denial: it ain't just a river in egypt

My county has two days devoted to Kindergarten registration. Guess who's going to hold off until that second day...in part because she couldn't get the paperwork together in time (seriously people, getting a mortgage involves less paper trail than this!) and in part because I just can't bring myself to admit that my first born (my sweet pea! my goose! my sweet baby girl!) is actually old enough to go to kindergarten?

I mean, wasn't it just yesterday that she looked like this?

Excuse me while I go sob uncontrollably into my coffee.

weekend o' fun

This weekend was a great one filled with lots of friends and fun.

On Friday evening, our friends from Philly arrived. We spent the evening catching up, eating pizza and watching some basketball. Then it was bedtime for the girls. The sleeping arrangements were to be as follows: Baby Kerri in with her parents, Bridget in A's crib, and A, E, Maura and Maggie together in E's room.

There were some logistical issues. First off, there were three inflatable beds and one sleeping bag so there was disagreement on who would get what. Then there was the issue of where everyone would go. No one wanted to sleep on the nice, comfy full sized bed in the middle of the room...and they wanted to sleep next to each other which was impossible to do. But eventually we did get it settled.

Next up was the issue of how late do we let them stay up and play. Obviously, we aren't totally killjoys...it was a slumber party. However, we couldn't let them stay up all night either. So, finally we had to crack some skulls, Maggie got taken to her parents room and eventually the girls did settle down to sleep.

The next day, John and Sean took the older girls to the Air and Space Museum while Autumn, Kerri and I hit the outlets. Then we met back up at home for some more basketball watching, playing and fun. The girls had some dinner and then settled in for the latest installment of the Little Mermaid. I think they were a little mesmerized.

 

 

Slumber Party #2 was a little less successful. While the girls wanted to stay up and play, they were pretty exhausted from all of the excitement of the previous 24 hours. After a while, Maura and Maggie headed into their parents room, and E headed back up to her comfortable bed. And A? Well, she had passed out on her inflatable bed despite the chaos ensuing around her.

The next morning, the girls got up and played a bit more. Here are E, A, Maura and Maggie saying goodbye in a gigantic group hug of cuteness.

 

Later that afternoon, E and A headed out to their friend Julia's birthday party. The girls had an absolute blast running around, though I have no idea where they got the energy because I was totally dragging. After dinner and a second round of cupcakes from the party for dessert, the girls headed off to bed earlier than usual.

And, quite honestly...so did their mommy.

no longer scared of mr. sucky

So this morning, E and I had our dental checkup and cleaning. Similar to the pediatrician, the dentist is apparently high on the list of awesome places to go, since A was devastated to learn that she would not get to come.

At some point during breakfast, E turned to me and said,

"Mama, I'm not afraid of Mr. Sucky anymore."

For a brief moment, I almost spit out my coffee...and then I remembered that the dental hygienist called the spit vacuum tool "Mr. Sucky." Let's hope she doesn't tell her teachers about her new love of Mr. Sucky because, well, that would be awkward.

Anyway, I was flipping through channels the other night and caught an episode of Jon and Kate Plus 8 where all the sextuplets go to the dentist. At one point Kate remarked how last time the dentist experience was totally different and she was amazed at how much older the kids were 6 months later, now that they were 4 1/2.

At the time, I kind of thought she was being overly dramatic. But after the appointment I have to say that I agree. They actually scheduled our appointments at the same time...so she went over to the chair by herself, got x-rays by herself and then even let them do a fluoride treatment. Last time, the x-rays were totally nixed and they didn't even attempt to get a fluoride treatment out of it. She really has gotten so much mature and independent since September, it's crazy!

As for our weekend plans, Queen Mommy and the Four Little Princesses are coming to visit us. The girls are super-excited to have a sleepover with Maura and Maggie. We're a little weary of how A's going to do...but if you try to suggest to A that she might be to little for a sleepover, she burst into tears.

I'm excited because I honestly can't remember the last time that Autumn and I hung out together where one of us wasn't pregnant. Which isn't that hard to comprehend seeing that Autumn has been pregnant for a full THREE YEARS since 2004. But, there will surely be some wine consumed and good conversation enjoyed over the weekend. I can't wait.

the multi-tasker

If you ask A to spell her name, her response will be as follows:

A-D-E-L-I-N-O-P

I love how it not only demonstrates her mad memorization spelling skills, but also her mastery of the alphabet.

against all odds

Today is picture day at school for the girls. I could have sworn that we just had picture day, but I guess that's the new thing at schools -- multiple picture days so you can have even more crappy pictures of your kids with bizarre backgrounds. Anyway, for this picture day they are specifically shooting the girls together. And since it's been over a year since I've braved a professional photography establishment, I figured I give it my best shot in getting a decent picture from this.

So, the girls today are wearing matching dresses, pink tights, their new Easter shoes (thanks, Grandmom! They'll look much better than their Crocs!) and barrettes in their hair. Luckily, I was in charge of drop-off this morning, so their hair looks slightly more presentable than when my better half drops them off (i.e., brushing is not optional on my watch). And I even had the girls practice smiling on the way to school.

But still, I'm not to hopeful that this is going to work out.

1. The top button on E's dress keeps popping open. So, if no one notices she could be sporting a deep V-neck dress a la JLo at the Grammies.
   
2. E also likes to reposition her hair clip. It's never a good thing when she does this.
   
3. Despite my best efforts to counteract it, both girls had massive cases of bed head this morning. So you never know what it's going to look like by the shoot.
   
4. You know how we practiced smiling in the car? We live 2 minutes from school. Perhaps it would have been helpful if we lived a bit further away...like Timbuktu.
   

I believe that there's an online ordering component to the school pictures...so if there is I'll let you know how it went. But I wouldn't get too excited or anything. I'm certainly not.

Of course, if my friend Steel Magnolia would ever get her heiny back to the area and take pictures of my kiddos (as I've been begging her to do), then this would be a moot point. What do you say, SM? A little road trip in your future?!?!?

sidetracked

After a lazy Sunday morning, the girls and I got dressed and headed out to Wegmans. Except that when we got outside it was absolutely gorgeous. So, we (temporarily) ditched the shopping trip for some fun playing outside. When it became time for lunch, we decided to have an impromptu picnic on the front yard.

 

 

 

Couple of things to note about these pictures:

• The girls were responsible for dressing themselves. I suspect that one, possibly both, of them is color blind.
  
• E is wearing snow boots with her outfit. She had taken off her sneakers to attempt rollerblading, band when faced with the prospect of untying and having me retie the laces...she went for the velcro boots instead.
  
• Why, yes, it is a Barbie blanket we are sitting on. It was a hand-me-down from a neighbor. And I was more than happy to devote it to full-time picnic use (rather than on top of E's bed, where it resided for much of the winter).
  
• Mini vegetarian corndogs are definitely a bizarre choice for a picnic lunch...but, hey, our kitchen was pretty bare (hence the plans to grocery shop). Also, I felt a little Martha Stewart-y by serving standing up in a paper cup with ketchup in the bottom. It was surprisingly un-messy!
  
• We did end up going grocery shopping later in the afternoon. And I discovered that bribing the kids with candy from the bulk foods aisle works really really well! Especially when you don't put them on the belt to paid until you have safely maneuvered the cart through the checkout without them grabbing all of the candy in a free-for-all.
  
• If you haven't figured it out yet, John was away this weekend. He had gone to Dayton to watch UT blow it in the first round of the NCAA tournament. We certainly missed him, as evidenced by the *four* Welcome Home, Daddy! signs the girls created while I cooked dinner.

a little morning roadtrip

So there was pretty much one thing on my To Do list on Friday.

Buy coffee.

I had used the last of our supply on Friday (and had to settle for a measly 8 cups instead of the full 10...but I dirgress). Of course, I totally forgot about my need for coffee until late Friday night when the girls were already in bed.

So on Saturday morning, once everyone got up, I told them that we were going on a wacky roadtrip. We put on our fleeces and whatever shoes were by the door and headed out in our jammies to the car. We drove the 10 miles to the Starbucks with a drive-through where we ordered a Venti coffee, a vanilla milk and a chocolate milk, two blueberry muffins and a pound of coffee (to ward off any other java emergencies on Sunday). All the while the girls giggled and laughed and sang along to the music.

When we got home, as they ate their muffins and drank their milks, they deemed our little trip a whole lotta fun. We might have to make it a little tradition of ours, whether we actually need to go or not.

Thanks, Kiki, for the Starbucks gift card. Or, thanks Kiki's students for giving her a gift card to a store that a non-coffee drinker would have a very hard time spending $50 at! Her over-caffeinated twin is very thankful for the re-gifting!

slow week

It's been a slow week in the Slacker house. I've mainly been working, catching up on my sleep and hanging out with the girls since I got home.

The hanging out with the girls part has been key. I'm not going to lie...E was very, very upset when she found out that I was going to California. Like burst-into-tears-at-the-very-mention-of-it upset. It kind of threw me for a loop, because even though I'm totally awesome, it's not like I never-ever leave her -- she goes to daycare school and I do travel without them (like a week in Ireland, for goodness sakes!). But, she had a great time last weekend with her daddy (and Grandmom and Granddad) and was no worse for wear.

But, since it's just me and the girls tonight, we are going to have another movie night (or moobie night, as A calls it). Actually, it's Movie Night -- Now With More Jammies! since we are changing into our jammies before dinner, eating pancakes for dinner and then watching a movie. I had mentioned the possibility of everyone sleeping in my room, slumber-number style earlier in the week...but I'm really hoping they forgot about that.

And speaking of sleeping arrangements, we had the following conversation this morning over breakfast, before my first pot cup of coffee.

E: Where does Baby AJ sleep?
Me: In a crib
E: Why does she sleep in a crib?
Me: Because she's a baby. Babies sleep in cribs.
E: A still sleeps in a crib. (Turns to A) Are you still a baby because you sleep in a crib?
A: I NOT A BABY! I NO SLEEP IN CRIB!

I'll be perusing the 'Net for some cute big girl bedding today, just to be safe.

home again, home again

What do you get when you mix equal parts sleep deprivation with jet lag?

ME!

I had a great weekend in San Jose meeting my new niece and helping out. She's a fantastic baby...and this taking care of a newborn is a lot more fun if you aren't a crazed lunatic due to hormones.

Here are a few pictures that New Daddy Steve took from the weekend.

do you know the way to san jose?

'Cause that's where I'm headed on Friday. To meet my niece, AJ! Yay!

AJ was born on 3/10/2009 at 2:17 AM. She weighed 7 lb 12 oz and was 20 inches long. It was a looooooooooooong, hard labor for Kiki, but everyone is doing great now. Isn't she beautiful?

I'm not going to lie, the sparse reddish hair threw me for a big loop. I assumed that AJ would look more like my own girls when they were born, which could easily be summed up as DARK and HAIRY.

I also secretly hoped that AJ would look like me, since E was a spitting image of Kiki at birth.

Regardless, I'm going out to help out on Friday...so expect many pictures when I return on Tuesday!

gold digger

I had an accident report waiting for me when I picked A up from school.

"A was playing outside & came to me with a nosebleed. She said she was picking her nose."

In a word, this is karma. I was an avid nosepicker when I was younger. When I told my parents about the note, they just laughed.

they'll be kick-ass sorority girls some day

Ever since I made the girls into unicorns in January, E has been *begging* me to do it again. I try to explain to her that it's not an actual hairstyle you can wear outside the house...but she doesn't get it. Today, I told her I would do a slight variation of The Unicorn, The Droopy Unicorn. This style also involved a piggle on top of her head similar to a horn...but instead of sticking straight up, there would be a braid.

Well, miracles upon miracles, she bought it. And since I have nothing better to write about this week they looked so cute, I thought I'd take pictures of the cuties and their new 'dos.

 

 

So, what does this have to do with being a sorority girl? Well, back in the day, Slacker Mama was in a sorority (Kappa Delta, to be exact ... AOT, baby!). Anyway, our mixers and formals were always attended by a photography company owned by Chuck Lane. When you and your friends determined that you absolutely, positively had to get a picture taken to commemorate the moment, you would all scream "Chuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!" and a photog (not necessarily named Chuck) would come running.

Then, it was time to pose. Now it didn't matter if there were 100 people trying to get in the picture or two...the pose was always the same. You and your sisters would ensure that you would all be in the picture by hugging each other and squeezing your faces so tight together...as close as humanly possible. (It's times like these that I wish I had a scanner, so I could show you what I mean.) So imagine my surprise when I asked the girls to take a picture together and this is what they did.

 

Aw, yeah. That's sisterhood for you!

thanks for the clarification

As I was buckling A into her barco-lounger carseat today, E yelled goodbye at someone.

"I just yelled goodbye to my friend, Olivia," E explained. "She's a person, mommy, *not* a pig."

they got their way (of course)

I'm not going to lie, it wasn't looking good when I went to bed last night. There was supposed to be 1 to 3" of snow on the ground by 8PM...and it wasn't even sticking by 11PM. John and I were convinced that this storm was yet again going to be a let down.

So, imagine our surprise when we woke up to about 5 inches around the Slacker house. The girls' school was closed (as was pretty much everything around these parts). Both John and I worked from home and we took turns watching the girls. John did most of it while I worked (oh the joys of being paid by the hour!), and was a trooper through lots of crafts, some drawing and coloring and an afternoon screening of "The Little Mermaid."

Here are some pictures from the day...

Heading out to shovel and play

 

Driveway sledding

 

Hot cocoa and marshmallows

 

 

Movie time

Rocking out to "Under the Sea"

six to nine

When told there was the possibility of a snow storm hitting on Sunday, the girls decided to campaign sartorially for the white stuff. Here's what you get when you let wannabe snow bunnies dress themselves for the day.

 

 

spring is in the air

It's not just me who's hoping to see flowers pop up 'round these parts.

 

It's amazing how something as simple as a drawing can remind you how much your kids are growing up. Gone are the days of random lines and scribbles. I actually can figure out what E is drawing some most of the time.

disney: the blog post

Day 1 - Saturday
After a fairly uneventful Friday night arrival, we woke up early on Saturday morning and got ready to head out to the park. We packed our backpack with snacks and hopped on the shuttle bus for the park, arriving a few minutes before opening time (as many of you told us to do). Well, none of you told us about the little opening number that they do to open the park with the singing and dancing and arrival of characters! The girls were bouncing up and down and screaming like pint-sized groupies at Mickey and his friends. I must admit that I got a little teary when I saw how excited they were.

We took the train to Frontierland (since Mickey's Toon Town didn't open until 10) and walked over and did It's a Small World, Dumbo and the Teacups and had met Ariel and Alice (aka, Allison to E..."you know, Allison Wonderland") all before 10 o'clock. We then hit the cars where I made the rookie mistake of letting E drive our car. She apparently has not figured out that turning the wheel violently left and right over and over and over again will make the car lurch left and right (and Mommy a little nauseous). But she had fun and I was able to steady the wheel somewhat with minimal resistance from her.

After the cars, we headed to Toon Town where we tried to distract them from the mass quantities of stuff they wanted us to buy them. We got in line to meet The Princesses and were immediately grateful that our girls had no love for The Fairies, which was totally packed. A quick 20 minutes later and we were in the presence of royalty (Cinderella, Belle and Sleeping Beauty, to be exact).

John and I were cracking up at E because she wore her Ariel t-shirt, which clearly signaled to the other Princesses that she was not E's fave. Also, we marvelled at how well A did at these things. She did *not* want to go with her sister. And she totally made herself at home with Sleeping Beauty, climbing up on her bench while SB signed her book.

After The Princesses, we met Mickey and Minnie, and then headed to lunch. After lunch we did the Carosel, Mickey's Philharmagic movie and a couple of more rides and walked around a bit before calling it a day. We headed back and got the girls to take naps.

In the evening, we headed to Epcot for beer dinner. We hadn't made reservations anywhere, so this entailed wandering around to the several countries to see what was available. We were going to do the German buffet, but since it was a beautiful night, we opted for some brats and frankfurters and pretzels (and more beer) instead. We then caught the fireworks and headed home.

 

Day 2 - Sunday
On Saturday, we had reservations for lunch with The Princesses in Norway at Epcot. (In the interest of full disclosure, we actually didn't get these reservations well in advance of the trip. We lucked into a cancellation on Wednesday night. Yep. We were slackers. Who knew?) Anyway, since we were eating at 11:20, the girls dressed in their Princess dresses and we headed straight to Epcot after breakfast.

After running into Stitch (my kids were like "Who?" and I was all, "Lilo. It's from a movie that doesn't have Princesses in it"), we went to the Nemo ride. E is still on this terrified-of-the-dark kick so she didn't enjoy it, but John, A and I did. After that we went to the Turtle Talk interactive thing which was really cute. It's the turtle from Finding Nemo (who sounds a lot like Spicloli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High, if you haven't seen Nemo). At one point he asks for questions from the audience, and E's hand shoots up. I'm immediately wary of what she's going to ask, with good reason. Her "question" is,

"I'm going to lunch with The Princesses. And this is my sister, A."
The turtle answered, "I totally know the answer to this question. Yes, you are."

After that we headed over to Norway where we found out that our reservations were for 11:20 AM...on Saturday. Yep. Our hearts dropped about a mile. Luckily, they were able to squeeze us in and thereby saving us from being the Worst. Parents. Ever.

The lunch was good. The girls were excited to see the Princesses. John was excited to order beer with lunch. Truly a win-win. At one point during lunch, A had spilled some salt on the table. When I said something to the effect of A making a mess, E told me,

"Don't worry, Mama. I see Cinderella's here. She can clean it up for us."

Before we knew it, it was over and we headed over to the Magic Kingdom on the monorail. After saying "Hi" to Daisy Duck, we headed to Frontierland where we met up with The Donald (Duck) and saw a parade. Again, the girls were bouncing up and down with excitement, waving to the characters and screaming like...well...like little girls.

We then rode the Aladdin Magic Carpet Ride (the motto should be "Like the Dumbo Ride, but with a shorter line!") and walked the Swiss Family Robinson Tree House. As we headed back toward the main gate, we finally relented and bought E the Tinkerbell she had been begging for since Saturday and A a pair of Mouse Ear teedly-boppers.

Since we didn't nap that day, we made a dinner reservation at the Italian place in our hotel for 6:15. By about 6:45 the girls were d-o-n-e. We finished up our delicious meal and headed to our room. The girls passed out and we watched some of the Oscars before doing the same.


Day 3 - Monday
On Monday, we got up and got out the door ready to hit the park right as it opened. The shuttle bus was a little slow, so we chatted with another family as we waited. E immediately became best friends with their daughters, who were twins that turned 5 in December. When the bus finally arrived, it was crowded so we ended up standing next to each other and chatted some more. Once we hit the park, they took the train with us to Frontierland where we all rode It's a Small World together. The mom and one of the girls went to Haunted Mansion, while the dad and the other girl rode the Peter Pan and Dumbo rides with us.

We then split up as they went on while we rode the carousel. We then hit a couple more rides, including the Goofy roller coaster, before heading back to Main Street for lunch. We caught another parade, rode some more rides and bought the girls ridiculous hats before it was time to call it a day. We headed back where everyone took naps.

For dinner we headed over to the Boardwalk, which was the resort next to ours. We ate at the Brewery, which was nice and then walked the boardwalk before catching the Epcot fireworks. Before we knew it, it was bedtime and our First Ever Slacker Trip to Disney was over.

I've said it before, but your tips really did help out a lot. We followed most of them, with the big exception being the bringing a stroller. We decided to go without, and were pretty glad we did. We did end up carrying the girls a bit (A has perfected her technique to make you pick her up which involves standing in front of you and grabbing both of your legs rendering immobile until you relent), but we didn't have to deal with parking the stroller and finding it after every ride, which was nice. I think it helped that my kids aren't big stroller riders (despite my love of researching and buying cool strollers).

So there you have it. I feel like this post took longer to write than our actual trip to Disney. We definitely had a blast on our trip and will definitely go back again. E threw a coin in one of the fountains at our hotel and wished "to come back to Disney on my birthday." I doubt that will happen since I can't imagine doing Disney in the heat and with the crowds...but we'll see.