Happy Birthday Destructo!! (Betty Crocker your job is Safe)

Destructo wants a firetruck birthday cake, so I research on Google and find the perfect cake, complete with video instructions. It looks easy! Besides, the caterpillar cake back in February for Spitfire turned out relatively edible and did bear a slight resemblance to its namesake--a caterpillar. I know there is trouble when Spitfire walks quietly up to my elbow midway through my culinary adventure wearing a decidedly glum face.
"What?" I say, shortly. After all, I am in the middle of creating a fire engine masterpiece.
"The cake isn't going to work out, is it?" she says, solemnly.
So domestic goddess, I am not.
But Happy Birthday to our favorite destructive three-year old anyway!! No matter that you have developed a fondness for pouring full bottles of liquid out in the middle of the living room floor when no one is looking(laundry soap takes aproximately 12 days to dry out of carpet, latex paint only about 4 days, and you can salvage some of the paint by scooping up with a large spoon), or even that you like to tackle us with now warning. We know you mean well, or else you are practicing for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, it remains to be seen. In any case, we adore you, in all your glorious destructiveness. Before you came along, we were not quite complete. You added just the right pizazz, making four our magical number--plus two cats whom you have trained in your likeness.
Happy Birthday, Destructo!!!

The Beer Song

It is Sunday night and I am trying my hand at singing the kids to sleep. Destructo has lived up to his name over the past couple of weeks (poured Spitfire's sea monkeys over his head, banged her on the head with an empty plastic bottle, and destroyed her lego masterpieces with calculating skill),so I am thinking that he will succumb quickly after so much excitement, but he tosses and turns. Maybe I am off key? I sing Christmas songs that they like and that are soothing--Silent Night, Silver Bells, Little Drummer Boy. And then finally. . .silence. I make a move to get up when Spitfire pipes up and asks about that other song.
"What song?"
"You know. The one about beer on the wall."
(Dart Guy, she must be your daughter!)

Upside Down L

So Spitfire is 6 this month, which comes as quite a surprise to her parents. SIX! The number right before 7, which, of course, turns directly into 18. We see the writing on the wall.

In a dramatic turn of events, the loose tooth Spitfire has nursed for days and days (i.e. relentlessly and methodically shifted back and forth until the pearly white literally hung from one fragile thread) makes a jarring exit during a particularly spectacular aerial assault on our sofa. I console Spitfire, whose main concern is that she missed getting the prize for her tooth falling out at school. Dart Guy sadly contemplates the newest stain on the pillow--blood. We decide that it fits right in with other marks there; milk, juice, spit-up, magic-markers, and various food stains have all converged to create a truly, original, one-of-a-kind couch cushion.

Soon afterward, Spitfire quiets long enough to observes that her look is like an upside-down L!

Today, she has recovered completely, and tries to teach her challenged student (me) how to jump rope. Apparently, my technique is all wrong. She shows me her thoroughly mastered system, jumping with both feet at once and counting each time, all the way to eleven. I take my turn, and she counts for me:

1. . .2. . .

"How many was that?" I ask, my feet hurting a little.

She looks at me skeptically. "2?" (She can barely contain her disdain). Before I can say anything in my defense, i.e mid-rise dress heals, just finished lunch, she snatches the rope.

"See, you have to practice. Watch my feet," she commands. She counts up to the teens again, and I sigh. Take off my shoes. I manage 8 this time, which is highly respectable, in my view. Spitfire shrugs and take the rope, while I sit, vaguely nauseated by the feel of my just-eaten Taco Bueno violently sloshed around in my stomach.

She must have felt some bit of sorry for me, because she wrote this letter to me while I was out with Dart Guy:

Fabuare 20010:

From: Cadence To: Mommy I Love You I mist you

Than she drew a picture of herself with a very large, glittering crown on the top of her head. Mmmm. Who wears the crown around here? I guess she has it right.

Snow!

The numbers:
Approximate inches of snow: 9
Number of hours without power: 15
Number of McCammacks on one mattress in front of fireplace: 4 along with 2 cats (very crowded)
Number of clothing changes after cold and wet set in: Way more than host costume changes on awards show
Amount of excitement from snow starved children: Too much to quantify
The peaceful sleep of kids derived from a long day of snow fun: Priceless!!!!!!!!!

The creek behind our house is home to several ducks that didn't get the memo to fly further south for this winter. I am surprised when come across them today.
"Aren't they supposed to go somewhere for the winter?" I ask Dart Guy, as the kiddos aspire to get too close to the edge of the steep creek incline--I feel my blood pressure rising.
"Yeah"--Dart Guy answers immediately, as though duck migration patters should be well known to me. "Here."

Kittens!!

Ahhhhhh. I like when Destructo is napping. . .

Check out early Christmas presents for Spitfire and Destructo!! We brought home two sibling kittens from animal rescue on Sat, names still pending, though Spitfire has some specific ideas on this subject, namely, that one should be called, Elizabeth, after a helper in her Sunday school class that she adores. I'm sure Elizabeth will be glad to hear this. Destructo has been surprisingly non-destructive with these kittens; he picks each one up gingerly (only once have I feared for Kitten's tiny little neck), with two hands spanning a petite belly, and parks he/she on his lap gently, being sure to keep a firm hold so the wiley, little creature won't run and hide. Again.
Spitfire has surely found Heaven on earth, and is convinced that she should stay home from school to take care of her new charges. She keeps excellent tabs on our furry friends, even orally detailing events that take place inside the litter box, as though she is a football commentater.
"They are going into the littler box. . . Now they are covering up everything, and moving it all around. . . "

Mmmm. How best to pick him up from this angle. . .

This is the life. . .

Kindergarten!!

This is now the second week of Kindergarden for Spitfire, who appears to have warped into a poised, young-adult over night, leaving her parents in bewildering contemplation of the time passage between diapers and school supplies. Suddenly, Spitfire has become a testy fashion connoisseur , squashing my suppsedly well thought-out wardrobe aspirations for her, as well as my attempts at perfection in lunch box assembly, which are now required to pass a "friend test." I am somewhat taken aback to hear that the little cut-out hearts and star shapes adorned with sweetzie type messages that I have lovingly created and placed in her lunch pack each day are a source of humor for a discerning Spitfire and her peer group.

"You laugh?" I ask lightly, as though not very interested in her answer, all the while moving as close as possible with both ears cocked and ready. Maybe I hadn't heard her right.

"Yeeeeesss," she says impatiently. "When I take them out and show them to my friends, they make us laugh."

Mmmm. I absorb this painfully. This is like the first day all over again: Dart Guy, myself, and Destructo, quiet in his stroller, walk Spitfire up to school on the first day of big K expecting protests, tears, and drama, only to leave a newly commissioned sophisticate in a chair with Spitfire's name on it. There is an off-handed wave and a hug we insist upon, then we become non-factors. The only worrying and mourning imposed on this day is offered up by her parents.
It would seem we are on the fast track to uncool, a fact that is even more apparent while waiting outside her friend's door on the week-end, hoping to borrow a blender for smoothie making. I break out into a silly dance, pretending there is a tune playing somewhere, making Destructo giggle crazily in his stroller. Spitfire smiles ever so slightly, nervously glancing at the door on which she has just knocked.
"I hope Abigail doesn't see you," she says fearfully, watching the knob closely for any sign of movement.
What do you mean? These are happening moves, sister!

I guess it is lucky we still have Destructo's destructive ways to distract us from our precarious slide into the land of old and out-of-touch. This morning at five he wakes and immediately demands breakfast, though I stash him in bed with us in hopes of more sleep.
"I eat," he states forcefully. I ignore. Forcefully. Or sleepily.
Some random thumping noises alert me to the fact that he is trying to pull his Big Wheel fire truck into bed with us, possibly to ride it over the top of our heads. This thought brings me fully awake and upright, which causes Destructo to strike out gleefully and triumphantly for the kitchen ahead of me. I step on a plastic tire on the way, yelping loudly. Destructo comes to my rescue, offering to kiss my boo boo. At least to him, I am still a little cool.

Dart Tournament

It is a fateful day when I agree to play in a Couple's dart tournament with Dart Guy. I think I was under the influence of too much sleep, a rare happening in our household. So here we are, entering the smoke-filled Dart Bar (it's like Texas--a whole other country), and I shutter seeing a large crowd of dart-playing connoisseurs milling around tables littered with all manner of dart paraphanalia. I live with one, but, even so, I feel decidedly inferior holding onto three darts and stepping up to the line to take my first throw. That's when I decided I need a drink. Or a few drinks. So I gulp some wine and try and stay near the "tip" case, which, unfortunately, is not a case containing a nicely prepared notebook filled with an array of helpful dart hints; but, instead is the case filled with extra plastic tips for when one or more errant dart throws creates a sensation all across the bar by violently slicing the short, black tip of your dart away from the steel shaft. My darts are a little wild today, or every day, to be honest, and they rush toward the electronic boards like rogue missiles destined to place me in war crime tribunals. I have a particularly disturbing image in my mind: me standing before a panel of somber, dart experts that deluge me with all sorts of terrifying, hard questions--Did you practice for today? Do you want to win as bad as Bruce Jenner wanted to win the gold in his hey day? Can you add numbers quickly in your head to determine the proper target on the board? At this point I begin to stutter and stammer and wish for a starbucks to wisk me away to lovely esspresso land. I go outside and take a sip of my Frappacino in the car. We lose our first match, since I cannot decide what end of the dart should be pointed toward the board. Dart Guy pretends that I do not frustrate him., and I am reminded of why I married him. He puts our team on his shoulder for the second match, dragging us to a win. His throws are graceful, perfectly aimed miraculous events. Five hours after this all began, we lose our last match. Though I have not really performed any great athletic feats here, I am ready for bed. We pick up Destructo and Spitfire from Grandma's, where they have created the world's largest House of Clutter, and enthusiastically enjoyed it. And that's the end of my bi-annual Dart Adventure. I leave the real dart playing up to Dart Guy, for which I think, he breathes a great sigh of relief.