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Heather is at the ASA conference today and tomorrow. She should really be there more than that, but in the constant struggle to balance work and life, the full conference got sacrificed. So she has one night away from home.

Owen, Our Rebel Child,
Oh how you make my blood boil,
my heart race,
my spirits soar.
In a bright flash you bring me to tears with frustration,
to my knees with laughter,
and back again.
Most young mothers might fret at the thought of it:
clever, mighty, quick-witted Rebel Child
But not me.
I adore you.
My beautiful Rebel Child Dream come true.

Kyle, Our Mama’s Boy,
Before, I dreamt of a child who’d nuzzle, and cuddle,
and long to be held by me.
And now, I feel guilty in moments
when I long to be un-clung from you.
But, oh my sweet boy, how my crazy-love for you looms.
Engulfing, I admit, all of me —
even my fleeting pangs of independence from you.
Words cannot be put to it —
the sticky, sweet, salty skin,
wave after wave of reciprocal adoration between
this Mama and Her Boy.

Well, it has been one of those weeks. Braydon and I each skipped out of work for an hour to go out to lunch on Wednesday. Over hummus and stuffed grape leaves we both confessed to each other that we’re each battling minor depression in the wake of the terrible tragic loss of Joe (if you’re not an avid Johnson-McCormick Family Blog reader, click here). Once we got that out in the open and decided to just let ourselves feel it, everything felt a bit better. But still. Sometimes life is just hard. We know it is normal to go through these spell. It still doesn’t make it easy. Here are some other less deep tid-bits from the past week:

• Latest favorite swimming pool activity for K & O is “riding in the ferry” (i.e., on the little yellow raft) “in the deeper!” (i.e., the deep end of the pool), pretending that they are “in the ocean!!!” and it is “salty in the eyes!” and they “see beautiful fishies!!!” and “coral!!!” and “ah! ah! ah! SEA URCHINS! Sea urchins!!!” that are “RIGHT DOWN THERE!!!” The ferry has to “go fast! hurry! hurry!” because “the sea urchins may be owie!” and “we can’t touch them! they could be a big owie!” and “we can’t step on them! they may be very owie!” They see “red sea urchins!” and “black sea urchins!” And it is all very dramatic. And fun. (Note: we did, in fact, see many red and black sea urchins while we were in Virgin Gorda and Braydon and I were always telling the boys to be careful not to touch them or step on them. This is obviously where this ferry-ocean-sea-urchin thing is coming from.)

• One morning I was loading the dishwasher while the boys played nicely outside drawing on the driveway with sidewalk chalk. I began to notice that I could hear them inside the garage doing something that sounded suspicious, but I had no idea what it was. I could hear them repeatedly and very animatedly shouting out something about fireworks. I went to investigate. This is what I found (note that what you see at the base of the garage wall, all over the floor, is broken pieces of sidewalk chalk):

They had been throwing the chalk sticks against the wall… pretending that the ‘snap’ sound they’d make when they broke and landed was “fireworks!!!” When I said, “WHAT DO THINK YOU’RE DOING?!!!” They said, “Mama, we’re pretending we’re sixty, and we’re just like MorFar, doing fireworks!” “CLEAN IT UP!!” I demanded(after taking the photo). Here’s the pathetic tub of sidewalk chalk now:

• Got Milk? –>

• The boys (mostly Kyle, really) are currently absolutely obsessed with their middle names. Kyle likes his, in particular, because it “has an O in it.” (quote unquote). He reminds us of this constantly. These masterpieces below took a long time to make. I must admit, I was really quite proud of them. They found all of the sticker-letters themselves (amidst a huge pile of alphabet letters), and made their names. I helped them figure out the order of the letters, of course. But really they did most of this project themselves. I think that’s pretty dang good for two boys who just turned three in May (and have a hard time sitting still for more than 5 minutes).

• Some other random tid-bits that have no associated photos: I discovered this week that Owen will eat absolutely anything as long as it has balsamic vinegar poured all over it. How weird is that?! Owen is really into nicknames right now. He has started calling Alex “Nan” (short for “Nanny”), and he’s started calling Alex’s dog “Cyps” (short for “Cyprus”). Kyle is back in a lovey-dovey phase and says, “I need a hug.” about a dozen times a day. The boys are really interested in adoption right now. They love hearing their own adoption story over and over and over. This morning at the pool Kyle said proudly, to no one in particular, “I was adopted!” Kyle continues his fixation on acquiring a trombone and asks for “a real trombone” at least once a day. The boys are hardly fighting at all this week — the fighting seems to come and go in ebbs and flows, and it is much nicer for everyone when we’re in a fighting-valley-phase instead of a fighting-peak-phase. A very proud moment for me this week came while sitting out at the pool with Owen on my lap — we were cuddling and I said, “Owen, do you know how beautiful you are?” He nuzzled his head into my neck and said, “I am a beautiful brown boy.” My heart skipped a beat with pure pride and joy for my beautiful brown boy.
• Two nights this week the boys had to go to bed early because they had not napped and were beyond exhausted. Early bedtimes on work nights means that there is absolutely no way we can eat together (I simply don’t have enough time to pull together a meal for all four of us in the short period of time between arriving home from work and tucking them into their beds). So the boys eat first, we get them in bed, and then Braydon and I eat later. Here’s Braydon with K & O while they eat their dinner. I am so glad to be co-parenting with this man. I’m so grateful my boys have such a wonderful father. I hate to shove it in people’s faces, but I can’t help it: My man is the best.
  
• Thanks for reading ~~ Have a great weekend y’all!

Starting this week, as the media hub-bub regarding the fact that we’re now exactly one year away from the Beijing Olympics went into full gear — (can it possibly be a coincidence???) — the boys have apparently put themselves into a serious training regiment for the 2008 Summer Games. Couch Diving. A new olympic sport??? They do this over, and over, and over, and over, and over. It is exhausting just watching it. But like any serious athlete, these guys are focused on precision and seem to fully embrace the ‘no-pain-no-gain’ approach to their sport. They’re both very serious couch divers. Almost always the “couch dive” ends with a dramatic “forward roll” and then they run full tilt to climb up again.

For some background on this post see the meme I did a few days ago (click here)– specifically numbers 10 & 11 on that meme.

Faithful readers know that I’m a WM (Working Mom). Faithful readers also know that my boys love to eat. And man, can they eat. If you’ve been reading awhile you also know that ‘Pre-K&O’ I loved cooking. And man, could I cook. Some of you may have even partaken of a meal or two from my kitchen. Those are lovely memories. But just that: memories. In the distant distant past. Anyhoo… life is different now. For the better. For sure. But in our life ‘Post-K&O’ cooking has, well, uh, it has certain challenges.

For one thing, I rarely have time to cook anything that I find interesting/creative/fun/enjoyable. I’m so limited by time constraints. And that’s not just time constraints on actually preparing the meal. I am time constrained in every aspect of food prep (menu-creating, meal-planning, recipe-finding, food-shopping, refrigerator-cleaning, dinner-making, kitchen-cleaning). In the precious family time that we have (evenings, weekends), the LAST thing I want to be doing is slaving over a hot stove — I want to be on the floor/in the pool/running in the yard with my boys (all three of them!). But eating a healthy well balanced diet is important to me. I don’t want to just buy a bunch of frozen junk and shove it into the microwave five minutes before I scream out “Dinner Time!!!” So, unfortunately, I spend a ridiculous amount of mental energy fretting and stressing over what the heck I’m going to try to get onto the table in record time each night. I’m seriously considering trying to figure out some sort of way to have someone else prepare some of our dinner meals (I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately, and have begun looking into it — it seems it might save me a lot of time and stress… and even save us a lot of money too). And today I was even having downright fabulously inspiring email correspondence about it with my new girlfriends (hi Rony and Cindy!).

And yet, when it goes well, I get great satisfaction from feeding my family. It is nights like this (see below — photos from last night’s dinner) that make me question how I could possibly even consider giving up the meal-making-role. I made the boys’ (all three of them) favorite dinner — fresh pasta and chicken with a pesto cream sauce, fresh parmesan sprinkled on top. All from scratch. Basil even from my own plant pots. No kidding. The boys go nuts over this meal. Kyle seriously must have told me at least a dozen times during dinner: “Mama, I love this! This is my favorite! Pesto pasta is my favorite!” And Owen just kept saying: “Mommy, thank you! Thank you mommy for making this delicious supper!!!” They each ate enough to easily make a grown man full. Literally, in fact. The same servings did, in fact, make Braydon full. All three of them were just ooohing and aaahhing and “thank you!”‘ing and “I love this!”‘ing all dinner long. O.k., really now… how could I not just love that???

I keep telling myself that I shouldn’t complain – that I should just be happy that we can even get through a meal now. I mean, it is just sooooo much easier now than it was then (photos below).

Photos were taken Winter of 2006. The boys were in a terrible phase that lasted about six months where they just threw everything — including food — ALL. THE. TIME. I’d literally be crying many a night at the dinner table after getting home from a long day at work, struggling to get dinner on the table, and then watching them throw it all over the floor/walls/each other/us. As K & O “mature” (if you could call it that — golly knows we still have our ‘moments’), it is getting easier and easier all the time (note I am not saying it is easy now, just that it is easier). Anyway, I keep telling myself that if I just hang in there I can make this whole career-driven-working-mommy-of-twin-boys-healthy-eating-family thing work. And I also remind myself incessantly that the vast majority of working moms can’t even consider the idea of outsourcing the dinner cooking and therefore I shouldn’t either and I should just suck it up and quit complaining and just do it. But at the same time… I really really really hate to waste my time in the evenings frantically cooking when I could be playing/tickling/reading/running/chatting/just-plain-old-being with my bambinos. What’s a working mom who cares about nutrition to do?

Above photo was the scene at 10:00 this morning. The photo does not even come close to capturing the mayhem that was my life at that moment. The boys had gotten into my gift-wrapping stash and gone haywire with the yellow and orange spools of ribbon. Braydon left the house early this morning to attend to some business at work. The boys were up and at ’em at 7:00 sharp and for whatever reason they were going-going-going NON-STOP from 7-10:00, while I tried to supervise the activities to keep destruction to a minimum. In such periods my primary concern is their safety. Secondarily I’m concerned about the health and well-being of our two cats. Third in my list of priorities is the condition of the material possessions in our home. Every day is crazy-making with these two. No doubt about it. But it seems to be the case that some days are just more exhausting than others. No rhyme or reason. Just is what it is. And today was one of those days. By 10:00 a.m., when Alex arrived, I said to her, “Alex, honestly, I cannot believe it is only 10:00. I feel like I’ve had an entire day already. And I haven’t even gone to work yet.” At that moment the boys ran into the kitchen with the ribbon fiasco in full gear. Kyle, completely naked, was “dragging” Owen, still in his pjs, by the neck/throat. I couldn’t tell if Owen was laughing or choking (turned out he was laughing), but I grabbed the camera, clicked once (the shot above), kissed the boys, and said, “Have a good day Alex!” and retreated to my office. After lunch Alex took the two rascals to Musikfest (click here). Lord only knows how she has the gumption to do all these things with them — but God love her for it (God knows we love her for it). And THANK YOU LORD FOR ALEX. AMEN. When they returned home Kyle was beaming with his first ever face painting (even I, in my exhaustion, had to admit that he was incredibly cute in his face-painting-Elmo-sheer-happiness). He reported they had “played drums,” “heard music,” and “jumped” in a moonbounce thing. And ~~hallelujah~~ Owen — butterfly face painted and all — had fallen asleep on the way home in Alex’s car. They were both in bed by 7:00 tonight, despite Owen putting up his usual waaay-too-tired-“I caaaaaaaaaan’t go night nights”-fight. And currently Braydon is off to pick up take out burritos. I gotta end this post now so that I can go mix up some margaritas. Hopefully that will take the edge off. And then hopefully we’ll both be sound asleep before too long. Tomorrow starts another crazy day around here.

We spent yesterday with the Waters and the Millers. 3 families on a sunny summer sunday = 6 adults chatting + 12 kids playing + good eats and drinks + lots of laughing and loving = A DANG GOOD TIME. 12 kids playing = 9 beautiful Haitian sensations (4 who were in the same orphanage together!!!) and 3 beautiful American-born. We all went to the Waters’ church and then spent the day chowing down and hanging out at the Waters’ house. A very good time was had by all.

A super special Owen quote of the day from yesterday — Waters & Millers (I know you’re reading!) — this one’s for you!!! — Last night, as I was getting him ready for bed, Owen: “Mama, where did I get all these stinky toots?! I bought them at the toot store and I put all these toots in my butt!”

… notice I didn’t say “Lazy” ~~

Photos from today–

My mom has a real problem with some of the antics that we allow to go on around here — specifically the dangerous ones. I’m sure a lot of people would agree with her. But the boys love it so. They are real thrill seekers. And Braydon is right in there with them. When he throws them in the pool he throws them a bit… um… well, a bit HIGH. I know my mother would have been mortified (I am positive that she would have fled the scene immediately and hid in the house until someone went to fetch her with promises that it was all over). Mom, if you’re reading, just don’t scroll down — just go ahead and skip over the next four pictures. ;-0

So, yeah, Mom, if you’re reading this, just go ahead and skip over this post (for the same reasons mentioned in the previous post). So, anyway, we decided it would be fun to get out the boys’ old baby slide to use as a pool-side-slide (o.k., I admit, it was me who came up with this idea). Owen and I found it in the attic. He was thrilled with the concept right from the start. The boys got a big kick out of sliding down it into the pool. They did this over and over and over…

Until… they came up with the bright idea (o.k., I admit, it was me who came up with this idea too) to turn it around backward… and use it not as a slide, but as a high dive. Kyle went first, of course:

Then Owen:

Over the course of the rest of the afternoon they did this about a million times… each. They are really good at high diving. ;-0