Gabe's Best Weekend Ever

Gabe and Norah got to spend last weekend with Nana and Poppa. While they were out there, Dad filled Gabe's time with awesome. They wore him out so completely that something new happened last night. He was still so worn out that, about 7:30, he came up to me, blankie in hand, and asked if he could go to bed.

Fortunately, Dad had his camera with him the entire time and was able to document the weekend.

Poor Norah, however, didn't get as much camera love. It will be nice when she starts to like things as much as Gabe does and we can FINALLY stop feeling like she's being neglected in favor of Gabe's love of doing things. I know we similarly "neglected" Gabe when he was that age, because small children just don't NEED all that much to keep them entertained, but I know that I at least still feel guilty.

Anyway, here's how it all shook out.

Gabe got to visit the fire department in Cunningham. It's not a BIG fire department by any means, but it had pretty much everything that Gabe needed to experience the awesomeness. He got to dress up . . . .

And pretend to drive the brush truck (I don't think they have a "big" fire truck there, just the smaller ones as brush fires are mostly what they deal with) . . . .

And pose on the front . . . .

And then pretend to fire the hose.

Then, to make matters awesomer, he actually got to hold the hose while they turned it on.

I'm guessing they turned it on at a very low volume. Gabe's a strong guy for his age, but I don't think he's quite got the mass to hold a fully gushing fire hose.

After the fire station, Dad and Gabe drove around a bit and checked out the new section of highway that is being built out there. While they were doing this, one of the deputies from Kingman stopped to talk to Dad. So, in addition to getting to pretend to be a fireman, Gabe also got to talk to a police man, look at his car, and he received a little "officer in training" badge that he's been wearing on his coat since we got home. Sadly, no pictures of that stuff.

This was all Saturday, mind you.

Sunday, then, before we got out there to pick them up, Dad helped Gabe set up all of the "Armies" that Gabe has become recently obsessed with. I must admit that I have mixed feelings about his army fixation. I know a lot of it is just being a boy. He doesn't actually play war with his armies. As far as I can tell, he just likes the fact that they are little people of different colors. He likes to stand them up in opposing forces, and then sometimes he runs them over with his cars. But he doesn't have them shoot at one another.

He IS starting to gain a fascination with guns, though. While we were in Dillons yesterday, he had a minor melt down when I told him he couldn't have the Nerf dart gun they were selling there--not necessarily because I am such a pacifist that I refuse to buy him guns (I know that if I try to convince him NOT to like something, he'll just like it all the more, so I might as well just give in to his whims and let him decide what he wants to like and dislike on his own instead of trying to unduly influence his decisions in one direction or the other). Mostly I just don't want him shooting Norah in the eye with something until she's at least old enough to realize that she can pick something up and bonk him on the head with it in retaliation (and old enough to explain to me what happened so I know who to be madder at). Plus, he'd just lose all the darts in five minutes and it would all be a pointless waste of money.

Anyway, here he is setting up all of the different army guys that Mom and Dad have left over from our childhoods.

Oh, and one other note on these guys. See the pink ones mixed in there? Does anyone else remember those? The M.U.S.C.L.E. Men? I'll let you follow the link to remember what the acronym stood for. I LOVED these guys. Ben played with them a little, too, but they were mostly my thing. I never had them all, but I had a lot of them. I particularly enjoyed setting them all up and then shooting them down with a disc gun (the best projectile weapon for children EVER). Gabe inherited about 1/3 of the guys while he was out there--Dad sent them home for him to play with, so now I have them back in my life again.

Which hasn't been all that great. I stepped on one of the little thorny ones on the dining room floor yesterday and nearly cracked my skull as I flailed around in pain. Another childhood memory dashed against the rocks of the painful reality of adulthood. Sigh.

Eventually, he created what he called his "rainbow" army there on the bottom. Dad renamed this his "Don't Ask Don't Tell Division." But, as you can see, Gabe's clearly more interested in setting these guys up and looking at them than in actually depicting or reenacting great battles of history. Nonetheless, when we went to the library last night and it came time to pick out a movie, all he wanted was an "Armies" movie. Obviously, they don't make those for preschoolers. I was tempted to show him Saving Private Ryan or Full Metal jacket to try and get it out of his system early (I think I could have also shown him In the Army Now with Pauly Shore and gotten the same "eternally turned off by the subject matter" effect, but they didn't have that one at the library--thank god). But I opted instead to get 20 Trucks again (which, if you have a small boy to watch it with, I highly advise it--it has one of the absolute worst opening songs I've ever experienced in my life, and Gabe LOVES it, which makes it all the better in terms of reducing my time in purgatory).

And, finally, the one picture of Norah from the weekend. Standing by a chair, holding Lulu. But, then, that's kind of her thing--standing in one place holding onto something. She's developing my riveting personality, I'm afraid.

Something Too Gross to Put as My Facebook Status

I wanted to put this as my status, but decided that it was in too poor taste to share on there--and that's saying something considering the things I WILL post on there.

Gabe's STILL suffering from his flu bug. He puked again yesterday--but hasn't yet today--and he's been suffering from diarrhea for the past couple days, too. That's still going strong this morning.

As he was sitting in there just now, a cascade of explosive butt noises poured from the bathroom. After a particularly strong spurt, Gabe said, "It's kind of like a rain storm."

That's all. Just something disgusting to get everyone through their days.

Silent but Disgusting

There are many things that we learn along the way that we distinctly do not remember learning. Some we don't remember because we figure them out before we're forming clear memories--like how to climb stairs or play with our genitals. Some we likely block out because remembering how terrible they were to learn would likely traumatize us for the rest of our lives--like how to climb stairs or play with our genitals. But there are many, and we don't really give their learning much thought until, MANY years later, we witness our children learning about these happenstances for the very first time.

Like sharting--or the "soupie poopy" as Libby grew up calling them (I don't think we had a cute name for them, choosing not to normalize them and, instead, focusing on the utter shame we should feel at letting them happen--at least that's what I ASSUME we did). They happen. And somewhere along the way we learned that, while suffering from bouts of diarrhea, it's advisable not to pass gas because it might be bringing a friend along.

Gabe learned this lesson yesterday. At least I HOPE he learned the lesson yesterday.

It's been a pretty awful week, really. For the third time in three months, we're passing a stomach bug through the family again. I have not had a stomach bug of note for nearly two decades, but I've been sick three times this year already. In Gabe's four years, he's only been quite ill once, until this year, anyway. Until these past few months, Norah had not been sick with anything but colds. Libby . . . well, Libby gets puking sick about every third month, so it's nothing new with her. Something terrible is going on in the world right now, and our family is suffering because of it.

Anyway, last week, Norah began to puke, like clockwork, one hour after she went to sleep. Every time. At night and at nap time. For five days. At the time, I was convinced that she was just working herself up crying and then puking as a result of it. She does that with a bit of regularity. And it just seemed too coincidental that she was ONLY sick one hour after going to sleep. After puking, she'd get up and be relatively fine after a few minutes, so I figured she had just learned that throwing up was getting her special attention and allowing her to come down from bed and play longer.

I still think that might have been the case, because that girl is the queen of manipulation, and I wouldn't put it past her to view projectile vomiting as a viable means to the end of getting to stay up another fifteen minutes.

But, once Gabe got puking sick, too, I began to give her at least SOME of the benefit of the doubt. He got sick in the middle of the night Sunday morning.

And it was the most disgusting puke that I have ever witnessed.

Saturday, we attended a 30th birthday party for my sister-in-law. At the party, Gabe ate the following things: over a dozen bbq mini hot dogs (we always called them monkey peckers, not sure what they are actually called), the frosting off two pieces of cake, two iced cookies, two cups of soda, and one piece of broccoli. When he puked in the middle of the night, the only thing I didn't spot was the broccoli.

Really, there is no other description for it but "meat puke." It smelled like a dog food plant. It had the consistency of soft cat food. And it went EVERYWHERE in his bed. It coated everything. And because it was still partially solid, when he pulled the covers off himself to get away from it, much of it slid off the covers and onto the floor. When we pulled the bedding off to wash them and transported them downstairs, far more of the stuff caked off until very nearly all surfaces of our house between his room and the washing machine smelled like the inside of a hobo on Vienna sausage night. Yet, as graphic as this description is, I really don't feel like it's doing the whole thing justice. It was vile and terrible.

My first assumption was that he had just eaten too much crap and run around too much that night, resulting in an awful memory for Libby and I and a valuable lesson NOT learned by him. But then we noticed that he was running a fever, too. And he spent much of yesterday suffering from the same fever. He puked a couple more times earlier in the day, but after a short time he discovered something else tragic.

"I tooted on you!" he said to Libby, seemingly feeling better. That's one of his disgusting little boy games now. He doesn't actually toot on anyone, he just tells us that he has after he farts. Which I suppose we should just count ourselves as lucky for, even though it's hardly an acceptable social habit to get into. Sure he's telling people he's farting on them, but he's not ACTUALLY farting on them, right?

Anyway, while he didn't actually fart on Libby, after he did some moving around, he very nearly shat on her, as a stream of sloppy squirts gushed around in and eventually out of his PJs bottoms and all over our couch, blankets, and pillows. He had no idea what was going on and was discernibly upset by the whole affair. After having spent the last six months more or less mastering potty training, I can see how a sudden and inexplicable failure would be somewhat crushing.

So Libby cleaned him up and ran all the blankets and such like through the wash.

And then it happened again.

And again.

And then we remembered, "Hey. We have a baby still wearing diapers. Why aren't we using those diapers in place of the underwear, clothing, and surroundings that are getting soiled?"

Which we did. Gabe was NOT thrilled about the idea. He protested quite strongly that he was not a baby and should not be wearing diapers. Eventually, we found a few leftover pull-ups from his potty training days and Libby was able to convince him that they were astronaut diapers (you know, like the ones that crazy stalker ladies wear on cross-country road trips). And he ended up being OK with that concept and wore the pull-ups the rest of the day, saving us a couple loads of laundry and much poop spillage on our environment.

This morning he's still suffering from the fever and obviously isn't feeling well. He has VOLUNTARILY spent almost the entire morning on the couch, which is not the least bit normal. Norah might pass a fair chunk of the day lying on the couch or sitting in the same spot coloring, but Gabe never does.

But when he first woke up this morning something possibly foreboding happened. In the middle of the night, he removed his pants to go pee in his little potty in his room. This wasn't unusual. For some reason, when he gets up from sleeping to pee, he almost always takes his pants all the way off then goes back to bed half naked. But when he came downstairs, we asked him if he wanted to wear his astronaut diapers again, just in case he had an accident, and he did. Then he told Libby that he LIKED wearing these astronaut diapers, and despite numerous prompts through the day, he's shown ZERO interest in using the toilet. So I'm kind of figuring that we've managed to take about a six month step backwards on the toilet training in the last 24 hours.

Ugh.

Boying

It's no secret that boys do stupid things. Thanks to the internet (and a loosening of the "clean family fun" formula that America's Funniest Videos clung to throughout the Saget years), it's possible watch videos of boys doing stupid, reckless, and personally harmful things to themselves nearly every hour of the day, without seeing the same video twice. It's kind of glorious, actually. Who would have thought that the internet would prove to be useful for something other than carrying porn quickly and efficiently from one location to the either?

I'm not sure WHY boys do stupid things, though. As a boy, I've tried many times to break the phenomenon down to better understand it.

And I feel like I am uniquely qualified to analyze this curiosity because, on the one hand, I am a very rational person. I easily recognize activities that will harm me, are unnecessarily risky, and will, ultimately, have no payout worth the trouble they might cause.

On the other hand, even KNOWING that something is a bad idea, I find that a little part of my brain is always pushing thoughts into my head along the lines of "But what if? Wouldn't that be cool?"

Actually, that probably sums things up as best as I can figure it out. If there were no boys in the world, there would not exist the concept of "cool." Girls are too practical and too easily dissuaded from doing really stupid things. Well, really stupid, physically irresponsible things--they still do really stupid inter-personal things all on their own, and without men in the world to balance that out, I think it would only be the matter of a short time before no girl in the world would talk to any other girl because "that bitch has a lot of nerve." If there were no girls, on the other hand, it's tough to say how boys would fare. Because, let's face it, a solid 75% of the stupid things boys do has the rider attached named "I think this will really impress her." Eventually, though, that 25% of "doing things because they are cool" would probably spell the end of my gender. Either that or the fact that we would stop bathing, eating sensible food, or leaving the comforts of our recliners would do us in quickly enough.

Anyway, girls also don't understand the difference between the reality of WILL happen and the fantasy of what COULD happen as its "understood" by boys. Girls' brains are always quick to dismiss the COULDs as too remote of a chance to even mess with. But boys' brains always live somewhere right in between. All it takes is the slightest little nudge from the concept of "coolness" for the possibilities of COULD happen to outweigh the almost certain negative consequences of what WILL happen, resulting in an attempt to make something happen that almost certainly will not, just in the off chance that it works.

And, yes. I know I'm making sweeping generalizations here. Obviously this doesn't apply to ALL boys and girls. There are always exceptions--as about one out of every twenty videos of amusing self destruction on any given episode of AFV proves. But I'm just dealing with the relative concept of "boying" here, which LARGELY holds true to the gender.

Moreover, I think it takes several years for the WILL capacity of the boy brain to develop. For at least the first ten years--and probably extending into the first twenty for many boys--they live only in the COULD section of their brains, and only the fear of imminent death can dissuade the boys who have just enough wherewithal at their disposal. Anyone who's read no more than three of the posts on here concerning Gabe's development can see that this is clearly the case. He rarely does the "right" thing when the "more interesting" thing is clearly staring him in the face, even if I am telling him, outright, that he is going to hurt himself if he keeps doing it.

Mostly, Gabe's attempts to achieve "cool" result in the destruction of house and home and the bruising of many body parts--often not just his own. But late last week, I was able to turn his own innate desire to do destructive and probably stupid things into a passingly useful activity.

He wanted to "smash" things. We have a special hammer in our yard--a rubber mallet that we've long since written off as lost to the terrible misuse it has suffered--that he uses just for the purpose of smashing. Sometimes it's pears, sometimes it's just rocks in the driveway (usually it's just rocks in the driveway--and I can't for the life of me figure out how he's managed to keep finding interest in that, even after he's done it for dozens of hours--I guess he just keeps hoping that, eventually, something really cool is going to happen).

He started off with the rocks again, but then I thought, "Hey, why not have him smash something that actually NEEDS to be smashed, like our aluminum cans!" So I pulled out some cans and set him to work.

And he went after it with gusto. Trying to smash the can with ANYTHING he could find, and when it didn't work to smash the can with the object, he tried to smash the can ON the object. It was actually kind of fascinating.

You can nearly see the gears in his head turning as he tries to find the objects that will return the greatest smashing potential or that might render the coolest effect.

After he smashed every can in our recycling bin, he moved on to building a pile of sticks in the backyard. Again, not sure what the payoff was supposed to be, but he seemed to think it was worthwhile (it's also worth noting that, while picking up small sticks in our entire yard and putting them on a pile is a "worthwhile" activity, even though he gets nothing out of it, we still can't convince him to pick up the dozen toys or so he has spread out over a five foot area with the reward of not having those toys put where he can't play with them--an OBVIOUS payoff. It's truly a marvel how the mind of a young boy works).

While he did that, Norah began to do something curious. She picked up one of the crushed cans and started hitting it on everything she came across. Clearly, she learned this from Gabe, and I can't imagine she would have EVER thought to do something like that if she hadn't seen Gabe do it. Probably that proves something relevant to what I was saying earlier, too. But, to be honest, since I've been working on this for, like, an hour now, and it's not going to impress any chicks, I really haven't been paying much attention.

Anyway, here's what I managed to catch of Norah with her can.

Kids Do Weird Things

Over the past week, I've accumulated a collection of pictures and a few videos of our kids doing odd things. Not that this should surprise anyone. My kids are always doing odd things. But I figured I would share anyway.

The kids decided to put on a marching band performance the other night. Mostly, it was just an excuse for them to make noise, but Norah's marching was amusing enough that I thought it was worth sharing.

Later, possibly that same night, possibly some other because I can't remember that far back anymore, we started playing with some blocks in the office. The first half of this is pretty boring--just the kids stacking blocks and me half-heartedly helping. But then Norah starts to do something pretty amusing with one of the blocks. It's worth watching for that.

Then this happened. Clearly exhausted from the physical strain of lifting those heavy blocks, I half passed out on the floor. Then, because he's weird, Gabe laid down on top of me. I'm pretty sure he's also eating a peep in this picture.

Then he started hamming it up some, which is a weird feeling, to have someone squirming around on top of you trying to pose for a camera.

Because he's got a little Carrot Top in him, Gabe went for his props shortly after he ran out of other ideas. I had no idea any of this was going on because I was trying really hard to go to sleep.

And, finally, the other night Gabe decided to make a pile of babies, with Norah being the baby at the bottom of the pile. I was hoping for an ET-esque "head poking out of a pile of stuffed animals" picture, but this is what I got instead. Not really cute OR funny, but what can you do.

A Troubling Portent

As many people who pay attention to the calendar are probably aware, Tuesday was Fat Tuesday. To celebrate, Libby stopped by the grocery store on her way home an bought the last King Cake. Not only was this Gabe and Norah's first King Cake experience, it was mine as well. Supposedly, there's supposed to be a baby baked into the cake, and the person who gets the baby is supposed to receive good luck.

I find this tradition troubling. What part of finding a baby baked into a cake is good luck? Presumably, it would be good luck for the baby to be freed from the cake--except for the part where it has to be baked into it in the first place. And, I suppose if the person receiving the baby is hoping for a child, then it might be lucky for him/her. But what if Gabe had received the baby? He's not in any position to care for a child. He can't even wipe his own butt yet! I think this kind of random baby acquisition is just irresponsible.

Fortunately, we didn't find a baby in our cake. Dillons must not have had access to the "irregulars" at the local baby factory or something. So we dodged that bullet. Thank god.

Gabe was convinced that this was a King Donut instead of a King Cake, which, really, it sort of was since it was basically a big cinnamon roll. But drawing his attention away from it long enough to take a picture proved impossible. He couldn't even focus well enough to smile for the camera. The boy LOVES his donuts.

Instead of a baby, our cake came with a mask. Both of the kids took turns wearing it. There's something about this picture that I find unsettling. Not sure what it is.

I love her pose for this picture. She looks like a superhero. By day, mild mannered Norah Albers. By night, she's Fat Tuesday, scourge of fried foods everywhere!

Is that name a bit too cruel? If so, I take it back. But I won't erase it because I find it to be hilarious.

Gabe and Norah also got to have their first Mardi Gras "beads" experience as well. Gabe's preschool had a giant tub of them when he got there Tuesday morning, and Gabe came home with fifteen or twenty. They spent most of the night trading them and decorating themselves with them.

Then this happened.

Yeah. She's wearing beads and lifting up her shirt. The worst part is--well, there's no "best" part of this scenario, really--she was doing it without being offered more beads. If she's going to completely objectify herself, she should at LEAST be doing it for the predetermined award. Instead, she's just giving it up for free. Deeply troubling on so many levels.

The Peep Pilferer and Terms of Endearment

Couple shortish little amusing things to share.

It's Peep season again! And, as I've touched on the past two years, Gabe is a fan. It's nice to have an ally in the house, but it also means that there's a pretty open competition between he and I for what Peeps there are available. Every time he's in my office (where Peeps are stored for the staling process that turns them from mushy and kind of off-putting to slightly crunchy and glorious), he's about 90% likely to find a way to get at the Peeps and eat a couple. If we're closely watching what he's doing, he will ask if he can have one. If he thinks we're not paying attention (or if we're NOT paying attention), he'll be sneaky and find a way to reach them. Last night, Libby snapped a picture of him sneaking one off my shelf.


It has become pretty apparent that we're just not going to be able to keep Peeps in the house like I used to. Once upon a time, I'd keep a few packages of them on the shelf and nurse them for a week or two. In the last day, he's eaten almost an entire package. If we want to prevent him from being a diabetic, we're going to have to keep the sweets away from him entirely. Which makes me sad. At least I can find consolation in the fact that Peeps are sold for EVERY holiday now instead of just Easter (I'm pretty sure I even saw them for 4th of July last year), so it's not hard to find them just about every day in the grocery store. So if I'm ever jonesing, I can get a quick fix that way.

Then, this morning, Gabe was in the bathroom while Libby was getting ready for work. For some reason, the topic of conversation was nicknames that people had for Gabe.

"Poppa calls me "Buster," he informed us.

"Oh really?" Libby responded. "What do I call you?"

"Grubber," he said.

"That's right. Grub or Grubber. What does Daddy call you?"

"Damn."

"What does Daddy call you?" she repeated.

"Damn."

"I do NOT," I insisted. "When have I ever called you 'Damn'?"

I'm not sure where that's coming from. I HAVEN'T ever called him "Damn." I mean, what kind of name would that be anyway? "Come here, Damn!" Now, "Dammit," sure. I say that quite a bit. But Gabe has repeated "Dammit" quite a bit himself, so he knows the difference. To make sure he meant what he said, we asked him two more times over the next half hour what I called him and he said "Damn" again each time.

It's actually pretty funny to me. Growing up, we had an LP of a Bill Cosby stand up routine from the 70s. It was one of our favorite things to listen to. And on it he has a bit where he and his brother are being called by their father. He's calling their names but neither of them are responding because one of them thinks his name is Dammit and the other swears his name is Jesus Christ. I used to think it was a pretty funny concept growing up, but I only now am really getting it. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Gabe thought his nickname was either Dammit or Jesus Christ because I say those two things two or three times a day at least when I walk up on him and he's doing something openly destructive to our house or our belongings.

But just to make sure he doesn't end up thinking those curses are his REAL names, I also make sure to include his name as well. "Jesus Christ, Gabe! Stop throwing your food under the table!" "Dammit, Gabe! How many times do I have to tell you not to give Norah your cup without a lid? Now there's apple juice smeared all over the TV again!" But "Damn"? Nope. Never. It's just not feasible that I'd work it into a chastising sentence with any regularity. It's not like I'm spending my days "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn"ing around here. It's just no something I say. So I don't know where he got it from.

Umbrellas

I always feel bad when I don't post something on here twice a week or so--and I hope to post something at least passingly interesting at least once a week. This week, however, the kids and I have utterly failed to do anything terribly noteworthy.

But that won't stop me from posting SOMETHING.

Yesterday, Libby took the kids shopping for new shoes. Gabe has finally reached the point where we only need to buy him new shoes every six months or so, which is a blessing. Norah, however, jumps a shoe size every month or two. She is now--get this--almost a size 8. Gabe is 11 1/2. To give you an idea of just how big Norah's feet are, Gabe's BFF Finn, who's a couple weeks older than Gabe, also wears a size 8. Admittedly, Finn stopped growing about six months ago--Gabe seems to be a head taller than him now--but still. As it stands now, our 21 month old is wearing clothes that are AT LEAST 3T. If they are girl clothes, for them to not be skin tight on her butt and legs and for the shirts to not ride up her formidable gut, she has to wear 4T--but she can still comfortably wear boys' 3T clothes.

From what I can tell, boys clothes are fitted to wear comfortably--nice and baggy shirts that are plenty long and such like. Girls clothes are ALL shorter and tighter. I guess they assume little girls have short torsos and tiny little bellies. Not Norah, I guess. Sadly, most of the boys 3Ts that we have are not very gender neutral (they would have been if I'd been the one buying clothes, because I'm sensible like that, but since it was Libby and other family, all of his clothes have pictures of trucks and dinosaurs and robots and stuff on them).

Anyway. Shoe shopping. After she found each of them a new pair of tennis shoes, for reasons known only to her, she let them start playing with umbrellas. Which they HAD to have. That's right. Umbrellas. I've gone my entire life without owning an umbrella of my own. Do you know why? Because I live in Kansas. We get rain, of course, and plenty of it at certain times of the year. But I can count on one hand the number of times we get a rain that isn't torrential and doesn't include wind gusts of 30 mph or more. In other words, umbrellas are useless here. And umbrellas for kids--who will never know the right circumstance to use them--are even more useless. I give them two uses before they are turned inside out.

If they even make it out of the house, that is. They've been demanding to play with them all morning.

Still, they are pretty cute posing with their umbrellas.

That damn binky. I swear we're losing ground with it now, too. He's gotten very good at hiding them on his person when he comes downstairs and then secreting them away behind or under the couch for later. We've been prepping him for the Binky Fairy to come take them away to poor babies in need when he turns four, but I'm pretty sure he hasn't actually grasped the concept yet. It will not be fun.

Ignore the wet spot on her coat. Libby didn't let her get wet enough to soak through all of her clothes or anything.