Guess How Long his Time Out Was?

Collin used to like brushing his teeth.

Then, he used to not mind brushing his teeth.

Then, he started to tolerate brushing his teeth.



Then, he started to hate brushing his teeth.

Then, he found brushing his teeth to be tantamount to water boarding.

Now that I caught him having made this mess with the toothpaste this morning, I think he will equate toothpaste with the epic timeout he served shortly following and thus equate it with death. Crap, now he'll never brush his teeth again.

Those raspberry seeds are never coming out.

Hold Me Closer, Royal Dancer

When Bryon saw my post about our P90X progress, he said, "Hell no, will you ever get a picture of me without a shirt...ever

This is Bryon doing the Yoga DVD. It's 90 minutes. It sucks. Well, it did the first few times we did it; it has since begun to suck a little less because we've gotten better at it. I think it just sucks the way going to the dentist doesn't suck, especially after you have kids. You know what I mean? These days, going to the dentist means ninety minutes or so of time alone, with other adults who are going to talk to you about things like the weather, you, the news, whatever you direct the topic to and you won't have your kid with you and if you drive slowly home, it could be longer. You make it fun. Anyway, this is the "royal dancer" pose and this is Collin attacking the Rancor doing his best royal dancer pose.

What? You didn't know that Daddy, in his every waking moment is not really Daddy, but a living, breathing mutant creature from Star Wars that lives in a cave beneath Jabba the Hut that needs to be killed with a broken in half light saber (which you can't see from the angle, sorry). Anyway, as you can see, we aren't too zen with our yoga around here. We get the job done but aren't real chi, or whatever about it. What? Those are yoga words, aren't they? When Bryon and I do it together, there's a lot of chatting and trying to knock one another over.

There's the sword, but you couldn't see Bryon as well and that was really the point, right? You know what I think is awesome? That Eddie is lying on the floor in his bed watching all this, Collin is attacking him, and I'm clearly lying on the bed taking a photo. What does that tell you about this whole scenario?

Since Bryon is TDY and I can't take a picture of his reaction to my posting this humiliation, this is how I imagine his adorable, yet somewhat pathetic indignation will look. (Really, I just took a cute picture of my cat and wanted to share it. I know; I'm lame).

In the sake of fairness to my furry and tortured animals, doesn't the dog look pathetic when he gets a bath?

When Collin was a baby, he would cry hysterically when Eddie got a bath because he stunk like wet dog and apparently, Collin has a strong sense of smell and disliked it when Eddie was wet. The house would be in turmoil until he was dry because Collin couldn't handle Eddie's stench. The poor dog would be beside himself because he was wet and uncomfortable and because the baby was upset. Well, not much has changed, except now Collin's got verbalization skills which I'm not sure is more or less irritating than hysterics. Constant whining that, "Moooooommmmmy, Eddie smells baaaaaaddd," is grating on the nerves. I told him to cut off his nose but he didn't think that an adequate solution. And, before anyone suggests using the blow dryer on the dog, we are talking about a dog that is afraid of ceiling fans.

Random Updates

Eddie made a new friend. Collin leaving his treasured Buzz Light Year out for some nap time snuggles is the least he could do considering the constant torture he forces the poor dog to endure which consists of stepping on him, pulling on him and refusing to pet him. Eddie pretty much adores Collin and Collin thinks, like the rest of us, that Eddie just plain old licks too much.

I fixed Collin's hair the best that I could. It's still got a pretty weird spot in the back but it's not as noticable. When you cut someone's hair in your kitchen, you get the vaccuum treatment at the end. Kind of fun, huh? Collin is taking swim classes on base. He loves them. His new teacher is named Dylan. He liked Miss Polly better but he won't admit how much he likes having a man for a teacher. He describes Dylan as "hairy like Santa Claus." His favorite part of swimming class? Sticking his face under water to grab enough water to spit it at people. Or? Splashing the other kids. Yep, I have the mean kid.

It Still Saves Money

I've been cutting Bryon's hair and Collin's hair lately. It's not a daily occurrence, mind you, of course; but since I bought the clippers, it's sort of a, "hey, need a haircut?" kind of thing. It saves us a bit of cash and makes me feel less guilty that my hair cuts cost $75. I'm still a little apprehensive about cutting the boy's hair because he's a little squirmy and I am still overly attached to every hair on his head.

The squirm factor led to my first major haircutting mistake this week. As you can see, he moved. I got all the way to the trimming bit over the ears when Collin, apparently alerted to an alien abduction occurring outside, quickly turned his head jerkily to the side.

Oh well, his problem. I feel no shame at having a kid that looks like an early nineties throw back. That's what I've decided his "look" is. I think people have vainly decided that he asked for one of those shaved designs in his head, like initials of zig zags and then chickened out. That's my theory and I'm sticking to it. No way do they think that his incompetent mother cut his hair or couldn't get him to sit still. That would be impossible. Besides, if she could get him to be still, she'd have a better picture of his head, right?

In other news, he's not bothered by looking completely foolish; in fact, he relishes it to complete abandon and refuses to believe he looks in any way ridiculous at any point in his life. He has no sense of right and wrong when dressing himself. Exhibit A. (Normally, I don't bother fixing said incidences of inside-outedness and/or backwardness as it just causes meltdowns that aren't worth my time and I figure, eh? What the hell?).

Such tomfoolery and backwardness has rubbed off on the animal kingdom of our home as well, as cats and dogs have become not only friends but bed mates. Everyone all together now: awwwww.

Oh and in case you are wondering why I didn't just cut Collin's hair all evenly to match my "mistake," it's because I didn't have a comb on the clippers when I was trimming around the ears, so I'd have had to buzz his whole head down to the nub. I just can't bear to do it. I can't. Nope. No how. If I can't run my hand through that mop and tousle his hair, I think I'd die.

Why Collin is Taking his Nap at 4 p.m.

I'm not sure I care if it makes it hard to put him to bed tonight. I need a break, and I don't mean a "go to the bathroom" kind of break. I mean an honest break for at least thirty minutes. I decided to surprise Daddy by clearing out 75% of our yard and putting in the seeds in bought.

As my Dad so kindly pointed out, "do you want to eat Cilantro you dog pissed on?" So, I took his suggestion and bought pots since my dog is less likely to pee on pots. Oh and folks, don't adjust your monitor, that is in fact, 75% of our yard, as you recall.

The project started with pulling up these random bulbs that are sprouting all over our yard. There were about 40 of them or so. I thought I could use my little garden trowel to pull them out. It broke. The smallest bulb is pictured here. The largest one was about the size of Collin's head.

I don't like to point out when my mother in-law is wrong about anything because she's the best darn mother-in-law anyone could ask for and she's generally smart on all things plant and otherwise, but the agapanthas she was sure were growing in my yard, turned out, in fact, to be onions. This was determined by their sheer stink factor, the fact that they were onions and well, there's no mistaking an onion when you see and smell one.

Anyway, pots o' herbs about to grow here. And some pretty flowers in some other pots there, eh?

And, for good measure, I put some ground cover down that is not grass so it doesn't need water but it has flowers on it. The goal being total covering in oh, twenty years. I have a vision. It will be pretty eventually Ahhh, the desert. It's pretty "enough" now though, huh? It is better than before. Trust me.


So, now I'm filthy, can't move forgot to eat lunch and have sunburn. You're welcome, honey. No wonder you kept claiming you didn't have time to do this.

I Won't Show You My Butt. Don't Even Ask.

So, you know we've been doing P90X around here. It's a cross between torture and fun. Fun, because I love to work out. Torture because it's testing my love. I bought it because I can't run right now. My specialist is sending me to a specialist. Apparently, my foot has decided to put me on running hiatus and I have to accept that; so instead of resting, I sought out the hardest workout ever that is not, indeed running.

Anyway, Collin wants to know why I make a sad sound when I exercise. I think he means why do I grunt? Um, it's because it's crazy hard; like don't eat an hour before you do it, kind of hard. I'll admit, I was unprepared and arrogant that I would be able to handle it with somewhat of ease. I mean, come on; I run! I do sit ups! I do push ups! I squat! Yeah, right.

One quarter of the way through the program, I am happy to report that I have not lost a single pound. Bryon has, of course. Men and their metabolisms. We planned it this way, but it is still irksome. I have begun to manage to not swear at the Ab Ribber DVD that has to be accomplished every other day. (A note here: ABS EVERY OTHER FREAKING DAY!!! WHAT WERE THEY THINKING!!!!) And, I am willing to show the universe my stomach-in-progress. I think that's a testament, don't you?

Alas, I realized this morning as I prepared to do my workout that it might be harder to take a picture of yourself in the bathroom than it is to work out. The flash, making a stupid face, all that jazz. It was quite the challenge. What the hell, I figured that an embarrassing picture of my half-naked self more more than makes up for how stupid it is. Besides, even if my belly isn't the greatest yet, I take this fact into account: that kid in all those other pictures...HE came out of it, and man, he's huge.

Oh and the blurry picture. Sorry, it was virtually impossible to get my arms. Maybe for the next few weeks I'll try to get both Bryon and I. If he'll consent. I'll trick him. "Hey honey, hold this soup can, riiiiiiight here, just like this." Now me. I guess I was just too lazy to set to the timer. Oh well, you get the idea. And tickets to the small gun show. Oh! Had to.

And so as I get ready to post this, running through my head is, is someone going to think: she is being vain. I guess for anyone who actually knows me, I wouldn't have to qualify that. There's vanity and there's taking pride in your accomplishments. But, when you put something that feels like an accomplishment out to the world, you suddenly feel like you have to qualify it by hiding behind, "but I'm not trying to brag," especially if it's about our own bodies in this world of obesity today. Guess what world, Bryon and I are working our butts off over here and it's showing.

More Painful than Giving Birth

Family Circle often has these "ideas" for crafty things. I can usually tell that they are full of s-h-i-t on how easy they are but that doesn't stop me from saying to Bryon, "hey, doesn't that look like a cool idea?" Usually he responds, "You aren't crafty." My interest in said project usually wans before I finish the issue and the house heaves a collective sigh of relief.

This month's issue had a paragraph, no kidding a freaking paragraph with ONE photo, of the craft you will see below. I knew in my heart it would involve swearing, multiple "drafts" and a finished product that looked nothing like their original; yet, I wanted to try.

So, here's what I'm thinking: if you too would like something that resembles a "tree" in your child's bedroom, I would be happy to come over and put one up for you, as I have plenty of extra supplies, and in the process your child will learn valuable new vocabulary, how to fudge-measure and how to throw scissors and exacto knives so they stick in cardboard from across the room. I will do all this for the cool price of one million dollars per "tree."

Please note that at no time doI claim that your "tree" will at any point resemble an actual tree. The point of this "tree" is that I will scew some hooks into the "bark" and Collin will have a place to hang sundry items. I also want to put a height stick on there so we finally have a place to keep track of his growth. He's pretty keen on it. He thinks it looks beautiful. He's three and not very versed on the difference between beautiful and ugly.

Or, he was afraid to tell me the truth.

Notes:
Elapsed Time to Completion: 3 hours
Number of "trees" attempted before accepting this was the best it would get: 3
Number of times I screamed at Collin: 0 (number of times I thought about it--2,999)
Number of times I actually just "screamed": 3
Number of times Contact Paper stuck to itself: 5
Number of times I swore: 0 (Hooray for me)
Number of times I grrr'ed: Lost count