Friday, February 27, 2009

Fashion Potato

Julius made his own baked potato. He did such a fine job and thought it was so beautiful that he said, "Now that's a fashion potato. It looks so good it should be in a fashion show."

Milk Does a Body Good

Waiting for speech therapy.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Slide!

Tristan practices sliding in to home base. What an athlete!

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Body Parts

Advice and a book review by me over at Type-A Mom. Woot!

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Goink!

The boys jump on a high jump mat which I'm sure they are not supposed to do, but oh well...

Tristan says, "Goink! Goink! Goink!"

Triangles

Tristan points out all the triangles on the track.

At the Track

The boys and I are at the track, about to take a walk. Laps here we come!

Friday, February 20, 2009

Moms and Muffins

My card and rose gift. So adorable!

Muffin Face

Julius eats a muffin at "Moms and Muffins" day at school.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Whack!

I was trying to take a picture of Tristan with his pirate patch on and he punches the paprazzi right in the lens! (See the tiny fist at the left side of the photo?) I guess picture time is over!

Milk with Dad

Rob sent me this picture from his phone. I think they must be in the cafeteria at the hospital waiting for the speech therapist to arrive.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Safety First

The men in the family are shooting Lego cannons. Dad is attacking the fort from a raft trying to free the prisoners. Julius is defending. They decided to get safety glasses after Julius nearly put Tristan's eye out with a flying cannon ball.

And, yeah, that's a fat lip. That happened yesterday when Julius somehow managed to smash Tristan in the face with the wagon tongue. It was a bloody and horrific mess but no stitches needed.

I actually feel pretty great that that's the worst injury we've had since becoming parents. (Knock wood.)

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Happy Birthday, Julius

Opening presents.

The Abomination Cake

Okay this is embarrassing but I have made a commitment to reveal the good, the bad, AND the ugly. This definitely qualifies as The Ugly. This abortion is supposed to be a very cool treasure chest cake I found online. What I made is something that looks like it was put together by 12 monkeys hopped up on acid-laced banana juice. Poor Julius.

P.S. Right after I posted this and went back to look at the cake to see if it was as bad as I remembered (it was), I discovered the "lid" of the cake broke in half. Rob says, "It's okay honey... it's an OLD chest and a little bit broken." I hate this.

Pirate Chest, Phase One

This is phase one of building the pirate chest. This is built from a diaper box and extra cardboard and lots of duct tape. The padlock is built from card board, wadded newspaper and more duct tape. Gotta love that. I haven't engineered the hasp yet, but I have to pause to go build the cake.

Friday, February 13, 2009

Green Tongue

Valentine Party

At Julius's Valentine's Day party at school.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Puddle

Tristan splashes in the puddle with his big boots. Check out this cool storm drain!

Bubbles

Tristan and speech therapist blow bubbles. It's B practice!

Monday, February 9, 2009

Son of a Carpenter Man

Julius got tools for Christmas. Tristan borrows some after Julius leaves for school.

(Have you wondered yet why there are so many pictures of Tristan and hardly any of Julius? It's because a certain unnamed person is hostile toward the paparazzi! Hopefully it's a phase. He does like the video camera!)

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Ginger Dressing

We found a copycat recipe for Benihana ginger dressing. It was perfect with one slight modification. Well, two if you count we left out the celery because celery is evil.

Benihana Ginger Salad Dressing

1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup peanut oil
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp water
1 tbsp chopped fresh gingerroot
1 tbsp soy sauce
1-1/2 tsp tomato sauce
1-1/2 tsp granulated sugar (we added one extra teaspoon)
1 tsp lemon juice
dash salt and pepper

Combine all ingredients in blender container or wok bowl of food processor fitted with steel knife; process until almost smooth. Makes six servings. May be kept refrigerated up to one week.

Servings: 4

Roll Dad Roll

Dad prepares the seaweed and rice. Just about ready to roll!

Aah, Sushi Night

The masses have been clamoring for sushi. Here is the plate filling up as Dad, the household master sushi chef, makes California rolls.

The Arithematic of Food (or Two, Three, Four)

Tristan looked at me sideways out of the corner of his eye. He was standing on a chair at the kitchen counter. I'm not sure how long he had been standing there but he had a devilish grin on his face and both cheeks stuck out, puffy.

"Tristan," I said with my Mommy Early Warning Voice, "what's in your mouth?"

"Dum."

"Open your mouth."

He opened his mouth but I couldn't tell what was in there except that it was gum and a lot of it.

"How many pieces do you have in there?"

"Mmfmm."

"Seven??"

He grinned. "Eight."

"Eight??"

"Nine!"

"Nine??"

He stared at me thoughtfully for a second then added, "Fee. Foh." Another pause. "Two."

"Two?"

"Fee. FOH!" He nods.

I sighed. I hope there's a mathematician in there somewhere and not what I more likely suspect is a serious need for medicine to treat an OCD.

A moment later his brother came and took away the rest of the gum and Tristan went and got a bag of cookies and handed it to me. "Two, fee, foh...

"How about two," I offer generously.

"Yeah, twoooo. Fee, foh."

"No, just two."

"Fee, foh," he countered before walking away, munching his cookies.

The Morning Train

Tristan shoots Mommy with a laser gun after she went to all the trouble to design him a new train track. This will be the first in a long line of parental disappointments, I'm sure.

Friday, February 6, 2009

Resident Evil

On the outside he looks like a sweet little boy. But then you discover that he has scooped copious amounts of Vaseline (by the handful) out of the jar and rubbed it into his hair which is now sticking straight up in places and plastered to his skull in others. That is the moment you are forced to reevaluate what you're dealing with.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Date Night

Tristan and I spent the evening together alone. The other boys were out having meetings at the fire department, going to a chili supper and a high school basketball game. Party animals!

So, the Toddler and I ate leftovers standing at the kitchen sink. It's what he wanted to do. He likes standing on a chair by the kitchen sink because it's near the faucet and he just hangs out there hoping I will eventually turn the water on and he can sneak his hand in there.

I set up the cutting board propped across the sink and laid out ham, pizza, sliced some carrots and cucumbers. He started by sinking carrot pieces to the bottom of the dish of ranch dressing we were supposed to be dipping in. He refused to eat the ham.

"Here, take a bite of this ham."

"No."

"Come on, it's good," I coax.

"Dirty."

"It is not dirty!" I am outraged at the implication that I would feed him dirty ham.

"Hot." He grasps at straws trying to come up with an excuse I will accept so he doesn't have to eat.

"It is not hot. Just eat it."

"No."

So, instead of eating he stacked carrot slices on top of little candles we had set out on the counter for our emergency lighting a few days ago. One little orange circle per little white candle.

Since starting in speech therapy Tristan seems like he really wants to talk but still doesn't have the words. He has a great receptive vocabulary, but isn't good at putting the words together himself. And yet... he can count! So, this new thing he is doing is to say numbers and pretend he's talking.

As I'm standing there eating, he starts moving candles from his side of the counter to my side. "Two... three... four... five..."

"Very nice, Tristan."

"Two. Feefohfive. KICKS!"

"Mmhmm."

"Twofee. Foh. FIIIIIIIVE!"

"What else?" I say, wondering how long he can keep it up.

"Fourfive. Kicks. Twofweefoh. Five."

"Hmm."

"Nandos. (Candles.) Here."

"Thank you, Tristan."

"Kay."

We later lit the candles and had fun blowing them out a few times. He practiced blowing on them gently so they would nearly blow out and then light back up brightly. Eventually all were out, dinner was over and then he negotiated me up from one cookie to two. I have trouble saying no.

Candle lit date night is over and now it's time for SOMEONE to go to bed! Three four five!

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Banana Phone

Tristan discusses the topic of cookies with Grandma on the banana phone. All the women in the store are in love with him.

See My 'Nana?

See my banana??

Slave Training

Tristan helps Dad with the dishes. First step to slavery!

Howdy Ma'am

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

St. Blaise Day Disasters

As promised, here is a retelling of today's disasters. By the way, it's St. Blaise Day. I am not Catholic, but I know this because it was pointed out to me since Julius had surgery on his throat yesterday. And it has absolutely nothing to do with anything I'm about to say.

Fortunately, there were few disasters, but what they lacked in quantity they more than made up for in quality.

1) There was a pee incident with the Toddler's blanket which had to be put into the washer. This sent him into a complete meltdown due to the fact that he must never be separated from the blanket. I considered putting him into the washer also, but was vetoed by Rob.

2) Julius choked on a piece of beef jerky and when he coughed it out it landed in a big wet mass on the floor and before I could get over there to him he picked it up and ate it. I had to go lay down for a minute after that.

3) Later, Julius was on a time out for some heinous crime (can't even remember what now) but he kept managing to find something to play with in the timeout OR his brother kept going over to play with him. So, I told him to go into the bathroom and shut the door and stay in there until the timeout was over. About two minutes went by and I heard him scream, "IT'S AN EMERGENCY! AN EMERGENCY!" so Rob goes running in and when he flings the door open we see that the walls, the counter, the sink, everything on the sink and the whole bathroom mirror are covered in some kind of blue sticky liquid. Apparently he had taken his bottle of "plaque detector" and slammed it down on the counter to try to smash an ant that had gotten into the house and when he did it exploded. Everywhere. We mopped up blue stuff for 15 minutes.

4) While we were mopping up blue stuff in the bathroom, Tristan was rubbing his whole body with a stick of deoderant. He thought it was really funny, too.

5) Tristan ate my soup. Julius ate my ham. So, I had seconds, which was really firsts. If you don't understand that, it's okay. Most days I don't.

Easiest Recipe Ever



This is the easiest recipe for a cool pseudo oriental dish that everyone will love. My kids cannot get enough of it. In fact, I had to increase the size of the recipe because everyone wants seconds!

Ingredients:

3 packages chicken flavored Ramen noodles
2 carrots, julienne-style
1/2 thinly-sliced leek or cup of finely shredded cabbage
2 chicken boullion cubes

Prepare Ramen per directions, adding additional water for the 2 extra bullion cubes (follow directions on the cube container). When you put the noodles in, toss in all the other ingredients. Serve within 1-2 minutes per the noodle directions before they get too soft.

Optional: add cooked chicken cubes or canned chicken. Or sprinkle some crumbled bacon over the top when you serve it. Also if you do the cabbage instead of the leek I like to sprinkle scallions on top.

So easy and cheap and yummy and FAST! (Tristan named this one "Snake Soup"!)

Rob's Drawings

My doodling has caught on. Rob is doing drawings too. Mom noted that nobody has gotten blown up with a hand grenade yet.

Don't Drink the Kool-Aid

Continuing Ed

I'm in continuing ed today and it's very surreal. We are so far off topic I feel like I've accidentally gotten in the wrong class.

Monday, February 2, 2009

Going Home

Julius unwraps a little chocolate bar. We're on the way home! His blood pressure was super low and they almost wouldn't let him leave.

The Go Home Nurse

Nearly done. The go home nurse will remove the IV.

Almost Time

It's almost time to leave. We are waiting on the go-home nurse.

Mimi

Mimi brings a snake and a book.

Dragon

At night Rob and Julius lie in bed and make up stories about Julius and his friends being dragon riders and going on adventures!

The Present

Dad picked out a special present for Julius.

In 2nd Recovery

We're in the 2nd recovery room waiting for him to become more alert. He has had 2 cups of pudding!

He's Out!

He's in recovery and we can't go in until he wakes up, but he's out and all is well. The doc said 6 month interval was perfect this time so maybe we can get this down to 2 times per year. Cool!

Commercial Break

And now for a commercial break. We're down in the lobby having some health food while we wait. See the little pager in the corner? That will beep if they need us. We are almost always back upstairs before they have to page us. I wonder if I can get a Lay's sponsorship.

Going in to Surgery

There they go. Dad on the left, Dr. Vollers on the right. We'll know in an hour.

Going Out of the Room

Suited Up

Today Dad goes in with him. First time. I hope it goes okay!

Sleeping Beauty

Hates the Breathing Treatment

He finally got the hang of it but we weren't sure at first how that would go. This is the first time he hasn't completely wigged out over it. I was trying to get a picture of him trying to do a smoke ring but right then he had to cough.

Yes He's Still Breathing

Listening to heart and lungs.

Foot Reduction Surgery

It looks like he's in for foot reduction surgery. What's up with that?? Non-skid socks and everything. Dad is asking if he wore clean underwear today. Julius says, "No, these are ones I found in the trash when we got here." Funny kid.

Vitals

It's moving so fast today. Stressing me out. Faster than normal for once. Someone said they are ahead of schedule.

Height Check

The ruler says 4'2". Double wow!