Just some random thoughts since I can’t seem to put enough together to make a whole post.

*Being pregnant with your fifth at age 40 is much different than being pregnant with your first at 28.  Though I think it has less to do with my age and more to do with the current batch of children who need to be schooled, fed and chauffeured.

*We tried to determine the gender of the baby today.  We saw two arms, two legs, a face, a two-hemisphered brain and could even count fingers and toes.  Baby even waved happily at us…and kept his or her little ankles crossed.  We poked and prodded, but that little one would not give up his/her secret.  I’m not quite 18 weeks yet, so it was a long shot, but now it’ll be another 4 weeks until my next appointment.

*Is it possible for cats to be moody? Not just normal cat aloofness, either.  I mean like, being all, “love me, love me, scratch my head, give treats, love me…”, purring just at the sight of you, weaving in and out of your legs one week, then all walking away as you get close and giving you the stink eye the next week?  Our still-not-spayed mama cat is like that.  Could she be hormonal?  We do plan on getting her fixed, we just want to give her time to adapt to being taken away from the only home she’s ever known.  You know, before subjecting her to major surgery.

*Speaking of cats, I found the perfect way for Pumpkin Girl to keep her room clean!  The cats live in her room.  Their food and litter is in the bathroom across the hall, but they spend most of their time with her.  She reads aloud to them and cuddles them and pampers them like the little goddesses they think they are.  Plus she has a giant window seat in her room where they can perch and look down upon humanity.  Anyhoo, as a result, her room gets a little furry.  So every other day she has to clean everything off of her floor and vacuum.  Plus, she is learning that anything that she leaves out is fair game for the cats to attack, scratch or nibble.  I’ve never seen her room look so good for so long!

*I’ve never seen an episode of “Lost”.   I didn’t care for “24″.  Thus, my life continues as normal this week.

*I downloaded a bunch of ’80s songs on iTunes, and then rediscovered my CDs.  I already owned most of those songs.

*Phil was complaining that he’d put on some weight (bringing him out of the “skinny” category and into “normal”).  Pumpkin Girl blithely told him, “Don’t worry, Daddy.  Everyone gets a little winter blubber.”

“Bless Lord, the people at Disneyland, because we want to be there, too.”

“Thank you for this nice house, which is better than a hotel, because you don’t have to be so quiet, because when mom and dad are watching tv, they are downstairs, but at a hotel they are really close.”

Amen!

“Mama,”  Bip said to me during lunch.  “I have someting to tell you, but I didn’t want to get in trouble.”

“Okaaay…,” says I, wondering what sort of mess I was about to be cleaning up.

“I had a little accident in my underwear and pants.”

“Oh, Ok, well, that happens.  Did you change your underwear?” I asked.

“No.”

Of course he didn’t. But at least this was minor and well within the scope of my parenting abilities.  “Well, you need to get clean underwear when you have an accident.”

“No, no, no, mama!  Listen – you just leave them alone and leave them alone and leave them alone.  And then…you have…”

“Clean underwear.”

As I put Bip down for his nap, he patted the pillow next to him and said, “You need to lie down for a little bit.”

I told him, “No, not today.  I have too much work to do.”  To which he replied:

“But you said you were tired of my questions.”

Heh, heh.  I guess I did say that.

Until today, Boo didn’t know the color of his eyes.  He’s of Chinese and Mexican heritage, I bet you know the color of his eyes!  His language arts assignment required him to write similes, including one about the color of his eyes.  He claimed he couldn’t see his own eyes, so he didn’t know what color they are.  Nope, he’s never looked at himself carefully enough in the mirror to know.  So off he went to investigate and returned to tell me that his eyes are “Brown like dirt.”  Good to know.

I would have gone with “as brown as chocolate.”

In completely unrelated news, it looks like the kids’ America’s Got Talent audition will be less exciting than I thought.  There won’t be any judges, it’s basically a taping of their performance which the judges will view later.  If they like what they see, we’ll get a call back to a live, local performance in front of an audience.  So no autographs from “the Hof” for us.  Also, we’re not allowed to bring cameras.  I guess that’s good for the show, but it’s not good for the blog. Don’t these people know I’ve got people wanting a behind the scenes look?  I wonder if it’s too late to get a press credential?

And lastly, you’ll be glad to know that my PayPal-eBay fraud claim was resolved in my favor.  Turns out that someone won a computer on eBay, then hacked my PayPal account to pay for it.  Since I check my email 700 several times a day, I saw the PayPal notification within 20 minutes of it coming through my email, and within 30 minutes I had a fraud claim filed.  The seller had actually shipped the computer to Vietnam when he heard from PayPal saying the transaction was in dispute.  He got his computer back and helped out with my dispute by telling PayPal everything he knew and he filed a complaint with eBay.  eBay is pressing charges.  My money is back in my account and all is well.

Language Arts assignment:  Use prepositions to describe where Tib (from Betsy-Tacy and Tib) lived.  Use your imagination.

Boo’s Answer: beside the Pentagon, along the freeway

Lived in DC long?

Catechism Question:  For what did Esau sell his birthright?

Boo’s Answer: Vegie Soup

Correct answer: Pottage, a kind of vegetable stew

Cub Scout Citizenship Belt Loop Requirement:  Develop a list of jobs you can do around the home.

Boo’s list included:  Widows

I think he meant windows.

“Dear Rebecca,

I miss you. I wish you would come back but your happy. (sigh) Tell me what heaven is like pleas. I bet it is great, full of never ending happynis and beuty and love. (sigh) Not like here, ugh. Some beuty, some happynis, some tears. I want to be with you. One of the worst things is mosketos (mosquitoes). Aghagah. I am running out of room (on the card) so…

Love, Pumpkin Girl”

sigh

(edited by me only for clarity)

Says Boo this morning, “I’m getting so good at keeping my underwear clean that I only have to change it on bath nights!”

This is significant because the boy does not shower every day.

Sigh. That explains why his clean underwear is still in the laundry room, waiting to be folded and put away. I guess he didn’t need them.

Pumpkin Girl to Boo: “The Stations of the Cross are no place for rock and roll.”

So I guess we won’t be substituting “Bohemian Rhapsody” for “At the Cross Her Station Keeping ” (Stabat Mater) any time soon?

So they’ve been at this ballet folklorico thing for a few months. The whole reason Boo agreed to try dance classes was because he remembered seeing a folklorico machete dance. He thought would be pretty OK. So he patiently waited to learn a machete dance. I told him that he should ask his teacher. But at the end of September, he came home all smiles, telling me how the new dance they are learning has…machetes! I don’t care what the experts might say, but there is something on the boy DNA that attracts them to weapons – and showing off their weapons. Because the story behind the machete dance is basically that the men working in the sugar cane fields are showing off their machete skills for the pretty senoritas.

And just for fun, here’s a folklorico dance with the machetes. Boo is a beginner, of course, so he doesn’t have all the fancy moves, just hitting them under and over his legs. He says dancing with machetes is pretty easy, “Just swish them around and try not to cut off your ear.” Good advice, Boo.

But that was before he whacked his sister in the ear while practicing.

(Be sure to watch the video through to the end, when the men pull their head bands over their eyes)