B to the A to the B to the Y

*drum roll please*




I am going to be an auntie!!!

Yup. My youngest sister, and only sibling, is due in November. The way she informed me and our mother was most cute. Our mom was here visiting me and she had told us that our mother's day cards were coming in the mail and since the both of us were together, she wanted us to open our cards together. I didn't think anything of it, even though mother's day was still a month away at the time.

When I opened my card, it had a picture of a champagne bottle being uncorked... and inside the card read "Congratulations!".

Congratulations?

For what?

...for still being a mom after 10 1/2 years because I have not yet strangled my children?

I read on and saw that the congratulations was for my getting to be an auntie!!! I still didn't get it right away.

Did she get a new puppy or something?

After reading what she wrote in the card, I looked up at our mother to see what she was doing and she looked up from her card and we both just sorta stared at each for a brief moment with curious squints wondering if the other had just been "told" the same thing or maybe Ashton Kutcher would be bouncing around the corner with cameras at any second now.....

Fast forward...

My sister and I were speaking on the phone last night about possible names. Of course, it's still a little too soon to know the sex of the baby so she's toying with boy and girl names and has come to realize that liked girl names are easier to come by. She told me of some names that she likes and understands that these names aren't for everyone, but her child is going to be need a name that is not typical. As if she needs to explain this to someone who named her child something that she cannot find in ANY baby book other than the ONE that she originally discovered it in, which has magically ceased to exist.

As I was tucking in my own children last night, I asked them their thoughts about the chosen names thus far. Here is my email to my sister with the results of my question to them:


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
okay. i have discussed your name choices with the children. here are the responses:

i gave them the names of:
girl choices: daisy, ruby, violet, lily, lena

boy choices: wesley, holden, levi, brutis

my daughter's thoughts::

likes lily best. and likes the middle name of "anna" so it would be lily anna (which kinda sounds like a full first name, but it's not).

had nothing to say about the boy names because [and i quote:] "it had better be a girl"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

my son's thoughts::

kinda likes ruby, lena, and lily

for boys, likes brutis, of course, and has suggested the name "fertilizer" or "sprinkler"

not crazy about violet because "it's a color- not a name" -- i let him know it was a flower, too. he didn't seem to care much about that and was not swayed in the least.


my husband's thoughts:

daisy - ew.
ruby - m'eh.
violet or lily- i like lily, violet is maybe okay
lena - that's pretty
holden - "too catcher-in-the-rye'ish" ['cuz that's horrible, right?]
wesley - ::made squinty eye face with a sound much like "yuck"::
levi - he hates this name... because [my husband] is dumb. Levi is the most awesomenest boy name.
brutis - ::stared at me wondering if i was being serious::

then he says,
"why doesn't she pick out names for when she has a kid."
:: i stare at him for a moment wondering what in the hell he thinks i'm talking about ::

"um, she IS having a kid."
"yeah, i know."
"these are her name choices"
"oh. i thought they were for our kid."
"why would chloe be suggesting names for OUR kid when 1) we're not pregnant and 2) she IS pregnant, which would clearly make more sense as to why she is thinking of names."
*rolls eyes*
:: thinks to self, "boys are dumb" ::

and the moral of the story is that: you better have a girl otherwise it will be twice or even triple the work to raise a boy who will grow up to NOT be dumb. i don't think any mother [even the BEST mothers] have conquered that feat.

~~~~~~~~~

now this little blog entry of mine takes me to three places.

One - please see this post. I now will have an excuse to buy something from this site!


Two and Three - a couple of recent stories about my own children that I told my sister about last night because I really wanted to express that in order to be a successful parent, in my opinion, one must have humour. A lot of freakin' humour.


story one:
this happened yesterday as I was preparing to pot some flowers & herbs outside. I asked my son to join me. He was uninterested. I tried to sweet talk him and asked him to PUH'LEASE come out and spend some time with his mother in the sun and that he didn't even have to help, but rather just keep me company. Still uninterested but took a moment to at least reply with "maybe in a few minutes."

A couple of minutes go by.... and I am walking past him to go back outside and I say "Hey, it's been a couple of minutes... come on!"

He says without blinking or turning away from the video game he was playing , "First of all, I said a FEW minutes. Second of all, I said MAYBE."

I could do nothing more than laugh. A parent who has little humour in their bones might want to backhand their kid for gettin' "sassy", but how could I do that when, really, he was just calling me out on NOT listening to what he had actually said in the first place.


story two:
My daughter comes home from school the other day to tell me about a meanie girl who was playing out on the playground. Apparantly, she called my daughter a "fool" and my daughter's response was, "The only person who is allowed to call me a fool is my mother!"

I confirmed that her response was directed to a child rather than an adult because most grown ups might not find the fact that I call my children "fools" and "foolios" to their faces very endearing.

Heaven forbid they find out that I also call them "ratbags".

Yeah.

It's a good thing my little sister has me to look up to and to admire and to be in constant awe with all the wonderfulness that makes up my fabulous parenting skills.