The gift that keeps on giving

 

Okay, I got this book for Christmas in…. *sigh* … 2009? 

 Theoretically I should be long done with it. My story, and I’m sticking to it, is that this book periodically goes into hiding. A kid rediscovers it and attempts to get me back on track. I’ll do well for awhile… and then we will need to clear off the kitchen table, it will get shelved, and forgotten.

Well, today my ACTUAL sketchbook is in hiding so as I dashed out the door I unearthed this so I could do an #Inktober prompt. Today’s was “backpack”:

“Guess this is goodbye, old pal...”

If you're not familiar with the above quote, I'm happy to enlighten you. It's from a scene in "Into The Woods" in which Jack has to give up his cow, whom he views as a pet. He sings further, "you've been a perfect friend... I'll see you soon again. I hope that when I doooooo, it won't be on a plate." Busts me up every time.

I kind of had similar feelings for this old friend. This was gifted to me by the teachers I worked with when I finished student teaching in Norristown. I took excellent care of it for forever and then the kids started using it, and, well, you can see for yourself. It went the way of the dodo, I'm afraid. 

No shame, though. Rest well, faithful little lunchbox. For the record, it was an Arctic Zone product and I highly recommend them. We have several other ones that are holding up well to the abuse my kids put them through, so keep them in mind come back to school shopping. If it can withstand the impatience with which it gets shoved into backpacks and squashed by binders and gym shoes AND be tough enough to be clipped to the outside of said backpack on other days to be smashed into the bus seat repeatedly, it's worth its weight in gold. 

Winter break challenge, indeed

Twas the day before back to school
after a long holiday break.
Mama was prepping kids' backpacks
and lunchboxes for them to take.
Dismayed, she found an assignment
that was due the very next day
despite having asked many times
if such things were hidden away.
The lesson learned: never assume!
Empty the kids' backpacks yourself
so that mad frustration can't bloom
and ruin your prime mental health.
"It's their responsibility!"
You moan, and yes, that part is true.
However, it's your sanity.
Somehow you've got to make it through.
So while one kid reads his eyes out
fervently hoping to get done,
another from the shower shouts
that his fight with soap's not been won.
School clothes are out for tomorrow, 
we know who will pack and who'll buy.
The sun will rise on the morrow
and we'll give our new day a try.

And so it goes

Any typical school morning finds me asking, "Liam, do you have your backpack or binder or lunch?"
"Yeah."
Dada interjects, "brain?"
Liam stops. "What?"
I crack up.
Liam inquires, "Did you say ears?"
I laugh a little bit harder.
Dada emphasizes, "BRAIN!"
Liam processes. "Oh." 

And guess whose science textbook and notebook have been sitting on the kitchen table since he finished the homework on Wednesday night? Doesn't do you a whole lot of good to do it and then not turn it in for the credit...

TGIF. Welcome to May, everybody.

Life with Boys

Life with boys is often surprising. I never know what I'm going to find even in the most mundane of places. For example, while cleaning the kitchen, I found Dada's espresso maker lid hosting a foam bullet:

I turn around to attempt to put things back in the pantry where they belong and "the way is shut":

"Look Mama, he's hugging me!" 

I'm glad you're having a moment. Please get off of the floor.

***

Even right now, I am set up to blog in the guest bedroom where I foolishly hoped I'd be working in peace. I grabbed a mug of Elixir of Magic Beans, the camera, my phone, and the laptop, strode through a single filament of spiderweb (yes, the guest room was used just last weekend but our spiders are very industrious around here and have apparently set up shop again), plunked everything down on the table...

and have had Damon with me more than without me. He's having a meltdown because the iPad is in Carrie's room and she is still sleeping. He wants it because he won this:

How I can hear my Nana chuckling. It seemed she was always winning some door prize or another. If there was one single clothespin tucked under a chair at an event, that's the chair she'd be discovered sitting upon. If there was a lucky ticket number, that'd be the one she'd drawn. It was amazing as a kid to have a Nana who won just about everything.

And now I have That Kid. 

The Gizmo dog is part of the selection of prizes for the elementary school's fundraiser. He claims it's what he would have won had he sold 150 items. He sold six. 

After I drove to the school to pick up said six items, I received a text informing me that he'd won the raffle prize. Could I come pick it up or should they just send it home with him the following day?

Having just a tiny Inkling of Eventualities, I texted back that they could please send it home tomorrow and that it would make his day and thank you.

Did Gizmo the dog make it home safe? You bet. 

His backpack and lunch box remained on the bus.

The following day, yesterday, I sent this note in his lunch:

He did manage to bring home his report card, his lunch box, the original backpack he'd left on the bus.

The second backpack stayed on the bus. 

It's a long weekend because they're hosting conferences at school today.

Lest you think he's the only one, we have yet to see the middle schooler's report card because... well, Life With Boys.

Wednesday

Me: Did you bring your report card home?

Liam: No, I didn't get one. They were passing them out but it was bus time and I had to go.

Me: You mean you didn't get yours. Yours is specific to you, you can't just take any old report card home.

Liam: Right. 

Thursday

Me: Did your report card make it home?

Liam, staring at me like a deer in the headlights: It's in my binder.

Me: Can I see it, please?

Liam: It's at school. In my binder.

Me: Liam, it is a long weekend! We won't even get to see it until Monday?!

Liam: *blink*

Lest you think they are the only ones, I hate to burst your bubble. Miss Carrie is going without her winter coat all this long weekend because it is also at school, but that is a story for another post, believe me. 

She did, however, bring home a report card of straight A's! Your kid gets a part time job AND the best report card of her high school career thus far- who knew?! Good job!

Back to Gizmo. 

We had our conference with Damon's teacher last night and she laughed that he'd asked to take Gizmo out to recess the day he received it. She wisely told him that's not the best choice as it could get broken, and she laughed again when I informed her that Gizmo had made it home safely whereas his backpack did not. 

Of course he is over the moon about this newfangled contraption (sorry, I had to) and once he discovered that it comes with an app where you can feed the dog and tell it how to move, it was all over. Never mind that it already operates on voice command. Telling it to sit, play dead, roll over, go pee pee (and no, I'm not kidding, unfortunately), and whatever the command is for playing and dancing to the music is, no, none of those were enough. 

For two days he's pestered me to add this ridiculous app.

Yesterday:

Damon: Mama! Add it onto the iPad. Please!

Me: Damon, the iPad is out of room and we can't delete anything because you see? There are no little x's. I'm sorry, buddy, there's no room on here.

Damon: *sound of ultimate suffering* Then on your phone?

Me: Not just no.

Damon: Where's the mini iPad? Can we put it on the mini?

Me: We'll have to wait until Carrie comes home because she had it at school with her and now she's at work.

Damon: *more sounds of ultimate suffering* It's not faaaaair!

This morning:

Damon: Can we add it to the mini?

Me: The mini is in Carrie's room and she's still sleeping.

Damon: *wailing* She's going to sleep until karate tonight!

Me: That's ridiculous. No she's not.

Damon: It's not even supposed to be in her room! It's not fair! 

(He's not wrong.)

Me: Why don't you go get some more reading minutes or play with Legos?

Damon: *sound of ultimate suffering*

Me: Or go back to bed...

Drat it all, Nana, this had better not be a sign of things to come!

***

On Monday, Damon's belongings all actually made it home from school. I removed his lunchbox from his backpack and was a bit dismayed to find everything was wet.

Me: Damon, did you take your water bottle to school?

Damon: *distracted* Uh, what? No. Why? What?

Me: Why is your backpack and lunchbox wet?

Damon: Uh...?

The culprit? See that small container of applesauce? The one that wasn't eaten at lunch?

Right at the edge of the spoon you can see the puncture. It exploded just enough applesauce to make a mess.

Now his lunchbox has been washed and is no worse for wear. However, one must always remember to check every pocket of boys' belongings before dumping them into the wash. Look who would have ended up squeaky clean had I not checked the pocket of the lunchbox:

I'd ask plaintively if it was the weekend yet, but one, it obviously is as they are home with me, and two, I'm not sure it'll make it any better because then they're home with me! I'm reminded of the quote from the movie Beetlejuice:

"Because then I will go insane, and I will take you with me!"

Please keep your musings to yourself as to what mischief they'll get up to next. If speaking a thing into being is real, I don't want to have to hunt anybody down!

The part where I bang my head against the wall

There are lots of jokes out there about the world having two kinds of people- the morning people and everyone else. 

We are not a family of early birds around here. Let me just tell you that in case it has somehow escaped your notice from any other blog post about mornings or bus schedules or breakfast or in case this is your first time on the blog. Hello! Welcome to our niche of crazy!

For example, Carrie sets two alarms, one for 6:15 and one for 6:30 and then on a good day she gets out of bed at 6:45 to catch her 7:10 school bus. 

Got all that? 

She can pull this off because she wears the same hoodie and jeans/shorts pretty much daily, changing out her T shirt, socks, and skivvies. She owns several combs- uses none of them- maybe brushes her teeth after breakfast if she has time, does no makeup, very little jewelry. This is my no-fuss girl, and I thank God for that. 

Now, we have multiple bathrooms, so it shouldn't be an issue of not being able to get into one in the morning. However, this morning she was in the tiny loo downstairs because it's closest to the garage door we leave from to get to the bus. She'd meant to just dash in and out, so she didn't shut the door the whole way.

Damon comes staggering downstairs, leaps out at Dada and I with a cheerful, "BOO!" and proceeds to head to the the same tiny loo where he usually does his morning routine. He starts to push open the door (remember that THIS kid has been up all of 3 minutes) and she bashes it shut the whole way, hitting him in the head.

After kisses and gentle admonitions to always, always knock just in case, I manage to get Carrie out the door so he can get in there. (He's fine, she only clipped him.)

After her bus comes and goes and I'm back inside, I realize that I still haven't even seen Liam, whose alarm went off almost 15 minutes ago. Damon is wandering around, accumulating his breakfast, and Dada heads up to check on Liam's progress. 

I throw our sheets into the washer and come back down to Honey Nut Cheerios ("Bee O's" in our house, because of the honeybee on the box of the genuine ones) all over the floor by Liam's seat. Apparently gross motor skills are not happening on this Tuesday morning. 

I swear he sleepwalks through breakfast today, putzing and interfering with the thank you card full and fully-dressed Damon is working on for his teacher, being scolded redirected several times. 

The phone rings. 

Let me just stop right there, because if you're new around here you probably don't know that I despise the telephone. My sweet, sweet innocent husband gently reminds me that when the phone rings it's because someone wants to talk to me, and that I should not snarl as I pick it up.

I let the machine get it and hear, "hey Mom, it's me, and I..."

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

"Hello?"

"Hey Mom, it's me. In my backpack [which she hasn't taken for the last two weeks because she has only been carrying her binder] is a weather and science hard back book that I need for seventh period. Could you please bring it to school?"

*Here's where you insert every mental argument and counter argument about teaching responsibility (not taking it- it was her book, her responsibility), teachable moments (showing grace by taking it in; she's just a kid, and it IS the third-to-last day of school), waffle between those and other scenarios instantaneously in your head. I did.*

"Are you supposed to turn them in today?"

"Haha, well, actually, that was yesterday, but I forgot, and then I forgot again today..."

Nail in your coffin, my girl, nail in your coffin...

"I'll think about it. Have a good day. I love you! Bye!"

"Okay, bye." [Because Heaven help her if she uses any type of affection over the phone in the Office, bless her heart.]

Eventually, the spilled Bee O's get swept up, (thank you, Dada, who has already left for work by this point), with Liam topping off the dustpan before emptying it for our birds and squirrels out front. I physically take his pajamas from him so that he has no choice but to get dressed in the school clothes I had to pick out for him last night because he was busy with karate and last minute Boy Scout requirements that are due Thursday. He's dressed and sent to brush his teeth. He takes his backpack with him.

What the ?

Damon is done with his card at this point and is chattering about glow in the dark bracelets that he's holding and something about the basement and something about school and "because Liam did."

What's that?

Liam has escaped into the bathroom with his backpack, at this point articulating the argument by using our own words of wisdom back at us thus, "I'm supposed to be clear and copious!"

When the door opens, I am right there like a vulture, going through the backpack.

"WHY is there a cape in here!?"

"I only wanted it for recess!"

Yeah, that banging you hear? It's just me beating my head against the bathroom wall. Carry on, citizens.

First day of school 2013-2014

Our beautiful Care Bear, ready for *gulp* FIFTH GRADE!
 

 

And our handsome Liam, entering second grade. Yes, he remembered to get shoes on before he left for the bus.
 

 

 

They were so excited that the were bursting at the seams. Fifth graders got laptops this year, so that's why Carrie looks like she's headed off with half her belongings attached to her. She has a brand new backpack and lunchbox which I told her she had to use until college, and she got a cover/carrying case for the laptop.
 

 

There were eight school age kids at the bus stop this morning and since I only knew three of them (besides our two) I didn't want to post pictures in case any of the parents have privacy issues, etc. Lots of homes in our neighborhood have been for sale or sold, so it was nice to see we've got new kids in the neighborhood!
 

Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze!

School starts next Monday. We're not quite ready yet.

We got home from the Outer Banks after midnight on Sunday morning, dumped everything out of the car after we woke up properly, looked at the mess, looked at each other, then decided, "the heck with it" and went to Maumee Bay for one more day of sun and sand and water. The mess can wait.

Then we went again yesterday with Mama Rita, Nina, and Jonathan. Hehe!

However, we also washed the kids' sheets and remade their beds, scheduled and went to an appointment with Dr. Jon because Carrie has a classic case of.... duh duh duh DUH, poison ivy! He recommended Benadryl and steroids, and she'll be good as new when school starts. She will, however, have to attend picture retake day since the school pictures were today.

So today we got a few more groceries, dropped off all our school paperwork, had Liam take his school picture, picked up Carrie's school supplies which included her new backpack and lunchbox since her olds ones look like they'd been chased by a lawnmower, had some playground time, got lunch from Wendy's, and are now all recovering. Damon's down for his nap, I just scrubbed the last toilet of the week, our sheets are on the line, and chicken legs are in the crock pot. Trying to decide where next to attack the mess.

I think I'll blog instead.