My little meatatarin.....

So I was in my room, doing a few random crunches on the floor. The Princess was doing some, too, while Side Salad was trying to sit on me. The Squirrel all of a sudden says,

"I wish everything I touched turned to meat! And gold."

.....okay.....

Then, she began running around turning things into meat. "Daddy's TV is meat! The counter is meat! The towel is meat!"

The Princess tried to reason with her little sister. "What if you touch us? Then, we will be meat, too. You can't turn everything into me-"


"You're meat! Look, Mommy! I turned her into meat!" Obviously, the Princess wasn't very convincing in her argument.


She followed me downstairs and patted me on my back. "Mommy, you're meat. I'm just kidding. But everything else is meat, meat, meat!" She bopped off to work some more magic.


"Pencil meat! Yummy yum-yum!"

"Call me on the line, you can call me, call me anytime-Mommy your phone is meat!" That's right. I am rockin' Blondie for my ringtone.

Anywho, the Princess and the Squirrel, as far as I know, have never heard the tale of King Midas. That makes it all the more intriguing that she is touching things and turning them into meat.

Guess I know what tonight's bedtime story is :)

My Perfect Princess

If any of my children is me all over again, it's my Princess. She is a true diva, late to her own birth. She stayed an extra 10 days before her eviction/induction. Our running joke is that she stayed in because her hair wasn't right. This child was born with a doobie wrap. She was due a week before my 21st birthday, but born 3 days after. This was NOT a good thing. Princess was my hardest pregnancy. Six straight months of vomitting during which I lost 20 lbs. My whole weight gain was only 16 pounds. She was 7 pounds 19 ounces and only 18 1/2 inches long. (A wee bit bigger than her mama, who was 7 pounds 1 1/2 ounes, and only 18 inches long). She was born rather quickly; I went from 6 cm dialated to her being in the isolette in about 20 minutes, epi free. That short birth is probably why her head wasn't very cone-y. We are both Sagittarius' and have similar dispositions and similar taste. We even look alike. Our baby picks are nearly identical. Except I think she is much prettier than me. She has this big doe eyes, with impossibly long eyelashes. They literally look like butterfly wings, they are so long. Sometimes I can't believe this gorgeous creature came from my belly.
Me at four:
She at four:


She stayed on her own schedule, not walking until she was nearly 14 months, not talking until about a year and a half-but spoke in full sentences immediately. She was very petite and looked like a little walking doll. In fact, I bathed her in the bathroom sink until she was nearly 3.

But now she's tall and lanky, like the horse who happens to be her Chinese sign.

Princess is a tough cookie. Her doc took her tonsils and adenoids at the tender age of 4. Dora accompanied her to the hospital for surgery that day. It was one of the most nerve wracking days of my life. Surgery and the whole anesthesia thing terrify me. But Princess was a trooper.



To be candid, she was born at the wrong time. She should have been a firstborn child, the oldest or an only. She is so competitive, has so much drive but she feels so limited and inadequate because Astronaut can do more than her. She gets so frustrated when he does things she can't, but at the same time, she is very advanced. Not to brag, but this child is quite possibly a prodigy. She taught herself to tie her shoes and write her name at 4 years old. While amazing, it is a major factor in her school behavior. She was bored silly by pre-K and it showed. I got a lot of calls home last year.

I love my mini-me. She is a challenge. I imagine her teen years will be memorable. And I can't wait until she is all grown up so we can do things together.

Sweet, isn't she.

Checkin' in

Hello, all!

I've been busy with midterms and first birthdays. That's right! Our side salad is now one years old. We celebrated in style at the local Mickey Ds. I think it's okay to have a McNugget or two on your birthday-you only live once...

School is...school. I am just exhausted. If I could figure out a way to pay off my student loans and have some sort of stable income, I'd say screw it and just be a SAHM.

Lettuce and I had a talk about breastfeeding. I know his family are pretty anti-breastfeeding so I wanted to gauge his feelings on me continuing to do so. He was totally fine with it. He can see the benefits in the health of the ducklings. Astronaut sleeps in his undies only, year round. Literally. The boy walks around in just underwear when it's snowing outside. He never gets sick. Lettuce and I have been together since he was 3 1/2 and he'll be 9 this year and he has never been sick. I breastfed him until he was 13 months old. The girls on the other hand, weren't so lucky. Princess was only breastfed 4 months. She immediatly stopped growing. She had tons of earaches and her tonsils removed at 4 years old. Squirrel was EBF until 6 months, though we started solids at 4 months. She had a combo until she was about 7 or 8 months. The ear infections were constant and she got tubes at 9 months. Whoa!! I've gotten a bit off topic. Anywho, Side Salad will be getting the good stuff indefinitely, that's the point. And here's a pic of us nursing in public to celebrate.


Ciao!

Picture Blog: Nature Walk 2/21/09

Happy Chinese New Year!

Ni hao!

It is the year of the Ox. We celebrated in style with a dinner of roast duck, orange ginger tiliapia, steamed broccoli, fried rice, and Chinese noodles, with tangerines and fortune cookies on the side. We toasted with sparkling apple cider.

Squirrel and I originally went to the local Asian market in search of duck. They had duck, of course, but it was looking at me through the plastic. Literally. The ducks they had were "Buddhist style," which as far as I can tell means that the head and feet are still attached. My goal was to introduce my kids to new foods and I didn't want to terrify them so I went to Bi-Lo and got a less personable water fowl. I roasted my duckie and glazed it with some Iron Chef Orange Ginger sauce.

Here is the duck, who we affectionately called "Mr. Duck-Duck." Forgive my ugly roasting pan. It gets the job done.

Anyways, the food was much lovlier when plated.


Here is a shot of the table decorated with a pyramid of tangerines and plums.

It was a lovely meal and the kids enjoyed it. They also discovered that they like duck. Misson completed with flying colors.

Right before visions of sugar plums danced in their heads....

I love Christmas.

I love the magic, the mystery, the fun, the suspense, the traditions. Childhood seems so short now. I try to make Christmas as magical as possible for my kids while they are young. They believe in Santa. We have things we do. I want them to have traditions so that they are their uncles and my age, they can reminisce. Tonight, we set out the reindeer feed for Santa's crew. It's birdseed and glitter. We sprinkled it out in the yard. They loved it, though the Astronaut felt it necessary to give it a taste test-yuck! Then the real fun began.

The kids decorated cookies and a gingerbread house. They did a great job. The first time, we decorated, then baked. Didn't go so well. The kids piled on the sugar and sprinkles and all of the sugar carmelized-then burned. Plus the kiddies handled the dough so much it got really thin and hot. So the second batch, we adults made the cookies, then baked. Then I whipped up some quick frosting (powdered sugar, plus milk and a dash of vanilla extract) and the kids decorated them. This turned out much better and we had Santa-worthy cookies.

The Squirrel and her fractured gingerbread man

The Princess and her snowman

The Astronaut and his snowman

Then we decorated a gingerbread house. It was fun. Then everyone got washed up and went to bed without many complaints.

I have to go move the gifts downstairs. I only have a few hours until they are back up. They'll be up with the sun and I have to make breakfast, then start on dinner. I hope all of you are having a wonderful Christmas too.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a goodnight!

Help, please! I have a cookie conundrum....

We are having a cookie decorating party for the kid on Christmas Eve. It will be my ducklings and Smoo's monkey and turkey. The kids are 8, 6, 4, 3, 9 months, and 1 month. We'll probably have some extras, too. We initially planned to bake with the kids but since they are on the younger side, we are going to bake in advance and let them decorate. What kinds of cookies should we make? Smoo is making chocolate chip and I am going to get some Immaculate Baking Co Vanilla Sugar cookies and bake them. (IBC makes the BEST cookies ever!)

My conundrum is this, we want to make 4 types of cookies. I make 2 and Smoo makes 2. What other kind of cookie should I make? And what other type should Smoo make?

I want something that I can use my snazzy cookie cutters on. I was considering gingerbread, but my kids don't seem to like them that much. I like them so maybe I will still make them. Any suggestions (with recipe or recipe links)?

My "Large" Family

The average woman has about 2.1 kids. I have 4 and I am not even 30. So we are labeled a "large" family. And being that I am pretty young, I honestly can't say I am done yet. Now, both Lettuce and I came from "large" families; we are both the oldest of four children. We are used to this. In fact, I don't really think I have that many kids. 6, 7, 8, that's a large family. I think we are normal. Even though it appears that we are above average on the kid count. Anywho, my number of kids seems to floor everyone I encounter. Typical scene:

Stranger: Aww, what a cute baby! Is he your first?
Me: Thank you. No.
Stranger: Your second?
Me: No.
Stranger, with eyes bulging incrediuously and speaking slowly: Your....third?
Me: No.
Stranger, rolling prostrate on the floor while gnashing their teeth and foaming at the mouth: Your FOURTH?!?!!
Me: Yes. I have two boys and two girls.
Stranger, face turning purple and pupils dilating: OH MY GOD!!!!! YOU DON'T WANT ANYMORE, DO YOU??!?!!??
Me: Well, maybe one or two more. I love being a mother.
Stranger spontaneously combusts.

That was a dramatization. But people are awfully presumptuous. They ask all sorts of invasive questions. Obviously, they think that the niceties of society will prevent me from making snarky answers. Obviously they are wrong. Here are a few of my favorite answers to silly questions.

Stranger: I hope you got your tubes tied.
Me: No, I am not spayed.

Stranger: Are they all yours?
Me: No, they followed me from the produce section.

Stranger: I would never want to have that many kids.
Me: Well, with kids like mine, it's easy to see why I want more. But all kids aren't like mine so I could see why some people don't want more.

Stranger: I don't know how you handle all those kids.
Me: We don't all have the same limitations.

Stranger: You have FOUR kids?
Me: Well, four with me. I left the rest at home.

Stranger: Are you going to have anymore?
Me: Well, we do have one more empty seat in the minivan...

If you ask a stupid question, you will get a stupid answer. What annoys me is how people feel as if they have some sort of bearing on how I form my family. Even my family does this, though not as much as they used to. Probably because of the answers they kept getting. So, here is a list of things you should never say to a MoM:

Do they all have the same Dad?
Why did you have so many of them?
Just HOW old are you?
Why would you do that to yourself?
I hope you are finished?
Did you get your tubes tied?
I hope you got your tubes tied?
Why didn't you get your tubes tied?
Anything involving getting tubes tied?

If you see a MoM, the best thing to do is just congratulate her on her beautiful family and move on. It will make her day. It's not easy being the MoM, but there is no greater reward than looking at your children interacting with each other. It is an awesome sight. It's stressful job but I wouldn't want it any other way.