But he doesn't like my cooking???

Well, I hate to call it out in public, but we're working with our little B-man about a very gross problem: nose picking. I'd love to hear if anyone has a solution to that gem. But, this isn't a vent about nose picking. Instead, it's a funny story. About nose picking.

Yay for mommy blogs!

So, the other day, I caught B-man picking his nose again. I told him to stop, and like always, he asked why.

With a distinct tone of frustration in my voice, I said, "First, it's disgusting."

He stopped me and said with that same tone of frustration, "Mom, first, it's delicious."

Yeah, now we're working on not eating our boogers...

That Kind of Day

I was having THAT kind of day yesterday. You know the one. Where nothing goes right, though luckily, nothing is terrible. Just kind of blah.

TK was out for the evening at band practice, so I knew I was on solo kid duty through bed time. We had a zillion issues with the lawyers/house sale (STILL unresolved), so I was trapped all day at home waiting on phone calls and dealing with things. By the time dinner rolled around, I decided we needed some fun, so I took the kids for a walk to the Au Bon Pain about 1/4 mile away.

We got there, ordered, sat down. Everything's fine. We're having fun. Both boys wanted to sit next to me, so we were cuddled all on one side of a booth. It was pretty cute, and I was starting to relax. We wait for a while, the buzzer goes off, and I go get the food. Or I should say the boys' food. Turns out they're out of the chicken rice bowl I ordered. Again. How come every time I go there they're out of what I want to eat? And why can't they tell me when I order, or at least before I've waited with the boys for 10 minutes? It's not like they're busy in the evenings. There were only 2 or 3 other customers in the whole place while we were there!

Fine. I get something different (which for the record ended up being delicious!) I ate about half of it, but by then the boys had finished their drinks and were both complaining they were thirsty. Okay, easy enough to solve. I went up to the counter, got some little glasses, and got them some water.

I get back to the booth, and ask B-man to scoot out so that I can get back in between them. He puts his little hands on the table to push himself up to standing and....the whole booth tips over!

On to B-man and N-man.

And all our food falls off onto the seat.

Can you believe the entire table fell over because of my tiny little B-man? He wasn't doing anything crazy at all...I can't believe the table doesn't get knocked over ten times a day!

I picked the table up, and both boys were crying but seemed to be without serious injury. Both of them were more concerned about their food than anything else! Luckily, they had mac and cheese, and amazingly, both cups landed right side up and didn't spill a bit. So I moved them over to another table and that, combined with the awesome cups of water with ICE (their favorite!) in it calmed the boys right down.

But the tragedy is that my meal, my substitute dinner that ended up being delicious and that I'd only gotten to eat half of, had entirely spilled out of the bowl, all over the seat and floor.

Don't worry, I salvaged the situation. I went up and bought myself a huge chocolate pastry. Do I know how to solve a problem or what?

Kitchen Adventures

Remember when I used to post lots of recipes here? Remember when I used to write about cooking with kids (mwah ha ha!)? Yeah, between the winter sicknesses and my pregnancy food aversions, that has fallen by the wayside. But I rallied the other day and decided to try something new with my kids. I had come across a new (to me) cooking blog the other day, and saw a recipe for pop-up baked pancakes. Sounded good and easy to me! So the boys and I got to work.

And they started fighting.

Quite honestly, they'd been fighting all day and it was wearing me out. We measured out the flour, each putting in half the amount, but when we got to the milk, all hell broke loose. B-man demanded to add the FULL amount of milk, but N-man wanted to add some, too. Adding half amounts just wasn't going to cut it as a compromise. But tough noogies, that's what we did. B-man was having a full-out tantrum, and I was just ignoring him, going to the fridge to get some eggs. But in the midst of their fighting, they knocked the blender. Which fell off the counter. And smashed into a zillion shards of glass.

So I stuck them on the counter so they'd be away from the glass, ran and got some shoes for myself so I wouldn't cut my feet up, and began the long and arduous task of cleaning up broken blender pieces. It took about half an hour, and by the time I'd gotten all the glass up, the milk and flour had dried into glue. That absolutely would not wash off the floor. Another fifteen minutes with a scrub brush finally loosened the "glue" enough to clean it up.

So after 10 minutes of cooking (and fighting) and 45 minutes of cleaning, we had soybean butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch. Want the recipe??

I might not be quite ready to get back into the kitchen just yet. What do you think?

The most (sarcastic) awesome Valentine's Day on record

So, did you all have a nice Valentine's Day? I hope so!

We didn't. Are you ready for a gross story? Here's how mine went:

Well, first I should qualify that I'm not a big fan of the "holiday". We don't really celebrate it. Call us unromantic, but it I'd much rather be kind to one another every day than create some unrealistic demands on a Hallmark holiday.

However, I'd hoped it would go better than this.

We started out our day by...wait for it...renting a storage space. And moving a zillion boxes and furniture! Really, nothing says "Valentine's Day" like a little manual labor.

We got home around lunch time, when B-man started to feel sick. He'd had a stomach bug Thursday night, but hadn't thrown up since then. Turns out he was saving it up for Saturday.

Around dinner time, B-man threw up all over EVERYTHING. I was sitting on the couch with him, and he managed to hit every couch cushion. And a blanket. And me. And N-man. N-man reacted as I wanted to: he ran into the corner, yelling and crying "It's on me! It's on me! Get it OFFFFFFF!" But then running away whenever we tried to get his clothes off.

TK and I started mopping up as best we could the couch and floor, and stripped both boys. TK started a bath and threw the boys in the tub, while I grabbed the blanket, the kids' clothes, and headed down to the laundry. I stripped myself as I was completely covered. I mean, my hair, my shirt, both arms, my watch, my pants, even my socks. It was truly disgusting. I cranked the washer up to hot, and got it going. Then I raced upstairs, completely naked (and still with PUKE in my hair! ACK!)

Now I have a problem, though. What I want more than anything is to turn the shower as hot as it can possibly go, and wash 10,000 times while scalding my skin for about an hour until I finally feel clean. But of course, after the boys' bath, and the hot water washer load, there is almost no hot water left. So I'm forced to shiver in the lukewarm water, desperately washing and washing and washing, hoping frigid water is as good at removing germs as hot.

I went downstairs, and TK and I just stared at the couch. It was pretty disgusting. I finally decided to scrub it with a scrub brush and dishwashing detergent. Probably not the recommended treatment, but it worked.

We got the boys to bed. And that's when TK started to feel sick...

So, I fully realize our Valentine's Day could have been far, far worse. But still, I think that any Valentine's Day that starts out with manual labor and finishes up with half the house covered in vomit deserves a do-over. I hope all of you had a better weekend than we did. And I'm hoping next year we can have a slightly more romantic Valentine's Day!

Potty training woes

Ugh, yes, I'm STILL on this. I have 3.5 year olds! This should be LONG in my past! But N-man is still not at all trained.

I talked to the pediatrician's office. Okay, I know technically 3.5 years isn't *that* old not to be potty trained, but come on! The nurse basically laughed at me, gave me the depressing information that it takes some kids until they're 5 to learn, then sent me information about "the reluctant potty trainer".

Here's the gist of the advice: put him in undies, and never mention the potty again. If he has an accident, have him clean it up, no biggie.

That's the advice? Where was the phone number for potty training boot camp? That's what I'm ready for!

The other kind of annoying part was that the information had all kinds of stuff about the mistakes parents make to cause kids to become reluctant potty trainers: punishing a child for accidents, forcing them to sit on the potty, etc. I never did ANY of that! B-man trained no problem. I have been SO laid back about the whole thing.

I'm losing my mind. Any advice? Well, I'm trying the "don't mention the potty" tact...we'll see how it goes.

_______________

On a related topic, N-man is SO independent. I don't think I'm EVER going to have to worry about him following the crowd. In fact, I think I'll mostly have to worry about him running in the opposite direction from the crowd. I see it at school: if the teachers want him to color, he wants to cut. If they make him color, he insists on coloring the back of the paper rather than the front. He's not defiant, he just wants to do his own thing rather than anyone else's thing. I think this is our main potty training stumbling block: we want him to use the potty, so he doesn't want to. I swear, I'm about to pull out the reverse psychology and forbid him to use the potty. Of course, I don't know how I'd explain that one to his pediatrician! Here's how that conversation would go:

Her: How have you been trying to train N-man?

Me: I've forbidden him to use the potty.

Her: And how's that working for you?

Me: No worse than asking him to use the potty.

Her: Excuse me a minute while I make this quick phone call to the insane asylum....