I Take it Back

Can you take a thank you back? Is that wrong?

The moderate success of our evening out with Brian Regan on Thursday made us bold enough to try going out for dinner on Friday. I think perhaps we were a little over confident or a little over eager with our new-found freedom. Or perhaps the little ones were a little over confident and a little over eager to have mom and dad gone a second night in a row.

We attempted to eat at the Olive Garden but we arrived too late and the wait was going to be much too long. We realized that going to a movie and eating dinner inside would take the same amount of time and settled on seeing Sherlock Holmes. We called Sheriff and informed him of the change of plans. We were interrupted with only one phone call during the movie with the question, "is there any of MY popcorn in the house?" (Sheriff has butter-free popcorn due to lactose intolerance). With that question answered we settled in to watch a great movie....

And returned home to this...

Do not be fooled by the label UNO on the cards. They are in fact Ninja stars. That explains why there are ALL OVER THE ROOM. Picture that last night after they cracked into their treat bags.

Oh dear.

School Bus Vows

We are now into the month of December and my lectures... uh... discussions with Smiley continue on how to act properly on the bus. Every day after school Sheriff and Wannabe report that Smiley stood up while the bus was driving, and/or hit someone on the bus. So we walk to the bus stop the next day going over the school's BIG 3 - Respect, Responsibility and Safety.

Smiley looked up at me this morning after another discussion of where his bum should be and said with in all sincerity, "Mom, I will never stop standing on the bus."

I believe he means it.

Up

I have never actually watched the movie "Up" all the way through. But after my experience this morning with one of my boys I now know who the creators of Up based their dog character on - my son.

As we walked to the bus stop this morning and I spoke (lectured) to him about how to be safe and respectful he suddenly pointed and shouted, "squirrel!".

If I hadn't seen it in "Up" I probably would have been irritated but having seen the absurdity of it in the movie I actually had to turn my head to hide my smile and bite my lip to stop from laughing.

And where were we? Oh right... back to the lecture.

X Marks the Spot????

Just when you think your kids are growing up and being more responsible they go and surprise you with this....

Silly me left an orange Sharpie in my bathroom.  I had been walking around with the current grocery ads and circling low prices in the ads with the marker.  I set the Sharpie down on the bathroom counter earlier in the day and forgot about it.  Stupid me!!!! I'm usually more responsible than that and put all pencils, pens, markers, and scissors away from sticky fingers (and by sticky I don't mean sticky in the sense of needing to be washed if you get my drift).  So after supper when I went into the bathroom for something I was surprised although not shocked when I saw orange markings on the counter top (I didn't see the toilet seat or the toilet paper yet).  Mentally kicking myself for leaving the marker there, I of course figured my 3-year-old did it but we asked all of the kids who did it and they all denied it.  The most emphatic denials coming from my 6 year-old (that should have been my first clue).  I took my 3 year-old into the bathroom and asked him why he did it.  He kept denying it and as I looked closer at the counter-top markings I realized that under the scribble was a beautiful number 8.  Bingo!  Giving my 3 year-old a hug I said thanks for telling the truth and called in my 6 year-old whose number 8s I recognize and asked him again why he drew on the counter.  I kid you not..... when I was growing up when we were asked by our parents why we did something our response was always "I don't know" my boys give me this "because I wanted to".  I think I would rather have the "I don't know" suggesting they were out of their minds when they did it versus knowingly doing something wrong.  In the process of discovering that it was my 6 year-old he managed to lie to me 3 times and to Brett once (while I was in the bathroom with my 3 year-old).  So he actually got in more trouble for lying than he did for drawing on the counter-top.  Poor kid!  

Anyways the point of this story is actually to ask for suggestions on how to get permanent marker out of the toilet seat.  I have been able to get it faded somewhat by using Goo Gone and Clorox Bathroom cleaner while scrubbing with a toothbrush.  Any other ideas to get the rest of it off or do I have to live with a toilet seat marked with an X?  (we just bought this seat 2 months ago.... sigh...)