Tag: parent humor


May
2018

Being a Parent is 90% about being roasted

categories: Blog, Kids

That was a tweet on Twitter.  I wish I could remember who so I could give them credit.  I totally agree with this tweet.  And since I have a few budding comediennes in the family, I get roasted quite a bit.  But it’s OK, I actually find it pretty hilarious – most of the time.  There are also those times though that are just plain embarrassing.  These are a few of my roasts:

Dinner with family visiting

My sister came in town for a visit with her family for a weekend and she had never seen our house before.  They were going to stay the weekend at our house.  Now, you know if you have kids that it’s scary to have people stay over night b/c you don’t really know what all is lurking in your kid’s rooms.  I knew we had to do a thorough deep clean.  I cleaned all the bathrooms – even the showers!  We finally cleaned the kid’s rooms and this wasn’t me just telling them to clean and them shoving everything under the bed and in the closet.  I knew that wasn’t going to fly with adults staying in their rooms.  I actually put on my hazmat suit and went into each of their closets – the horror.

It took days maybe weeks to get the house into decent shape for company.  I even cut the glitter glue out of my daughter’s bedroom carpet.  She managed to spill half a bottle of glitter glue on her carpet.  Don’t ask me how because they aren’t allowed to have any glue in their rooms.  But this glue had dried into a hazardous shape.  I mean it basically dried into a knife and like it would tear your foot off if you stepped on it.  Luckily, it was in a corner of a room and I had placed a book on top of it so it wouldn’t tear my daughter’s foot off.  However, company was coming and what if they picked up the book unknowingly and ended up losing a toe.  I couldn’t have that.  So, I got the good scissors and hacked away at the carpet.

My daughters were watching me do all this and apparently taking notes.  My sister and her family arrived and we pretended that our house is always this clean even though inside we were feeling like visitors in our own home – lol.  The only thing amiss was that there were gnats circling our heads occasionally.  We must’ve thrown so much junk in the trash cans that gnats flocked to our house from around the globe.  We probably had Costa Rican gnats here.

Anyway, all was well until the last night we had dinner at a nice restaurant and I made the mistake of mentioning cleaning.  My daughter’s eyes lit up and she was like now that you mention cleaning my Mom went crazy cleaning the house before you came!  She spent weeks!  She was running around like a chicken with her head cut off.  I really wanted to clamp a hand over her mouth at this point but that would’ve been rude.  She continued.  She even cut stuff out of our carpet and tossed everything out of our closets!   She kept telling us why do we have to be such big pigs..  Yada Yada Yada..  Ya, I definitely got roasted like a pig that night.  But I was laughing pretty hard in an insane put me in a straight jacket sort of way.  :-p

Craft time

The one time I made the signs for the Girl Scout cookie booth but they turned out awful and I told everyone my daughters worked really hard on them.  My daughter was in the background with a shocked look on her face like she didn’t know what I was talking about.  lol.  Ya, totally called me out.

Mother’s day

All the moms got invited up to the school for Mother’s day tea at my daughter’s preschool and the kids had prepared an All About My Mom worksheet for all their moms.  So sweet, right?  The teacher read them out loud that day for fun.

Just to give you some background: I was very pregnant with my third daughter at the time.  And my mom had been in town visiting for a couple of weeks to help out.  So, the question on the sheet of paper was – what is your Mom’s favorite thing to do?  So many cute answers – my mom loves quilting, my mom loves cooking, my mom loves reading to me, my mom loves … well, me.  All the moms are oohing and aahing – oh, how sweet.  Isn’t that precious!  Then, we get to me and my daughter had written – my mom’s favorite thing to do is…  Watch TV.

Really?  You couldn’t have put laundry, or dishes, or all the other things I do – maybe b/c I complain too much about those? – lol.  I admit I was watching alot of TV at the time because I was trying to entertain my mom without talking since I was a hormonal very pregnant person.  As soon as my mom started talking about how I should take Livatox (liver cleanser – you’d have to know my mom), I would discreetly turn up the volume.  But usually I don’t have a whole lot of time to watch TV.  Needless to say, everyone in the room was laughing – some a little too hard. :-p  Ya, definitely roasted that day.  :-p  Or as my daughter likes to put it: Roasted, Toasted, ….   And Grilled.

Homework

Then, there’s the time my daughter’s teacher roasted me.  Whenever I would help my daughter with her homework in Kindergarten or First Grade – can’t remember which.  I stopped helping with homework early on!  My daughter’s papers would come home with, “Read the Directions..” or “Needs work!”.  Whenever my husband would help her with homework, the papers would come home with, “Great Job!!!” and a sticker.  Or, “Your daughter’s really progressing!” and a sticker.

It was kind of demoralizing and a running joke in our house.  I still occasionally put in my two cents with homework though but I’m not really sure if I’m helping or hindering.  :-p  Common core is not my forte.  Like, why should we have to explain in words why 2+2=4?  I loved my daughter’s answer for one of these math questions.  It was an addition word problem question and she answered it: 3+2=5.  Then, the follow up question was: How do you know this answer?  And she wrote: Because I read the words or (becs I red the wrds in her first grade spelling).  I was like Yes, Exactly!!!  Self explanatory!

What do you want to be when you grow up?

My one daughter roasted herself at her preschool graduation, then me.  Her preschool put on a big celebration where all the kids were supposed to think about what they wanted to be when they grow up.  The teacher took pictures of them with their chosen dream occupation and they played a slide show at the graduation.  The kids all were holding signs like, “Engineer”, “Doctor”, “Astronaut”, “Scientist”, and there’s my daughter with her sign that says, “Checkout Lady”.  And she even had this exhausted, miserable expression on her face as if she’s been dealing with difficult people all day – lol.

The room erupted in laughter and I could tell she felt bad but she played it off.  Later, she asked me why everyone was laughing at her and I told her, “well there’s nothing wrong with being a checkout lady but it’s just that people don’t usually think of that as their dream profession, it’s more like a necessary profession.”  She said, Mom aren’t you going to have to be a check out lady?  B/c at this point, I had been staying at home with the kids for 10 years.  I was like well I don’t know  – I felt bad but I played it off as well.  :-p

I know there are a million other times I’ve been roasted.  Those are just the ones that I can think of in the moment.  Marshmallows do taste better roasted though don’t they?  I think so.  Though I do kind of fantasize about the day when my kids are older and they have kids of their own and I get my chance to roast them.  I imagine being kind of a Betty White (as opposed to Betty Crocker) grandmother.  Though I’ll use some of Betty Crocker’s products to make the grandkids some yummy treats.  But I do tell the kids to please invite me to their family dinners on occasion so I can do an impression of each one of them when they were little at the dinner table.  It would just make my life to be able to come full circle with that.  :-p  Although, I may not get invited back.  Whatever – It’d be worth it.  :-p

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Dec
2017

Locked Up At Home

categories: Blog

In our house, we turned all the locks around on the kid’s doors so they couldn’t lock themselves in their room.  You see where this story is headed, right?  We should’ve just replaced the door knobs but whatever – details.  One day, I was reading to the kids in my youngest’s room at nap time.  My oldest was in First Grade.  My youngest was 18 months old ish and she decides to lock the door from the outside and close it locking us all inside her room.  Luckily, she was in the room with us!

I did not have my phone on me and  I needed to be able to get to the bus stop to pick up my oldest daughter.  I thought about climbing out the window but we were on the second floor.  I thought about opening the window and screaming as loud as possible but I might give someone a heart attack.  I thought about kicking down the door like Wonder Woman.  I thought about finding an axe like tool in the room and axing through the door like the guy in The Shining. I thought about tying some sheets together and rappelling down like Rapunzel but with sheets.  Then, I realized I just needed to breathe.

I’ve watched alot of scary movies in my lifetime especially because I had teenage babysitters (older siblings) when I was younger and they let me watch things like Nightmare on Elm Street when I was in elementary school.  :-p  That didn’t have any side effects – none whatsoever.  :-p  I finally got my wits about me and noticed that there was a tablet on the girl’s bed.  Great!  So I emailed my husband at work explaining the situation.

Next thing I know, not even 5 minutes later, I see a hairy arm push the door open.  I’m like – oh great –  now I’m about to get murdered because there’s no way my husband could have gotten home that fast. The reason that thought was the very first thing that crossed my mind is because there were no side effects whatsoever to watching Nightmare On Elm Street when I was a kid.  :-p  Well, turns out, it was just my neighbor.  My husband had contacted my neighbor to rescue me.

This was one of those times where I had taken a rest from cleaning for a few days and so my neighbor must have had to levitate to get up the stairs b/c there were toys everywhere!  After he left, I did one of those forensic analysis of the house sessions where you walk around and survey all the crap the visitor must’ve seen.

I’m like – oh great – that’s where my kid just blew their nose and threw down the toilet paper on the floor instead of walking a few steps to the trash can.  Oh and they decided to use q-tips apparently – they’ve never done that before – oh, lots of q-tips.  There’s the area where the girls thought they would make a rainbow loom bracelet but three minutes in abandoned it but managed to still make the room look like a rubber ball exploded.  There’s someone’s dirty underpants.  Greeeeaaaat..  So glad my kid locked me in a room on this day.  You know that feeling?  With kids, you just don’t want any surprise visitors, amirite?

Although, I have a feeling that there are people out there who always have their house clean but I don’t want to know about them because then I would just feel bad.  That happens in a land far, far away that is not my reality.  Now that I look at the title of this post though, I realize that it could also apply to feeling shackled to your house at times.  You know as a parent when you just want to go to the gym with your spouse and how easy that is without kids and how hard that is with kids?

Every.  Single.  Time.  we take our kids to the gym day care, they get the plague.  It never fails.  And the last time, my husband caught it and actually had to take off work for a couple of days.  Our kids are just not at that age where we can leave them at home by themselves for any length of time – maybe the older two but not the youngest.  So, I feel like one day we are going to just go buck wild and like grocery shop all day(just us) or something when we can actually leave the house unattended, you know?  B/c it’s been so long that we’ve been cooped up that it’s hard to imagine.  One day in a land far, far away.  :-p


Dec
2016

9 Things That Will Turn Your Child from a Gizmo Into a Gremlin

categories: Blog, Kids

Whoever created the movie, Gremlins, must’ve been a parent. It’s the perfect analogy for children. Ever look at your child one minute and they are sweet and cute (Gizmo), then the next they are foaming at the mouth and having the biggest tantrum ever (Gremlin)?  I call this the Gizmo to Gremlin transition.  It happens in the blink of an eye.  I’m compiling a list of the things that cause it so I and others can be more aware..

9 Things that will turn your gizmo into a gremlin:

1.) Go on a playdate without a snack/drink or go anywhere without a snack/drink. They will claim to be dying of thirst the second they realize you have nothing for them to drink. You will end up buying a $3 water somewhere.  If you are on a playdate at a friend’s house, they will eat everything in your friend’s kitchen or complain the entire time about being hungry.  You may end up clamping a hand down over their mouth and making a bad impression with said friend.  :-p

2.) Let them stay up past midnight.  In the Gremlins movie, you aren’t supposed to feed them after midnight, but in real life – it’s don’t let the kids stay up past midnight – you’ll regret it.  We frequently let our girls sleep together on the weekend and next thing you know, they are each breaking down in turns and your whole weekend is consumed by tears.

3.) Wake them up from a nap. The phrase never wake a sleeping baby applies to everyone: never wake a sleeping baby, never wake a sleeping toddler, never wake a sleeping preschooler, never wake a sleeping husband.

4.) The witching hour: anytime between 4pm and 6pm.

5.) Serve them anything homemade.  I no longer answer my kids when they ask me what’s for dinner.  I tell them that’s a loaded question!  Or I’ll tell them it’s something frozen that I warmed up b/c they trust that stuff more than they trust my cooking skills..

6.) Tell them you are going to Home Depot.  They hate Home Depot, mostly because they will usually end up getting barked at by some old, grouchy person that thinks kids shouldn’t exist in this world.  But some are nice and give them lollipops so it just depends.

7.) Tell them it’s time to clean.  Although, now that they are older, I find that I tell them all to clean just to get them to play quietly together.  Somehow telling them to clean, causes them to play nicely.  Not exactly the desired response, but close.  Sometimes, as a parent, you have to improvise and be flexible to get what you want.  :-p

8.) Tell them no at the store.  I like to say, we’ll add that to the Christmas list.  If they push further, I pretend to add it to a list on my phone.. This applies more when they are little – now, for my older children I say no incessantly at the store – it’s like I’m making up for all the times I couldn’t say it when they were little.

9.) Tell them to share.  This evicts the worst response.  It’s like you are asking them to set their toy on fire or something.  Telling them to take turns isn’t much better – they will watch the clock like a hawk and nag you incessantly to see if it’s time yet.

Anyone else have any other things?  My kids are 4,  7, & 9 so the list might’ve been different when they were younger.. No, wait, it was definitely different and more exhaustive when they were younger. I used to say – it’s so hard being little – all the time because it seemed like EVERYTHING upset them.  Seriously, you could say, “We are going to the park!” and they’d get upset.

And gremlin kid after they’ve eaten all the snacks out of your friend’s pantry:

And now I’m going to flip the script down here and write about times when Mom turns from Gizmo to Gremlin:

Here’s Mom “happily” at the computer paying bills:

These are the things that turn Mom into a gremlin:

1.) Talking to me after bedtime.

2.) Scream mommy from another room over and over again and expecting me to come running like I’m some kind of butler.

3.) Leaving the house without shoes on or with only dress up shoes on and not finding out until we are at the destination.

4.) Incessant fighting.

5.) The sound of the bead bucket hitting the floor.

6.) Bouncing around so much upstairs that it sounds like a Jumanji style stampede is going to come through your ceiling.

7.) Having to repeat myself for the 5th or 6th time.

And gremlin Mom (angrily stuffing face with cookies while offering the kids none):