A Dispassionate, Clinical Account (I.e., 'He Says')

At approximately 10:34 this morning, I received a call at work from Cindy.
She anxiously related that a carbon monoxide detector was going off.

I asked if both of the detectors were going off.
"No," she responded.
I asked which one of the two detector was going off.
She told me that it was the older one--the one that had caused a false alarm 3 years ago.
She further explained that she had turned the kerosene heater off about an hour earlier.

Having ascertained the pertinent facts, I reassured her that all was probably OK. I further said that she could call the fire department if she wished--the decision was hers, as she was still in her pajamas, etc. I further offered to come home if she wanted me to--I would meet her at Dean and Kay's house across the street.
Within seconds of hanging up, she called again and said that she wanted me to come home and that she was calling the FD.
I arrived home 10 minutes later, and after the FD came and ascertained that there was no carbon monoxide problem, I drove back to work.

As a countermeasure to such future false alarms, I will now be purchasing a CO detector with a readout that shows the current CO levels.
Problem solved!

Allyson Update

Maybe it's because we know she's the last one, but for whatever the reason, Allyson is a joy to have around.

It is heartwarming to see her break into a wriggling mass of smiles when she sees her Mom or Dad. Likewise when she is sucking her two fingers and you do some antic to coax the corners of her otherwise-occupied mouth upwards in a bemused grin.

She is good at scuttling around on her knees, and if she notices that you have food at hand, she scoots over and pulls herself up to make herself more available. If the food happens to be ice cream, she yelps whenever we let her go too long between bites.

She eats most everything. This past week I have fed her little bits of meatloaf, baked potato, freshly smashed bananas, and even some chicken enchilada. (Cindy was not amused with me when Allyson appeared to have a tummy ache after the enchilada and kept us both up half the night.)

She is now able to climb up the stairs--and quickly too--so we have dusted off the old baby gate again.

On the flip side, she doesn't sleep through the night as she used to, but we can handle that. At least she falls right back to sleep after getting tanked up again.


She is also a big 'Dancepad' fan!



What a gal!

Filthy Lucre Does the Trick

Cindy has come up with a new way to motivate the kids to get their daily chores done.

She made up chore charts, and at the end of each week the kids are now receiving an allowance based upon how many of the chores they have fully completed.

This is not to say that they get money for doing their chores, they just lose money if they don't do them. Cindy was also prescient enough to leave a number of empty spaces on each chart for additional weekly write-ins.

During the first week, everyone had deductions for missed work, but on the second week Cameron made sure he had everything done. The kid loves money!

And there have been a number of secondary salutary effects. There is no longer any fighting about who gets to sit at the end of the table (because the kid who sets the table for the whole week gets to pick where they want to sit, and they now know that they will each get a whole week to enjoy the 'hallowed' seat). Ditto for the big fights over who got to put what away from the dishwasher (they all strove mightily to do the silverware, one kid now does the entire dishwasher for the entire week!

Yes, Cindy is a genius!

With bowed head....

'Kenner has a new way of waking me up at night. She walks into our room, comes over to my side of the bed, and lays her head on my chest.

She then softly whines, 'I'm scared!'

That is my signal to get up and stagger behind her to her room and lay with her. Depending on how tired I am, I can be in there anywhere between 3 minutes and 4 hours.

Life is rough for a 42-year old dad!
However, Cindy is very appreciative of Makenna's new 'stealth mode,' as most of the time she doesn't hear Makenna come in, nor me leave.

Here is sweet 'Kenner during the daylight hours....


UPDATE! On Sunday night I woke up as she quietly came into the room. As she sidled over to my side of the bed, I pretended to be asleep, waiting for her to gently lay her head on my chest. She came near, paused for approximately 0.05 seconds, then roughly shoved me in order to wake me up. Just to show her my displeasure, I only stayed in her bed for 3 or 4 hours.

Allyson 'Spawn of Dracula'

A week ago Allyson was doing her darndest to get put on a formula-based diet.

As we have related previously, she has two lower teeth that are fully extended, and as Cindy let me know a number of times last week with her whimsical loud yelps (exaggerated for comical effect, I am sure), Allyson had been trying to get some red meat (or at least blood) in her diet. When Cindy first began yippin' at the nippin', Allyson would get startled, and even start crying in response. However, she soon grew hardened to the pain and just did it for fun.

Cindy is also quick to note that Allyson's fingernails also serve well as talons to pin down the prey during feeding time.

But as you might expect, Cindy finally found a good cure. As she started feeding Allyson she would gently place her thumb and forefinger on Allyson's soft cheek and softly caress her. When Allyson started to clamp down, Cindy would clamp the aforementioned two fingers together and apply some pressure until she stopped.

Thanks to this, Allyson has stopped being so carnivorous (cannibalous?) and both mother and baby are doing well.

Ahh, sabbaticals

Actually, the main reasons for the blogging being so light since Christmas is that things have gotten a lot busier at work, and I've been lazy during the time I get to spend at home.
But even more than that, it is also due to the disappointing performances of the kids--they really need to work on doing things that are blog-worthy!
They definitely need to get their collective acts together!

Parting words....

As I prepared to leave Makenna after tucking her in bed and tickling her back, she rolled over to face me and sweetly said, 'Don't even think about tootin' in my room!'

Christmas Loot and Smiles to Boot!

We really need to do something about that 'Red-Eye' photo problem!

As you can see by her facial expression, Allyson displays great pathos as she gives piano recitals!

Merry Christmas!

We hope you and your'ns had a merry Christmas!


Our kids enjoyed Christmas exceedingly, but we parents were rather stressed out--not enough parents to go around to help all the kids figure out their stuff!

Keeping the Floyd family tradition alive.....

Last night I made something I haven't made in 11 years of married life---oyster stew! Of course, traditions have to be adjusted over time, and this was no exception:

--I used half cream and half milk instead of just skim milk.
--I used a whole 12-oz. container of large fresh oysters for 1.5 quarts of soup instead of just a couple little ones for 2 gallons.

After just smelling it, Cindy refused to even look at the big oysters half-submerged in the stew. She made some wisecrack about the smell, and not wanting to spew!
As I was eating it later, I asked the kids if they wanted to see a really big oyster. Cameron came over to see, then Makenna came over for a gander.
I could tell she was impressed with my hot and creamy soup, as she had plugged her nose before approaching!
Anyway, at least I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Our first and second Christmas miracles

Tonight it was my turn to take Erin shopping, specifically for athletic shoes and jeans.
After sifting through the jeans for 30 seconds, Erin decided she didn't need to buy jeans tonight.
That was the first miracle.

Miracle number two was when we found a pair of Womens Size 12-Wide Nike shoes in a style she liked and a price I could live with. The miraculous part is that these were the only shoes in the store in that size.

Lucky Ducky

Today Cameron came downstairs wearing the same clothes he has worn for the past two schooldays. (It is no surprise that it is his camouflage shirt and pants.)
When Cindy pointed out this oversight, and pleaded that he wear something else, he refused.
She came to find out that these were his "lucky clothes."
Lucky how?
"Well," he explained, “Yesterday I got 5 homeruns in kickball, and the day before I got three." (And yes, he has quite the inflated ego about his kickball prowess.)

Cindy jumped at this teaching moment, and related to him the story of the little girl who had a lucky duck, then lost the duck, and thereby found out that it wasn't the duck that made her lucky after all.

Needless to say, that dog didn't hunt.

"Nope," he replied, "I still like these clothes--they're lucky!"

And they may be even luckier than even he thinks, as they will pay out extra dividends come Saturday when it comes time for him to do his laundry, as he will only have to wash, dry, fold, and put away one shirt and one pair of pants (along with his action figure boxers and the 3 pairs of socks (the ones with green wording in the toe area) that he deigns to wear).

Of course, the above assumes that he can bend or otherwise contort the lucky clothes ('lucky stiff' clothes?) enough to get them into the washer.

Gizzards

Erin brought home a slew of books from the library yesterday, all with similar themes, such as Haunted Houses, Scary Stories for Sleepovers, and The Nightmare before Christmas (based on the overrated movie directed by perhaps the most overrated director in history).
As she started Haunted Houses, she came over to show me the photographs in this 'non-fiction' book that had images of ghosts, etc. I explained the wonders of PhotoShop and other photo enhancing software. Soon thereafter she came to me to say that the book had made her scared.
Doling out loving fatherly advice, 'Well, stop reading it then! Duh!!' I gently urged.
'But I've read the whole thing already!' she protested.
Needless to say, at bedtime and then again much later when Allyson woke her up during the night, she complained about being scared.
'Think happy thoughts!' I suggested. Having just gotten Allyson back to sleep by tickling her back in the middle of the night, it took me awhile to think of some actual happy thoughts for her to consider thinking.
I don't think she'll be reading the other books anytime soon....

We don't want to make anyone jealous, but....

unlike previous years, it is only one week from the big day, but this is where we stand.
1. All presents to extended family, etc., have been sent.
2. All presents to our family have been wrapped (except for a few 'undecided' items).
3. Our Christmas cards and family Christmas letters (both the English and Japanese versions) have all been sent.
4. Presents for teachers have all been prepared.

But lest you accuse us of boasting....
1. Our 'goody trays' are only half-baked. (Truth be told, our neighbors for some reason have developed some very high expectations. A couple years ago we just took some banana bread and oranges to a diabetic neighbor, and there was such moaning and gnashing of teeth (mostly by the diabetic) along with hints that they were really anticipating our next visit when we would be bringing the 'real stuff' that we spent the next week making over 10 different taste sensations.)

Hmmm....maybe that was boasting too....?

Chomper

Allyson's first tooth has finally come through this past week.

Matching the indentation on my finger with her gums, it is situated on her lower jaw, just right of center.

Dear Mr. Manners....

Dear Mr. Manners,

As Christmas approaches and I see the way my children are acting, is there something wrong about these feelings I keep having--that I really want to return all their expensive presents that I have spent so much time and effort on and replace them with some chunks of low-grade sub-bituminous coal?
I mean, I know it would be wrong to take even stronger steps. Besides, there are no local gypsy folk to sell them to anyway!
Sincerely,
Being Driven Up the Walls in Dayton

Hello Walls,
I have some good news and some bad news.
The bad news is that the malady with which you are afflicted is a common winter ailment. As an aside, the illustrious Polish psychologist Dr. Myse is the namesake of the clinical name of the ailment, namely 'Myse Lfishk Ids Syndrome.' And I regret to inform you that this is a chronic ailment that strikes without fail sometime between the Saturday after Thanksgiving and December 22rd, and will strike every year until your dear children move away.
Though there is no prescription available to combat this, please do not be too concerned, because there is good news.
By December 23rd, the magic that is Christmas and frantic rationalizing that there must have been SOMETHING good that the kids did during the year that justifies straining the family finances will combine to relieve all the symptoms.
Enjoy your Christmas!

Cherry cordially yours,
Mr. Manners

Like a rattlesnake!

Last night at 10 PM or so Makenna staggered into our room. She was only half-awake and obviously moody.

We put down our respective books and asked the usual questions....
'Did you have a bad dream?'
'nnnNNNN!' she snarled.
'Do you have to go to the bathroom?'
'nnnNNNNNNN!' she hissed.
'Would you like to get in bed with us?'
Silence, then a short nod.

She climbed in between us and we gently covered her with a blanket.
Ten seconds later she petulantly threw the blankets off, accompanied by additional snarls.
'Are you hot?'
'nnnNNNN!' she screeched.
'Would you like me to tickle your back?'
'nnnNNNN!!!' she shrieked.
By this reply we now knew that she had reached a new level of irritability.
'OK, then we'll just leave you alone.'
I turned back and continued reading King Lear.
Makenna snuggled up against me, draping an arm over me.
Cindy and I both began chuckling.
'nnnNNNN!!!' she bellowed.

However, she was soon squirming around again, lashing out at anything that displeased her, which was anything she saw, heard, or felt. After a couple minutes of this Cindy decided to shut it down.

'Makenna! Tell us what is wrong!'
'nnnNNNN!'
'Why are you wiggling so much? Does your bottom hurt?'
'nnnNNNN!'
'Makenna, if you won't tell us what is wrong, then you need to go get back in your bed!'
A pregnant pause.
Then...
'I have to go to the bathroom!' she moaned.
Cindy and I again made eye contact and tried to hide our spontaneous chortles.
After Makenna finished her job, all was well.

Especially as Makenna for once asked Cindy to go lay with her for awhile!

Christmas is coming, The goose is getting fat....

....That means we clean the frig out
To make more space for all that!

As you can see, we haven't cleaned out the frig recently, and I must say that the great variety of old dishes (also called 'petri dishes') was something to behold! Cindy says I am becoming more and more like her father every day!

Cindy probably also appreciates that I am throwing away some of the old mustard I have accumulated over the years. I am trying to make room for the prepared horseradish I asked Santa to bring me.

The Birthday Girl

As you can see, Cindy didn't have to slave over a bloated icing bag to prepare Erin's 10th year birthday 'cakes.' So in one sense it was more of a present for Cindy!

And we finally took Erin to 'Build-a-Bear' for her to build her own....MONKEY!
[Does not compute! Does not compute!]
She loved the experience and loves her bear, AKA 'Misty.' (Miserly fathers like me also get 'misty-eyed' by the time they walk out of this establishment. Others just cry outright!)
She also loved the fact that we took her out of school in the afternoon to do this (the lines during peak hours are unbelievable!)