Very brief catch up (of mostly shame)

Mylie has become a very good artist for a four-year-old. My favorite drawing of the week was a very detailed can of Diet Coke. The picture above was taken with my cell phone and is a bit dark, but it is a nice version of the most recent Diet Coke can design.

Mylie knows how to write a few words, but mainly she strings together letters like aweovffeoruahsoehtha and is frustrated when she asks me to read what she's written and I sound it out phonetically or explain that it doesn't say anything . She also had a melt down last week when she asked me to spell Mom and I told her she already knew how to spell it. It turns out she thought she was spelling Allie each time she wrote Mom and felt very betrayed.

On the first of February, Andrew had a hilarious verbalized thought process that went like this, "It is February now! Valentines Day is in February. February is the month of love. Black History month is February. February is the month of Black Love."

Recently, Mylie stripped down naked and ran through the house with a trail of toilet paper clenched in her butt cheeks and screaming, "I've grown a tail! I've grown a tail!"

Maddie lost her cell phone while riding bikes in the neighborhood. I received a call from a garbage man calling from her cell phone asking me to meet him at a local gas station to collect the phone. It was a special moment. I was glad to have the phone back and that the guy was honest. I just don't like meeting random men at gas stations.

Yesterday afternoon, I gave my kids three simple instructions that I thought would keep them out of trouble as they biked around the neighborhood. The first was to not throw anything (Andrew recently nearly caused a car accident by throwing a large branch into the road. It was a windy day and he hoped it would blow back to him like a boomerang. Even after being brought to my door by the woman who had nearly crashed, I found him throwing sticks into the street again on Monday...). Rule two was to stick together. Rule number three was not to chase after animals (the list goes on when it comes to animals, you may recall Andrew shouting for permission to "pet" someone's "wiener" as the person walked by with a dachsund. Also, remember when Zack was bitten by a chihuahua that was loose in the neighborhood, and later he admitted he had let the loose dog out of its backyard?). Shortly after they left, Zack returned to inform me that Andrew was throwing big chunks of snow into the road and at his siblings. Rule number one broken. Then I got a call from Maddie on her cell (most likely moments before it falls out of her pocket) to inform me that Andrew had vanished. Rule number two broken. When they find him, and I am not making this up, he was holding onto some dog's leash as it pulled him along the sidewalk on his scooter. Rule three broken. They all had to come inside.

Andrew recently showed up in the kitchen with a big bald spot in the middle of his head and a chunk out of his bangs. In his words, "It just feels really good to rub a clump of hair on your arm. It is kind of like rubbing your arm with a paint brush."

Each afternoon I coax Andrew through hours of homework. He needs to get a drink, then use the bathroom, then find a pencil, then sharpen his pencil, then stretch for a minute, then his pencil breaks and he needs to resharpen it, then he's thirsty again, then he can't remember where he put his worksheet. Once he finally sat down last night and did his assignment, it only took him 4 minutes. Forty-four frustrating moments of my life lost to one four minute assignment. Adding to this special joy of last night's homework was Zack cartwheeling (his primary mode of mobility these days) towards us to let us know what level he is on in Donkey Kong Country and can we please all join him in the basement to see. When we politely refused, he stormed downstairs to blast the music through the house (at decibels I didn't know possible) so that we can at least "hear the music from that level" so we know he isn't lying. Mylie was plunking away at the piano with one hand, and covering one of her ears with her other hand complaining of the noise in the house. Maddie was shouting from the top of the stairs for Zack to please turn down his music and for Mylie to stop playing the piano. Of course, her version is more like "If I can hear that Wii from my room and you are in the basement, I am going to break your game so you can never play it again and who ever is playing the piano is going to die!"

There is beauty all around when there's love at home...