Magoo went missing yesterday and I nearly lost it. Has this ever happened to you? Did you freeze? Panic? Or look for them with a singleness of purpose?

[More at Parenting.com]

No one knows why Wanda went all Mike Tyson on Dan while we stood on the sidelines watching Laylee play soccer tonight. Everyone knows we’re glad that she did it a second time so I could take this picture. I mean, “WHAT?!”

“What’s the difference between sage parental advice and annoying lectures? Honestly sometimes I’m not sure.”

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I could hear their bickering from upstairs and tried to ignore them. Soon it spilled out into the hall and shortly Laylee was at my side with her arms folded.

“Mom! Magoo’s being so mean to me.”

“Yeah?” I asked, with a bored tone to my voice.

“Mo-om. He’s being so mean, like really really mean,” she continued, visibly distressed.

“What did he do?”

“He was calling me ‘Laylee Middle Name Thompson’!”

NO! He dared to call you by your NAME!? Like your full NAME!? That I gave you!?

I’m trying to think of a punishment for that particular crime. I’ve got nothing. I could call him by his full name but that doesn’t escalate things at all and I’m all about escalation. Maybe I could also start referring to all of his body parts by their correct biological names, his fingers becoming phalanges, his jaw becoming a mandible. I don’t know though. It’s just so MEAN…this proper name-calling.

It seems that more and more everyone just calls everyone by first names, like we’re all chums, BFFs, equals. As much as I choke on the “Mrs. Thompson” moniker, I like what it stands for. It means I’m an adult with life experience and authority. It means I’m responsible to protect and care for the little ones in my life because I’m not a peer, I’m a mother. [read more at Parenting.com]

“Her happy dance consists of lying flat on her back with her dip-cone mohawk vibrating, her eyes bugging out of her head, her lips pursed, and her arms flapping at her side asynchronously like two uncoordinated metronomes beating different times atop your grandma’s piano.” [Read more at Parenting.com]

So there I was, writing a note to my alter-ego, excusing my daughter from the possibly harmful effects of my own parental choices. [read more at Parenting.com]

Today Dan went back to work but we all survived.

He left for work while I was still sleeping and I was sad that he didn’t say goodbye, but he called shortly after I woke up to tell me he loved me.

I got Laylee to school on time but forgot to put in her hearing aids and told her to buy lunch instead of me making it.

My baby cried a lot but when I do this:

Sometimes she does this:

The sun shone in Seattle so I took Magoo outside to play but we came back in too quickly because the baby was cold.

I made dinner for my dinner co-op but I had to ask Erin to bring me some ingredients that I’d forgotten so I wouldn’t have to wake up Wanda to go to the store.

I survived all day but I did need to call on Stephanie for help getting Laylee from the bus stop after my hip seized up and I had to lie on the couch for an hour with pain killers and a heating pad.

Laylee and Magoo were definitely in sugar withdrawals today but they never completely melted down and they even helped a ton with the wee bairn.

I voted in the election but I didn’t get my vote in until 15 minutes before the “polls” closed.

We now all use absentee ballots instead of “polls” in Washington State but there was still a sense of civic camaraderie as the hordes of procrastinators met at the library to stuff their envelopes into one of the few vote boxes scattered around the county.

It was a rough day and I couldn’t have made it through without the help of my friends and the encouragement of my family but as I drove home tonight with my music blasting and the stars shining I was happy with no buts.

I think I can do this.

I fluffed some stuffed animals and placed them in her crib just for the effect when she sees it for the first time. I know little babies are not supposed to sleep with a bunch stuff in their cribs until they’re much older and that they’re supposed to sleep on their backs and be bathed just enough but not too much and not eat solid foods or drink alcohol in their bottles for the first few weeks of life. As I was putting the freshly-ironed curtains up on the rod, I heard the kids start again.

[read more at Parenting.com]

Sometimes I wonder when they will get a clue. I already know the answer but I ask it hypothetically to the universe in general and to my husband specifically. “WHEN WILL THEY GET A CLUE?!”

The answer is – 20 years from now when they have kids of their own and suddenly realize that I wasn’t just nagging them for my own amusement but was trying to teach them to be responsible citizens and often because I actually needed their help.

Today was a day spent working, working and being in pain, working and being in pain and begging, sometimes yelling at my kids to help me just the tiniest bit. I wasn’t asking them to polish the silver or wax the floors or give me a mani-pedi while I watched soaps. I was feeling the shooting pains as my ligaments pulled and expanded, limping on hips and a pelvis that may not hold up much longer under this kind of pressure, gagging with a sudden resurgence of morning sickness and working my butt off to clean the house. I was asking them to pick up their ratchen fratchen toys that covered the entire main floor. I was repeating myself over and over until even I was sick of the sound of my own voice.

At some point in the afternoon I considered changing Magoo’s name to some glass-shattering word from the mermaid dialect, anything that would cause him to show the slightest sign that he could hear it as it was coming out of my mouth. He is completely deaf to the sound of my voice unless my voice is whispering sweet nothings about chocolate, gummy worms or time for game play on the Wii.

But if I’m calling him, even yelling from as little as 3 feet away, he bounces along playing and making strange little man noises, giving me no notice at all. It seems like the worse I feel, the worse the deafness gets.

Laylee, on the other hand was willing to work on and off with very little coaxing or threatening but seemed intent on bullying and tormenting Magoo as she went, causing him to bawl and collapse and then come running to me once he’d regained his strength. I took my frustration out on them and they took theirs out on each other. It was a lovely afternoon.

Then Dan came home exhausted from work and I complained and whined and tattled on them like a spoiled child. So he took them off to bed. Last I heard, someone was crying. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Dan and I’m pretty sure it was in response to something like the threat of no stories if they didn’t pick up the pace a bit.

It’s days like this that make me glad we can reset overnight and start fresh in the morning. And maybe I won’t wake up 4 times tonight. And maybe I’ll feel better in the morning. And maybe they’ll decide they like me and each other. And maybe I just remembered there’s a chocolate bar in my purse. And maybe I’m done blogging now.