A Boy's Take on Makeup ...

I was doing my makeup this morning with Joel beside me. He pulled one of my MAC eyeshadows out of my makeup bag. "What's this?" he asked.
"Colours for Mommy's eyes" I said.
Joel began to pull more eyeshadow out of the bag and lay them all on the table in front of him.
"Wheels!" he said.
This kid is all boy.

This Would Look Great on a Resume ...

So I've been taking a cake decorating class. AND LOVING IT. I'm having so stinking much fun. The other day we learned how to make a rose with icing. They look so pretty.

When I showed Jacob he said "cool mom, now you could work at the Safeway bakery or something!"

The Bliss of Two Babies Napping at the Same Time.

Some days your two year old brings the hose in through the patio door and floods the kitchen. And says "uh oh. Mess" as you're pulling out the fridge and stove to sop up all the water.

Some days you put a clean diaper on your littlest just to have him poo an up-the-back-poo two minutes later.

Some days your pre-teen talks to you in a tone that boils your blood. And yet, it's pretty familiar because you once talked that way to your own mom.

Some days you bring your two year old to a park and out of nowhere he tries to roundhouse kick another little kid in the head.

Some days you take them to the store and have the baby crying the whole. Way. Through. Walmart. And then you get home and realize you forgot to pick up eggs, the one thing you went to buy.

Some days all your kid will eat is peanut butter on a spoon.

And yet I am dreading - DREADING - going back to work in two and a half months because I don't want to miss a single second of this.

Character Development

If we could compare our children to characters in Arrested Development, Jacob is the most like Michael, Joel is like Gob and Joshua is Buster.


... Now we just need a Lindsay.

Even Better Than Winning the Lottery:

When our little baby Josh was born, one of his feet was puffy. He wasn't in pain and it was a little bit of edema, but it was still perplexing for the doctors and pediatricians at the hospital. And then a self proclaimed new nurse thought she heard a heart murmur. Josh was immediately brought to the nurses' station but no one else could hear the murmur. Not doctors, not nurses, not even the new nurse when she tried a second time.

The pediatrician and my doctor consulted about it and decided to send us to the department of Genetics at Children's Hospital. The only thing they could come up with as a cause of the puffy foot (and possibly of a heart murmur if there was one) was Noonans. Even so, they said, they were not convinced that this was the cause of Joshua's symptom.

For seven months I worried about my little wiggle. I read about the syndrome. I cried. "You can't cry over a puffy foot, sweetie," Jason said. "All we know is that one of his feet was a bit puffy." But I still cried. And every time Joshua cried I wondered if it was because of his foot. Or another symptom I didn't know about. He smiled around the same age as my other boys. He rolled over, sat up and developed similarly to them as well. And every check up at the doctor's was perfect. No heart murmur. No concerns. But always in the back of my mind was the possibility that my littlest love may never have a normal little kid life.

And then we finally got an appointment at Children's. When I talked to our family doctor about it he said "I think they'll tell you that they haven't seen such a beautiful baby in a long time." I hoped. I braced myself for the worst. I cried. I bit my nails. I snuggled my littlest love. Jason held my hand and kissed my forehead. "It's going to be ok" he said. We met with two very kind doctors. They thoroughly went over Joshua's health and measurements. They interviewed us for a long time.

And then they said the words every parent in our situation would die to hear: "Little Joshua is healthy and we see no reason to have you back here for another meeting"

What an amazing moment!

Please Be Advised:

If you pee on the floor instead of in the potty you do not get a treat.

Oh Bologna!

Do you remember when this was a good comeback?: "Well excuse me for living!!"

I do.

This Conversation Just Happened:

Me: Are you seriously watching Tyra for the second day in a row?

Jason: ... Yeah ... Maybe it's time for me to go back to work from my vacation.