Mommy, why did you say you were going to kill somebody?

**UPDATED TO ADD: No children were harmed during the course of this incident.**

I was never really going to kill anybody, but the thought of strangling a 12 year old did cross my mind and lingered there longer than I'd like to admit. Let me explain. I was in our cell phone store, which should shed quite a bit of light on my mental state at the time. It was my third trip in about a month. Let's go back to last month and start with my first trip in this sequence to Verizon. To be fair, I'll have to start with the day before the trip when I got an unexpected email...

Our account balance had exceeded our monthly allowance, and Verizon thought that since we owed them over $700 ( a bit over our average $200 / month bill), they would shoot me a courtesy email to let me know about some unusual activity on one of our phones. Also to let me know that if we didn't go ahead and make a payment, they would go ahead and shut down all of our phones.

Our bill is pretty stable each month. Jack and I both have unlimited services on our phones, so we are never in danger of any overage charges. The other phone on our account, which is used by one of Jack's employees, doesn't have any kind of data capabilities, and this guy has never abused his allotted minutes. So I was pretty sure that Verizon had made a huge mistake. I assured Jack that I would take care of it and went into the store the next day to confirm.

As it turned out, the tertiary phone on our account did indeed have some data capabilities, in that it was possible for a person to download games onto that phone. 91 games to be exact. At an average of $4.00 / pop, that's about $364.00 in backgammon fees. Plus a few other fun applications that brought our total to just over $700. Awesome. Since the games and applications had been downloaded from a third party and not Verizon, the salesmen were not confident that they could help me out.

Jack confirmed with his employee that there were quite a few "extras" on his phone, and the employee admitted that he had let his girlfriend's kid play with his phone a few times recently. Other people's kids. Wouldn't you just love to strangle them sometimes? Me too.

I spent a great deal of time on the phone with customer service, and they were kind enough to listen to my sob story. Then they said they were really sorry and would cover 25% of those premium services fees.

The next day after the initial shock had worn off, I made my second trip to Verizon to cancel all access to third party services on that phone. Something we would have done a long time ago had we known it was even possible. We paid the bill and thanked God we had the funds to cover it. We also rested in the fact that it wouldn't happen again.

Fast forward to this month. Another email from Verizon. Another $267.00 in "premium services" fees on our employee's phone. I thought I was mad until Jack found out. His face turned so red I thought he might explode. I ran back to Verizon before Jack had the chance to go kung fu all over this guy's face.

Hmmmm, it was so confusing. The premium services had all been blocked the month before. Where were these fees coming from? The salesmen just didn't know. One guy suggested, "maybe he signed up for some monthly subscriptions?" I called customer service again. Before I could even begin my "I'm not going to pay for this" shpill, I was placed on hold. I suppose the lady could feel my anger through the phone line, because she put on some very soothing music while she looked for a supervisor.

I tried to calm myself by imagining myself in different scenarios: on a beach somewhere, soothing music playing, waves washing over my feet, on the banks of a river, babbling brook, mountaintop resort. But I just ended up strangling this kid over and over again in my mind alongside the ocean, river, mountain, whatever. The soothing music wasn't working.

Once the customer service lady confirmed that we had canceled all premium service access, she also confirmed that many of the games and applications this kid had already downloaded came with a monthly subscription service. We had only just begun with the overage fees. You can't just download one solitaire game for $4 and play it forever. You have to pay each month. We had blocked all access to MORE games, but the ones that had already been purchased would continue to bill each month. Brilliant! Very Tapfish like.

The good news is that the customer service lady was able to cancel the subscriptions, so this SHOULD be the last time we have to deal with this. She also said to call back after the next billing cycle and they would issue a credit to our account for the subscriptions. Strange that she couldn't do it right then, but if she thought I was going to forget about it by the time the next bill comes, she was wrong. I already have the date circled on my calendar.

On a related note, my phone stopped reading my SD card last night. I was back at Verizon today. I'm pretty much on a first name basis with all those guys now.

SB auditions for American Idol

It was an accident?

Last week I had an early morning appointment, so I sent SB downstairs to play while I got ready to leave. She was doing a very good job of playing by herself, and I was so proud. When my mom arrived to watch the girls, I ran downstairs to tell SB goodbye.

In my absence, she had drawn me a beautiful picture. A very large, red picture. So large in fact, that the extra large sized tablet had not been able to contain it. So she expanded the picture to cover most of the carpet. A true masterpiece. In Red.

I stood aghast at the bottom of the stairs, staring in disbelief at the long red (marker) streaks across the floor.

Me: SB!! What happened?
SB: I drew you a picture!
Me: I see the picture. Why is it on the carpet?
SB: It was an accident.

An accident. Really? You be the judge.



Needless to say, SB is grounded from markers for a while. And I spent most of my afternoon with a bottle of carpet cleaner.

Open mouth, insert paint

I don't have to tell you that kids will eat anything. One of my friends and her husband started calling their middle child "big nasty" after his palate expanded to include toilet bowl cleaners. Poor kid, like he didn't have enough of a complex being the middle child already. Now he has to deal with a nasty moniker while being on a first name basis with poison control.

Looks like we may need to free up a speed dial spot for poison control as well, since Annie has taken to eating paint. I noticed some curious white specks in and around her mouth for a few days before discovering her latest teething ring - the side rails of her crib. Apparently this is a common problem amongst teething babies, although I don't remember experiencing this with SB. We've got the teeth marks to prove it this time.

But now, thanks to Go Mama Go, we've got it covered. At least part of it. I ordered a soft crib rail guard from Amazon (yay prime!!), put it on last night, and it did the trick. It successfully kept Annie from chewing the side of her crib rail. I noticed this morning that she had slobbed all over the rail cover, but no paint in sight! So naturally I was surprised to see more white flecks of paint on her mouth when I rescued her from her crib this afternoon.

I shouldn't have been surprised. She just moved on to another crib rail. Duh. A kid's gotta do what a kid's gotta do. So Go Mama Go just received a full order of crib rail guards from the Redwood family.

(PS Jack I put a few things on the credit card)

UPDATE: works great!!

Breakfast at Emily's

I realize my last post was about breakfast. Delicious doughnut breakfast. This one is also about breakfast, only slightly less delicious.

Last Saturday, Jack had to work again ("it'll take about 3 hours" which I have learned translates into "I'll be busy all day.") Being the wonderful husband that he is, he still offered to pick up breakfast; Wendy's was on the menu.

If I may pause from my prose a moment, I'd like to tell you about Wendy's breakfast. It is fantastic. If you are not fortunate enough to live in a market that offers it - as some Wendy's restaurants do not - then you should ask to speak to the manager immediately and find out why they hate your town. They offer the traditional biscuits, but they like to call them frescuits. I suppose that is because they make them fresh every day. I don't care what Wendy wants to call them; I call them delishcuits. I'll let you figure out why. And if you're feeling extra froggy, jump into a maple baked frescuit. You'll never look back. But I've gotten way off track.

This is the Wendy's bag that was presented to me a short time later by my brother, who was helping Jack for a half a day. Jack was still outside, moving some equipment around, finding more things he needed to work on (hence the 3 hrs = all day technicality).

Did you know they have natural cut fries now? Still not half as good as the fries at McDonalds.

When I peeked inside the bag, I was certain there had been a mistake. I was not about to put my hand inside to find out. So I tore the bag open instead. This is what was inside:

Two empty burrito wrappers; sausage/egg burrito remnants; a crumpled, dirty napkin; an empty sauce packet and a piece of junk mail that looked as though it had been used to clean a saucy spill. Further inspection slowed clues that my delishcuit was indeed at the bottom of the trash bag, peeking out from behind the saucy junk mail.

This realization left me facing a dilemma of gargantuan proportions. To eat, or not to eat. On one hand, my breakfast was sitting underneath a pile of trash. For most of you, that's an instant no brainer. But for those of us who use our children in lieu of brooms, eating leftovers off of the floor is not only allowed, but encouraged. So it is not a huge leap from eating food off of the floor to eating food from the trash, right?

And let's face it, the trash in question was also delicious Wendy's breakfast, or had been very recently, so it all kind of blended in together nicely in an aromatic kind of way. And I was pretty sure none of it had been on the floor, with the possible exception of the saucy junk mail, and I honestly did not want to think about where that had been.

On the other hand, my delishcuit was still encased in its flavor-protecting wrapper. It hadn't actually touched the saucy smorgasbord of someone else's garbage. And that someone else was my husband, not some random, filthy stranger.

So I ask, what would you have done?

Give me a long filled john and nobody gets hurt

SB loves doughnuts. What kid doesn't? What adult doesn't, for that matter? I heart doughnuts almost as much as I heart NY; even though I've never actually been there (yet), I'm sure I will heart it. Anyway, Jack takes SB to get doughnuts most Saturday mornings. Last time they came home with a cream filled chocolate covered long john for me. It was unbelievable. I had to share most of it with SB who was certain that it was supposed to be hers. Never mind the bag full of doughnut holes and the sprinkle covered doughnut that she had licked clean. But since Jack had to work this past weekend , she missed her weekly fix.

Last night as I was tucking SB into bed, she apologized to me.

SB: Mom, I'm really sorry.
Me: Why are you sorry?
SB: Remember when you took me to the beach and you wanted to take me to get doughnuts and I didn't want to go?

How could I forget the one time she turned down a chance to get a doughnut? There was never an explanation offered. She just said 'no thanks.' I don't know why SB was suddenly remembering this from 3 months ago, but I just went with it.

Me: Yes, I remember. That's okay though. I wasn't mad.
SB: Well, that really hurt my feelings.
Me: It hurt your feelings that you didn't want to get doughnuts?
SB: Yes. And I'm really sorry.

At this point, she was sniffling like she might cry. I don't know why she was so upset, but she seemed genuinely distraught.

Me: It's okay, Sarah Beth. You don't have to apologize.
SB: Well, *sniff* can we go get doughnuts tomorrow? You and me and Annie?.....But not Annie.
Me: Okay, maybe we can, but Annie will have to go with us.
SB: YAYAYAYAYAYYYYYY!

I forgot that to SB, the words "maybe" or "we'll see" or pretty much anything other than "no" means "yes."

Me: I said MAYBE we can go get doughnuts tomorrow. If we have time.
SB: Okay, Annie can go with us. I want a long filled john and doughnut holes. BOTH. Okay, mom?
Me: I guess we're getting doughnuts tomorrow. I could go for a long filled john too.

Dear cell phone companies

Dear Motorola,
Why must you make such delicious cell phones? Not to mention the charging cords (YUM!) which are especially interesting and mysterious. I don't understand why my mommy yells such a loud word every time I try to taste one of the chargers. She's been yelling that word a lot lately - every time I get into the trash can or try to eat something out of my diaper.

She never seems to want me to do anything fun. And chewing on your cell phone charging devices is one of my absolute favorite activities. But every time I try to sneak a little sample, Mom gets all hysterical with me. So could you please do me a favor and stop making them in such mouthwatering flavors? Also, mom wants to know if it would kill you to make the cords a little longer so she can actually use her phone while it is charging.

Thanks for your prompt attention to these matters.

Sincerely,
Annie R.

Where are you Christmas?

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas; we certainly did! We spent lots of time with family, more than usual this year, I think. And I got some great photos of the girls, as you can see.



SB had a grand time playing with all of her cousins. My nephew Jacob, who just turned 13 yesterday (Happy Birthday, Jake!!), is such a sweet guy. He is the second oldest of all his cousins, but he doesn't mind playing punching bag for the little ones. They had a fabulous time punching and jumping on him, wrestling him down to the ground as he feigned defeat. SB either didn't appreciate or just didn't understand that Jacob was just playing along for their amusement. So in the middle of a 5-on-1 wrestling match, she grabbed him by the arm and marched him to the couch. She sat him down and told him he was in jail. When he asked why, she said, "You look like a ballerina out there! Sit down; I'm doing you a favor!!" Where does she come up with this stuff?

Poor Jacob.

Christmas morning was so exciting. Annie woke up grinning as though she knew it was a special day. Every time I took a picture, which was a LOT of times, I would say "cheese" and she would give me the biggest, gummiest grin you've ever seen. It really was so adorable.

Waking up daddy on Christmas morning.

SB got tons of toys plus a stocking full of goodies. Annie got a few small things in her stocking too, which SB was happy to open for her. Among the things in Annie's stocking was a tiny plastic cell phone toy. SB has two REAL cell phones, as Jack and I recently got new ones and gave her our old ones with games, music and movies galore. But when SB pulled out that $3 Wal Mart check- out-line toy from Annie's stocking, she insisted that Santa had made a huge mistake. Surely that worthless toy was meant for her.



Annie was happy to share; all she really cared about was the fruit flavored puffs. So it all worked out in the end.


SB said to me yesterday, "Mom! It's Christmas again!" So Merry Christmas to all, and to all a Happy New Year.

Tis the season for matching pajamas.