My mom even thinks they're weird

What does it say about my children that my own mother calls them weird?

We were hanging out at her house yesterday, doing some chores for her and visiting. My mom was quiet, which is unusual for her. I watched her for a while and realized she was just watching the kids. The girls have recently learned the chicken dance, and they do it often. Their version of it is a little different from what you may know as the chicken dance. What they do is much more like the way real chickens would dance, if they were inclined to do so. There is no order to it. They tuck their hands up in their armpits, then do this combination of jumping and running all over the room. They do, however, have the most annoying part of the whole thing down pat - the song. They know every note of it, and they sing it loudly while they do their crazy flapping thing.

It's my own fault that they know the song. I bought Molly this stupid dancing chicken at Easter, and it's been played until the batteries died. Someone replaced them, instantly putting him at the very top of my list. He spends a lot of time at the top of The List. I still haven't forgiven you for it, honey.

The girls chicken danced for pretty darn near an hour without stopping, then they lined up directly in front of my mother and launched into a rousing chorus of "It's a Small World." I let them have at it. It's not fair that I'm the only one who is subjected - I mean treated - to this kind of entertainment daily, so I let them sing for her. They sang for a long time. When mom's eyes started to cross, I sent them to find something else to do.

When the girls left the room to find something to destroy, we noticed Bryan. He was laying on the couch with his head hanging over the side, iPod headphones firmly in place, bobbing his head back and forth. He plays his music loud, like a good teenager. It was loud enough that when the song ended and a new one began, we clearly heard it switch. Two seconds into the next song, his eyes popped open and he jumped off the couch like something bit him in the butt. He yelled like I wasn't sitting directly in front of him, 6 feet away. "MOOOOOMMMM!"

He stood in front of me, mouth working like a codfish, which reminded me of Mary Poppins. Close your mouth, Michael, you are not a codfish. When he finally found the ability to form words, a torrent flew forth from his mouth.

"Moooommmmm, I can not believe you put this song in my iTunes! I hate the Little Mermaid! I don't want to be a part of her world! I am so going to kill you! WHY would you do that, and WHY didn't you tell me? If my friends see this song on my iPod I will never live it down! Grrrrrrrrrrrr!"

Oops. I can see how that might be a little embarrassing for him. In spite of the fact that he was obviously traumatized, I couldn't help but sing the song.

"Look at this stuff..."

"Mom, no."

"Isn't it neat?"

"Oh, mom. Really?"

"Wouldn't you think my collection's complete?"

"Mom, I swear, if you do that in front of my friends on Tuesday I'll die."

"Wouldn't you think I'm a girl, girl who has everyyyythinggggg...."

He left the room, grumbling under his breath, wondering if it was possible to actually die from embarrassment. Mission accomplished.

Because I'm easily distracted (oooh, shiny!), I didn't notice that the girls never came back in the room. I called them, wondering what they found to do that entertained them for a full ten minutes. They came running, and I found out. Toilet paper. They were playing with toilet paper. Abby was wearing a long TP scarf, flipping it over her shoulder with the skill of a madam. Molly decorated herself a little differently with her TP. She had two footlong lengths of it, each twisted tightly at one end, stuffed firmly up each nostril and trailing out of her nose. It was like the worst possible case of nose hair gone wrong. She stood in front of me, grinning like the Cheshire Cat.

I looked at my mom. She was shaking her head, a look of amazement on her face. "Your kids are SO weird."

Yeah, they are, and I love them for it. I can't imagine where they get that from. ;-)

I could charge admission to my car.

I've been spending a lot of time in the car lately. One of the downsides to being a parent is that you automatically become a chauffeur (and a maid, laundress, tutor and personal chef). It gets tiring, driving from here to there all the time. Lucky for me, I have entertaining children.

My kids love to listen to the radio in the car, mainly because we car dance. If you've never car danced, you should try it. It will most definitely entertain you, and will absolutely humiliate your teenagers. We were driving down a 6 lane highway the other day when "Mr. Roboto" came on the radio. My son started praying out loud that all the stoplights would be green. I guess God has a sense of humor, because we got stopped every quarter mile. I do a mean robot, and now the girls do, too. I would pretend to feel sorry for my son, but... well, I don't. He has done his share of embarrassing things, so he can suck it up and deal.

I like to sing in the car, too. I don't sing in the shower. I actually don't sing anywhere but the car. I wasn't blessed with a melodious voice, so it's best to confine my singing as much as possible. I get a little too much echo in the shower, and I don't even want to hear my warbling repeated back to me, so the shower is out. The car works for me. My favorite genre is 80's music, and I seriously know every song written in that decade. One of the local stations does a "Friday Night 80's" show, and we happened to be in the car for it on Friday (thus the Mr. Roboto dance party). A few minutes after I retired my robot, I heard a popular tune from my early teen years. I was belting it out at top volume, much to my son's chagrin. He did the mega-sigh, and I kept on singing.

"Tell it to my heart, tell me I'm the only one, is this really love or just a gaaaaame.."

"Hey, Mom? Who sings this song?"

"Taylor Dayne!"

"Ummm, can we keep it that way?"

"Fine, then. No more serenade for you. There are children in third world countries who never got a serenade in the car by their loving mother. How dare you complain. I'm ashamed of you."

"You're ashamed? Pffft."

That wasn't nice. At least I tone it down a little when his friends are with us. I try to sing songs from decades that they were alive in.

My most recent car entertainment has been courtesy of my daughters. I really don't know where they learned this, but they yell at other cars. I'm not an aggressive driver, and I keep my road rage in check by singing badly, so I'm certain that they did not learn it from me. I'll have to remember to thank their father.

So I'm driving down the highway (singing Life is a Highway - imagine that) and hit a little bit of congestion. I slow to a crawl, and turned the radio down a little. I know that I'm not the only person who adjusts the volume of the radio to match the speed I'm driving, so don't laugh at me. When I go slow, I have to turn it down. It just makes sense. Anyway, when I slowed down, I heard a bellow from the backseat. "Move out of the way, cars!"

Awww, cute.

"I said, move out of the way, FARTHEADS!"

What? Oh, no. I swear, I did not teach her that word, either. Abby chimed in with a, "Yeah, fawtheads!"

Super-dee-duper. I'm always proud when they add new words to their vocabularies, but it seems like every third new word is one that they can't say in church. I glanced to my left, and noticed a nice looking older couple in an expensive sedan waving at my daughters. I could see from their giggly grins that they thought my kids were being cute. I looked in the rearview mirror in time to see Molly sticking her tongue out, and Abby waving while chanting, "Hi, fawtheads! Hi, fawtheads!"

I'm so proud. I'm thinking about making them signs. I'm already out of the running for Mother of the Year, so I might as well make my children useful. Next time I'm stuck in traffic, I'll give them signs to hold up to other drivers. I think I'll start with a pair of signs, one for each girl. Molly can hold "You're ugly," and Abby can hold, "and your momma dresses you funny." I'd laugh if I saw that while driving. Then again, I have a sick, sick sense of humor.

My kids are going to wind up on YouTube one day. I just hope they're more popular than the Britney Spears guy.