Work is going forward on our House, hopefully we’ll be out of Hotel of the Burning Prairie by Halloween. It’s not bad, really, just a little cramped for two active kids; and the fold-out bed I’m sleeping on is killing my back.

Pumpkin is about the only one of us who seems unaffected by our situation, probably because of her age. And her generally role-with-the-punches temperament, which she developed as a result of being Monkey’s little sister. My patience is cut short and frayed at the ends. Work feels like a rest at this point. Hubby’s, shall we say, “artistic” temperament is more pronounced. (And people say women are moody!). At one point, he looked at me and told me he felt stressed and didn’t know why. I looked at him, mouth open in disbelief, and said, “Hello! You were in a House fire, with the babies!” And he said, “Oh, yeah.” Like it snuck up on him, unawares.

I wasn’t there during the fire itself, so I can deal with this at a remove. But I told Hubby he needs to start processing this or he’s going to suffer from PTSD. He was in a House fire, with the babies! I told him that he’s my hero for keeping my babies safe, but he still has a lot of stuff with which to deal.

Monkey is still processing all of this and he probably will be until well after we move back into our House. He thrives on routine and doesn’t care for change, so he’s acting out more than usual. He cried twice this week when I dropped him off at school, something he usually doesn’t do. But our situation is anything but usual.

There was a substitute on his first day of school after the fire, but his regular teacher was back the next day. She said that he told her all about the fire, “in great detail.” When Monkey and Pumpkin play, I hear a lot of pretend involving fires. I know that this is part of his way of dealing with what happened, and all the changes that have resulted, so I just listen but don’t intervene. Part of his way of dealing involves art. Monkey is just as creative and talented as his father, and just as temperamental.

He tells us he wants to be an architect when he grows up; he wants to design and build cities. The walls of our room are now sporting what Monkey calls his “art museum.” He has been prolific, drawing and constructing submarines, safety signs, volcanoes with cave men, and many, many houses. I told Hubby that I think Monkey’s drawing so many houses because he’s not in his own right now. He misses our silly, old, ghost-lousy House of the Burning Prairie.

And so do I.

Ok, let’s see if I can get some hot comment action here. Please share with the whole class just how you happened upon my humble blog. And for everyone’s amusement, edification, whatever, here is the list of phrases that brought people to my doorstep so far this month:
molly ringwald movie when she has magic powers     burning prairie      house     bakugon stuff animals     tom and jerry kids room     burning house epic fail!     long skirts women shackles ankles     my family     parents review bakugon     benefits of burning prairie     a woman crying in front of her burning house   angel choir comic     small prairie houses     men s underpants     poop in her pants     what happens to you when you swing backwards on the chair     i m pregnant and broke a compact fluorescent light bulb     what would a man dress like in the 16th-17th century     remain in light blog     where does chocolate come from     are minature pumpkins poisonous     did men wear under pants in the old testaments     burning in left hip infertile     panties that do not ride up my butt     age 40 frump transformed     ni hao kai lan lunch box     bakugon.     granny naked     bixby ok cults     current movie with house burning in scenes in kitchen den and bedroom     sexy girl with flour     womens fashions of the civil war era  Nothing too outlandish, but I am now apparently a go-to source for information on children’s programming and underpants.       

Everyone is OK, that’s the most important thing. 

Training is all done and I started my brand-spanking-new official schedule this week. Which means I work Monday, Tuesday, Friday and Saturday nights. Hubby flies solo while I am at work, and he does a great job. And it is a good thing he was on duty Saturday evening, I probably wouldn’t have handled things as well.

My cell phone started ringing off the hook about an hour and a half into my shift. (I keep it on vibrate because I use it as a clock, watches get in the way of the typing.) I had to use the ladies’ room anyway so I decided to check and see where the fire was, turns out it was at my House. I heard a frantic voice mail from Hubby telling me to “come home right now! The House is on FIRE!!!!” I turned right around without making my much-needed pit stop (this is important later), ran to my supervisor’s desk, told her I had to leave and why, took the time to shut off my computer, and ran out. 

On my way home, Hubby called again and told me they were out and safe. Then he told me I had to at least pretend to be calm, for the babies’ sake. I resolved to be calm, and my resolve lasted until I saw a half-dozen or so fire engines in front of the House. I parked in the neighbor’s driveway and ran through our yard until I got to our driveway, whereupon I was physically restrained by a giant firefighter lady. I couldn’t see my family, but she told me (yelled at me) that everyone was out of the House. Then the Guy in The Big Red Hat, who was talking to Hubby, came and got me and took me to them.

Our across-the-street neighbors brought out chairs and a blanket for Monkey (who sheds his pants the moment he walks in the door, a practice that is now at its end, by the way) and Hubby, Monkey and Pumpkin were watching the spectacle nestled safely among the Halloween lawn ornaments. I have to admit that while I find the giant bat and fake severed body parts hanging from their tree to be adorable, I was quite startled to find my family right next to an un-dead skeleton creature rising from the earth. Gave me a bit of a start.

Hubby told me that the damage was confined to the garage, but that the whole House was filled with smoke. Some kind of short happened between the circuit breakers and the electric meter, causing the whole mess to blow up and catch fire. Hubby smelled smoke and grabbed a fire extinguisher, thinking he could fix the problem. He decided to leave it to the professionals once he got a good look at the flames shooting up the back of our House. So he grabbed the babies, his phone and called 911, his shoes and ran out the door. He could already hear the sirens when he stepped outside. And by the time he got across the street and had the time to put his shoes on, the fire engines were pulling up in front of the House. That’s when he called me.

By the time I arrived, the fire was mostly put out, but smoke and seemingly endless numbers of firefighters were still pouring out of our darkened garage. After praising Monkey for being such a brave big boy, and comforting Pumpkin who trembled in my arms, I took them over to Nana’s house. The kids happily dumped out toys and Nana’s jewelry box while I called the insurance company. After I finished talking to the adjuster, I realized that I still hadn’t used the ladies’ room and was in a bit of discomfort. One emergency had yielded to another.

In the meantime, the firefighters had cleared the House. The dark, smoky House. The physical damage may be confined to the garage, but the whole House was filled with smoke and even after days of airing out still smells like the inside of a Weber Grill.  And since our circuit box is a charred ruin, we have no power. A long time ago, before we had babies, Hubby and I may have roughed it, playing gin rummy by lantern-light and keeping our Dr. Pepper in an ice chest. But alas, we have babies. Babies that I cannot ask to give up Dora The Explorer or climate control or cold chocolate milk. And the House is truly uninhabitable. We spent most of the day mucking out the garage and bagging up stuff that didn’t survive the fire, the smoke, or the fire hoses. 

So, our insurance is paying for all of us to stay in one of those hotels for extended stays. It has a queen-size bed in an alcove, a dreadfully uncomfortable pull-out couch, a big closet (bigger than mine at the House), a desk, a tiny bathroom, and a one-butt kitchen with all the comforts of home, just not as big. Here we stay, hopefully for a month or less, while the House gets fixed up.

We meet with the adjuster in the morning. I’ll let you know how it goes.  

As all of you know, I am a mom of two beautiful and frustrating children. Sometimes they drive me nuts (and it’s a short drive), sometimes they make me laugh, and all of the time they make me ache with how much I love them. I’m not perfect, I’ve never claimed to be, in fact I am a deeply flawed individual who’s just trying to do my best by this family. Not every parenting decision will be perfect or even all that good, no one can hit it out of the park every day. I’ve tried to learn from the mistakes my own parents made (so I can make all new mistakes!) and just hope that the kids don’t have to get therapy.

One thing I have learned is that if a child is being violent, destructive, or dangerously reckless, you stop them. Immediately. When a child hits or bites or physically lashes out in other ways, you intervene. You don’t wait to see if the other child is going to get upset or fight back; you don’t wait to see if the situation will work itself out. Children love to make messes and that’s OK, as long as there is no actual damage done. When making a mess devolves into damaging and destroying their own or others’ belongings, you stop it. You don’t wait to see just how bad the damage will get. Once a child sinks into destructo-mode, you don’t wait to see if he or she will calm down and clean up his or her own mess. When you see a child, any child, preparing to do something reckless, stupid, dangerous, something that permanently damage them physically, you stop them. You stop kids from running into the street, you stop them from throwing themselves off the top of the jungle gym, you lock up your cleaning products so they don’t get into them. Much of parenting is stopping children from doing the things that they don’t know are dangerous.

The Republican party is a big, violent, destructive, and reckless child, and it’s way past time to stop them. The entirety of the GOP needs a time-out. In 2000, the current administration claimed to be all about restoring dignity to the White House. Instead we have had eight years of the worst behaviors childhood has to offer: selfishness, greed, fear, bullying, lack of empathy, the inability to understand consequences, detachment from reality, meanness, hatred, pettiness, poor impulse control. The GOP runs with scissors and does NOT play well with others.

In 2004, in the midst of a war of choice, I heard many people say that George Bush the lesser should be re-elected so he could clean up his own mess. But the thing about it was, Bush wasn’t (and isn’t) just throwing his toys on the floor and spilling his grape juice on the couch. Bush was (and is) hurting other people and tearing up other people’s stuff. And his complete lack of judgment, utter recklessness, and ignorance of consequences has led his party, and the rest of the country, into many kinds of trouble.

The grown-ups in this country should’ve put this over-grown toddler into time-out four years ago, but we made some poor parenting decisions.

There is a ridiculous school of parenting-thought that advocates down-playing negative behaviors and praising positive behaviors. This is about using positive reinforcement only. Maybe it works on perfect children, but it sure doesn’t work on mine. You can’t just go around hoping to catch your kid doing something good so you can over-praise him. Oh! Little Johnny finished his lunch! “Thank you so much for finishing your lunch, Little Johnny, what a good boy, what a perfect boy!” Oops Little Johnny just ripped the arm off his sister’s doll, better to just ignore it, wouldn’t want to emphasis those bad behaviors.

I think that every half-way decent parent knows that you praise your children for the good stuff and deal out the consequences for the bad stuff. There’s a scene out of Mr. Hobbs Takes A Vacation that illustrates this beautifully. One of Mr. Hobbs’ daughter gets mad at him for stopping his grandchildren from doing something destructive. She haughtily tells him, “We don’t believe in saying “no” to the children. According to all modern psychologists, saying “no” leads to neuroses.” Mr Hobbs responds with, “It can also lead to bankruptcy, too, if he breaks enough stuff!”

Nobody has ever said “NO!” to Bush and he’s finally broken enough stuff in this country to lead to bankruptcy, not to mention what he’s done to the rest of the world. And his leadership has induced his party to jettison any pretense of real conservatism in exchange for greed-mongering, fear-mongering, war-mongering.

When my son hits his sister, he loses privileges and has to go to his room and stay there until he can act like a civilized human being. It is time to take away the GOP’s privileges and send them packing to their rooms until they can act like civilized human beings. You know, human beings that actually care about others. No longer can we adults, we parents of this country we are raising up, refuse our duty of discipline. It is high time that the GOP learn that there are consequences for their actions. And they are lucky we parents have become more enlightened.

Fifty years ago, they could’ve expected a peach switch out behind the woodshed; today they can expect an extended time-out (maybe eight years to pay for the last eight) and to not get to play with their video games. Let’s get busy here, parents, elect the grown-ups to the White House, the Governor’s Mansions, the state and federal legislative branches and give the GOP a little time, space, and perspective to do their own growing-up.

Warning: Poop alert!

The phrase, “Don’t eat crayons!” sounds pretty straightforward, don’t you think? But apparently to my 3-year old it translates into “Go ahead, eat all the crayons you want!”

As if the fact of crayon-eating weren’t bad enough, I find little damp piles of masticated crayon in odd places, usually with my bare feet. Ew. But obviously she gets enough of the crayons ingested to make her poop colorfully speckled.

The worst part–they aren’t even her crayons, her pitiful victims belong to her brother. Poor little guy, reduced to coloring with ball-point pens and highlighters because his sister eats all his crayons! And this is no case of entrapment, I confiscate all crayons when I find them. I think she has a secret crayon-stash around here somewhere.
So, when I find my little crayon-bandit, evidence on her face, I tell her, “Don’t eat crayons!” I tell her over and over again as if it will make a difference. And every time she looks up at me, so solemn, so resolute, and says, “Ok, Mama.”

I swear this doesn’t happen to anyone else.