Advent Songs?

Our nightly advent routine includes various prayers followed by song. I like to sing O Come, O Come Emmanuel. Well, a while back the Conqueror decided he needed to sing a song he learned in Atrium. I am unclear on the exact tune, as it changes nightly, but the words are along the lines of "Light one candle for Hope, Light one candle for Peace, Light one Candle for Joy...." So, now it starts out that he and Biki each sing their own version of "Light one Candle" followed by a family rendition of "O Come Emmanuel." Well this evening after their turns Beanie decides she's just got to have a turn singing. So, I tell her to go ahead, thinking she's going to sing one of those two songs. No, she busts out with "Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells....HEY!" I just had to tell her she did a great job. No matter that Jingle Bells is the most secular song in the whole holiday repertoire. It was darn cute!

Another Beanie beaut: She'll talk to someone on the phone and say Hi and then go immediately into "good" as though they asked her how she was- even if they didn't. So tonight with Grandma I hear her on the phone with no pauses, "Hi Grandma Good." There was no time for Grandma to even ask her how she was!

Clothing Concerns

It is 75 degrees outside. The kids are playing outside all afternoon and it is a week before Christmas. I can't believe I am saying this, but I could learn to love warm weather!!! The only problem- the kids' drawers are overflowing because I feel awful forcing them to wear long sleeve shirts when its beautiful outside. So, we keep all the summer shirts in the drawers to wear alone, or as layers under sweaters. So much for organized swapping of the winter and summer things.

Maybe I need to buy more stuff to keep things in!!! Just kidding, I am already single-handedly ruining our finances with take-out as it is! (See previous post!)

Am I crazy?

I had to make a return this evening and I was pretty exhausted from Christmas parties, watching a friend's children on the playground, and double carpools. So....I decided to take the kids out to eat by myself. To a real resturaunt, with no children's menu. Now I know this lovely asian institution does have sippy cups but still. It actually could have gone worse. Bean stayed in her chair until I was signing the check and a minimum of rice ended up on the floor. I paid for my indescretions when I actually made the return after dinner. At that point I had three hooligans running around the store hiding in displays. I am sure people were wondering what my damage was attempting to shop with all 3 of them. I left in hurry!

The Living Nativity from Hell

I always envisioned living nativities as peaceful, warm and fuzzy type events. Not so!! We're missing the one at our parish so I thought I would truck it out to a joint production by the Methodists and Baptists. My friend, another Army spouse with a husband deployed, found it on the Christian radio station's "family" calendar.

Well, we arrived and had to wait in the sanctuary (after filling out registration cards!) listening to Christian rock music for thirty minutes. I should have left then. The kids, rightly so, were distrubed by the full rock band in church. Whatever happened to Christmas carols?

We started our little tour with a costumed guide and she tells us that the guards at the entrance to Bethlehem are a little rough tonight, so hold the little ones close. What? Where did I miss the growling centurions demanding taxes in the nativity narrative? We get there and found children pretending to be beggars and grown men screaming at the top of their lungs at us. All of my kids start crying and these guys don't let up, don't break character, refuse to tone it down. It was absolutely ridiculous. They were screaming they were going to put us in jail for not paying our taxes. There was even a little jail with kids in it.

We moved on and went through various "shops" in Bethlehem where the "townspeople" gossiped about the young couple in town that wasn't married and was having a baby outside of town. Everyone in "town" was mean and ugly. Oh, and I forgot to mention that the guide must have said "Shalom" fifty-five times and kept referring to us as Jews. Weird, very weird. I certianly expected a few grumpy innkeepers, but this was ridiculous. We finally got out of "town" and found a stable with 3 donkeys. One angel came out and proclaimed exactly one line from the bible and it wasn't "Glory to God in the Highest." No shepherds at all- my kids were expecting sheep at the very least! And catholics don't read the bible??

We finally see the Holy Family and they were peaceful and beautiful but at that point the kids just wanted to get out of there. There was no way they could have stayed and contemplated the incarnation after that spectacle. But oh, we weren't done. We had to talk with the pastors as they sat in front of crosses and a tomb and explained the importance of Easter. I expected some level of proselystism but at that point I was just so frustrated and wanted to get out of there.

As we were leaving my friend's three year old stated that she never wanted to go to Bethlehem because she didn't want to go to jail. It was like these people totally got confused about what feast we are celebrating. Those centuriouns belonged in the scourging scene in Mel's Passion!

I had such high hopes when we arrived in the picturesque little town with the big beautiful houses, old shops retooled into antiques stores, and Christmas lights on every streetlamp. When we turned the corner to the chruch the Huddle House's sign even said "Happy Birthday Jesus." Awww...how sweet! Leaving was another story entirely. I was doing serious damage control with my kids.

I have been thinking about it a lot and I almost feel that what happened was logical outgrowth of Protestant theology somehow.....let's skip over the incarnation and get right to the Easter story. I understand they were trying to show how dark and ugly the world was before Jesus' birth but please! What concerned me was the fact that these "actors" would not let up even in the face of crying children. Sadists. I kept thinking that this was being brought to me by the same people who brought me "Babywise"a/k/a "Growing kids God's way." Sorry, but its true. They probably thought they were doing my kids some favor by scaring them half to death....why make 'em soft? Oh well, I need to be more charitable.

This much I know...I will never go to another living nativity unless it is in my parish!!!

Do unto others

I would like to think I am a charitable person. I have enough social skills to know who needs a little social help at a cocktail party (not that I go to them anymore) and who needs introductions etc. I certainly try to be friendly and helpful to people. So, in a sense it is sort of weird to be the one on the receiving end of charity, and knowing that I need it. One of the ladies from church and school has taken me under her wing. We were late to a huge social gathering for Our Lady of Guadalupe and she immediately came up to me and had the Conqueror go put my stuff near her family's things so we could sit together. Then she proceeded to help me get my kids dinner and dessert and chatted with me during dinner. From a social perspective, she made things so much easier for me, and I am so thankful. I am sure I could have pulled it out in the end, but it was less stressful not to have to worry about it. Then she offered to watch my kids during confession and help me at mass with them too. She keeps saying she's going to get me set up for meals after the baby comes and begs me to bring the kids over to play so I can get away.

I am almost overwhelmed by her kindness, but very thankful too. So often I have found people in the South to be initially friendly, but not willing to take the next step. She is setting such a good example of Christian charity for me!! It really is the little things that are so important!

We're not in Tysons anymore Toto

Today's activities went a bit longer than planned. We arrived so late at confession that we ended up staying for mass since a friend volunteered to help with the kids. So, as a treat I decided we'd go to the mall and eat at the food court. I wanted to make a return anyway.

Well, as we were finishing up dinner and getting ready to leave a nasty fight broke out between two young women. It started with woman screaming and then taking off her jacket and posturing..."you wanna start somethin'?" and then they went at it. I have never seen people fight like that in real life. The mall rent a cops came very quickly and subdued one of the girls immediately. It was getting nasty, men holding babies were trying to break it up too, so we high tailed it out of there. Mall cops were running in from all over. Anyway, I have new respect for mall cops. I also realized that it is stupid to go to the mall at night with my small kids. They were very disturbed by the fight and didn't understand why someone would do that.

As my Mastercard bills can attest, I am an excellent shopper, particularly when I am bored or lonely. Toledo found us at the mall at least once, maybe twice a week. The kids have fond memories of the food court. But lesson learned, this mall is too close to an urban area. I read enough in the local paper to know that there are lot of people packing heat around here, and we're not talking conceal weapons permit. I don't want to endanger my kids just to keep the peace around here. Next time we'll go to the drive thu at Mickey D's!!!

3 Weeks Down.....many more to go!

Blogger has been down for a while. Interesting thoughts (at least to me) have come and gone. At this point I am counting down, along with my little friends, until we leave for "Papa's house" with a pit stop at "Charlotte's house." I think we could all use a change of pace.

I know in the past week I have wanted to write about the wild woman of Borneo, our resident 2 year old. The child is amazingly physical. I turn around and she's climbed in the sink and is "washing my hands" a/k/a soaking wet with the entire contents of the soap bottle all over the counter. She is constantly taking off her socks, shoes, diapers, clothes. She'll come downstairs in the most random of things. Now that her clothes are in the same room as everyone else's she just sort of helps herself to whatever she's in the mood for. My favorite was when she came downstairs wearing 3 pairs of Biki's underwear- with nothing else on. With her snaggle toothed grin (another tooth is chipping and rotting in the front), chubby cheeks, and crazy hair (no how often I comb it!) she is darn cute but utterly exhausting. She loves playing with all the nativity sets and I find the Fontanini and Fisher Price pieces mixed up every day. She is really excited about the magnetic advent calendar and is absolutely obsessed with snuffing out the advent candles. Tonight she only got to snuff out one and threw an absolute tantrum. Yikes!!! Her rendition of "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" isn't bad either.

I wonder if she's acting out so much because so much of her day is spent strapped in the car chauffeuring her siblings around. The more and more I think about it I wonder if I should be homeschooling. I think its just too hard on the little kids to be in the car all the time. Ugh. I think it would be beneficial for Biki, but Conqueror is too social for it and with no brothers I think he'd be too feminized.

Well, I wanted to tell the story of when the retail clerk asked me why I don't do birth control but alas, duty calls. I gotta sweep and mop the floor and finish wrapping presents.

What does it mean to be a friend?

Facebook is both fascinating and disturbing. I now have over 100 friends. It is sort of a status thing. The more friends you have the cooler you are. But then I look at my younger brother. He has something like 650 friends. I don't think I know 650 people by name. That is so weird.

I have a feeling my relationship with Facebook will be limited to the lenght of this deployment. I am not generation y enough for it!!

Skype my daddy!

I think the kids have a love-hate relationship with Skype. They really enjoy seeing P. and getting to talk to him. Bean's favorite question is "See me daddy? See me?" or "Why you in there daddy?"

When he called in tonight the girls were getting out of the bath and Beanie started laughing. "Heh, heh, heh! Heh, heh, heh! Skype my daddy! Skype my daddy!" Each time the phrase got louder and louder.

They are all so silly on camera, I wonder if it is because of the general awkwardness of the situation. They are also always so sad after we get off. They don't want me to leave them and they start talking a lot about dad and how long he'll be away. I heard Dad's voice on the teddy bear quite a few times after lights out.

Speaking of the teddy bear, I noticed that one bear was missing from the usual spot at tidy up time. I had seen the Conqueror listening to it in the family room earlier. Then I remembered he had disappeared for a while before dinner. Turns out he'd take his talking dad bear upstairs to play over and over again in private. He's such a sensitive little guy and is trying so hard to be a big boy about all this, but he really is sad!!

Why children need a mother and a father.

Mothers are designed to protect their children. Fathers help children push limits. I remember coming to this realization vividly on one of our first family walks with the Conqueror riding his own bicycle. We were going up a very large hill and he was having a hard time. I would have just let him jump off and push the bike up the hill, but P. pretty much made him ride it up the hill. After a lot of whining, he made it up the hill and then P. told him to turn around and look at how far he'd come. The Conqueror just started beaming with a huge sense of accomplishment.

So, yeah for dads. What I don't appreciate is the teaching of silly little 5th grade boy songs. I think I have heard "We three Kings", the loaded cigar version, 400 times in the past 3 days. It is the only Christmas carol they know how to sing. I suppose this is all necessary for proper development, but I am just hoping I don't get a call from the teachers!

Random Thoughts

What is it about 3 and 4 year olds and death? One of the main reasons I stay home is to field these sorts of questions- things that the nicest old nanny wouldn't answer to my satisfaction. Biki is obsessed with death and dying and heaven and the saints as of late. I am sure some of this coming to the forefront thanks to dad's imminent departure to a war zone.

Some recent smatterings:
* We had better pray they don't drop one of those big bombs in Iraq, because it would explode everyone. Even the doctors. (That one's sort of sad and we had lots to talk about after that comment. Where she learned about the atomic bomb, I am still trying to figure out. I blame dad! : )

*Does heaven have a roof?

*What saints do you want to meet in heaven mom? I answer with Mary, St. Joseph, St. Josemaria, St. Monica, St. Margaret....and then she keeps egging me on, obviously wanting me to pick her saint...and so I say "St. X" and she says "that's me!!!" So at least she's getting the concept that she needs to be a saint!

*Will St. Joseph have his head in heaven? This one had me stumped until I figured out she was talking about St. John the Baptist. Since we haven't gotten to the whole resurrection of the body question, which still fascinates big brother, I just quickly answered that God gave him his head back since he was such a good man!

Depends on how you look at things.....

So, Daddy's short visit was THE topic of conversation for the past two days. I love how temperament and age can give such different worldviews to my little people.

The Conqueror- "Wow. We were so lucky to see Dad for those three days before he leaves for 7 months in Iraq."

Biki- After thinking things over...."No, Dad WAS really lucky to see US!"