1) In another case of the younger sister using the qualities of sly and stealth to continually antagonize her older, quick to react and quicker to head flail in tears, brother,  Josie has once again proved herself the victor. Four long days ago, James came running to his momma unable to find, blanky, his infant attachment object. The house was scoured and it was perhaps mom who was the most upset. The determination to find it once and for all returned this morning to a serious level with a stern voice to match. In the 40th minute of search, a sweet, mildly antagonistic, and genuinely entertained voice indicated knowledge of its whereabouts.

“Maybe some little giwrl took it” she popped her hip and flashed her skinny arm.

“Which little girl, Josephine?”

“A little girl who likes to wear pink…a little girl like me” she said with her best version of a wink and a giggle.

“Do you know where his blanky is?” I said on the fourth day of frustration.

“No, but a little girl might.”

Up to her room I went.

Roughly 20 minutes of searching through backpacks full of shoes, most of them stolen from my closet and in the shape of stiletto, with a few mozzarella sticks mixed in, I found his most loved object hidden in her trunk underneath 7 stuffed animals and several blankets of her own.

It was, in fact, a little girl in pink. Purposeful, Impressive, Mean. Isn’t two years too little to know how to pull off such a long-standing prank?

2) Two nights ago I fed my kids broccoli with dinner. We moved on to dessert in record time. I was happy, full of pride and esteem for my children who crave healthy, nutritious vegetables, certain of their brain development, and maturing taste buds. Yesterday, as I began to tackle the dirtiest of the dirty laundry, I noticed some extra bulging  weight in Josephine’s pants. Their contents? Several uneaten broccoli stems successfully hidden and completely undetected from perhaps the most gullible mother of all time.

3) When the grocery store with which I am accustomed rearranges and goes under construction, I apparently take it personally, need two hours to find the applesauce, and somehow find myself searching for lemons in the spaghetti aisle. I thought it would be acceptable for my daughter to still be in pajamas, since we made it there before breakfast at 8:30 am. When we checked out at 10am with little to show and a cart full of chocolate almond milk, new lip liner, and shoplifted pretzels, the experience begins to look much more nutritionally and fashionably irresponsible. To my credit, there were fewer tears than 2 million, and no one jumped out of their cart and into the arms of an old woman wearing a bird hat. Please put the yogurt back where it belongs!!!!

4) While completing a blogging profile, I asked my husband, “how do you think a person would describe my blog in less than 200 words?” “How you deal with your not quiet life of sh** and piss.” When I began to gently berate him for his indifference to my poorly written sentences and posts about mostly nothing, he responded again, “if you were a queen, you would have killed 800 messengers by now.” What do your husbands think of your blogs?

5) Recently, I sat tired on the couch as all three kids jumped from the ottoman onto my head, and I really didn’t mind the neck jolting, because it was the most still I had been in hours. After jump #4,476,895, a feather flew in the air, because hand-me-down couches aren’t actually made to be used as gymnastics equipment. As it was spotted fluttering, James, in a moment of pure childhood magic, caught it in his hand. His eyes widened and his jaw dropped. “MOM! We have to find the bird that lost this feather!” Before I began to correct him and explain the feather’s origins, I realized and seized the precious opportunity and for the next 25 minutes, I scored myself 5 emails returned in stillness and to the sounds of “here birwdie, birwdie, birwdie..”

6) We seriously interrupted some lady’s chance to work quietly, and some other large book club meeting, at Panera when I met two other moms and their kids for lunch. At the 37th dirty look, I decided, its Panera bread at noon on a Friday. Trying to work quietly and participate in a conference call or discuss a short story printed on a paper brochure while seated next to 7 kids under 4 is just as, if not more of a fruitless pursuit to my kids and their friends’ effort to pretend the recycling whole on the garbage can is a voice portal while Rita licks cookie off the floor. Our macaroni and cheese was delicious.

7) You know those days when you forgo the bra and embrace the sweatpants for early school drop off?  That is the exact day my sister runs out of gas in the fire lane and has to request assistance from the same maintenance man who once prevented the same car from exploding when she tried to jump her car incorrectly and also the same man who was called by several neighbors when her husband tried to host a kid friendly bonfire with a 9 month old Christmas tree. She will forever be the mother I most look up to in this life.

Go to Jen for bunches more. Happy Friday, folks.