Living with "naughties": aka "Only at the Barczaks' House"

Hudson and Cooper... oh these two keep us on our toes.  It used to be Porter.. but he's kind of outgrown most of that naughtiness.

Let's start with Hudson.  In the past 2 weeks:

• He clogged the bathroom sink with random junk
• He got a shish-kebob skewer jammed in the toilet 
• He scooped powdered formula into his humidifier... which upon cleaning I found a marble, a matchbox car, a pencil shaving, a shell and a rubber Automoblox tire in it. 
• Drove my grandma's car into a telephone pole.  Oh yes.  Only at the Barczaks' house....
  
  Last Monday my grandma came over to watch the boys while Amelia and I had lunch with Jane.  She brought Aubri with her.  While I was gone, she let the kids wash her car.  I told her to go ahead and park it in the front yard under the tree so it was in the shade.  When I got home, we chatted out front for a bit and then my grandma and I took Amelia inside.  Not long after we hear Aubri and Porter screaming.  We both run to the front door and as I make my way outside I see my grandmas car rolling towards our driveway from the neighbors yard!!!
  
  I run to the car as it rolls to a stop and it crosses my mind that if he has the car on and hits the gas I might be chasing a moving car driven by a 4 year old.  I hop in and put the car in park... turns out he somehow got it into neutral and it rolled down our driveway, turned toward our neighbors yard and bounced off their telephone pole!
  
  After we realized everyone was okay, nothing was seriously damaged in the fiasco, my grandma and I start busting up laughing.  Then Hudson says to us in this pitiful little voice "And I even went potty in my paaaaants!"   We start laughing even harder, which makes Hudson burst into tears- the "ugly cry"... scrunched up face, lip sticking out, mortified.  I check his pants and sure enough... he shit his pants!
  
  What a day.  What a day.  

And Cooper.  He's the King of Naughty.  Lately:

• We've been losing pacifiers left and right.  Finally found the culprit:  Cooper is EATING them.  Like, swallowing them (at least I watched him swallow one).  
• He climbs the 3.5' baby gate.  The gate stays in place... he shimmies up and over. 
• He randomly brings us dirty diapers from the garbage.  Luckily if we're around he won't eat them, he just brings them to us.  But he has been known to tear them up. 
• He escaped from the mudroom while we were swimming at my grandmas.  We came home to a living room full of the bedding for the rats (he tore apart the entire bag!), a shredded shopping bag that had baby clothes in it, and shredded diapers.  Oh... and he got into a basket and pulled out a package of NEW pacifiers, ripped open the package and ate the nipple off both pacifiers.  What is wrong with him?!?!

Friday Madness

Friday morning Porter's school was cancelled.  A high school teacher/coach had passed away in the middle of the night.  So so sad.  He was only 48, and a well liked person in our community.  While I felt terrible for the reason he was off school, it was so nice to have my 3 babies all home with me.  It was just like "old times" when I had Fridays with both boys.  Only this time Amelia was here too!

Our day was a bit dramatic.  Here are a few highlights (and some pictures to go with!)

Amelia was super needy throughout the morning.

The boys were in the front yard playing and climbing the tree.  I hear banging and laughter.  I look out and find a stool being thrown around the yard and Hudson peeing.  Nice.

Cooper ripped a hole in the fence and escaped.  The boys were insanely worried and wanted me to load up the van and drive all over God's green earth to find him.  Sorry.... not gonna do it.  He'll come back.  Porter had this great idea that just killed me.  "Mom, I'll draw a picture of a bird and tape it to a stick and Cooper will see it and want to chase it and he'll come back!"  And so he put his idea into action.  So so cute.

Then Mr. Mischief (Hudson) dumped out some of our art supplies in the dining room.  He said he was making me a project.  Mmmkay.  He told me he was picking out all the hearts.   I let him "create" for a bit then asked him to clean up.  Well... this is Hudson we're talking about.   Stubborn and lazy.  Porter even helped him clean up a bit but Hudson refused to finish the last few bits.  So, I let him sit there pouting.

During this standoff, Cooper had come back and was filthy- he'd been running through the swamp.  Porter and I decided to give the dogs a bath outside.

I came back in to find Amelia screaming and Hudson screaming, still refusing to finish picking up.  He cried and screamed for over an hour that "his belly hurts!" and "I'm hungry!"  all the while his lunch sat on the counter waiting for him to get over himself.  Yes, this boy would rather cry and scream and gag for an hour than just clean up his mess to begin with.  He did finally clean up.... momma always wins.  :)

It was definitely naptime by now.  We had plans to go to the Cruise In for the evening. It is a monthly event where the streets in downtown are blocked off and all sorts of old and new cars are shown off.  There are super old cars from the 1940's to brand new Transformer edition Mustangs.  Lots of eye candy for my guys, that's for sure.  We headed downtown around 6:30 and spent a good hour and a half checking out cars.

 

Top O' the Mornin'!

Aren't these little leprechauns sooo cute?    I love all the different faces the kids come up with. :)

So it is "top o' the mornin"" for me.  Its lunchtime and I'm taking a break from being productive around the house.  Duncan is at the groomer getting his hair lopped off (short.  SHORT! Because I don't want to have to deal with the groomer for a few months).  I'm sure he'll feel so much better than being so shaggy in this heat!

I got the rat cage cleaned out... had to wait for Ryan to be able to bring it downstairs and outside to give it a good scrub down.  It was stinky!  The new cage is too big for me to carry.

Ry and his dad are scoping out pressure washers.  Is it ridiculous or what that I'm super excited to get a pressure washer?  I have so many things I want to spray down and it seems like an effortless task... stand and spray.  First up is the house.  There are spots of moldy stuff on the front and it looks so skanky!  I also want to spray down the driveway, privacy fence (so I can stain it) and the treehouse/climber (so that can be stained too).

Porter has been so into playing t-ball/baseball and I'm feeling bad I didn't get him signed up.  He really wanted to play coach pitch but I kind of felt like we should wait until maybe next year to do more sports stuff.  I feel like he always ends up dis-interested halfway through and when you're paying $40-$60 a sport, it adds up.  Today, though, we taught Cooper how to fetch the baseballs and bring them back!  He's a pro.  :)  I sat behind Porter with a cup of treats, Porter got Coop's attention and hit the ball and Cooper chased it like crazy.  He brought it back to me, dropped it beside me and got a treat.  I passed the ball off to Porter, he got Cooper's attention and the process continued.  He caught on after about 3 rounds of this.  YAY!  Up until now Porter had to play with 3 baseballs so he could hit one and Cooper could run around with one in his mouth.  And Porter would have to chase down his balls.  We got smart... now Cooper brings em' back!  He's a good outfielder.  HAHA!

On the list today (since it is sunny and GORGEOUS out) is washing all the sheets and hanging them on the clothesline (saw our neighbors are in on this clothesline kick too... their sheets are out hanging as well!) and hopefully play around with the new pressure washer if they ever get back home!

Documenting via Facebook

• The Marley and Me dog has nothin' on Cooper. Just sayin'.  He is stir crazy. Its been so rainy here lately we don't like to leave them out in the yard b/c they run and wrestle (which is good... they wear eachother out) but then come in and Duncan is a wet soggy muddy mop. And they start to dig up the grass running when its so wet and soggy. So... today its sprinkling. And they're stuck inside. I locked them in the kitchen/dining room b/c they keep wrestling in the living room but Cooper keeps jumping up on the table and pulling things off. He pulled down a box of parchment paper and ripped it open and was unrolling the paper. He pulled down a box and was playing with it. Then he ripped one of Hudsons artwork off the fridge nad ripped it up. And he was chewing on a paintbrush (which I think was on the table) UGHHH.
  
• Porter woke me up this morning and had pulled his tooth out by himself! I texted Ryan and he said "What does he think he is in the Hangover?!". Hahaha   And who the eff invented this tooth fairy gig? Trying to pry the tooth box out of P's hand without waking him. What the hell.

• What was even better was going upstairs to find toilet paper pulled through the bathroom and down the hallway to Hudson's room... and my lipstick smashed all over the mirror and picture in the bathroom. He had been quiet for about 10 minutes. TEN. UGH.  I asked him if he had looked in the mirror to see what his face looked like and he just grinned and said "Yup!"

Thursday Thoughts

• I've been reading.  READING!  This summer I set a goal of 5 books by the end of the year.  5 books that were not requirements for grad class.  I'm so happy to have completed 4/5 for my goal!  I have read:
  
  Murderers Daughters
  The Beach Trees (ooh a little mystery)
  The Help (by far my favorite)
  Best Friends Forever (ehh... kind of a slow read)
  I also had started (and got partway through) Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks but found it pretty boring and predictable.  Ehh.  I skimmed the ending and shelfed it. 
  
  and right now I'm just starting I Don't Know How She Does It.  I want to to see the movie so I ordered the book from Amazon and just started it the other day.  It SO reminds me of my life... chaotic working-mom life.  AHHHH!  Except, she's attempting to make the store bought pies appear homemade?  I'd be the nut in the kitchen 'till 4am baking friggin' pies.  I cant' wait to get further into the book and to see the movie!
• I dropped my Master's Class the day it started.  I knew that with the exhaustion of being pregnant in my first trimester I wouldn't be able to get anything done.  Not to mention September and October are CRAZY busy photograpy months and I already had a bazillion sessions scheduled.  So, I've re-registered for another class that starts the end of January.  That will get me my 9 credits to get an extension. 
• We have started puppy training with Cooper at home (and a little refresher/solidifier for Duncan).  He's doing great at recognizing his name and the first little "session" he learned to sit.  The niblets of cheese had a lot to do with it, but he's a smart little guy.  He's starting to walk on his leash a little better rather than treat it like a venomous snake attached to his neck. 
• The other night I was putting the boys to bed and thought "Oh my word... these kids act just like a couple drunk frat boys.  Hudson had to go pee and I walked back by the bathroom and saw him distracted, with a necklace of mine that was on the sink and he was trying to fit it over his head.  I thought to myself OMG i could totally see a drunk person doing that.... "I have to go pee.... OOOH pretty necklace!  I'll try to put it on.  Ooooh its not fitting on my head.  Errrr if I just tilt my head this way...."  HAHAHaH   There are so many spontaneous and wacky things my kids do that I can't do anything but shake my head at.  Little boys are like little drunk frat boys. 

Hangin' with Mr. Cooper

It's about time I introduce little Cooper around here.    After Ramsey passed away, Duncan was so so sad.  He didn't want to play outside alone, he was a constant cling-on to our sides.  He was lonely.  We have always (or at least most always) had 2 dogs in our household so it wasn't a hard decision to add another pooch to our family, though it seemed kind of soon.  However, the upcoming arrival of Baby #3 kind of gave us a time limit... it was now or at least a year from now.  A new dog/puppy needed time to get accustomed to our home before we let ALL chaos break loose in the spring/summer.  

We did visit the animal shelter and Humane Society, and did meet with a few dogs.  However, none seemed to tug at our hearts.  Ryan really wanted a rottie... we oh so loved our Ramsey and aside from her dominance with other dogs, she was such a perfect dog for our family.  However, I couldn't bear to see another wiggly rottie butt standing next to Duncan at the front door.  It was too soon.  

We debated on a few different breeds but one night while lying in bed we brought up Cooper... he was a stray we rescued from a playground in town about... ohh.. 9 years ago or so (Ramsey was about 6 months old when we rescued Cooper).  He was a German Shorthaired Pointer and the vet estimated him to be over 11 years old.  Despite his age, his obvious graying and aging body, he would still run and jump and fetch a ball with us.  He had a sweetness and gentleness that just stole our hearts.  And my mom's, as well.  See... she isn't a dog person at all... AT ALL... but she LOVED Cooper.    Cooper was only with us for 6 months before he passed away but in that short 6 months, he was such a charmer. 

We decided we'd get a GSP.  We know they are a little more high energy, but all in all the breed was familiar to me (well, not exactly... but I did grow up with English Pointers and English Setters... my dad was an avid hunter and raised Pointers throughout my childhood).   The Pointers I'd grown up with in our house had all been loyal, sweet family dogs- willing to run and play when needed but also calm and sweet in the house.  

Cooper came home with us almost 2 weeks ago.  He's the cutest little nugget and it cracks me up how tiny he is compared to Duncan.  Surprisingly, Duncan is great with him despite their ginormous size difference.  He plays very well with him and they definitely keep each other entertained.  So far he's totally spoiled... well, the big one kind of is too :)  

So, blog... I introduce to you Cooper.  We sure think he's a keeper.