Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Seriously - Bed time political correctness???

Much to our luck, we have a full series of "Little Golden Books" from my mom - yes HER collection from when she was a child.  This one in particular was pubished in 1954.  So....let's first put in perspective in 1954:
- polio vaccine firs administered to kids
- Vietnam split into two north/south entities
- Eisenhower is President
- racial segregation is officially banned in pubic schools
- US national debt is only a quarter of a billion dollars
- World Series first broadcast in color on TV

OK....we have the image of the era officially in our minds.  So - any guess to the actual context of this book? 

HELLO!!!! I can not believe I actually read this to my kids....the violence and language was so terse....I found myself reading the page very quickly to myself to "modify" the story as needed for '2011 appropriateness'.  Wow...the question becomes - why did I feel the need to do that?  I know Hansel and Gretel is not a pleasant story....but somehow was shocked the way it was written.  I was read this book when I was younger - and I turned out ok.  Do I shield my kids too much?...Should I read it as is? Wow....I feel like I have fallen into the current society trap of overprotecting my children - at the basic level of bedtime stories.


Aunt Brenda reads @ bedtime!

Thanks to a wonderful Hallmark book that allows recorded voice to read a story page by page...we enjoyed the Christmas story again....forget it is nearly mid February....at least it still looks like Christmas outside :)  Thanks Aunt Brenda.


Preschool Math -> Calculus I?

Yes....this is actually a semi typical day for children of two nerdy engineers.  Tonight was patterns and explaining exponents...yes, my husband just uttered 'exponential'.... and I just had an eerie Calc I flashback and decided maybe we should hold off a little on finding the area under the curve via integration :) My teacher Dr. Zeman in tight running shorts explaing dx/dy still makes me cringe.



Uck...really?

So randomly I checked my Droid this morning while laying in bed around 6am.  No emails from the previous night at 10pm.  Well - that's not good.  Spammers LOVE me overnight and continuously load my inbox day after day.  In essence, our email server was down.  What does this mean....quick fix? grouchy remote staff not in the loop on what's going on? no CRM use for the staff? just a nice quiet morning?

Well....not good on all fronts.  Evidently the server is botched so bad, that we MUST switch to gmail IMMEDITELY.  Does CRM gonna work...I don't know.  Will I lose my google Picasa images...I hope not.  Will we have any email access today....maybe?!?

EGAD....welcome to an upcoming super unproductive day in my wonderful corporate life.  I think I'll enjoy a nice long run since no email will be steaming in to bother me - of course :)

What started their domination...

Yesterday I was having an online FB chat with a good friend I haven't seen in a very long time.  He asked..."Everyone happy and healthy?".  I quickly told him about our 3 ER visits in 30 day period and reminded him that IF they survive each other, it may be a miracle :)  He then reminded me of how their 'devlish' ways started....many a years ago.  A wonderful story, as I reflect now....

When we lived in our townhouse when the twins were 1, they use to do many things that made me think..."How in the HECK did they figure that out!".  They couldn't even speak English yet at the young age of 1 and slightly walking, but they eerily would communicate in their twin-lingo and get some crazy task accomplished.  Before cabinet locks were attached, they would sneak into a lower chip cabinet...pull on each end of a pringles can, until the top would fly off...and then feed each other chips as fast as they could.  One of these times, I actually was able to capture the image and take a deep breath and think - yes - this IS a mess...but is pretty funny.  I bit my lip - and just took the camera....and got the shot:

That was one of the first 'cute' instances of them...via their 'twin-lingo' to really use their two heads to accomplish a simple task...get Pringles!

Next....came the first dangerous accomplishment.  The twins LOVED helping me in the kitchen, from a very young age.  I would give them mixing bowls and spoons so they could 'cook' while I made dinner at night.  When I baked brownies or cookies, they would help lick the bowl and be covered in gooey chocolate!  And don't get me wrong, they LOVED to eat cookies and brownies as well! 

Well....this is when I realized how smart they truly were.  The babies never understood how something had to cook in the over to be ready to eat.  They didn't enjoy the wait of the 'bake' to truly have cookies to eat.  Or as they would say....COOOOKKKIES!.  One day I went upstairs for a second after placing cookies in the oven, when I came back in the kitchen, I witnessed the most alarming sight known to man.

---Madyson was hanging from the oven door handle and Kaiden was hanging from her waist in an attempt to over the HOT OVEN TO GET THE COOOOOKKKIES! AHHHH!  Somehow in my two minute disappearance they had 'twin-lingoed' to each other - QUICK, LET'S DO THIS!  The way they were doing it, I realized instantaneously that this was premeditated.  They had sat with their toys, babbling some twin-isms to each other, about HOW they would get cookies someday when they had the chance...so they didn't have to wait the desperate 8 minutes of baking!  They had somehow planned out the steps perfectly so that when I left the room...They were ready to ATTACK and get the COOOOKKKIES!.  The look on their face when I walked in the room was priceless....the look of 'WE'RE CAUGHT! - WE'RE BUSTED - WE DIDN'T EXECUTE AS EFFICIENTLY AS POSSIBLE'.  They had already been educated on the danger of fire/heat/burns....but the lure of warm cookies proved to be too much for the temptation. 
Sweet 17 month old twins...in a picture :)

Many days I tried to figure out how to best lock my oven...even contemplating going to the hardware store for a dead bolt of some sort.  Over the next couple days, I even walked in on them perfecting their 'oven execution' when nothing was inside.  It was almost as if they were thinking "What IF Mommy forgot some cookies inside?"  For nearly the next two weeks, we didn't use the oven.  I found some way to terrify them into not perfecting this 'drill' anymore.  I never had to buy a deadbolt.  No one went to the ER over a massive third degree burn.  But....it was step one in what launched many future maneuvers and escapades that even today, at 4 1/2 and 3 ER visits in 30 days....is what I think about when wondering -- How did we get to this....and wondering "Will they survive each other?!?"

And to those that utter the words...."Ahhhh....I always wanted to have twins....It must be so easy to do it all at once....I say "SUCK IT..."YOU HAVE NOOOOO IDEA".

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

So happy to finally be playing :)




It's the first day of basketball and BOY is he excited!  Watch out superstar in the making!