I've realized that almost on a daily basis I talk with my sister April and she laughs at me (not with me) at the moments I have with my children. She is laughing most likely in relief that she is not experiencing these moments herself with her own boys because they are now grown up. That, of course, is her challenge: to deal with the almost empty-nest syndrome. I'm a little green with envy on some days when I have too many "moments".
Just this morning as I was driving Giggles to school he said to me, "mom can I do THIS?" and raised his fourth finger to me. "No Giggles, you can't." "But it isn't my middle finger!" "The intent is the same so don't do it." I replied."
Now if you know our neighborhood you know that our street gets the bus. So you are probably wondering why I was driving Giggles (and Smiley) to school today. For that I would have to take you back to last week's "moment". It was a doozey. For many days I was hearing reports from big brothers that Giggles and Smiley were not acting properly on the bus. I kept reminding them that they needed to follow the rules of the bus. I even tried silly band offers and stickers as an incentive. Apparently, little plastic bands, stickers and the possibility of time out just weren't enough. Jumping OVER bus seats, "falling" into the aisle repeatedly, standing on the seats and hitting other kids was just too much fun. As I waited at the bus stop with the boys the bus pulled up and the driver honked at me. I came over and she told me that Giggles and Smiley were on the verge of - you guessed it - being kicked off the bus. Nice. Can't say that I blame her really. I followed my wise guru of a sister and voluntarily took them off before they could be kicked off. They are having "practice time" in the morning until they are ready to try again on the bus.
Now if you don't like gross things please stop reading now and click on someone else's blog to read about pretty flowers or go to ebay and start your Christmas shopping. Otherwise please continue reading for my next "moment". This one actually had me laughing. It isn't really funny but it is the way my husband presented it to me that had me laughing. Sheriff and Wannabe share a bathroom downstairs (again... final warning...you may want to stop here and move on to another more pleasant blog or website). They have a terrible habit of not flushing the toilet. Because they are downstairs and Brett and I are rarely downstairs we don't often catch the problem unless we happen to go down for something: which again is rare. The boys had gone to bed for the night and my superhearing picked up the sounds of laughter coming from the basement. Brett went down to investigate and had them settle back down. He came back upstairs and described the downstairs toilet as looking like "Yoda's Dagoba system" and that he fully expected Luke Skywalker's x-wing fighter to rise up out of the toilet at any moment. His vividly accurate description had me laughing for two minutes straight.
Let's not forget doing homework with Smiley. Here is a classic example: "Smiley, listen to this pattern: circle, triangle, circle, triangle. What comes next?" His response: "Square?"
Or two days ago when Sheriff lost his tooth and Smiley took Sheriff's tooth and put it in his own mouth grossing everyone in the family out (I'm gagging right now).
Or just two minutes ago when I paused to take pictures of my nephew for his mother's Christmas gift (don't worry she already knows what it is... I'm not ruining the surprise or anything) and I walk back in the room to discover Smiley in the pantry standing on his stool trying to take Halloween candy without permission. -sigh-
I guess that means I'll be calling my sister again today...
Our tree is not a fancy tree but a hodge podge mixture of decorations from my childhood, gifts from neighbors, and ornaments the boys have made. 
I take pride in the fact that we made it through the process without any bloody noses or time outs. Whew! Now if I can only get all of the stockings finished in time for Christmas....
