christmas? did that really just happen?

i remember when christmas held so mcuh hope & magic. all the waiting & anticipating. waiting for santa to come & leave all those shiny presents. waiting to get your lil paws on your gifts & tear into em like a doberman with a fresh cut steak. that last gift was such a let down. knowing there was nothing left to open was such a sad moment.

this year brought a new low at our house. WE ALL GOT THE FLU! it was horrible! first my mother-in-law got it & then the monster got it & then i got it & then the hubby got it.  i had it on christmas day & felt rotten. i feel like  i missed christmas with the monster cause i was sick.  not to worry though we are all better now & back to normal (whatever that is).

the monster got so much stuff this year it was insane! she got the leapster 2 she had been wanting forever. she also got 5 games to play on it & a free download that came with it. i said i would not get the monster a video game until she was much older but this thing is great she actually learns things when she plays itbut not the things she would learn from a playstation game or something like that...no killing on these games & she'll have to be atleast 12 before she learns to fly a plane. it tells me if she getting questions right & everything.  she also got tons of clothes & toys & even a new pair of shoes. now i just have to clean her room to make room for all the new stuff she has.

how to mop: as taught by a 3yr old

i now know how my mother felt when she tried to get me to clean my room all those years. i can't believe a kid can live in a room as messy as the monster keeps her lair! its horrific they state that place stays in most days. i can clean it & with in a 30 minute period it looks the same way it did before  i cleaned it up. it is completely useless to try to clean a childs room.

i recently found myself complaining  about the amount of sand & random trash on the monster's bedroom floor. of course i had to clean her disaster area...wait i mean bedroom...just so i could find the floor in the first place. it looked like someone had missed a target in iraq & hit her room instead! this place was a MESS!! she has s lot of small toys...toys that are SUPPOSED to be in bins in an orderly fashion...my mother likes to get her happy meals & make sure the toys find their way to my house....& pillows...she has more pillows than bed, bath & beyond! my child's idea of organization is having everything spread out in the floor so she can see her mighty kingdom sprawled out before her.

so, i finally get her room clean & we are having dinner with our neighbors...the three smallest kiddos are in the monster's room playing & watching cartoons. we are all enjoying our dinner & watching a movie  then the hubby goes to check on the kiddos that have suddenly fell rather silent for a group of kids their age. the hubby comes back & urges me & our neighbor to go peek in on the little darlings....they had gotten the hand soap out of the bathroom & were spreading it all over the floor. "we want to slip & slide!!" "look at us!!" one even took off  socks & shoes & applied soap to feet & replaced shoes & socks to save it for when they got home. it was horrible, they had used over half of the bottle of soap on the floor. they were handed rags & made to clean up the mess that they had made. the rags they used had to be washed twice to get all the soap out. we still don't know which of the three came up with the scheme to slip & slide on the bedroom floor...all parties involved are presumed guilty until proven innocent :)

presto...instant mopped floor!

who are you...

i can remember wearing a store bought halloween costume twice in my entire life. the first one was none other than the amazing WONDER WOMAN...i was like five...it had the flimsy plastic mask that you could cut yourself on & the plastic jumpsuit. the second one was a super crappy witch thing, it was SUPPOSED to look like the wicked witch from sleeping beauty...it did no such thing however.  the rest of my trick-or-treat career i was dressed in homemade costumes. my go to outfit you may be asking yourself...why a witch of course! i have done the green face, fake nose & any other witchy thing you can think of. i play the part well.

fast forward more than a few years & now its my kids turn to dress up for halloween. her very first time she was like 4  or 5 months old & she was a fairy...made wings & a wand for her...she was super cute!!  her second halloween she was a princess..her gown cam from her very own collection of dress up clothes. this year she has been a chicken for a costume party (i got the chicken outfit from a thrift store) & she has been trick-or-treating twice as lola luftnagle. yes, lola from hanna montana....she picked it out...lola is nothing but a wig & some clothes out of the monster's closet....she was also a rockstar, which vaguely resmebled the lola get up. sha has not wanted to take off the purple wig except to sleep & to shower.
guess what i was....oh you are no fun....yes i was a witch...as usual.

for all you kiddies too young to know about the early haloween costumes, here are a couple of pictures of one like the wonder woman one i had. yes that says the suit is made from VINYL!! that is PLASTIC kids....talk about sweating for ya candy...you could sure do it in one of these puppies!  they were so great though.  costumes have come such a long way!

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ok, so not really sorry about it...but it sounded nice didn't it. my mom has the monster for the weekend & its just me & the hubby for the next couple of days. i have every intention to sleep in late & be lazy. the harsh reality is that i might sleep a lil later but i will have to clean house & do all the stuff i didn't get the chance to do during the week.

don't get me wrong now...i LOVE keeping #2 during the week but it can really wear me out sometimes. all that running & playing & question asking & running & playing & doing worksheets & running & playing & asking questions. this week i had my monster, #2, & a 2month old...i am so not used to that....much more & my brain might explode(well what is left of it anyway) that would just be messy & i don't wanna clean it up. so yeah don't get the wrong idea & think i hate having kids around or anything like that becasue you would be WAAAYYY off!!  it can just be mentally draining is all i am saying. ask any teacher or daycare worker. let me ask you five million questions & see if you don't need a vacation.

stickers, eggs & lots of attitude

 ya ever wondered where your kids gets their attitude from? haha, me too....but, according to my mom the monster is exactly like me when i was her age....mom i thought you always said i was a good kid?  yeah, so now i know my mom has a foggy perception of my childhood.

when you take my child somewhere you should be prepared to wish you had a roll of duct tape for her hands & mouth...and maybe her feet too. she will try to touch EVERYTHING(and succeed at it) & will talk endlessly about nothing & not make any sense to anyone over 6.  she makes millions of excuses to get out of the buggy when you go to wal-mart, her two faves are "i gotta potty." & "i wanna be holded.", she is good at faking you out too. she thinks that she NEEDS everything she sees while you are in a store.  i admit she is a lil spoiled, but she is an only child so that is expected. i don't call her the monster for nuthin :)


this is gonna sound like a commercial but here goes anyways.....
the lil monster has been playing what she thinks are games online for the past few weeks. really what she is doing are reading lessons on readingeggs.com she calls it sam. all i hear is "i wanna play sam!!" or " can i play sam now??"  we have been using a free trial (which runs out the 23rd) you can get a 2year subscription to it for $80. i really think i am gonna buy it for her since she loves it so much & is really learning from it. she now recognizes most of the alphabet & can tell you what letter lots of words start with. when she is playing she can even read some of the words all by herself! its super awesome! even #2 likes it. ok back to your regularly scheduled programming.

the monster & #2 have been doing worksheets for the last 2weeks. they have killed my paper supply & are quickly running me out of ink(will take donations). the only thing #2 likes better than worksheets are gummy snacks, playing outside runs a super close 3rd. we have been working on colors, letters, numbers & anything else i can find that i think they will have fun doing. some of it is a step back for my monster but we all need to review sometimes & she does other stuff after he leaves too. the other day the lil monster did almost 30 worksheets all together. i print enough for them to have some the next day but they do them ALL...they actually ask to do another & another & another...its crazy!!maybe once they get this silly alphabet mess over with i can get them started on some stuff that is more fun like history, spelling & latin....maybe i can get them into college at age 6 or heck maybe 5 who knows....the possibilities are endless.   i am so happy that they love learning.

thursday i made them charts for behavior. i went back & gave stickers for the rest of the week & #2 has all of his stickers but the monster is missing a few....surprise surprise huh. i really hope the charts will be incentive enough to help the lil monster be...umm...less of a monster....yeah we shall see.