Unprepared

As a mother, there are times when I am caught completely off guard. Like Benjamin picking broccoli over french fries. Or Nicholas' ability to climb. But nothing could have prepared me for Eliana this morning. In her cute little voice she said, "Mom, I have pockets in my pants. Pockets can hold things. Where's my weapon? My pockets need a weapon!"

The funniness of Benjamin

Benjamin is a very unusual kid. He is overflowing with book smarts and he's very proud of this. One of the things that makes Benjamin unique is his love of words. He loves to learn new words {sometimes very large words} and use them regularly. For example - Josh and I were having a conversation about the cost of something - maybe taxes. And Benjamin piped in with "I'm not sure I understand all the facts you have been talking about, but I do understand the money issue and I think that is outrageous!" {word for word quote}

The kid is seven.

Benjamin's word of the moment is assume. He uses it so much that I find myself wanting to say "You know what happens when you assume . . ." Instead I pointed out that he uses the word a lot and asked him to cut down. He said, "Mom you have no idea how hard it is to come up with new words to use to impress people."

Today after school, the boys wanted to have friends over. Our rule is there are no friends over until the bedroom is clean. Sam had already cleaned his mess and told Benjamin, who was unloading the dishwasher, that he would clean Benjamin's mess. Then Sam said Benjamin would owe him big time. This, of course, made Benjamin ask me if it was true. I told Sam that Benjamin didn't owe him anything. And Benjamin said, "Yeah Sam. Goodness is it's own reward."

And lastly . . . no offense is meant by this comment. And I promise {just like the other three examples}, I have no idea where he gets these things. . . So Sam was decorating a pumpkin for a school project. The theme was "Favorite Book Character." Sam choose to decorate his pumpkin like a Bugger from the book Ender's Game. He made a preliminary sketch to follow. Benjamin took one look at the sketch and said, "I'm not sure this is the look you are going for Sam, but your drawing looks like an ant mixed with a Mexican Robber."

You be the judge.

Eliana's dreams

The other night, Eliana woke up crying. She was just terrified of something, so I let her sleep with me. When she woke up, I asked her if she remembered what she was scared of. She said that there were geckos dropping from the sky and crawling all over her back. "Too many geckos got on me!"

The next morning, as I was changing her diaper, she looked at me and asked "Why?" I asked her what she was talking about. She said, "Why were you squishing my poops last night? Poops are gross. We don't play with poops mom."

And the next morning, she woke up and said that she had a dream about hurting her eye at the jumping place. It was so real for her, she had to look at her "owie" in the mirror to be convinced she was fine.

So to sum it up - Eliana's dreams are filled with geckos, poops, and bruises.

Where are the princesses and sunshine and butterflies?

And what does she want to be for Halloween?

A vampire or scary monster.

Lucky me.

{I'm going to make these and shove girly down her throat!}

We raise 'em sassy here

Nicholas hung a "no girl's allowed" sign on his door. I told him Ellie was a girl and asked if she could come in. He said, "No girls allowed." I told him I was a girl and asked if I could come in. He said, "The person that cleans my room can come in when it's messy."

Nicholas and Eliana were fighting over her pony toys. I told him to give the pony back. Nicholas told me, "I don't want to hear any more of your noise in my ears."

Eliana has a disgusting habit of drinking the bathwater. This morning I told her that drinking bathwater would make her tummy sick. She told me, "Oh yeah? Prove it."

At two and almost four years old, how can the innocence be gone? And how am I going to survive their teenage years?

Happy Halloween!

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