A Daily Dose of Mischief

We got a new CD this week. It is a CD of church music and other music for kids, and its an A Capella CD of course. One of the songs on it is called Peanut Butter and Jelly. It is basically a cute little romance sung from the point of view of the peanut butter. The first part of the song goes something like this... I'm Peanut Butter and you are Jelly And we're so happy on our little piece of bread I remember the first time that I saw you Sitting 'cross the cupboard with your other jelly friends And you're so sweet, and I am crunchy You're low fat-well I'm working on that 'Cause I'm Peanut Butter and you are Jelly And we're so happy on our little piece of bread #3 has been singing along with a lot of the songs on that CD, and today while we were out running some errands he was singing it along with the CD fairly loudly. After a couple of minutes I noticed that he was giggling and singing the words slightly different. Instead it was I'm Peanut...

I haven't set Spidey (full name Spidey Yellow Muffet the first) free yet. For a while I thought it was going to starve to death...but since we have a little moth problem I just started catching little moths and putting them in there. Pretty soon there were little moth bodies on the bottom of Spidey's house. I wasn't sure though if the spider was eating the moths, or if they were just dying of boredom or something. Spidey spins, but not a big web, just some little webby pieces here and there. Not even enough to catch a bug. I think the web is more of an alert system for Spidey because when a bug gets near it, it will get very still and open up its legs, and wait. We finally got to see it catch a moth and eat it the other day, and today D put a fly in there and Spidey caught it right away. The boys of course were thrilled to see that! Still, I keep thinking every day about setting Spidey free. I am not sure anyone will let me. D went out and dug a little p...

#2 is our resident helper. He is always willing to clean up and to help out whenever he is needed. I had a sister like that who I secretly hated for it. However, as a parent, I appreciate all the help I can get! #2 is also the one at our house that laughs the hardest about anything to do with bodily functions, and has the strangest sense of humor. His contributing efforts to this blog include Old Age is all about perspective , What Boredom can Do , Plane Crashes and Subtle Insults , #2 is a poet , A Future in Advertising , Burps and other bodily functions , No Wonder I don't Like Milk , and Our Flag .

#1 aka J brought home a card for me from church yesterday. Please note the Post Script at the bottom (it says P.S. No, I'm not asking for food.) Often when #1 compliments me or comes to give me a hug its because he is about to ask me for some kind of food or some other favor. I guess he noticed that I have noticed that particular habit of his. Also...if you are bored...you can check out the interview questions that Tori gave me to answer on my other blog .

Okay, I will admit that there have been times when I was stumbling through my house in the dark, (sometimes not even in the dark!) stepped on small Lego pieces and suddenly had a strong urge to curse the very existence of those tiny Lego building bricks with their incredibly painful corners. Generally though, I love Legos and so do all of my boys. Legos invite creativity, they invite imaginative play, and they invite people of all ages (excluding small people that like to choke on things the size of legos ) to get down on the floor, dig in and build yourself a whole city. I had Legos as a child. They were one of the few cool toys my Mom didn't get rid of (I am still upset over the loss of my Luke Skywalker on Hoth action figure and my as close as I wanted to get to having a Barbie Bionic Woman Doll with the cool flaps on her legs so you could see the bionics inside). The Legos , for some reason, my Mom held on to. Years later, when I had a couple of sons, I got those Legos o...

People are often surprised to find out we have five sons. Almost every time we go out in public we get the same questions. Usually its something like this... Stranger: Are all of these kids yours? Us: Yes. Stranger: All boys? Us: Yes. Stranger: Wow! You really have your hands full! ...Or other similar variants including them counting out that there are five and looking positively shocked. Of course there are times we get that evil question about whether we are going to try for a girl or not. I usually answer with a simple no. While we may have another baby at some point, the point of having another baby would not to be to try to achieve the glorious prospect of a daughter. How would you feel if you were one of six kids and your parents told you that #s three through five were just failed attempts to get a girl. That drives me crazy. CRAZY! We have kids because we want them, whether they are boys or girls (although I admit a horrible fear of having a girl someday, they are very scary to...

I wish I had something really spectacular or funny to relate today in celebration of my 100 th post. Really I spent most of today and half of yesterday away from the boys while I went to OIS training which is a kind of training that helps you to defend yourself and safely physically restrain someone else. Its a long story...but I am done with the training now and back in the swing of things. I haven't really been able to blog or read blogs for the last couple of days. In honor of Wordless Wednesday I am including a picture of #2. Yes, I am aware that it looks fake . He still thinks it is cool, and I had fun making it (D helped out). I am also just learning how to use the program, so I may get better as time goes by. #2 vs #2

The other night at dinner we were talking and I said something about the boys being my babies. I got the typical rolled eyes because of course they range in age from four up to ten and only the four year old feels okay being called my baby. Me: You'll ALWAYS be my babies. When you're 60 I'll still say goo goo 'You're SO cute' when you come to visit me in the rest home. #2: Don't you mean when we're 40? When we're 60 won't you be like 110? Me: How old do you think I am?!?! D: She'd have to be sixty right now... #2: Oh. I don't do math well when I'm chewing something. First there was the parachute jab , and now this. I am starting to wonder if he is insulting me on purpose.

D with #1 With #1 and #2 #2, D, #3 and #1 #1, #3, #2, D and #4 #1, D, #4, #5, #3 and #2 #1, #3, D, #4, #5 and #2 We LOVE you Daddy!

Four Years ago... On his second Birthday One year ago... Happy Fourth Birthday #5!

#2 is already bored. He is also the only one of our five kids that is willing to work hard without... motivation. This can be a winning combination! The other day he called me upstairs to show me something. What I found was that both bedrooms and the area at the top of the stairs were both spotlessly clean. He was so bored he cleaned the whole upstairs. Then yesterday he asked me to bring the vacuum up for him and he vacuumed the whole upstairs too. I am tempted to keep him bored all the time, maybe I can reorganize the whole house over the summer! Still, I think that after all that hard work he did he deserves something to break the monotony that is fun...any ideas?

D brought a laptop home from work for the weekend to install some software on it. He told the boys to be careful around the laptop since it wasn't his. #5: Whose is it? D: My Boss' #5: What's a boss? D: My Boss is the person who gives me my job and gives me work to do. #5: (gasping) Oh, that means Mommy is your boss!

In half an hour from the time I am writing this...school will be over for the summer. I am not sure I am ready. Somehow I feel a little bit of panic at the thought of every day feeling like Saturday except for the fact that D will be working and I will have to entertain the masses alone. Wish me luck!

(Background to the conversation) Every Friday night is our date night. We have five kids, so babysitting is not something we can afford very often. Our date nights happen after the kids are in bed. They still go to bed at 9pm just like on a school night, and then D and I will watch a video we rented or a TV series on DVD, or we will play board games, eat a late dinner, paint watercolors or ceramics, etc. Tonight I had made deep fried zucchini and fried mozzarella cheese sticks to go with dinner. I mentioned to D that the cheese sticks and some fried shrimp and other appetizers would be good date night fare. #1 whimpered because he loves all those foods. D: You can have those for your date nights when you grow up. #1: (incoherent noises that translate to YUCK, and some squirming around.) Me: Yeah, you can have a date night when you grow up, get married and want to spend some time with your honey bun. #1: (More tortured sounds) D: Yeah, you can sit on the couch and kiss...or you can kis...

Star Wars is a recurring theme in our family. #3 would love his own double sided lightsaber . He recently had a Star Wars Birthday when he turned seven. Stylin ' in his shades. Here are some of the posts #3 has inspired on this blog. Literally Half Dead , School , Tiny Gifts , It Depends on Who You Ask , Nakedness Has Many Forms , Favorite Christmas List Item , and The Definition of Damaged .

We are going on a trip to Disneyland later this year. It is a much loved topic of discussion in our home. Four out of five of the boys will be flying for the first time, and #1 has not flown since he was a baby. We were talking about this particular aspect of our trip earlier today. #1: I don't mind flying as long as the plane doesn't crash. #3: Well if it crashes we will just have to walk. (I decided not to explain to him that if the plane crashes we will likely all be well beyond the ability to walk.) #2: (this suggestion was directed at me). Wear a sweatshirt. Make sure you wear one that fits you and we can use it as a parachute! Me: Are you saying I am fat? All I can say is ouch. #2 insists that he didn't mean it that way, but really, how would YOU take it if someone said the same thing to you?

#3 tends to take things very literally. If you say something to him, you had better be prepared to mean what you say, or to back it up with fact. He doesn't have a firm grasp on sarcasm, and I am not sure he ever will. It is one of his more frustrating, and yet sometimes endearing qualities. He is also known for frequently asking questions, some of which are not the easiest in the world to answer. I think he could confuse a person with a PhD. A week or so ago we were in the car, on our way home from Vancouver. Its close to a two hour drive from there, which gives #3 a lot of time to interrupt my singing along to a favorite song to ask a question (hmm...maybe he doesn't like my singing...). This time his question was... "What would happen if you were half dead?" We were kind of stumped on that, and tried to explain it as a figure of speech that doesn't mean death really, just a close proximity to it. (I don't remember what we said exactly, I only wrote ...

We were up visiting family for Memorial Day. On our way home #4 asked me who his Aunt Heidi was going to marry. I told him she was going to marry her boyfriend Scott. His reply was: No wonder they were reading a book together! So be careful who you read with...you don't want someone to get the wrong impression!