The Cabin and Cousins

Sunday and potty words.

Max still can't get over his potty word problem.  I've told him that he is only suppose to say poop in the bathroom.  Today, during Sacrament meeting, Max announced with urgency that he had to go.  We headed into the only empty stall and then he proceeded to loudly talk about what he was doing:

Max:  Mom, I'm sitting on the potty and pointing my wee down.  My poo is coming, Mom.  My poo is coming.
Me: (Quietly) Max, I am here.  I can see what is happening.  We don't need to talk about it.
Max:  Mom, I can say POO in the bathroom!  My poo doesn't want to come out.
Me: Max!  SHHHHH!
Max:  Mom, I pooped.  IT'S DROWNING!  MY POO IS DROWNING!!!
Me:  Max, it's okay.  This is what is suppose to happen, remember?
Max:  Oh, Yeah.  Hey, MOM  I have more POO!
Me: SHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
Max: (Oblivious to my embarrassment and having a great time) I have 4 POOS, Mom!  See.  1...2...3...4... Look, they are little!  They are brown and round.
Me: (Peeking out the crack in the stall to see if I can leave without being seen.)  Okay, time to go wash our hands.
Max:  I pooped!  Mom, I can say Poop in the bathroom!
Me: (sigh) Yes, you certainly can!


Out of the mouth of babes:

Max:  I don't kick or punch, I just wack things.

On the first day of Easter...

The Easter bunny brought to me: A sugar-high, 5 extra pounds, and too much introspection leading to a self-diagnosis of being an "emotional" eater. Thanks, Easter Bunny. Maybe some sugar-free candy next year? Or just a nice dress?

The kids faired a bit better:

Until... Ella broke her thumb. It all kind of went down hill from there.

1 splint, 1 blue cast and $800 (ish) dollars later, we decided that the Easter Bunny is banned from our house. To emphasize this decision, Jackson cut up his brand new (for church) Gymboree polo shirt and I almost threw away my stash of cadbury mini eggs.

Scripture Study

We read 2 Nephi chapter 9 tonight. There are a lot of "wo's" and warnings in this chapter. I was feeling fairly good about my righteousness as I explained repentance and the atonement to the kids. The following were the reactions I got:

Kate: (Bursts into tears and wails) What if I don't make it to the Celestial Kingdom to be with Mommy? I know there are some things that I forgot to repent for! (Sob, sob.)

Ella: (Confidently) I don't think I'll make it to the Celestial Kingdom. I'm pretty sure I'll be in that second one. (A few moments later while I am trying desperately to calm everyone down.) I try to feel bad about some things that I do.

Jackson: I always feel bad about what I do!

Me: TIME FOR BED!!!

Valentine's Day Feast or How to gain 5 pounds in one day!

Katie made us some fabulous, hand drawings to get us in a celebratory mood. Sadly, she spent most of the day sick after a lovely night with the stomach flu, fever, chills and body aches. But with a little Tylenol she was able to muster up enough enthusiasm to share her drawing talents with us.
Ella was enchanted with my candy heart table decorations. "You can eat them," she was overheard exclaiming. Thank goodness, I was channeling Martha Stewart that day.
Grilled Lobster tails were the main event at our Valentine fete. (I had to tell Jackson that swords were not allowed at the table before and after the picture! He had trouble grasping the concept. Why shouldn't a 5 year-old be allowed to eat with his sword at the table? Well, for one look at the picture. He looks positively devilish.)
My very first (probably last) red velvet cake. A bottle and a half of red food coloring and a pound of butter, in case you were wondering. (Yikes!)
Robert surprised me with red roses. I fainted dead away and had to be revived with smelling salts. Just kidding. Oh, but sometimes that man can charm me! :)

Reynolds Family and the Harry Potter Extravaganza

My kids are scared to death of The Little Mermaid. Yes, the Disney cartoon version. So you can imagine the difficulty I had in getting them excited about the Harry Potter series. We started by reading the first book and as soon as we finished it was decided that we were going to watch the first movie and have a party. At our house a party is all about the eats. So we had chocolate covered frogs, edible magic wands, dragon dung, Bertie Botts all flavored beans, and of course different mix-your-own potions to drink. I printed out the house crests and the kids assigned us each to a house and made a badge/necklace for us to wear. In case you care: Kate-Gryffindor, Ella-Gryffindor, Jackson--Gryffindor, Max-Hufflepuff, Robert--Ravenclaw, Me-Ravenclaw. I was relieve to see the kids hadn't assigned me to Slytherin. I made them wait all day for the "movie party" so I know they were tempted. We had a great time and were only the slightest bit sick afterwards. :)

The Bun

Most of you know that I wear a bun in my hair all the time.  No occasion is the exception.  I wear a bun at church, at the gym, at home, on dates with my husband, at the movies, at night to bed.  You get the idea.  I've even overheard myself described as "the girl who always wears a bun in her hair."  That one made me cringe.  You see, it's not as if I love this particular hairstyle.  It's just so easy and practical.  My husband loves my hair long.  And when I say love, I probably mean an emotion even stronger than that--maybe obsessed would be the word.  

When we were first married, he left me for three days to go see his brother return from his mission to Japan.  I decided to cut my hair, as all newly married women do.  I tried to explain to him that it really wasn't my fault, I didn't disregard his wishes, it's a phenomenon with newly married women.  It was pretty much inevitable that I would do it, once I said, " I do."   That line of reasoning did little to convince him.  Let's just say that I have yet to repeat the experience in our eleven years of marriage.  He's much more easy going about my hair now, but still prefers it long and I prefer to keep him happy.  So in the bun it goes, because I am, if anything a lover of the easy and practical. 

Today I woke up feeling uneasy.  I wanted to do something different with my hair.  I wanted to blow it out, leave it long and frustrate everyone's opinion of "that girl with a bun."  I didn't want to be her today.   Sadly, Ella wanted to be in time-out for fighting with her sister and brother numerous times.  Jackson wanted answers to important questions like, "How does the garage opener work?" and "What does invisible mean? Why is the air invisible? How come we bleed? Where does our food go? Are peas good for you?"  Kate wanted to talk about complex emotions and figure out why everything isn't fair and find her missing underwear.  Max wanted to be rescued from the toilet bowl, the stairs, the balloon piece in his mouth and a whopper of a poopy diaper.  Yet, I still had hope--until ten minutes before we had to leave for church. 

 I was downstairs with drippy, wet hair feeding Max his lunch.  I finished up and on my way up the stairs to my blow dryer, I discovered J sitting in our coat closet with a pair of scissors.  He had already cut up his brand new gymboree, plaid church socks and was working on his pants.  After a mini meltdown(mine) and a time-out(his), I was back on track to my blow dryer and then I discovered Ella in the bathroom with an entire tube of gel in her hair,  mixed in with hair spray and leave-in conditioner.  She was repentant and the damage was done--so I said little and we washed her hair.  By this time, I  was at least 30 minutes late.

 We ran out the door: Jackson in his cut-up, hole-filled socks, Kate in her dress sans sash, Ella in her wet bun and ripped-up jelly shoes, Max and his poopy diaper and me, in a wrinkled dress with my hair in, of course, a bun. 

And that folks, is the reason why I ALWAYS wear my hair in a bun.

Of course, sometimes I'm just lazy.