Well, dear readers, as you may have noticed (I hope you noticed!) I’ve been a complete slacker the last couple weeks. The truth is, with DB’s schedule in flux with him working full time and going to school, plus Butterfly refusing to sleep well at night anymore, I’m just not feeling it. I’d rather not have anything for you to read than expose you to something I ripped out my brain with a pair of pliers.
So, yeah. Hiatus.
I plan on being back in November, so don’t give up on me just yet!
It’s just a mess, and messes go away.
DB started working the night shift last week and it’s had an interesting effect on me.
Yup. That’s me.
Of course, if I’m burnt toast than DB can’t be any better off. Worse, I’d wager.
At least with me, we could scrape off the burnt parts and still come out kind of edible.
Despite our crusty states, these three small things just keep bouncing around us without pause. Like, literally. As in, please-pass-me-the-remote-all-this-motion-makes-me-sick without pause. Even during the night, the wild things creepeth. It’s like they can smell that Momma’s spidey-senses are on high alert and even the littlest, tiniest, cricket-like-est sounds will send her bounding out of bed and streaking into the hallway, a veritable Wonder Woman, magic lasso at the ready.
...tell me, did you REALLY think I’d give away my secret identity to you just ‘cause you read my blog?
Unfortunately, all this nighttime activity leaves my super-strength a bit sapped during daylight hours (bet you didn’t that super-mom’s weakness is daylight, did you? Mothers are vampiric that way). I think what this means is that I need to level up.
Level Up, Verb: To gain enough experience in a video game, through either fighting or questing, that your character “gains” a level, thereby increasing strength, speed, magical ability, etc. Eg., “I got Cloud up to level 99 in the first disc, tracked down Sephiroth, then pwnd him so bad that my PS exploded.”
If you didn’t already know what leveling up was, that probably made it clear as mud, yes?
Let me explain in pictures.
In a video game, as you progress the enemies you fight get more and more difficult. If you fail to level up sufficiently, your characters stay relatively weak. Then bad things happen and you start looking like maybe a zombie revolution would actually be in your favor.
Characters names have been changed for their protection.
So you go out, and you just keep fighting. Even if it’s barely by the skin of your teeth that you make it through battles (or even if it’s only by dint of multiple saves of your game; I’m not sure what the parental equivalent to that would be. Possibly Momma time-out, when you put the kids in their rooms so’s you can pull yourself together), you’ll eventually find that this wonderful, glorious thing happens.
Yippee! I’m strong now!
All at once, you hit harder, run faster, think clearer, and definitely would never, ever lose to munchkins.
Ladybug dressed herself just like this yesterday. I’m not even making that up.
Let’s face it: I can’t give up. My kids will still be there in the morning (and evening and night) regardless. So am I going to give in? Will I lose my schmidt all over everything? Will I explode like some disgusting pig-lizard that’s been turned inside out by a malfunctioning teleportation device?
Maybe.
But I’ll clean up after myself.
And then I’ll keep going.
Because that’s what we do, parents. We haul ourselves up by our bootstraps, and when the bootstraps break we levitate because we just freaking have to.
Props to you, all my parental friends. Go forth and gain many levels so that someday, when we reach the golden years of level 99, we can watch our children struggling and, even though we know we could take all their enemies out with one swing, we won’t. Because we love them.
And we know that it’s worth getting stronger.
i thank You God for most this amazing day.
– e. e. cummings
You can always tell when it’s time for a new type of food around the Dyer household. At the clarion call of “Dinner!” the two elder children rush to the table. There is breathless suspense as they scramble into their seats, then sit down and examine the feast laid before them. Ladybug inevitably spots the suspicious newcomer first. She eyes it, sniffs in its general direction, wrinkles her nose, then opens her mouth and —
Momma interrupts with, “It’s okay, Ladybug. You only have to try one bite.”
Ladybug then twists her head to the side, her mouth in a knot. Strawbee has now noticed the foreign food and is already shrieking “Don’t want it, THANKS.” Ladybug shakes her head.
Momma is too tired to argue, so she comes out with, “All right. Let me get the ketchup and ranch.”
Yes, you read that correctly.
They would eat just this for every meal, if I'd let them.
Ketchup and ranch.
The saviors of our meal time, carefully placed at polar ends of the plate so never the twain shall meet. Despite this, however, they don’t actually eat it like that, separately and all. They don’t carefully choose which condiment will do better with each food. No, no.
They use both.
Ladybug dips hers in ketchup, then the ranch, then in the ketchup again before eating whatever it is. Strawbee just kinda… swirls the two together.
They both lick whatever is left over off of their plates.
Some of the things they’ve eaten with ketchup and ranch:
No, I’m not making that up. And if you asked me how it started, I wouldn’t really know.
Really, all I have to say is: Thank goodness for Costco.
All Hail, Ketchup and Ranch.
Just keep moving and you can’t get bogged down.
I don’t usually do this kind of thing, but Ladybug helped me out and we were pretty proud of how it turned out.
Fall! Fall! It's FAAALLLLL!!!
Best part? It took maybe 10 minutes and the critical eye of a 4 year old. No creativity required from my Momma brain.
Martha better watch out; Ladybug is coming up from behind.
