Musings from Laney...

Last night we were all in the car driving Laney to basketball practice and TJ was crying, I was lost, and Laney was musing as normal. It went as follows:

Laney: "Jen, Jen, Jen...(until I finally say 'What') Nathan N has not been at school for three days."

Jen: "Do you miss him?"
Laney: "Not really. Well maybe a little bit. He was out on Monday, Tuesday, and Today. That makes three days. He is my friend, so I guess I miss him. He is not my boyfriend though, I do not have a boyfriend. So I miss him like a friend, not miss him like a boyfriend."

Jen: "Ok" (because mind you TJ is still crying, I am still lost, and Adam is also calling my name from the back seat to ask me to put Kids Bop on the radio for the hundredth time)

Laney: "Jen, Jen...Daniel P was also absent today."
Jen: "Oh really (afraid at this point I am going to get the whole attendance report while I drive around looking for this elementary school). "
Laney: "Yes, but he was only out today."
Jen: "Did you miss him?"
Laney: "Not really, he says cuss words."

And that was it.

Happy Birthday TJ!!

TJ had his first birthday this week. We are having a party this weekend. In the interim my dad always calls and sings Happy Birthday on the answering machine for everyone's birthdays. Its his thing. So I have saved it and was playing it again for TJ and the kids yesterday. They all go very excited (including TJ who beams each time he hears it) and started shouting, "That's grandpa Tom, that's grandpa Tom!" I answered, that yes it was. Then Ashley looks thoughtfully at the recorder and says, "He sounds like he is getting OLD!"

REALLY Chewy...

So if you read this often, you know, my children are not allowed to criticize, critique, or any way be disrespectful about dinner preparations. This includes, but is not limited to:

I don't like that
That's yucky
Ewww
How many bites do I HAVE to eat (usually spoken as soon as we sit down)

and generally any other show of disgust.

Now this has not always been easy as I have served some not so great dinners before. Once Ashley was sitting in time out when my sister arrived at my house, and Kim asked her why she was there (clearly breaking the rule of not talking to the kid in time out). Ashley replied, "Because I complained about my dinner and would not eat it, but (she added for good measure), Aunt Kim it was NOT very good." Kim came into the kitchen and asked about dinner, I replied, "It was pot roast, but it was not the best." Still, I can say it, the kids cannot.

Once I served a pasta dish for dinner. However, as I was making it I realized we were low on pasta. I added some old lasagna noodles to the pot. Then I realized the sauce was also low, so I added some canned tomatoes (would have been ok if they were not the chipotle variety), and when I realized we had no Parmesan cheese, I added slices of American to the top. Even I would not make anyone eat that dish. But, I digress.

So, after many battles the children have learned to say compliments only at dinner time, or if they don't have anything nice to say, they have been instructed to simply say 'thank you', because after all, at least there is dinner on the table. Last night I made stir fry (another page in our dinners from other countries quest) for the second time in two weeks. I picked up some stew meat because it was on sale, and tried to marinate it for two days to tenderize it. However, I knew I had been unsuccessful, when before I even had one bite, Laney commented, "Jen, this dinner is really good because you can just chew and chew and keep on chewing and the meat never goes away. Its very...CHEWY"

How about next time Laney, you just say, 'Thank You!'