Signs it might be time to wean

"Mommy, put that nipple away.  I want the other side now."

More from Ben and a Pastafarian offering

Ben stormed off to his room, angry at Steve and I.  Soon we heard singing.  It was a looong and loose song and by the time I managed to get pen and paper to hand it was already slipping away, but part of it went a little something like this, sing along once you get the idea:

Bullets and bombs...they are a bad thing.
Guns and shooting...they are a bad thiiiing.
Bombs and bullets...they are a bad thiiing... (repeat for a while, with other "bad things" that you really, really love)
Somebody faaarted, and it was baaad.
It was Saturday niiiight
oh yeah
Or maybe noooot.
And I need to go to the baaaathroom
So so long for now...
(and he dashes into the bathroom, closes the door and sings unintelligibly for a bit.)

I'm pretty sure that was a Dead Kennedy's song.

In other news, inspired by a fellow Pastafarian, I've made Steve and I Flying Spaghetti Monster pins for our 12th anniversary.

I feel so Blessed by His Noodly Appendage to have the mad skillz needed to produce this work of Sacred Art.
Ramen.

L'Shana Tova!

...or something.  It's our first post-child Rosh Hashana when we aren't in New Jersey w/Steve's folks, so Steve helped the kids to remember it here.  Julianna and Ben wrote down their regrets, guilts, mistakes for the past year on pieces of paper and then took them to the Monocacy River and tossed them in.  Absolution through littering!







As it is written "Cast your troubles into the river and they shall be eaten by ducks."

Boy knows how to PARTY

So I went in to turn off Ben's light last night and found this on the door:



And then this on the train table:



And then this in the bed:



I imagine he'll have a Behind the Music special before he's 16.

Product plug by popular demand

Enough people have asked about the cereal dispensers in the picture link that I'll just mention it here.  They're Zevro Countertop Dispensers.  I got mine through Amazon, but you can Google for what is the best deal now.  I'd like a whole wall of them for storing grains and beans.  Steve wants a kitchen that looks like a diner.  I want one that looks like an upscale natural grocery store.

Stoned and fat and wealthy and sitting on the bowl.

We were listening to Mojo Nixon's "Elvis is Everywhere" in the car and the kids were asking about Elvis, so I was giving them the highlights.  Then I mentioned that he died on the toilet.  Ben about split a side, laughing.  He has giggled all evening about it.  Nothing has ever been this funny to him.  He's drilled me with questions--How did they know he was on the toilet?  did they find a body or just a skeleton?  Was he pooping?

And speaking of which...today's conversational gem with Lily:

Lily: After I finish pooping, can we go to my great grandmovver's house?
Me: That's sweet, but no.
Lily.  But I love my gweat gwandmovver.  And she gives me candy.

The birthday pary

You know, the main tragedy of the Titanic sinking wasn't really the loss of life so much as the untidy disarray of the deck chairs.  I can assure you, dear reader, that had I been on that ship, those chairs would have been in straight lines, arranged by color.  Yessiree.

Since we had a gazillion people coming over for Lily's party on Sunday, I figured I ought to clean.  And since the bulk of the activities would be in the dining room, I figured I ought to clean there first.  But that table...so ugly.  Sure, we could just throw the party cloth over it, who'd know?  But I've been meaning to paint it forever, I had the stencils ready to go....So I put down the swiffer and headed off to the craft store for brushes and stencil paint.  So I spent all day Friday painting the table yellow.  And all Friday night stencilling on a Scandinavian design (ordered from Ingebretsen's in Minnesota! Your source for all things Norse!)  then Saturday, I had to apply the varnish, several coats.  Between coats, I'd tidy, hauling down the cobwebs, scraping up the macaroni and cheese fossils.  Slowly, I started remembering things--make the cake.  come up with a craft and games.  Clean other rooms of the house.  Hm.  Frankly, I'm surprised I didn't need a nap.

So off to AC Moore to get a bigger cake pan and some sort of crafty thing (door knob hangers.  I thought, "Who'd want one of these stupid things?"  Turns out, all of them.)  I made the cake and put its crumb coat on and got it into the fridge.  Barely.  I drew a pony for pin the tail on the pony and decided that was enough games for any child. 

Sunday--AUGH!  PANIC!  Throw table cloth over table to keep kids off of it (shut UP!).  Frantic cleaning and mopping.  Steve scours the downstairs bath b/c...well, ew.  Lily comes in, "Why don't we decorate now?" decorate?  Screeching halt.  Take an hour to string ribbons all over the place in the dining room.  It's 12?!?  Frost giant pony cake. 

Guests start arriving.  Ack!  I haven't put out the food!  Slap food out run around like a nut, get kids working on craft, serve cake, play game, say good bye, collapse.  Hot dogs and cheese curls for dinner.  STeve says it came off well.  I have no idea.

The birthday girl:


The full birthday album, starting with pics from her actual birthday-- birthday pics