does anybody else....

• have a toddler who lays on the ground and laps up water from puddles when they are thirsty?

•  or have children who say with the utmost drama, "If you don't let me have cotton candy, then i will NEVER have cotton candy again!  i don't deserve cotton candy anyway, i don't deserve anything!  Fordy deserves everything, he can have all my legos and all my animals!"

• or do you have a dog that lays next to you all sweet and sleepy and then proceeds to have the worst gas you've ever smelled?

• or do you ever need to make two pies by 6:00pm and have your house cleaned up for houseguest, yet you decide to sit around and write a stupid blog entry because you are afraid of the lemon merinque pie? 

i do.

love(y) lost and found

so we lost "doggie."  who is now, "bobby doggie" because ford has started calling him "Bobbieeee"  however, frank's bear is called Bobby because his cousin Hank's bear is called Bobby.  so in order to separate the bear from the dog, we call him "bobby doggie."  we also call him this because it makes us laugh.  say it out loud.  for real.  you can't help but laugh when you say, "bobby doggie."

last night I had my first BSF class (Bible Study Fellowship).  While preparing dinner and waiting for michael to get home so that i could run out the door, Ford was already a crying mess because he was hungry and tired and i could not find bobby doggie.  He still hadn't eaten when i left the house, and I could tell it might be hard to put him to bed.  I was, however, confident that bobby doggie was around somewhere and wouldn't be hard to find.

when i arrived home 2 hours later, frank was still awake and the dinner had not been put away, and i asked, "what's going on?"
to which michael replies, "i can't find the dog."

i start to be immediately concerned, because i assumed he was refering to Angus - because angus is the dog.  i go outside and start looking for him, and then it occurs to me that he was not talking about the real canine, but bobby doggie.  to which i explained that if you only would call him by his correct name, we would not have this type of confusion in the house.

michael had spent the past 2 hours unable to console ford and unsuccessful in finding that ridiculous piece of fabric that means so much to him.  he had searched inside and outside for over an hour and announced that he was done. 

Now here is the amazing thing, our good friends Alex and Don have been searching for a replacement doggie for months now just in case something like this ever happens.  and i just received bobby doggie2 in the mail just 3 days ago!  However...he is too fluffy and the tag has not been greased down with snot and drool yet, so as soon as i hand it to him, he launches it out of the crib.  (i will attempt to break him in on my own.)

Eventually, ford gave it up and went to sleep.  I asked michael if we could pray for bobby doggie, to which he laughed and said one of the funniest prayers that i have ever heard.
"Dear Lord, please help us find Bobby Doggie.  He is important to Ford, so he is important to us, I guess.  Amen."

around midnight, ford woke up because he couldn't find his friend in his bed.  he was restless and searching for him while he was asleep.  AND HERE IS WHERE BOBBY DOGGIE2 SAVES THE DAY.  Ford didn't notice the difference while he was asleep!  at least at first.

bobby doggie2 bought me at least a few hours of sleep, until around 4 when i had to sleep with him in frank's bed (as frank was already in my bed complaining of a hurt ankle. seriously, who hurts their ankle at 4:00am?) until morning.  apparently the only other substitute for a rag with a head is his mom's face that he plays with while sleeping.

it was a rough morning with two cranked kids and a mama with a dirty kitchen, no coffee and feeling anxiety about a missing piece of fabric.  I prayed some more, and then to my great joy, i started looking in the playroom closet, and there he was, all disgusting as always, hidden under a black cowboy hat.

Praise the Lord.  you should have seen Ford's face.  he held that germ trap up to his cheek like a lover who had been away at war.  he has not relinquished it yet.

see if you can find him.  bobby doggie somehow even made it into ford's baptism.

i'm thinking pretty seriously about learning to play the banjo.

today, i took my boys to Sephora

and it was fun.

they are ridiculous.  frank sampled almost every single perfume on the little sticks and brought each one to me with great joy at how "great" they all smelled.  His favorite was when he combined 5 different vanilla scents together on one stick.

meanwhile his mom just could not decide between two different perfumes herself.  I probably spent 40 minutes debating between something i love and have worn for years:

and something new that i really, really like, but seemed risky.

Its risky because when it comes to a perfume, i feel that it can really set the tone for how I will feel about myself and about the day or evening ahead.  I only wear it on special occasions and want the smell to match all of those occasions.  plus it's expensive and i can only buy one every few years.  perfume purchasing should not be taken lightly.

the only reason i am even at sephora is because my sweet husband has already purchased and returned two different perfumes that i have rejected as either "too old lady" smelling or "too sweet and sorority girl" smelling.  now i am on my own. 

i ended up finding another at the last minute, and decided it must be the one for me.

it has a nice orange fragrance mixed with basil.  after a while the orange fades and it just smells nice.  like a good soap.  i like soap.  soap smells good and not too overwhelming.... but I am still not sure that i will keep it.

but i am sure that frank and ford at Sephora was exhausting and hilarious all at the same time. (thankfully the sweet sales lady thought so, too.)  After frank discovered that there was a "man's" cologne section, he smelled most of them and then declared that he must have "the blue one." meanwhile, ford had gotten a hold of some cheek stain that i was holding in one hand while holding him in the other, and he managed to take it, and unscrew the lid, and had already applied "blushing bride" to his sweet cheek before i even noticed he had gotten hold of it.  and as i am blending it into his glowing cheek, i then hear:

"mama please, i just have to have the blue one, it smells sooo good."

"Well frank, cologne is expensive - and it is actually for men.  so when you are a man and have a job and have money, you can buy yourself the blue one."

"I can't wait to be a man! so then i can have a job and have money, and then i can buy MAN PERFUME!"

i won't even discuss his reaction to the nail polish.

late night insomnia style writing

tonight, in a state of exhaustion from dinner at chuck e. cheese, cleaning a vomit coated toddler, having a bourbon and diet dr. pepper, visiting with my most beloved sister, and catching up on my late night internet surfing - i collapsed in bed - only to find multiple tiny, pointy plastic sea creatures under my covers stabbing at my legs.

it is at these strange times, that i rejoice in small children.  and i stop to rejoice that i had a reason to go to chuck e. cheese, and a reason to get ice cream yesterday at 6:00.  I got to pretend to "get married" today about 6 times to both my niece and my son.  and i get to read children's books - i honestly think i like some of them more than grown up books.  I have found more depth and beauty in Eric Carle's "A Home for Hermit Crab." than i have in many 200 page adult fiction novels.  

kids are funny.  like when ford decided he must wear his new long sleeve t-shirt with an excavator on it - immediately - while still in the cart at Old Navy. he literally rubbed it on his belly until i put it on him, despite it being 90 degrees outside.  he then refused to take it off.  i had to break off the tag and hand it to the cashier.  i love the contagious zeal for life that these two have. i love how everything that frank does - he does 100%.  we get ALL the stuffed animals onto the couch with us, and then we put ALL the blocks into the boat we are building.  and then we put all of his army men into battle at the same time.  He is either ALL in or definitely ALL OUT of his activities.  I am never bored as a home staying mom of two.

damn.  i just found a spider on my foot.  curse you ozarks.

anyway, sometimes i just want a glass of chocolate milk, just like they do.  how happy i am to get to be silly and be a part of so much newness and fascination in two little boys' lives.

that is until i have to decide what the consequence should be of deliberately waking up your younger brother by stomping as hard as you can accross the floor of your shared room after i specifically reminded you not to wake up your brother.  this part does not make me happy, because i don't know what the consequences should be for throwing a bear at your mom when you are angry and disappointed.  i don't know how to deal with hitting and pushing your brother after he messes up your lego cars.  i don't know the answers to all these newfound situations we find ourselves in.  and i can't study for it, because no matter what i think i am going to say when i have caught you in a lie, or watched you deliberately disobey me, no matter what i planned on saying, usually something else entirely comes out of my mouth.

i don't have all the answers to my sweet, goofy boys.  but i am so glad to be here to watch it all go down.  and when i hear my oldest one say to his cousin today from the way back of the car, "my mama never lets me down,"  i sigh and smile and say well, i guess he's glad to have me here, too.

now i can't sleep becaue i am afraid a spider is in my bed.  i bet whoever said that we eat ____ number of spiders in our sleep per year probably lived in the ozarks.  i kill at least one to two daily.  at least they don't crunch like the roaches. 

p.s. as of friday - i officially have a working washer and dryer.  isn't that somethin?  now i have to resume my trips to the basement.  ugh