Corey came down this morning and the first words out of his mouth were:

“Mom, I need some more…” OK FREEZE!

Those words coming out of the boys’ mouths usually fills me with annoyance right away. Why, you ask? Because it is usually followed by something like:

• I need poster board for school on Monday. (Even though ALL four of the older boys know I do my weekly shopping on Thursday!)
• Mom I really need the new video game that just came out! (Nevermind that they have 200 other games in the house.)
• Or Mom, I need new sneakers! (Yet they don’t like going to the store with me to try them on, and I just bought them new sneakers!)

So, anyways, I braced myself to give Corey one of my withering stares, when he busted out with this:

“Mom, I need some more moisturizer.”

Huh? I didn’t even know Corey used moisturizer, let alone needed more of it. Every Christmas, we usually get the boys some special pack for their stockings - Axe, Old Spice, something silly like that. Target has something for men, and I really liked the way it smelled, so we got that, and I guess Corey ended up with it. Apparently, it had a moisturizer in there, and he has been using it. Who knew?!

But Corey is not the only one to use this intro…

Joe came home the other day and waltzed into the house.

“Hey, Mom…” I braced myself. What now? Pens, pencils, a movie, money? What?

“Hey Mom! I passed my Corporal test! Now, I’m the same rank as Hicks!” He means Cpl. Dwayne Hicks from our favorite family movie, Aliens. (I know… Weird ‘family’ movie.)

Joe is very active in his high school’s JROTC program. He has been Cadet of the Month this school year, he has passed each of his promotion tests with flying colors, and has made some new friends. We are so very proud of him.

“Hey, Mom…” Now this coming from Addi can turn into a ten minute monologue that covers everything from woodshop (his new favorite class) to how his math teacher assigned no homework, to some kid that gave him a sandwich, etc., etc., etc.

So I braced myself for what came next and sat down.

“Hey, Mom! I made a new friend. Can I go over to his house?”

I still love hearing this from Addi! Addi is our wild child and though he is friendly and personable, he can be a bit much for some people. E.g., his mouth moves a thousand miles per hour. So, I love hearing that he is making new friends, and that they hang out.

“Sure you can go to your friend’s house. Take your phone, and home by 6:15.”

“Hey Mom… ” This phrase accompanied by that familiar whine can only be from Hayden.

Roy looked at me, and I looked at Roy. We figured we knew what was coming next.

“Hey, Mom. Can I have some dessert?”

“Sure! Dean and I bought some special pops for you guys today at the store. Corey, can you help him get one?”

We just bought a huge bag of these little freezer sticks that the kids eat by the handful every day during the summer.

“Mom, they aren’t quite frozen yet.” Corey hollered from the garage.

“Hey, Mom! You said I could have one! I never get anything… AGGHHH!” Hayden is quite the drama queen. I especially like the tortured sound effect at the end of that completely untrue statement.

“Hayden, get over it. They aren’t frozen, have something else.” Daddy put his foot down.

“Fine.” And off he went to get a strawberry fruit pop.

“Hey, Mama…” The Mama, instead of Mom, can only be my baby Dean.

Can I have some milk? Some orange juice? Can I watch Max and Ruby? Can I watch Chowder? With Dean you just never know… it could be something sweet and charming (“Hey Mama, Kiss?”), or he might be setting me up to listen to him beg me to take him to Target for the next hour.

But this last “Hey, Mama” was too cute.

“Hey Mama?” He waited until I turned to look at him and then loudly exclaimed, “I’m Not Your Boyfriend!”

If you watch Chowder (Wiki info here), you know what that one’s about.

First let me explain the title of the post…  Dean has been watching the cutest show called Bubble Guppies on Nickelodeon.  The show is about five little mer-people friends. (I say that because I don’t think a mermaid is a male, right?)  They go to school, and their teacher is a fish… a grouper I think.  And like most kids’ shows, each episode is another “lesson” - manners, colors, even adoption (the kids adopted a little puppy from the shelter).  Roy and I are actually surprised how much Dean seems to absorb from the show - shapes, colors, please and thank you, even the songs.  Then again, why are we surprised?  I don’t know.  When we watch Ni Hao, Kai Lan, he repeats all the Chinese words and phrases.  Obviously our son is a genius! :-)  But sometimes he takes it one step further… it is very funny to me that he acts like a puppy, but not just any puppy… a bubble puppy.

He will crawl up to me and pat my leg, and then when I look down at him, he pants like a puppy and will keep doing so until I pat his head and say:

“Are you my little bubble puppy?”

He always shakes his head yes, and then barks at me.  He won’t do this if others are watching.  Sometimes he is even too shy to do it in front of Roy, but I have that exchange with him five or six times a day.

Lately, I would say the past two or three days, he will occasionally even oink at me and will do so until I pat his head and say:

“Are you my little bubble piggy?”

I love this sort of play with the boys.  It is wonderful to see their imaginations come to life.

So, anyways, this morning at about 4:45, I felt Roy get out of bed, and then I heard that sound… if you are a parent, you know the sound I am talking about… the gagging and then the vomit hitting the bed, the coughing afterwards and the weak cries of “daddy” or “mommy.”

“Is that Dean or Hayden?” I asked Roy as I was getting up.  Lately the two youngest have decided their blanket pallets in our room are more exciting than their beds in their room.  So both boys were curled up on the floor in our room.

“It’s Dean.” Roy’s voice was muffled as he had pulled his shirt over his nose and mouth to try and stop the stench from assaulting his senses. “Wow! That’s rank!”

After nursing five boys I have been spit up on more times than I can count, so I thought I was immune to vomit.  I was wrong… this was nasty.  We got Dean cleaned up, replaced his pallet with fresh sheets and blankets, gave him some water and love, and he seemed better.  We tucked him in and went back to our own bed.  I looked at the clock and figured I could get another hour of sleep.  I was wrong… five minutes later that sound filled the room again.

“Oh, I think he might have got Hayden!” Roy exclaimed noticing Dean pointed right at Hayden’s pallet.  (Fortunately, he didn’t project that far.) Of course, Roy had his shirt pulled up over his mouth and nose once again.  ”Come on, buddy, let’s clean you up.” Roy picked him up and took him in the bathroom for a warm bubble bath.

I looked at the clock again and realized there was no point in trying to get some more sleep.

“I’ll just take him downstairs, honey.  Lay back down.”  And I pulled my pajamas back on and grabbed my glasses.

Roy was putting Dean into the tub, so I went to get another sheet and some clothes for him, figuring I would lay with him on the sofa, and then get the older boys up in a little bit.

Roy finished cleaning up Dean and lifted him out of the tub.  Wrapping him in a towel, he combed his hair and then put him on the ground.  Since Roy was tending to Dean, I went to get clothes for Hayden, and as I was coming out of their room, I heard Dean downstairs.  I followed my little boy’s voice, and when Roy saw me, he went upstairs to get and clean the rest of the “nasty” stuff.  I set about drying Dean off when I heard this sad little voice,

“Hi, Mama.” I looked at my little boy, and he smiled weakly at me.

“Hi, baby.  Here let mommy put your shirt on.”  And no sooner had I gotten his pajama top over his head, I could see the face… again, if you are a parent, you know the face.  The little cheeks start to puff out, the belly starts to heave, it was coming.  I grabbed the little blue bucket that we call the “puke bucket” and helped my little three year old puke up the last of his dinner.

After a few minutes, Dean pushed the bucket away and said he was done. 

“Ok, here, let’s get cleaned up.” I put the bucket down, and wiped Dean’s mouth with a towel, rubbing his back to get him to calm down.  Roy came down, fully dressed and wide awake and took the bucket from the floor near my feet.  I laid Dean down and tried to hurry with the rest of his clothes.  He watched me with his big, baby eyes, and I smiled at him, cooing that he will be ok and mommy and daddy will take care of him.

After a minute, he smiled weakly at me again, and said:

“Oink, oink, mama.”

Our little bubble piggy.

We watch Phineas and Ferb all the time, and everyone in the family gets a kick out of it. I’m sure we’ve seen every episode more than 5 times each. In any event, Wired has a nice article about the show and creators.

Roy and I are digging Kick Buttowski too.  It has a kind of retro cartoon feel to it, and the voices just make us giggle for some reason.

D LOVES “Olivia!”  Loves it, loves it, I just wish they would have some new episodes.  I think we have seen every one about six times!

We bought Planet 51 today, and I know H and D are hoping to get The Princess and the Frog here soon.

I really want to see The Blind Side, which comes out tomorrow!  YEAH!  Got to love Sandra Bullock!

And from Netflix we have Fame (the remake) and The HUrt Locker.  Which I am kind of sore at, because I can’t believe it beat Avatar for the Oscar, but we’ll see.

Now? And then?  And by then I mean when you were little.  R said I need to have some easy ones for the younger boys here and there.

Then?  For me that was quite awhile ago.  When I was young, as in H’s age (about 5) I liked The Electric Company and The Land of the Lost.  Neither was a cartoon, but I dug them and would run home from the bus stop to watch them.  When I was a bit older, I liked the Smurfs, though I think the really cool, fun ones (He-Man, She-Ra, Jem, etc) was when I was a bit older and not into cartoons as much.  I really liked Scooby Doo though.

Now-I don’t watch a lot of cartoons, but one I don’t mind watching with the boys is “The Backyardigans.”  Each episode has a different type of music in it-Rock, polka, county, jazz…and some of the songs are really witty and catchy.  D LOVES “Olivia.” About a little pig and her family.  I don’t mind that, though he will watch the same episodes over and over again if we let him.  The older boys like iCarly.  Not a cartoon, but I can tolerate it.