You know you've gone over to the dark side as a mother when -

You realize that you actually just said:

"If you don't go downstairs right now and watch TV, I will send you to your room!"

Crazed rant

Um. It looks like I need to just keep this space blank. When you need to revise the revision, it's time to admit that you have a problem.

Prayers for charity, which I seem to have in short supply, and direction would be appreciated.

Happy Mother's Day!

To my Mom, my Mother-in-Law, Grandma Lamb and Gram Campbell -- thank you all so much for all you do. We love you! We really do, despite the fact that we haven't acknowledged it in any way (except for here, but blogs don't really count.) Thank you for putting up with idiots like us. The cards will be in the mail on Monday, I promise!!!

Side note, to highlight the unorganized mess that is me:

We went to the noon mass today, because the 1st Communion class was invited to participate in the May Procession. So we had plenty of time to get ourselves together -- I even curled my hair! I was proud of how well we were rolling on Mother's Day: no dirty faces, every head brushed, baby clean and fed. There we were, putting our best foot forward for Mother's Day!

Getting out of the car, though, I realized that Beth had her dress on inside out. Oh well, too late to fix that, I thought. Then, as Katie left to join the other kids in their Communion clothes, I realized that I hadn't put her veil on quite right, so that a big chunk of hair was sticking up out of the crown. Just let it go, I told myself, nothing you can do about it now. Sitting down in the pew, Lucy started to fuss so I picked her up out of her carrier realizing as her cold, wrinkled little feet hit my arm that I had forgotten to put her socks on.

What is amazing, even to me, about this is not that three out of my five children were not properly dressed for mass. It's that I not only did not notice these things until after leaving the house, I was actually congratulating myself for having them so well put together! Add this to the Alzheimer's that I will almost certainly contract in my old age, and you're looking at a scary picture.

So, a happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there. May you deserve the recognition more than I do!

When good groundhogs go bad

We loved our groundhog. Last year, I really enjoyed watching the little guy waddling around in the mornings, nibbling on the flowers. It gave our yard a cozy, country-ish feeling, and I really felt like the groundhog and I had a real connection, especially in our shared desire to never, never, ever actually encounter each other face to face. If I so much as tapped the window, the groundhog would dart back into his hole. We never heard so much as a rustle when we were outside. Those were nice days.

Last weekend, we noticed that the groundhog had grown bold after his winter hibernation. He mosied around the yard undisturbed while we tapped on the windows at him, and when we went outside he kept his little head poked out of his burrow entrance, watching us. This seemed strange, but we weren't really alarmed. That is, until things got creepy.

In the late afternoon last Saturday, after everybody who had come over for Katie's Communion had gone home, the groundhog decided to pay us a visit. I was upstairs, and heard Chris yell urgently for me to come down to the basement. What I saw there forever shattered my little love affair with the groundhog. He was standing in front of our basement door with his nose pressed against the glass, looking in at us. His eyes were beady and evil. Worst of all, he was covered, covered in fleas who swarmed around him as though he were the decapitated pig's head from Lord of the Flies. Chris pounded on the glass, but our sinister visitor only backed up slightly, keeping those light less eyes fixed on us. It was seriously one of the freakiest things I've ever seen. I just know that this image is going to figure in my nightmares for some time to come.

Once again, our "fake country" feels a little too real for comfort. In a move that really pushes us towards hillbilly-hood, Chris ran out to Wal-Mart to buy himself a critter-shootin' machine. He spent most of yesterday afternoon sitting in the kitchen with his shotgun, waiting for the groundhog to make his appearance. Of course, now that the groundhog has asserted his dominance of the yard he probably won't feel the need to wander in full view for a while. But when he does, Chris will be waiting.

Last summer I considered naming this creature. What a novice I was back then! This summer, I'm plotting out an animal graveyard.

This puts a whole new spin on an old family joke

Chris and I often joke about selling off one of the girls, since we have so many in reserve. But we had no idea just how lucrative the concept could be...

Chris' sister Becky needed to come up with something to auction off for her school's fundraiser. She often talks about "the neices" to her students, so she decided to put up a picnic, hosted by herself and attended by the winning student, with our four older girls attending.

Now, I suspect that Becky is a popular teacher. I know she really loves her students, and I think it's pretty mutual. So I don't necessarily attribute the bidding war that ensued purely to the attraction of spending an afternoon with my kids. But there was a bidding war, and the winning bid is.......impressive. How impressive? I'm not going to tell you the exact amount, but if you guessed a thousand dollars, you are waaaaaaaaaay off.

These girls are no cheap date.

So now we're a little nervous that this kid won't get her money's worth out of our girls. On the other hand, though, after hearing this exchange between Claire, Abbie and Grandpa Mlinek I think I should be nervous that she will:

Claire: Grandpa?
Grandpa: Yes?
Claire: One time, I fell off the swing and hurt my vee-ginia.
Abbie: BE-GINIA!
Claire: No, Abbie. It's "VEE- GIE-NEE-AH." It really hurt, Grandpa. Right here. I was so sore!
Abbie: BE-GINIA! BEE-GINIA!

What's a Grandpa to do in this situation? Chuckle a tiny little bit.
And look nobody in the eye.

Katie's First Communion

Happy First Communion, Katie! We are so, so proud of you and how well you "get" the mystery of the Eucharist. God bless you, little one.