THE PAIN!!!!!

I don't know why but it just hit me that in about 11 weeks I will be putting my sweet 5 year old on a school bus that will drive away with her...without a seat belt...1/4 mile to her school. Why not just drive her you ask? Apparently you haven't seen the hell that is the carpool line. It starts 45 minutes before school begins and logistically, because there is a median in the road, I will have to travel an extra mile or 2 in the wrong direction to make a U-turn and drive a mile back and then wait in line. For 45 minutes. And Kennen slept in and hasn't had his breakfast yet and he's screaming. For 45 minutes. What's that? Why don't I walk her to school? Ok, now your just being cute. hahahahahaha. That's not happening either. Plus all her little friends are going to ride the bus. I would be hurting her socially if I drove her to school. Right?

I can just see her full of pride and excitement, backpack strapped to her back, phone number and address memorized just in case, feeling like such a big girl. Then the bus will drive away. Then I will wave to her and she will wave back then I will see her little face scrunch up and she will do the 'siren' (you know where the pitch and volume of their cry gradually gets louder and their little mouth is in a perfect circle?.) Reality will set in that she is really driving by herself to school. Without a seat belt. By herself. I know that at this moment I will sprint to the school, hide in the bushes and watch as her teacher fetches her off the bus and makes it all better. Oh Lawd. My heart is breaking at the thought of this.

It will probably be more like preschool where if she catches me peeking in the window at her she will 'shoo' me away with her little hands and if I still don't leave she will come to the door and tell me to "GO-wah! Awaaaaay-uh!"

Full Circle

Sometimes things go full circle. Sometimes a boy will step in a poop filled crib, get a nasty infection in his foot, get even nastier antibiotics that 'cleanse' his colon, and then his mommy will go into his room after his nap and he will be standing in puddles of diarrhea. Then his mommy will cut his clothes off because there is no way she will poopify his blonde hair by pulling a shirt over his head. Sometimes these things happen. Oh and sometimes she will laugh because as she is 'pre-rinsing' the diarrhea out of his sheet she will notice that the brown giraffes on his safari themed sheets are a little more brown because her son fingerpainted over them perfectly. I'm so proud that he stays between the lines when he colors. Such good motor skills.

Oh and sometimes he will get a diaper rash from all the explosive diarreah and will scream 'EAM! BALL! EAMBALL! UH-EAM-BALL! And this mommy will know that the boy is asking me for 'diaper cream' on his 'balls'. When I'm done he will emphatically say, "Day-doo Mama...Day-doo!" Your welcome buddy...your welcome.

I friggin love Summer!

I love it. I do. Nothing makes me happier than super hot weather. It's my comfort food.

I went to the beach club today with Patty and Laurie and the 6 kids between the 3 of us. Kennen is a little maniac in the pool. My scaredy cat little boy that is unsure of himself in every other way RAN into the deep end of the pool the entire time we were there. It's a fake beach so it starts out shallow and gets gradually deeper. Once his little feet couldnt touch anymore he just kept on kicking and lunging his body out into the open water. This is the first time he has swam this summer but he immediately mastered 'balancing' in the water with his floatie clad arms. We went throught a small meltdown because he wanted his floaties OFF! but I kept saying no. I then did take them off thinking that if he went 'under' a few times he would get the message. Well, I took them off, he ran until his head went under water, I scooped him back up, he coughed and sputtered, then ran back under water. The boy just wasn't learning the lesson. He screamed like a banshee but then I put him on the 'step' for 2 minutes, then fed him a snack and then he was a happy boy again...and he surrendered to the floaties staying on his arms.

Kimberly finally doesn't cry when her face gets wet. She needs floaties still too but she is actually pretty good at getting around now. I watched her like a hawk but I let her have a lot of freedom today. It's nice that there are lifeguards there too. We also ran into on of the kids from yesterdays playgroup and Kim, Ian and the little girl all had fun frolicing in the water.

Life is just so much better in the summer, no?

*gasp* I had fun!

I have a mommy group! And I actually want to go back. :)

Maybe it's because moms of 5 year olds aren't disillusioned and competitive anymore. Maybe it's because I live in the 'energy corridor' of Houston and lots of the families I met have moved here recently too. Or maybe the Cinco Ranch Bitches really do rock. I dunno, but I had fun. For real.

Kimberly and Ian found some fellow frog/bug catching kids and they had a blast. None of the moms had a holier than thou attitude. Now I have something else to look forward to every week.

Kennen got fried in the sun. The combo of the sun and his antibiotics turned him red. I fed the kids lunch, pumped Kennen full of more antibiotics and steriods and watched him puke it all back up. Nice. If it's not coming out one end, it's coming out the other.

darnit!

Ok, so tomorrow I am going to a 'playgroup' for moms of kids that are about to start kindergarten in our neighborhood. Ahhh, the things I do for the love of my child. :) I want her to know as many people as possible when she starts school so she wont feel afraid or alone without me. This is a great opprotunity for her to make some friends. I'm pretty excited even though I am not a 'playgroup' kind of girl. It's going to be pretty big though (we need to wear nametags) so it will be more of a let the kids run around and then we can just chit chat. I like chit chat. I just don't like sitting in circles singing songs with 2 kids on my lap. I shouldn't be mean but moms are crazy. And sleep deprived. Y'all know the type of moms I'm talking about. I used to be one of them. That's why I breastfed Kim for 21 months. At first it seemed like a good idea but then Kimberly just.wouldnt.stop. She literally sucked the desire to ever attachment parent another child out of my body. I just can only give so much. That's why Kenny loves his crib so much...he doesn't have a choice! Whoa...tangent! Sorry!

The mom that is putting the whole thing together sent out a phone/email list of all the moms that have signed up. Since I'm a big dork, and since I have way too much time on my hands since Jeff is out of town, I looked up some email addresses on myspace. I only saw a few profiles that actually exsisted and they all looked nice. None of them, however, had a picture of them hanging on their husband, throwing horns in the air with their hands and having words like 'tequila' in their headline. I'm not going to change my pic because it makes me happy, but I am feverishly waiting for myspace to get back to me on changing my email address. I only have the one and I really don't want to scare any of these nice ladies to think that I'm a trainwreck. I at least need a chance to charm them with my witty banter before they judge me. That's how I corrupted the mormons in highschool. just kidding. :) I'm sure I'm worrying over nothing because I doubt anyone is as lame as me with myspace. I know I'm not 13 anymore and I'm not as cool as my teenage neighbor (she likes to remind me from time to time) but I luv me some myspace.

Okay...onto more important matters!

Kennen's foot was not any better this morning! I called my Ped and she squeezed me it to take a look at my sons purple club foot. Nothing makes a mother more terrified than being helpless to heal your child. The antibiotics weren't working so the Dr. stepped it up a notch. Now he's on super-duper antibiotics that can cause you to poop blood. This is a rare side effect but I have an over active worst case scenario imagination. I keep tip-toeing into his room to make sure he's breathing, foot is still elevated etc. The sweet little soul. Tears fill my eyes and my heart aches to think of him limping around, 'vrooming' his new car all over the living room. We've been calling the swollen foot the 'poop foot'. I want him to correlate smearing/stepping in poop with his nasty infection, but it's also pretty funny to hear him say 'poop foot' and then look up at me so seriously. I have to entertain myself somehow. :) I think I'm gonna sneak in and give him more tylenol so he doesn't wake up in pain...it's been about 7 hours since his last dose.

G'nite!

Saturday

Yesterday I was at Target with my neighbors sundress shopping. We were looking for something to wear to the work party that my husband had planned for the day and we really wanted our outfits to say, "Cinco Ranch Bitches". But...we shopped and shopped and found nothing except a couple of halter top tanks. Well, I found one dress but I didn't buy it because I didn't want to be 'Stella being Stella' again. Yes it was see-thru and it really enhanced my cheetah thong, lol. j/k!

Anyway, while we were there Patty noticed that Kennen's little foot was red and warm to the touch. I looked at it and chalked it up to another exzema flare up and ignored it. When I got home though I took off his little shoe and his foot was definitely swollen and painful when I touched it. I rushed him down to Urgent Care and waited to see a doctor for about an hour. Apparently he had some cracked skin due to his exzema on the bottom of his foot and some of the bacteria from his poop smearing party yesterday caused him to get an infection. They gave me antibiotics, steriods, tylenol with codein, and some external steroid cream to help his exzema after the infection cleared up. $200 later we were back at the house ready to party!

Jeff's friends from work are a lot of fun and I think a good time was had by all. I fell asleep while I was tucking in Kimberly but I woke up an hour later to men yelling in the backyard. I went to investigate and Jeff was on the ground wrestling with his secretary's boyfriend. Great. It was all in good fun though. Apparently Jeff's admin has been dating this guy for a few years and she wants to get married and he was saying that he 'knows she will wait as long as I tell her to wait.' Well, since Jeff is a happily pussy-whipped man, he just wasn't havin' that. I guess he thought the best way to send the message that you don't jerk around a good woman was to wrestle him to the gound and throw him around like a rag doll. Did I mention that Jeff used to do jiu-jitsu? I yelled him him to get up and stop acting like a big dumb animal. He listened and 5 minutes later I got him inside and into bed.

This morning Kennen woke up screaming! His little foot was hurting him so I busted out the tylenol with codeine! I dont advocate drugging your child but heck, if they have a prescription...and they are in pain...why not give them a teaspoon full of happy juice. Kenny was the jolliest little baby this morning. He was all sugar and smiles. I'm just hoping that this glimpse of a happy child will someday come true! I'm hoping that one morning he will wake up and become a delightful little 3 year old. Maybe he wont always be a grumpy little guy! Thank you tylenol with codeine for giving me that hope.

again?

This morning I went to get Kennen out of his crib and he took off his fucking poopy diaper and peed all over his crib. I am going to duct tape his jammies from now on. At least this time he didn't smear the wall. The poor little soul was laying really still with this guilty look on his face when I went in today.

"Kennen! Did you poop?"

He nodded his little head but didn't move the rest of his body. I think he was trying not to roll in it. At least after doing this about 20 times, I finally have a system down for cleaning it up. I filled up the tub and just let him soak. Then I throw everything straight into the washing machine and use scrubbing bubbles on his crib. voila! No more poopy bed. I can't believe my life is so uneventful that I'm blogging about poop again. Sigh. Yes, I have become the mom that talks about my kids poop all the time. Sorry people, but I'm just shocked at the sheer volume of shit I am responsible for cleaning. Or digging out of constipated kids. Or scrubbing off the wall. Or painting over. Or wiping out of mouthes. Or picking out of fingernails. Or plunging out of toilets. Shit.

Plus we are having a party tomorrow for Jeff's co-workers so I have to get the smell out. Patty, I need you to come over later and smell my house for me. I'm immune to it since i'm up to my elbows in poo every day. Thanks a bunch!