Is This the One that's supposed to be Sick?

Joshua suddenly screamed, "My ear!!"

"What's wrong, dude?" I asked.

"My ear!! It hurts!! Owww!!"

So I made him an appointment with the doctor, which was set for 3 hours away, and gave him a dose of Motrin.

By the time we made it to the doctor's office, the pain killer had kicked in, and he spent the few minutes in the waiting room doing somersaults, cart wheels, and giving precocious answers to a teenage patient and her mom about the coolness of the toy in the middle of the waiting room.

Then when the doctor (a man Josh had never met) came into the exam room and called Josh by his name, he said with a hint of suspicion in his voice, "How do you know my name?"

Yeah, But what about when it really happens

I'm all about talking the talk.

In Elders' Quorum today we discussed Elder Wirthlin's last Conference talk, "Come What May and Love It," and I made some comments about how we should enjoy the every day things that we do with our families, particularly our children, who can sometimes be a little frustrating.

Then this evening, as J was getting ready to go to work, we came upstairs to find Morgan hysterical and saying something about, "Clean it up, Daddy!"

We followed him into the bathroom where there was an inch of water on the floor. He had put nearly an entire roll of toilet paper in the toilet and flushed.

This is something we have tried to help him learn not to do, inasmuch as he is currently in potty training mode and these kinds of temptations are around. But he doesn't learn such things very easily.

Or, at all.

I got most of the water mopped up and then went to try and fix the toilet. In my attempts to do so, more water ended up on the floor, which I cleaned up.

(Oh, all this while poor little Jack had to sit in his high chair and try to be entertained, though he was really in the mood to be held.)

Just when I was very nearly done mopping up the water for the second time, Morgan came running toward me there in the bathroom (I do not know what for), slipped, and knocked the mop bucket of dirty toilet water over.

Yeah, come what may, and love it.

Maybe tomorrow.

Monkey and Monster Both Start with ...

My kids are watching Word World.

Just about every day as I'm doing whatever it is I do each day, I think, as things are happening, ooh, I should blog about this.

Then I get home and the moment is far gone, and either the thing doesn't seem that interesting anymore, or I can't remember what profound and eloquent things I wanted to say about it.

Oh, by the way, you will no longer find me at the Seagull Book in Orem or American  Fork (where I spent two blog post-less weeks, not that there wasn't anything worthy of blogging (see above)), but you will find me at the South Towne (pronounced Town-ee I'm pretty sure) Seagull Book. As of this past Monday that's where I've been assigned as store manager, no longer in training.

Here is something though, I'm going to try to get a picture if I can.

Never mind, actually you can sometimes mind if you want, but it's no mind right now. I'm going to go ahead and take my own fatherly advice to not disturb him if he's playing nicely; advice that usually sounds like this: "Joshua, put him down! If he's playing happily there is no reason to pick him up and distract him."

The picture would have been of Jack's fat lip. He's got two sharp little teeth on the bottom of his mouth that met with his upper lip when his hands slipped out from under him as he was crawling and his chin hit the floor. His lip is huge; it makes him look really pitiful. Poor guy.

I've Only Been Golfing Three Times in My Life

But if I took it up, I might excel at it.

And this is why:

Jessica has incredible reflexes. One night when Mini Holdinator #1 (otherwise known as Joshua) was an infant and still sleeping in a rocking cradle, Jessica bolted out of bed, out of a deep sleep, and caught him as he was pulling himself up in the cradle thereby causing it to rock and nearly dump him out on the floor. It was incredible! The cradle was at the foot of the bed, so the speed with which she did this was nothing short of amazing.

The other night I was up with Jack, and I got hungry, so I poured myself a bowl of cereal. Suddenly the bowl was slowly moving across the table top and on its way to the edge. Then it fell off and into my lap. This was of course because I knocked it off the table somehow (I'm really not sure how), but I had plenty of time to do something about it, I guess. But I couldn't. I just don't have the reflexes.

Then to top it off, after it fell and got cold, wet cereal in my lap, I considered the situation and the predicament that I was in, then I thought for a few seconds about what I should do. I considered my options: What should I clean up first? How would I clean it up? Would I use my hands to pick up the fallen cereal, or go get a paper towel for the whole thing?

Before I did much of anything, I changed my facebook status to reflect the situation I was in, because apparently comedy trumps all action.

And this is a problem with me. I don't react. And I know it drives Jessica mad sometimes. If Jack spits up all over her, I'll tilt my head and take in the scene, and consider whether a paper towel, s dish towel, or a baby wipe will best remedy the problem. She just wants me to do something.

This is probably why I never excelled in the sports I played as a kid: football and basketball. Both of those require pretty quick response times to situations.

This is also why I could never be in the military, or law enforcement.

Brian's thoughts in a crisis: Huh, this guy is shooting at me; what can I do about this? I guess I could try to avoid the shots. Should I call for backup now or after I've diffused the situation? How should I diffuse the situation? Let's see, I have my own gun, and I have this tazer thing, but I could get in a lot of trouble if I used it inappropriately. The guy who's shooting at me has something on his face, what is that?

etc.

This is why I think I might be good at golf. It's not one of those sports where you're required to make split second decisions and rely on your quick reflexes. You really consider every shot, even the two-inch puts.

So yeah, I feel bad for my kids while knowing just how lucky they are. On the one hand, they've got a parent who will be able to rescue them from anything in the blink of an eye. On the other hand they have a parent who, well, is me.

Are You Really Posting At 5:45 am?

Yes.

Because the two older Mini Holdinators decided they were either getting up with daddy or waking up the youngest Holdinator in the process of trying to talk sense into them.

So, for some early morning merriment, I present you with Porky Pig singing "Blue Christmas."

A Square is Also a Parallelagram

So said Mini #1 when looking at shapes with J tonight.

And then the Amazing happened.

Have you ever tried to put the bottom sheet on a large bed (queen or bigger)? Does it happen that every time you do it, you get it wrong first? You start putting on one corner and when you get to the next one you figure out that you've got the top/bottom on the sides, and so you have to rotate the thing 45 degrees?

Now, you're disqualified from this contest if your sheets are patterned in a way that you can tell just by looking at them which way is up. You know, like if your sheets are Batman and you know that Alfred needs to be right-side-up at the top so you never have that problem. I'm not talking to you.

I'm talking to those who have plain sheets, or sheets with an indistinguishable pattern on them. That dang bottom sheet is never, and I mean never, on right the first time.

That is until tonight.

Yes, I went to make the bed and fully expected the bottom sheet to pull the same trick it does every time, and was shocked and completely in awe when it fit on my first try.

I can hear you gasping. I know; I know! It's impossible, you say. But no, I'm telling the truth.

Oh, and the reason for changing the sheets. Mini #3 peed on the bed.

And about Mini #1. He started preschool today. We wanted to send him to the same preschool TJ sent her daughter, but the half hour drive for two and a half hours of school wasn't justifiable. So, we went with a place very near our place; and he blew up. The sweet people at the school said he was probably just dealing with the anxiety of this new experience, and whereas most kids just cry, he expressed his distaste for the situation with words, and they were all amazed at the vastness of his vocabulary and sentence structure, even if he was telling them that they had broken his heart and he would like to scratch them until they bleed.

Anyway, after a discussion with J and a very heartfelt prayer, he got the broken pieces of his heart back together and braved the school again, and absolutely loved it.

Here's to hoping he loves it again on Thursday.

Children Don't Forget

If you are at the public pool, the one with the two water slides called the Watergator and the Slidewinder, and your kids

don't feel like going home, how can you convince them it's time to go?

Take each of them on the water slides, even if they are protesting and not wanting to.