Nolan's little instruction book for life

Nolan: "Hey Mom, I have a new rule for me"
Me: "yeah, what's that?" - at this point thinking it is going to be something profound as he is clearing his breakfast dishes without being asked....
Nolan: "I think I need to have dessert before I take a shower from now on"

Thank you Nawnie

Simon came running into the family room yelling (I believe he has one volume - LOUD) "Mommy, mommy it's a robin bird. Look there's a robin bird outside."

I took off running to see if a bird had once again been trapped in our screened porch. Birds trapped in our porch are a pretty common occurrence and my fear is that Beamer will discover a bird "toy" during one of his potty outings and bring it in the house.

As I looked out the window I was pleasantly surprised to see a beautiful bright red male cardinal perched on our bird feeder and the female sitting on the branch behind him. Breathtaking.

At this point, I am surrounded by 5 little bodies pushing past me to see what Simon is talking about. They too have seen many a birds frantically trying to find the porch door to try and find their way out.

"Simon that is a cardinal, isn't it beautiful"

"Look mommy it's a batman bird", Mary Kate said with such pride.

"Mary Kate it's a cardinal"

"Oh a batman cardinal, look it's a batman cardinal mommy"

I think she is now understanding that Batman and Robin have nothing to do with the birds that are ever so patiently waiting for me to snap a picture. See my birds and I have an understanding, when they visit I frantically search for my camera to try and get the perfect "thank you Nawnie" picture. I think I may have just captured it. I was able to tip-toe onto the porch and zoom in on our visitors.

So why the "thank you Nawnie"? Some of my fondest memories of my maternal grandmother (Nawnie) are sitting on the couch in her living room with her looking out the window and talking about the birds. Usually within reaching distance you would find the 3 inch thick dark green Audubon society book that helped us to correctly identify the birds that were visiting on any particular day. The cardinal and blue jays were the ones we would always get the most excited over. They always seemed to be in abundance when Nawnie and I would bird watch. Since Nawnie died nearly 19 years ago (gulp!) every time I spot a cardinal or blue jay I flash back to those times and am reminded of the love of a grandmother. I am also reminded of how thankful I am to have my own mother to be a "nawnie-type" grandma to my kids.

The red cardinal holds a very dear spot in not only my heart, but in my sister, my mother and brothers hearts. There are days when things aren't necessarily going the way I would want and as I am driving along a cardinal will fly past my car. In my head I'll say a quick "thank you Nawnie" as I have been reminded to love, to be patient and to be truly thankful for the blessings that I have (no matter that they are screaming their heads off in the back seat!).

Peanut, Peanut Butter and JELLY!

Mary Kate and Simon were wrestling around tonight before dinner when Andrew made an observation...

Andrew: "the two of them are like peanut butter and jelly"
Me: "what do you mean?"
Andrew: "don't you understand food comparison's mom? they are always stuck together like peanut butter and jelly. They are always with each other and playing together."
Me: "oh, gotcha"
Andrew: "yeah and you know when Simon is in jail, Mary Kate will be the one to bail him out"

I would have been ok with the analogy up until the bailing out of jail part. Note to self, work on Andrew's expectations of Simon's future.

You're Welcome Riley

On the way home from guitar lessons tonight...
Ri: "mom thanks for letting me be born"

I'll take it as a compliment

Ri: "mommy you look just lovely"
Me: "thanks Ri"
Ri: "even when you were mad, you looked just lovely"

Warning for Riley's future girlfriends...

Riley: "mom I'm never going to marry a girl that burps, pukes, toots and gets sick a lot"

Whew, glad we got that covered. Hopefully, he'll be a bit more forgiving when his wife has morning sickness....

Mary Kate may have a future in Mary Kay

After dinner tonight we were all sitting in the family room watching The Flintstones movie. Mary Kate was sitting very quietly on my lap (well actually it was more like lying alongside my hip). It wasn't until I looked over at her that I saw what was keeping her quiet.
It was most definitely a picture moment. Thankfully, the camera was charged and hubby was able to find it.

Biden's job description according to Riley

Riley: Mom I know what a Vice President does
Me: What's that Riley?
Riley: Well if Obama is sick then the Vice President fills in. Kinda like a princess filling in for a queen.

This is one of the reasons I enjoy taking Ri to do errands on the weekends. You just never know what he's going to say :)

Would someone please tell my daughter she's a girl

I knew it would be tough raising a little girl to be girlie when she has 4 older brothers, but some days I wish I could go back to the times when she would let me put the frilly dress of my choosing on her. The day usually begins with her removing her pj's and putting on whatever pj's of her brothers that she finds laying around...

Then once the boys are off at school or camp, she likes to raid their rooms for a little change of clothes. Most recently that entailed going into Andrew's baseball basket and putting on his baseball socks to have with her morning cup of yogurt....

At least I got her past the stage of wearing Andrew's football cup all the time (can't find the picture of that one) and of putting Simon's pull-up over her clothes...

There are many a day that I'm just thankful she's wearing something, because she'd certainly prefer to live in her birthday suit. Why be restrained by clothes?

I think the picture that most accurately captures my little girlie-girl is when she was outside swinging Easter morning with her dress flying in the air as she was grabbing her gun....

MK's chicken is my kitchen.

Me: "Good job getting undressed Mary Kate. Where does your pullup go?"
MK: - walks into boys room and throws it on the floor -
Me: "No Mary Kate, it goes in the trash"
MK: - surprised look - "Oh da twashhh"
Me: "Yes in the trash in the kitchen"
MK: - questioning - "In da chicken?"
Me: "In the kitchen, the trash can in the kitchen"
MK - "Oh, ok. In da chicken"

She continued to mumble "in da chicken" the whole way down the stairs.

Nolan seeking bride. Must be Amish.

Nolan - Mom, when I get married, I know where I'm going on my honeymoan (yes that's the way he said it!)
Me - Yeah, where?
Nolan - Dutch Wonderland
Andrew - Don't you think you should take her somewhere more relaxing?
Nolan - Like where?
Andrew - The beach would work.

Ummm, No Thank You Ri

Riley: "mom can I put fertilizer on you?"
Me: "no"
Few seconds later...
Me: "Ri, why do you want to put fertilizer on me?"
Riley: "so you can turn into a chicken egg and I can heat you"

Obviously, Ri is learning about the life cycle of the chicken at school. Clearly, we need teach the difference between a person and a chicken.

Why Riley won't be a Pirate

Ri: "I don't like Pirates because they drink a lot of alcohol, they don't follow Lent, they say a lot of bad words and say the Lord's name in vain"

This conversation all came from him seeing an A&W commercial in which people were drinking out of a barrel. He must have drawn a connection to Pirates and then felt it necessary to reassure us that he wouldn't become a Pirate.

Some day I'll just need to write a book about Riley. He cracks us up. I've said it many times, we are so blessed with him and I think every family should have a Riley ;)

It's in the bible

After watching the movie "School of Rock" with Andrew tonight, I asked if he thought Ri would like this movie and he said he would.
Me: "yeah, but we have to make sure the bad words aren't repeated like A - double S"
Hubby: "well it's in the bible"
Andrew: "yeah, Jesus road the ass down to Jerusalem"

I'm A Wonder Poacher

The kids had "silly dinner" tonight, also known as pancakes for dinner. I really wasn't in the mood for pancakes, unless they were pumpkin pancakes and I knew that there would be at least one member of the family that wouldn't have eaten them anyway (if you guessed Ri, you were right). The hubster came home in time to take two of the boys to karate and I took care of bathing the 2 boys left behind. Mary Kate likes to stand outside the tub and terrorize the boys by threatening to turn the shower on (I know she has succeeded when I hear the blood curdling screams).

While waiting for the inevitable scream to beckon me to the bathroom, I figured out what I wanted for dinner. Poached eggs! Random? Yes. I knew we had an egg poacher that I believe was given to me by mom back when we first got married, but getting my hands on it and trying to remember how to use it was a whole other story. Google to the rescue. I panicked when the only links I was coming across involved boiling water and slowly pouring cracked egg into water?? Uh oh, I was now desperate to find my poacher and directions for how to use it. I did find it and saw that it was made by Duncan Hines, I guess they used to do more than cakes and brownies. I finally found directions online for the "perfect poached egg" using a poacher.

Kids were out of the tub and gathering up books that I had promised to read after I ate (I really was obsessed with eating the poached eggs). In under 5 minutes, I had 2 slices of toast with butter and 2 poached eggs PERFECTLY made! Definitely hit the spot, so when hubs got home he was treated to my poaching obsession too :)

A funny conversation while I was eating...
Mary Kate: "zat momma?"
Me: "that's mommy's eggs Mary Kate"
Nolan: "Mommy how old are you?"
Me: I told the truth, not sure why he needed the age though "34"
Nolan: "Mary Kate, when you are 34 you gets eggs too"

The marriage - job link

Nolan, my 6 year old stereotypical middle child, gave some insight into the economy this morning. He stated very emphatically, "Well actually, I do want to get married cause I want to get a job". Hmmm, where do you go with that one? If everyone would just get married, then everyone would be employed? Get married and get a job so you can be out of the house? A marriage will be his job?

I chose to just stop with my deep thoughts and chuckle at the funnies that are always coming out of their mouths. How blessed we are, when we listen to their deep thoughts instead of our own.

He's a walking commercial

This morning Riley was eating his 23 french toast bites, (yes you read that right, 23, he's on a weight gain diet), when I guess he realized it was time to educate his mom (that's me:)

Ri - "Hey mom you need to get me some Arthur books"
Me - "Arthur books? Sounds good, but why Arthur?"
Ri - "because they are at the local library and we can find Arthur books and other cool things at the local library"

Maybe he has a future working for PBS. Apparently, Riley hasn't figured out that I have a very strange phobia with public libraries and that is why we always order from either scholastic or amazon.com!