Sweatstain

During the first week of March, most of our family relocated to a little town in unincorporated Citrus County, Florida. I wouldn't know that it is an unincorporated area, since the real estate agent who handled the lease didn't mention that little factoid, had it not been for a sheet of paper posted in our local supermarket stating that since we are located in an unincorporated part of the county, we can now purchase beer and wine at that store before noon (or 2 pm or whatever the arbitrary rule is here) on Sundays. We still have to go to a proper liquor store to buy anything harder than that. I don't know what those places are called and think I'm giving myself away as a "non-cracker" (seriously, I'm not trying to offend, that's just what we're called here) by using the word "proper".

Oh, how the (fill in the blank of whatever you think we are) have fallen.

There were only two posts to you, my beloved blog, in 2010. That number will hopefully be much higher in 2011 for myriad reasons (yes, Booie, I know you appreciate that wasn't phrased as "a myriad of reasons" and for that I love you).

So enough with the parentheses and general vagueness. Details are really where the devil lives, so here you go:

Living in the east San Francisco Bay Area on a single income with three kids is difficult. Building anything even close to resembling a stable financial future under those circumstances is nigh impossible unless a family can survive on air, water, no food, and without its own mode of vehicular transportation. I absolutely love and achingly miss my completely walkable community, but raising a family in the 'burbs requires at least one car in case you have to get the kids to the ER, which happened twice in the same week last August, but more on that later if anyone's interested.

Hubby and I discussed it for a good fifteen months and decided that, since we had family here in Florida, we should at least temporarily transition ourselves here to make some financial headway. After all, we're supposedly building a life and family, not just cobbling together a moment-by-moment existence and, in case you haven't noticed, I'm pretty flexible but still at heart a girl who likes to have a plan.

Anyway, about the kids, since that's really the primary focus of everything we think and do: Biscuit stayed home in California with his dad. That was the most horriblest choice I've ever had to make, but his friends are there, he has the majority of his family there and most of all his heart is there, as is a huge chunk of mine. We've been here almost five months and I'm just now getting used to the arrangement but there's also the fact that he just returned to the West coast on Tuesday after six weeks here so that's probably coloring my perception a bit. I'm sure I'll bawl my eyes out all next week.

My Beans can swim. Boy, can they swim. They have to now, because there's a pool right outside the kitchen door ( and the living, family and master bedroom doors). The house is built around the pool. Sparki little Parki-Pants, a month before her fourth birthday, can swim herself right down to the bottom of the deep end and retrieve whatever she's dropped down there, just to prove that she can do it. And, she's declared that she's going to be an Army-sniper-rock-star when she grows up. Power to her, and woe be to anyone who finds himself in her way. Pipsi is going to be a princess and just today, insisted that I introduce her as "Princess Jasmine" to the checker at Home Depot and the burger-flipper at McDonald's.

"Mommy, will you please tell them my name?" Pipsi asks me as I'm pushing them along through Home Depot, searching fruitlessly for bed risers (we have a scorpion problem here, and if you really want a dose of the howling fantods, Google Image "huntsman spider" and click through for the most ghoulish photo you can find [make sure there's something else in the photo to use for scale] and you'll see what I mean-- I literally just clobber the smaller ones with my bare hands now and smear their remains on my pants and I was a certifiable arachnophobe before we moved into this godforsaken burg).

Back in Home Depot, I sigh, thinking about the news story I'd seen on TV yesterday, about the mom whose 4- and 5-year-old children were removed from her custody and placed with CPS because Mom had left Kids in the car for 15 minutes while she ran in to WalMart WHILE IT WAS 94 DEGREES OUTSIDE!!! I'm all for convenience but I wouldn't wish that fate on the giant mosquito that just bit me THROUGH MY PANTS.

"Sweetie, if I tell them you're Princess Jasmine, they're going to think there's something wrong with me. Or they're going to judge me as overindulgent," I reply. Are those bed risers? No, they're just hardwood-floor protectors. Drat (I've really had to make a highly concentrated effort to quit potty-mouth cold-turkey, which has a LOT to do with Pipsi's "f*cking buckets!" episode and the fact that the Beans are starting preschool in 12 days :)-- please forgive my punctuation; it's been pretty much since the last blog post that I've spent this much continuous time behind a keyboard.

Anyway, I still haven't found what I'm looking for as Bono would say (in Home Depot--Surprise Surprise!!! as Gomer Pyle would say) so i amble inconspicuously toward the service counter. Well, I'm as inconspicuous as possible as a professionally highlighted ( In a recession? SHAME ON ME! SHAME! SHAME!!!) pushing two super-blond, singing preschoolers in a bright-orange, steer-from-the-rear kid-friendly Home Depot cart, carrying an authentic designer handbag in the not-so-swanky Crystal River, FL Home Depot. I ask the guy behind the counter whether that store carries bed risers and am met with a laugh and a decisive "NO". Cordial conversation ensues in which he imparts a story to a coworker (whom I think he's trying to impress for reproductive reasons) about how the last people who asked about bed risers ended up buying his own personal set of said item (EWWW!!!!!!) and then he says maybe I can use some four-by-fours to accomplish what the bed risers were designed to do.

I briefly imagine how Hubby will react when I come home with bits of four-by-four and a can of Krylon and tell him excitedly about Home Depot Guy's plan to cut the wood into little bits, paint it to match the carpet, then use those little woodies to get that bed up off the floor to make sure we ain't got no bugs under thar and the image that momentarily runs through my mind is the Hindenburg in its final moments.

I thank him for the time and thought he put into his solution but tell him that I just don't think my husband will go for it and politely excuse myself. He recommends I try a furniture store (Badcock. Seriously, that's the name of the store. Girlfriends don't let girlfriends use Badcock, fyi). I have, through this adventure, found some caps for the bed legs should I decide to go casterless and need to pay for them on my way out.

And as I roll my Beans, steering from the rear (backward in so many ways), toward the checkout line, I start thinking (yep, this is the part you've been waiting for and yep, I'm SO back). I think about all we've given up to move to this place : time with my first-born child (his band practices, his Junior Prom, Senior Ball-- I'm gonna well-up), my mom and dad, my grandma, all our countless friends and community ties, the neighborhood like Cheers where everybody knew our names and our barista who prepped our drinks the moment he saw us walk through the door. And I think about how quickly time passes and how briefly the magic of a childhood exists-- the finite breaths before a mother bids a tearful goodbye to her son. And I thought of the frustration I felt when the electricity company's customer service manager explained to me, before our move, that demanding a $475 deposit was a reasonable amount to authorize service to a new client because "Florida's such a transigent state that we need to ask for this because people use our service then move without ever paying for anything", and how I wanted to correct her, "you mean that the population of Florida is so transigent that..." but knowing that she'd neither understand nor care-- I thought about everything that had brought my daughters and me to this place at this moment in time.

The Beans and I arrive at the checkout counter and I pull out my debit card to pay the $1.13 tab since I rarely carry cash. Pipsi's eyes keep moving expectantly between me and the cashier, waiting for her majestic moment.

"Wow, aren't you cute! Are You Mommy's little helpers?"

"Oh, please," I say, a note of great importance in my voice, sounding, to myself like an absolute freak, "Allow me to introduce Princess Jasmine," I announce, lightly touching Pipsi's curly blonde hair, just above her beaming face, "And her sister, ParkiPants."

"Perky Pants? Oh! We must be potty training! Congratulations!" says the checker. Thank God I had only one item. I shudder to think where this conversation would have gone had it been any longer.

"Yes, thank you so much!" said I.

"No, that's Prince Ali," says Pipsi, correcting me in regard to her sister's title.

"Bye, bye, Princess and Perky Pants!" says the checker.

"Bye!" Shouts Parki as she waves at her new friend.

"Mom, Parki is Prince Ali, not ParkiPants!" Pipsi chastises me as we scoot out the exit toward the van(parked next to a cart-return area because I rock.

"Oh, Jasmine, I'm sorry. She must have not heard me correctly," I apologize. I want to tell her that gender-bending isn't really en vogue here.

"I'll be more careful next time," I promise.

"Mommy, can I please have some FedEx?" Parki asks. FedEx is Beanish for 7-Up or Sprite. I really don't know why.

"Sure, since you were so good in there. Princess Jasmine, would you like some too?" I ask Her Highness

"No, but I would like some lemonade," and I think that if nothing else, living in the South will surely teach them some awesome manners.

We load up into the faithful Starship Margaret and set off on our next voyage.

Remind me, next time to tell you about our new barista's comment...

P.S.
Quit posting Chinese comments related to adult websites. It's really gross and if you do it again I'm going to contact Google and make bad things happen. Bad things that people won't even want to watch on the internet, even if they're on Tosh.0

Feeler:

Be honest with me now... Is turquoise poop a blog-worthy topic? I get that nobody reads blogs since fb wrecked everything, but, if i were to devote, like, an hour to the exercise of describing turquoise poop, would anybody find it a worthwhile read?

Fridge on Lockdown

A few weeks ago, on an inauspicious day and without much fanfare, my accident-prone old laptop died. Finally! I was more than a little relieved. The thing just kept crashing and Hubby kept breathing life back into it somehow so it woud limp along feebly for a few more days, then the stupid thing would just crash again. So I'd wait and wait until Hubby had a couple of minutes to look at it and... you know where this is going. It's been that way for the past year, I guess, and I've gotten more and more disconnected from the rest of the world as the days clicked by.

But no more! Now it's 11:05 on Tuesday night and I can sit here and cruise along wherever I want to go on the Internet and actually arrive at the destination in the address bar. It's crazy!!! Because it actually works!!!!!!

So, I'm sure you're wondering how the kids are. They're splendiferous, actually. Biscuit just returned home from his dad's this afternoon since he's on Spring break. Oh, the Beans were overjoyed to see him. Parki ran up to him and gave him a huge hug and just cuddled on the couch with him for, like, twenty minutes. Piper waited about an hour and, when Biscuit was on the couch by himself, walked up to him with Xylophone Dog in hand and a little smile on her face. Biscuit thought she looked really cute and he asked if she wanted a hug. Pipsi just kept smiling and whacked him on the head with Xylophone Dog, then ran away laughing. I think that sounds a lot like a normal sibling relationship. Don't you?

It's funny, but there's always a learning curve every time Biscuit comes back home. We have locks on all the kitchen cabinets, which he's pretty much used to opening but rarely remembers to close, and today he was a tad dismayed to see one on the refrigerator. That is, after all, just another thing for him to forget-- and then I see it and get all exasperated and ask him how many times I'll have to remind him to do this and... yadda yadda yadda.

I really haven't wanted to put a lock on the fridge. It just seems like if I do that, I'm conceding the point that my children truly have no self-control and that I assume they will not listen to me. It felt like my last little bit of civility in the kitchen, that unlocked fridge. I could ask the Beans to grab the juice and put it on the counter, then to put it away when we were finished. They liked being my big-girl helpers. That last little bit of kitchen civility today has, like my old laptop, decidedly died.

It happened in a span of about four minutes. I was on the phone with my brother for one of our five-minute check-ins and I was multitasking, tossing a load of my smelly clothes into the washing machine when my MommyRadar started going berserk. I slammed the washer lid shut and let the empty laundry basket clatter to the floor, then swung around to the open door into the kitchen and stepped inside. No Beans. As I quickly scooted through the kitchen and dining room toward the family room I caught a whiff of my dad after lunch which was the last thing I expected to smell and was defnintely a sign that something bad was happening. At the threshold of the family room I spied my little Beans, twin partners in crime, silhouetted side by side in front of the semi-opaque sliding-glass door, all four of their little hands moving in mad little circles on the glass.

"Oh, no, Day. I gotta go," I said to my brother.

"What's wrong?" I heard through the phone. He sounded far away, like I was talking to someone who was living in another world which, in a way, was the truth.

Several years ago, in my life before twins, my dad and I worked together at the same company and we would have lunch together a couple of times a week. Frequently lunch consisted of sandwiches and Dad absolutely loves a mustard-slathered sandwich. Loves it like nobody's business. Hubby and I, bonded strongly and forever in our mutual disdain for condiments, keep a bottle of mustard in the fridge for Dad but otherwise generally eschew condiments. Today I learned that there's a possibility that a penchant for mustard is a hereditary trait that skips a generation.

"There's mustard all over the place," I said miserably.

"'Kay. See ya!" my brother chirped.

"What did you DO? Why would you do that?!?" I stood looking stupidly at my daughters and the mustardy finger painting masterpiece covering the patio door.

Parker turned and looked at me with her hands out in front of her, then focused her attention to her hands and gave one palm a tentative lick.

"Ew, guh-lowhs," Parki smacked her lips and wrinkled her nose and looked at me with those great big eyes. Pipsi turned and smiled that great big smile right at me, sunshine glinting off her golden curls. I wondered for an instant how two such divinely beautiful creatures could make such a hideous mess.

"Don't touch anything!!! Stay right there! Do NOT move!" I barked as I ran back to the kitchen for the baby wipes, paper towels and glass cleaner.

"This is disgusting! Don't ever do this again. Yuck, yuck! Now Papa won't have any mustard when he comes over," I tried to sound sad but really, it was all I could do not to scream like a wind animal. A wild, totally freaked-out wild animal.

"Oh, that's okay Mommy, there's more! See?" Parki showed me the mustard bottle, still terribly full.

"Papa has lots of mustard, Mommy. He has more at his house, too," Pipsi chimed in.

Parker's shirt, her brand-new shirt that she'd worn for maybe thirty minutes, had several yucky yellow streaks on it. I wiped the rest from her hands and face, then Pipsi's, then peeled off Parker's shirt and got to work on the door. Fortunately, mustard is surprisingly easy to remove and within a minute, it was like the mess never happened.

"I'm going to go clean your shirt so it doesn't stain. You stay RIGHT HERE and don't get into any more trouble, you little monkeys," and off I went, thinking that it was fortuitous that there was a load of clothes already in the washer. I was in the garage for a minute, wondering what could ever compel a couple of two-year-olds to smear mustard all over glass. Really, what was it? The texture? The color? Was I letting them watch too much tv? Was I not nurturing their inner artists enough? Were they, as I've kind of always feared, just evil?

I was pondering these and other deeply troubling problems during my return to the family room. I was figuring that I needed to get Parki into another shirt and prep the girls for a trip to Target when, for the second time in less than five minutes, I stopped dead in my tracks at the family room to gasp and stare at my daughter.

In the less than two minutes I'd spent cleaning her mustardy shirt, Parker had managed to clear everything off the surface of the coffee table, pull off her pants and Pull-Up, climb up onto the table and empty the contents of her bladder. I found her standing in the puddle of said contents stark naked with her head between her knees and her wet hands up in the air behind her in a display so bizarre I seriously thought that maybe, just maybe she really was possessed. Pipsi was moving over toward the table to play in the puddle too because, after all, what's more fun for Beans than water toys?

"Pipsi, do NOT touch that, baby! Parker, what are you doing? Wait, stop! Red light! You freeze! Don't move!" I bounded back through the kitchen and prayed fervently that Parker wouldn't do her old standby trick with weewee on the floor, the one where she stomps her feet, then stands on one foot and kicks the other one back and forth like a little motor, sending weewee spraying about in all directions.

Pipsi got her hands in it by the time I returned but we were able to avoid making this horrible situation far worse. I went over with Parker yet again the proper receptacle for bodily wastes and then asked whose turn it was to ride in the cart and who got to be Backpack Buddy. We all cleaned up, went back to their room, and dressed Parki and changed Pipsi's Pull-Up. While we put on Parki's pants she turned around and put her hands on my shoulders.

"Mommy love Parki so much?" Parker asked me, smiling.

"Of course I love Parki so much!" I do. It's gonna kill me, but I do.

"Mommy happy?" Pipsi came up behind me and hugged me, a big smile on her pretty Pipsi face.

"Yes, I'm happy! I have my Beans and I love them so much! Are you happy?"

"Yeah, I'm happy. Pipsi, you happy?" Parki asked.

"Yeah, I'm happy." Pipsi said.

At least we were all in agreement on that. And I think that we will remain so, now that the fridge is locked.

Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication, Etc...

Perhaps I should have glanced at the date on the last post before beginning today, but really, why? I know it's been a long time. A very, very long time. And for good reason(s), too. Sure, I could spend a good amount of time waxing poetically on the passage of time, and meaningful fleetingness of our earthly human relationships and all that blather but the only relevant blurbs I have to offer on those subjects are:

1) Mimzi's chemo is done and she's growing hair. You should see her eyebrows! Think Al Franken... or don't if you'd rather not.

2) Biscuit is now in high school, taking two honors classes and an extra period in addition to marching band, which practices twice a week. He doesn't get enough sleep. Neither does his alarm clock (that would be me).

3) The Beans are now 2 and GIGANTIC, verbal, and at least one Bean is pooping on the potty willy-nilly. Parki still loves nakedness, but Pipsi? Every time I ask her she answers, "No. Not yet."

About six weeks ago, little Sparki Parki finally got a cute little leg over the top of her crib rail. The rest of her shortly followed, along with an obligatory thump and a subsequent wail. Knowing this was inevitable (and that her twin would waste no time falling to the floor in a similar, slightly blonder heap) I was well-equipped with two crib tents to keep the Beans sequestered in the safety of their cribs until I was ready to remove absolutely everything from their room, cover the floor in that spongy-rubber playground cover and convert their much-abused cribs into toddler beds.

Once Parki made her escape, I pulled out the tents, ready to assemble and slap them on whenever necessary. But the funny thing was, Parki didn't repeat her feat for another week or so. Figuring it was a fluke (stupid me!!!) I let it go, but kept the tents in mind, telling myself that I needed to wash them and make sure everything was going to fit, blah, blah, blah-- oh hey, wait, I have to start dinner and finish the laundry or else everything's going to go to hell this afternoon and the kids won't have pajamas and I have to put a new sheet on Parki's bed because she whipped off those pants and poopy diaper AGAIN before I got her up from her nap and I still have to thaw the chicken... You get where this is going.

So, one Tuesday morning I emerged from a five-minute shower and heard Parki calling me.

"Mommy?"

I thought I'd left the TV on. I must have, thought I, because that little voice that sounds so much like little Parki cannot be, in fact, my daughter, because that voice sounds like it's right outside my door, and my daughter is in her crib.

Dripping wet, freezing, and freaking out, I yanked open my bedroom door. No Parki.

"Mommy?" Again.

I stepped across the hallway and gently pushed open the Beans' bedroom door. "Parki?"

There, in the doorway, wearing a gigantic smile (and, thankfully, also her pajamas) stood Pleased-as-Punch Parki.

"Hi, Mommy!" Oh, the cuteness!

Beaming down from her crib at her twin was Pipsi, tongue lolling out the side of her smile and standing on one leg, the other slung over the top of her crib.

"Hi Beans! Where are you going Pipsi?" I asked carefully.

"Out!" Pipsi proclaimed.

"Wow! How did you get all the way over here, Parki?" I asked Parker while picking up Piper.

"Climb out. Mommy all wet!" Parker answered and quickly changed the topic of conversation. She's so much like her daddy.

"Hair wet. Mommy hair all wet!" Echoed Pipsi. Hmmm. I could see where this was going.

"Yes, Beans. Mommy was in the shower when you started climbing out of your cribs. That scares Mommy! Please stay in your cribs until Mommy comes in to get you. We don't want boo-boos!"

"No! No boo-boos!" Pipsi agrees. Parki, already halfway down the hall as I begin speaking about the importance of crib safety, returns to poke her little bedhead through the doorway.

"Come on, Mommy. Juice!"

That was the day the crib tents were going on. Except for one little problem. Well, two rather significant problems. Fortunately, things like ill-fitting tents and missing parts are no match for a mother's resourcefulness when it comes to securing for herself a decent night's sleep and the tents have been (mostly) firmly in place for about the last month or so. We just needed to add a couple of parts, take off a couple of others and do it all over again for the next one.

And that got me thinking about everything that we've handled over the past several months. Everything our family's handled, that is. All the changes wrought by Mimzi's illness and forced placement on the disabled list, Biscuit's transition to high school and a true, devoted commitment to something he considers far greater than just an extracurricular activity, and the verbal and social leaps and bounds the Beans make daily now that the images of the two-year birthday cakes look ever smaller in the rearview mirror. Everything's about give and take, and adjusting sometimes a little, sometimes a lot, to get everything done and keep everyone happy.

We're lucky we're so happy. Sure, I've laid aside a few novel ideas for a time when I'll have more than a few moments to toss at them (I first typed "navel ideas", which they might as well be at this point), and I have to keep reminding myself that most all of what I put away now will still be right where I leave it but these moments with my kids will only be here today-- even when today begins at 5:37 AM and feels like it's going to last FOREVER. Bring it all on. I'm glad to have it :)

Okay!

For a while there I thought Parki was a pirate. Anytime I asked a question of anyone and she was in earshot and wanting to answer in the affirmative she would pipe up and say, "Aye". It was kind of cute. It went something like this:

Mommy: I think it might be time for some cereal.
Parki: Aye!

Mommy: Beans, do you want to go bye-bye?
Parki: Aye!

Mommy: Hmmm, what do you think about taking a shower?
Parki: Aye!

In the last couple of weeks, though, Parki has started using "okay" instead. But not just a plain, one-size-fits all "okay". She matches her vocal inflection of her "okay" to the amount of enthusiasm she has for whatever it is she's agreeing to.

Mommy: Parki, are you hungry?
Parki (indifferently): Okay.

Mommy: Parki, will you please take this cookie to Pipsi?
Parki (excitedly running down the hall): Oh-Kay! Piiiiip- seeeee!

Mommy: Parki, let's go get Soft Blanket for Happy Nappy.
Parki (snuggling up, murmuring softly): Okay.

Mommy: Parki, do you want to go see Grandma?
Parki (high, ascending, quick tones): Okay!

We get over to see Grandma each day, as long as Grandma's up to it. We'll bring her something from the grocery store, or some tastiness we've prepared or we'll visit to vaccuum or wash a scarf or just to chat. Mimzi was in the hospital from last Thursday until Monday afternoon with a couple of infections and severe anemia. After several days of antibiotics and two units of blood enjoyed in isolation she's home again. We giggle as much as we can about silly things but her condition's starting to get to her. Which is okay. Hopefully she'll keep the perspective that this is a phase and, like the Beans, she'll quickly outgrow it and get on to the next thing. I'll have to remember to point out the next time I see her that the Beans cried all the time when they were bald.

Obviously now, everything's "Okay"!

Pretty Lucky!

It's almost 2 PM on Friday afternoon. The Beans are finally napping, the dishes in the dishwasher are clean and there is a six-pack of Dos Equis chillin' in the fridge. And I can't get over how lucky I am.

Putting it mildly, this week totally sucked. The Beans were grumpy from their shots, Mimzi was in the ICU for three days and Biscuit was on extended leave at his dad's because they came down with some form of nasty crud during his week there. Because Mimzi was cooling her jets in intensive care and because the Beans were already out of sorts, when Biscuit's dad called and said they'd been throwing up and coughing I had to make the sad decision to leave Biscuit in exile a little longer. The last thing we needed around here was the flu. I don't care if it wasn't officially the flu. If you're sick, you can't visit anyone in the hospital and the phone conversations I had with Mimzi were rather murky and confusing. Mimzi is not good on the phone since she likes to use pronouns without antecedents and hop around from one subject to another. Sometimes it's kind of fun. I like to see how well I can keep up, or how many other things I can think about while still following her circuitous path through her stories. And it's kind of efficient, too, because she can tell me three things at once. But through the black veil of painkillers, anti-anxietics (is that a word?) and anti-coagulants, ole Mimzi was making even less sense than usual. Not seeing for myself that she was going to be okay was just not an option.

I have to admit, I was pretty overwhelmed last week. Especially Friday. I spent a big chunk of the day visiting doctor's offices and labs with Mimzi, Beans in tow. They were very good (the Beans, not the doctors) but that was due largely to the fact that their mommy (me) exerted a ton of energy keeping them entertained in their stroller for a couple of hours. They had Dollies, Cheerios, cups, bowls, books, fruit snacks, my keys, my purse (ack!) and new faces every so often to stave off a meltdown. By the time we got home we'd been to the hospital, the grocery store, Mimzi's house and the DMV (don't even get me STARTED on the DMV experience). The Beans were pissed off and hungry and tired and I can't blame them one bit. We returned home to eat and I realized when we walked inside that the house was in absolute chaos.

They had lunch in their high chairs and topped off their tummies with a cup of milk each. I put Parki in bed first and zipped her all up before returning for Pipsi. Pippers was a little fussier and wriggled around in my arms when I picked her up, twisting around until her tummy was over my arm, when suddenly she burped-slash-barfed, splashing milk and turkey sandwich on the floor.

And that's when I realized how lucky I was. Yeah, my mom's carotid artery was full to the point of imminent stroke. Yes, I'd just spent a crappy, rainy morning running errands with two cranky toddlers. Yep, I'd just spent waaaay too much in late penalties at the DMV and my house was in utterly disgusting disarray with Craps everywhere. But Pipsi barfed in the one spot in all the kitchen that was the easiest to clean and not a bit of it hit any clothing on either one of us. Off Pipsi went for Happy Nappy. I returned to the kitchen, cleaned up the barf and thought to myself that things weren't great, but all things considered, they could be much worse.

I could have to work at the DMV.

In The Nudes-- I Mean, NEWS...

I'm happy to report that we do NOT have swine flu. At least not that we know of. But considering the way everyone's talking about that and nothing else I'm sure we'll all get it very soon. I'll be sure to keep everyone updated.

We do have other news to report though. No, we're not expecting any more babies. At least not that we know of. But we had a visitor on Friday the 17th. The Binkie Fairy came to our house. That's right! The Beans are getting to be big girls now and the Binkie Fairy decided they were ready to leave the Bink behind in favor of Bedtime Bears.

Stupid Binkie Fairy.

Hubby and I put the Beans to bed that Friday night and within five minutes I had left the house. After almost two years of getting up, sometimes several times, in the middle of the night to rescue an overboard Binkie and scrambling madly at bedtime to procure the requisite number (5) for night-night, I was totally okay with letting Hubby handle this one. I called Biscuit about forty-five minutes later and he reported that the Beans were still crying. I hightailed it home and heard...

Silence.

My timing was perfect. Saturday night I left, too. I just can't take the crying and I knew that if I stuck around I'd cave and that could mean still more months of getting up in the middle of the night and doing the one-eye-partially-open-looking-at-the-black-floor-sweeping-the-hand-blindly-under-the-crib-hoping-she-doesn't-wake-up-for-real-okay-got-it-back-in-the-mouth-falling-asleep-thank-you-God-I'm-going-back-to-bed-ow-goddam-shoe-oh-sheets-are-still-warm routine and I couldn't TAKE IT ANY MORE!!!!!!!

I miss them a little bit. I miss how one would pick up two Binkies and take the extra one over to her sister and pop it into her mouth, or how they would swap because everybody knows that Binkies taste better with a coating of your twin's slobber on them. Sometimes one would walk over to the other one and pull the Binkie from her own mouth, lean over and pop out her sister's and shove it into her own piehole while forcing her former Binkie into her sister's maw while she just kept playing with whatever was in her hands.

So now they're finding other ways of entertaining themselves. With poop.

Yes, poop.

On Saturday, the day before Biscuit returned from Disneyland, the Beans were down for Happy Nappy and I poked my head in to peek at them. What greeted me was the unmistakable aroma of Beanpoop and the color brown. Parki had, in the ten minutes since I'd last checked on her, filled her diaper with solid waste matter, stripped naked, pulled off her diaper and PLAYED WITH ITS CONTENTS. It was always a matter of not if, but when, and I really wasn't in the mindframe to deal with it on that lovely Saturday afternoon but there it was. And it was in the crib, on the sheet, on the blanket, on her clothes, and in her hair, under her fingernails, on her hands and smeared across her little butt which, coincidentally, was the part I saw first through the crack in the door since it was pointed right at whomever walked past.

Needless to say, every day since then Parki's gone down buttoned, taped and zipped seven ways to Sunday. But at least there is no poop whatsoever on Bedtime Bear and I got a great picture to use whenever and how ever I deem appropriate.

And, I'm really sorry to be taking such long breaks between posts. I don't want to do that because I forget a lot of moments that I really want to blog about but Mimzi's been pretty high-maintenance lately. She's got "triple-negative" breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy on April 7th. Did you know that Nordstrom sells prosthetic breasts? I didn't either! But their staff is absolutely fantastic and I cannot recommend them highly enough. And you know I'd snark on them mercilessly if the case were otherwise. Mimzi is scheduled to begin dose-dense A/C chemotherapy on May 7th, but she may have hit a snag with that because while receiving treatment for sleep apnea, the neurologist ordered an ultrasound on her carotid artery (the one that hasn't already been surgically cleared) and he found "significant blockage". Ole Mimzi might need to get that fixed before chemo begins.

But she's a tough old biddy and, personally, I think she'll totally rock the bald look. Fortunately her lymph nodes were clear, so she's got that going for her. I'm thinking about getting her some of those thick plastic black-framed eyeglasses and having her dance around in a suit to some crazy techno music so she'll look like the creepy old dude in the Six Flags commercials. We could put it on YouTube and she'll be an Internet sensation. Or I could just get her a few cute hats and make her some homemade chicken noodle soup. Whatever she wants. If she starts jonesing for cotton candy and sardines I'll figure out a way to get her those too.

It's funny how something small, say, a three-centimeter tumor, can have such a tremendous impact on so many people. But what I think is even more important is how we're going to let it change us. Mimzi's taking everything one day at a time. DPSM's keeping his patent stiff upper lip, stoic in the face of new developments that seem to just complicate matters a little further each day. And I'm suddenly aware of a malignant specter lurking in the future that may rear its ugly head not just for me but for my kids, too. There isn't a "preferable" cancer, I don't think, but this one's particularly disheartening for a woman with twin daughters. That's six boobs to worry about. And I only have two eyes.

All in all, it makes me appreciate what's most important to me-- and I want to make sure that I accomplish everything on my list before I can't do it at all. I want to make sure my kids and Hubby know every single day how much I love them. I want to teach my kids to love completely and with all their hearts. I will never stop working to conquer my fears, and even though it may be extremely messy and smelly and get them in trouble sometimes, I hope my kids never lose their curiosity. But hopefully Parki's had her curiosity about poop satisfied. I'll be totally okay with that.