I'm not fit to fit my kids for the outdoors.

Vile weed!

I would rather eat cat poop than cooked brocolli. Jen loves cooked brocolli and wants to marry it.

Today, I made some for the girls for dinner. Abby turned up her nose at it. Lily crammed it into her esophagus as fast as is humanly possible.

Let there be no doubt whose kid is whose.

And in a crazy twist you never saw coming (take notes, M. Night!), I eat way more brocolli than Jen does, as I don't mind it raw and eat it frequently for the sheer goodness of it. It's actually rather pleasant raw. Cook it, though, and it tastes like the 5th circle of hell.

Today, Jen was at school from 9 until 9. 12 hours spent working tirelessly. Of course she comes home and thanks me and tells me she owes me, and so I ask you: how big of a dink would I be if I considered her indebted to me because I watched the kids all day while she was at school? So thanks Jen, but no thanks. I won't take you up on your offer of having all next weekend off from the kids.

For anyone interested in what my answer was to the dilemma of what to do with the kids today, the answer is: nothing. I had considered leaving to go do some shopping. This thought was usually followed by my visualizing the girls and me in the MOA, which was followed by me hyperventilating. Instead, I thought i could bring the girls out into the snow and play, which seemed like a home run idea. It was a total debacle.

Not the fault of the girls, though; they were troopers for the most part. I, however, apparently do not know how to dress toddlers in a waterproof/snowproof manner yet. I have seen parents and kids who are impossibly well put together and sophisticated, out in the snow enjoying themselves. To them I say: "How dare you flaunt your abilities." I do not have the skill to dress my kids.

Most importantly, I could not get their mittens to stay on, not for more than 9 seconds. They're impossible. They're too big, I think, but they're age appropriate, so I don't know what's going on. Both kids think taking their hats off is the easiest way to make me happy, so that happens the second I put them on. Abby had a particularly hard time. After all the preparations and layering, I brought them outside and put them in the snow. After a little bit, she started to get whiny, so I checked her out. There was at least 3 inches of bare leg, totally soaking up the snow and getting drenched. I'm still not sure how or why, but I couldn't cover her in a way that didn't allow 19 pounds of snow to funnel directly into her boots.

I admitted defeat pretty quickly.

The day passed, then, just doing random things around the house, simply partaking in whatever activity we had a whim for at any given moment. There was some roughhousing for a while, which was fun because they're just starting to do that. They both tried to tackle me, and as far as they know, they succeeded (I was faking...they're way too light and weak! They could never take me down).

Day two hundred and ninety nine.

She has a "busted" look here.

So does she.

And this one! My kids look so guilty!

Applepus! Applebutts!

I have a pet peeve. Get ready...here it is. I have a strong dislike for any food production company that uses an anthropomorphic iteration of their product for marketing purposes. Dear god, what twisted mind thinks consumers would prefer to identify with their food before they eat it? Look at that package. I see - and always have, in these cases - three good (and multi-racial...aww!) friends who can talk, love, laugh. They likely have wafery wives and wafery kids back at the factory, but some of them will never see their families again. No. Because we're going to eat them.

M&Ms does this. So does Chips Ahoy, which I believe to be the most egregious offender based solely on the pathos of their dopey spokes-cookies. ("spokes-cookies" is a great word and a great name for a band). These tv spots are especially horrifying, as they present the psuedo-canibalistic consuming of their product as something to find highly amusing. I feel like Charlton Heston at the end of "Soylent Green".

Whew. I feel better. Am I the only person who thinks this way? I still eat all these things, because they're delicious.

The real reason I took that picture (my soliloquy above came after the fact) is to tell a story. It's not a good one, but cute. Grandpa Neil and Grandma Marj had those cookies up in Duluth, and at some point Grandpa gave them to the girls after a meal. They were fans. Thanks to some grandparental goodwill, the cookies then came back home with us. Tonight we gave some to the girls. Lily took a bite, smiled wide, and said, "Grandpa!"

In the Abby corner, she did an entire verse of Head Shoulder Knees AND Toes, all by herself, both the vocal and the gestures! That was huge, and cute, and awesome, and it made my day.

I'm not sure what was up with Lily today, but in general, all day, she was a total goofball. She kept laughing and giggling, sometimes at random things that weren't funny, sometimes at nothing at all. It was hilarious and very contagious.

Random observation of the day: Both the girls love to say "applesauce". Every time we have it, there's some palapable excitement. The amusing thing is that it always comes out as "applepus" or "applebutts". Good stuff. It's fun trying to decode their language. Lily said something to us tonight about 52 times before Jen finally figured out she was trying to tell us that she wanted to throw a kleenex in the garbage. Good thing the kids are patient with us.

I think those are the high points. Both of them were a riot tonight. I have no idea what I'm going to do with them tomorrow, as I'll likely have them for at least the morning by myself. Any thoughts or suggestions from my bloggy crowd? I was considering Christmas shopping, but I'm just not sure I can stomach being in a mall with them by myself.

Day two hundred and ninety eight.

Punk.

Random playtime.

Fire! FIRE!!! No...wait...forget it, false alarm.

Rat a tat tat. She's a sharp percussionist.

To Christy: I'm working on a video/audio of them babbling over the monitor. I've actually tried already, but they have a preturnatural sense for when I'm filming them, even when we're in different rooms on different floors, and promptly clam up. Damn psychic kids.

And there is nothing stopping you from enjoying this soup. It is calling to you. If you want, here it is; very very easy:

Slice about 5-6 large onions thinly (no need to dice or chop, just slice and cut them so they're semicircles). This is the hardest step of the recipe...
Saute onion in a large pot with 1/2 stick of butter over medium-low heat for 30 minutes
Add a tbsp of flour; saute 3 more minutes
Add 1 1/2 quarts of beef broth.
Add a dash of worchestershire and a splash of red wine (those are optional)
Bring to boil.
Simmer for 15 minutes.
While that's going, cut up some french bread (the denser and higher quality, the better) into cubes; toast under the broiler on high.
Ladle soup into oven proof bowls. Top with bread cubes. Add craploads of shredded swiss and parmesan (or gruyere, some people do that, or use whatever you want).
Broil until bubbly.
Let cool. (very important. Nobody likes mouth blisters)
Thank brother in law.

Some get all lunatic and add rosemary and bay and thyme and 12 other things; I prefer to stay basic and let the onions speak for themselves.

I should say that eating a lot of this soup made my pee smell kinda funny. So, you know...caveat emptor and all that.

Poor Jen/Mommy. She's working at school, as it's the zero hour for a giant presentation thingy (I'm paraphrasing) that needs to be done, so she's called to let me know not to wait up. Less than a week out from graduating and being done with school, and she's not even allowed to slack.

Tonight, I decided to do music night. I dragged out an electronic piano, a snare drum, a tamborine, and (most importantly) a cowbell and let the girls have at it. They seemed amazed at first, then interested, then okay with it all, and then kinda bored, until finally, maybe 12 minutes after starting, they were ready to go back to what they normally do: reading stories and playing with baby (a baby doll that Lily likes). Meh. I wouldn't call music night a failure, but the tour is definitely on hold for now.

I don't think I helped things when I gave the snare drum a rather enthusiastic couple measures, and Lily seemed pretty annoyed. She told me, "Nooo!"

I'm not sure if it's already happened, but Lily counted to ten all by herself tonight for, as far as I know, the first time. Yay! And while I was doing the alphabet for Abby, she nailed "L-M-N-O-P". Yay! My kids are geniuses. Geniui? Geniusees? Smart kids.

Speaking of talking, we now have a new word for pacifier. She's started dropping the "paci-" part, and is just calling it "fier", or "fire", since that's exactly what it sounds like. So every night, come night night time, we find her loitering around the buffet, pointing at it and mewing, "..fire! fire!" We might be avoiding crowded theaters for a while.

Day two hundred and ninety seven.

I like error pictures. I probably did permanent damage to her retina with this flash, but it was worth it. So blue!

She even looks like a piano player.

In case you thought I was lying about music night (how dare you not believe me!??)

Raising kids...is there an app for that?

Reason #42 to embrace winter: you think you're going to curl up with a bubbly-hot bowl of french onion soup in the middle of July? I don't think so.

It's impossible to make french onion soup and not feel like I'm 16 and working at Sir Ben's again - shilling beer to the regulars and getting a lifetime of bluegrass music in 5 summer's worth of Thursday nights. It must be the smell; the place reeked of onions and wood and stale pints of kayak kolsch. But then, I should state for the record that they called their soup English Onion; same ingredients, just more pretention.

After at least a weeklong string of nights that featured our kids babbling to each other for at least 40 minutes after bedtime, I think we have to face some facts: our nighttime schedule is about to be extinct.

That's the bad news.

On the good side of things, it does not seem to be affecting us in any way, since the girls are perfectly happy to still go to bed at 7, but now they just happily yap back and forth from their cribs until Lily falls asleep. Lily always goes first. We usually notice that her contributions become fewer and fewer until they disappear entirely. Abby always soldiers on, though; I imagine she is sitting back down at this point, conversing with the monkey she sleeps with. After 40 to 60 minutes, the pauses get longer and her comments more incoherent, even by Abby standards, until finally, sweet sweet silence.

This seems to be a transition time. I imagine that the near future will see us having to bump them back to 7:30 or 8:00 bedtimes. Yikes. There goes an hour of time to get things done. But then, here comes an hour more with the kids. The yin and yang of parenting: always the good with the bad.

Day two hundred and ninety six.

Toddler smothered wth Beagle sauce.

Doin' time in solitary

It's coming down. Go home and take a snow day, Mrs. Braintree.

Our street tonight. This photo is dedicated to my Dad's air conditioner, which is likely working dutifully down in Ft. Myers.

There seems to be some mystical quality of the snow that makes other parents linger at day care during the drop off, as if they think they can sequester themselves inside and forget about the blustery weather outside. During both drop off and pick up today, the street parking was full, so both times found me driving around the block twice and slowly lingering, waiting, waiting for these people to just move already. Sooo....sloowww. I'm also intrigued at whatever ridiculous procedure people use to get their kids into/out of their car seats. Not that I'm keeping score, but I am usually faster with two kids than most are with one. Harumph!

This is all notable for the reason that Lily, on passing day care during our first transit around the block, once again took this to mean we were not going into day care, and exploded into a supernova of unhappiness and tears. I have to say, I never really considered how aware she is of our surroundings in the car. I've watched her in the mirror...she doesn't really look outside. Normally she just makes funny noises, asks me for kleenexes ("Nooose! Noose!!!! NOOOOSE!" I give it to her for a few seconds. "All done!"), and plays this game with Abby where they try to grab each other's hands, which is wicked cute. I have truly never seen her look out the window with any semblance of anything smacking of cognition in our location.

Yet somehow, she knows instinctively that we just passed day care.

As it was the first time she did this, it was adorablesadfunny. The sad part comes from knowing how ingrained she is in the rigamarole of being with somebody else all day. It makes me feel secondary in their lives.

In other news...Abby is starting to pick up on the whole "talking with words instead of whining gets better results" principle. There's been an uptick in her "more"s and "eat"s and other pleadings of necessity. She's also aces at doing the sign for "please", but when she does it she says, "Abby?" Funny how much they both love the word "Abby".

So I have to go on record as saying how excited I am about the snow. I have no real reason to be; I have no vested recreational interest in the stuff, like I had when we lived in Denver and days like this would send me running for Summit County. I just like the change of seasons. And to be honest, I feel like I need to defend winter. I've heard so much griping today about the misery that is floating down upon us (or flying sideways to drift upon us, as the case may be tonight), and I think winter simply gets a raw deal. So, here's to you, winter. Thanks for the variety. Thanks for giving me reason to hug my registers. Thanks for making me use 3rd, 2nd, and (yipes!) 1st gear on the highway. Thanks for reminding me why I keep those sleds stored in my garage all year.

Day two hundred and ninety five.

This picture is unique in that her hair seems to be defying gravity on the upper-left part of the picture. Not sure why.

Abby, difusing a bomb.

The tongue is there, just aching to get past those lips.

The Count (did I already use that for a post title?)

"Muunnn. Poooo. Freeee. Aaaaiittt. Eine. TEN!"

"That's good. What about four?"

"Poooor. Piiiive. Sissss. Sebbben. AaitEineTEN!"

Lily is indeed on the very cusp of being able to pin down the whole count to ten thing. Abby isn't close, but she can do little bunches of numbers as well, and is pretty good at chiming in with the alphabet song for random bits of letters.

Tonight is Monday, and we all know what Monday is....drag a member of my family over to hang out night!! Surely a wordy title, but it's a good event. Tonight, Steve and the kids came by. There was entertainment for all. Even Abby, who's been a little slight because of a sore tooth and some Daddy-centered neediness lately, was running around babbling at her cousins.

Day two hundred and ninety four.

Daddy!

Buaaaaa ha ha!

Daddy defers to his sleepyheadedness.

And what's a beard shaving without trying out some new, experimental looks?

I'd gotten down to a handlebar (sort of) mustache and decided to go with a "Daniel Day-Lewis from 'Gangs of New York'" sorta look. I think I did okay, minus the big top hat.

I'm pretty spent. I've already passed out on the couch tonight. I'm going to take the night off, I apologize.

I would hope publicly releasing a photo like the one above would help atone for my shortcomings. You be the judge.

Day two hundred and ninety three.

"huuuh..?"

"gaaaahh...?"

Sneaking, Vol II

Adios, beard.

Before:

(my eyes are really crooked)

And after:

My eyes are still crooked, and I am suddenly struck at how very unattractive I am.

It's 20 after 12. That's late for me in any stage of life, and especially after I've had kids (in general) and a couple beers (tonight specifically).

Yup, I shaved the beard. It feels great to have it off, but I'm now very much of the opinion that my facial features are hideously out of whack. My mouth is tiny! And crooked. And off center. I won't even get started on my droopy eyes. Why I lived with these things for 33 years and had no problem, then grew and shaved a beard and am now totally self-conscious, I have no clue.

I was musing on Christy's comment from yesterday (thanks, glad to know I'm not the only crazy parent), and I suddenly realized I missed a head-smackingly obvious correlation that would have brought the whole post full circle, and it is this: While I know how to walk around the house without making noise to wake the girls, in just a few years the girls will reverse that, knowing how to get around without waking their parents up. As a kid myself, I used to know the best way of getting around our house in Duluth for maximum silence. This seems to be the natural progression of things, and, in the words of K. Vonnegut, "... so it goes"

Day two hundred and ninety two.

My delicate slip of sunshine.

Radiator head rest.