Hi Daddy

Miss you.

When Daddy's away, the mice will be bored out of their gourds with their Mommy

Daddy left us yesterday for his secret mistress, The Desert. No seriously, he's in Death Valley right now, emailing me to tell me that his cell phone doesn't work. What a dork.

We won't see him again until the wee-est hours of Tuesday morning, leaving me in sole charge of midget entertainment for a week. Well, I did schedule the babysitter to come over for two nights while he's away, so there will be breaks. But it's really not that bad. They are such good boys, and we are all feeling better, so I think I won't have sold them to the gypsies by week's end.

Today I had our friendly local mechanic pick up George the Green Car for a seriously minor amount of work that we knew had to be done. When George arrived back at my house, with nary a phone call from them to discuss the terms of his release, I got slapped with this bill that is literally three times higher than what Dadaw told me it should be. So now I have to call them and get all "I'm calling the BBB on you fools." Me, a girl who has a visceral dislike of confrontation AND who is supposed to talk like she knows anything at all about cars and what their repairs should cost. Grrrr.

The plague returns to our busy household

Yay, we are all sick again. Just in time for Jakey's little birthday party tomorrow. It is now cancelled, and I am so thankful Daddy insisted I put off my party-food shopping because now we won't have veggie platters rotting in our fridge.

We all have these awful coughs and colorful boogers. The coughing is so bad that bedtime stories have to be pruned to two instead of four, because once I get started reading the coughing hits me so much that I can barely talk. Daddy is the worst of us and went to the doctor today, where his lungs were pronounced "awful-sounding". Now he has some horse-pill antibiotics. I just love February in Delaware.

We were kind of asking for it, really, with the way we ran ourselves this week. It's a good thing Meemaw and Poppop are here this weekend to take care of us.

Our busy week, part Wednesday

On Wednesdays we have a standing playdate to hang out with our homeboys Carlos and Anthony. This Wednesday we really hung out -- if you get me, because you like lame jokes -- because the gymnastics club where Carlos has class hosted an Open Gym where any yaywhos off the street could come and jump into a pit filled 6 feet deep with squishy foam blocks. Among other things.



How could you not have a good time? My timid Isaac even found his inner Tarzan and swung on a big rope, just once, screaming "Look out, here comes Super Isaac!"

Our busy week, part Isaac's Tuesday

Tuesday was Jacob's birthday of course, but also picture day at Isaac's preschool. Here is Big Brother doing his preschool thang in his picture outfit. He looks far too old for my liking.



There was a calendar for the rest of the school year in his cubby. He has parent/teacher conferences in April, at least one more presentation, and even a review day at the end of the year. Like a real kid. Keeping in mind that this very day was also both picture day and my youngest's 2nd birthday, you might understand why I arrived home a weeping mess.

Our busy week, part Monday

Monday it was 60 degrees outside and totally luscious, if a little muddy. We met our friends Ella and Ella's mommy at the new park for a playdate. They brought Jacob three birthday presents, bless them.

Jacob showed me he could climb this tunnel ladder made of licorice all by himself. No, seriously.



Isaac found this sign by the sandbox and pointed out letters to me, in order, to spell his name. Over and over he did this. "Look, Mommy, I- S- A- A- where's the C?"



He is obsessed with spelling his name now. He is also trying to write it on his own, after a few weeks of me prodding him annoyingly about it. He writes his "s" backwards and his "a"s look a bit like nose-down goldfish crackers, but I am just so pleased that he gets it.

Jakey's big day

We spent the day as our Young Master Birthday Overlord demanded, namely, playing trains until our eyes bled and our fingers were numb.



While Isaac was in preschool, Jakey demanded that he and I spend time coloring together, and so we did. When he expressed an interest in listening to "Woody Songs," I bought the Toy Story soundtrack on iTunes and burned it to a CD so we could listen to it all day in the car. When it was naptime, I whipped out a new book to read, one featuring his brand-new Chocolate Percy train. I'll have you know that Chocolate Percy and his package cohorts were hand-picked by Isaac to give to his brother on this auspicious occasion. This means we now have 5 Percys. Because we need them.

Both the UPS and FedEx men delivered presents during nap. I wrapped as much as I could, but I ran out of paper. Behold the artfully arranged towers of unopened toys.



After nap we took Jacob for a traditional O'Neal boy birthday dinner at Red Robin. Lucky for Jake that his birthday is on a Tuesday, AKA a day when some dude in a Red Robin costume walks around from table to table and shakes his booty in the aisle. This gave King Birthday and his sidekick much amusement.



Birthday Boy also enjoyed being sung to by the entire waitstaff, though his brother was being a right old turd by that point. Isaac flatly refused to even sniff his dinner, yet he was happy to help with Jacob's birthday sundae. Imagine that. Jacob's impressive sharing skillz are shown here, where he not only tolerated but even encouraged such injustice.



Then we came home for birthday cake and presents. Here is the Jake sporting a small fraction of his swag, namely this Mater chair from Mamaw and Dadaw and some killer blue dinosaur rainboots from us.



Out of the several dozen times he heard it today, here are two renditions of "Happy Birthday to Jacob". The first was performed at Red Robin after dinner tonight; the second was performed at our house immediately following. I will warn you that he himself sings along for the whole song at home, because he is really that awesome.

Good morning, young prince...

He's TWO! I sobbed my eyes out before 9:30 this morning!



You can see from the enormous unsightly thing on his forehead (and the red scuff marks under his nose and above his lip) that he's already received his birthday beating. KIDDING.

He was at his most ungraceful yesterday. While at the kitchen table yesterday so calmly and unwigglingly playing with his new trains, he magically fell off his chair and landed face-first on the tile floor. Fantastic. Apparently, however, he was just keeping with tradition, as shown by the magnificent forehead bruise he sported on his first birthday.



Does he not look exactly the same then as he does today? Sigh.

Disney POD 7 -- Taking in the Tiki Room

The Tiki Room has a special place in my boys' hearts. I am sorry to say that it's because they (especially The Jake) are addicted to the Tiki Room song. Not the oldie-but-goodie melody sung in the actual Tiki Room, no. It's the new, supposedly improved version, sung by those delightful masters of noise that brought you the Macarena, and the only version available on iTunes. I am not kidding. Stupid iTunes.

It was our first stop on the second day, when we only had time to do one thing before heading back to the hotel for our character breakfast reservations. And look, here it is, the Tiki Room of yore!



We got there too early for the first show. Nobody was bummed about this in the least, because immediately in front as you can see are The Magic Carpets of Aladdin. You can also see Daddy and Isaac riding in one, with Isaac driving as always. Here they come!



Eventually we pried Isaac off of this Dumbo-clone ride to take in the Tiki Room. Here we are waiting to go in and getting a preview of the animatronic goodness to come.



I think the boys enjoyed the Tiki show, because if you can't enjoy watching birds and flowers sing doo-wop, your heart is made of stone.

Okay, kids, time to hurry back to the hotel! We're gonna see Mickey! For rilly reals this time!

Disney POD 8: Officially freaking out

Following our brief Tiki Room experience, we had to head right back to the hotel for our brunch reservation at Chef Mickey's.

Now, if this isn't a racket, I don't know what is. To meet characters at Disney, you have two choices. You can either wait in line for an hour or more to see Mickey or other characters, or you can just pay a king's ransom and have each of them come and love on you as you like at a character restaurant.

After our fantastic breakfast experience, the crochety old miser in me regrets to say that I would definitely choose the latter. I dare you to look at Isaac's face and disagree.



Here Isaac is busting a crazy preschool move when commanded to dance by the Disney Powers-That-Be:



Minnie and Isaac are giggling because he just gave her a kiss on the ear.





The food was pretty good, too. So many choices!



I was surprised that the boys ate so well with so much excitement. It was definitely a fun place to be. Thanks go to Mamaw and Dadaw for treating us.

Babysitters on ice

Last night we took the boys to an ice skating show. It was quite special because our babysitter, Aly, is on the University's synchronized figure skating team. When she first told me this, I couldn't quite wrap my brain around it. Lots of chicks? On ice? How do they not bump into each other? The answer is really quite simple: they are all very, very good.



And actually, these girls in particular are super-extra good, because UD's team is ranked 3rd in the nation. This show was their public send-off to this year's national competition.

It was lots of fun -- they had plenty of cute routines -- but Jacob found it a little long and got pretty obnoxious about it several times. Here he is in a calmer moment, modeling his boy-band hair.



In contrast, Isaac the Patient was determined that he would see Aly on the ice. We actually tried to leave about halfway through the program with still no Aly, but Isaac was in tears that he would miss her. So we stayed. It was worth it to see her, a confection in blue, zipping right past us as we stood near the glass. Isaac thought it was just about the coolest thing he'd ever seen.



We also got to meet her mom. She was very nice, but Daddy thought she had a special look for me, one that said, "Why does that 14-year-old have two kids?"

More V-day lovin'

For Mommy and Daddy, from Isaac -- We got this in the mail last Monday. He gave us no warning at all. When I opened it up I was so confused, until he saw it and lit up. "I made that for you at preschool!"



His teachers addressed it and wrote "Happy Valentine's Day! Love, Isaac" on the inside. He decorated the envelope and the card.

He also gave us some sweet public words at preschool, recorded for posterity:



Interestingly, the night before Valentine's Day, his brother "showed love" in the same way, for the first time. It was post-bath as I was snuggling him in a towel. It was totally coerced.

"I love you Jakey. Do you love me?"
"Lub you Mommy. Lub you, too."

To Mommy, from Daddy:



This was in continuation of a tradition, begun last year, that I hope lasts until the end of time. A good bottle of hairy old man drink is one of those finer necessities, like lingerie, that one does not often take the opportunity to buy for oneself. The last bottle was a very slow but steady project of mine. I finished it right before Christmas. It's nice to be able to unwind at the end of a long, scream-filled day with a tasty glass of Mommy Sauce. As Nerdy Daddy put it, "this is the evaporant for the glue that holds this family together."

Happy Valentine's Day

From the International House of FD&C Red #5.



Isaac had a Valentine's Day party in preschool today. There was the traditional gathering of valentines and candy in hand-decorated sacks. Isaac's is in the middle.



He never told me they had made these until we got home today.

"Did you paint these?"
"Yes."
"With a paintbrush?"
"No."
"A piece of string?"
"No, mommy. I used a marble. I thought I could use one marble, but Miss Susie said to use two, with red AND pink. And to let them roll all over the tray."

Those evil preschool teachers also gave me a shock when the day ended with a class mini-performance. Did they tell us beforehand so we could bring our cameras? NO. They will pay, oh yes. My darling boy sat in formation with the rest of his class and sang "Skinnamarink" with choreographed hand gestures. He SANG, ACTUAL WORDS, WITH EVERYONE. NO FUSSING. And to make it even more adorable, he was watching Miss Susie the whole time for cues on his moves.

I tried to get him to repeat his performance later for posterity, but I'm sorry to say (DADDY) that he and Jake had only one song on their minds.

Operation Big Boy

As Isaac recently threatened to outgrow his toddler bed, we put into motion a plan to give him a real little-boy room, replete with a big-boy bed. This was no small feat because Isaac's room was too small to house both his ginormous dresser and a twin-sized bed.

Our first step of Operation Big Boy, completed when we first got back from vacation, was to switch room assignments. We disassembled Jacob's crib and the unused daybed in his room, and transferred him, his mattress, and his dresser to Isaac's old room. Jacob now sleeps on the toddler bed. His transition has been completely seamless. Not once has he fallen out during the night, and he has only gotten out of his bed twice on his own. We think his brother taught him that the bed is surrounded by some invisible fire that can only be crossed with the help of a grown-up.

In the meantime, Isaac was moved to Jacob's old room. He was not happy about this in the least until Dada offered to paint it for him, any color he wished. I was pleasantly surprised that he wanted us to paint it "Green, like a jungle!" instead of some brain-piercing red color. For this, I wish to thank my homeboy (and dance instructor) Diego. Dada and I worked together to promptly paint his room, I kid you not, Jungle Moss Green. When it was done even Isaac could not help but exclaim "Daddy, it's BEAUTIFUL."

Because we like whiskey in our tango, Isaac slept on a mattress on the floor for the better part of a month. Yesterday we finally got our butts in gear and bought him an actual bedframe, like what real people sleep in. Naturally this was accomplished at our favorite store, IKEA.

Isaac insisted I take a picture of the two of us as we waited in the warehouse section for Jakey and Dada:



While we were there, Dada made the surprise command decision to buy a coordinating bedside table for Isaac's new room. I think you'll agree that it makes all the difference.



When Dada called me in to see the finished product, I got a little choked up. I mean, it's a real room, like, for an actual person. When did my baby become a person? Don't even try to tell me how he's almost four years old.

The dangers of birthdays in the bleak midwinter

I think everyone in the world has this particular virus, the one with the fevering and the coughing and snotting. Luckily we at the O'Neal estates are over it now, with minor residuals such as an earache for me and minor snotting for Isaac. Jacob had his cold for a week, but that surprises no one since he gets sick from every major bug that filters down from Dada's university germ-factory. We thought Isaac would escape unscathed since he has the immune system of a robot. Seriously, it's been at least a year or better since he came down with anything. But it finally came and busted his buns last Friday, just as Jacob got over it.

You could tell how inexperienced Isaac was in the sick department once the snot started dripping uncontrollably. He would shake and fuss in horror and panic that this weird stuff was coming out of his nose. He refused to even try to blow his nose. Life was really quite loud from his whining until Dada taught him to inhale his snot, a skill on which his continued survival clearly depends. It's so annoying to hear him sucking in his boogers every 30 seconds.

"ISAAC! Can I give you a tissue?"
"No thanks, Mommy, I'm sucking up my snot!"

He also delights in picking his nose now, seeing the benefits of clearing out the fat boogers that do alight there. When he was supposed to be falling asleep the other night, he called me in.

"Moooooooooommmy, come heeeeeeeere."
"What is it, Isaac?"
He holds out his finger to me in the complete darkness. "Look at this booger I got!"

Our good friend Ella's 3rd birthday was on February 1st. Her party was originally scheduled for last Saturday, the 2nd, until she also caught this heinous cold and her parents spent that day with her at the pediatrician, worried sick over her unabating 103-degree fever. They rescheduled her party for yesterday. I think she was in a better place to enjoy it, as you can see from this smiling girl with her daddy:



Here's one of my boys "eating cupcakes". This translates in O'Neal language to "extracting every molecule of icing and leaving any of that unsavory 'cake' business behind". It's made even more insane in that Isaac expresses a strong preference for chocolate cake.

Cannonball!

Another day of decent, sunshiney weather has hit. After lunch we thought we'd check out this brand-new and ginormous park the county had just finished. Perhaps you can tell in the background of Flying Isaac just how awesome the playground section was. There were no less than 4 separate play structures to choose from, not including this sandbox and assorted springy ride-on things. We called this one -- chime pipes inside a plastic-maze-of-sorts -- the Music Jail:



Before we hit the playground, we took a stroll around the lesser-developed sections of the park. I got the boys out of the house by promising them they could get as dirty as they wanted. Here they are, atop the sledding hill, choosing which of the muddy tractor trails they will soil their shoes with next.



Pray my washing machine survives it all.

Place your orders here

Isaac's preschool is having picture day the Tuesday after next, on Jakey's birthday! So begins the long and lovely tradition of adorning our walls with cheesy posed photography. Bring it.

Life in Isaac's preschool has been a little unsettled for us since we returned from vacation. During the holidays, two things happened, neither one awesome.

First, we got a letter from the school saying that a student was being treated for MRSA. They didn't say whether this kid was in Isaac's class or the 4's class. I talked with the teachers later, and they said the responsible mommy didn't even know if the kid had MRSA, just that his or her skin infection was not going away and they were treating it as a worst-case scenario. We were reassured that everything in preschool kingdom come was disinfected daily and then again doubly disinfected over Christmas break. We did our own homework on Dr. Google to learn more, and when Uncle Chrissy came to stay with us for a few days while he had a job interview, he explained the situation even further. So now we know that MRSA is more like strep-throat-scary than ebola-scary. And, if you do come down with it, you may be eligible to treat your gaping flesh wound with maggots! Is there anything the internet doesn't know?

Second, and arguably worse, is that Isaac's best friend at school dropped out. Ryan and Isaac were so thick (and so blonde) that the other kids would mix up their names. Ryan's mom was easily the coolest mom there, and she was so gung-ho about our school, having put her two older boys through it already. She was the one who sold me on the place at a time when we were gun-shy about preschool, having endured a major upending of our plans before it started. It seemed like she and I hit it off okay, and I kept inviting her and Ryan over to our house for post-preschool lunch, but we never did it. She blew me off all the time for these "errands" she had to run for the Catholic school attended by her older boys. Whatevs.

And when we came back from vacation he was just gone. She gave no reason at all why she was taking him out, if he was going somewhere else, or if it was too much running for her. Isaac took it really well considering he talked about Ryan more than he talked about anything school-like. He asked about him for a few days, but has since latched onto Leah, who is apparently will marry when he grows up.

Peeking out

After a week and a half spent cooped up in the house with snotty noses and fevers, today the boys were well enough to play with Anthony and Carlos. Isaac and Jacob haven't been outside in so long, I actually had to bribe them to get them in the car with me. I promised that they could get as muddy as they wanted at our favorite local state park, especially given the 60-degree weather.



Now maybe if Mommy could learn how to go to sleep, she'd kick this cold too.

Disney POD 6 -- Dinner and a rain-soaked show

After our character-hugging debacle, it was already. Hungry, we headed to Main Street for hot dogs at Casey's Corner. As soon as we ordered, the sky opened up and poured a waterfall down on Florida, hard enough that one really should not be outside.

Unfortunately, Casey's is not a joint with ample indoor seating. We were forced to eat our meal outside under an awning, crammed against every other person determined to stick it out in Disney World. Though there were not many of us, there was also not a lot of space. We stood there, getting dripped upon, watching people buying up ponchos and scrambling down Main Street with their kids and strollers and gigantic shopping bags. We thought hard about joining them. Our day had been so long, and the kids were really getting tired. But Dada and I had committed to the whirlwind version of a Disney trip -- we only had 48 hours in the parks -- and we thought it best to stick it out.

Disney helped convince us. One of the things you have to love about the place is how the cast members really go out of their way to make your trip a memorable and unique adventure. During the half-hour it rained, we could have been bored and grumpy, confined in our little awning-prison. Instead, as soon as our crowd formed, a rather accomplished cast member sat down at a piano right next to me and started banging out ragtime versions of folk songs. No one sang or spoke to him, but you knew he was there solely to keep the rain off your parade, so to speak. The babies stayed quiet to listen, and watching the guy work certainly helped pass the time. When the rain lifted and we could move again, he moved on, his only purpose to help keep everyone in good spirits. What could have been a low part of our vacation turned into something that I'll never forget.

Oh, and am I ever so glad we stayed. The rain cleared everyone out pf the park. When it stopped, we visited the Haunted Mansion -- my absolute favorite attraction in Disney -- where there was no wait at all.

We were so excited to get Isaac on this ride. The kid is psycho in love with spooky stories and Halloween. Given his predilection for movies and storytelling, we look to him to become the next Wes Craven. He was indeed excited. We went in, and were closed in the round-ish room that descends and stretches pictures. He was cool. Then --I forgot -- they showed a hologram high above your head of some dude hung, in a noose, from the ceiling. In as understated a tone as one could ever muster, Isaac said, "Guys! Let's get out of here!" We knew he would like it if he gave it a chance, so we gave him a quick spiel about how it wasn't real and if he didn't like it he could close his eyes before we pushed him into a car with Mamaw and Dadaw. And he did like it, because "the ghosts were having a party!"



After the Haunted Mansion we rode the Pirates of the Caribbean, which also had no wait at all. It was awesome. I enjoyed the 3 sightings of Wax Johnny Depp. Isaac wanted to know why the pirates were shooting bowling balls at us. Jacob said it best: "Dat was fun! Do it again!"

We were intoxicated by this no-waiting business and wanted to do more, but both babies uncharacteristically demanded we take them back to the hotel, to try the rest again tomorrow.

Disney POD 5 -- Trapped in character jail

As the teacups led us away from Tomorrowland, there were loud and angry choruses from the peanuts in the gallery. "Mickey! MICKEY! Can we see Mickey now? How 'bout now?"

Turns out we actually know nothing about how to find Mickey in Disney World, but we thought perhaps a section called Mickey's Toontown Fair might help us out. And lo and behold, such a place appeared:



The special people that created this character habitat set it up in the following way:
* have the mindless minions (that's us!) enter multiple parallel queues, the ends of which cannot be seen
* to entertain the minions as they wait in said queue, funnel them into the dark heart of a buildling with no windows or doors. Allow them to stare at puke-green 70s carpeting. Oh! And those dated wood-plank-looking walls. Perhaps put tiny framed pictures of smiling people cuddling up to their favorite Disney character, inspiring the minions that hope waits for them just around the bend
* at the end of the queue, repeatedly take many many many people from the same line back into a room no one can see, what must be the character area. Keep all other lines chained off and make sure they can see that they are being passed over. Offer no explanation as to why

Isaac was amazing in his Job-like patience, waiting in this mysterious line which had no obvious end. But poor 21-month-old Jakey. Remember how much he loved the teacup ride? His next Disney adventure was to stand in line for 45 minutes to see "Mickey". He was so happy.



There was no mention, at all, of who we were doing all this waiting for. We assumed it was Mickey, and stupidly talked that up to the boys. Instead, it was Goofy and Pluto. Lucky for them, my boys are psycho in love with Goofy.







All the fussing and drama evaporated when we finally got to love on some characters. The Disney authorities also let us linger for a generous amount of time, which was the most important part. Perhaps you can tell that Isaac is nearly bursting with glee.

When we finally made it out of the County Bounty, we realized Mickey's House was right next door.



We wandered through the rooms, which were all dolled up for Christmas. When we made it out to the garden, we saw that there really was a designated place to meet Mickey, in a big tent in his backyard.



Inside, the line to meet Mickey was over an hour long. Isaac wanted to go so bad, and I'm so sorry to tell you that, after having wrestled with Jacob for the better part of 12 solid hours that day, my aching biceps made me scream oh HECKY naw. We told him instead that he would get to meet Mickey in person, for sure, the next day at a restaurant, where we had reservations for brunch. Mickey would even cook him breakfast.