Funny First Days and the Proof is in the Photos

Today my three boys all went off to school.  

It was the easiest first day of school for everyone.

It made me smile the whole drive home.  

I also now have time to write more and share it with you.  I am sorting some of my old stories from the journal I have kept since we began our family and I came across a funny from Mitchell when he and his twin brother Avery were in kindergarten.

My husband Jim came home from work and…

Jim, said very enthusiastically, “How was kindergarten boys?”

Mitchell, said with a very grown up matter-of-fact manner …“Dadda, I think there is more yelling than learning going on in Kindergarten.“

First day of school – Kindergarten

Avery and Mitchell’s First Day of School – 7th Grade

(note our dog always wiggles her way into photos)

Peter’s First Day – Kindergarten

First Day – This Morning

I may not go back to pick them up.

I’m joking!

If I am not, I am sure it will make the news.

Abbie Gale

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Introducing Us

“You did WHAT Boys?

That is me, Abbie, and that is what I say, a lot.

What you cannot see on the floor behind me is my constant pile of clothes I am trying to fold, at all times.

Let me help you.

 I should be happy to be folding clothes because that would mean I am not pulling a slug off of someone or cleaning milkshake off the ceiling again…

or for that matter, getting the legos out of the blender.

I can help you with that one too.

I started sharing my favorite stories February 29, 2012.

I have written our stories down for years and I take pictures of everything, clearly.

 

Avery is really is not happy

because I am taking a picture

instead of helping him

get the bag off of his head

He is 4 in this photo

 

 

Avery is the “oldest” of the twins and likes to say since they are identical twins and came from the same egg he “made” Mitchell.   Avery is now 12.

 

 

 

 

 

Mitchell just happy I’m taking

his picture despite not being able

to get the bag stuck on his head.

He is 4 in this photo. 

 

 

 

 

Mitchell is 12 now and he says he is a “chick maggot”.  Mitchell thinks he is a middle child?

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is our Peter.

Enough said.

Peter is four in this photo.

 

 

 

 

 

Peter is now eight…

…and has had an entire post dedicated to things he has said called,

“The $hit my kid says is funnier than the $hit your dad says.”

 

 

 

Jim is my husband and while he was in medical school I began emailing him stories of our kids for him to read when he had a minute or two, knowing he was missing out on these “priceless” moments.

 

It may have also have been to explain my future trip to the nut house that I didn’t realize was an unobtainable goal.

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I would send our favorite story in our annual Christmas letter.  People began requesting I add them to the growing mailing list to receive the “DREADED” Christmas letter I decided this may be a better idea.

She doesn’t care where she sleeps as long as it’s on me.

Our Mutt Lilly (if she could talk)  “My brothers have found a new way to entertain themselves… When I am outside they yell, “Lilly in the house!” The funny part to them and not me is when I barrel through the yard and leap up the stairs and…this is the part that makes them laugh…I slam face first into a SHUT door. I don’t mind. I like making them laugh but our mom made them stop.

If you need a laugh today…

Ten Things We Learned This Weekend

Another Holiday That Tries to Turn Me Into a Liar

I have some serious stories to tell too.

Not Everyone had a Mother to Celebrate

What I cannot figure out is why they have reality shows called “The Real Housewives of…” but no one has a reality show of what a REAL housewife’s life is like. We have the most crazy, fun, REAL times in a crazy, fun, real, gated community with our families.  The best part is that we know how abnormal it all is and we go with it.

Here I am with our traveling Nutcracker, In August.

He enjoys Grey Goose and brunettes.

 

I write down our stories because, let’s face it, I am never going to make a scrap-book.

“If you would just smile she would STOP taking our picture!”  

Our Norman Rockwell moment.

I just started February 29, 2012 and so far I feel like I’m giving birth…mostly that legs apart and up in the air while naked in a well-lit room with strangers…feeling.

“Look mom!”

“You keep an eye out Peter while we sneak a kiss.”

“Those aren’t real boobies mom!  They just have sponges under the shirt!”

The stories I write are to give our kids one day.  Having a forum* to share our “funnies” encourages me to write them down so that when they have children of their own…

I can show them that they will only get to the brink of insanity.

Ha, take that!  The “nut house” would be a vacation and God needs parents to stay home and take care of their kids!  I will be sitting back laughing at my grandchildren’s “funnies” while watching my own grown kids squeegee the cooking oil off the floor.

I’m pretty sure their kids will one day POUR COOKING OIL ON THE FLOOR to slide around on or POUR A GALLON OF MILK INTO THE CARPET to see if it makes its way to the pipes that we should have NEVER told them run all over under the floors.

Peter is Tom Sawyer.  I can prove it.

So I may be new to blogging but I have years worth of stories that I will try to deliver daily to make you smile, laugh, think, love and possibly occasionally cry.

* My parents were hippies and I may not have made it to school as often as I should have to learn grammar and punctuation.

That is your warning.

I write as I think and am already aware I do not know how to use a comma or most punctuation.  Up until now I made my husband proofread our Christmas letter which was the extent of anyone seeing my thoughts fall onto paper.  Jim likes to tell me my writing is like an ugly porn star and my punctuation is the ugly part.  Thank God he finds my inadequacies cute.  Oh, and thank God for spell check.

Please don’t make me regret this thing yet.

What have I gotten myself into?

People like to tell me my kids are funny. I always reply with all kids are funny. It is wrapping your mind around the moment and finding the humor.

Halloween 2011 and yes, that is Doogie Howser, MD and Vinny.

 Mitchell and Avery are IDENTICAL twins and this is how much they looked alike before the can of black hairspray.

I believe in having a grateful heart and being joyful mother of children.  I am trying my best to instill in my children that we have to find things to be grateful for in order to be happy.  I am also sarcastic and not afraid to laugh AT MY KIDS, as well as with them.  I also think it is important for my kids to see adults having fun.  I want them to look forward to growing up as well as enjoying each stage.

“Oh no Bat Baby, have mercy!”

I want to create a place for people to check after they have read the day’s news in the car pickup line at school or on the side of a practice field and now you need a smile.

“Mom, the baby is eating dirt…don’t worry he likes it!”

-Abbie Gale, allthatmakesyou.com

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Hit the “Follow me” button and I will try to tell you a story regularly that you can relate to.  A story that makes you smile, laugh, think, love cry or cry laughing.

 

 

Summer Camp

Saying goodbye at camp.Little brother Peter was left to watch Lilly our dog while we were unpacking Mitchell and Avery.  Peter was so worried our dog was upset that we were leaving his big brothers.  I think perhaps little brother was a little sad we were leaving them too.

Can you see how nervous Avery and Mitchell are while we check them in?

I CANNOT BELIEVE I LEFT MY BABIES!

I went to summer camp for the first time when I was their age.

That is what I kept chanting to myself every time I had the thought to throw them back into  the car and drive them to Disney World so I wouldn’t have to leave them with strangers.

The summer camp I went to in Michigan was not sitting on the top of a mountain though.

I would have happily stayed with them for these views for a week.

The camps now email the parents daily pictures of their kids and what they are up to.

The camp sent me this picture the first day.  I snapped a quick pic of the computer screen on my phone and texted it to my husband.

It looks like my boys are fitting right in.

Do you have fond memories of summer camp when you were a child?  Did you decide to send your own children to sleep away camp?

-Abbie, allthatmakesyou.com

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All that makes you smile, laugh, think, love, cry or cry laughing.

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Things Every Mom Says Or Just Mine

I love that Twitter is trending #ThingsEveryMomSays because if gives me a chance to share one of my favorite quotes my crazy mom used to say…

 

“Honey, I HAD you to do the dishes. You should be thanking the dishes. It is because of the dishes you exist.”

Every year I think my mother was smarter than the year before.

Here is a story about my mom called “Back Back Before You Could Just Go And Buy Boobies” that includes the obvious mention of boobs and chicken poop and how you can use one to get the other.

Recently, when asking one of my 12 year olds to empty the dishwasher, he replies with, “I’ll give you $20 to do it for me mom.”

I say, “That is terrible. What would I be teaching you if I were to say yes?”

My 12 year old replies, “OK, fine $40.”

Now I am thinking I may just take his money to teach him a whole new lesson. I turned around and shot him a look, completely accidental, and he began unloading. Lesson learned…12 year olds these days have too much cash.

When they were little they would sneak and “wash” the dishes!

-Abbie, allthatmakesyou.com

Follow us for…

All that makes you smile, laugh, think, love, cry or cry laughing.

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Watching Old Sitcoms With Our Kids

Watching “old” sitcoms with our kids.

Do you remember Doogie Howser, MD doing things like an “emergency” pelvic exam…ON HIS GIRLFRIEND?  Well, he does.

Our three boys love watching Doogie Howser, MD with all its nerdy, dated glory and friend Vinny makes them belly laugh.  We didn’t remember the show dealing with such “racy” topics that have required some previewing by us before letting our little guys watch.   If you could have seen my husband and I running for the remote when Vinny was showing off the condom in his wallet he was planning on using that night.

Doogie and Vinny, as played by our 12 year-old IDENTICAL twins, were last Halloween’s hit, (only with adults over 35 who knew who they were.)  It took an entire can of black hairspray to turn Avery into Vinny.

This picture shows how much they look like normally…

“Who wants to watch Little House on the Prairie with me tonight?”

Peter, “Why would anyone NOT want to watch Little House on the Prairie!”

I’m thinking Peter would make an awesome Laura Ingalls next Halloween. You have no idea how happy it makes me to watch Little House. 

Peter wearing my scarf and offering me a poison apple.  Wrong show but you see what I mean with thinking he could rock Laura Ingalls this fall. 

I always find it hilarious when the kids don’t connect that the actors are not REALLY the characters they portray.

We rented Smurfs to watch with our boys.  Peter, then seven, announced when he saw Neil Patrick Harris, “DOOGIE IS IN THIS MOVIE!  THERE IS DOOGIE HOWSER!”

Avery, who is twelve, looked at his younger brother with a very annoyed and sophisticated look said to Peter, “That is NOT Doogie.  I read this book and Doogie is not in the story at all.”

I don’t know if I should be worried about them all but I did what came natural.

I laughed at them all and told them they are all a bunch of DING-A-LINGS!  

I explained, for the thousandth time that these are all actors and that was indeed Doogie but playing the part of another person in a different movie because he is an ACTOR!

Good Lord.  I know one day they will be adults and watch “Harold and Kumar go to White Castle” and I would LOVE to be a fly on the wall when they see all the things “Doogie” does in that movie.

It may wreck my boys forever.

Do your kids watch any “old” TV shows?  You have to love the DVR.  It may turn my kids into super geeks, but I am ok with that.

Thanks for letting me share,

-Abbie, All that makes you smile, laugh, think, love, cry or cry laughing.  allthatmakesyou.com

P.S.  ALF terrified them!  Bahahaha!

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Frog Hunting With Kids During Summer Evenings

Frog and toad hunting has been this weeks evening pastime.

It is HOT outside during the day and this gives our boys something fun to do when it cools off.

Access to ponds or creeks…We have both in our backyard and many more on the golf course across the street.

Transportation…We walk or use the critter mobile golf cart.

Lights…We use headlights and flashlights and even golf cart headlights.

Nets…Do we have nets!  We have short-handled and long-handled and large holed and small holed.  We are even willing to reach in.

My boys tell me this is a “smaller” bullfrog.

Container…We use a big tote.

Sense of humor…Peter likes to take “frog orders” before he heads out.  I say I would like a green tree frog and his brothers might say a bullfrog.  Peter especially likes to watch people open the tote and see how many he has brought home.  Below is poor Mitchell not expecting dad to pull giganto bullfrog out.

An ability to say goodbye…With the hopes of seeing you again in the pond behind our home.  This took years to perfect as saying goodbye to “caught critters” is very hard for little boys.

Peter may have been kissing this little guy on a dare from big brothers.  

Big brothers can be especially cantankerous.

Camera…It is much easier to say goodbye if you have a photo to remember your new friends.

Potato brush and soap…Have it at every entrance to the house for the “Frog Hunters” to use before entering their home!

Thanks for letting me share,

“All that makes you, smile, laugh, think, love, cry or cry laughing.”

-Abbie  allthatmakesyou.com

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Why Summer Vacations are Longer for Mother’s of Boys…

Why summer vacations are longer for the mothers of boys…

Little boys find it amusing to go “number 2” and leave it for their brothers to find.

They call it “leaving a deposit?”

What makes this funnier to little boys…

To write the persons name it is intended to be found by on the toilet seat…

In permanent maker.

If you have heard screaming coming from my house “am I gonna die?” last night that was the electric cobalt blue model paint all over the new floor in the basement golf cart garage/workshop.

If you heard screaming this morning it was the toilet seat in the new basement bathroom.

I’m running away (again) to work at one of those Caribbean resorts that doesn’t allow children in.

I’ve been preparing them. I taught them to make their favorite meal, linguini with clams, because they will get sick of Jim’ eggs.

This is within 12 hours of each other with a full nights sleep in the middle. Upon texting Jim the antics he replied that one of his coworkers lost a baby to SIDS.

I can live in our colorful graffiti house.

Abbie,  All that makes you smile, laugh, think, love, cry, or cry laughing.

allthatmakesyou.com

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Hatfield’s and McCoy’s

.   Our Peter’s first grade teacher’s names this year were

Hatfield and McCoy.

Hatfield to left and McCoy on right.

Dont they look ferocious?

I fuzzed them for privacy.

I cannot make this stuff up.

It is the end of another school year and my oldest boys have finished their first year of middle school and our youngest has finished his first year of first grade.  Avery in red and Mitchell in yellow.  They are receiving a citizenship award. Here is Peter receiving a “Future Scientist” award. He is in the pale yellow.

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We Would Live In A Zoo, Maybe We Do?

“I have decided I do not want a Veiled Chameleon anymore.  I would like a Jesus Christ Lizard instead.”  – Peter

He has been talking about this chameleon for MONTHS.  So I ask him why he changed his mind.  I also added the appendage to the question, “When your wife agrees one day.”  This is how I now answer pet requests.  “Sure, you can buy a ball python, as long as your wife agrees one day.”

Don’t judge. I spend every day making them put things back outside that they “rescued” from the pond.

His reply, “I want  a Jesus Christ Lizard because they walk on water.”

I answer, “That’s cool.”

(Photo courtesy of Strange Animals)

He adds, “Besides, you wouldn’t let me have the chameleon because it is a hundred dollars and if Jesus Christ dies he was only thirty-five bucks.

I don’t need a “wing man” I need an assistant to spend the day reasoning with three little boys why we don’t live in a zoo.  Oh, and to wash their turtle hands and check them for leaches…

Ok folks, this is a boy thing right?  Please tell me this is normal or else I am going to have to buy them a pet store one day with their college money.

– Abbie, All that makes you…  allthatmakesyou.com

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Video Game That Goes Terribly and Hilariously Wrong

I was in the kitchen cooking and I hear horror movie screaming coming from the family room.

I turn around from the stove to see what was going on.

I see our three boys sitting around the laptop in a huddle.

Kind of like this…

The boys all begin yelling and have looks of terror on their faces. They have now backed up away from the lonely laptop.

The thoughts that are racing through my head…has the child safety features on our internet failed. What have they happened across…

I am now racing towards them as one of the older boys pushes his twin brother towards the laptop and he steps forward and slams the laptop shut while cringing. They begin to turn on each other.

“Why did you build it that short?”

“You should have sent a zookeeper sooner to catch it!”

Oh my word…I hesitantly open the laptop to see a ZooTycoon “NOTICE” on the screen that tells me a lion was eating the park visitors.

Our youngest, Peter, has tears in his eyes and says to his brothers, “Why did you let it eat those children?”

Zoo Tycoon. The game I bought for the kids because it was supposed to be happy and make their minds plan and organize, they get to create habitats and care for animals…lets the animals eat the zoo’s guests if you build the habitats wrong?

There are shrieks coming from the laptop. My three sweet boys have their eyes covered up as I shut down the game.

This really, really makes me laugh.

Have you ever met a person and thought that there was no chance you could ever be friends with them? I have a friend that is moving away and I have written her a reference letter to give to her new neighbors in case they judge her on their first impression like I did. Here is that story…

2 Broke(n) Girls

My kids need to be shipped off to a farm for a summer to toughen them up. So stinkin’ cute.