How does a redneck lock the bathroom door?

With a bungee cord, of course!! Well, if we were truly rednecks, we wouldn't even bother to close the bathroom door, but we do have some manners....believe it or not.


Anyway, as to our newfangled bathrooom door lock: I asked Milo to wash his hands before supper. He had just been in the bathroom, and I had heard him slam the bathroom door shut, but when I asked Milo if he washed up, he said no, so I sent him back into the bathroom. I was in the kitchen getting Milo's stuff together for supper, and I heard him frantically twisting the doorknob to the bathroom, to try to get in there. I asked what was the matter, and he said "I can't open the door, Mom, it's frustrating me." Ooookay. I thought that maybe Milo HAD washed his hands and they were wet and slippery, so I went to help him. I tried to open the door, and the door was locked. Somehow, Milo managed to flip the teeny little old-fashioned lock lever while he was in the bathroom before, and then when he came out and slammed the door shut, it locked behind him. (We have never showed Milo how to lock that door because there is no key, or keyhole, and we didn't want to be in exactly this situation.) I had NO IDEA of what to do, short of dismantling the doorknob, so I called Corey at work. Of course, this stuff always happens to ME when I am ALONE! He suggested using a credit card to pop the tongue of the lock back. I did that, and it worked fine, but then the guts of the doorknob fell out in my hand when I opened the door. Jeez o' crap says I, but at least we still have a doorknob. Only problem is that the door won't stay shut now. Hence the bungee cord arrangement, to be used as needed, until we get a chance to replace the doorknob.

Of course, one of Milo's friends is coming over tomorrow for the first time ever, and now I'm going to have explain to her mother that this is how we lock the bathroom door. Do you think she'll believe me when I say "This is only temporary; it's not how we really live, honest!"

the word of the day

Today's word is "tether." Corey and I were eating dinner tonight (Milo had already eaten) and Milo came bopping into the kitchen with an army guy and a ball on a string. He said "When I tether this army guy to this ball, the ball can be his parachute." We asked "What does tether mean?" Milo said, "Here, I'll show you," and proceeded to tie the army guy to the ball with the string. We don't go around saying tether all the time, so we have no idea how he figured that one out. Besides that, what 3-3/4 year old uses that word? Milo likes to say "apparently" a lot also. Who knows what that kid is thinking at any given moment? That preschool teacher of his doesn't know what she's in for!

A visit to the shark tank

If you ever want to give yourself a screamin' headache, just go to Chick-fila on a Saturday, around lunchtime, and hang out in the kids' play area. Milo and I had a play date/lunch there, with his friends and their moms this past Saturday. Our kids were pretty good, but the other people's children.....UGH. There was this one kid who would not stop SCREAMING. I must have told that kid to chill out at least five times. His mom was just standing there staring at me like I was the rude one. Uh, hello, I do not allow my child to run up to other kids and shriek in their faces for no good reason.

Despite that, we all had a good time, and Milo even ate his food. It was great for me to catch up with my girlfriends, and fun for Milo to hang out with Brody and Autumn and goof around. Leave it to my kid, though, to take off his stinky socks way at the top of the playground thing, and throw them down the slide. Some other kids slid down the slide and Milo's socks came along with them, but without Milo. When I asked Milo why he felt the need to take off his socks in a restaurant, he said that his feet were hot. Good enough reason, I suppose, but still weird.

ha-ha funny

The Trenton Times is getting more redundant every day, but thank goodness their comics section is still good. One of my favorites is a strip called Get Fuzzy, about a guy that lives with his smart-ass cat and dog. It reminds both Corey and I of our house and the chaos that we live in. Last week's whole thing really hit home; we have conversations like this in our house all the time!

Milo's frog interpretation

We were having a crafty afternoon one day last week. Milo and I made lots of animals out of construction paper shapes. Then he decided that it was his turn to teach me how to make a frog out of shapes. He drew the shapes, I cut them out and he glued them together. The result: A frog that bears quite a resemblance to Grandpop Jim!

duh, Mom

The other day Milo and I were playing a game in his room. He was looking at the lid to one of the totes we keep toys in, and I asked Milo to read the word on the lid. Milo said, "Mom. I can't read that. It's in lowercase letters. I can only read uppercase." I should have known better, you know? So I spelled out the lowercase letters to him (the word was Rubbermaid) and we have begun learning our lowercase alphabet. That kid is too much!

A very big day

Great news!! Milo starts preschool on February 5th. He will be going on Thursday and Friday mornings, from 9:15 to 11:15. The program he's enrolled in is run by the high school that is just down the street from us. We went to meet the teacher on Friday morning, and Mrs. Heiss let Milo stay and play with the other kids till class was over. Milo is sooooo excited about going to school. After he met all his new friends, Milo told me that we had to go to Walmart and buy a backpack, so he can put all of his things in it just like the big kids. Milo is also very impressed by the cafeteria in the high school, and the fact that he will get to hang out with big kids. (the big kids are the monitors for the preschool class)

Friday was a very busy day for us; after the visit to the preschool, I took Milo on an extra-special adventure. We went ice skating at Mercer County Park. At first, Milo was terrified of falling, but after I told him not to worry about it, Milo fell about 150 times. By the time my back was really hurting from hauling him up every 20 seconds, Milo started to get pretty good at balancing on the skates, and sliding them forward without tripping over himself. I'm not the world's best ice skater myself, but Milo made my limited skills look Olympian! There was a nice teenager girl there who tried to help Milo learn to skate, but he wasn't really interested in watching his own feet. He was much more interested in watching everyone else. After a while, I let go of Milo's hands and he skated pretty much on his own without realizing it. We stayed near the wall the whole time, although Milo did get adventurous now and then and tried to venture out by the middle of the rink. Of course, he would splat on his bottom and have to crawl back to the wall to get up again. Milo had decided that he didn't want me to help him get up anymore, so I let him do his thing. It wasn't very crowded, so I wasn't too worried about other people tripping over us. Milo had an absolute and total blast that day, so I'm sure we will go again; I love ice skating too.

We did stop at Walmart on the way home to get a backpack, by the way.