'She's just a baby!'

Kyeli will be 2 in November. She is due to start at daycare next week for a couple of hours each day. Her mother, my daughter Elanea, is inconsolable at the thought of the little baby Sweet Sweet being handed over to strangers and suffering who know what kinds of neglect. Big brother Drake, who is 3, already goes there and survived the first few days of crying for Mom without permanent damage. But the Baby! Alone without Mom or Dad, Nana or Papa! Especially her Papa! You would think we were going to let the tribal leaders throw her in the volcano! ‘It’s just daycare, for crying out loud!’ I am the only un-emotional one in the crowd. ‘But she’s so tiny!!’ they all wail.
Yeah. She is little, but so are badgers … The thought of her being harmed in any way is unconscionable, but we are talking about the best daycare facility in town, where they know the Head of the House is a Parole Officer and the doting uncle is the Sergeant at the big County Jail; the kids are safe. Besides, are they forgetting about how things go at our house every night?? Kyeli beats the crap out of her big brothers, stomps, throws stuff, screams her lungs out, throws tantrums, runs away when you call her, tells people to shut up and tries to lie her way out of situations! She is the Prime Suspect in the missing cigarettes, the missing remote and the missing hair off the cat! She steals food and will rifle through my purse every chance she gets. Honestly, I don’t think we have to worry about Kyeli when she is at daycare with ‘them’..
I think we need to worry about them being locked in the building with HER!

Who's been sleeping in my bed??

This is the most bizarre event that has ever happened to our family, and the story you are about to read is real!
Night before last, Paul and I are sawing logs at 3 AM when I awoke. I could see the shadowy outline of my grandson, Little Zac, reaching for my cell phone on the dresser (probably so he can text his girlfriend, I am thinking.). I rose up on one elbow and said ‘What the BEEP are you doing? Go back to bed!’ and lay back down. After a few minutes I heard him in the kitchen, grabbing a midnight snack and then nothing but the usual household-of-8-people noises. Just before 6, Paul got up and there was Little Zac, asleep in the living room. Paul told him to go upstairs to his room. I was still asleep at that point, but within one minute the entire house erupted!! Screaming, running, yelling, cursing – my daughter Elanea kicked in the bedroom door like Rambo and tossed the toddlers on the bed, Little Zac sprang in the bedroom dialing 911, 11 yr old Aalyiha climbed up around my neck screaming and crying and then Medium Zac, my 17 yr old stepson jumped in, grabbed the shotgun and started loading shells as he ran upstairs! I hear Elanea’s husband Kye yelling ‘He’s got a gun!’ as I ran barefoot to the van with 3 kids in my arms.
When the dust settled, here is what happened: some time in the wee hours, a burglar decided to rob us. He managed to gain entry through the back patio door and began to gather loot ever so quietly. Since there is ALWAYS someone awake at our house, the sound of a person walking around, opening doors and such did not wake anyone up. It was the robber that was in my room, scoping it out and he was the one that got a midnight snack!! He had found the smokes and had a couple, raided the freezer and had a bag-o-meat ready to go. He was strung out on something, because he gathered our valuables and put them in piles (some in bags and such) but then he decided to take a break from robbing us and went upstairs on Little Zac’s bed and WENT TO SLEEP!! When Paul woke Little Zac up it looked like we had been robbed, and Paul, Little Zac & Kye were starting to investigate when the crook was discovered in Little Zac’s bed – WITH NEMO THE GUARD DOG ASLEEP ACROSS HIS LEGS! That dog is so BLEEPING fired! They tackled him and he had a pistol of some sort, which my Hero-Husband took away from him, then they held him there at shotgun point until the police arrived – which was in , like, 2 minutes! And evidently he fell against the dresser as they were disarming him … several times … because when the police arrived, he was begging to be arrested. LOL!! THEN he was carted off to the big County Lockdown, where my oldest son, Andrew, is the Sergeant! I almost feel sorry for the guy… He had smoked our smokes, eaten our food and slept in our bed.
Goldilocks on crack!

My Boy

We have had strep throat at our house! Terrible disease and we all caught it, with me being the last one. I had to go as a walk in to my doctor, which took forever, but I got the meds, picked up some asprin and headed home for the day. My grandson Drake is 3 and Paul and I live with him and his family. When he arrived home from daycare he was very surprised to see Nana under a blanket in her favorite chair. He and I have our own little routine. Every day, when Paul and I get home, he is already there and waiting for us. He will then tell his Papa whether or not he was good at daycare. If he was good, he gets a little piece of chocolate. If he ‘didn’t listen’, then he has to forgo the treat. After he has collected his bounty, I always say ‘Hey, I need my boy!’ and he climbs in my lap and we talk about his day. So, the fact that Nana was already home was a little confusing. His Dad said ‘Nana is sick, so she came home early today.’ Drake walked over next to my chair and gently started patting my arm.
‘Nana?’ He said. ‘Do you need your boy?’

Kyeli's will

That little brat Kyeli! That child is so strong willed! She absolutely flabbergasts me to no end! Yesterday she had a small carton of milk, the little individual sized one. She drank almost all of it, and then toddled over to show her Papa that it was ‘Gone gone’ by turning it upside down .. on the carpet. ‘It’s all gone gone now..’ Paul said dryly. ‘Kyeli’ I said, ‘go throw that in the garbage.’
‘wha?’ she said, still holding it upside down and letting every last drop hit the floor.
‘Go put that in the garbage.’ I said in a stern voice. She just smiled and stood there. ‘Kyeli! Throw that in the garbage right now!’ I used my Very Stern Voice this time. She kept smiling and started walking toward the kitchen at a pace that a snail would have called slow. ‘Don’t you make me get up!’ I put my hands on the arm of the chair as if I was about to jump to my feet. She was in the kitchen doorway, grinning, holding the carton toward the trash. ‘KYELI!’ I thundered and stood up. She disappeared around the corner. I walked in the kitchen. There she stood, next to the garbage can, holding the carton over it and grinning from ear to ear, just waiting to see if I would actually walk in there and enforce my will! I think I surprised her, because she said ‘Oh-uh!’ dropped it like a hot potato and ran to her Papa. What a brat!! Of course she cannot be disciplined, because she makes it to the Sanctuary of her Papa. At least, that is the rule that has been in place, but I came in the other day and there she was, in Papa’s lap, both of them with popsicles – but they were both very upset! Kyeli found a sewing needle on the floor, and Papa yelled for her to hold still, which scared her and made her cry, which made HIM cry! So they were both holding onto each other, sniffing and eating popsicles, looking forlorn. Paul is so tenderhearted towards those grandbabies! He is a bear of a man, a Parole Officer for Washington State and an ex-cop AND ex-military – but put a little one on his lap and he melts into a puddle of bubbly ooze.
Which melts ME into a puddle of bubbly ooze, so it works out great!

Hi Ho, Hi Ho its off to work I go

We have a nice big yard radiating out from our front porch. Nice and green, very inviting for the family to play, dip in the pool, BBQ, and the like. We have about 20 feet of sidewalk running from the bottom step to the gate at the edge of the property. Each morning Paul and I get our coffee, sunglasses and briefcases and go down the 3 steps, over the sidewalk and through the gate. This morning Paul had the day off, so I was flying solo. I grabbed my gear, kissed him goodbye and started out the door. On the porch I had to step over Nemo, the golden Lab: on the steps were 2 towels, from the last dip in the pool yesterday evening. I looked at the sidewalk: there was a bike with only one training wheel, 2 skateboards, a huge Tonka dump truck, a floatie, a pair of socks and an extension cord – all on the sidewalk! Not in the grass, not by the fence, but lined up on the sidewalk, like an obstacle course laid out just for Nana. The grass is pristine but wet. My hands are full. So I have to use my best Geriatric Matrix moves to make it to the gate. The neighbors can only see me from the waist up, so it looks like I am doing Tia Chi on the way to the Lincoln.. and of course Rascal the cat was escorting me off the property like a bouncer with an unruly patron, weaving in and out of my legs like a snake! BLEEPING cat! When I finally made it to the office, my peeps greet me with ‘What’s up?’
My blood pressure.

defense mechanisms

My son-in-law, Kye came home the other day with a brand new tent. The thing is HUGE, with a main area and then 2 side rooms – big enough for the entire clan! Of course, we had to set it up in the front yard, just to make sure everything was there, and no holes or anything. The grandkids were all over it, the cat was inspecting it, Nemo sniffed it – it passed every test! Our grandsons Zac and Michael decided that they were going to sleep in the tent that night and break it in. Paul and I just shook our heads; no way were they going to last all night! There were 2 main reasons we pooh-poohed the idea: number 1, our grandkids are wieners, afraid of the dark and all things therein, and number 2, they are city slickers! Roughing it at our house means having to use dial up internet access. Sure enough, as the sun began to set, the kids started taking out their ‘supplies’ to the tent. Two extension cords, a fan, a lamp, mattresses, video games… and that is not counting the wardrobe changes and food. And the darker it got, the more apprehensive they became. Zac found a big stick, and tucked it inside the main flap, within easy reach in case of attack. They tried to get Nemo to sleep in the tent, but he is a city slicker dog, and only sleeps on his Simmons Posturpedic and so declined the offer. Finally the time came for Nana and Papa to turn in, and so the kids walked the 10 steps from the front porch to the tent and zipped in. Then we turned off the lights and called it a night. A couple of hours later, Paul got up for a bathroom run. When he returned to bed he said ‘Lewis & Clark are asleep in the living room.’ We both laughed about it and then Paul began to tell me about his first experience sleeping out and how scared HE was of all the noises and shadows. I commented on how it would have been funny to jump inside the tent and scare the kids. Paul said that he had a defense mechanism that always kicked in when he was a kid – immediately upon being frightened out of his wits, the vicinity would be flooded with .. well, he called it ‘liquid feces’. In other words, he would lay down a layer of *&^% which would cause the assailant to either run away or slip and fall down. Either way, he could escape. I thought that sphincters tightened in moments of panic, but evidently Paul is a throwback to our amphibian ancestors, such as the Squid, which also squirt out a defensive cloud when they sense danger. Just the other day, I surprised him in the bedroom and he jumped out of his skin, spun around and cut the cheese, all in a nano-second! Note to self: jumping out to scare husband may be hazardous to my health.