Obviously Cindy-Lu is a special shining star of a girl, but I’m going to be honest here for a moment. The girl scares the shit out of me. I have this fear that one day she might grow up to be the friendly neighborhood serial killer.

Oh, who am I kidding? Friendly? Cindy-Lu? Not likely.

She’s a good girl and she’s usually pretty sweet. And, Lord knows, she’s beautiful beyond words, but that girl…well, let me give you a few examples.

Eeyore and Cindy-Lu were playing nicely together when I heard the following exchange:

Cindy-Lu: If you don’t say nice things to me and do things for me then I’m going to kill you.

Eeyore: I’m not going to do that.

Cindy-Lu: Fine then. You want a lollipop? *holds out her empty hand*

Eeyore: Sure! *reaches for her*

Cindy-Lu: *stabbing noises as she pretends to stab his hand*

The fact that she threatened to kill him if he didn’t say nice things to her was bad enough, but then she offered him candy to lure him closer so that she could stab him? Serial killer.

Later in the day, she had the following conversation with me:

Cindy-Lu: Mom, if you don’t let me sleep in your bed tonight I’m going to have a bad dream about you.

Me: Oh, no! I hope it’s not too scary, because you aren’t sleeping with me tonight!

Cindy-Lu: Okay then. I’m going to dream that you have tape over your mouth and all around your arms and legs so you can’t talk or move.

Me: *finding a weapon to sleep with, just in case*

Seriously. The girl scares me.

I don’t even know how long it’s been since my last post, mostly because my blog is being dumb and not loading for me. Huh. Wonder how long that’s been going on? Oh, there. It loaded. How nice.

So, I actually have interesting stories to tell you, but I feel like an asshole coming back and being all “Let me tell what has been going on with meeeeeee!” So, how about we compromise?

How have you been?

That’s nice. Let me tell you about meeeeeeee.

I hired a housekeeper and she ruined my life. I should clarify that it was just a one time cleaning deal so that you don’t all hate me. We are selling our house (no, really. I know I say that every few months, but this time I mean it. The sign goes up Thursday! THURSDAY!) and I’m a pretty crappy wife so I needed a professional to come in and clean the junk off the front of my oven (dude, my oven SPARKLES now! Like Edward’s skin!) and scrub the pee stains from the floor around my toilet. She did a lovely job, but while she was here cleaning I had to leave the house. It just would have been too embarrassing to be here while she scrubbed away my failure, you know?

I did something that I’m not proud of while the housekeeper was here.

I took the children to the McDonald’s play place. That place is just so wrong. I don’t understand why, but bad parents just FLOCK there.

Anyway, I totally could have handled the 2 hour trip at the play place, but then the kids made friends. When it was time for us to leave the little snot nosed brats told my kids that they come EVERY. SINGLE. MONDAY.

You can imagine what the past week has sounded like around here, right?

“Mom? What day is it? Is it Monday? Is tomorrow Monday? Are my friends at McDonald’s?”

Today was Monday, so I took them back to the play place just to shut them up and SURPRISE, their friends weren’t even there.

I made friends though. The mom sitting next to me couldn’t help but love me when my daughter shouted at the top of her lungs that she sure was glad that mommy sitting there (finger pointing at the lady directly next to me, totally in punching distance) wasn’t her mommy. Me: Oh God. Oh God. Cindy-Lu. Please go play.

The mom, thankfully, didn’t punch me. Instead she befriended me and told me all about her life and SWEAR TO GOD offered me a bite of her ice cream.

I blame the housekeeper for the sad turn my life has taken. If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t be sucking on a stranger’s ice cream cone. (Okay, so I politely told the lady I wasn’t hungry.)

And, now it’s time for your daily weekly monthly dose of pictures of my children and Cleatus.

Also, if you follow me on facebook you’ve already seen a couple of these pictures, so I apologize.

The other night I was watching Grey’s Anatomy and one of the dudes had a big ol’ hickey on his neck and it got me thinking. Do women actually give men hickeys? I mean, do YOU give your boyfriend/husband/random guy from the bar hickeys? I’m fairly certain that I’ve never given anyone a hickey before. Am I a bad person for this? Should I add “Give Cleatus a hickey” to my bucket list? Or, better yet, maybe I should add “Give Michael Weston a hickey.”

As for receiving hickeys…do you? I mean, are you galavanting around town, dropping your children off at playdates, taking your son to soccer practice, doing your grocery shopping, and mopping the floors with HICKEYS ON YOUR NECK? Or, god forbid, elsewhere on your body? Please share. I must know.

And, because I’m asking for your hickey information, I shall share mine. I have had two hickeys in my lifetime. One was while I was in high school and it was most unfortunate. I was “dating” this boy named (oh God) Lester, which meant that a.) I heard quite a few jokes about Lester the Molester and b.) something was clearly wrong with me.

Let us go off topic for a moment here while I describe Lester. Lester was what we, back then, called a scumbag. Really, I know no nicer way to put it than that. He had no money and he did not bathe and he only owned two shirts. (I’m sorry, it was high school, there was no such thing as “compassion.”) One was a Green Bay Packers t-shirt and one was a band t-shirt (I think Metallica). How do I know these were the only two shirts he owned? Because he wore those two shirts every single day. But, because it would be totally uncool to be seen wearing the same two shirts over and over he would (OH DEAR GOD) switch back and forth between wearing them right side out and inside out. And, uh, he didn’t wash them in between wearing them either. He also had rather long, greasy blond hair (and this was not a time when long hair on boys was fashionable) and once an older girl came up behind Lester and me kissing and, noticing the long hair on both of our heads, said something about how she couldn’t believe two girls were kissing in the hall. (As if high school wasn’t hard enough…) My only excuse for dating this boy is that I think I was going through some sort of bad boy phase, and I just expected this greasy kid from the wrong side of town to be a bad boy. He really wasn’t though, because I once suggested that he come over to my house while my parents were out of town for the weekend and he acted all scandalized. So, since I couldn’t find any actual bad boys in my high school, I opted for a dirty boy. Next best thing, right?

Anyway, back to the hickey. It was Christmas break and Lester was no where to be found seeing as how he lived way across town from me. I was hanging out with some neighbor boys (who, come to think of it, were actually “bad boys”) and I ended up making out with one of them the night before we went back to school. And he totally gave me a hickey. I’m pretty sure Lester saw it, but because he was actually only dirty and not bad, he never said a word about it.

I am an asshole.

My second hickey was courtesy of my soon-to-be-husband, Cleatus, and when I say “soon-to-be” I fucking mean WE WERE GOING TO GET MARRIED IN TWO DAYS. And the bastard gave me a hickey. Like it was a fucking wedding present.

The worst part is, Cleatus and I were totally just goofing around, tickling each other and play fighting when all of a sudden he said something like “Wouldn’t it be funny if I gave you a hickey right before we got married?” and I screeched something like “I will fucking kill you” and then he held me down and gave me a hickey. He swears he didn’t mean to REALLY give me one, but y’all. I had a hickey on my wedding day.

Cleatus is an asshole.

Now, spill. When did you last give/get a hickey?

Today was Picture Day at the preschool and Cindy-Lu was so excited. She helped pick out her “dress up” clothes and only got pissy one time when I vetoed the Cinderella princess costume. She sat still and let me brush her hair and fix it all pretty and she promised to wipe her little snot nose before it was her turn to get her picture taken.

I picked her up after preschool prepared to hear all about the big moment and watch her model her “cheeeeese” smile for me, but instead she was brokenhearted.

“Everyone else got their berry own comb but me!”

I assured her that she probably had a comb in her book bag, but a quick search proved me wrong. She went on and on about how those other kids had a comb and she didn’t and it basically ruined her little sunshine filled day. I insisted that they must have just missed her and it was an accident, but she was still pretty upset about it.

I didn’t pass out a comb after I took this picture. I handed out candy. Bribery. It’s what all the best parents do.

At dinner we were talking about our day and I mentioned her pictures again and asked her to show me how she smiled.

“I don’t think I did a berry good job at pictures. I didn’t get my own comb.”

I excused myself from the table and snuck to the bathroom to grab one of her Daddy’s combs. I hid the comb under my shirt and snuck it out to the coat rack.  I stuck the comb in her coat pocket and went back to dinner.

After dinner I mentioned that maybe the teacher put her comb in her coat pocket. She took off to look for it and moments later I heard “A-ha!”

She came barreling into the living room full of giggles and showed me her “berry own comb.”

She held it up in front of her face and exclaimed, “What the heck do you do with this thing anyway?”

Twenty-nine days! That’s how long I’ve been living life without writing about it. Well, I still write about the food I eat, but I haven’t been writing about, you know, my vagina or my kids or my bastard husband. I’m not going to lie, I haven’t missed the pressure of feeling like I should write something, but I have noticed recently that while I’m going about my day I’m writing blog posts IN MY HEAD. Clearly, I miss this blogging thing. Not that that means I will update regularly again. Don’t get your hopes up, is what I’m saying. You know, if you are even there anymore! And I wouldn’t blame you one bit if you weren’t!

In other non-blogging news, my most recent written in my head blog post was about how I’m a total douche-bag. Yesterday it was cold and rainy and slippery outside, so what did I do? I decided to get the mail, because like I said, douche-bag. Out I go, wearing my pajamas (because if I am at home, I am in my pajamas. Always.), snow boots, and winter coat. I was looking hot is what I’m saying. So, there I am, at the mailbox when the neighbor comes outside and just stands on his front porch and stares at me. Weird, right? I just ignored him and turn to walk back up the driveway and did I mention it was icy out there? My feet start sliding around and I’m trying desperately to hang on to the mail and keep my balance and save face in front of the asshole neighbor, but no. The next thing I know, I’m laying on the ice, which is rather wet and cold I might add, on my back with my feet up in the air. I don’t know how to react so I just…laugh. Loudly. The neighbor proceeds to tell me that it’s slippery out there (big no shitter, right there) and I should walk in the snow.

So, yeah. That was humiliating.

And, really, I think that’s all I’ve got. A month away from the blog and I come back to tell you that I slipped on some ice. Scintillating, isn’t it?

Here, have a couple pictures:

Cindy-Lu, who happens to have just turned five, looking all pretty and smiley to hide the fact that she is actually an angry, hormonal teenager who would like to roll her eyes at you and then eat your face off.

Eeyore, who is still the sweetest kid ever even though he still hasn’t quite perfected his aim while peeing standing up,  looking irritated with me for insisting that he stand still long enough for me to snap this photo. And probably also irritated about me telling the internet he has bad aim.

I haven’t done a meme in, oh, about 2 years, but this one actually looked kind of fun. So here you have it. (I yanked this from Swistle, by the way.)

Eggnog or hot chocolate? I have never, not once, tried Eggnog and one of my life goals is to never, not once, try Eggnog. Cleatus and the kids have been trying to think of ways to get some Eggnog in my mouth without me knowing it’s coming (like dripping it in there while I’m asleep or some shit), but they will not succeed. So, I guess the short answer to the question is: Hot Chocolate, please, with marshmallows.

Does Santa wrap the presents or leave them open under the tree? Santa wraps them in special Santa only paper. Some years we have the kids pick out the special Santa paper and they leave it under the tree for him to use, but other years I decide that wrapping everything after they are in bed is too much work and I buy paper myself and slowly wrap the gifts throughout the month of December.

Colored lights on a tree or white? White on my tree, colored on the kids’ tree. Next year, though, I am hoping to get a white tree with colored lights, but the chance of me convincing Cleatus of that is about zero.

Do you hang mistletoe? Nope. I’ve never even been kissed under mistletoe. How sad!

When do you put your decorations up? Much to Cleatus’s dismay, we usually put everything up the week before Thanksgiving. I like Christmas, okay?

What is your favorite holiday dish? The side dishes. All of them. Keep your ham, give me all the carbs and veggies and cheese filled side dishes.

Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? We open gifts from our extended family on Christmas Eve, but everything from us and Santa gets opened Christmas morning. Except for the one present I talk Cleatus into letting the kids open the week before Christmas. I’m such a cool mom.

How do you decorate your Christmas tree? My tree is pretty boring, covered in brown, gold, and maroon balls, some bows, and a couple of “fancy” decorations. By fancy, I mean something that was purchased as a single ornament, instead of in a value pack of 12. I usually buy the fancy ornaments during the big Target clearance sale after Christmas. The kids’ tree is a mish-mash of homemade crap treasures and ugly but colorful ornaments they love.

Snow: love it or hate it? I love it, but only when it’s clean. I don’t like the brown, muddy slush crap.

Can you ice skate? Are you kidding me?

What is your favorite holiday dessert? That’s tough. I don’t think I have a favorite. I love these butter cookies (mm, butter) and these little buttons are always fun to pop in my mouth every effing time I walk through the kitchen.

What is your favorite holiday tradition? I’d like to say it’s reading a nice, wholesome Christmas story by the fireplace every evening while sipping hot cocoa before bed, but we don’t actually do that, so I guess opening my presents. Sorry, but I’m still a kid at heart when it comes to Christmas. Opening presents? Best part.

Candy canes: yum or yuck? Eh. Whatever. I don’t eat them, but they aren’t gross.

Favorite Christmas show? Probably Rudolph. I like Rudolph.

Well, that was fun. And now I’m officially in the Christmas spirit (by which I mean, ready to open gifts)! Hope y’all have a great holiday filled with cookies and lots of boxes full of fun things to unwrap!

Oh, and don’t step in any reindeer poo.

My cat is currently outside hanging off the window screen and meowing to be let in. Rather than remove myself from underneath my laptop and let the poor frozen kitty inside, I decided to blog. It’s been awhile, yo.

I think the reason for the blogging is partially Cleatus’s fault. Remember when I used to bitch and complain about him all the effing time? Man, those were the days. He truly has been like some kind of Super Husband lately. HE EVEN BOUGHT ME A NIKON D90 FOR CHRISTMAS. And let me have it two weeks ago because the sound of my whining was about to puncture his ear drum because he loves me so much. Seriously. Super Husband.

However! This morning I woke up on the grumpy side and DO YOU KNOW WHAT, INTERNET? I feel like bitching about Cleatus. Do you know what he did? He came home from work after a 12 hour shift and opened the little cubby/drawer thing where he keeps his keys and wallet and other crap and he put his wallet inside BUT LEFT HIS KEYS SITTING ON TOP OF THE SHELF and! HE LEFT THE CUBBY/DRAWER OPEN. Clearly he doesn’t deserve to live. If he weren’t in bed sleeping right this minute, I’d go in there and fart on his pillow. I guess I’ll just have to settle for farting on his toothbrush.

(Notice how the things I am bitching about now are really only minor inconveniences and I even go ahead and give him credit for the 12 hour work shift? What the hell happened to me? Where did my anger go? I want it back.)

Oh! One more rant (not about Cleatus though, something is wrong with meeeeee!). I listed my old camera on Craigslist, because you know, Cleatus is awesome and super and he bought me a new one. So, some guy was interested in one of the lenses that I had listed and he asked me to come to his tattoo shop(!) to show it to him. Now, I have nothing against tattoos. You go ahead and cover your entire face with a big tweety bird tattoo, see if I care. It’s just…tattoo shops (parlors? Are they called tattoo parlors?) are not my place. I don’t belong, is what I’m saying. I’m a 27-going-on-80 year old frumpy mom who writes a blog, for fuck’s sake. I was feeling out of place before I even got out of the safety of my car.

Anyway, long story short, I stood in there while he bashed my lens around and generally acted like he had never seen a camera lens before in his life (newsflash: you should be GENTLE with them. They are fragile and made of glass and oh my fuck, dude, quit trying to jam it on your camera the wrong way.) and soaked up the smell of incense and biker dude into my clothing. I really hope that smell comes out, because like I said before: frumpy mom with a blog. I do not need to smell like I ride a Harley and smoke dope, thank you.

(I apologize for all the stereotyping in the above paragraph. He just FIT THE STEREOTYPE, OKAY?)

And, all that to say, he didn’t even buy the lens, WHICH I KNEW HE WOULDN’T, because he needed a lens for taking pictures of tattoos, which would be difficult with the 70-300 lens I had for sale. DUH.

Oh, and did I mention that I got the Nikon D90 yet? Squeeeee!

And also:

Y’all sick of pictures of my kids yet?

I generally don’t send Christmas cards. I know, I hear you all wagging your fingers at me. Its not that I have no Christmas spirit (my Christmas tree is already up I have so much Christmas spirit!), it’s just that I’m too lazy. There is all the searching for the perfect card, writing heartfelt bullshit inside the cards, digging up addresses for everyone, addressing the cards, going to the post office to purchase stamps, and finally walking all the way down my loooooong driveway to put the envelopes in the mail.

Baby Jesus wouldn’t want me to strain myself, you know? So I just don’t send cards.

This year, however, I decided that I would send out cards, but not just any generic store bought card, I was going to send out PICTURE CARDS. Because I am insane.

Here are just a few of the pictures from our little holiday card picture taking session we had in the backyard this afternoon:

No.

Nope.

Huh uh.

Uh, no.

Gettin’ closer.

Almost there!

…

Sadly, this story has no happy ending. I didn’t get the perfect holiday card picture. I do love all the above pictures though, just because it shows how much those two love each other and what fun they have together.

How about you? Are you all mature and responsible? Do you send out holiday cards?

• Last night I was sleeping, when I suddenly woke myself up by answering the question “Have you ever played checkers?” I don’t know who it was that asked the question, just some random voice in my mind, but I answered aloud, “Only in the backseat of a Pinto.” And, I’m sorry, but double-you tee eff? I’ve never seen the inside of a Pinto. Besides, the only thing I’ve ever done in the backseat of a car involved taking off my pants.
• Speaking of backseats, have you ever, you know, done it back there? Better yet, WHERE did you do it? I mean, yes, in the backseat, but where was the car parked? Cleatus and I once parked at a pre-school parking lot (after hours) down the road from my parent’s house. We also parked in an elementary school parking lot. And, of course, the front yard of my parent’s house when it was still under construction. All of these were when we were dating, FYI. Now that we’re married we do it in a bed like God intended. Although we once did it in the closet of our daughter’s newly remodeled bedroom, just because we could.
• Things with my neighbor have gotten even weirder. He is all FRIENDLY now. He waves and smiles and talks to me and stuff. He even came knocking on my door with Cindy-Lu’s shoes in hand one day after she apparently took them off outside and left them laying in our driveway. I think it’s fairly safe to say that he reads my blog and is frightened of what I may write about him if he does not behave. Or he has dementia. Either one is possible.
• When was your first kiss? Not your first little peck on the lips because someone dared you, but your first REAL kiss. Mine was when I was 14 years old. Incidentally, that was also the first time someone felt me up. A friend and I had gone to the skating rink (we rocked the skating rink during 7th and 8th grade, yo). I was sitting in a booth across from my friend and drinking a soda. This boy that I had been flirting with for awhile sat down next to me, asked me out, I said yes, and he put his arm around my waist and UP MY SHIRT. Gawd. I’d never even kissed anyone before and here he was trying to grope my boobs. Then he totally slobbered all over my face a little while later and I broke up with him the next day.
• Glee. Are you watching it? Why did I not believe everyone when they said how great it was? I’m on episode 5 now, and y’all, I love it. Best show ever.

I’m a big fan of shopping. It’s fun, you get to bring home shiny things, you get exercise from all the walking around and toting heavy bags (heh), and it makes me happy. I’m a shopper.

Once, twice, sometimes even three times a year I go on a shopping trip with my mom and aunt. We head out of town, stay in a hotel and eat at yummy restaurants, and shop until our feet are so sore that we are all in tears. It’s fun!

Obviously, my daughter is destined for great shopping success, right?

Cindy-Lu never really cared one way or the other about it until recently. She got her ears pierced and now “the earring store” (Claire’s) is her favorite place in the world. She picks out earrings and hair pretties and Disney princess paraphernalia. She loves to go to Old Navy and browse their selection of tights (the girl loves to wear tights). The other day I took her in a Justice for Girls store just to look around (the sizes are all too big for her) and she walked in, looked around the room and breathed “Oh, Mommy! Isn’t this store lovely?”

She’s a shopper.

I really wasn’t too worried about it until this morning. You see, we’ve been getting a lot of toy catalogs in the mail recently and the kids both love to go through and circle the toys they want Santa to bring them. I was flipping through one of the catalogs this morning to see what the damage was and there I saw it. An ad featuring a woman standing in a pile of toys wearing gold high heels. Cindy-Lu didn’t circle a single toy on that ad. She circled the gold high heels.

As Cleatus said when I showed him the ad, “We are so screwed.”