A Girl and Her Snail

Evie turned nine on Wednesday, and her birthday wish was simple:

Yep, she wanted a snail. No big deal, right? WRONG! As it turns out, there aren't a ton of snails in my nearby radius during a rainstorm in January. I upturned every chunk of cement, abandoned 2x4 and water-filled flower pot in our backyard, all to no snavail. (Get it? Snail + avail! Hahahahaha!)

I did some attempted out-sourcing, calling pet stores (nope) and, in a desperately silly moment of mental washout, I called a nursery. Nurseries, as we know, don't really like snails, so I'm not sure why I thought they'd have one. But I called, and they didn't. I texted friends, posted on gardeners' message boards, and hit up Facebook. I optimistically erased the request and drew a picture in it's place, hoping that if I couldn't find a real-live snail, a chalk drawing of one might suffice. 

Luckily, Facebook came through, like it always does.

Meet Evie's pet snail:

Temporary name: Lenny

I got him (or her...I think they're one and the same) all set up in it's comfy new home full of water and leafy greens and a little cup to hide in, which it promptly scooshed past in order to crawl up the side of it's terrarium wall to the uppermost corner, where it stayed until it met Evie. 

I figured since it wasn't being cute anyway, I'd just go ahead and wrap it up: 

She'll have no idea what's in the big box!

Upon picking her up from school, Evie asked no less than six thousand times if I could just give her a tiny little hint about whether or not she'd be getting a snail when we got home. I was like, "no way dude, forget it!" And I made her open her boring book presents first, just for the extra torture. When she got to the big box, she was amazingly surprised! Like I wouldn't get her a snail for her birthday?! Psh, who does she think she's dealing with here, a total amateur??

"Oh my gosh mama, is it a snail?!"

Since he/she was still hiding, she had to work a little to find her new BFF.

But once she did, they were inseparable. I mean, literally - those things are super sticky.

Here is a heavily-cut video of Evie's snail - Flash - crawling. Because it's cute. Happy Birthday Evie!!

Number Two

January 4, 2015

Looking back at the blog I see that we got Finn his potty chair a YEAR ago. Since then, the main thing it's collected in its froggy head has been dust. He was okay with the peeing starting last November and there have been a couple of celebrated (though I suspect accidental) turds dropped here and there, but it wasn't until this holiday break that he finally embraced what is universally accepted as truth: pissing your pants is not cool.

Consequently we've recently declared step number one officially reached. In fact, he's so good at going number one, he'll often just sit and squeeze out a teaspoon so he can say "gummy bear", which I'm obliged to award him.

Such prowess with number one should mean that number two will be quick to follow, but this is Finn we're talking about.

Once again, the issue isn't that he doesn't know how to go, or when to go. He's in complete control of his bodily functions, he's just the kung fu master of stubborn. He will hold it from morning til nighttime diaper. I not sure how he does it, but then again his poops are 90% gummy bear these days.

During the daylight hours he's in underpants, with rare exceptions. On long road trips, or visits to locations too sacred to risk an accident, he'll get a midday diaper which he soils the instant the double grip strips lock in place. When he finds himself  truly desperate to go during the day he'll tell me "diaper?", which is my cue to sweep him into the bathroom so we can both sit for ten minutes while he doesn't poop.

Last Saturday, right after a hearty lunch, he said "diaper?" and I put him on the potty with inexplicable confidence. He hopped up, went to back to his room, climbed the bookshelf, retrieved a swim diaper left there from last summer, put it on, went into the closet, pointed his little finger out of the darkness toward the hallway and told me "go". I would have intervened but I was completely transfixed.

Jodee thinks we should try respecting his need for privacy by placing him on the potty and leaving him alone. I'm all for it, though my version might look a little more like solitary confinement than she had in mind.

Christmas 2015

I have a Clark Griswold complex. I go into the holidays with the same wide-eyed naivety every year and end up disappointed. At least this year the boys reminded me to lower the bar early.

To kick off the holiday I thought I'd take the boys to the mall for, what was destined to be, "the best picture with Santa...EVER!"

They'd watched the Rankin/Bass "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" at least 80 times and were Santa-crazy. Every decoration that appeared at all Santa-esque was dubbed "SAN KWAZ!" by Finley. I figured actually meeting the real Santa this year was going yield the most adorable moment ever captured on film. Here's what we got:

This was the BEST of EIGHT, just by virtue of the fact that all three of their heads are in frame. The first four shots looked like the boys were exploding out of Santa. After some blue lollipops that I'm sure were laced with sedatives (I have no problem with that) and the patented white-gloved death grip seen above (also, absolutely no problem with that) Santa managed to get this moment captured on pricey, high-glossed film. The cheapest package was $29.99.