Paul McCartney's Birthday

Today's my birthday.
Today is also Paul McCartney's birthday.
Sweet!

Want to know what else is sweet?

Clark.
Tonight we were reading "Love You Forever,"
(you know... Love you forever, Like you for always, As long as I'm living...?)
and right at the end, where the Mama gets all old and sick, Clark jumped up and half whispered, half spit in my ear (my heart does still melt even if it entails wet willies) "don't read it when you get to the song!"
So I didn't.
And he threw his arms around me and not-too-gently rocked me back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And while he rocked me, he said:
"I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, As long as I'm living, my Mama you'll be."
And then my cheek met the nicest biggest goofiest Clark-smooch.

Yep.
CUTEST SON EVER.

BEST BIRTHDAY EVER.

A Tantrum, from Megan

"Forget-to-feed-me-nots"

From me: We had another baby. Her name is Megan. She just turned one year old. She's very very sweet. But this week she started throwing tantrums. Yay.

From Megan:

Mom just doesn't get me. She pulled out a piece of licorice and I saw it, so I hurled myself to the floor and started screaming to let her know I could be appeased with it. Instead of inserting licorice and a little part of her finger into my bitey chompers, she picked me up, gave me a very stupid-looking one-eyebrow-up kind of a look and said "obviously none for you." Mean Mama.

Then she started filling me a bath which I was very excited about so I crawled towards the bathroom I'm never allowed to crawl in (sometimes my siblings sprinkle when they tinkle and they aren't always neat and don't always wipe the seat), and mom picked me up and walked toward the non-bath. I tried to hurl myself out of her arms hoping I would freefall sideways across the house and into that delightful water, magically naked, having flailed all my clothing off in the wiggling to get down phase, but rather than struggle to hold me in my happy floppy screaming display of how much I adore baths, she set me in my "play" pen and said something to the effect of "don't hurt yourself" and patted me on the top of my angry little head.

Someone needs to teach her that instead of ignoring tantrums, she should...

...hello?...

....hello???....

....Is anyone reading!?!?

I sure smell good after that bath. Ends up it was for me! Go figure she wanted to test and adjust the water first and not burn my flawlessly gorgeous baby skin. And go figure she'd want to get washcloths and towels before plunking me in so I wouldn't spend a single moment without someone to drench as I splashed myself silly. I liked my Mumsie so much I gave her a big hug when she took me out. She had a nice soggy me-print on her shirt. She looked more ridiculous than she usually does when she's praying noone comes to the door until she gets a chance to pee and pull the cheerios out of her hair.

I spent the rest of the night flopping myself in the direction of my once filled, now drained bath and screaming about wanting to have another bath so I hope she gets the point we should do this more than once or twice a week.

SHE"S PUTTING ME IN MY CRIB FOR BED! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Send help. This is my message in a bottle. Seriously. I've been marooned in my crib. 

What Our Neighbors Heard This Morning

This was my idea of being a good helpmeet this morning. Lucky Ian :) Pat him on the back if you see him. We all have our own races to run. His is all uphill.

S: No really! This will work and it will only take a couple minutes!! (Dragging soggy wet-head just-out-of-the-shower Ian outside) See look! I already scraped your car off!!

I: This will not work. I have to leave soon. Seriously? Are you Serious?

S: Just try. please? Okay.... Ready? PUSH!!!!!

I: IT IS NOT MOVING.

S: oops. Brake is up. hang on. How do you take it out of park?

I: are you kidding me?

S: yeah :) just kidding. I knew that. I already put it in drive. PUSH!!!!

I: DRIVE?! you're supposed to put it in neutral!!

S: (slides in and puts it in neutral.) SORRRY!!! :) PUSH!! YAY IT MOOOOOVED!!!!

You see... Ian's car battery dies in cold weather and we accidentally left it outside.
So, we kept pushing his car, in 1-degree weather, forward, inch by inch, moving only slightly closer to our goal of moving it out of our driveway, angling it around, getting it back into the garage, and aiming a space heater at it's nose so by the time Ian went to work, maybe it would be warm enough to start! BRILLIANT!

...there is a big bump - an uphill bump - right where our driveway hits the road. We hit that.

I abandoned my post pushing next to the wheel and we both started pushing from behind. (believe me. it wasn't going ANYwhere faster than we could get to it and it was all uphill to the middle of our circle. Comforting, right?)

It took us a long time, but "we" basically lifted it over the bump. And as "we" kept moving it past the point where we would maybe hit our neighbor's mailbox, I shouted encouraging things to Ian, like "wooo muscles!" "We're doing it!!!" and "YOU. ARE. MY. TEBOW!!!!"

I jumped in and Ian started pushing me back toward the garage and BOOM. I slammed on the brakes. Surprise!! :)

S: you're gonna have to sit inside and let me push. There's no power steering and I can't get the wheel to budge."

I: really?

S: yah. I tried.

I: so... you're gonna push the car? because you can't turn the steering wheel. really Susie?? REALLY?

S: I gave birth. I've got pushing. (besides... it was downhill now!!)

So I start pushing and it's going well, but like the cotton-headed ninny muggins I am, I thought "too fast too fast!!" and stopped to run around and see if he was going to hit anything in the garage.

Well... you know how it was going to be downhill? yeah? well... it's only downhill until the middle of our driveway. Which is a big dip between the little uphill out to the circle and the bigger uphill and bump into our garage. Oh the things you don't notice when you aren't your car's engine, right?
So... momentum gone. But at least we're lined up right in front of the garage now.
So I started my car and went to push him with that.

s: wait wait... this isn't going to make my airbag go off will it?????

I: I don't know... are you planning to smash into me or drive up slowly?

S: how close am i?

I: about a foot.

S: how close am i?

I: about 11 inches.

S: how close am I?

I: WHOA!!!

S: ee. did I hit you?

I: no. keep comin....

I eventually got there and pushed him up the hill but we weren't lined up exactly and I thought I'd line up better just to be on the safeside and backed up. Without telling Ian who is now rolling down the hill-we-just-discovered going "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!?!" while I'm shouting "OH MY GOODNESS DON"T HIT ME... the AIRBAG WILL GO OFF!!"

So we line it up again. "How close am I... are we there yet... are we there yet...." all over again. And this time we get it in the garage. And we go in, find the space heater and I unwrap it's nice long cord because I'm just trying to be helpful. So he picks it up and says... "thanks hon. I sure hope I don't tangle this on the way out there where I could have just unwrapped it..." and starts it up. We close the garage door and he starts getting ready for work.

I: that was a LOT of work. My hair was wet. I just caught pnemonia.

S: you'll forgive me when you go to work and your car starts.

I: not if I die of pnemonia.

S: oh dear! you have to leave in about 5 minutes.

I: glad my car will be warm.

S: well... if it's not by the time you go, it will be by the time I take clark to school. Take the van and leave me the carseat.

I: I still haven't packed a lunch... or had breakfast!!

S: I'll bring you some on my way back from dropping Clark off.


How on earth he made it to work on time, I'll never know. His car still won't start. I did get food ready for him. I just can't get it there. I tell you what, I sure wouldn't want to single handedly push a car up a hill first thing in the morning with wet hair on an empty stomach with no hope of food in sight. I hope he orders a Philly or something.

My Hero!

Yeah so... spiders. I don't like them crawling directly on me or my babies, but I am not afraid of or grossed out by them. If I see one I don't recognize, I capture it, look it up online so in the future I'll know if it's friendly or not and then flush it. If I see one I already know is friendly, it has a pretty decent chance of life depending on my mood.

Well... I was having a friendly sort of afternoon and saw a great big fluffy happy happy spider taking a little walk across our wall. I went over, took a good look, told him to be on his way and told the kids "Okay... let him be, but he can live," thinking they would enjoy watching him crawl around the wall for awhile. I mean... It's not like they can watch Thomas the Train *all* day.
But that does not capture the imagination of a BOY. Nope. His response was "or... we can SQUASH IT!" So I consented and he ran, cut me off and tumbled into the dining room ahead of me shouting "I will! I will!! Can I kill it Mom! I get to squash it! Please can *I* kill it!? I know how! I know how!!!" grabbed a napkin and stood there quivering in anticipation of me allowing him to assert himself as a man and kill the spider.

Upon receiving my "yes, yo...(u may)" he was off. I've never seen a kid run SO fast!... until he tripped over the leg of a chair. I've never seen a kid fly so far. Or land so hard. On tile. He screamed, and being Clark, he screamed at me "I DIDN'T WANT THAT CHAIR THERE!" But the splat he made was enough that even with the scathing references to my horrible chair to running toward spider space planning, I went rushing to his side and scooped him up to comfort him. I sat there rocking him for a minute and while he was screaming "oh! It's still hurting! It's STILL HURTING!" I got a huge scary scenario in my mind of his leg being broken and having to throw everybody into the car and go to the ER.

Apparently, he had plenty going through his head too. He bolted up mid-scream-sentence, stood and wobbled for a second on the hurty leg and said "I gotta get the spider before he goes away! Wanna see how I squash him!?"

He squashed him. He showed me how one of spidy's legs even came off! He flushed him. And then he took me over and showed me how he "even didn't get any spider guts on the wall! So can I kill *all* the spiders, mom?!!!" Who needs Tylenol when you have a spider in need of death, eh? :)

And, I have to say, his spider killing skills are impressive! I didn't know shining armour came in his size... but there you have it! My cute little knight is ready to gallop off and rescue any spider-frightened damsels in distress. Just move your chairs before he gets there, please.

To a Squirrel

Dear Psycho Squirrel,

It's been a fun year with you. I still remember seeing you last spring when you were so scrawny, starving and stupid that you would try to run through the glass door. Poor squirrel. It was amusing finding out that you sleep every night on the fence and don't EVER leave our yard - except to get peanuts from somewhere to put in my flowerpots. I love it when you hide behind the lilac bushes until I go inside and you resume your post by the sliding glass door. It's been fun watching you chase off all other squirrells. I see you've gotten fat off all the heirloom seeds I tried to plant, the planters they were planted in, the snacks my kids left outside and the birdseed. So fat, I'm thinking you'll be hybernating soon. Sleep with one eye open :)

Your friend,
Susie

Practice Makes Perfect?

...or perfect getting practice? ;)

"Squishy's Bed"

Hank commandeered my wheeling basket and set it up perfectly for baby for when she gets here. She's uber-possessive. She gave me a LONG talking to about not putting things in it. So for 6 months, no wheeling basket for me. But when baby is born:

"Squishy is gonna ride in it and she's gonna say "WAH WAH!" and we'll tell her "SHHHHHHHHH!" like *that.* And I'm gonna share my teeving ring wiff her. And she won't be able to walk anywhere because she's a baby and she's gonna say "WAHHHH!""

Clark has his old crib mattress set up next to his bed in his room and is lobbying for Squishy to sleep there. My only drawback would be that he loves taking the sheets off the mattress and leaning it up against his bed. It really does make a fantastic slide/car ramp/tent. I think if Squishy slept in the 'tent' though, her nick-name might become a wee bit too literal.

An Immature Post

So... I picked up a miniature Stein (German beer mug with a lid...) just the size of one of Hank's tea cups. It goes everywhere with her! It's kind of her 'to-go' tea cup. And boy, does she make a tasty pretend "red tea" to put in it!!
My dad very nonchalontly asked her for a sip of her beer, and I told Ian about it and it gave us a giggle. (Think before you speak, Susie!)
Ian took it and ran with it. (Think before you speak, Ian!)
...Around Clark. Who, being the Daddy-adoring, impressionable, everything SHOUTING little all-boy he is, has copied it even more loudly and more abnoxiously all day.

Word of the day: BEER!
Maturity level at my house: all time low.

What's worse is, being the lovely little lady Hank is, she now wants nothing to do with her beloved Stein. I miss all those sips of pretend tea she'd run by as a pick-me-up and I miss watching her chubby little two-year-old legs run to "refill" it.
How's a Mama to fix this!? Perhaps I will go make some real red tea for her to fill it with?

Clark has thankfully lost all interest in talking about beer since he just found a dead bumble bee and will be busy telling me all about it's glorious dead-ness for the next hour or so. I like this part of having a little boy. Dead bugs ARE pretty interesting. Unless you happen to be the one that squashed it into it's current gooey state of death and are planning on coming inside with bug guts on your shoes. Then it's back to just being mommy of a little boy! ...who says "DEAD!" about as loudly as he does "BEER!" Maybe instead of writing a blog, I should go write a nice little note to our neighbors about how much I appreciate them still being nice to us in the front yard after having to listen to us in the back yard!