It is midnight central time; I started this entry over an hour and a half ago. About the time I clicked “Write Post,” Rob came walking through the kitchen with an odd look on his face. Odder than his usual look. Almost a freaked-out look.I asked him what was wrong and he said that Emma was sitting midway up the staircase giggling and saying “I want to play.” NOT typical bedtime behavior for her. Especially since she had been asleep since 8 p.m. It was obvious [to me] that she was walking and talking in her sleep.

For the record, Rob does not handle sleepwalkers and/or sleeptalkers very well. When Jenna was younger, she would occasionally show up at the foot of our bed babbling utter nonsense and insisting she was not asleep. It’s been quite awhile since we’ve had one of her visits (probably three or four years) so I forgot how spooked Rob was when it happened.

I guess the sight of our sweet-faced-four-year-old-little-baby-girl cackling like a madwoman on the stairs could conjure up images of Gage in Pet Sematary. Think “Hi Daddy. I played with Mommy. Now I want to play with you,” scalpel in hand. Pretty sure that’s where he came up with this phobia. My main concern was that Emma might fall down the rest of the stairs in her sleepy stupor.

Moving on. We put Emma back to bed and–big surprise coming in 3 . . . 2 . . . 1 . . . –the ruckus woke Katelynn up. We knew she was awake when she said, “Want dink.” Emma chimed in next, “I want a drink too.” Crap.

I picked Katelynn up out of her crib while Rob went back downstairs and retrieved the girls’ sippy cups of water. Guess it tasted pretty good because they both gulped it down. I headed back downstairs to write some more. Rob re-tucked Emma, re-rocked and re-tucked Katelynn, then headed down too.

Not five minutes later, Katelynn began fussing and crying out for us. We let her whine for five or ten minutes until she proved that she was only going to get wound up if we waited any longer to respond. Rob went up and came back down almost immediately, two-year-old in tow. She had huge tears in her eyes and her cheeks and nose were red, but when she saw me she smiled and said, “That your ‘puter, Mommy?” Big. faker.

I let her sit on my lap and watch me type for a few minutes. She was very quiet until a thought occurred to her. Eat. She asked for a bowl of cereal. Nuh. uh. I offered her a few animal crackers instead and she accepted. After washing them down with more water, she stealthily toddled over to the TV and turned it on. Ohhhhellllnoooo. It was at this point that Rob scooped her up, brought her to me for a kiss, proceeded up the stairs (again) and re-tucked her for the second and final time. Say goodnight Gracie.

When all was said and done, my train of thought was completely shot. I’ll save my original topic for another post.

It is 12:55 a.m. central time. I’m going to bed now. Emma’s bladder will be waking her up in a few short hours. The noise will disturb Katelynn from her slumber. Lather, rinse, repeat.

As the month of July wound down last year, Katelynn’s first birthday was quickly approaching. Rob and I had several discussions about what to give her as a gift.

It’s been my experience that one-year-olds aren’t that much fun to shop for, so I wasn’t much help in the creative-giftgiving department. Rob wasn’t much better.

Katelynn wasn’t really old enough to enjoy watching DVD’s. Short attention span and all that. And, she had lots of baby-type toys but wasn’t quite ready for the toddler toys. Plus, Emma had turned one just two years earlier and we still had nearly all her toys and books. In awesome shape. Like we probably could have wrapped up three or four of those to give to Katelynn and no one would have been the wiser. Especially Katelynn. Everyone always bought Emma way too many toys.

Spoiled rotten to the core, that one.

So, we were pretty perplexed about what to get her. Well, Rob was perplexed. Katelynn is only his second baby, but she’s my fourth, so I’m pretty numb to quandaries of this type. But anyway, we gave it some thought.

A few days before the party, I finally came up with a brilliant idea. A KITTEN! Genius, yes? I mean we already had two dogs, why not add a cat to the insanity family? Rob agreed. Which was never a question. He’s a sucker for animals. He said we should go by the city animal shelter and pick out a kitten. I think we threw on our shoes and left right then. We were stoked.

At the shelter, there must have been a hundred cats up for adoption. Every color, shape, and size. We walked from kennel to kennel checking out the kittens and narrowing our choices. We used a very scientific method called This One’s Cuter Than That One.

More of that MENSA magic at work.

Finally, we were down to just two kittens to decide between. One was a fuzzy white female that was barely old enough to be adopted. She was about the size of a hamster. The other was a male gray tabby that was four months old. He was bigger than a hamster.

The white one did little else but mew and mew while we held her. Very whiny. The tabby walked back and forth in his kennel, rubbing his side against the door and every time I approached him, he reached his paw toward me and tried to touch my arm. He also let me scratch him under the chin and purred like an motor.

Rob was holding the white one and looked like he was in love. He said, “Well, which one is it gonna be.” I said “That one,” and pointed to the tabby. Just to crush his spirit. Only kidding. Seriously, we did NOT need a kitten that was one misstep away from being the next mess on the carpet. Besides, three whiny females in the house is more than enough. That’s not counting the dogs. Or me. I never whine. Shut up.

So, we took the tabby home. Emma wanted to name him Jojo. [I have got to cut off that kid's Disney channel.] We said “Uhhh, no.” So, she came up with Pete. I don’t think she has ever come into contact with anyone in her whole life named Pete. My dead grandfather’s name was Pete but he died in 1977, when I was six, so we don’t talk about him and I don’t think we’ve ever told her his name. Spooky.

I can’t believe it’s been a year now since we brought Pete home. He is the most affectionate and human-oriented cat I’ve been around. Has been since day one. My cat-loving relatives try to take him home every time they’re over. You know who you are.
Stop it.

These days, Katelynn mostly chases him and pulls his ears. Which he patiently endures most of the time.

Emma is his true love. I frequently find him curled up in her lap asleep. He runs to greet her when she comes home from school. And, he comforts her when she cries. Which is a LOT.

Like I said — rotten to the core.

He can hear her crying from anywhere in the house. (We all can. She cries VERY LOUD.) He goes running to her and jumps up in her lap, pressing his nose against her cheek which always makes her laugh.

I think she is more his than he is hers.

And poor Katelynn got screwed out of a birthday present.

School started last Wednesday for 75% of my kids. That’s three out of four for those of you keeping count. Jake (my oldest and only male offspring) moves to The 8th Grade Center, Jenna starts middle school at The 6th & 7th Grade Center, and Emma, starting Pre-K, goes to school for the first-time-in-her-life. Even if it is for only a half day which isn’t really HALF the day per se since she’s actually only out of my hair the house for 2.4 hours.

Not that I did the math.
Six weeks ago.

Emma is in the afternoon Pre-K class with all the other children whose parents are still in their pajamas working on their first Mocha Frappe when the morning class starts.

I don’t mean me, of course.

That time of day I’m still in bed asleep.

So that day, after Jake and Jenna were long gone on their respective buses, I dragged myself out of bed and quickly remembered that I needed to buy Emma some tennis shoes. By noon. See, none of the seven pairs of sandals and flip flops she wore this summer were going to work out on the playground because according to her teacher children who wear sandals to Pre-K spend their recess dumping woodchips out of them. I’m not sure if she meant out of necessity or as punishment and I wasn’t about to ask. Teachers intimidate me.

We went shopping and had the shoes taken care of in record time. But unfortunately, Emma bears the curse of having really fat feet so her new shoes were just a smidge too snug when worn with athletic socks, so I decided to run into Wal-Mart on the way home and buy her some Cuffed White Bobby Socks which are quite a bit thinner than athletic socks.

ON A SIDE NOTE: At this point I feel compelled to say that I don’t need any grief for admitting to being a Wal-Mart addict shopper because 1. Our Wal-Mart is less than a mile from our house whilst Our Target is FOUR miles away. and 2. Our Wal-Mart is a small store NOT a Supercenter. It’s quiet and clean and the cashiers and greeters are very friendly and besides I’m still working the steps of my program and also I’m looking for a sponsor so e-mail me if you’re interested. Although do hurry since I will be going Wal-Mart-free cold turkey as of October 15 when they are closing Ours due to the fact that they are building two (TWO!) new Supercenters to replace my small one, the closest being FIVE miles away. Which is the suckage because of the comparatively longish drive and the fact that I don’t do Supercenters.

Moving on.

I made a quick stop in, bought Emma’s socks, and we were home by 11:30. Aces! After I fed her lunch and gave her a spit bath I grabbed a pair of the new socks. As I placed one brand new Ultra Low-Cut Ankle Athletic Sock on her right foot I realized my error. No amount of cramming was getting that foot in that sock into that shoe. Crap. Back to Wal-Mart to make an exchange.

I found a decent parking space and entered Wal-Mart with the erroneous socks. As the pneumatic doors slid open I was greeted by . . . silence. No greeter on duty. I probably should have taken this as an omen of things to come, but instead I shrugged it off, figuring the scheduled greeter must have gotten sick or died and I don’t mean that in a bad way, our greeters are just really old.

I walked over to the Return-Exchange Desk and took my place in line behind a young mother and her two children. Who were in line behind three other returner-exchangers. With only one Return-Exchange Processing Cashier on duty. I’m not kidding. This. is. my. hell.

At first I was patient. I flipped through a fantasy football magazine (the only reading material in a twenty yard radius). I chewed a piece of gum. I checked the voicemail on my the cell phone and sent a text message to my husband to tell him what it’s like in hell. I gave the lone refund cashier the look. You know, the look that says “Are ya gunna call for some backup already?” She didn’t call for backup.

About this time, Young Mother’s two children started getting really bored. And really bratty. They started running circles around Young Mother and smacking each other until Little Girl was crying. Young Mother put them both in her shopping cart. They commenced whining and playing a variation of “Are We There Yet?” that shall be called “Is It Our Turn Next?”. To occupy them, Young Mother sang the ABCs twenty times off key, while I checked the sales flyer for specials on handguns.

Twenty long, miserable, eardrumbreaking, homicidal minutes later, it was Young Mother’s turn. She stepped to the counter and said hello to uberslowcluelesscashier who reached out to take Young Mother’s items for return. It was only then that I noticed what she had waited in line all that time to give back to Wal-Mart.

Three.
Pocket.
Folders.

Which at this time of the year are in huge supply at the Wal-Mart Everyday Low Price of — y’all ready for this? — TEN. CENTS. EACH.

Her refund jingled.

If only I had noticed sooner, I would have given her a dollar and let her keep the folders for her place in line. And some peace and quiet while I waited.

The end.

It has been an interesting day keeping my two youngest kids (both of them girls) occupied while I finished setting up my blog. Especially during the two hour period my husband was mowing the lawn. The girls were well past sitting still to watch a DVD, and they had already pretty much destroyed their room dragging out every toy within reach, so they went their separate ways to find alternate means of entertainment.

Alternate meaning forbidden.

Emma, the Four-Year-Old Formerly Known as The Escape Artist, disappeared upstairs. I convinced myself she was headed for her Polly Pockets and decided to give her a few minutes before investigating. She needs her alone time. Meanwhile in the family room, Katelynn made her way behind the chair where I was working on my laptop. The built-in back there has a cabinet where we keep a pretty healthy collection of board games. Emma had left the child-lock off the cabinet earlier in the day. Katelynn had noticed.

She gave away her location by dumping out 91 Mexican Train Double Twelve Dominoes. The crash woke the cat and he flew off the couch like his ninth life depended on it. I did not intervene at this point. I figured the STACK DOMINOES–KNOCK THEM DOWN–REPEAT game would buy me ten or fifteen more minutes of (noisy) computer time. Had I paused to glance two feet behind me, I would have realized that Katelynn had pushed past the dominoes and was checking out the contents of a few other games.

Apparently nothing was catching her fancy, because when I finally did turn around the domino pile had grown into a Clue-Boggle-Chutes and Ladders-Life-Payday-Travel Connect Four-Chinese Checkers-Wizard of Oz Trivia-Apples to Apples-Farkle-Monopoly-and-Mexican Train Double Twelve Dominoes pile. In less than five minutes.

It was at this point that I wondered to myself what all the silence was coming from Emma’s room. I didn’t have to wait for an answer since Emma came scooting down the stairs at that exact moment carrying three Barbies. Two naked, one headless.

I gasped and yelled “OH!NO!” and not because the Barbies were naked and headless but because the Barbie Rolling Travel Case where the naked headless Barbies live is stored in Emma’s closet on the top shelf. The very top shelf. Like the I-Need-My-Stepladder-to-Get-to-It top. And it didn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure out how she got to it. She used the chest of drawers in her closet as her step-ladder.

I asked her, but she denied it.

I’m still pretty sure I’m right.

I was just starting to hide the evidence clean up the mess when I heard another sickening sound which I immediately recognized as the lawn mower turning off. Crap. My husband, Rob, walked in the front door and jerked to a stop as he caught sight of Colonel Mustard. In the family room. With a shitload of Monopoly Money. And he proceeded to do the one thing that sends chills down my spine every time he does it.

Stood. and. stared.

Okay, that’s two things. Whatever.

Probably thirty seconds passed before he spoke:
ROB: “I’m just curious. Who’s in charge? You or the baby?”
ME: “The baby.”
ROB: “All right. As long as you’re okay with it.”

I am.

And anyway, the important thing is I got my blog set-up finished. Hope you enjoy reading it. Oh, but don’t tell my husband who got the Barbies down.

I’ll deny it.