Can't Make this $#!+ up....

Yeah, I'm slacking on blog entries.  I know.  I know.  In my defense, somehow neither child failed pre-school.  Which means neither child required summer school of some sort.  Which means I actually have to take care of them all day.  Every day.  And it's friggin' exhausting!  And strangely enough, neither child wants to veg out in front of the TV watching a "Real Housewives of New Jersey" marathon with me.  I KNOW!  What the hell?!?!?

However, in my eternal pursuit of trying to entertain my lil' cherubs, I encourage them to use their imaginations.  When I say that to them, it usually sounds something like; "For the love of all that is unholy, please go find something to do that doesn't involve screaming at each other or me!"

So... this is what they found:

Yup. That's them.  Wearing metal popcorn tins on their noggins.  The good news is that the tins were empty when Chaos & Mayhem decided to slap them on their heads.  And yes, they were doing their best impressions of two angry, hormonally imbalance male deer and were indeed trying to bash each other using their metal-popcorn-tin-covered skulls as weapons.

Y'all thought I was making this up on Facebook, didn't you?

See?

Oh stop it.  I made them cease and desist after a while.  Actually, Jason made them stop when he caught me telling them "Come on... let's make it a "best out of five"... winner gets a popsicle!"

Gonna be a long summer.
xoxo
Deb

Mother-of-the-Year Entry #4,826

I am a deeply stupid woman.  Just putting it out there, to ensure that you are clear on that one fact before reading further.

At some point during the fifteen or so years that it took us to potty-train Nick he decided that once he was "completely" potty-trained, he would receive a reward.  To this day, I have no idea how he came up with this concept, but as I'm completely comfortable with offering bribes to my children (and Jason) for Debbie-approved behavior, I agreed.  Jason, of the "pick-and-choose-your-battles" school of being the husband of a Debbie, nodded and grunted his agreement as well to the deal. 

Nick's choice for his reward was Ramone's House of Body Art Color Shifters Playset.  Seriously.  I couldn't make this up if I tried.  Check it out on Amazon. 

To be honest, neither of us expected Nick to ever be completely potty-trained, so we never anticipated having to keep our end of this particular bargain.  Plus I thought something else would catch his interest over the years it took to potty-train the boy.

Flash-forward to yesterday morning:  I'm having a conversation with Bree about my favoritest topic ever- potty training.  In case you're curious, if I had known exactly how maddening it is to potty-train someone, there is not a chance in hell I would have ever made the suggestion that we have kids to Jason back in our carefree, relaxed, childless days.  We should have just bought a boat.  Or something.

Anyway, during the conversation with Bree about getting her out of diapers before she can get an AARP membership, Nick makes a startling statement:  "Mommy, I think I'm potty-trained.  I don't have many accidents anymore.  Let's go get the color changer."  That's what Nick took to calling Ramone's House of whatever-the-hell-it-is.

My reaction, you ask?  Here it is:
CRAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP.

But, a deal's a deal.  So off Nick and I went to pick up the color changer yesterday afternoon.   As we left the house, I wasn't sure if Jason was laughing at me or booking a one-way ticket to Aruba.

Let me be clear about one more thing:  I HATE this toy.  I may have finally found something that annoys me more than the Tea Party.  Although now that I think about it, there are some similarities, neither the color changer nor the Tea Party operate in the manner that makes any sort of sense.

But, as usual, I digress.  The TV commercial portrays a happy little boy, sitting at a table, delightedly playing with Ramone and his buddies in the body shop playset while his parents beam at their happy child.

Lies.  All lies.

The squirt bottle thingy leaks so much water that you need to refill the damn thing every twenty-nine seconds.  You know what else is about twenty-nine seconds?  The amount of time it takes the water in the stupid little dunktank to go from being warm enough to change the stupid little cars another frigging color to being just lukewarm water that can't do a damn thing but get slopped all over my kitchen floor.  Which is fine, because the floor is already covered in water because the cap from a tube of Chapstick would hold more water than the part laughably called the "reservoir."

Of course the minute Nick woke up, he wanted to play with the stupid toy.  Jason actually whistled as he left for work this morning.... wonder why?

And as much as I appreciated the water all over the kitchen floor yesterday (couldn't come up with another reason to not mop this time, with it being all wet already) I wasn't looking forward to our own little waterworld again.

So... this is how I let Nick play with his new toy today:

Now all I can think is "was changing his diapers really that terrible?"

xoxo
Deb

Haircut

I really, really, really tried to come up with a witty title for this entry.  Clearly I failed.  Decided to be brief and to the point, for a change.  Who knew I had it in me?

Anyway, Bree got her first professional haircut.  Up until now, Jason had been assuming the role of hairdresser for the girl.  And Nick, too.  And yes, despite the musical theatre, Jason is indeed straight.  For now.

Anyway. Again. (So much for those claims of "brevity"...) Bree did very well, loved the whole experience, examined every inch of the "beauty salon" and no longer resembles a cute, tiny, pink sheep-dog.


Next step... getting Nick's hair professionally cut. 

Does anyone know where I can pick up a child-sized straight jacket?  Might need a gag, as well.

xoxo
Deb

In sickness and in...

The kids have been sick since, well, at this point I have a distant memory of a time when locating the Tylenol wasn't the most pressing task at hand.  Distant.  Very. 

I don't even remember which child started the latest round of coughing and sniffling and cries of "I'm cold.  Get me a blanket."  No "please", just "get me the damn blanket."  Normally my kids are well-mannered.  Despite their affinity for destruction "please" and "thank you" have always come easily to them.  It appears that their degree of civility is inversely proportional to their temperature.  I'm not even going to share what Bree called me while requesting a cup of orange juice a few moments ago.  I think she may have a future in composing gangster rap lyrics. 

They even look sick.  Both are pale, with dark circles under their eyes.  Bree has a perpetually chapped upper lip from having her nose wiped every six minutes.  Nick's had a headache that starts up the moment the Tylenol wears off which has made the already daunting job of trying to tame his hair with a comb fairly impossible.  Thursday was the last time I gave it a try.  Normally I (as all mother's do, I'm sure) think that my children are breathtakingly beautiful.  Not right now.  They ugly.  UGGGGLLLLYYYY.

However, my beloved mother-in-law happened to send me a couple of pictures of Chaos and Mayhem from early December, which coincidentally, was they last time I think they were healthy.  I'm considering having the pictures printed out and taping them to the kids foreheads. 

xoxo
Deb

Caption TBD

Couldn't make up my mind on the caption for this picture.

a)  Look!  Finally found a kid who will sit at the table and eat  Unfortunately that kid is Baby-All-Gone.

or

b)  Bree's biological clock started ticking at a very young age.

xoxo
Deb

p.s. And of course Nick had to show Bree the correct method on how to feed the doll.  Now if he could just get Bree to feed herself....

How a Tokarski Decorates a Christmas Tree

This would be why it takes so long for us to decorate the tree.  Each ornament needs to be used as an accessory prior to getting placed on the tree.

Sigh.  xoxo

Deb

Disney Cruise Slideshow

Finally.

Better late than never?

Special thanks to Aaron for technical support (which means holding my hand and literally walking me through the process of setting up a slideshow.)  Technology is not always my friend. You'll need to click on the white box below to get the slideshow started. Still haven't completely figured out how to caption the photos, but they're all fairly self explanatory.



xoxo
Deb