Hi all,
If you like what you've seen here be sure to head over to the Kelso Kids page on Word Press or Facebook to see more of our shenanigans. Just remember, when it's quiet and something smells funny...it's best to wait and breath before you open that door.

Who runs this world? Toddlers. What a stupid question, hand her a tiara and just open the box of crackers already, silly mama.

Be nice to each other

Nora asked about "my grandma" and I explained she was sick and resting in Oregon City. She said, "I need my backpack!" She filled her backpack with bandaids and her phone and said, "Let's go!"

Moments

Nora tricking Jamie w the classic "made you look" and tapping his nose saying "boop".

Owen hearing a baby pass by outside crying and looking up at me to hoot questioningly like an owl.

Nora complimenting my dress, telling me, "Oh, you have a dress on, mama? It's beautiful! You're pretty, mama. Go look in the mirror, mama. You're beautiful."

The two of them cuddling and laughing before their nap.

Her consoling him, "Ooh, it's ok, Owey. It's ok, Owen."

test ~ 5-25-2014

Having feedburner issues - sorry, folks!

Photos and small moments ~ May 15th thru May 23rd, 2014

             

I had planned on going to Ikea in the first pic, he had other plans. The second pic is a week later. At least I managed to get a shower that day before he trapped me on the couch. No one is to move once he's asleep.

I love this photo. He is truly mini-Jamie.
I couldn't figure out why he flipped out every time I put a knit hat on him...

This face was expressing "I love my brother but please don't take photographic evidence"...please. I had heard them stirring from their nap together and came in to find her reading him a book.  

Once the camera came out she got mad and split. Good thing she didn't wake up earlier (see below).

Clasping feet and hands ala Mr. Burns-style.

Little did she know I had snuck in earlier and caught these.

We had bought a stuffed puppy dog for Nora at Ikea a couple years ago and she had no interest in playing with it once we were home. It had been thrown in to one of the baby toy totes in hopes that maybe he would like it...I think he likes it just fine.

The old me is in there somewhere

Whenever I happen to see the clock says 4:20 I make the buttrock bull horns hand sign and laugh like Sean Penn from Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and say "righteous", just to make myself laugh.

I still check my rearview mirror for cops and I can't remember the last time I needed to worry about this. The only thing I see now are carseats.

There are three different sizes, one pair of each, of my favorite Calvin Klein jeans stashed under the bed. Currently, none of them fit me. And none of them are in style. I'm hoping that will change with time. If not, I love my new yoga pants wardrobe so it's ok... I just realized what I said. The old me would have tapped her cigarette ash, ordered a Manhattan, and stopped reading this.

I use to check my email every couple hours to check for notes from friends, concert notices, airline deals, and social invitations. Now I check for kid event notices, baby product deals, and newsletters about parenting, psychology, pathology, and toy recalls. Emails from friends are pounced on like the last bag of Funyons at a Gorge concert.

Travel shows are no longer an inspiration but a whimsical vicarious escape. I don't look anything like my passport picture any longer. I DO look like my driver's license photo, unfortunately.

If I wake up with someone breathing and giggling in my ear I don't panic about what I look like, if they saw me drewling, if they heard me snore or fart. I know they did. Because it's most likely our kids. Nora's hair that smells like sunshine and her breath that smells like canned seafood. Owen who smells like malt, amber oil, and toe jam. A musky sweet boy stench with milk burps and farts that smell like popcorn.

I no longer have date underwear. I have the same underwear for everything. It's more of a question as to whether or not I'll wear any underwear when I leave the house.

The last warm meal I ate that wasn't reheated in a microwave was brought to me by my friend, Nicole, as a surprise. It was from Burgerville. That was the best lunch I've had in a long time.

I'm sick and they're not sick enough ~ May 22, 2014

Note the diabolical smile on his face.

"Bless you," Nora replied to each of Owen's sneezes between shoving crackers in to her mouth while her eyes never left watching Daniel Tiger. We were on our third kid PBS show, second box of Kleenex, second outfit for Owen and his first bottle, and my third mug of tea. It was 10 a.m. Nora ran to switch in to a different dress out of the basket from her room at the end of each show. At least she puts them back in the basket now when she's done. Before she put them in the dirty clothes hamper.

Owen fell asleep for his first nap after much peeing and burping. I nestled him into his bouncer and stretched my aching body. My lower back ached more than usual, my ears itched as if someone had inserted feathers in them, my eyes always feel lacerated with sand happen to close for a moment and I thought about what drugs are safest to take for head congestion if breastfeeding when I heard,
"Oh! I wrap him up." 

Nora had wadded up a blanket and tucked it around Owen's head like a giant bib. Thankfully he was still asleep and merely farted in response. Nora followed up by piling pillows on him to "keep him warm". It didn't phase him. She laughed as he kicked at them in his sleep and farted more. She quickly tired of this and asked that I chase her.

I gave pursuit for about ten minutes and collapsed on the couch to blow my nose. She went to stare morosely out the front door and said in a Streisand-Yentl-esque timbre, " Come back, Papa."

Later, once Jamie was home, she tried to chorale him in her room to keep us from talking. When that failed she sang "Grown ups come back...", her favorite Daniel Tiger tune, from her room to guilt him into coming back in and playing with her dollhouse. It worked.

Not yet ~ May 19, 2014

I've got hazel eyes like my Papa but he says they're brown, just like his.
You be the judge.

I read a heap of books about pregnancy and delivery when I was pregnant with Nora. None of which did me any good or served any purpose. (Note to pregnant women everywhere: If you're going to read something make sure it's funny, about postpartum, parenting or all preferably!)

While pregnant with Owen I read books to Nora about babies and being a sister. One of her favorites being "Are you Ready for Baby?" which had the refrain "No, not yet!" in response to the many questions the book posed about what a baby could do.

So far our resident baby can:  grab and pull (clothing, hair, skin), clasp his hands or feet like Mr. Burns, hold his head up, aim and touch (my cheek, Nora, stuffed animals), roll onto his stomach from his back (then grouses and looks like a stranded flipped Kafka-esque turtle), occasionally say "hi" and/or waves, coos up a storm, laughs, and kicks quite strongly (sometimes ill timed). Yet his biggest fete of strength so far is charming his sister. A hard won challenge at times but who can resist a smiling baby staring up at you adoringly? A three year old in the midst of a power struggle for attention.

Her love for him can only be rivaled by the wrath of her temper tantrums. The rare moments away from our kids are spent discussing them and Nora's temper is the popular topic as of late. I stay up late, nursing Owen in bed, researching different approaches and theories. None of which are helpful in the moment of a sanity skewering tempest of a meltdown when your child is shrieking at full volume, crying, screaming, kicking, flailing and you're trying to help her, remain calm, help her calm herself in the midst of prying, judging, and questioning from others. All the while feeling angry that she scared her brother, helpless to understand her or be understood, unappreciated,...exhausted, just exhausted. At the end of it, when she's speaking clearly and when my patience returns, I hug her and remind her I love her. Silently I wish that was the last of the temper tantrums and wonder how many hours until Jamie is home.

I know she's testing us and wanting reassurance from us and I see her sadness at missing my full attention in the moments she has it once again. She fights going to bed now but seems to resist less if it's me putting her to bed. As I was the other night when I read her favorite bedtime book, and mine, On The Night You Were Born. We reached the end, I wished her good night, kissed and hugged her, and as I went to turn out her lamp, "No, not yet!" I reminded her it was time to sleep, that she could only leave her room for the potty, and shut the door to her screaming. 

Sometimes the hardest moments in parenting for me are not making the decisions but living with them once they're made. I write this as I sit and listen to her scream in her room, refusing to nap but clearly exhausted, and wish there was an easier way. But, like I was guilty of saying in the past (much to the horror and shock of a fellow mother), "If I wanted it easy I would have had stupid children."