Key Lime Bars of Best Deliciousness

Yum.

Want to know how I made them?

Because, really? Wow.
They were delicious!!!




Okay, fine.


Here.

We Made It!!

This morning Bubbles woke up and asked me if today was The Big Day.

Bubbles: Today is my birthday, Mama?

Me: Yes! Today is your birthday!

Bubbles: Today I am four?

Me: Yes, today you are four! Happy Birthday!

Bubbles: Oh, I'm four? I keep saying, 'am I four?' and you keep saying, 'not yet!', BUT I MADE IT!!!!

Indeed!!!


Happy Birthday, Bubbles - every day you bring more joy into my life than the day before.

And, since you share my silly sense of humor....

I hope you like your cheeseburger cupcakes.



Love, Mama.

Fish Oil in Peanut Butter? Really?

I wrote this about fish oil and peanut butter and pleasant surprises.

In Honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month

To the abuser;
If you want to apologize to your victim, I mean really apologize (as in, 'you have genuine feelings of remorse'), here is my advice to you.

1. Do not ever follow up your apology with a 'but...', thus rendering it no longer valid.
   
2. Do not go on to say - yet again - that your actions were defensive. Unless someone was hurting you physically, threatening you with a weapon, or physically hurting another person, your actions were not defensive. 2.a) Chasing someone into a house to violently grab them, shake them, keep them from leaving a room, bruise, batter and choke (twice) does not meet this criteria of 'defensive behavior'.
   
3. #2 actually takes what you may have convinced yourself was intended to be an apology, and turns it into just a really complicated and pathetic defense for your violence.
4. Do not confuse the word 'battery' with 'restraint'. (See 2.a)) I know that's a tough one, but it's not restraint when you chase someone who is trying to get away from you. In any reality.
   
5. Do not confuse the term 'battery' with 'grabbing and/or holding' someone.
   
6. Do not confuse claiming 'remorse' for actions with 'regret' for having a consequence. They are not one in the same.
7. Do not continue to emotionally abuse your victim via following up the apology defense with a novel's worth of manipulative lies.

Sledgehammer

Everything is fine, nothing to see over here.

Yes, I know many of you know we went back to court today.

Nothing happened - there was not enough information offered today for a ruling, so we are going back on Nov 13th, with a bit of mediation sprinkled in.


He used to call it 'the sledgehammer'. He'd bring it out if he needed to...get something done. Or just if he wanted to disarm someone.
He would tell them about Elijah.
Wouldn't talk about Elijah with me, ever. (That's what your blog is for, he'd remind me.)
But the sledgehammer, use as needed, was his weapon.

Today, in court, he pulled out that sledge hammer over and over.
And I feel fucking pummeled.

Nice one, dude. Real nice.

All I want for my birthday is some heat, please.

Bubbles just told me that his birthday plans have changed. I mean sure, we have been waffling between pirate hunt and safari hunt for the time killing events theme of the party, but there's more to it than that.

He realized today, while putting away his piles of toys in baskets and on shelves, that what he really wants, are:

• A bag of groceries, non-specific.
• Enough cash to throw a party for his 8 favorite preschool friends.
  
• Five lbs of nitrite-free bacon.
• Five gallons of organic whole milk.
• One case of Ovaltine, Malt or Chocolate flavor, please.
• Sensitive skin shampoo and body wash, Aveeno please.
• One full case of cereal. Low sugar, please.
  
• Electricity: to heat his bathwater, allow him to practice his new 'mouse skillz', cook his meals, and let him jam out on the keyboard.
• New tires for the car which drives him to preschool.
• A winter jacket, size 4.

This is dedicated to the dad who reads this and pretends that being a dad is all about bribing buying his kids toys. And avoiding, at all costs, paying to support his children.

Chickens Come and Chickens Go

So, yesterday Supergirl stayed home from school, with a slight cold (cough cough). She was spending more time running with the chickens than lying in bed sipping tea, so I kept threatening to take her to school. At around 11:30 I told her to put the chickens away, so we could go get Bubbles and head into town for some errands. The chickens usually spend a good portion of the day running free outside, happily scratching for bugs and terrorizing our cat.
She put the three she could find into the coop. We were late, so I demanded she get in the car. As I got into the car, I saw a pile of feathers in front of it.
Oh.
Umm, a big pile of feathers.
But no chicken.
"Ummm, honey? Which chicken did you say you couldn't find?"
"Tiny."
Oh. Tiny. The plumpest, waddliest, slowest chicken of all.
"Oh. Umm....honey? Come here and look at this..."
We determined that there was indeed, no Tiny to be found, and that the sheer volume of feathers did, in fact, indicate that there was probably no chance of recovering Tiny.
Personally, I was relieved at the absence of visible carnage.

But oh! The tears.....the sobbing and heaving and high pitched sadness. Oh!

With my own upcoming non-fun events, such as court with bad-vibe Xman on Monday, I knew we needed a solution.
New chicks!
I had to call around the county to find chicks at this time of year; used up the family fun budget on their accoutrement, but I think that, so far, it's worth it.

Meet Lilo and Stitch. Stitch is the wild one.



Now putting an emergency call in to the friend who promised months ago to build that damned chicken run. Because hell no I'd rather not go through this again, and whatever it was (bobcat, coyote, hawk?) will more than likely be back, looking for another chicken dinner.


Lilo checks out what she will look like when she grows up:

Definitely NOT Parent's Choice Toy Award Material...

I am in shock.

Bubbles loves his 'guys' more than any other toys. Sure, he loves his rescue heroes, and his trains, but not as much as his 'guys'. Guys are tiny and have many snippety-snappy accessories and come in blue boxes. Playmobil, with its attention to detail and lack of merchandise produced in China, has won our family over.

But today, while searching for 'guys' to go in the castle and boat he has requested for his birthday (he's not getting both, btw), I came across this.

And it is just so so very wrong.


Notice the mask and the scattered (obviously stolen) money.
It's a getaway car.

Apraxia in Action: Again

So, we love to go to the thrift store on Tuesdays, because it is half price day.
We got this totally lame awesome find for only $2.5o the other day, and Bubbles is in love with it's archaic attractions. We start with just the word 'flamingos', which in some way, I would love to never change and always hear in (my mind at least) as 'fingogos, yeah!'....forever.




On the other hand, we have put almost two years into this speech therapy business, and that is almost half of Bubbles' life. Pretty soon he will have been in speech therapy for more than half of his life...
Whatever.

So. Here is the part where I introduce you to what I do approximately 23.8 times per day.




Oh yeah, watch the magic.

Loser Fortune Cookie

Unfortunately this was not my cookie:



Fortunately, my friend let me take a picture of it.....