Terms of Endearment

For those of you who are married (and female): Have you ever noticed that the things you find most endearing in your husband when you are in a good mood are the things that make you the most frustrated when you are in a bad mood?

Blame it on PMS if you like, but I can’t, because I’m not… Some days I just find myself wanting to throw things and I don’t really know why. It’s just nit picky little things and I’m in a MOOD so it makes me mad. I wish I could find the off switch to that mood… I don’t like it.

It’s the same way with the kids. Yesterday that was cute, today it’s annoying! As I tell Welly as she sings the same song over and over and over, “Honey, that song was interesting the first 10 times, BUT IT’S GETTING A LITTLE OLD!!!!” or Bowey when he’s been hogging the bathroom, “THAT IS NOT YOUR PRIVATE OFFICE!!!” or Neeps “Didn’t I tell you to do that 45 MINUTES AGO!!” or DoBug “DON’T ARGUE WITH ME! JUST DO IT!!!”

For the children, I prayed when they were toddlers that I would stop screaming at them, and God in His goodness brought me out of that TERRIBLE habit. That doesn’t mean I don’t raise my voice (with all the radio’s going on around here I have to yell), but it isn’t rage directed at THEM anymore.

For Himself, I often ask the Lord what I’m doing to add stress or irritation to the situation. And God has faithfully pointed out my faults to me repeatedly, and yet gently. I am also a great believer in PRAY AND DUCK. You don’t have to hit your husband with a frying pan to get his attention and make him change. Let God hit him with the frying pan. He has better aim.

Pray for your husband. Pray that God will change him into the godly man that HE wants him to be. Pray that God will open his eyes to his own faults. And then DUCK! Get out of the way! Don’t pray and nag. Or pray and whine. Or pray and push. Or pray and manipulate. DUCK. Because when you pray for God to hit your man with a frying pan, you don’t want your head in the way!

And by the way, be ready. When your man gets hit, there are a lot of changes going to happen. Not rapidly, but steadily. And more than likely you are going to have to change too.

KIDS SAY THE FUNNIEST THINGS

My kids come up with the craziest comments in the midst of conversation. Maybe it’s the Irish sense of humor, but the last couple of nights we have been just rolling in laughter at the dinner table.

It all starts as toddlers, when their beginning to talk and understand how to tell us things. I can still vividly remember my oldest daughter walking in as a two year old with her papa’s boots and work gloves on (mind you the boots went up to her hips and the gloves to her elbows) and announced “look mama! I’m a man!”

Or the argument between my two oldest (oldest son and daughter) having an argument in the back seat of the car as we drove somewhere.
“is so…” she says
“is not…” he says
“Is so!” she says
“Is not!” he says
“Wohwee! Don’t you contwadict me!” she bellows
“Contwadict, contwadict, contwadict.” he replies in a singsong voice.

But as they have gotten older the comments have gotten more hilarious. Like the child who complained that we always made the bath water too hot, “don’t you know I’m sensible!” or the son who always mispronounces words. “mama? Have you ever read Haiti?” “No, what’s that?” “oh some book about a girl who has to live with her grandpa in some Swiss village or something” “you mean Heidi?” “No, Haiti.”

But two nights ago, we got the cream of the crop as we discussed new busses and the new features in a brand new bus. Mr. “Haiti” announced “our bus is SO new it still smells like Home Depot!”

I almost died laughing.

The beginning of a new season

The geese have been winging over our home to the lake across the street, gathering and then flying off to warmer climes. The grackles have been covering our lawn with their squawking little selves, eating as many bugs and seeds as their little bodies can hold in an hour and then swarming off to the next yard. THE MOSQUITOES ARE ALMOST ALL DEAD!!!! The weather is cooler, more snuggling under pounds of blankets. The wood pile is growing, a little late this year, but a friend has a friend who works in a place that builds furniture and we are getting their kiln dried oak scraps... oh my... a whole dump truck so far today and the girls and I stacked it all while Himself is at work (the poor man) and the boys were off doing boy stuff... When they got back we were done, so we made them do the house work (yes!!!).

Soon it will be chilly enough to get a nice crackling fire going and curl up with Himself on the couch and drink tea and talk/giggle/whisper/flirt/snuggle (I rearranged the furniture in the front room this week to take full advantage of the fireplace this fall). Perfect weather for bonfires (in the summer it is just way too hot for that)

I love the first few weeks of cool weather, and then it gets serious with the whole wear-your-coat business and I'm ready for spring again!

But for now... I'm dreaming peaceful things for the next week or so.

I am so totally outrageously excited!!!

Ok, so I've only been blogging for a month and a half, and looking at other blogs and telling people that I am blogging and whatnot. I have found one other blogger who I find very intelligent and interesting (who doesn't happen to be my best friend or relative) and occasionally I have written comments on her blog. Today I was checking out her site and peeked at her link list, and MY BLOG was there!!! I think I just stared blankly at the screen for a minute or two. Wow, someone finds me link worthy! That is amazing! and Exciting! I don't even know what else to say. Thanks Mrs. L, you made my day!

Himself

My Husband is (in my opinion) one of the most wonderful people ever! now I'm not saying he's perfect!(if he were, he wouldn't be able to stand me...) but he is wonderful. Himself met a cute girl (me) and decided to marry her, not even concidering (much) the fact that she couldn't cook, was a terrible housekeeper, and was basically not much in the way of wife material. He married her, then proceeded to teach her to cook, patiently.

Years of lumpy rice, over cooked pasta, under cooked chicken, not to mention the unrecognizable items followed. He patiently sat down to dinner after dinner with a smile, and occasionally offered a word or two of advice. "Honey, if you put _______ in it while it is cooking, it will taste really good." or, "Honey, I love you, but please don't make that ever again." or "That was really good, do you remember how you made it?" and finally, fifteen years later, he has a wife who can cook ("Please tell me you wrote that all down! I'd hate to go through life and never have that again!").

Yes indeed he married her, then proceeded to teach her to keep house.

Years of pink underwear, bleach spots on all my shirts where I leaned into the washer to get the clothes and "you know what" part of my anatomy dipped into the bleach cup, sinks full of dishes, grit on the bedroom floor, and the soap dish always a little mushy, not to mention all the more obvious things that I always either didn't do, or forgot. But he came home night after night, and only occasionally commented, "um.. Honey, I sure could use some underwear tommorrow..." or "You know, if you put that away right after you use it..." or "Sweet heart, you did a fine job, that __________ is lovely". And now, 15 years later, we live in a somewhat sanitary stage of chaos (what do you expect, I have four teens and their friends!)

To some who read this, they may think of him as a bit over expectant, or pushy or whatever. But it was exactly what I needed! I needed someone to point things out. I needed someone to help without being bossy or mean. His patience with me has been outstanding, especially on the weeks where I didn't diserve it (because I spent the whole week reading or watching movies instead of keeping up with things!)

I have always been a listener, and he has always been a talker. GOD in His mercy put us together!

Of the friends you keep for life

Her Royal Diness has always longed for royal treatment. From the days when she was known as Artemis, to the present. And I think she always deserved it. I don't even remember who I was when Artemis reigned in the upstairs hall, and subjected me to some of the wildest decrees ever imagined. And then we grew tired of that and threw Royal parties for only the rich and famous (ah, but who remembers John Stamos and David Hasselhoff now...WHO? indeed) Sometimes we tried to be serious. but that rarely lasted. Life was TOO BIG for seriousness. And if her Diness wanted to dance? Make sure you watch your head, it could get kicked off!!! Michael Jackson had nothing on her! And one doesn't turn royalty down when being forcefully dragged to a dance at the grange hall. But one does look forward to the next forceful dragging, because it was SO VERY FUN! Ah... being the best friend of Royalty definately has priveleges, and draw backs... like hand me down boyfriends (I don't think that was fair, poor mike)some days I would like to go back and live it all again! I loved it! I miss it...

Of shirts that talk

We recently got some shirts for my son. He likes the kind that have those cool sayings like “its ok, I’m with the band” or “people who think they know everything annoy those of us who do.” or one of my favorites, “good hard work never hurt anybody, but why take a chance?”. We are trying to get him a good collection, you know so he doesn’t have to wear the same one twice in a month J. I find the shirts enjoyable for the most part, but I don’t like the obnoxious or disgustingly (or not so disgustingly) sexual ones.
It all started when we found a camouflage shirt that said, “you don’t know this, but I’m standing right in front of you.” and has escalated all the way up to a simple white shirt that states “Mr. Wonderful” which he refuses to wear and passed on to me to give to my husband, but I know he will refuse to wear it. My daughter wants to put an “s” on it and then she will keep it, (Mrs. Wonderful) except that she isn‘t a Mrs. yet. I dunno.
I wonder if anyone has found any really laughable ones like “I like to let my mind wander, but it doesn’t come back” or “How do you keep an idiot busy? Look on back. How do you keep an idiot busy? Look on front”.
Some aren’t that funny, but I laugh at them anyway, because I’m Irish and I have a twisted sense of humor and some things just put an image into my head that I have to laugh about. Like once I read in a book about this kid who was always getting into weird types of trouble, and he said “I’m not allowed to play in the mud anymore, not since I lost the cat.” I almost died laughing. No one else gets it. I’m sure if I found another Irish descendant out there, they’d laugh too. Or at least I keep telling myself that…

Humor

I am Irish. And I have been told that I have a twisted sense of humor. I never really thought so until I got married to a very practical Scottish man. He rarely laughed at the things that I thought were hilarious. But over the years I have corrupted his sense of humor, and I can now get Himself to at least chuckle over the things that put me in tears of laughter for hours. I even try to explain why things are funny to me, but he doesn’t often get it. He just says, “Honey, you’re cracked…”. But God in His goodness blessed me with a son with MY sense of humor. So we have these ongoing giggling conversations, where we are both laughing so much that we can hardly speak. And Himself just shakes his head, we’re both cracked…

Now I’m not trying to say that Himself doesn’t have a sense of humor. His just tends to run along the Dry British Humor type. He likes the sly stuff that sneaks up on you and occasionally the slapstick stuff. The other day I brought home a Bruce Li movie (not to be mistaken with Bruce Lee, which I mistook it for) and the kids watched in stunned silence to the voice over and slap sticks not quite believing what we were subjecting ourselves to. Himself just laughed at the ridiculousness of how serious the actors were trying to be. That is his kind of humor, and I appreciate it. I appreciate Any kind of humor. Well, almost any kind of humor. Not the blasphemous or disgusting kind. I don’t really appreciate potty humor either, but with a household of teens what can I do?

I also tend towards the “giving voice to animals” type of humor, because I have a glorious mix of humorous and expressive faced animals. I have a pouty faced boxer who just doesn’t understand why the cats get to go in and out whenever they want. She wants to play with anyone anytime and doesn’t know which is better, snacks or people. A sad faced Labrador mix with the drool of a mastiff, who does anything for a belly rub, or people food. A “developmentally disabled” calico cat who can’t win a fight with a stalk of grass, but brings home a breakfast offering every day. She’s ugly and loud and forgets half of everything she ever experiences, it took her till late July to remember that mice are fun to catch, which explained the extreme lack of rodential gifts till late July. A very passionate black cat who is definitely a descendant of a Siamese. She gets so desperate for someone to touch her that she snuggles up to the lab for a bath, eeeewww! A gray lump who allows any child to do what they want with him, even dressing him up and carrying him upside down. And a new long hair with an eye infection that loves discomfort… play with him like he’s a dog, let him sleep on rocks and concrete and he is happy. It seems some days like they are all trying to tell me something, and so I give voice to their angst. Which is one of the things that Himself finds the most amusing . “How can you be so sure that is what they feel?” he laughs. And I say , “Just look at their faces.” and he laughs some more….

kid clothes

Sitting here thinking of the injustice, or just foolishness of buying kids a brand new wardrobe in late August of every year. All my kids grow at least 4-6 inches between August and December of every year. So I spend a ton of cash to buy them the obligatory school clothes, like my mom did for me, and her parents did for her… and then I have to do it all over again in December because all of those hardly worn clothes don’t fit anymore by Christmas. Go figure. Of course I really don’t have room to complain. Some people are actually spending hard earned cash on NEW clothes!!! I go to the Village Discount Outlet where I can buy gently (and sometimes not so gently) used clothes for pennies on the dollar. This year I did an outrageous thing though… I spent $170 on clothes for 4 teens. I felt so guilty for spending that much that I almost got sick. But we bought the best stuff they had there. All the stuff that LOOKED brand new, and those shirts with cool sayings . Then I realized that most of our nation buys brand new stuff for their children, and for themselves, and most of those people are lucky if they get away with $200 per kid. And then I realized another thing, my kids are learning that used isn’t bad. Of course I bought them New under things (I have a prejudice against used under things, as well as a fear of the creeping crud you can get from used under things). But when I showed them the bag of New under things from K-Mart at almost $70, and the 5 bags (that are 3 times the size of the K-mart bags) for $100. They were like “whoa, how can that be right???” and they shook their heads in amazement. Four packs of underwear and 4 bra’s is equal to 8 pairs of jeans and about 30 shirts and 20 pairs of socks. Go figure. So I figure, in the long run I am teaching them a little something about value. Really perception too… because the whole NEW clothes for school thing is more about how you feel about yourself than about where you bought the clothes. Some kids are taught to feel better about themselves with certain brand names etc. My kids know that how you feel about yourself has more to do with your relationship with Jesus than about Tommy Hilfigger or Joe Boxer. And so we have fun shopping and finding the best deal. I think I am going to make that a game here soon. We will all pile into the car and head for Village Discount Outlet and I’ll give them $10 each and say who ever gets the most good quality stuff for the least amount of money wins and gets to keep the change! Of course that would entail me getting a job… hope hope hope…