Because If we couldn’t laugh, we’d … (part 2) August 7, 2010

The chaos ensues daily here, and while it has me wanting to pull out my hair very often, I find myself recounting the events to my mom or to friends who laugh themselves into tears, and then, so do I!

So, while nervously sharing the ins and outs of having and raising my various sets of twins on a live local radio show yesterday, I was reduced to silent fits of laughter when my friend Caryn called into the show to share her views about my book, TWINS x 3. No sooner did the hosts welcome her on the line, did we begin to hear a sudden burst of barking dogs in the background following the sound of a distant doorbell ringing. I learned afterward that a Schwan’s Delivery truck had arrived to deliver some meats just seconds after Caryn got through on the call-in line! Her two-year old daughter began to chime in as well, and all of us in the sound room at the radio station began to laugh (silently) … one writing and sharing a note which read: “Gotta love the dogs!!!”

When the hour-long show was over, and I’d just stepped out of the building heading for my car, my cell phone rang and I could see it was from one of my 15-year-olds at home watching the other four kids. “What do you use to clean up cat hurl???!!” asked the anxious voice on the other line. It was at that moment that I realized I’d not placed my phone on silence during the radio show broadcast, and said a silent prayer of thanks that our cat hadn’t “hurled” just minutes before!

Back at home, I was informed that, yet again, one of my 2-year-olds, now in the unfortunate habit of removing his diaper or pull-up during nap or night time, had done it again! Thoroughly soaking his bed, as he had several times recently, one of my older girls had to remove him from his bed, clean him up and re-diaper him after his nap in my absence, that on top of cleaning up the cat hurl so that the boys didn’t get into it once they were back downstairs in the family room where it lay. My son also pulled this diaper-removing stunt while in the care of my mother-in-law when we were on our vacation in Louisiana … of course, I’d been out having a little bit of fun at the time. Just proves that having a few minutes of fun has its price of added guilt, of course.

So last night, Sean (aka Mr. bed-soaker) and I had a heart-to-heart talk before bed. We discussed how “yucky” sitting in wee-wee must be, and how he must learn to be a big boy and leave on his pull-up or diaper until he can sit on the “big boy potty” when I take him out of his bed. Doubting my effectiveness from this discussion, yet hoping for the best, I went into the nursery this morning and noticed that he HAD HIS DIAPER STILL ON! Alleluia!!! But, when I went to lift him out, the bed was DRENCHED!! How could this be???

As I lay him on the changing bed across the room, and examined his diaper, I realized that the culprit responsible for the bed-yet-again-in-dyer-need-of-changing was the little pink tip of his “pee-pee” pulled out of his diaper at the top of his little inner thigh. As I exclaimed, “Sean! Don’t pull out your little guy!!” … he just smiled up at me.

Boys.

Sibling rivalry in the Pitre house! July 9, 2010

There are some days that this wouldn't surprise me!

Raising and living with three sets of twins, in all twin combinations, there is bound to be head-butting and creative ways that each child asserts to “get his or her way” around our home.

When my oldest twins were between 9-12 months of age, during their crawling phase, we noticed how our older daughter Kathryn (first-born in every sense of the word, although her birth beat her sister Lauren by only a minute and a half) had begun to subscribe to the notion that “what’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine”. For weeks, I’d observe as Kathryn would notice a toy that Lauren was happily examining or playing with, and then crawl over to her and snatch it from her little hands. Lauren would then begin to cry from anger and frustration at the injustice of it! As this went on, Lauren began to learn the drill, and I realized one day that Lauren had a plan and decided to initiate it. She decided to openly display herself enjoying a set of stacking cups so that Kathryn would become interested. As soon as Kathryn crawled over, eagerly snatched the set of colorful cups, and began to sit down satisfied that she’d won yet again, I observed as Lauren crawled over to some board books that she loved dearly. After checking to see that Kathryn was occupied, if only for a minute or so, Lauren was content and began to open the cover of the first book … the object she’d wanted to enjoy all along.

Lauren and Kathryn are now 15 years old. To say they’ve had their share of rivalry over the years would be a true understatement! Several years ago, each graduated to her own bedroom, which cut down on the arguing dramatically, but not completely. Recently, Lauren’s light bulb burnt out in the bedside lamp she uses most to study and do her homework by. We were totally out of light bulbs in the house, so she decided to go into Kathryn’s room and steal her lamp’s light bulb. When Kathryn discovered that not only did her lamp not work, but that the bulb had been stolen, she was furious, and knew immediately who was probably the culprit! Needless to say, the light bulb went back and forth for a few days until the poor thing bit the dust! Fortunately, I’d replenished our light bulb supply, thus ending the battle of the light bulb!

The latest rivalry between my eldest children has been over Kathryn wearing Lauren’s clothes without her permission. After battling about it for months, a battle I chose to stay out of since I had four more kids to worry about, Lauren decided to create a contract of sorts. She had Kathryn verbally state that she promised never again to take Lauren’s clothing without prior permission, all the while Lauren was recording Kathryn’s official “statement”.

Now don’t think that the sibling rivalry in our home is limited to only our oldest girls. Oh no … our middle twins are a 10-year-old boy/girl set named Erin and Brandon. Although these two seem to play together the best, they also are fiercely competitive! Neither of them can have a dish of ice cream or a plate of spaghetti placed before them that they won’t argue about who has more. Brandon is determined to always be first … first out the door, first down the slide, first while racing bikes, first to get dressed in the morning, and first to finish eating. But, mind you, if the two of them are eating a bowl of chocolate pudding, and Erin was about to finish hers first, Brandon will point out to her that he still has more than her!

This past year, for their fourth grade year, I temporarily took Brandon out of the Catholic school that he’d always gone to and placed him into our neighborhood public school due to the excellent intensive reading program that he could benefit from. He’d recently been diagnosed as dyslexic, and the recommendation to have him attend this particular school was made by a reading tutor I trust. He’s doing very well with his class, as is Erin with her class this year. Should Erin, however, mention subject that her class was about to cover, Brandon will jump in with, “Oh, we already learned THAT!”

You know, Brandon was the first born of their twin set, but I sometimes wonder if he was truly meant to be. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to learn one day that, in fact, Erin was positioned to be born first, but Brandon just “cut in line” so he could be FIRST!

As for my last set of twins … they are two-year-old boys named Sean and Ben. Although Sean was born first, Ben has taken over the role of “leader”, or perhaps I could describe Ben as the one “who simply gets his way” these days. If he wants something that Sean has, Sean doesn’t stand a chance. Ben will throw his three extra pounds around and very forcefully remove the little car or ball from Sean’s fingers. That’s it. Sean had no defense but to scream at the top of his lungs out of protest for this terrible injustice. I’m sure the tide will change in only a matter of time.

Because if we couldn’t laugh, we’d … July 2, 2010

We all have to admit, that as much as we love our children, they can drive us nuts by the end of the day!

So, here’s just my way of plugging in that daily need for humor.

Like it or not, we repeat the things to our kids that our moms said to us. Only now, we understand better what she was really saying to us! For instance:

Said: “Put that down!! You don’t know where it’s been!” (intended to gross out our kids and make ‘em drop whatever discarded “thing that’s not ours” they just picked up off the ground.)

Meant: Please drop that now so that you don’t pick up some terrible germs that will make you sick, then spread to your brothers and sisters and result in sleepless nights, countless trips to the doctor, too much money spent on medicine (OTC or prescriptions), missed days of school for you and missed days of work for me, make-up homework, make-up tests to prepare for while staying up way too late for many nights in the process of making up all the missed work …