It's friggin' hot again. It is one week until Christmas, and it's 80 degrees outside today. Seriously, Mother Nature?

When I was a kid, every year I asked Santa for two things: a pony, and snow. Every. Year. Christmas morning brought all kinds of goodies to my house, but never the two things I asked for. The Barbie Townhouse I got one year almost made up for the lack of snow and large animal, but the longing was still there.

I got to an age where I "understood" about Santa, so I started praying for snow. God, if you'll just let it snow this Christmas, I promise to be good for the rest of my life. I guess He knew he'd get the short end of the stick in that deal, because I never had my white Christmas.

I know, you're thinking that you'd love to be where snow shoveling and ice scraping are just things you see on TV. I love it most of the time, too - just not this week. Running the air conditioner on Christmas to keep from breaking a sweat opening gifts is just wrong. Having to crank the AC down to 50 so it feels like winter is wrong too, but we do it every year.

About two Christmases ago (yes, seriously), I finally came to terms with the fact that I'd never see snow on Christmas morning in Florida. This morning, Molly came to me and said, "Mommy, I really want snow for Christmas. Can you send Santa another email?" I told her it doesn't snow here. She drew a picture of snow and asked me to mail it to Santa.

Another tradition continues.

Funny Sign Sunday

I'm deperately trying to get ready for the holidays, and failing miserably. It didn't stop me from scouring the internet for funny pictures today, though.

This sign made me laugh, then made me feel a little guilty for laughing. Poor little Virginia found out the hard way that there is, indeed, a Santa Claus.

I love my kid, but DAMN

Molly is in Pre-K now, and she really loves school. Her favorite thing is show and tell, which is supposed to be on Fridays. I say "supposed to be" because her teacher is very lenient, and if the kids show up toting a treasure, she always makes time for them to show the class.

Today, we left a little late for school. We were engrossed in an episode of Go Diego, Go and totally lost track of time. It's understandable if you've ever seen the show. To a couple of preschool girls, Diego is a hottie. I think it was Click the Camera that made us late, though. We all started singing the song, and... well, when you get my girls excited about something, it's hard to get them to refocus. The song is catchy. I'll share.



Anyway, I was scrambling to find shoes and get the girls out the door, so I wasn't paying a lot of attention when Molly said, "Can I bring my lamb to show my friends?" It's a beanie babie sized lamb, in a lovely shade of lavender.

"Yeah, sure, whatever, just put your shoes on the right feet and get in the car."

We pull into the school parking lot and I whip into a parking spot, screaming like a drill seargent. "Unbuckle your seatbelts! Put your shoes back on! Stop hitting your sister! Let's go, maggots, now now NOW!"

I walk them in and nudge Molly into her classroom, breathing a sigh of relief that we made it before we were interrupting "circle time," because when you're late, ALL the kids with prompt parents will tell you that you're late. I love when my weaknesses are pointed out to me by people under four feet tall, don't you?

The kids were just sitting down to circle time, so Molly joined the group. Her teacher, Miss Dawn, said, "Molly, did you bring something to show the class today?" I had a moment of panic, trying to remember if I was supposed to send something, when I remembered the lamb. With a smile of relief, I watched at the door for a moment while Molly held up her little stuffed animal proudly.

"This is my little baby lamb. See, it's a baby and has to wear a diaper. I changed his diaper, so he's not stinky."

Wait, what? Diaper? The lamb did not come with diapers. I stepped a little way into the classroom to see what she had diapered the lamb with when realization struck. It was like slow motion. The teacher looked at the lamb, then slowly turned to look at me. I lunged forward, with a slo-mo "Noooooooooooo," bursting from my lips. At that moment, Abigail piped in with her two cents.

"Oooooohhhh, Molly, that's Mommy's diapers. You's not suppose to pway with Mommy's diapers."

It was a panty liner. She had stuck a panty liner on the tail end of her lamb, straight through its legs, just like a diaper, then taken it to show all her friends.

Heaven help me.

Don't faint

So I was just reading someone else's blog, and it reminded me that it has been a long time since I've been here. I've been oddly busy lately, not as much of a loser as usual. It's been kind of nice. Today I feel like I've been trampled by a herd of buffalo, so I've been hanging out online catching up here and there.

I keep aiming high in my holiday preparations, but somehow I keep falling flat. I've done all kinds of ambitious things, but not the things that I should be doing. I've been making homemade ornaments for the Christmas tree with the girls, but I don't have the tree up yet. I've bought a cupboard full of baking supplies, but done no baking. I did, however, make chocolate covered cherries. Who knew you could make those yourself?

My friend Denise gave me a recipe, so I did it. I'm pretty damn proud of myself, too. I had to rearrange the fridge and hide them behind 47 jars of pickles (how does that happen?) to keep my family from eating them before they liquefy, and I'm hoping there will still be a few at Christmas.

That's all I've done. I have done no shopping, no baking, no decorating. It's 18 days (447 hours, 26783 minutes, or 1606938 seconds) until Christmas. Remember a few minutes ago when I said I haven't been loserish? Yeah, I take it back. We might have a Whoville Christmas this year - we'll just sing a song while holding hands on Christmas morning and call it a year. Think the kids will buy it?

Yeah, me either.

Funny Sign Sunday

I'm not sure if I should be terrified or tempted by this offer.

I'm such a slacker

I haven't written anything here in over a month. My friend Mary asked me if my fingers are broken. I was tempted to say yes, but... well, she knows better. I think she's tired of looking at Timmy the Turd. Understandable.

I could say that the winner inside me took over for a month or so, but that's laughable, too. It is true, that the start of school brought much activity to my world. Bryan started high school this year, and Molly started Pre-K. I feel like I spend my life in the car. I figured it out the other day, what I was paying per month for the use of my car. Even given the fact that it's paid off, with gas and insurance, the cost to square footage ratio makes it an extremely expensive living space. Unfortunately, it's a necessary evil. Public transportation where I live sucks, and there are a lot of rural areas.

I have no idea where I was going with that train of thought, so I'll sum it up this way:

Booooo gas prices. *two thumbs down*

I vow to be a better blogger. If I don't, I'll let Mary break my fingers. Seriously. (Think that would get me out of doing dishes for a while?)

Timmy the Turd

Today is Molly's 4th birthday (Happy Birthday, Molly!). I googled "funny birthday," hoping to find a cute picture or something to post here in honor of her special day. I was browsing the first page of image hits, when I happened upon the following.

There's nothing that says "Happy Birthday, sweetheart" like a special greeting from Timmy the Turd.

I'll take some cute pictures later. She's getting a bike. Shhhh... don't tell. You either, Timmy.

No ice cream for you

My husband wants to buy an ice cream truck. When I say that he wants to buy one, I don't mean he mentioned it in passing. I mean that he's been looking on Craigslist and eBay at ice cream trucks for sale. He stopped the ice cream lady that comes through our neighborhood to ask her questions about where to get inventory. He even found one for rent and called the owner to find out how much and what the terms were.

He's serious about wanting an ice cream truck.

It occurred to me that he works a full time job during daylight hours, when most ice cream truck business would be taking place. The next time he called me over to look at a "really cool one" on the computer, I cornered him.

"So, sweetie, are you planning on quitting your job or what?"

"Why would I quit my job?"

"To drive the ice cream truck that you are so set on buying."

That was met with a moment of silence. With my husband, silence means one of two things - either I've stunned him and he's speechless, or he's taking a moment to try and figure out how to tell me something. In this case, it was the latter.

"Well, honeysweetiepumpkin, I thought maybe you would like to drive it. Look, it's pink."

Of course. Why didn't I think of that myself? It's always been my dream to drive in circles for hours on end, selling ice cream to sweaty kids with handfuls of pennies.

"What in the name of Blue Bunny would make you think I want to drive an ice cream truck?"

He looked thoughtful. "Ice cream trucks are cool. They play fun music."

Oh, no. I hadn't considered the music. You think It's a Small World is bad twice in a row, try hanging out near the ice cream truck for an hour. There's one that used to drive through a neighboring town that had a unique soundtrack. It played "La Cucaracha" loudly, over and over. In case you're not fluent in ice-cream-truckish, that means "the cockroach." Appetizing, eh?

I told him I would make a terrible ice cream lady, and it's true. Every kid that came up and asked "how much," then turned away with a sad face after looking at a sweaty quarter would get free ice cream from me. I'm a sucker for kids. I also told him that until gas prices fall below "WTF" level, that it's just not economically smart to drive in circles all day to try to sell $1.50 ice cream bars. My final argument was that we couldn't afford the Xanax prescription that I would need to not go bonkers listening to a tinkling version of "How Much is That Doggy in the Window" all damn day.

He's still shopping around for an ice cream truck. He can keep right on looking. When he finds one and buys it, I'll load the kids up in it, paint a tiny mustache on my upper lip, and make myself a nametag that says, "The Ice Cream Nazi," then I'll terrorize the neighborhood. It'll be fun.

Mommy Stay-Puff

Kids say the darnedest things.

Last night I was holding the girls in my lap, reading The Runaway Bunny. They were snuggled under a blanket, captivated by the story... or so I thought. Something in the book made Molly think of food. It might have been the big bunny cloud, blowing the bunny sailboat home. Whatever it was, she decided she was hungry, and it wasn't for hasenpfeffer.

"Mommy, I wish you were made of marshmallow so I could take a bite of you."

Say what? While I was still trying to figure out where in the world she got that idea from, she bit me. She chomped my arm like a dog tearing into a t-bone.

"OWWWW!"

She smacked her lips a little, made a face, then said, "You don't taste like marshmallow."

No kidding, genius. I never claimed to be sweet. Something good did come of this. I got a stellar idea for a Halloween costume this year.

It's funny sign Sunday!

I'm designating Sundays "Funny Sign Day" from this point on. Hey, at least you're getting something out of me on a weekend day.

Here's one I found the other day. I have no idea why this is so funny to me, but it cracks me up. I picture Caillou running around stealing wallets every time I see it.