NAUGHTY NEIGHBORS

Our kids were naughty neighbors today... I came home from my 18 mile run to find Jay working hard replacing ceiling fans in the carport while the kids played with the neighbor boy (Henry) and his cousin (Lane). As I was finishing chores and about to head to the shower to get ready for Oktoberfest, I see our across the street neighbor walking down our driveway with a very sad looking Henry... Turns out Henry had spray painted one of our buckets. No big deal. The problem was, where did the spray paint come from? Apparently the 4 kids thought it was a great idea to built their new fort at Miss Linda's house (next door to Henry's house). While it's bad enough that they were playing on her property without her permission, as all us parents walked over to assess the damage (and pray that nothing else was spray painted, like the neighbor's RV), we found the kids had cut limbs out of her bushes (to better conceal themselves within the "fort"), stolen spray paint and tiny flower pots from her carport, spray painted not only the bucket, but also some of her trees and the bushes, dragged a bunch of trash out of the ravine behind her house, and generally made a giant mess that was somewhat concealed from her driveway... Because she was out of town, we had the kids write her letters of apology and pay for the paint and pots they took.

(We were later able to stop by and talk to Miss Linda, who had a hard time keeping a straight face while we explained the situation and was not mad, but played along nicely for us so that the kids would learn a lesson. She let the kids keep their money, but I promised her she could call on them for yard-work help any time she wants.)

ROUGH HOUR

It was one of those afternoons where everything was great, until it wasn't. The kids were on good colors at school (they usually are these days), they didn't have any homework, they quickly did their chores and got ready for dance, and we happily headed to the studio. Then Pre-Ballet ended, and while Cora was in Acro 2, James went from awesome to unbelievable... There was running and yelling and Acro in the halls (distracting the students in classes), defiance of my asking him to sit quietly and read his AR book (complete with whining, and then outright telling me "no"), and an all around terrible attitude (from eye-rolling to rude noises to full-blown meltdown-sobbing). All this from the child who normally behaves angelically (though, this behavior is becoming more common over the past month or so... must be a birthday coming up - we always have behavior issues around birthday milestones for some reason). When Cora got out of Acro, I was beyond ready to leave, but I needed to get the kids fitted for Acro shoes. While I waited for the sales girl, Cora jumped up to hang on the counter. I asked her to get down, and when she did, she accidentally knocked over the ceramic pen holder, smashing it into a zillion tiny shards of danger for a bunch of barefoot ballerinas... As I was attempting to clean that up, she started crying because she thought she was in trouble (she wasn't, it was just bad timing on top of everything else) and James continued to whine (now about wanting to go sit and watch his friends play on his Kindles). When I turned full around to tell Cora that I wasn't mad, and tell James NO and that he needed to wait patiently to have his feet measured, I caught him chewing on his watch band again (we've asked him repeatedly not to do so). It was obviously missing chunks and about to fall apart, so I took it from him, which caused him to WAIL (and lie that "it got stuck on something - I wasn't chewing it!) At that point I was DONE. You know you're no longer holding it together when your friend walks over from the waiting area and pats your shoulder to assure you that "we all have those days". Oh, what an hour...

 So, I did what I had to do to keep my sanity. We left without the foot measurements. We blasted the radio on the way home and I sent James to his room while I threw dinner together. When dinner was ready, I had him come out with the $12 required to purchase a replacement watch band, plus $3 in "whine taxes" (we started this with Cora over winter break and it has worked really well, mostly, and we recently had to start doing it with James too - $1 for every "most horrible noise on the planet" made - and I felt that $3 was lenient for an hour worth of back-talking and whining). I ordered his band, fed him (and everyone else) dinner, and sent him to bed (with plenty of hugs and kisses and an "I love you, but you're overtired and/or overwhelmed if you're behaving like this, so you're going to bed an hour early"). The rest of the evening was much calmer (and he barely complained about his early bedtime, so clearly he knew he needed it, on some level). We played Cloud Hoppers with Cora (and when I checked on James 10 minutes into our game, he was already asleep.) Jay won, neither of us had a beer (we cut out weeknight drinks again at the beginning of the month when the holiday festivities ended), and we vegged out with TV until my temper was completely calm and ready for bed. Oi. Vey.

 This blog/journal tends to document all the fun and cuteness, but it's obviously not like that all day, every day around here, so this was a little bit of "the bad" recorded for posterity. And now I can't wait for James to turn 8 and get this transition behind us!

STRIKE 5...

Why is it that 5 out of 5 documented Captain Destructo moments have involved Cora?...

This occurred just as you're probably thinking, looking at the photo: Cora went to the bathroom to wash her hands after a syrupy breakfast and shortly after James came out to tell us that she had jumped up onto the towel bar and "made a nail stick out". Daddy was not pleased to have his lazy day interrupted with repair work...

"I'M PAWPAW!"

While babysitting the Sanchez crew tonight, I was finishing dinner prep and all 4 kiddos were at the table. Leo was already eating, James and Manu were joking around, and Cora was coloring. When I placed the big kids' plates on the table I looked at Cora and saw this:

When I asked her what in the world she was doing coloring on her face, she said "I'm PawPaw!", just as proud as could be. And she did indeed get the general shape of his moustache correct...

 

(James was also sporting a thin moustache, and when I asked him if he was allowed to color on his face with markers, he said "Well, CORA gave it to me!" At least Manu and Leo were unmarked. It sure led to some ridiculous dinner conversation though...)

MAKING MOMMY SMILE

Spinning the cart in circles at Home Depot while daddy gets blinds cut to size for the kids' rooms. We're taking down the drapes because the kiddos have recently been wrapping them into "vines" and swinging from them...

Showing me how they "keep their monster hands to themselves", a very important lesson...

LOOKING GUILTY

For those who wanted a better look at what Cora cut out of her hair, it's slightly easier to see fresh from the shower. She may look guilty here, but she honestly doesn't care. And we don't really care all that much either, other than the fact that we're now terrified she'll cut someone else's hair at school and we'll all be in trouble...

WE'RE NOT READY...

 Unplanned: Cora's first haircut. 

Completed by Cora. At school (we certainly don't leave scissors laying around outside of locked cabinets at home, for this EXACT reason). I suppose talking about taking James for a haircut for so many days in a row was too much for her to handle, even though we explained to her that she would be waiting at least 6 months if not a year or two before we take her for her first haircut (since she still doesn't have much). Are we upset? Yes. I'm sad and Jay is bummed (but glad that we already took her 3-year portraits). It's not super noticeable (due to the fact that her hair is so thin and blonde), but she already had a weird short spot in that part, so it shows up. And I wanted to be there for her first haircut, to take pictures and enjoy the milestone (you know, completed by a stylist, not a 3-year-old). But alas, it's only hair. It will grow back. And Jay luckily found a chunk still sitting on top of her head when he went to get her out of the car, so at least I have something for her scrapbook...

Planned (decided on Friday after refinancing our house): a new convertible harness/booster seat for Cora.

No, she is nowhere near the weight or height limit of her Britax Boulevard (she's 30 lbs and 38" and it goes rear-facing to 40 lbs and 49"), but we're over it. On vacation, while traveling forward-facing in Addy's Boulevard, Cora learned that she can simply flick up the switch and loosen the straps. We pulled over on the side of the road and scolded her multiple times on the trip, and yet when she got home to her own Boulevard, rear-facing, she continued to do it. Completely unsafe. Also, the version of the Boulevard we own has the easily removable padding (for cleaning purposes), which we have removed MANY times to wash, and which is literally falling apart. They aren't cheap to replace. Or easy to find for older models of car seats. Thirdly, Cora is ridiculously demanding in the car. The Queen can't tolerate holding her food wrappers or sippy cup longer than 30 seconds, so she is constantly whining for the driver (or passenger, if we're driving somewhere as a family) to reach back and take them from her to hold up front. The child needs some cup holders. And patience. So even though we're not really ready, and kinda feel like hypocrites for moving her out of her rear-facing car seat before she neared the limits, she's now in the same car seat as her brother, the Britax Frontier SICT 85. And she LOVES it. At least she made is 3 years, right? It's going to feel so weird taking them to school in the morning, with both of them watching my every move, checking me out in the mirror, and acting as backseat drivers (this will be Cora's first time forward-facing in her home town, so I'm honestly interested to see what she thinks about seeing her normal routes from a different perspective).

AN OWIE WORTHY OF HER YEARBOOK...

Cora the Climber got herself injured for the first time tonight. After learning that James' boat shelf (which hangs above his blue bookshelf) contained a treasure chest, Cora decided she needed to investigate. She climbed the blue bookshelf (which is securely attached to the wall, thank goodness) and reached up to pull on the boat shelf, which came tumbling down, it's contents in tow. Luckily, she seemed fine within 3 minutes (the screaming/crying and bleeding stopped - we think she was more scared than hurt) and it's a very small puncture wound (it was just a lot of blood, as head wounds tend to produce). James' treasure chest, pirate piggy bank, and boat shelf were less fortunate though... And I'm pretty sure Jay and I grew some new gray hairs tonight!

After a wound cleaning by daddy (while mommy helped hold the ice pack) we were able to see that it's really just a small cut (and not too deep), the bruising wasn't too bad, and there was almost no swelling. It could have been so much worse. Thank goodness it didn't hit her eye (and we're pretty sure it was the treasure chest that hit her head and not the heavier boat shelf).