I believe I am the anti-mompetitor.

Mompetitor = Mom competitor.

Damn. It loses all humour once explained.

Annnyway, what I'm saying is I have ZERO Mom pride. Heh heh.

Exhibit A:

 

 

- Hair bow ripped out as usual.

 

- Standing in a booth

 

- Booth is located within a McDonalds within a Wal-Mart (somehow that strikes me as extra bad, like Wal-Mart nuggets have a second helping of preservatives or something)

 

- Drinking chocolate milk

 

- Eating nuggets and fries.

 

Oh, and while I was taking this photo Payne was telling me he had to go potty and I was saying "You can go potty after you finish your nuggets".

 

We were sort of camping within Wal-Mart while my car was having the tires balanced.  Ok, you could live for awhile in Wal-Mart. Rip a few of the display play equipment thingies off of the walls in the toy section and my kids would be happy for a minimum of three days.

 

So Payne turned four.

And I'm such an exceptional parent that all I have to remember the day by are grainy cell phone pics:

Posing with his birthday gift from us.

 

Post mortem pic of the cake. Oops.

 

I think four is going to be totally awesome: 

 

He is so big. So big.

 

He can follow directions and has opinions and plays with his toys using little made up voices and personal plot lines....I love it.

 

He says socially appropriate things like "No 'dank you" and "Ahwiiiight. 'Dat's fiiiiine" in perfect mimicry of a certain person who sometimes get's exasperated with her offspring.

 

He loves his sister. In that special "No one can hit her but me." brother way.  They laugh hysterically at one another daily.

 

Oh, and he goes to two schools; Preschool and Sunday school. However, he insists that they are Thursday school and Sunday school.  Preschool on Tuesdays is still Thursday school, and don't try to tell him otherwise.

 

He completely sabotaged 80% of our family photos the other day, though. It was bad. I mean, he was outperformed by a 15 month old.... He has developed the dreaded young child "cheese face".

 

I love him so much.  This is going to be a good year!

 

 

 

 

I'm at a bit of a loss.

I walked into Payne's room to get him up from a nap.

The room was empty.

I looked left. I looked right.

I looked up. I looked down.

I looked in all of the corners.

No Payne.

I called out his name and got no answer.

As I was beginning to panic and think that it might possibly have been wise to take a gander at one of those "bad people in your area" maps, I thought to check one more place:

Yes. I found him in his freaking toy box. (Note the pillow for comfort)

 He was very relaxed.

 He said he took his nap in there.

 Gosh, guys. I just noticed I'm SUPER low on garlic. Gotta go get a couple of cartfuls at good old H.E.B. And maybe I'll lift a gallon or two of holy water from mass this week.

 No reason. Why do you ask?

No wonder my dogs are so fat.

What is this? A normal female infant, you say?

Wrong.

It's a human bento box.

(google it, grandparents)

And guess what small house mammals use their pointy noses to comb through the laundry with the avid focus of an old man armed with a metal detector on the beach?

You guessed it.

One can't accidentally stash pancakes in a polar bear print hood.  The children and canines must be in cahoots.

My kids are weirdos.

-I don't know why all of my offspring have been inexhaustible in their search for creative cart sitting solutions:

A rebel, that one.

 

-So Dan does this thing with the kids where he leans in and they touch forehead to forehead, and then nose to nose.  It's adorable and sweet:

And they do it to each other, which is also adorable and sweet....and a little more, um, life threatening. 

 

So far no noses have been broken, so I just sit back and admire the family love fest.

 

-Today I was sitting at the table eating my lunch while the kids played quietly in the family room.

 

Too quietly.

 

Mmmhmm:

Caught him red handed.

 

He stole my frozen tube of ground beef right off of the counter and was smashing/beating it on the floor in a manner so stealthy I was truly impressed. 

 

If our meatballs and garlic bread are a little sub-par tonight, it's all on him, man.

 

 

 

Buddies.

I love that they're old enough to play (and fight) together now.

Dress up is huge around here. Payne is very invested in Genevieve having a costume.

(Notice the dragon cap can't be fastened under the chin anymore, and Mr. Dragon totally has a bit of a perma-wedgie these days. His "feet" also hover several inches above the floor. I can tell you that I will be made to RUE the DAY that I get rid of that costume, though.)

 

Playing Various Beasts of Prey in the car: 

Not sure who's the beast and who's the prey over on Genevieve's side, there.

 

They were both "Rhhoooaaaarrrrh"ing at me today.  Genevieve makes an excellent roar.  I suppose one on one instruction in "Terrifying Noises: A Broad Range Study" is a definite benefit to having an older brother. 

 

Yes, her shark was going something like "wwwwhhhoooooaaaaarrrrGGGHHH" on the way to the grocery store.  It was a little creepy. I like my sharks appropriately silent.

 

Entropy is real, folks.

Genevieve on a typical Sunday morning:

 

 

Genevieve on a typical Sunday evening: