Attack of the Tazmanian Night Gnomes

Dang Tazmanian Night Gnomes. Wifey tries SO hard to keep our home clean but after she goes to bed, that's when they strike. Nothing is safe and no barriers nor locks will stop them.  I came home from a usual night shift this morning with thoughts of soft pillows and relaxing, monotonous fan sounds whirring quietly at my bedside. I unlocked the front door and walked in through the living room. That's when I began to see traces that they had been there. Curious yet destructive little critters.

Here lies the remnants of an important letter. Scissors visible on the edge of the counter. A Gnome boot lays cold and abandoned. 

They got hungry, left the cabinet open, and left evidence of a sugary preference.

I'm guessing there's a shortage of gnome painters in Tazmania, so they used Wifey's craft resources wisely. Why worry about foam green overspray when you have tile floor to catch it?

A bloated super mega mega toilet paper roll was victim of an apparent walk-by toilet clogging.

A slap in the face: the DP was returned to the fridge with one... gulp... left. Doh!

Poor Ramen, never saw it coming. Bits of noodle still strewn about.

They sneak in at night, when no one is the wiser. No sounds of doors creaking open, no slamming cabinets. They quietly glide about the house, leaving destruction in their wake with no witnesses to call them out.  Besides, who in their right mind would be awake at the wee hours of the morn to catch such dastardly deeds? I'm surprised the kids haven't seen them. Being on summer break and all. I mean, they're up til 4am...and sleep til noon...and...hey, wait a minute!

Dang kids. Welp, gotta hurry up and get to sleep...before mom wakes up ;-)

Lessons Learned Staying At Home

You used my WHAT?!...as a WHAT?!
(Image courtesy of Warner Bros.)

Wifey has our three oldest daughters on a weekend Grand Session retreat and I, lucky soul that I am, get the pleasure of spending a few days at  home with our three toddlers. Although I am getting an increasingly stronger knot up the right side of my neck, I am learning some very valuable lessons. Why not share?

Lesson #1: Diversity.
There is NO way, at ANY given time, that ALL three girls will agree on the same activity. Luckily for me, the two year old will agree with anything upon receiving Cheetos. Majority rules!

Lesson #2: Tolerance
After hugging his neck in a choke hold fashion, tugging his leg when he tries to sneak away, or being cornered by three squealing little girls, our newly adopted eight year old Cocker Spaniel has yet to even act like it bothers him.

Lesson #3: Think before you speak...er, make an offer.
On day two of our "what are we going to do now" fun-athon, I offered to load everyone up in the Orange Jeep and hit the local Sonic. Sounded easy enough...in my head...without REALLY thinking about. The girls were excited about it as well and quickly ran about looking for shoes and scrunchies.   It wasn't until AFTER I let the excitement build that I realized I had to hook in car seats...during a heat advisory. So, not only was it 105 degrees outside, it was also a seemingly 200 degrees INSIDE the Jeep where my big six foot three self had to climb in and lock the seats in place. Oh, and air conditioning helps little with a soft top. I won't be doing THAT again.

Lesson 4: Possibilities are endless.
It is, to my amazement, possible to forget to wipe, flush, and/or turn the light off...27 times in ONE day. Heck, I didn't even know it was possible to waddle from couch to toilet with pants dropped to the ankles THAT fast. These kids are adaptable!

Lesson 5: Security can be thwarted...and sometimes WAY too easily.
Even if the door is locked, with the key on TOP of the door jamb, a determined three year old can still open the adjoining window and climb into mom's craft room (we added onto the house, so once "outside" windows are now "inside" windows.) You'd be amazed at how much floor space unwound ribbon can fill.

Lesson 6: Limitations are only bound by imagination.
Just because you block off or lock up most of the house and anything that you THINK may become a huge mess doesn't mean that your toddler won't find something seemingly harmless and simple (TOOTHPASTE) and resurface your bathroom sink with it. At least my little Rembrandt left a little in the tube.

Lesson 7: You can be anything you want to be.
You can be a mermaid, Rapunzel, an Island Princess, a fairy, a Musketeer, or Thumbelina. Especially if you are Barbie. Oh, and you can have a Diamond Castle AND a Pegasus.

Lesson 8: Schedule schmedule.
Your schedule is just that...YOUR schedule. Just because it is 3am and MOST people are sleeping doesn't mean that you won't wake to a two year old needing to go potty (yay for potty training, boo for doing it at 3am.) Sleep is now considered a privilege.

I'll have to stop there. Not because the lessons have stopped but because my concentration on this posting have been interrupted for a billionth time. Now, first things first, where's that Advil...

Half Boy...Half Girl

Are they called tights? Stockings? Not sure

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Time for Dad to get a haircut. As with any chore "away from home," I chose one child to go with me. Wifey and I do this in an attempt to get some one-on-one time with each of our six girls.

I finally figured out a way to be "fair" and avoid the dreaded argument "...but SHE got to go LAST time!" I use a Droid app called COLORNOTE. I created a list with each daughter's name. Each time a daughter goes with me on an errand, a quick click on her name marks it with a strike-through mark. Done! One less drama in a house FULL of drama (sometimes.)

Anyway, back to the reason for the post.
Due to arriving at the Sports Clips shortly after a Dad with two boys, all needing haircuts, I had a little time to kill. My five year old and I snuck next door for a little yogurt from The Golden Spoon. As we nibbled our candy-coated yogurt, two unusually dressed boys entered to chit chat with the teeny bopper behind the counter.

One boy had jeans cut off as shorts and cuffed with black stockings underneath. Jewelry gleamed from their faces like one of my preteen's bling'd-out cell phones from a couple years ago.

After examining the boys' attire, the following discussion ensued:

5 year old: "Daddy, I thought only girls wore those kinda pants?"

Me: "Yes honey, they do."

...a few minutes passes by.

5 year old states matter-of-factly: "Daddy...that boy is half girl."

Trying not to choke on my yogurt, I snickered "Yes honey, he is."

Easter Jewelry Made By Mommy

Our girls were delighted with their Easter necklaces and happily wore them to church. Mom is getting VERY good at making things with her sewing machine AND by hand.

This post was originally sent from my Droid Incredible via SMS text but for some reason pictures are not going through. I'll have to dig through the Blogger instructions to find out why. Otherwise, I might start trying to blog via email from my Droid.

The Orange Jeep Got Egged!

We spent last evening celebrating Easter with family. It was a terrific evening with lots of good conversation and delicious food. Today we'll be celebrating at  home and going to church this afternoon.


Gotta run, there's some chocolate with my name on it!

Eggs in the backyard

Six little girls get six little Easter baskets

Happy Easter!

The Dad-blog-dom...or lack thereof.

I just checked with my friend google for a blog related to dads. Blog posts that were updated regularly and offered relate-able content that average dads can use in their day to day lives. Like how to fix stuff when it breaks, how to grow food for the family, fix cars and install wall niches. Stuff that, as dads, we come across every week in our lives and wonder "How am I going to do that?"

By the time I got to the second result, I noticed the last two entries were 2011 and 2009. Not much activity out there! I went through link after link to dad blogs listed in the top ten results on my google search. If it was updated regularly, most of the time there were enough curse words in the posts that I wouldn't let MY kid read it. If I had a dad blog, I would want it clean enough that my kids could read it.

So here I am. Let's see if I can add something worthwhile to the anals of Dad-dom. Wait, that didn't sound right...