Mr. Mom: Days 2 - 4

Mr. Mom: Day 1

Well, RP is out of town for a few days and our kids, their hygiene, and my sanity all hang in the balance. I'm pretty sure I can handle it. By "it" I mean of course survival. Maybe that's just being dramatic. I mean, we've played this game before, and I think it turned out pretty well!

We started off the Mom-Free weekend with Pizza Night (the best night of the week). Since RP wasn't around, I could finally make that Thai Chicken Pizza I've been craving . And since the kids won't eat anything but Cheese and Pepperoni, I had the whole thing to myself. Having the whole thing to myself turned out to be a bad idea. But I wouldn't learn that lesson until 24 hours later. Think I'll use a little less red pepper flakes next time.

Sunday morning was great. By assuming parental responsibilities, I was able to skip early morning Sunday meetings. This was probably one of the best trade-offs ever. I would much rather be a Mom on Sunday morning than a Dad in the bishopric. At least at our house. At least until 8:30 AM. That's when I woke up to the one of the kids laughing mischievously, and another one screaming. This is NEVER a good sign. The same pattern repeated all morning, so I concluded that it probably comes out about even between Mom's and Dad's on Sunday morning at our house. By "even", I mean I really don't have anything to complain about, do I?

On the "Don't Forget" list I got from RP, there was ONE thing I needed to remember to do today (besides give B his medicine. I'm only batting 0.500 on that one). Just ONE thing! I had to bring the snack for the kids in Nursery at Church today. To help me remember this, I strategically placed the oversized snack bucket filled with Graham Crackers RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE DOOR. My plan was foolproof. When we tried to walk out the front door, at least ONE of us would trip over it. Right?

My plan didn't work. There's actually a good chance that I DID trip over it. But in the chaos of ushering 3 reluctant kids out the door, I probably just muttered a bad word under my breath (like "oh crud!") at the inconvenience and hurried out the door without giving it a second thought. Of course, it wasn't until we got all the way to Church (a 15 minute ride) and started unloading the kids when I realized what I had (not) done. And we would have actually been there ON TIME! I loaded the kids BACK into the car for the 30 minute round trip home - to pick up the snack - and back. The lull of the moving car was too much for C and he fell asleep about halfway back to Church. That actually turned out to be a GREAT thing though, because a sleeping 2 year old is WAY easier to handle than a tired-and-awake 2 year old!

After Church, I managed to enlist the kids to help make dinner. Since Sunday is a special day, we kept up the tradition of having a "nice" dinner. To avoid the inevitable "this is disgusting!" theatrics at our house, I settled on Grilled Cheese Sandwiches ("on the stove" grilled) and Chicken Noodle Soup (code for Ramen Noodles). To give our meal a fancy flair, we pulled out the nice dishes and a table cloth. Here are the pictures. Are you oo-ing and aah-ing now or what?

You'll notice B doing one of his favorite things: Pretending his brother is a Pillow. When C is old enough to sock him in the nose for doing things like this, I'll secretly be so proud.

We ended the night talking to RP and playing a nice game of Life. To really get a feel for how relaxing this actually was, remember that the original Game of Life has lots of little game pieces and some of them are shaped like cars. C, (1)has NO IDEA how to play this game, (2) is two years old (3)LOVES cars, and (4)screams when he doesn't get his way. Believe it or not, we actaully finished the game. K won by a landslide. By that time EVERYONE was ready for bed. What a great day :) But we ALL miss Mom!

"Yay for Sister's Weekend!"

Day 3: Pizza Night!

K and B had been up since at least 6:30. I know this because that was when they had their first argument of the day. Both tried to wake me up to plead their case. Both failed.

After breakfast, we did some jobs around the house and then drove back down to Wendy's to see if they found K's backpack and water bottle (she accidentally left them there on our last trip to Wendy's). They didn't. But we made some signs and asked the manager if we could hang them up. Hopefully, someone will call and give K some very happy news. She's not very optimistic though.

I'm really surprised, but I actually managed to get K to basketball practice. As we were getting out of the car, she asked me if wishes ever come true. After an impromptu motivational speech, I made it very clear that wishes do, in fact, come true, something that I very firmly believe. A few minutes later, I overheard her saying to herself: "I wish I never signed up for basketball. I wish I never signed up for basketball." So I stood corrected. That wish, of course, didn't come true. But you gotta hand it to her. She is NOT a quitter. She played basketball anyway. She's my hero today. Way more motivating for me than my speech was for her.

After basketball, we called up some friends and got together for a little hike in a nature preserve. B collected sticks, and K collected flowers. We almost got rained on, but managed to have a great time anyway.

Then it was back home for Pizza Night. Everybody loves Pizza Night. It's one of the few foods that nobody complains about. So even if I didn't like pizza that much, I'd still like pizza night just so I wouldn't have to hear the normal griping about the "disgusting" food they get to eat free of charge at mealtimes. Call me crazy, but I actually invited some friends over for dinner (Pizza Night wants to be SHARED!). Since I was spread a little thin, they got drafted into helping put together the final products. But I don't think they minded too much. It was pretty much the best Pizza we've ever made.



Then I realized I was tired. B took advantage of this by playing video games for a really long time. After they went to sleep, I suddenly got more energy. And then I realized I still had to do the dishes...

Quote of the week
K: What are you doing?
Me: Laundry.
K: Didn't Mom show you how to do the laundry?
Ouch...

Day 2: Transformers and More!

I'll be honest. This morning was a lot like yesterday morning. Funny thing is that even with a full night's sleep, I was still just as tired as I was yesterday. It might have to do with this unremarkable perception that today was going to be a lot like the day before it, without the fun of making a laser show.


B is kinda on a Transformers kick, so after getting K to school, B and I made paper Transformers. Here's how we did it:

Step 1: Draw a robot on a piece of paper. Colored paper, if you want to get fancy.

Step 2: Fold the paper into a paper airplane.

Of course, this set B's mind in Single-Track mode. The only thing he can talk about for the rest of our waking hours is Transformers. I'd tried to get it off his mind by going to the park. He insisted on bringing his new toys. Here's a shot of him trying one of them out:

He's been wanting me to find him Transformers movies online for a long time. So, I finally gave in. It will give him something to talk about instead of (or in addition to) Star Wars for a few days. Here's one of our great finds:

I show that to give you an idea how far the Geek spectrum goes out. I don't want to judge, but if you get out there, you will be socially excluded from the Gene Pool.

Today was also the DEWEY FUN RUN! K's been looking for sponsors, and I have been pleasantly surprised at the generosity of the graduate students, postdocs, and others that I work with. K didn't disappoint either. Off to a slow start, she ended up sailing 35 times around the track! It looked so fun that B decided to join her on Lap 20. He ran 16 laps himself! C tried to join them at least 3 times, only to be pulled off the track by an overprotective (and, after 3 times, a slightly embarrassed) dad.

So where do we go to celebrate a big deal like this?

Day 1: Mr. Mom

RP is away, and I get to take a few days off of work to spend some quality time with the kids. I know what you're thinking: something along the lines of "call social services". But I can assure you I have EVERYTHING ALMOST EVERYTHING under control. That shouldn't stop you from asking again in 4 days. There's a good chance I'll answer differently. If at all.

Actually things are going great. I really appreciate these chances to put my feet in my wife's shoes for a few days (figuratively, of course). So it was very appropriate that today started out at 3:30 am. That's right: AM! Not that my better half gets up at 3:30 every morning, but I should probably start my long weekend taking care of the family in an already-exhausted state. This approximates better the constantly-exhausted state she regularly experiences.

Despite my weakened condition, I'm happy to report (in case she's reading this) that:
1. Everyone was up by 7:15am
2. Breakfast was over by 8:00am
3. All the short people were dressed and ready to go by 8:30 (and yes I brushed her hair :)
4. We got to school on time.

We had a lightsaber fight on the way home. Yeah, it was dorky. Especially when we re-enacted the father-son fight scene in Empire Strikes Back. Especially with C on my back.

Once we got home, B and I went straight to work on our Laser Show. My high school physical science teacher did one of the coolest things and I've wanted to try it ever since. It all came together today.

We took a keychain laser and (with a lot of duct-tape) we taped the button "on" and wired it up to a power supply that we could plug in the wall. You know, so we wouldn't be wasting batteries and time.

Then we (yes, we. After I turned off the TV, B didn't have anything else to do. C, on the other hand, spent most of the morning pulling out anything that wasn't nailed to the floor). So we cut a large balloon and fit it over one of the small DVD player speakers. Using Optical Grade Elmer's Glue, we stuck a small mirror onto the balloon, close to the middle of the speaker.

The next part was tricky. We had to align the laser onto the mirror so that it would reflect onto the wall or ceiling. This required some pretty sophisticated equipment. Since we didn't have any sophisticated equipment, we built a laser stand out of tinker toys. You can see from the picture, that this really is a "work with whatever you got" kinda job here.

We were working so hard we had to take a couple of breaks to get snacks and play soccer. B won 8-4.

After we picked K up from school, we put the finishing touches on the laser system so we could put on a show when it got dark. Here's one of the better shows. Enjoy!