The most recent directive from the 6 year old:

“Mom, you have to get me some Old Spice body wash.”

I don’t even know what to make of this…

Yes. Gummy worms will melt if you leave them in the car on an 85 degree day.

Today I received the following email from a good friend.

Ok- so I will preface this by saying I despise most kid’s b’day parties…I got burned out on attending the parties thrown by the private school parents–fully catered, clowns, tumble bus, Spiderman delivering the cake, $25 gifts expected by the birthday brat and every mommy trying to one up the previous mommy. My kids HATED me, cause I wouldn’t do it. Absolutely refused-I believe in saving it for a special b’day like – 10 or 16, 18 or 21…something big seems a bit more easy to swallow then..every year. NOW- the pendulum has swung the other way and the past two invities have come with a fee! One is a skating party $2 admission – plus $5 skate rental and the other is bowling- entry fee, plus shoe rental.. Seems odd, would seem that if one can’t pay for ones guests one should try having a party at home…seems the need to keep indulging ones kids with un-affordable parties is somehow socially acceptable? I guess I don’t have to worry about Spiderman and the tumble bus showing up if the host parent is asking guests to pay to attend….and not that it matters, but I could afford to pay for the party and/or for my child to atend the parties with fees, but the principal of the concept is bothering me…so I would love to hear your opinion…maybe I should just have a glass of wine and get over it?

I tend to prefer more low-key parties for the kiddos. I read somewhere that a good rule of thumb is to invite as many guests as the age of the child. My gut tells me that’s sound advice.

Sure, it is fun to see your child’s eyes light up when the moonbounce gets delivered or they ring the bell at the top of the climbing wall, but how do you celebrate the big milestones when a Kindergartener’s party costs $400?

I don’t know if I have a strong opinion about charging kids to come to a party. I suspect Emily Post would say that as the host you are responsible for ensuring your guests have a good time.

What do you say to my friend? She needs to RSVP soon.

I have a very serious question.

How many times must one six year-old fart in the span of 15 minutes before he can be convinced that it might be time to visit the bathroom?

I only ask because if this goes on for another 15 minutes I’m going to have to find an all-night army supply store.

Cause they’re going! One son is actually going twice and the middle guy told me how much he wanted to go when his big brother received the invitation. Because I want to maintain some sanity in my life this week, I didn’t tell him we were going on Thursday. I just suggested that we might go some day.

The last time I went to the circus I was 18 years old and it was a double date. My strongest memory of the night is when one of the elephants pooped. My friend lost her mind when it happened and I laughed until my sides hurt. If an elephant poops on stage this time, I’ll be with not one but three people who will go crazy. And I’ll probably laugh just as hard.

Now I received this great discount code for Ringling Bros and I wanted to make sure I passed it along. I hope you can take advantage of it. It’s a great deal!!

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® proudly presents Over The Top

Offer #1: Get 4 tickets for just $44 by entering the code “MOM” at select ticketing channels** including http://www.ticketmaster.com. Offer good on all performances, minimum purchase of 4 tickets required; additional tickets above 4 can be purchased at $11 each. Offer not valid on Gold Circle Seating, Circus Celebrity Seating, Front Row and VIP seating or combinable with other offers. Other Restrictions May Apply.

The tickets can be purchased from http://www.ticketmaster.com and by entering the MOM code in the MomCentral promotional box when purchasing tickets.

Offer #2: A select amount of Front Row and VIP seats have been reserved for you to buy before they go on sale to the public – just enter the code “MOM” when purchasing those seats.

***********************************************
Washington D.C. Show dates: March 19 through March 22
Washington D.C. location: http://www.verizoncenter.com/

Baltimore show dates: March 25 through April 5
Baltimore location: 1st Mariner Arena http://www.baltimorearena.com/

Fairfax, VA Show dates: April 8 through April 19
Fairfax, VA location: http://www.patriotcenter.com/

Here are the dates for the other communities the coupon code works for these dates too!!

Houston
Disney On Ice presents Mickey and Minnie’s Magical Journey
April 15-April 19

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® proudly presents Over The Top
July 15-July 26

Dallas/Ft Worth
Disney On Ice presents Mickey & Minnie’s Magical Journey
March 18-March 29

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® proudly presents Over The Top
July 29-August 16

Sunrise/Miami
Disney On Ice presents Worlds of Fantasy
March 26-April 5

Toronto
Disney On Ice presents Worlds of Fantasy
March 18-March 22

Kansas City
Disney On Ice presents Mickey & Minnie’s Magical Journey
April 1-April 5

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® proudly presents Over The Top
September 16-September 20

Denver
Disney On Ice presents a Disneyland® Adventure
March 12-March 15

Phoenix
Disney On Ice presents a Disneyland® Adventure
April 9-April 12

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
June 24-June 28

Chicago/Rosemont
Disney On Ice celebrates 100 Years of Magic
Sept 8-Sept 13

Newark/East Rutherford/Uniondale/NYC
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
March 5 – April 13

Offer not valid on performances from April 10 – 13 at Madison Square Garden

Philadelphia
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
May 13-May 25

Anaheim/LA/Ontario
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
July 8-August 2

San Francisco
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
August 12-August 23

Sacramento
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® presents ZING ZANG ZOOM
August 27-August 30

I’m sure playing cards were purposefully created to be difficult for children to hold in a fan to keep them from losing all their money at poker.

“I wish I had a tail. Then I could grab things from behind me.”

— 6 y.o. commenting on Dr. Seuss’ Oh the Thinks You Can Think

What an incredible weekend! What an incredible day!!

I’m exhausted and I’m not sure why, but I think it’s because I’ve been holding my breath for so long.

And today I exhaled.

I expected tears, but none came. There were plenty of goosebumps, but no tears–and I cry at the M&M Easter Bunny commercial every year.

Barak Obama doesn’t represent a panacea to the world’s problems to me, but the possibility of change in our country that makes me hopeful.

I tried to figure out how to convey the importance of this event to my sons. I brought the two oldest to the inaugural concert on Sunday.

We all watched the swearing in (on our feet) today.

But I don’t know if they understand.

And you know what? That’s okay. It means that they see nothing remarkable about a black man leading our country. Hopefully some day they will think nothing of a woman or someone of hispanic descent or of gay identity leading our country.

A world where my children don’t expect that all leaders are white men? Is it really true?

Now I think I may cry.

Bedtime has arrived again and I haven’t recorded any grand thoughts, figured out which came first–the chicken or the egg–or even found some mildly funny words to make at least myself giggle.

In exchange for the prophetic, I leave you with some little nuggets of late.

As I sat in the doctor’s waiting room today–the foot and ankle surgeon–I looked up and took in the image of the man in a wheelchair sitting across from me. He had no legs from the knees down. WHAT THE HELL WAS HE DOING SEEING A FOOT AND ANKLE SPECIALIST?? HE DIDN’T HAVE ANY.

First grader came home from school before the holidays with a 3-D paper creation. The hubs complimented him on his dreidel. Son gave him the hairy eyeball and proclaimed, “Duh, it’s not a dreidel dad, it’s a lantern. The Jews use it to celebrate Ramadan.”

My first activity of the new year was so incredible that I don’t know how the rest of the year is going to be able to compare. I woke at 7:00 a.m. to the sounds of a whining puppy. I tried the time-tested approach of putting the pillow over my head to make her stop, but that approach was a failure. I rolled out of bed, threw on the closest items to protect any still-partying neighbors from the sight of my pale flesh and shuffled down stairs. And what was I greeted with?? A nearly six month-old puppy covered in her own poop looking up at me from her crate. So weird how the rest of my family was so tired they didn’t hear any of the whining.

There I was trying to get her out into the backyard and the crate…well somewhere without getting covered myself. Crate unceremoniously deposited in the carport awaiting some other sleeping ass’s attention, the puppy was brought upstairs for a bath–AT 7 FREAKING 30 on New Year’s Day. Oh yeah, it’s gonna take a lot to improve on the start of this year.

It was a pretty afternoon (every other hour it didn’t rain today) and it started like this:

And as any parent might expect, it ended like this: