The kids’ school is doing Thanksgiving bulletin boards right now. AndyZ’s teacher asked me a few weeks ago to write 2 or 3 words telling what our family is thankful for. Two or three words? That’s difficult. So, I decided to be cute and use some alliteration: Friends, Family and FOOTBALL! Then I put in parenthesis (Roll Tide!) for my husband since my team is sucking royal donkey balls this season. (I didn’t write anything about donkey balls, I promise.) I was hoping they wouldn’t mind the “Roll Tide!” addition to my 2 or 3 words.

They put the board up on Friday and I was shocked to find that every other family wrote paragraphs. Sweet, sappy paragraphs telling wonderful thing their family is thankful for. I thought back to when the teacher spoke to me and decided she probably said, “A few words” and I took her literally. I’m obviously an idiot. Now, when you look at the board, AndyZ’s family looks a bit insincere in their thanks. Poor kid. You got to feel for him.

NikkiZ’s board, on the other hand, was done by the kids. Each kid told the teacher ONE WORD that tells what they’re thankful for. (She was very specific about that.) The teacher then printed up that word in traceable lettering and the kids traced over their word. The sheets were then hung to the board around a giant turkey made from their handprints. It’s pretty cool. I was reading the board this morning and I came to NikkiZ’s sheet of paper. It said:

NikkiZ is thankful for…SPIDERMAN.

I think her choice shoes a sense of selflessness about her, don’t you? I mean - Spiderman saves the world - so she’s thankful on a global level. I’m quite proud of her choice. Much more socially aware than the several kids who answered with “Mommy.” Jeez. Those kids need to get out more. Mommy just takes care of her kids, Spiderman takes care of ALL OF US.

I am thankful that NikkiZ is strong enough to keep her brother from rolling down the hill while I tried to snap a few fall photos.

We bought AndyZ his Chili Pepper costume the second it hit the shelves because I’ve learned one important thing about shopping for Halloween costumes: The good ones will never be in the sizes you need. At the time of purchase, he was not moving much so we didn’t consider the consequences of bundling his legs into the sack of the costume. However, after a few minutes in it Friday night, we learned that if we expected AndyZ to wear the costume happily for more than 15 minutes - he would need to be able to have a little wiggle room.

Please ignore the cat hair on the couch. Thanks.

Notice the leg seconds away from escaping

Lucky for us - the outfit snaps instead of zips and AndyZ’s leg fits perfectly between two of the snaps on one side of the pepper. We decided to stick his leg through that gap and just cut a matching hole in the other side. I’m quite proud of our editing of this outfit as he wore it for several hours Saturday. Not only did he not complain, but we were able to buckle him in the stroller (which we wouldn’t have been able to do before) and he actually was able to kick and wiggle at will making him a very silly pepper.

See? In the stroller!

See? Silly Pepper!

I say that all in all? A brilliant solution that totally gives us the right to eat all of the candy he’ll bring home on Friday, don’t you agree?

Some people (You know…those “people” we all refer to when justifying our choices) say that if you introduce solid foods too early, your child could become a picky eater. Or some such nonsense. Who knows if it’s valid or true but since NikkiZ was/is SUCH a picky eater, we thought we’d wait the extra month to introduce solid foods to AndyZ. We gave her cereal for the first time as soon as the doctor said we could (around 4 months) and she hated it and became a very difficult child to feed. We waited until last night (5 months) to try it out on AndyZ, hoping for better results. I wanted to wait until 6 months but MrZ was so excited it was killing him just to wait the extra month. So, last night? AndyZ met cereal. And they did not get along.

I’m not sure if ANY of it made it to his stomach or not. MrZ seems to think that a little bit made it down the pipe, but after seeing the post-meal clothing I have to disagree. As a matter of fact, there was so much cereal dribbled down the front of AndyZ’s shirt and plastered to his face, that I actually think he may have been somehow been creating more cereal in his mouth to spit out. There has to be some explanation to there being more on his face and shirt than there was in the bowl to begin with.

All in all? He reacted about the same way as his sister did. Although the pictures we have of her experience seem a little more happy and less disgusted - so you’ll just have to trust me on that one.

I know this is my third kid and all…but what is UP with the scratches that are perpetually on my child’s face?

Let’s start by discussing infant nail clippers. The first time I cut his nails? I cut SEVEN of his fingers. SEVEN. As in - SEVEN of his fingers were covered in blood. It was AWFUL. Was I using safety clippers? Yes. Did it help? I don’t know…would I have cut all 10 using regular clippers? I’d hope not. So - why did I cut the fingers with the safety clippers? Because I could NOT see what I was doing! The safety piece was actually blocking the nail so I couldn’t tell how far I was cutting down. I was essentially doing it blind. Of course I cut his fingers! I’m a blind woman!

So, I switched to normal clippers. Seriously. For five months now I’ve been cutting his nails with regular clippers. I hope Children’s Services doesn’t come hunt me down for this - but I have not cut his skin on his fingers ONCE since that first time. Why? Because I can actually see what I’m doing. Which helps immensely.

But - the scratches are still there! Every day! You can look at AndyZ’s fingers and see - all of his nails are very short. Maybe even dangerously short because I like to cut them as short as possible since he scratches himself constantly. Short. Short. Short. So, where are the scratches coming from? SERIOUSLY? I’d say that maybe it’s kids at school, but none of the kids in his class are mobile. How could they even get over there? They can’t. My child is finding ways to scratch his face with the shortest nails ever in the history of man.

Just to torture me.

For the past three days, AndyZ has had the stinkiest gas ever in the history of the world. He has cleared rooms and had me changing false alarms all weekend. Even his teacher said today that she went to change his diaper thinking he had pooped and there was nothing there. It is keeping him up at night as he does the Wiggle…Wiggle…Poot dance to disturb me enough to keep me awake but not enough to actually wake him beyond the stray cries. It’s the WEIRDEST THING. I have ruled out all foods and beverages that I’ve put into my system because it’s been going on for THREE DAYS now. Obviously anything weird I may have eaten when it first started is long gone from my milk now. For the last 48 hours I’ve kept it normal and simple. YET THE TOXIC FARTS PERSIST.

Any suggestions? Or is this just a sign that maybe he inherited his Dad’s moody digestive system?