Holy Wars!!!!! (Kiddo Style!!!)

OK, so, by now, you all know that I am one of those moms who was OBVIOUSLY cursed by the whole...

"I hope your kids turn out just like YOU!!" saying....

Well, today we hit an All-Time low...

The kiddos and I were having a BLAST!!!!!!

You know that old saying....

"It's like taking candy from a baby"?

Well, let's just say, when you teach your kiddos that LYING is the WORST way to piss Mama off...

Then, teaching them to play Poker is an all out FANTABULOUS way to win back that undeserved allowance money!!!!!

(Kiddos afraid of lying=afraid of bluffing!!!!)

Sooooo....."Gamma" comes home and finds me "corrupting" her grandchildren with poker.....

and she decides to break out the "Biblical Characters Memory Game"

(insert random personal life choice judgment comment here: ____________)

Well, let's just say:

Sometimes MOMMY actually knows best!!!!!

Here's how "Bible Memory" ACTUALLY went:

Princess: OH!!! LOOK!!! I found baby Jesus!!!

Instigator: Yeah, good luck finding him AGAIN!!   

Instigator: LOOK!!! It's God!!!

Princess: That's not GOD!!!!! That's baby Jesus when he got OLD!!!

Instigator: BABY Jesus NEVER got old. (Good point, I guess.)

Princess: Boys are SOOOOOOOOO stupid!

.........................This is where I opened my first beer because I KNEW where it was headed.........................

Me: OK, OK.....let's just go to the next card

And they do.......

As luck would have it....

ADAM AND EVE!!!!

Instigator: You KNOW that God made boys first for a REASON!!!!

Princess:  What reason is that?!?!?

Instigator: Cuz boys are better!!!

Princess:   No WAY!! He made a MISTAKE and made girls to FIX it!

(Flip a card, flip a card....PLEASE someone flip a card!!!!!)

Instigator: OH LOOK!!! It's Jesus with his Mommy and Daddy!!!!

Princess: That's NOT his Daddy!!!! That's GOD!!!!!

Instigator: LOOK, it says "Joseph"!!!
Princess: But, Gamma says GOD is his Dad.....

(Oh, Dear Lord ALMIGHTY....PLEASE do not make me have to explain the "birds and the bees" to a FOUR year old!!!!)

.........................................FLASH FORWARD 10 minutes and several Mama drinks later.......................

Princess: It's JONAH!!! He got ate by a whale!!!

Instigator: You only know that from VeggieTales.....and that just means he got POOPED out later!!!

Princess: NUH-UH!!!!

Instigator: You can't even READ!!!! You are sooo stupid!!! If you get EATEN, you get pooped out!!! It's called SCIENCE....DUUUHHHH!

..................................looking for liquor now....DAMN! Forgot there's none here!!........................................

Oh, Dear Lord.....David and Goliath.......THIS should be interesting!!!!

Princess: YEP!!! That's right!!!! Story about how the "little one" beats the crap out of the BULLY!!!!  ......      BRING IT!!!!

Instigator: You do NOT have as good of aim as HE did!!! You're a GIRL!!!

Six thrown Leggo's and a goose egg on the head later........

ALL OUT WAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

.................This is where I grab a beer,  kick my legs up on the table and just WAIT for the fallout!!!...........

Flash Forward.....We've moved on to Mommy finding funny religious pics online.

 (Stop judging I couldn't take it anymore! They needed comic relief!) 

The dino/Ark pic from above shows up...

Princess: This is soooooo STUPID!!!! Everyone KNOWS that the Dinosaurs were killed by ALIENS way before they talked to HUMANS!!!

...................................................THIS is where it gets ugly...................................................................

Instigator throws the stack of cards, hitting the Princess in the face....

Princess, in turn, pushes him, and he falls into a deck chair....

Instigator throws aforementioned deck chair at her...

Princess retaliates by kicking him in the....."well, you KNOW where place"

ALL of this in the amount of time it takes me to jump out of MY chair and intervene!!!

Bottom line?

There's something to be learned from EVERY situation.....

There's a REASON they say it's wrong to talk politics or religion!!!!

  

"Feelin' HOT HOT HOT!!!"

I REALLY thought this summer would be easy since I just escaped the "Hell on Earth" NC summers....

WTF?!?!?

I do NOT remember it being THIS stinking hot when I grew up here!!!

I signed up for COOLER summers and UNBEARABLE winters!!

I got the latter  FULL FORCE, but this summer is just CRAZY!!

LUCKILY, I am one of those "glass is half full....so I'll finish it off and grab another" kind of people.

So, I look at this "so fricking hot you wish you were DEAD" spell and MAKE myself figure out ways that this heatwave will benefit ME!!!

(YES, I'm self-absorbed, but I ADMIT it so that makes it acceptable, right?)

Reasons this flipping Hot as Hell Weather makes MY life easier:

1.  COOKING: Come on, now?!?!? SERIOUSLY?!?!? Microwave, grill, and sandwiches are soooo much easier than actually cooking WHATEVER meal I make that they'll  REFUSE to eat, anyway!!!!  The "Why do I even bother" factor has gone down DRASTICALLY!!!

2.  No worries about the kiddos running away.....the trail of SWEAT they would leave behind them makes them easier to find!

3.  Bath/Shower time drama...OBSOLETE!!!! The way I see it, if they're gonna HAVE to be in the pool within the next 2 hours.....WHY BOTHER~~ (I heard, somewhere, that chlorine kills germs, anyway!!!)

4.  The excessive humidity?......yeah...that just hydrates the kiddos every time they breathe in, so I don't have to actually get up and get them a drink every other minute!!!

5.  I can just sit inside the house (where my folks REFUSE to turn on the AC) and sweat off extra weight as I save the time involved with actually going to a sauna!!!

6.  NO need to do laundry anymore!!! WTF would I pick out clothes for the kiddos to wear KNOWING they will be half naked within the hour?!?!?!

TRUST me.....

I am NOT a fan of this excessive heat.....

but if it continues to UNcomplicate my life...

I might just send a "Thank You" note to Al Gore

Choose Your Words Wisely

In light of the recent Casey Anthony trial, it has been brought to my attention that I tend to use the words, "duct tape" and "kiddos" WAAAAY too often in the same sentence!!

(side note to local law enforcement: I AM KIDDING!!!!!)

But, as so many random comments do, it's gotten me to thinking. 

THIS time, I'm thinking about a much more "humane" approach to stopping the whole....

"I HATE YOU!" , "The Instigator just SPIT on me!!", "The Bean just wiped poop on my shirt!!!" debacle.

I've been racking my brain for days.

Today, however, the answer came from the MOST UNEXPECTED place....

THE KIDDOS!!!

The ONLY thing they could agree on and NOT fight about today was the idea that they could

 "OUTVOTE ME" and get a new pet!!!

So, while they were incessantly BEGGING to get a pet hamster today,

(NOT gonna happen!! I hate ALL rodents equally!!!!)

a thought occurred to me......

(yes, I KNOW....those random thoughts NEVER end well!!)

GIANT HAMSTER BALLS!!!!!

It's absolutely BRILLIANT!!!

Every morning, we wake up, and I stuff each of the kids into a human sized hamster ball...

that way, they can't touch each other!!

As I thought about it, a few more bonuses came to mind...

1. No more random, "I tripped and fell under the car and burned myself on the exhaust" moments.

2. "Pool Time"....sooooo much cooler, just admit it

3.  I wouldn't need to buy one of those "rolling popper" thingies for the baby if I just stuffed a few colored balls in there with them.

4. The whole "tattle-tale" thing goes away when you can't hear them because they are enclosed in a plastic bubble!!1

5. When they make me mad....how FUN would it be to just kick the bubble and watch them run as fast as their little legs can carry them just to keep up?!?!?!?

So, I've decided to adjust my nonexistent portfolio to include "Giant Hamster Balls"...

Then again...

maybe I should just stick to "duct tape", because the "GIANT HAMSTER BALLS" Google search I had to do to find a pic for this post is probably a MUCH more embarrassing investigation!!!

The Carnival

I'm not afraid to admit that, while my hometown carnival brings back MANY fond memories.....

It's always secretly SCARED me. 

This town is full of enough permanent freaks and weirdos....

we can't handle the influx of anymore that are "just passing through"!!

Despite that fact, I decided to put on my "good Mommy" hat and venture out with all 4 kiddos to visit the annual freak show....ummm, I mean "carnival".

Needless to say, I will NOT be wearing THAT hat anytime soon!!!!

Here's a basic run-down of how THAT nightmare went:

3PM:      "MOMMY, MOMMY, MOMMY!!!  You're HOME!!! You said you'd take us to that "fun place" tonight.....Let's GO!!!!" (NOT looking like a promising evening, since the carnival doesn't open until 6!!)

4PM:     "MOOOOMMMMMMYYYYY!!" Why aren't we going, yet?!?!? JOEY'S Mom took him YESTERDAY!!!!"  (Yeah, well.....I guess JOEY'S Mom loves him more!!!)

5PM:     "Quit making dinner!!!! We can eat funnel cakes, cotton candy, and french fries THERE!!!! We'll eat MUCH more of THAT stuff, anyway!!!" (Note to self: Try to actually EXPLAIN healthy eating to the kiddos one of these days...)

6PM:     "Time to go! Time to go!!! MMMOOOMMYYY!!! It's OPEN!!!" (OK......no more excuses...time to suck it up!!)

6:05:      "What do you MEAN we are walking?!?!?! We have a perfectly good VAN, don't you know?" (Yep, I know that, but we only live 2 blocks away, and Mommy is still hoping desperately that they still have a beer tent there!!!.......UNFORTUNATELY....they didn't!!!!)

6:06:      Oh, GREAT.....we just ran into Joey on the way there... NOW I have to fake interest in a meaningless conversation with Joey's mother (whom I have NEVER met!!!)

6:10:      We arrive....$45 later, the three oldest all have their "ride as much as you want" wristbands, and we are informed by the "man in the booth" to have a great time.

6:15:     "MOMMY!!! I want to ride the bumper cars!!!" (we stand in line for 15 minutes, only to discover that they are all too short to ride--and the carny actually PUSHED my kids aside instead of telling us that!!!)..."MOMMY!!! I only came here to ride the bumper cars!!! JOEY rode the bumper cars!!!"....(sorry.....guess JOEY is not as damn SHORT as you!!!)

6:17:     WOW!!! The kiddos aren't tall enough to ride ANY of the rides they want to ride!!!! EXCEPT the bounce house.....which, of course, just guaranteed that I CAN'T get a refund on the bracelets!!!

6:18:     The Bean is pitching a complete TANTRUM because I didn't buy HER 21 month old butt a bracelet so she can't go in the bounce house with them!!!

6:30:    "I have to PEEEEEE!!!!!" (We run around for 15 minutes TRYING to find a port-a-potty.....NONE in sight) "I have to pee NOW!!!! RIGHT now!!!!".......(uuuggh.....we run home)(sidenote: I later discovered that there WAS a bathroom hidden in the back!!)

6:50:     All is good.....we are back 

7:00:     Oh, wait!!! A light at the end of the tunnel!!!! There actually ARE a few rides for the kiddos!!!

8:00:     "Who wants a funnel cake?!?!?"  (yeah, turns out--AFTER I bought THREE--that none of the kiddos will actually EAT funnel cake NOW even though they LOVED it 6 months ago!!!!.......Dear A$$: Sorry for the 3 funnel cakes I ate, but I REFUSE to waste good money!!!)

8:15:     Back to the rides, (and YES....I ate THREE funnel cakes in 15 minutes!!! Stop judging me!)......time for the giant slide......10 rides later....and 10 fights over who made it down fastest.....the carny working the slide actually asked us to LEAVE!!!!

9:00     Dear God: PLEASE let the kiddos leave peacefully!!!!

9:10:    We are home. "Mommy!!! That was SOOOOOO much fun!!! Can we go back tomorrow?!?!!?" (ummmm.....ONLY if someone ELSE takes you!!!)

Flash forward to tonight....

6:05     I can smell the scent of funnel cakes wafting up in the air from my back deck........well played carnies.....well played....

Just to be curious, of course.......

Do children still go "mysteriously" missing when the carnival leaves town?

And how much does that cost?!?!?!?