T.C.B.

Our first four foster children were angels. I'm not kidding. Angelic.  But there's a new tot in town.

Okay, honestly she is very sweet and lovable. BUT she has really been giving me the business these last two days.  She's definitely not shy. Her favorite words are HEY, NO, and MINE, and her favorite volume is loud.  Here's a list of some of the stunts she was able to pull even with with my unprecedented child care skillz:

Used a black marker for lipstick.
Wildly blinked the kitchen lights a million times while I was getting dinner ready. 
Squirted ketchup directly into her mouth, and not a little.
Drew on the computer screen (after a talking-to about non-paper drawing. She earned herself a time-out for that one. She took it like a professional).
Sprayed de-tangler on the couch.

BUT...
She loves to cuddle.
When it comes to meals she never complains and really puts it away.
She's crazy about the dogs and is super sweet with them.
She's very good at remembering her pleases and thank yous.
She has a seriously cute little devilish smile.  Seriously, it is really cute. 

She's actually fitting in pretty well, but she definately is a challenge. But I'm up for it :)

In other news of the day, Maxwell came home early because of a snow storm scare.  It snowed maybe two inches and it was the heavy, wet kind of snow.  Not the kind that lasts very long, and not really the treacherous kind.  We did go outside and play while it was still snowing, and Pa came home early and hung out with us a little before he had to go and get all dolled up for some fancy engineering dinner with the governor.  Here's the pictures of the day:

"J" goes to a therapeutic day care twice a week.  This morning it was only going to be for two hours because of the snow, and Mimi was at her school until 11:30, so it didn't really seem to make much sense to go back home and come right back and pick up "J".  Especially when my favorite local lib is right across the street.  Of course the meter was broken, but that would hardly matter to those parking guys, they are ruthless.  So I took a picture to show the judge when I get a ticket.  And I stuck that little blue paper there in hopes that the parking guys would then notice the jammed change slot.

I got a couple of books that looked amusing, and I chatted it up with my favorite librarian. She's awesome: she hoards the good books in the back for me when they first come in so I can have them first.  I don't even ask her to do it. She just does it out of reader's kinship. I love her!

That's Jeter parked under the table.  He stayed there the whole time we were out in the snow. 

There's Mimi hanging off the swing. She just lost her boot and Pa had to go running over to the rescue. 

Pa returning from the boot rescue looking pretty darn cute...

Pa is looking very handsome today. He must be taking notes during Ice Loves Coco.

Offspring #1

Offspring #2

A tired Mommy taking it all in.



Late night ramblings.

This has been the lamest winter, snow-wise.  It's made me realize that if there's no snow, then winter is lame.  There better be some really good and frequent snow storms next winter or these Eggs may have to take action.  I don't know.  Al Gore was so totally right.  Global warming is not a good time. 

This weekend we went to a Ziti Dinner to benefit the dad of an old friend of mine.  He was a detective in my hometown for my whole life.  There was an awesome turnout and food was really yummy.  The kids ate great :) but I didn't win the Kindle Fire (the one for magazines and shows), even though I threw about 8 raffle tickets in the bag.  But I did chomp up two really delicious chocolate chip cookies. 

Chris and I were just really beat today. We did nothing all day except for when Chris took the kids and the dogs on a walk through the state park.  I stayed home and cooked what turned out to be a pretty mediocre dinner.  I gave the kids their baths and we read three stories.  Right afterwards they got all excited with the idea of sleeping in our bed, and they ran around begging us to let them, but we dashed their dreams and tucked them in their own beds.  Sorry kiddos, try again on Friday.  I stole away to the armchair to read for awhile.  I happily report that 1Q84, the new Murakami novel, is starting to pick up steam.  He is the greatest writer ever. How does he make every single word do that???  He's amazing.  Best writer ever.  He may be the major reason why I'm Japanese-culture-obsessed. 

I'm counting down the days (2) until the next episode of Dance Moms.  Did you see the preview? Holly totes freaks out and Abby is just standing there like, ya, I know.  WHOW, what happened???  My 2 cents:  Abby is harsh but she's always right.  Come on, moms, this isn't a let's-have-fun dance studio.  This is prepping your kids for a professional life as a dancer. If you can't take the heat, get a move on.  The only mom that seems to get that is Melissa.  Christy is AWFUL, but the others are okay, even Jill is okay with me.  Also can we all just agree that the greatest love story of our time is Ice and Coco?  Ice really does love Coco and vise-versa.  Ice is so sweet and charming and encouraging and so supportive xoxoxo I love them!

Here's some pictures to go along with my ramblings :)  ENJOY!

Delicious Ziti with lots of cheese :)

Greatest writer ever (an old pic but super cute!) with a little cat (he always has lots of cats in his books).  :)

Ice and Coco: It's the real thing, people. 

Just a few things from the last couple of days...

Pa took these two pictures during story time the other night:

School was cancelled yesterday, but there really wasn't that much snow. Our town cancels school for any amount of snow.  Kind of lame when you think about them having to make up the missed days in the scorching CT heat and humidity in the summertime.  Nicky came over in the morning and spent the day with us.  We had pizza for dinner because both Max and Nicky were annoyed that school was cancelled on Friday, which is pizza day.  Apparently our town has really good school pizza, the kids are always raving about it (on the menu it says "Big Daddy's Whole Grain Pizza". That does sound yummy :) And Maxwell's school always smells good):

 I wish there was sound for this picture because they're on Starfall.com, the website they use at school on the computers, and they're all singing along to the songs together.  The kids love Starfall and I love Starfall!!!  I even bought a web subscription to the site so I could access all the additional stuff that the teachers' have.   It's been a good investment.  Max can show me all the stuff he did at school and do more stuff at home :)

I wish I could show you the little baby that's been with us these last few days but it's against the rules :(  She's super cute!!!!!  Big head of curly black shiny hair and the biggest brown eyes ever.  Her foster mama requested respite because she had to go out of state for a funeral, so we took her for a just a few days.  Her foster pop is coming tonight to pick her up.  She's been really fun and cute :)



Things I do instead of cleaning my incredibly messy house:

Watch Dance Moms.
Anticipate next week's episode of Dance Moms. 
Take a bath and fall asleep, wake up in cold water with cramp in leg.
Apply large amounts of icy hot to back.
Wait for Excedrin to kick in.
Lament about exhaustion and chaotic house.
Promise myself that tomorrow, no matter how tired I am, I'm going to get the whole house clean as soon as the kids are asleep. 
Reconsider choice to stop taking paxil.
Google search Bose Quiet Comfort Headphones and start a savings plan to acquire, while pulling my hair out listening to Chris and Jeter snore in unison. 
Use blog as alternative to expensive psychotherapy.

This picture is so apropos. I tried to stuff my big orange duck in the closet just yesterday.

Haircut Night.

Today was a pretty good time.  I babysat for my friend's grand daughter Sophie and she was a very nice and cute little kid.  We were outside the whole day because it was 65 degrees out and sunny.  I took a walk with the girls and the dogs. Sophie was in the wagon and Mimi rode her bike. Then Max got home from school and I took them on another bike ride/dog walk.  We started going our usual way, but there was a crazy stray dog in the road and he wouldn't let us pass, and J&J seemed spooked, so we had to go another way.  It ended up being a really nice, long walk. The kids even found some chalk up in the circle and wrote their names all over the road. Pa got home early, so he came along on Haircut Night, which is a whole process since Max hates to get his haircut.  So what we do is make a whole night of it and go out to eat at the McDonald's next to Cutting Crew and then go over to get haircuts.  The kids love it and I don't  have to cook, so fun for all. Bonus: we were the only ones at Cutting Crew, and let me tell you, that never happens.  Usually it's packed.  And the two best girls were working tonight.  So Max and I got haircuts, and at the last minute Mimi decided to get a trim too!!!  I was so excited to see her beautiful eyes again :)  She's still growing out her hair (don't worry Mom & Mary!!!) but she got it neatened up and decided to keep the bangs short and feathery: an excellent choice because her hair looks 1000x's neater and even longer than it did before now that the shorter bangs are shorter.  Here's a pic for proof: 

What gooses. They actually mooned me the first time I tried to take this picture.  Don't worry, I won't post that one.  Max is really mad at me that I won't post it though!  

I feel pretty!

Mimi has some new clothes from Young Folks Shop, thanks to her wonderful aunt Judy :)  This dress is a real stunner.  We even took a morning bath and blow dried her hair to get this desired effect.

Looking in the mirror.

The dramatic descent.

My close-up.

My extreme close-up.

 Waiting for Pa to take me to school.



No school today :)

We had a big play day today with Nicky and Gianna!!!

While I was snoozing...

Chris took these this morning!

I guess they were pretty good because this is the only evidence that pancakes were made this morning.  Everything was all nice and tidy when I got up :) but no leftover pancakes either :(

Also I'm going to throw the deuce up to Whitney.  When I was Gianna's age, she was like my Beyonce. I'd make my mom and dad move their cars out of the garage so I could use it as my dance studio, and I'd play my Whitney Houston cassette on my purple boom box and make up dances. Remember how her tape had the orange plastic instead of the plain black?  It would stand out real nice in my little cassette tape suitcase :) 

I was totally in love with her hair in this video too.  RIP Whitney :)

Lots of good stuff.

I wish I could take the credit as the one who snapped these snaps, because then that would mean I was there AND that I took these beautiful pictures. But it was Christopher, out gallivanting in the city last night, who took these beauties.  He went to hear a lecture about what happens to water in the soil during an earthquake (he was telling me about it when he got home, apparently the water starts to jiggle and it causes all sorts of problems. He had some fancy word for it, but it was after midnight and I was snoozing and only kind of heard him.  If you're lucky he may leave the word in the comments). Then he went out to dinner at an Irish restaurant. Nice job, honey, I really love these pictures. I haven't been to the city in a LONG time, and this really makes me want to go and take the kids.  I think that would be so fun.  I really love cities. 

I love all the different windows in this picture and the lights on inside.  I love the overcast sky.  Lovely.


In other news, Mimi and I have been working on this little workbook: 

I love stuff like this and Mimi got really into it.  I thought we could do a page a day and a little lesson on each country, but she was so into it that we did 5 countries in one sitting!!! We were at it for almost 2 hours.  She picked the countries, in this order:  Austria, Japan, Norway, Cambodia, and Korea.  Excellent choices.  I have big things planned for when we get to Poland :)

Also this week: a new storage solution!  I am (was!) so sick of stepping over laundry baskets full of clean, folded clothes with no where to go. Our house was built in 1940, and apparently no one wore many clothes back then, because our house only has one teeny tiny closet upstairs in Mimi's room and a sort of half closet about 3 feet tall in Maxwell's room.  Our bedroom has no closet at all.  So my truly genius husband came up with this idea!  It holds so much and has completely eliminated the problem of clean-laundry-no-home.   It's even eliminated one (of many) falling apart dressers that I've been dying to give the heave.

I can't seem to take a picture today without it looking kind of fuzzy... I hope Chris didn't do something to my camera while he was in NY, oy.  I'll play with it :)  The dogs are at the groomers, they're long overdue.  Pa is at work.  Mimi is at nursery school and Maxwell is at way-too-long first grade.  So it's just me here.  It's really quiet.  It's nice :)  Though I will be happy when they all start coming back one (Mimi) by two (Jeter and Jill) by one (Maxwell) by one (Pa).  Happy Friday!!!!!  YAAAY!!!

A lot more counter space.

Tonight our microwave broke.  I was only using the timer on it, but it started smoking, and when I opened it the inside was probably a thousand degrees.  I'll have to warm Mimi's HOP up the old-fashioned way: on the stove :)  I doubt we'll be getting another one any time soon, if ever.  Hey,  if the Hooks can pull it off, maybe I can too?  I guess I kind of have to try :) 

I pass under this bridge on my way up to see "A".

In the closet no more!

Listen up, world!  I watch The Jersey Shore. And I'm here to defend it (to some extent).  Pauly is truly a nice guy (questionable morals, true, but judge not).  Who wouldn't like Pauly D?  And Deena is funny and just wants to be a good friend to all.  Snooks and I are kind of parting ways since I really think she's going overboard lately on the sauce.  I don't want to see her go the way of Amy Winehouse.  Jenny is cool but is having an off season.  Vinny has been taking himself a little too seriously lately, and dare I say it, Sam&Ron are getting better. Mike is just a lunatic, what's wrong with him?  Ever since the head-into-the-wall-episode in Florence he's just been off.  I do think it's time to wrap things up though.  Cabs are here.  And maybe stage an intervention for Snooks.  But it was a fun time.

The cast enjoys a typical afternoon tea in the shore house.

Ron's pinkie slays me.