Preserving memories

My Mom has reminded me yet again, that I really should write more about what I’m up to somewhere, because how else will I remember those special little details. So, in order to make sure I remember those things. Here goes a few particular things that happened in the past few days.

My kids have all revealed they have a greater calling in life, here’s what they’ve decided their calling in life is: to be a hero or a princess. I just cracked up at lunch when I was solemnly told that Batman had (notice how I’m trying out not using their names, but using their preferred nicknames, I don’t know if I’ll stick to this, but it’s worth a try) been told by God “that he would be a hero,” specifically he’d be Batman. His brother then revealed he would be Robyn, and his sister, said she would be a princess.

Tonight we watched a surprisingly good movie “Gigi God’s Little Princess,” and as I was watching it, I saw my little princess in it so many times. There’s a scene in the movie where the little girl isn’t going to get what she wants because the king thinks she’ll like his plan better, so she pulls the “sad puppy dog face” complete with batting eyes, lower lip stuck out, and real tears. Did you see the real tears Daddy? And in the dream sequence of course the king gives in….. Now, how this remind me of my princess, even at the tender age of 2, she has mastered the sympathy I’m so cute look. And she knows how to flirt, this is very worrying. Her Dad is thinking of locking her in a tower once she hits 12, okay not really. But he has threatened the no dating until you’re married line.

She’s also developed a couple of really good defense mechanisms, that I’m having to break her of that habit: screaming. She can scream in such a way as to break windows, it’s kind of scary. When the boys take something of hers I always know what’s happened because I can hear it no matter where I am in the house. I’m not exaggerating, it’s that loud. She’s also decided that she’s the third triplet. She may be 21 months younger (my Mom reminded me of the difference in age again), but she is sure she’s a triplet. So, she wants to be in the same room with them, do the same things as them, she’s determined to potty train right there with them. Only, she’s not as successful on that last item as they are.

Okay, that’s a few things that are particularly on my mind right now, and I need to get to sleep, since I’m sure they’ll wake up at an insanely early hour, and I don’t have Jeff here to entertain them in the morning like I usually do. Sigh, poor me.

The funniness of little kids

So today I’m sitting at Taco Bell with the kids listening to them talk. Batman announces, “I have Superman on this hand, and Princess on the other.” He was using this to describe who was sitting next to whom. Now they continue on and Superman is talking about how this is Superman’s hand, but Batman keeps telling him, “No I Batman.” This continues on for a while with Princess piping in every now and then with “I Princess, I got Princess.”

Fast forward to driving home, Batman graciously let Princess sit in his seat. He had a hidden motive, he really wanted to sit in the middle seat, and not in his car seat. So as a special treat I let him sit there, with lots of warnings because I knew we were driving a very short distance, and he’s almost big enough to not need a car seat. I eagerly look forward to those days of only one car seat. Continuing on, so all three of them are sitting on the same row, and they are having a blast and talking to each other all the time. They are sitting there being silly and screaming occasionally, then telling each other to stop screaming, until the next one starts the whole rounds again. It’s really quite funny to listen to.

SNEAK SNEAK SNEAK

My kids seem to believe that when you are sneaking or hiding, to make sure people know what you are doing you need to say this. So, this morning as I’m taking my shower, I hear Superman, tip-toeing across the bathroom saying, “sneak, sneak, sneak,” and then he gets into the closet, and quite proudly announces, “I hiding!” To get a proper picture of this you should really imagine it like a cartoon mouse sneaking and hiding from the cat, it really was that exaggerated. At this point, if Jeff were here, he would be pointing out, that they learned this from me. Now, I maintain that I am completely innocent. Really and for truly. I have no clue where they picked this up.

I DON’T LIKE GIRLS

“I don’t like girls,” or so I was told by Superman the other day. This conversation started when he told me that Princess couldn’t help him find his shoes because it was a boy problem, not a girl problem. When I followed up with him about this, he did admit that he liked one girl. He wouldn’t say which girl. He also wouldn’t say if he liked Mommy even though she was a girl. Princess was definitely not okay. He’s smart though, he knew enough to remain silent on the matter of Mommy or Mimi.

ARE YOU HUNGRY?

Superman ate some string cheese, and he came back with “You hungry Mommy? I hungry. You want cookie Mommy?” This was then followed by going to the next person he thought likely to give him a cookie, until he found someone who was hungry enough to get up and give him a cookie and themselves a cookie. His Aunt Tara is a soft touch, and got him at least 3 cookies. Everyone was very impressed with his reasoning skills.

Here’s my reasoning of his thought process: I want a cookie. If I get a cookie by myself I’ll get in trouble. If an adult gets me a cookie it’s okay. I’ll ask if they’re hungry.

He also has figured out to ask his Dad for things I won’t give him. I had some toys I had set aside for our trip this summer, so they’ll be new and fun to play with. The problem being Jeff didn’t know this, so he said they could play with them. Oh well, they’ll still be relatively new if I take them away today and put them away for 2 months.

Bishop’s Palace (September 29)

So, we went to the Bishop’s Palace in the morning. The kids did great trailing through the 100-plus-year-old mansion they’re not allowed to touch anything in. REALLY great job. What better way to reward a great job than to take them mini-golfing?

Okay, I really want to tell the Bishop Palace bits I can.

We waited outside for 20 minutes or so, and the kids had lots of fun checking out the stairs and how much they can go up and down.

So Superman, pictured above on the stairs, has started sharing his wisdom with us, we’ve started calling it “The Tao of Superman.” As he was carefully walking up and down the stairs he told us “You go downstairs slowly, so you don’t fall down and get an owie.” We also got, “You got to be a little careful, so you don’t fall down and get an owie like Batman.” He also has now started telling us, “Hey guys! I got a plan!” Then he’ll tell me his plan, and it usually is a pretty good plan and well thought out.

And we stopped to get lunch because it was 1:00 something, and that meant Ticia needs food. And, the foyer of the restaurant had these cool carousel statues. Does anyone else find carousels as fascinating as I do? I took about 7 pictures of these horses, they’re just cool.

OKAY, NOW TO MINI-GOLF FOR REAL.

I love to go put-putting but sadly there are no really good courses in Austin. I was lamenting this point about the lack of good courses when Jeff named 3 courses in the Austin area proving me wrong. Sigh….

Here’s how you play mini-golf if you’re a preschooler.

1. Keep hitting the ball over and over again, never let it come to a complete stop.

2. If all else fails pick up the ball and drop it in the hole of the animal/building, you name it.

3. Oh, and of course swing your club like it’s a croquet mallet or a polo club.

4. If you fit inside of the hole, then you of course need to stand there. Regardless of this causes problems for whoever is trying to put.

5. If the windmill is in your way, then just stop the windmill and run in the house.

Meanwhile, Daddy is actually trying to golf correctly, and that’s not working super well with the extra help.

And how cool is this, the place has a cave. That and one of the holes was a pirate ship. This is the coolest golf course ever! Really.

So, I can’t tell if the pictures are blurry because I don’t have my glasses on or because it’s blurry. Hmmm, maybe that’s why I”m supposed to be wearing glasses.

My Downstairs as I cook as seen through Superman’s eyes

How’s that for a ridiculously complicated title?

So far I’m getting he thinks Batman is super important, both the person and the toy.

I also think he finds random shots interesting.

He likes to annoy his sister. That’s another important thing to do with a camera

This is Princess’ stepstool, I just finished putting it together before he got up.

Oops, randomly didn’t edit it to the right size (that’s the top right picture from before I made it collages), but I’ve given myself 1 hour to get all of my blog posts for this week done, so I need to keep going. HA! It’s not happening, but I’m going to do my best.
And this is with me deleting a bunch of pictures of tile…..

And then I took away the camera, and he cried mightily. This was all in a 5-minute picture taking spree. Seriously, there’s another 15 I deleted, and another 20 I didn’t even bother to upload.

It’s crazy.