit up a specialty clothes shop that we just don't have here in our small burg.  And she got sick on the way out there.
• I discussed with my other sort-of boss about the work done over the weekend and how to handle my invoice.
• Discovered that mixed-up, mooshed-up Play-Doh had magically gravitated to three other floors in the house.
• I realized lunch was now very late for Small Fry.
• After lunch, sent Small Fry upstairs to go potty in prep for naptime.
• Went upstairs ten minutes later to find out where Small Fry was, and found that she had gone into our bathroom, stood on the toilet, got out the baby powder, and had liberally anointed the bathroom...and had not bothered to go potty.
• Tucked Small Fry in for nap, and tried to concentrate on my job that pays me in cold, hard cash.  Fail.
• Got even later lunch for myself.
• Picked up Large Fry from school.  Report cards today.  Yay.
• Small Fry woke shortly after Hubby and Medium returned (Medium got sick on the way home), and I'm now trying to work, supervise Small Fry (who has done nothing but get into trouble all day, it seems), supervise Large Fry, work, and try to figure out how I'm going to divide my attention to now supervise Large's homework, which is math, which is difficult for Small Fry and taxing for my extremely short supplies of patience.
• Oh, good.  Relief.  Hubby comes downstairs (Medium sick yet again), and takes over supervising Large's homework.
• Discovered by overhearing Hubby's outrage that Small has cut up lots of paper, left out all kinds of Play-Doh, and gotten into the Apples to Apples game and strewn the cards all about the basement toy room.
• Okay, I should not be relieved by this, but Hubby was just literally banging his head against the wall in the dining room over helping Large Fry with her homework, because she's refusing to focus and concentrate on stuff that we know she knows.  I'm just glad I'm not the only one who gets frustrated.
• I now have a headache, still don't have an answer to my billing mystery, and our dinner plans have been hosed.  Yay.

Actually, if life was anything like this for my mother, it's a miracle I made it to adulthood.

And she's going to laugh herself silly over that one.

Bedtime Prayers

The twins got to bed later than usual tonight, due to an overly-messy toy room and the discovery that one of their bedroom windows wouldn't close without some extreme cleaning.

Hubby took care of the cleaning and getting the window closed (I just love home ownership), and reminded me when he got downstairs that they were waiting for me to tuck them in.  Small Fry had told him that "Mommy is going to tuck us."

Yep, ordered around by a 5-year-old.

Sort of.  (How do you say no when your youngest looks at you with pitiful eyes and says, "Mommy, I want you to tuck us"?)

Innyhoo.

I went back upstairs.

I gave hugs and kisses.

I kicked out monsters, giants, wombats, dragons and snakes.

I sent friendly things on their way to Gramma and Boppa's.

Then Small Fry started to pray: "God is gweat, God is..."

I quickly interrupted.  "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.  Angels watch me through the night..."

"Angels watch me frew my mommy..." Small Fry intoned with a grin.

"...and keep me safe till morning light," I finished.

I couldn't bring myself to balk at an extra round of hugs after that prayer.

"Who's dat wif da micwrophone?"

Hubby decided, after watching Kronk's New Groove, we needed to watch something with a little more culture.

Class.

Harmony.

Music.

So he popped in his DVD of the Gaither Homecoming in Jerusalem.

Now, it's worth pointing out here that Hubby sang for over a year as a tenor for a Southern Gospel quartet, and we still have several of his group's CDs.  The man can sing.

So.

The Gaither Vocal Band is singing, and at the time, the lineup was Bill Gaither (bass), Marshall Hall (baritone), Guy Penrod (lead), and David Phelps (tenor).  They're performing oldie-but-goodie "Can't Stop Talkin' About Him," which I remember them singing waaaay on back when Larnelle Harris was with the group.

Medium tapped me.  "Mommy, who is dat?"

"Who?"

"Da one singing wif da micwrophone."

I waited, and pointed to the young blond man on the screen.  "That's Marshall Hall."  I waited until the camera focused on another member of GVB.  "The one with the long hair--that's Guy Penrod."  (Hubby should be proud that I didn't try to indoctrinate Medium on how much we should loooove Guy and his amazing voice.)  The camera moved again.  "The one with the curly hair is David Phelps."  Man, he's got pipes.  "And the older man on the end?  That's Bill Gaither."

Medium nodded.  "I want to meet him!"

"Who?"

"Da one wif da cuwrly haiwr."

From the other end of the couch, Hubby didn't miss a beat.  "Me, too."

Observations from the Middle of the Night

I was awakened from a sound sleep by the frantic calling of my name.  I vaguely registered the presence of Large Fry snoring and pressed up against me, as Medium's voice got more urgent.

"Mommy!  Mommy!  I peed in my bed.  My panties are wet.  My sheets are wet.  My duckie is wet."

I got out of bed and yanked on my pajama pants--sleeping next to Hubby is akin to sleeping next to a pot-bellied stove most nights--and realized that drinking as much Snapple as I did last night means I need a pit stop myself before I assess the damages.

Medium stood and shivered next to me, and so I had her strip off her fleece nightgown (which hardly felt damp) and her panties (which were, well, soaked).  Then I chased her down the hall to wash her off before she put on new panties and jammies.

All I could think of was how glad I was that I'd put on the vinyl mattress protectors after I'd last washed the twins' bedding.  The sheets and mattress pad (and Duckie, obviously) would need to be tossed into the washer, but the mattress would be dry.

It was Medium's first accident in months.  Her sheets weren't that wet, but Duckie was nearly dripping (ew) and the mattress pad was more than a little damp.  Well, if she's going to have an accident, make it memorable, I suppose.

I went and got Hubby, who was still up and watching a movie, and had him help me strip Medium's bed and remake it.

As I tossed the nightgown, panties, sheets, mattress pad and Duckie in the washer, I reflected on several odd things:

• Either she drank more than I did last night, or Medium forgot to go potty before bed.
• I did not want to think about where she had been holding Duckie for him to be that wet.
• Fleece does not absorb liquids like cotton does.
• Mattress pads absorb better than microfiber sheets.
• I need more sets of twin-sized sheets.
• At least I wasn't doing a load of laundry at oh-dark-thirty because someone had gotten sick.
• I am never drinking that much Snapple again at dinner and after.  I required another pit stop before going back to bed myself.

In an amusing post-script, I woke up again briefly when Hubby finally came to bed and carried Large Fry back to her bed.

Not sure when that was.

It didn't last long, however; I found Large Fry nestled between us, on top of the covers, when Hubby got up this morning to get ready for church.

Clearly, taking her back to her own bed was ineffective.

The Only Thing Missing Was "FIRE!"

We're sitting around the island in the kitchen tonight, which is plenty big enough (and has enough of an overhang) for the five of us to share a meal.

It's been a long week.

Small Fry has a cold.

Dinner is new.

We're waiting for the rolls to finish baking.

And that's when it happens.

Hubby: Duck season!

Medium Fry: Bunny season!

Hubby: Duck season!

Medium: Bunny season!

Hubby: Rabbit season!

Medium: Duck season!

Hubby chuckled while I wondered when on earth my kids had seen that iconic Bugs Bunny clip.

Hubby leaned over and explained, sotto voce, that Medium had basically been arguing with everything he said since he picked her up from preschool.  Finally, he got so frustrated that he spouted, "Duck season!" Medium immediately mimicked him, and so he told her, "You're supposed to say 'Rabbit season!'"

And it just went from there.

Hubby: Duck season!

Medium: Bunny season!

Hubby: Duck season!

Medium: Bunny season!

Hubby: Bunny season!

Medium: Duck season!

Hubby looked at me with a grin.

"The only thing missing," he said, "was 'FIRE!'"

The Doctor Is In

"Mommy!  You hafta sew my Cliffowrd!"

Medium's tone is most indignant.

She's been after me for days to fix three separate seam rips on her beloved, very old, stuffed hound dog.

Which used to be Hubby's.

Which got appropriated by Medium when Small Fry appropriated the stuffed basset hound, Toby, left behind by our oldest nephew after his marriage.  (He'd lived with us for several months before the wedding.)

I had not found my sewing box after the move.

Medium had.

Presumably because Hubby had, and he'd put it away on the shelf in the coat closet.

Where my eagle-eyed, stubborn, and determined middle child had spotted it this morning.

So I went upstairs and fetched the box, and came back to the den, where my ancient patient was waiting.

Medium came over as I spooled off a length of white thread.

"Fix dis spot fuwrst."  Medium patted Clifford's right ear, which was half undone from the poor thing's head.  Then she bent down and kissed his head.  "I kissed him, so it won't huwrt so much!"

I was about halfway through the ear-reattachment surgery when Large Fry saw what I was doing, and scooted upstairs, only to return a few minutes later with her little purple bunny, who required some serious rotator cuff surgery.  "As soon as I'm finished with Clifford, I'll fix your bunny," I assured her.

Medium repeated her job as my Smooch Anesthetist for Clifford's two remaining suture locations, and then she loved on him once I was done so that Clifford felt all better.

Even Large got to moonlight as a Smooch Anesthetist, kissing her bunny's armpit before I began suturing.

I'm pleased to report that both patients and owners came through the procedures just fine.

Sledding on a Saturday: A Photo Essay

Large Fry

Double Trouble

Push us!

Whoa!

Medium Fry

Up the hill!

Large Fry

Medium Fry

*giggles*

Back to the top!

Large Fry

This is fun!

Here we gooooo!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay!

I love Medium's pink cheeks.

Yep, getting the snow off the sled is important.

Wride wif me, Mommy!

Skimming along!

Dis is fun!

Ready?

Go!

Lovin' it!

Medium, it's a sled...

...not a shovel.

Large & PeeJay's youngest son, D.

Medium loves Auntie JS's old sled!

Saucy saucer.

Wipeout!

Medium and D.

Wipeout.  Again.

*piff*

Go for it, Small.

Good throw.