Serenity Now

Can you be thankful and frustrated at the same time? I am. I love my kids.

Love, love, love, love them. I am so grateful for them because it took so long to create our family. At the same time they do things that make me go... huh? What in the world were you thinking? I look at what they do sometimes and listen to what they say and wonder why their mother isn't teaching them better... oh wait... that's me.

I watched my boys at the dinner table tonight and knew that if it was a table full of girls it would be sooooooo different. Then I thought back to our dinners growing up and took that thought back.

Of course my parents are enormously amused as I phone them with tales of what my boys are up to. Personally I don't think it is fair that the universe has seen fit to send me boys who talk back, sneak out of their rooms at night, have messy rooms with everything stuffed under their beds, tattle on their siblings .... okay scratch the last four... now that I think about it, that actually seems fair.

But the talking back part... SOOOOOOO not right.

Take Smiley for example. He hears only what he wants to hear. He had the flu last month and instead of throwing up in the bathroom he ran to tell us that he was going to be sick and threw up all over the carpet. I believe I mentioned it earlier. Well, he was sick again on Thanksgiving evening. He actually made it to the bathroom and I was soooooo proud. I thought, "finally he is growing up."

It was a fluke.

Last night before bed he said he had another stomachache and I told him, "if you have to throw up do it in your bathroom and then come tell me." He must have heard, "if you have to throw up come tell me," for at 11:00 pm I heard the splat outside my bedroom door.

Nice.

So I'm still dreaming of the day when he will really hear me when I talk to him. He is my kid who tells me the most that he loves me but he listens to me the least. Still, I love, love, love, him - even if I do not always understand him.

I'm sure you had no idea that you missed November Fool's Day. In our home we celebrated it by accident. The salt shaker was running low and as I am the only one who ever fills the salt shaker I went to the pantry and refilled the shaker. At dinner the following night Brett cooked hash browns which as I'm sure you know needed salt. I sprinkled some salt on it and tasted it. Nothing. I sprinkled more salt on and still couldn't taste the salt. At this point I was questioning Brett's shopping skills because he was the one who bought the salt on Saturday. But I wasn't going to shake salt on my hashbrowns a third time because I knew I would get a lecture from my kids. After all, I'm always lecturing them on too much salt.

After eating my peppery but saltless hash browns Brett started laughing. He had sprinkled the "salt" on his plate and tasted it. Apparently my powers of observation need a little fine-tuning.

Is October already over? Time to take down the witches, the spiders, the ghosts and goblins. Time to put away the slobbery vampire teeth.

But you know what that means right? The stores will be packed with Christmas paraphernalia and kids will be bombarding us with the "I wants". Already the store catalogs are arriving I have already dashed Giggles hopes for an iPod and more Legos to decorate the basement floor.

Halloween day was crazy busy and I didn't have time to dress up this year. But I still had fun going to the school to watch my boys in the costume parade. This was the first year that Sheriff did not participate as he is too old. :( But he is still young enough to trick-or-treat thank goodness. And he did wear a costume to his school which had his father a little nervous. He told Sheriff that he could take his costume off at school if he wanted and to be prepared if 9th-graders made fun of 7th graders. Sounds to me like someone has some middle-school memories they still need to deal with.

Smiley only cried twice and only dropped his candy twice (blaming it on Giggles once). I call that a successful trick-or-treating night!





Brett's brother Jeff continues to amaze and delight family and friends with his fantastic haunted Halloween yard every year.




By the end of the night this is kind of how I felt...


a little bit worn out. But it was fun taking kids around and watching how excited they were for their different treats. It was a beautiful night with great weather. Pretty soon they will be too grown up for trick-or-treating so I will enjoy these moments while I can.