Allowance

We have a round empty fish bowl.  I'm not exactly sure how we got this fish bowl and honestly I don't feel like taking care of fish. 

Coins!

At first we just threw our loose change in the bowl, when it got to a certain point we took it to the Coinstar machine and followed that up with a trip out to lunch courtesy of our newly acquired loot.

However, Parker has started doing little helpful things around the house- clearing his plate from the table after dinner, throwing away P2's pee-pee diapers (he refuses to touch the poop ones), and putting his clothes in the hamper.  I did not want him to lose interest, or momentum, in these new duties, so Josh and I established a sort of random allowance system.

When Parker does something like put his plate in the sink or hang up his towel he gets a quarter, which he puts in the fish bowl. 

The other day he "helped" the neighbor mow his lawn and was awarded with a WHOLE DOLLAR BILL! Into the fish bowl it went.

He helped Josh wash the car, another WHOLE DOLLA DOLLA BILL y'all!

This means he had two whole dollars and many quarters squirreled away.  I'd be lying by omission if I did not confess that those two dollar bills have been recycled through the process several times over.  I have put those dollars in my pocket, asked him to do something and then handed him the very same bills I just fished out of his bowl.

I foresee some issues with this method when he learns how to count money

The other day when I dropped him off at school he asked if we could get a slurpee after school.  I gave him the patent parent answer, "hummmm, We'll see, buddy."

He quickly replied, "Bring my quarters from the fish bowl!" Brilliant.

Yesterday the ice cream man came through our neighborhood.  Pfunk ran for his fish bowl grabbed a fistful of quarters, which he exchanged for SpongeBob SquarePants ice cream with stale frozen gumball eyes.

We had not had dinner yet, but he asked if he could eat his treat immediately.  At first I said no.  He was so proud of himself and in an instant my answer deflated him.  I relented and said he bought the ice cream with his money so he could eat whenever he wanted to. 

It was nearly gone by the time we reached our front porch.  He did still eat all his dinner though.

There is a downfall to a nearly four year old with unpredicatble income.
About a week ago, while the P's were supposed to be napping, Pman was picking at and ripping the wallpaper border off his wall.

When I went in to get him, I looked at his face and I knew he did something naughty.  Then shifted my eyes a bit above his head and saw the torn paper. 

I gave him the choice of either taking a 3 minute time out or paying me a dollar for the time it would take me to fix the paper.

He opted to skip the time out and pay me for my services.

Takes a Lickin

SBG has had quite a day.

It began with a her consuming a fistful of finger paint.  As she stuffed the teal paint in her mouth, she looked at me like, "Mom, this breakfast sucks."  Somehow, within seconds, the paint was behind her ear, in her hair and on the bottoms of her feet.  I pulled off her clothes and stuck her in the sink.

When Pman was a little bot, I used to bathe him in the sink regularly.  We have a different sort of sink in this house and she never quite fit, so she has pretty much always been in the bathtub. 
For her bathing in the sink was new and mystical, like unicorns and leprechauns.

I thought that was going to be her discovery for the day, her learning experience, if you will. 

I was wrong. 

Pman has been sick.  Fever. Puke. And an added bonus today, diarrhea.  During his nap he had a bit of an accident.  I was cleaning up that mess when I heard a loud thump followed by an even louder wail.

You know the song, "Ten Little Monkey Jumping on the Bed"?  We lived it out today.

It seems SBG was jumping on Pman's bed while holding onto the bedrail.  I scooped her up off the floor and asked P if he saw exactly what happened.  I was in the room, but otherwise occupied.

He said, "She did this."
He then laid face down, flat out on the floor.

The sweet P-Nut was crying so hard she was not making any noise.  I held her and sang "You Are My Sunshine" to her as I stared at the poop stains on P's rug.

In these moments parents feel like, "Wow, this is such a unique situation and others will be enraptured by my tale."

We are wrong.  These are parenting moments and they are a dime a dozen.  We all have them and will continue to tell them to each other with a certain amount of intensity and wonderment.

However, my SBG has her first shiner.  Her sad sweet face breaks my heart a little.

Old Men Dig Me

I seemed to have developed some kind of relationship with an older man at my gym.  He wears two knee pads, stays at the gym so long in the morning that he frequently changes shirts and he knows every.one.

He is sweet and means well, but when you are locked in a conversation with him, you are locked in like for life.

He give hugs. Sweaty, firm embrace kind of hugs.

This perspiring gent started chatting me up while I was pregnant with SBG.  He asked the normal questions about the baby and if my doctor cleared me to workout. 

That should have been my first clue to back away slowly and never- ever- turn back.

I recently made the colossal mistake of telling him I am training for a bit race in September.  Now he checks in every time I see him (at least three times a week) about how my latest run. 
Howlong?Howfast?How'syourhip/knee/ankle?Didyoudrinkenoughwater?Makesureyoueatprotein.

Fine, fine. FINE.

At my gym there are two tiers of treadmills.  The lower tier is made up of the newer models. 
On Thursday The Gym-Man was on the upper tier, apparently watching me run.  About 2 miles into my run he came up to me and said, "Hey Nikkiiiiii! Looking gooooood! I was watching you run and there's no jiggle at all girl."

I kind of stumbled through a response that involved praising God for spandex.

Then he followed it up with, "You're solid and sexy."  He repeated this so as to hammer home the point.

This morning, I saw him and again, he called me "solid and sexy."

I'm beginning to think all my running isn't working- solid? and sexy by geriatric standards, is not exactly the look I am aiming for.

Although, I guess it could be worse. Remember this?

Bragging Rights

My preciously brilliant Pman has been blowing my mind with all his smartness.

On Saturday we were making a quiche (that's a breakfast pie in Josh world because "quiche sounds gross." This coming from a guy who recently grilled a pigs foot and ate it.)

I told Parker we were going to start with 5 eggs. We had some in the bowl already and he counted them, "One, two, three." When I asked him how many more we needed he said, "Two."

After we added the two eggs and mixed in the other stuff I suggested we put 2 more eggs in the mixture. When I asked how many we would have then he said, "Seven."

He did not hesitate or use his fingers to count. He just knew.

Then yesterday we were in the car and he spelled stop. He knew what he was spelling and spelled it correctly.

This morning I wrote the word "go" on a piece of paper and before I could say anything he said, "Go!"

I am just so proud of this little guy! He is figuring things out, building forts on the deck and just growing so much.

He just rocks.

Easter 2012

I am a very traditional type of person.  I like to reflect on where I was and what I was doing this time last year, or five years ago, or who I was with last time I wore a certain shirt or drank a bottle of wine. 
On Easter 2005 I found myself home alone, I do not remember the circumstances, but there I was watching Crazy Beautiful- sobbing.  Mostly because for some twisted reason that movie reminds me of one of my sisters (if you have seen the movie I need you to know that my sister is not a drug addict and she regularly wears a bra).

About half way through the movie I called her in a misery loves company sort of way, but was met instead with her slapping me into reality with the comment, "You may be the only person to have ever cried at that movie- IT'S NOT EVEN SAD." 

In my defense, there is a hint of sadness in the movie, but nothing that justified my weeping. 

Since then, Easter has meant a bit less to me as holidays go.  I like it enough.  I understand the profound religious background and I can groove on being thankful, humble and awed by His resurrection. It's just not Christmas.

So now, this is how the Phillips' do Easter:

What our Easter wasn't
Church service on Sunday morning
Chocolate bunnies
Peeps of any sort
Lamb and/or Ham, I mean really they both seem a bit sacrilege (that's for you Lucy!)
Dyed eggs.  (Truthfully, Parker dyed two at school and made me eat them because he "doesn't like them in the shell."  Last year I was left with a dozen off colored hard boiled eggs.  No one person should consume that many eggs and it just felt wasteful this year.)
Egg hunts
Pastel puffy dresses and seersucker suits

What our Easter was
Sitting in the front yard on a beach towel.  Alternately watching Parker write his name in the driveway and SBG figure out her new sippy cup- she's a natural.
Easter baskets full of pinwheels, the wind kind not food kind, birdhouses, 1 Hershey's miniature and a small bag of Skittles. 
Chicken seasoned by Pman and cooked on the grill by Josh
A pre-Easter block party the weekend before, complete with smashed cupcakes, sunkissed faces and a moonbounce.
Joyful, yet untraditional

One of my other lovely sisters asked me to send her a picture of the kiddos in their Easter garb.
Here you go:

I Did It

On Sunday I ran 9.25 miles in 96 minutes.

I have a super cool ipod that will track how far I run and how fast I run it.  I can set the ipod for a distance- 8 miles, and after every mile a wonderfully encouraging female voice will say, "One mile complete."

"Congratulations, you are at your half way point."

"400 yards until you reach your goal"

"100 more yards"

"Congratulations, you reached your goal!"

However, when she said that, I was still more than a mile away from my car.  I could have walked, but I just wanted to get home, so I hulled ass to my car, to my endgame.

As I did the voice was telling me, "You are a half mile past your goal."

When I was relaying this story to someone else they said, "The lady in the ipod was probably about to say, 'Do you need help?'  'Are you lost?' 'Is there someone I should call?'"

After I did a slow walking lap around the parking lot, I hit the button to assess my distance and time.  Nine and a quarter mile in just over an hour and a half.

This is what the voice, I otherwise, trust told me.

I just can't believe her.  I know where I started.  I know what I ran.  Logic tells me it was over 9 miles.  Why can't I accept this victory, this milestone? I'm convinced that the ipod is wrong.  It was probably only 5 miles and it was probably more like 120 minutes.

I want to accept my amazing distance and time, but I can't and that is annoying.  Any other runner go through this self-doubt thing?

Breakfast How To

 

SBG here! I'd like to teach you how to eat Cheerios because you are probably doing it wrong.  Also, I'm the boss.

Step one: There are two ways you can attempt to get the Cheerios from your highchair tray to your mouth.  

Option A, involves focusing intensely on one Cheerio and pinching it tightly with your thumb and which ever other finger is easiest. Warning, this method is difficult and requires fine motor skills. 

 

Option B: Get your whole chubby hand moist with your own saliva, as you move through the process of eating Cheerios, this becomes easier- see below. Then place your wet hand directly on top of the pile of Cheerios, surely some of them will stick.

Step 2: Whether you choose Option A or B, then next step is the same.
SHOVE THEM IN YOUR MOUTH.  It is imperative that you use the entire fist, even if only one Cheerio is stuck to your hand/fingers/wrist.

Disclaimer: I cannot guarantee these methods.  I admit there are some flaws in my plan.

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