Um,

I just realized I have spent the entire morning with my shorts on inside-out.

Maybe I'd be more interesting on t.v. than I had previously thought.

House Wife

You know how we got rid of cable and satellite television in the Ashley household? Ironically, I am watching more television than I ever have.

I think the time I used to spend flipping through the hundreds of channels or watching commercials made it so I never really cared that much about any particular episode or show. Having to make a decision about what to watch and being able to watch the entire thing without interruption has changed my entire viewing experience and I have seen some amazing movies and television that I would have passed over before. I recently figured out how to hook my laptop to my television which opened up a world of possibilities, and also allowed me to catch up on Real Housewives. Wow. Those bitches are crazy!

Also, who came up with the term "Housewife" when casting these people? Almost all of them have either a career or adult children, and some of them don't have husbands or children! We've seen very little of them being wives or mothers, and a whole lot of them barely restraining from scratching each other's eyeballs out at some social event.

And I love that, I really do (like, a lot), but I don't think I would define a single one of them as a "Housewife". Don't even get me started on the Housewives of New Jersey. Those women really scare me; they could and would beat the rest of us up.

I am mostly writing this post in an attempt to hold off on the deep cleaning that must be done for my big play date tomorrow. I have considered calling her and asking if she wants to go to the beach instead, but that would seem weird and my house isn't all that dirty and this needs to be done so that we can move on to the type of friendship that doesn't require deep cleaning before visits. I guess this whole house-cleaning thing is supposed to happen regularly anyway, so at least this gives me an excuse to do it.

This is probably exactly why they don't use real housewives. It would make for the most boring t.v. ever.

Sun Shiney

Here is how every Summer morning starts (around 7:15 a.m.)

"Mumum, can I has peana buttuh cwackers?"

"No! Lay down and turn on a movie."

"I can has peana buttuh cwackers for lunch?"

"Yes."

"Mumum, is it lunch time yet?"

"No! I'm not awake yet, it's not even breakfast time, please turn on your movie."

"But for lunch I can. I gonna play Mario."

"'kay. Please turn it down." He turns the volume all the way up, the tinny sounds of the Mario theme song literally bouncing off of the walls. "Down! Quiet!"

"You can make this big jump for me? Just real quick? Then you can be not awake again, my mumum."

"little kid, I'm awake but I need 5 minutes of waking up before I start playing video games or making breakfast. Can you just chill for a few minutes while I wake up?"

"Yes, after you make this jump, I's be quiet! Then we's can make my peana buttuh lunch cwackers!"

Grrr.

The other child sleeps until 9ish. He has always slept late. When he was a toddler, we frequently slept until 10 a.m. Every mom I knew envied us.

Summer has been mostly fun, though. Yesterday I broke out the Slip 'n Slide and when it became obvious that my kids totally sucked at it and were failing to grasp the concept, I forced them to stand to the side to watch me demonstrate my technique. Repeatedly. Slip 'n Sliding is fun and they are already improving. I wanted to soap it up but Big Kid said I would get soap in everyone's eyes, and that seemed like a good point.

We've also been at the pool a lot and they both swim like fish. Two months ago, they couldn't swim at all and now they are diving to the bottom of the deep end and swimming from side to side. So fun! This means I can sit on a nearby lounge chair and read a book. There are no words to express the happiness this freedom brings me. People are also super impressed with my kick-ass 3-year-old swimming star, and I like that.

I am stepping slightly outside of my lazy comfort zone this Summer and have declared it to be the Summer of Socialness. I hate this idea, but once a week I'm going to make an effort with a new friendship. I really like being alone, but I do see the benefit of having friends and there is a great circle of families that I met through a mom's group years ago that already know that I struggle with keeping in touch but who seem to like me and reach out anyway. I need to capitalize on that before they are totally sick of me. All of the efforts won't be with this particular group but in order to make more life-long friends, I need to hang out with people other than the life-long friends I already have. I guess. It should also make for good blogging material.

So Girl Crush (remember her?) is coming over on Friday and I'm more nervous about it than I should be. I have ZERO reason to be nervous, we have hung out before and we always have fun. She likes me and is open and outspoken about liking me. I'm just neurotic, particularly about it being at my house. My house is lovely and in an awesome neighborhood--no reason to be neurotic about it but I AM WHAT I AM. And I'm a bit of a freak.

I was also invited to a Ladies Dinner next week and don't know what to wear. Again, no one will care and I will end up looking fine (probably) but they all make it look so effortless. I really wish Tim Gunn and I were friends--but that could never happen because I would never want to invite him over. Sigh.

Other than these minor social issues and the 7 a.m. wake-up calls, Summer has been fun so far. I'm hoping the social and early morning stuff will work itself out sooner than later.

Breakfast Service

Today we slept in a bit after putting a movie on for the boys.

They decided to make Mr. Ashley breakfast and filled a bowl FULL of Lucky Charms, poured some milk in there, got a clean spoon out of the dishwasher, carefully filled a plastic cup full of ice water and set it all up on the kitchen island, where it sat for about 30 minutes before they couldn't stand the anticipation and woke Mr. Ashley up to enjoy his soggy cereal.

They were so proud of themselves and so excited about their little bout of responsibility and so, so, so freaking cute. They were beaming with pride and talking over each other to let us know who did what and who came up with which ideas, praising each other for being so helpful. They were grinning ear-to-ear as they told us about their breakfast-making adventure.

They are such sweet boys.

And I am so glad I didn't have to eat that mushy bog of congealed cereal.

Summer of...Fun?

Today is the first official day of Summer break for us.

I was so excited yesterday. We had a family Summer kick-off party, complete with balloons and a cake and treats and those firecrackers that pop when you throw them on the ground. Big Kid got to choose dinner, so we had sandwiches.

But today I'm apprehensive about this whole thing. They have been fighting a lot--a major problem since one of the big benefits of Summer was having Big Kid around to distract and amuse little kid. I think I forgot how annoying they can be with all of the fighting and wanting stuff and raiding the fridge every other minute.

I'm also afraid this will mean the official end of naps for little kid. He usually falls asleep in the car rider line and if there's no car rider line, there may be no nap. This would be horrible, so we may have to go for a 3 o'clock drive every day. A slow, quiet drive. (It won't work, I know it won't.)

Things can't go wrong though, this is supposed to be the perfect Summer. I'm not working, we have a pool and the beach nearby, I look good in my new bikini, kids are at a (supposedly) manageable age. This is my time to shine. Summer WILL be fun, dammit!

I don't care if I have to beat some ass, this is going to be the best Summer ever.

(P.S. The kids aren't wanting to sing the Summer jingle I made up. That shit ends right now--they WILL sing the jingle. Songs are fun.)

Cleaning Service

Good news: little kid's work friends started a cleaning service, and until he gets called away on a work call, he will clean my house for free. Of course, this means he gets to use the feather duster, broom and spray bottle, and there are frequent arguments about my vacuum or the use of toxic chemicals, but who can argue with that kind of deal?

Bad news: little kid's work friends apparently believe in cleaning shower tile with a mixture of vinegar and water (from his spray bottle) and toilet paper. Lots of toilet paper, because it gets all clumpy and then you need more to dry the wet toilet-papered tile walls.

This is not how I do it.

He has announced that he will need to clean the house every day or his work friends will fire him.

I gave him his own cleaning rag, hid the toilet paper, and am starting to like his work friends more.