The Boy In the Box

Cardboard, the basic building block of life. Ok thats carbon but you know what I mean. Its everywhere. Your puzzles come in it. your shoes come in it. You move in it. Well you don’t move IN it per say but your stuff is moved in it. Your appliances arrive in it.

I personally think appliance cardboard is the best cardboard. We got a freezer once and that box became my sons fort for at least a month maybe longer. We coloured and cut that box, to have a door and a window. They slept in there (they were very little). Then came the time when the poor box could no longer be a house. What do you do with it then, well you make it in to a knights breast plate, helmet, sword and shield. All you need is a copy of A Knights Tale (you know to pass the time) duct tape, a box cutter, brads and a little imagination.

I have a friend who is the ultimate creative lady and her kids are too. One day they took their boxes, set up bases (protective places) in the back yard, built body armor and had an elastic band fight. Hours killed, minimal fighting and No T.V. during the process. I tell you its genius. I suppose if your one who is against such things you could use it as an obstacle course or make your own “Wipe Out” set. Water balloons might work too, but then the cardboard gets soggy.

My sister was once with a Primary home preschool. The parents would rotate during the week and cover one lesson/ activity for about two hours. One of their activities was a “Drive-in Movie”. The kids decorated their box cars, had pop corn and watched a short movie.

There are so many things you can do with cardboard. What would you do… you know…before you recycle it?

“Check your pockets please.”

It is inevitable. No matter how hard I try to be organized, when camping I always forget something. I plan. I make lists. Then I start early. Alas there is only so much a person can do ahead of time. Then like last year its crunch time, packing is interrupted and now I’m without toilet paper for the weekend. Really I don’t know how I survived.

I really should give myself more credit. It’s not every woman that enjoys camping and can get a family of five out to the mountains with minimal luxury. Some have tried and failed. My secret… bring another family with you. More times than not they have remembered what you haven’t and vice versa. (thats latin for “other way around”)

This year we were joined again by a family of Scottish decent, or so their name implies. For the purpose of the next few posts they will be referred to as the Scotts.

We had an awesome time partaking in the pleasures of one National Park called Waterton Lakes. Again, we stayed at the Crandall Mountain campground. No sooner had we put up the tent, the boys started asking, “Wheres this?”, ” I can’t find that.”, “Maaawwm. Where is my…?” This is to be expected as I packed most everything and checked and rechecked the clothing bags etc. (How I forgot the hot chocolate and smore stuff I’ll never know, but at least they were clothed.) It was later in the day when they had misplaced things after touching them that I was starting to get frustrated. Its harder than I thought raising “good lookers.”

After sometime I came to a realization. Boys like to put things in their pockets. “Check your pockets please.” became the new theme. Thanks to this little phrase my response time was reduced to 5 sec. So if you have boys about the age of 3 and older and they like to carry things small enough to fit in their hand, I suggest checking the pockets first.

Earth Sandwich

When Tweedle D was the age of Tweedle 3 he was in the hospital for observation. He was there for about 5 days. They wanted to see how he ate, measure his food and run a whole gamut of tests for he was classified as Failure to Thrive or in other words losing weight. I stayed with Tweedle D pretty much the whole time. I slept at the hospital, ate at the hospital, played at the hospital for I had nothing much else to do. Mr. Wonderful would come in the mornings sometimes and after work, bring me some dinner. When he left for the night our little family would have a family prayer and then a group hug. It started out being called “Group Hug”, but then as the days progressed it evolved in to a “Tweedle D sandwich” (parents on the outside, kid in the middle)

When Tweedle E was old enough he got his own sandwich and again with Tweedle 3.

This morning as the boys were getting ready to go, we hugged each other and said “Earth Sandwich.”

Unfortunately, that was all we did today for Earth Day. It snowed and the plans to spend an hour removing garbage got garbaged. Next year I plan to make these, if I can figure out how to make them more globe-like. Just so you don’t think I am lame, that will also be on top of the garbage cleaning.
Have you hugged your Earth today?

Talented

The primary party is a talent show. The kids were asked to fill out a sheet with the talent that they will be doing, showing, whatever. Tweedle D decided to play the piano, Tweedle E wrote down climbing. When he was asked by the Primary President about his particular talent he told her she needed to bring a ladder.

We had no clue about any of this until about 30 min. ago when the President called us trying to find out what he would do for his talent. Mr. Wonderful was laughing so hard when he told me he could barely get the words out. The really funny part is Tweedle E was serious.

S-O-C-C-E-R

Today was the first day of soccer camp on the hottest day of the year so far. Thankfully they are only in the morning but by the time I came to pick them up they claimed:

“I am sweating my hair off” (Tweedle D)

“I am sweating to death” (Tweedle E)

Thankfully I got them in time. D still has hair and E is still with us. PHEW what a relief. 

I have to admit I was a little nervous leaving them for 3 hours with an unfamiliar group. E was so scared and shy. I told him I would stay until things got started. In the beginning they were to find and make their own group of three. One person was to be 5,6, or 7, the next was to 8,or 9 and the last was to be 10, 11 or 12. They clung to each other and had a bit of a time finding a third but they did and that is when I left. I did a drive by to make sure Tweedle E was enjoying himself and he was so I did too.

They are so excited to go tomorrow and are a little upset that I didn’t put them in full day. I hope the rest of the week go just as successfully.

Chicken Abuse

I think we sang this for an hour this morning:

I had a little chicken,

that wouldn’t lay an egg.

So I ran hot water up and down his leg.

I ran hot water up and down his leg.

The darn old chicken laid a boiled egg.

A boiled egg, a boiled egg,

The darn old chicken laid a boiled egg.

 

Other versions

Crayon – Coloured egg

Beater – Scrambled egg

Hot oil – Fried egg

Bunny – Easter egg

Coco bean – Chocolate egg

 

And brand new:

Hunter – Poached egg

Speaking Childrenease

So were traveling on Glenmore trail and one of the tweedle pipes up and says “Does this mean we need more Glenns?” You see we have many friends with the last name Glenn. Then one of them said “When we have enough Glenns, will we change it to Glennless Trail.” Thankfully we haven’t reached that point yet despite the new addition to the Glen home. Welcome Baby Nathan.

Total Eclipse

It seems that I have a thing for the music of the 80’s today. I remember listening to Bonnie Tyler and singing my heart out “every now and then I fall apart, and I need you more to night, and I need you more than ever, if you only hold me tight…” Sorry I got a little sidetracked. Its hard to keep your mind together when its not functioning in peek performance.

So last week was the week of teething and colds. The whole family was sick. Phlegm, chills, coughing and headaches plagued our household. My poor baby was feeling awful on all counts. He only wanted to nurse but his nose was stuffed. He would sleep fitfully because he couldn’t breathe and therefore I slept fitfully because I never got to that o so need REM stage. Consequently I got sick.

Since both of us were sick I thought it would be a good idea for both of us to take a bath. I started the bath water, put the plug in and walked away. That was the last I thought of taking a bath until walking past the bathroom and seeing water coming from under the door. Oops.

The next day I had the chills and my body ached. The only thing that kept me remotely warm was my magic bag. I one of my moments of selfishness and laziness, I asked one of my children to heat up the bag. With much sympathy and love he went and fulfilled my request. As he was taking the bag out of the microwave it caught the glass turntable. Smash!! Tweedle D was surrounded by broken glass. In his effort to get me the bag, while crying for fear I was going to yell, he cut his foot. I spent the next 15 minutes inspecting his foot for shards and cleaning his cut, while he punched a pillow every time it hurt. Seriously why does relief have to come at such a cost?

Friday Tweedle 3 had been up all night gagging and dry-heaving due to the phlegm. I mistook it for something more, plus he was grabbing his ears more than he usually did. After giving moral support to Tweedle E during his spelling test, I took Tweedle 3 to the walk in clinic as I couldn’t get ahold of the doctors office. I spent two hours in a germ filled room soothing a fevered little one to only be told he was teething. Don’t get me wrong I am happy he isn’t “sick.” I am happy I don’t have to give him antibiotics, but this is my third child I thought I knew what teething looked like and both of them (his teeth) had cut through. I felt deflated and stupid.

Now we have one night of sleep under our belts and the smallest of the tweedles is showing signs of teething again, but when I check his mouth, nothing. This sucks! We were late for school everyday last week. Not just a little late either. Then there was the meltdown in Safeway where I discovered I was the meanest mom and one of my kids threatened suicide because I broke up their fist fight over cereal. Looks like we all don’t perform well without sleep.Maybe this week will “Turnaround bright eyes.”

Doctor, Doctor I Think I’m A Dog.

Doctor: How Long has this been happening?
Patient: Since I was a puppy.

Last week we went to the optomitrist, the two older Tweedles and I, to have our eyes checked. Tweedle E was first. He was in there a long time. Tweedle D started to wonder what was happening. After 45min I began wondering myself. Not long after that the optomitrist came out and asked to speak with me.

I followed him into the examination room and sat down.

“I think we need to see a specialist.” he says.

I started to tell him who we had seen in the past and for why, but he stopped me. “Not that kind of specialist. Let me show you something.”

He instructed Tweedle E to cover one eye, then he projected a huge “5″ on the wall and asked, “Tell me what you see.” Tweedle E said “A five.” Then the doctor turned of the over head light and said ” Can you still see that five?” Tweedle E responded “No.” to the very visible “5″. Then, lights still off, he pulled up a letter chart and scrolled down to a row of tiny letters and numbers. Tweedle E rattled them off no problem. The doctor turned on the light and asked him to read the line. “I can’t” Tweedle E explained. Then the docotor turned off the light again and asked him to read it. Tweedle E then said he still couldn’t.

The doctor explained that his answers were so inconsistant that it was going to be too hard to tell what his eyesite really was. The specialist that we need to see deals with children and has other “methods” to figure out if he is seeing. He told me he would be in contact with that specialis and an appointment would be made.

Tweedle E and I left the examiniation room where he looked around and walked over to the reception desk and bumped into it. Then like a pinball he bounce around the room excaliming “I can’t see anything. Can I get glasses?”

What a waist of time.

Ideal Birthday Party

So for the past few days we have been tryng to plan Tweedle E’s party. It was suposed to be tommorow but none of the locations called me back until today. I don’t know about you but I think thats too little notice. Anyway, I was quite frustrated last friday for that very reason and Teedle E piped up and said, “Its okay if we can’t go bowling or swimming. I think we could have it at Ikea.” The more I thought about it the more I liked it. Just think the people in small land take care of them for an hour (free). Moms get to go shopping, and then before we go home the kids can have a pop and a hot dog (next to free). Too bad I don’t have the intestinal fortitude to go through with it, but what a great idea.

By the by, we were able to work it out, his party will just be later.