You know your son needs a playdate with a BOY when.....

a) Given the chance to select any sticker from a basket of stickers he picks the pink princessy one;

b) You regularly hear him singing the "I'm a Barbie Girl in a Barbie World" song when he's happy;

c) You find out your one of your daughters (read, Caroline) has taught him how to go "MAN STYLE" on the potty.  And then, you find out "Man Style" means peeing stark naked, sitting backwards on the potty facing the wall.

d) All of the Above.

Answer:  D -- Call any other young boy immediately.

First Day of School

There are signs of summer lingering everywhere in our house:  a bag of sandy seashells hanging up in the laundry room, yesterday's beach towels still drying after a trip to the pool, and temperatures soaring into the 90s all week.  But, believe it or not, it is Abby and Caroline's first day of school.  With watermelon in Abby's lunchbox, we officially said "Goodbye!" to summer this morning promptly at 8:17am.

Caroline's First Day of Kindergarten

Abby Showing Off her Bookbag Loaded with Supplies & Lunch

And They're Off! 

(Caroline practically sprinted on, so I couldn't grab a photo)

While I am ready for a bit of a break from constant togetherness, I must admit that I am a little sad summer is over.  We had so many nice adventures and giggles together over the past two months.  Now, we're back to being bound by schedules.  It's a good thing, but summer freedom was nice too. 

The Last Day of Summer?!

I cannot believe it. Today is the very last day of summer (as counted by full days I spend by myself with all the kids).  Just today, then the weekend, and then school starts.  We all made it!  We even had a lot of fun along the way.  Of course we had a lot of other feelings towards one another that I'm now going to selectively forget.  POOF. Now, there's just a rosy memory of glorious summer days filled with laughter. (Not really, but maybe in 5 years that's how I'll remember this summer, right?)

Yesterday, before the exciting engagement news, we headed down to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia to enjoy one last summer day of summer fun together.  It was a surprisingly pleasant trip -- no traffic, free parking, happy and well-behaved kids, tasty lunch...you name it.  Delightful.  Almost good enough to make me sad that the summer is ending. 

Today, we're going to finish all of our back to school preparations, including the homework that arrived in the mail for Abby from her teacher.  Homework.......sigh.

Maybe I actually am a little sad that summer is ending?!

My Children, The Actors:

WEDDING BELLS!

Scott's brother Andy and his girlfriend (and our very, very dear friend) Trish GOT ENGAGED TODAY!!!!   I am so happy for them!!!!  I'm practically crying right now, I am still so happy!!!   

Trish and Andy have been dating for several years, and she's become a much beloved member of the family, and now it's going to be OFFICIAL!!!!!  Aunt Trish will forever be Aunt Trish!

MORE EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MORE GUSHING!!!!!!!!

MORE JOY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Behold -- The Closet

Since it was raining yesterday, Scott and I decided to tackle the laundry room closet transformation project, the goal of which was to change the messy laundry room closet into a "mud room" for the kids' shoes and bookbags.

We wanted to finish this project before the school year started, so that (hopefully) the kids will no longer walk inside the front door and immediately drop their coats, shoes, bookbags, and other stuff right in the middle of the entryway.  I am hoping they will get into the habit of putting things into their little own space right from the beginning of the year.  The reality will probably be that the kids will still throw their things into the middle of the floor, and then I will "ask" (read "repeatedly nag") them to put their things away. BUT, at least there is now somewhere to put it where they can reach. And, who knows, maybe they will surprise me. 

Before:  "Bag World" (Scott's term). We were using the closet to store recycled paper, reusable bags, and a few other miscellaneous things. 

After:  Behold!  I feel like I've finally channeled Martha Stewart.  And, I like it.  (And, the kids like it too. They had a great time simulating coming home from school and hanging up their bookbags.  The hooks are low enough that everyone can reach.)

Believe it or not, but this project only cost $34!  I bought 3 colored plastic crates ($3.99 each) and 3 of the cloth bins ($6.99 each) from Target.  Scott used some scrap lumber for the shelf brace, and the shelf itself we just moved down from above.  We also already had some spare hooks.  The recycled paper went into the garage with the other recyclables since it is single-stream recycling, after all, and the other bags went onto another hook right in the garage doorway-- still handy. 

As is usual with any home projects, the kids made a mess of several other rooms while working on this one space.  So, I must now ask (again, read "repeatedly nag") the kids to clean those other areas up.  While they are doing that, I'm going to go stand in the closet.

Vines Round 2

Let's all take a moment and marvel at the wonderful evolutionary adaptions that have enabled vines to be so successful in the plant kingdom.  Unlike mammals with our limited single method of procreating, vines can reproduce sexually or asexually. And, since vines don't have to waste precious energy on structurally supportive stems or trunks, they can focus their energy resources on growth.

Are you finished marvelling?

Now, let's gripe about vines.  At length.

Holy cow.  Scott and I spent hours and hours and hours clearing vines from our somewhat overgrown property only two months ago.  I'm clearly remember digging out the roots out during this effort.  I thought we had put a fair dent in each of the eight species of vines growing in the yard, although I knew at the time, that the battle was not over. 

Armed with clippers, a spade, and 15 paper yard bags, we went into battle with the vines again on Friday and Saturday.  I am not exaggerating when I estimate we cleared at least 1/2 mile of vines and roots out of the side yard (that's >2500 feet).  I was routinely pulling 30 foot stretches of Virginia creeper up off the ground or out of the trees.  Scott cleared hundreds of feet of kudzu roots from under the holly tree.

On the bright side, I didn't find any more honeysuckle growing.  One the bad side, there was much, much more bittersweet than last time.  Fortunately, the bittersweet had not finished forming its berries, so at least one method of reproduction has been squelched for a season. And, while we were working, we inspired our neighbor to come out and pull vines from his side of the fence, so he removed huge amounts of poison ivy and wild grape too.  (The jury is still out if I will escape getting poison ivy after this efforts...I'm not optimistic though, considering how many different places I found it growing.  But, at least all the patches of poison ivy were very small.) 

Sigh. I just can't believe how much invasive stuff was still out there, considering how much we removed only two months ago.  So...I guess should schedule Vines Round 3 this fall?

Round 2 - 15 bags of Invasive Yard Stuff

FANCY!

LOOK!!! Do you like the new look of my blog??  I think it looks pretty snazzy!!

Now that I have written over one hundred entries for my blog, I felt it was time to spruce up the header of my blog a bit-- a least make the top picture less than gigantic. Although I've written a little HTML before (a while ago), I was completely unable to figure out which part of the code was controlling the photo size since there were a lot of pre-set template definitions.  And, I was getting frustrated.

So, I asked my friend Melissa of Girlymama (her awesome blog HERE) for some design advice, and she not only fixed the header problem, she went one step further and made my blog beautiful (while she was sleep-deprived, no less)!  Thank you, Thank you!!!

Now, it looks like one of those "real" blogs.  I guess I should stop gushing and start writing...

Superhero Training Program

If I were trying to really impress Ben, I would give up this whole mom thing, and starting training to be a SUPERHERO.  Then, I could spend my days making cool sound effects and "booming" the bad guys.  Right now, Ben is living and breathing superheroes.  When he goes outside, he finds sticks and fights the bad guys.  When he is inside, he builds legos into ships to carry lego superheros to fight the bad guys. When we play under the covers in the morning (i.e., when mom is just trying to sleep for just a few more minutes), we fly in very claustrophobic rocket ships to go fight the bad guys.  Although Ben is improvising very well, our superhero collection is currently limited to a spiderman motorcycle, a couple well worn superhero T-shirts, a few books, and some spiderman pajamas.

Our neighbor on the other hand is swimming in superheros -- a whole big box full of superhero action figures -- which is why Ben wants to go over to their house at 6:30am every morning.  It's not to go so see his buddy; he wants to visit the toys.  

Which got me thinking.......

Maybe I should modify our potty training regimen in some way to incentivize Ben with Superhero action figures IF he would start using the toilet and keeping his pants dry.  Finally.   

We've been working on this toilet training thing for a while now.  Actually, a long while.  I just did a search on the blog and am a little shocked to see we started back at the end of May (see NAMREDIPS).  Clearly just being able to wear Spiderman underwear hasn't been enough of an incentive for Ben.  I didn't want to have to resort to any kind of reward system for the potty training, but then one of my friends reminded me that I used m&m's for Abby.  I know I used Hello Kitty stickers for Caroline.

So, I decided to offer Ben one superhero action figure (the ones we've been "visiting" at Target for a while) if he could go in the potty 15 times in 3 days.  Each successful visit gets a hand-drawn star; accidents mean a star is erased.  I went to target and plunked down $12 for one Iron Man figure and one Batman figure. 

Worth it? Probably. Although I don't know the long-term ramifications of this approach, Ben is now the proud owner of a very flexible Iron Man figure and is on Day 3 of bone dry superhero underwear (which, yes, he still insists on wearing backwards). 

Maybe this is really it for the daytime diapers?  Dare I hope??? 

Hungry Man

You know those cartoons about teenage boys that open the refrigerator and pour the entire contents into their mouths?  Well, I got my first preview of teenage boyhood at our house over this weekend.

Ben has been foraging in the pantry and in the refrigerator for anything he can reach.  (This is not a practice that I condone; however, he's pretty sneaky.)  Ben is only 3 feet tall and can only reach the front of the pantry shelves.  So, his foraging this weekend consisted of an entire bag of Craisins, huge bin of pretzels, and my personal favorite, almonds -- covered in WASABI.  These almonds are super spicy, people.  They make my mouth burn and my eyes tear after about 4.  Ben housed half the can.

Not so long after the almonds, Ben walked determinedly into the kitchen.

Ben:  "Mom, I need some more FOOD."
CC:  "Are you hungry buddy?"
Ben:  "Yeah, Mom, really REALLY hungry."

So, I gave him some cheese and crackers at 4pm, which he ate like you think I'd been starving him.  At 4:30, he had a huge bowl of pineapple. Then, he finished a plate of fish and broccoli (without complaint!) an hour later.  So, on Sunday Ben ate breakfast, breakfast snack, pre-lunch snack, lunch, lunch snack, almond delight, pre-dinner snack, giant bowl of pineapple, and then dinner. 

Better lock up your food.  Ben is growing.

Down The Ocean, Hon

The family and I just returned from a fun week in Ocean City, Maryland (which is why the blog was so quiet this past week).  Unlike last year when we left our vacation early due to significant technical and behavioral difficulties (i.e., broken AC with 100 deg temps + super cranky kids), this year we were able to enjoy a full, action-packed, 7-day family vacation. 

Our time together had a lot of wonderful moments, but it was thoroughly exhausting. I've heard people say they need a vacation from their vacation, and now I really understand what they mean.  However after going to the beach and camping, I don't want to even think about packing or unpacking another bag for a looooong time...

Some of the week's highlights:

1) Playing at the Beach (of course!) - We really lucked out weatherwise, so we were able to spend lots of time in the sand and surf. We didn't even hear too many complaints from the kids about the copious amounts of sunscreen required. Abby really got into boogie boarding and playing "over-under" in the waves.  Ben and Caroline stayed closer to shore playing in the surf break. 

Foggy Morning Walk

Shelling

2.  Amazingly Delicious Steamed Crabs - I have successfully taught Abby how to eat steamed crabs. While she doesn't have the speed and accuracy of a practiced picker, I hereby declare her an honorary Marylander. 

3.  Assateague Island - On Thursday, we drove down to Assateague Island National Seashore run by the National Park Service to see if we could spot some wild horses and do a little hiking since the temperatures dropped down to a very pleasant 76 degrees.  We hiked on three short half mile trails, each highlighting a different habitat (marshes, forest, and dunes). The mosquitoes notwithstanding, these trails were perfect for kids -- short, full of wildlife, and interesting.  We saw some beautiful wild horses up close:

And then a wee bit too close:

View of Salt Marsh from the Trail

4. Trimper's Rides - A family tradition from my childhood, we spent an afternoon at the Trimper's Rides on the Boardwalk.  The kids had a blast, and I couldn't help but marvel how most of the rides haven't changed since I was a kid.  Although I don't have a photo, the original hand-carved carousel from 1905 is a stunner. 

On 'The Whip'

5. Lifeguards - Holy cow.  On Friday, the wind kicked up to a sustained 20 mph or so (if I were more nautically inclined I'd tell the speed to you in knots).  The water conditions dramatically changed from 'fun waves' to "No, Abby, let's just watch".  I've been to the ocean for probably 30 years, and I can think of maybe one rescue I've ever seen.  The water conditions were so rough (and the swimmers so overconfident) that I watched the guards perform 6 (S-I-X!!) rescues in the span of 3 hours.  At one point, three guards went out together to help a group of teenage girls that had gotten caught in a rip current.  A serious Baywatch moment.  Only it wasn't on TV.  Wow.   

AND -- all these rescues followed an even more dramatic set of events that occurred on Tuesday.  A mother on our stretch of beach lost her 3-year old child.  Word spread quickly among all the people standing on the beach, and soon there were hundreds and hundreds of strangers patrolling the beach and the block of houses behind the beach for this woman's precious daughter.  The lifeguards signalled up and down the beach, the police came, and hours passed.  Hours.  I can't even imagine what the poor mother was going through.  The girl's extended family was at the beach too, and she just disappeared while they were all standing there. And finally, the girl was found!  Thank God!!  We stayed at 138th Street, and Eleanor turned up all the way down on 88th Street.  Strangers were crying  and the relief was palpable.  The sheer number of strangers that just dropped everything to help look for this little girl was amazing.  And so scary.  We kept an even closer eye on our kids for the remainder of the week.  

6.  More?  So much more happened -- biking and kite flying and revisiting some family favorites (Dumser's for milkshakes) -- but I really need to go fold some laundry....and you're probably tired of reading...Overall, though, the best part was getting to spend a whole week of time together as a family.

  

Caught Cute

Now that Abby is 7 (and a half!) years old, she doesn't have as many "cute" moments anymore.  She has lots of "beautiful" moments and "silly" moments and "smart" moments....but not just plain "cute" moments like she did as a younger child.  Of course, I know that this is part of growing up.  And, she is not so old yet that I have gotten nostalgic about the baby years. 

Last night, I caught Abby looking fairly adorable (in my opinion).  After we read together and I turned off the lights, she arranged all her favorite stuffed animals around herself, tucked in her unicorn next to her, and even spread her baby blanket on top of the pillow and fell asleep.  So, this cute moment totally caught me by surprise when I peeked into her bedroom before I fell asleep. 

Observations

#1 - If a young child is able to have an intelligent and detailed conversation about the causes and treatments of diaper rash, wouldn't it make sense that this same child, a 3-year old boy for example, would be interested and/or able to start using the bathroom regularly to prevent the aforementioned rash??

#2 - I have changed diapers for 2,774 nearly consecutive days....and counting.  (There have only been S-E-V-E-N days over this stretch with no diaper changes. Seven!)

#3 - While I am now a whiz at the quick change, the standing change, the super messy change, the car change, and diaper improvization, I am now ready to have these skills lie dormant until my grandchildren are born in twenty or thirty years.

Special Wishes

for my Dad a.k.a Pops today:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY! 



We wish you a very happy day!  Thanks for all your wonderful support and love over the years!

I asked the kids what they would like to get Pops for his birthday (for pretend, of course).  Here are your fictitious presents from us:

• Caroline sends an Ocean City Puzzle, "one of the ones with lots of pieces"
• Abby sends a disco ball (I have no idea on this one....do you have some kind of closet disco dancing hobby that you never mentioned??)
• Ben sends you a flower "but, I don't know what kind he likes"
• CC and Scott send you an Inverted Jenny stamp since money is no object, right?

Love, CC and the Gang

At the Zoo

I've been at the zoo for the past few days. 

No, we weren't sleeping there -- the zoo has come to us.  Although we all enjoyed the family camping trip over the weekend, I think the high level of physical activity and/or change of schedule temporarily transformed the kids into wild animals, as characterized by constant primal screaming, fighting over food, fighting over territory, selective listening, and general poor temperament.  Super fun times here.

Things were so bad yesterday, that after Abby had her final weepy episode of the day and went to sleep, I poured myself a shot of scotch and sipped it while crying (all out blubbering, if I'm being totally honest) over the end of the While You Were Sleeping movie with Sandra Bullock and then 30 minutes of a ridiculous teen TV show about gymnastics, Make It or Break It.  Poor Scott probably thought I had lost it, but kindly let me have my hour of self pity.  (Sorry if this is too much information, but the tough reality of parenting is that there are as many 'lows' of parenting as there are 'highs'.) 

If today had gone as badly as the last few days, I really don't know what I would have done.  My prayers for more patience and shorter minutes weren't enough.  Fortunately, the kids returned to their normal only semi-annoying and semi-trained selves today and played nicely with some friends for several consecutive hours while I talked to an actual adult female without too many interruptions or food requests. 

In addition to the zoo here, the family enjoyed a mostly nice visit to the Philadelphia Zoo with Grandma and Grandad on Monday.  We went up in the tethered Zoo balloon and saw a spectacular 360 view of the city.   It's been at least a decade since I had been to the Philly Zoo and they have made some amazing improvements -- Big Cat Falls, Avian Center, etc.  Really impressive!  In hindsight, I should have scheduled this zoo visit for a different week so the kids could 'recover' from camping before diving into another activity, but it didn't really occur to me they would be so tired since they didn't have to do the packing.  Overall, the kids and I definitely enjoyed our zoo visit.  Thanks Grandma and Grandad!

Philadelphia

Tortoises on the Move

Camping Attempt #1

Success!

Scott and I took the kids camping on Friday night at French Creek State Park. This was our first family camping attempt since Abby was 1 year old (that camping trip was...not stellar).  In addition to being fairly close to home in case a hasty retreat was required, French Creek has a little bit of everything:  hiking, biking, boating, fishing, playgrounds, and swimming.  A key component of the success was that we invited the Sullivan family to join on this venture so both the adults and the children would have some friendly reinforcements.   

Our plan was to arrive around lunchtime on Friday, spend the afternoon physically exhausting the kids so they would sleep, set up the campsite, have a campfire and eat s'mores, sleep like rocks, make a delicious outdoor breakfast, kayak, and return home.  We pretty well stuck to the plan, with the addition of some more hiking and swimming on Saturday.  Although the kids went to sleep later than normal, everyone actually slept and we had a lot of fun.  The three days of continuous packing and unpacking were worth it!

Some other camping highlights:

1. Absolutely perfect camping weather.  No humidity, no excessive heat, and no rain.
2. Super fun kayaking on a lake with gorgeous flowering waterlilies
3. Wild blackberry pancakes for breakfast hot off the griddle
4. Amazing fire-making ability from Mr. Sullivan (just like Bear Grylls using embers!)
5. Super speedy and stealthy kayak to canoe boat transfer by Ben
6. 5-Star camping accomodations

On the Water

Glassy Waters of Big Bass Lake

Happy Camper (literally)

At the Hike's Summit