Why clean....it's pointless.

This is going to be a short one, but one that I think about each and every day I live.  Why in the hell do I clean?  Honestly!?  Every morning I pick up the kitchen, put away toys, vacuum, and do laundry.  On given days I dust this room and that and none of it lasts for more than 5 seconds!  That's it....I am NOT joking.

Today, I almost lost it.  Well, actually people might have thought that I did because I posted a free ad on my Facebook page.  As I was starting my routine in the kitchen I kept hearing this clinking noise.  The noise was the kiddos breaking Christmas bulbs and they took them off the tree and then threw them back at the tree to see if they could hit and then break the other bulbs.  I lost it!  "What are you doing!!!???" I yelled as I watched the baby throw a bulb and my aspie jumping up and down and yelling, "Good Job!" to his little brother when one of the bulbs on the tree broke.  "Not a good job", I announced.  "We don't break the bulbs. They can cut us and plus then our tree will not be decorated.  How will Santa know we are sincere?"  (From my older post.)  "Mom, we are having fun.  And besides, we can just buy more bulbs at the store where we got these ones from." 

I immediately grabbed my phone and posted this to Facebook:

FREE to a good home: two over excited over zealous toddlers who are cute but tons of trouble. Little one will eat you out of house and home and big one will out smart you on a daily basis. Beware no return policy and cuteness is deceiving. Contact immediately if interested!

I did have some takers but no one has stopped to pick them up yet....

**Like my page on Facebook and leave me you cleaning stories or the disasters your kiddos have created.  Four legged kids messy accepted as well!!!***

Christmas Magic

Christmas is such a magical time of the year.  I have always loved it and try to make it a really special time for my family.  It is then by no surprise that our aspie loves the holiday season.  He honestly loves all the holidays, but Christmas for him is the pinnacle.  You could say that he is a Christmas expert.  He knows every Christmas tale, can tell you specific facts about Santa, his elves, his reindeer and knows the words to pretty much all holiday carols new and old.  Everyday he wakes up and asks if its Christmas eve  even though we have a calendar in the dining room. When I say no not yet, he then runs to check to see if "Blaze" our elf on the shelf moved from the previous day's location signaling his trip back from the North Pole.  It's actually awesome to see his excitement and curiosity towards the holiday; the only issue being that our son is too smart for his own good causing his father and I to scramble for answers to questions or comments that arise when one movie conflicts another or when toy advertisements come in and he happens to see them.

I used to love getting the Sears catalog when I was little to see all the toys in it and to circle things I wanted from Santa.  It was awesome, and yet not once did I wonder how the toys in the store were the same toys that Santa brought. Santa and his elves are suppose to make these wonderful toys in his workshop and yet you can buy them in a store?  And honestly I still never thought of it until my aspie came to me one day with the Toys R' Us catalog stating that he wanted to go to the store to buy a certain toy.  "Well honey, Santa is coming soon so maybe we should put it on your Santa wish list."  "Mommy (said in a whine), these toys are not made by Santa they are made by com-pa-nies (still not getting the word out well).  Santa doesn't make these toys, he makes toys you can't get in stores."  It was at this point that not only did I panic thinking of the stack of toys I have in the basement, but also a light bulb went off for the many things he keeps telling us he wants that we can not figure out where he is getting it from.

If you ask our aspie what he wants from Santa he will tell you he wants a long fluffly blue sword, a toy switch blade knife and a new Kindle.  Everyone in the family has been scratching their heads trying to understand where these toy ideas came from.  We have asked him, "Honey, where have you seen this sword/knife?"  "No where, its what I want, Santa knows."  Okay, as we have googled, searched and questions again about fluffly swords online.  It was then, when he made that comment did I realize that he understands that stores have certain toys and the magic of Santa can create whatever toy he wants.

Yep, we are so totally screwed.  We have tried to convince him that the toys from the companies are different elf families that make the toys.  For instance, Mattel, Fisher Price, etc are all different elf families.  It didn't go over to well, which led to more questions about the elves and their families and then the viewing of a few more Christmas movies to see if they mention the elves.  It then also led to the question of why can you buy these toys in stores.  We told him that the magic of Christmas doesn't go away just because the day is over and Santa sends the toys to the stores to kids can have toys any day of the year if they are good and earn it.  "Then why do we have to buy them?"  "Because that is how Santa earns the money to pay the elves."  "No Mommy, elves work for cookies."  "Well, how do you think Santa gets the money to buy all those cookies?"  And around and around and around we went until finally I think he just got tired of talking.  Since talking is not his favorite thing, that was probably the longest conversation I have had with my aspie ever. 

So our Christmas morning should be pretty interesting.  Hopefully he will be completely excited and forget all these questions and just enjoy the day.  I am sure he will along with the rest of us. 

And presents and toys have not been our only issue.  The issue of Santa being here, there and everywhere is also an a major concern for our aspie.  Why is Santa coming to my school?  Why is Santa at the store?  Santa lives at the North Pole and is busy this time of year.  Why won't they (people) leave him alone?  All these questions keep popping up so my husband and I decided not to take our aspie or the baby to see Santa this year.  Unfortunately, these Santa questions make our aspie aggravated and that it not what we want to happen, which can in times ruin his whole outlook on a specific subject.  For instance, his baby brother started playing with trains, the "wrong" way and our aspie stopped playing with trains for good.  Just like that.  No looking back.  And so we do NOT want that to happen to his love of Christmas.  If something would go wrong or someone would say the wrong thing, he could just be done with Christmas, as quick as a blink. 

And so with Christmas only 10 days away our house is gearing up with excitement of that magical day.  Our house looks like Christmas threw up on it, with every room being decorated.  And even with all these decorations, our aspie still says that we could use more because he is worried Santa won't think we are sincere enough.  (Wondering where that comes from, it comes from Charlie Brown's The Great Pumpkin Patch, where Linus wants to show the Great Pumpkin that he has the dearest and most sincere pumpkin patch.)  And instead of cookies, our aspie wants to leave Santa a healthy snack because he is worried that Santa will get a belly ache from all the cookies and won't be able to fit down the chimney. 

I mean the kids isn't obsessed and thought of every detail or anything.  I am sure there is something he has left out and will think of before D-Day.  But still there is something so amazing watching your kiddos get so excited for the holidays.  It honestly is magical.  I hope that all of you find some magic this holiday season! So from our house of crazies to yours have a very Merry Christmas!

   

A mouse in the house

We have a wonderful in-home therapist.  Her name is Ms. Nicole and she has made a HUGE difference with our aspie, who loves her dearly.  He quickly grew attached to her and when she is here, you will find him sitting in Ms. Nicole's lap while they are working.  Not only has Nicole gotten close to our aspie but she has also been extremely efficient in conquering some of my aspie's biggest issues.  Nicole came up with a way to handle our aspie's obsession of knives, has gotten him to say hello and goodbye when people come and go from our home, and has gotten him to write his name legibly in the last three or so months she has been with us.  She is so sweet, quiet and understanding and has become a member of our family since she is her nearly every morning in our home.  She even goes out with us when we think our aspie might have a hard time, like to birthday parties or trick or treating, and is planning on working on our aspie's ability to go to different stores in the near future.  Since she has become a member of our family, she gets to be here with the good times, the bad and unfortunately for her, the often occurring weird and unusual things that occur in our crazy family.  Her first experience of the un-normal was in October when we had a bat in the house.  She held the kiddos at bay while my husband and I wrangled the beast outside, and just the other day she was there again when another, smaller visitor came to visit. 

Before Nicole's arrival on Black Friday, I was vacuuming when I spotted a tiny cute field mouse in our dining room.  I guessed I had scared it with the vacuum cleaner because it went running across the room and stopped in front of me like a deer in headlights.  And although it was cute, it scared the crap out of me since I wasn't expecting it, causing me to scream as well.  My husband came running in to see what my shrill was over just in time to see our guest scurry around the corner into a foyer and under the toy box.  He looked but couldn't find it so we figured it had run some place else and we both knew it was time to set up some traps after the kids went to bed.  When Nicole got there we informed her of our furry friend so if it made an appearance again she would have my same reaction. 

A couple hours into their work, and during one of my son's breaks, Ms Nicole calmly and quietly said, "Umm, it's back."  Not being so calm my husband and I went running into the dining room to again watch the mouse run back to the foyer and under the toy box.  This time though our running made the boys curious and caused them to come running as well.  They made it in time to spot the mouse too.  "How cute!" the baby squawked.  "It's Jerry!" our aspie yelled.  "Jerry is here," referring to Jerry from the Tom and Jerry cartoon. From their excitement it became quickly apparent that a non-lethal method of removal was going to be necessary for our four legged friend.  Since the mouse was on the run, all of us kept spotting it going from here to there making the kiddos even more excited about our house guest, and so we had to be proactive and decided to hunt down the mouse before our kids decided to catch "Jerry" themselves.

Armed with Tupperware, my husband and I positioned ourselves on either side of the toy box and Ms Nicole had the kids on the steps so they could look over to watch.  With a yard stick, my husband nudged the mouse and got him running into my direction with the plan that I would set the Tupperware bowl overtop of the mouse trapping him.  Well, that was the plan anyway.  In reality, here is what happened.

Mouse came running towards me at an un-godly speed which made me jump, scream and miss the mouse.  Our dog Charlie (who loves to hunt) spotted the mouse, smashed through our lane of toys to force the mouse towards me and started biting at the mouse.  By this point the kids were screaming and Ms. Nicole had the brains to jump onto Charlie stopping him from grabbing the mouse.  The mouse had run back towards my husband who was now stuck under the toy box in the attempt to block the mouse.  With Ms. Nicole holding back Charlie and laughing her ass off, the kids escaped the steps, still screaming and now were climbing on top of my husband, who was still pinned, trying to look to find out if the mouse was okay.  I, who always thought of myself as calm in chaotic situations, was just sitting on the floor in a daze not sure what was going on wishing I had gone Black Friday shopping.  Once I came to I realized the mouse must have been just as confused because it was running back and forth down the lane of toys not knowing what to do.  Finally, after my hubs got the kids off of him and he sat up, Ms Nicole had Charlie calmed down, and I got my wits to me, we watched as the mouse came to a stop, in a white flag raising style, and allowed my husband to place the plastic bowl over top of him.  We slid a piece of cardboard under the bowl and I carried the mouse outside to release back into the wild.  Dazed, the mouse and I exchanged a look for quite some time before I finally left him there.  As I walked away I swear the mouse had a look of both thankfulness and pity on his face.  The kids watched him from a window for some time while the mouse bathed himself, and finally went on his way to his  other "home". 

And so, I think we can officially say the Ms. Nicole is a member of the house of crazies.  She has been here and survived some of the weirdest things that occurs in our home and has lived to tell about it.  And to boot, she comes back!  Thanks Ms. Nicole!  We hope you enjoy your birthday on Saturday and wouldn't know what to do without you!  And always remember, you never know what each day will bring, but we can promise you it will never get boring!