Ask and you shall not receive.

"Mama, what do you want for Christmas?"  This is what I was asked first thing this morning.

I did not have to answer, I just gave him a look. His response to my look "No, the answer is just No, you are not getting a one way trip for one to Hawaii!"

Bah Humbug!!!

Really?

One day last week Zack and I had to make a quick run to the grocery store. We did the whole fast walking through the store so we could get out and get home before the rain came.

As we pulled into our driveway the sky opened up and started pouring down so instead of getting out and making a run for the house we decided to sit in the car and wait it out for a few minutes, after all we usually get some really good conversations in when we do this.

A couple minutes later the rain was slowing up to a drizzle when I noticed Kris had just pulled up in front of the house. I told Zack to sit still and we would see if he noticed us sitting in the van as he was walking by. Not much of surprise to me, he walked right past us, oblivious to the fact that we were staring at him watching his every move. We watched as he gathered up his stuff from the car, we watched as he got out and walked right by us, we watched as he unlocked the door to the house and walked in. I told Zack to give it a minute and he would realize we were not in there and probably start looking all over the house for us.

Sure enough a couple minutes later Kris opened the front door, walked out onto the porch and was looking all around with a confused look on his face. Zack and I were still sitting in the van not more than 10 feet from him and he still did not notice us even though he looked in the direction of the van. At that point Zack and I both started giggling. It was then that he heard us laughing and looked into the van and just shook his head. It was at this point that Zack and I both broke into a full on laughing fit.

I wonder if he will learn to be a bit more observant now?

Where is my medal?

Let me just start this post by saying I deserve an medal of some kind.

Now as I tell you this you will understand why a medal is in order. You see I was able to restrain myself the other day. I somehow dug down deep and found the inner strength not to commit a crime, a serious crime. A crime that could have sent me to the big house for many many years.

I was minding my own business sitting on the stairs the other day just waiting patiently for the kids to show up so we could get started on our way to the bus stop (I walk several kids to the bus stop each morning so we meet at my house). While I was waiting my phone made that lovely little notification sound warning me that it was my turn on the game Words with Friends. So I picked it up to take my turn. My dear darling son decided to go upstairs at that very moment. As he was passing by, he made a comment to me that he should have never let escape his mouth.

"Mom, when I am at school do you do anything except play that game?"

Yes, that is what came out of his mouth. No, I could not respond immediately. I looked at him and after what seemed like an hour I responded with "Nope, I sit here all day playing games and it is magic that the dirty clothes walk themselves to the washer and wash themselves so you have clean clothes to wear everyday. Food magically appears in our house and then it jumps in the oven all by itself to cook so you can eat everyday. The dishes they all jump in the sink and play and play all day until they wash themselves so you don't have to eat off dirty plates. The floors that get covered with dead grass and dirt from your constant in and out get swept by that magic broom sitting in the closet that you never open. The bills, well they just pay themselves so that big black box upstairs can magically come on. Do I need to say more?"

"Um sorry Mom I didn't know."

Really? Seriously? 

I swear I love that kid more than anything and that just may be the only thing that kept me from beating the living tar out of him!!
So there you have it, I let the kid live after that comment and for that I deserve a medal of some kind.

Not ready for school

Here it is the first week of August. It seems like we have not done a thing this whole summer and school is scheduled to start up in just a few short weeks. This is one year I will say I am not ready to send my little one back there. We haven't done everything that was on our original list of summer events. We haven't done enough fun things yet.

If my little one were not so hard headed and stubborn I would consider home schooling but anyone who knows him knows he is on a track to being the president of the debate team and I just do not have the patience for it all day every day.

 Anyone know how to slow time down a little bit until I/we have gotten all our summer fun done?

Zack the chef

Zack is becoming the big kitchen helper. He is always wanting to make his own meals and making meals for anyone else. Granted his meals consist of cereal, sandwiches and chips, you get the picture. Well on Sunday morning (fathers day) he wanted to make pancakes for Kris. Normally pancakes are made from scratch in my house but if I am eating them I use a gluten free mix. I wanted some so the mix it was. Zack read the directions and started to pour everything in a bowl and tried to mix. It was obvious there was a problem. He reread the directions and still did not catch his mistake so I had to step in. Instead of 1 cup of mix he put in 1 bag. Lets just say he was on his way to making bricks instead of fluffy pancakes. Once I fixed the batter he took over again. The pancakes turned out well and we feasted. He was pretty proud of himself for making such a good meal.

I am beginning to think by the end of summer I will have this kiddo trained to make dinner and I will just sit back and watch.

Schools out.

Friday the 7th was Zacks last day of school. It is hard, very hard to believe he is moving on to the second grade next year. Just where has the time gone?

He received the Principals award for academics, the good character award, and perfect attendance for the last quarter at the awards ceremony that morning.  His teacher also made up a special award for each member of the class. What award did Zack get? Anyone who knows my child knows how spot on his teacher is. She gave him the most likely to become a 'Video Game Developer' award. Out of all the awards this one was his favorite!

When I looked at his report card I was very pleased to say the least, he is such a smart kid and I for one am a very proud mom!

Weekend at Patriots Point

Exploring an airplane on board the U.S.S. Yorktown

 

We took a little trip this past weekend down to Mt. Pleasant SC. We spent the weekend with the scouts aboard an aircraft carrier the  U.S.S. Yorktown.

 Boys quarters (4 bunks high) from what I hear there was 112 bunks in one room.

Girls quarters (I do believe mine was a little more roomy) there was only 6 bunks in our room.

 Exploring the ship before breakfast

 During the Aviation class

 During the oceanography class

 Trying to cool down on a hot and humid day.

 The destroyer the boys explored.

 Having a little bit of fun playing.

 

 The submarine, the men who stayed in the submarine had to be mentally strong. After walking through this I knew there was no way I could ever spend more than a few minutes in one of these. Talk about a tight space.

 A rocket on the grounds.

The ship we stayed on but really I think I boarded the wrong one, (see below)

Now this is the ship I should have been on!

We had a great time on board exploring, learning, and playing.

Land of Zack

Some cool things have been happening in the land of Zack.

Yesterday was Scout Sunday which means some of the scouts in his Pack attend the church services of the church that allows us use of their facilities. Well Zack had a speaking roll in the services and much to my amazement he did exactly what he was supposed to do and did it very well. Proud of my little man.

Tonight we went to a local a.m. radio station for a tour with the scouts and he was asking questions, was amazed by some of the things the equipment could do and got to speak on air very briefly with the other scouts. He had a blast doing that. One the way home we turned that station on the radio and he about jumped out of the seat when he recognized the dj's voice.

Today was also report card day, he brought home an awesome report card! For that he was rewarded with a trip to his favorite frozen yogurt place.

Next month is the spring concert at school and his grade is performing that night. The music teacher sent home a paper asking if anyone wanted to be considered for certain rolls that would be included in the concert, Zackary asked if he could be one of the few to have a special roll but he did request to have a none speaking part, well he was told today he did get a roll. He was pretty excited about that. So I can not wait to see that!

I am pretty darn proud of my little man, he was once a shy hide behind mommy kid and would not talk to anyone he did not already know. Now he is making a name for himself and becoming more and more confident in the things he does. Love him.

The ketchup tragedy

This morning Zack ran into my room upset. He was eating breakfast an ran out of ketchup. Anyone who knows my child knows he can not eat without having ketchup. It is a world ending tragedy to run out of ketchup. I am quite surprised the earth did not just crumble at that very moment. It is amazing that he was able to function and still speak, I thought for sure he would shrivel up into a ball or start twitching from withdrawls!

He insisted we go to the grocery store and get more. I told him next time I go to the store we would get some and it was at that point that he started telling me that we needed milk and bread too. I figured we had a good learning experience here so I told him he needed to go get a piece of paper and make a grocery list. Then we would go to the store. SHH don't tell but I was just being lazy and did not want to do it.

A few minutes later he came into the room with a list.
milk
ketchup
bread
c syrup (chocolate syrup)
L meat (lunch meat)
cake
ice cream
cheese
w cream (whipped cream)
s syrup (strawberry syrup)
and lots of candy.

After I finished laughing we had a discussion about wants and needs and things we were really going to buy.

When we did get to the store, it was his job to make sure we got 'the essentials' off his list and anything else that I added to it.  Needless to say we forgot the lunch meat but did remember the ketchup. I put one bottle in the cart but he was insistent on buying two bottles. "Mom we have to buy two so we do not run out again". Yes he goes through more than a bottle a week and normally when it is on sale I stock up but somehow I missed paying attention to the stock.

Even though this turned into an learning experience I am still thinking of contacting the ketchup companies and asking if I could just buy a 55 gallon drum! Then maybe just maybe I would be able to go a month maybe two without buying any.

Do it with feeling.

Even though Zack reads every day once in a while he will ask Kris or I to read to him before bed. So tonight he ran to get a Pokemon graphic novel and asked Kris to read it. He knows I do not get into comic books and do not like reading them so he figured he would sucker Kris into it.

Kris starts reading and gets several pages into the book. Zack interrupts him mid sentence and says "Dad could you read with feeling?" I could not help it, I started laughing. Kris tried to say that he was reading with feeling but Zack pretty much let him know he was not.

I just thought it was hilarious and would never have expected him to ask such a thing.

Reverse Psychology

I am in some very serious trouble with this kid of mine. By that I mean all my parenting skills are going to have to change because he is just to stinking smart!

Last weekend Zack was playing outside with some of the neighborhood kids, then when all but one went home Zack asked if they could come in and play video games. I agreed and let him know it was only for a while because it was getting late.

They were playing for a bit and then I heard C say he did not want to play video games anymore but wanted to watch TV. They argued a bit over it and then Zack gave in and they turned on the TV. C wanted to watch something that Zack deems "a girl show" and they argued over that. At that point I said it was time for C to go home.

Once we walked C home and came back, Zack was getting ready for his shower and we had a talk about compromising with friends and most especially compromising with guests we have in our home. I asked him if he understood compromising and he gave me an example so I knows he gets it. THEN he said something I never expected. Nope not in a million years did I ever expect my 6 year old to look me in the eye and say "But Mom I could have used reverse psychology on him." After staring at him in shock for what seemed like forever, I asked him if he knew what reverse psychology was. At first he said "no, not really" then he responded with "OK Mom, really I do know what it means BUT it is a little bit mean." I needed to get his version in order to know what I was up against so I asked him to explain it to me. Darn if he wasn't spot on!! He proceeded to tell me how you tell someone one thing when you want them to do something else. Aww Crud, I knew in that moment my parenting skills needed to change, this kid was on to me and I was done for!

He then gave me an example just to make sure I understood what he was saying. "Well Mom, it is like this... if I want to play video games and C doesn't want to, then I can say 'okay if your not brave enough to play this then we can do something else' and then he will want to play."

I know I wanted a smart kid but gee at 6 years old I would never have thought he would grasp the concept of things like this.

Letter to Mother Nature

January 18, 2013

Dear Mother Nature;

You do not have children, Do you? I think not because you really dropped the ball!

How can you allow your little minions (also known as weather men/women) to continuously appear on television taunting these little creatures (also known as children) with grand illusions of inches upon inches of fluffy white stuff. Fluffy cold white stuff that is perfect for throwing at other people and not getting grounded for doing so. Fluffy cold white stuff that is slick enough for these little creatures to slide down mountain sides on a piece of plastic and have their out of shape parents drag their not so tiny little arses back up said mountain side. Fluffy cold white stuff that can be shaped into almost anything, no need to stick with building a frosty that wont talk to you like he does in the cartoon.

Your little minions made my little creature believe that when he was forced to go to bed at the normal bedtime that he would wake up to all the fluffy cold white stuff that he could ever possibly want to play in. Little creature was lead to believe that when he woke up everything in sight would be covered and he would be able to stay outside playing in this fluffy cold white stuff for hours upon hours and not coming in until the nasal drip that appears when one little creature gets so cold has permanently frozen to his face and must be chiseled off!

Seriously Mother Nature how could you allow the heavens to open up and drop nearly 3 inches of snow in our yard in just a few hours with more still coming when I went to bed, only to turn around and melt most of it and turn the rest into ice before the little creature had awoken this morning?  Do you not have a heart? Do you understand the situation this puts me in? Are you trying to punish me for something I may or may not have done? Work with me here lady... I beg you to work with me on this one!

From,
the little creatures mother