December Peanuts

• Matthew the flirt: "I told her I had boogers in my milk, then I drank it. She said, 'Eww!' and ran away... then she came back."
  
• "Muzzy vocabulary builder" is less boring if you watch it at 50% faster-than-normal speed.
  
• Matthew shared his chocolate bar with Isaac. It had nuts in it. Isaac doesn't like nuts. That's why I had to clean chocolate-covered nuts off the carpet.
  
• After going to the book fair, Matthew shares the facts of life with his sister: "I told her about The Tax."
  
• Filipino cooking fits my personality. Cups of soy sauce, heads of garlic, large quantities of pepper... very straightforward.
  
• We had a ton of excellent chocolate mousse cake left over from Rachel's birthday. I explained to her that I would have given the kids some for breakfast, but the thought of the mess Isaac would make stopped me. Rachel was not impressed with my parenting... but ten minutes later she and Isaac were having cake for breakfast.
  
• Matthew's teacher told Rachel that he didn't complete his study guide for the test. "Well, maybe he'll learn a lesson," Rachel replied. Matthew brought home his test Friday, with a 97. I think he learned that public school is mostly make-work.
  
• Rachel: "I just had a disturbing thought. I can't remember when it was that I last made Matthew take a shower."
  
• The doctor gave me a shot of cortisone in my backside to fix something latin-sounding in my spine. I hardly felt the needle at all, but the cortisone made it feel like the world's largest bruise shortly later. That is a lot of butthurt.
  
• Me: "[Squeezes hard] This wood glue is totally clogged." Rachel: "No, it's not. [pop!]" Me: "Hey, I've never seen a wood glue that had a pop-top nozzle." Rachel: "Me, neither, but it was totally intuitive."
  
• I'm under 170 pounds for the first time since... probably since Matthew was born and I stopped going to the gym. Rachel's thoughts on my diet: "You have boring munchies."
  
• Isaac likes Looney Tunes.
  
• Rachel booked our first babysitter through facebook. Let's hear it for technology.
  
• Melissa discovered Photo Booth effects. She was glued to Rachel's macbook for close to an hour.
  
• Melissa: "Can I play with Franco?" Me: "You can play with Franco." Rachel: "Franco's in Argentina." Me: "You can't play with Franco."
  
• I was typing when the mouse cursor started going crazy -- Isaac found the bluetooth mouse in the other room.
  
• Matthew enjoyed singing the holiday classics: "Jingle bells, batman smells... "
  
• Melissa: "Can you tie this ribbon in a knot around my doll's neck? A shoelace knot." Rachel: "She means a bow."
  
• Me: "Salut!" Matthew: "Sally!" Rachel: "No, that's not it. It's a French U sound." Matthew: "But it sounds like an EE sound!" Poor Matthew; he tries hard, but he needed speech therapy for English, let alone another language. He just can't hear the difference between the sounds.
  
• Matthew thinks it's boring that rice only comes in white and brown. "It would be cool to have red, blue, and green rice for dinner."
  
• One extra-large Slim Jim is a fine thing. Two extra-large Slim Jims is a gastrointestinal horror show of epic proportion.
  
• Isaac isn't very good at opening peanuts. When faced with an especially difficult one, he eats it shell and all. Part of me admires his tenacity, but the rest of me shudders.
  
• I took the kids to the Dollar Tree to do their Christmas shopping. Melissa really tried hard to figure out what the alien mind of her brother would want for Christmas. Agonized, even. I hadn't expected that.
  
• Mental note: even if it's not raining _now_, the playground could still be covered with water.
  
• Took the kids to Pump It Up to get some wiggles out. When I had to use the bathroom, I could hear Isaac screaming as soon as I left line of sight. Nothing like having to rush your business because your kid is causing a scene in public.
  
• Isaac can take off his diaper now. This is cute when it's bath time. It's less cute when he hands you a poo-filled diaper and says, "Teenty [stinky]!"
  
• According to his coach, Matthew has a natural aptitude for Gymnastics. The Ellis family tradition of excelling in sports with no funding is alive and well.
  
• The other day I cut the fingernails of my left hand, but not my right. Yeah, I get interrupted a lot these days.
  
• Me: "Unless we have nine children, we'll either have an even number, or a prime one. Isn't that a pleasant thought?"
  
• Me: "Matthew, go empty one of the clothes baskets in Mom's room, and unload the clothes in the dryer into it." Rachel: "Wait, you skipped a step: if one of the baskets is already empty, use that." Matthew can be very pedantic.
  
• Kim Jong Il will never taste Rachel's Christmas Gingerbread. Score one for the free world.
  
• Remember when they had to debug console games _before_ shipping them? Merry Christmas, Son. Enjoy playing "Downloading update data... 31 Minutes Left."
  
• Teacher unrolls the Italian flag: "Does anyone know what this is?" Matthew: "That's the pizza flag!"
  
• Rachel: "Matthew, those socks don't match." Matthew: "How can you tell?" Yes, he's his father's son.
  
• Thursday's gymnastics class was cancelled due to the holidays, but I didn't know until I got to the gym. Making the best of it, I made a detour past McDonalds on the way home. While waiting, Matthew made the best of it too and started teaching kids in the play area how to do cartwheels.
  
• Rachel: "Adults have to put on deodorant every morning." Matthew: "So that's why you smell funny?"