It's good to be the mom

Abby is in her final week of Math Academy at the school. This means that from 7:30 am when she gets on the bus until 12:30 pm when she gets off the bus, Sam and Kady have to entertain each other. Not that Abby does a whole lot of Polly Pocket or Lego playing these days, but for some reason, the absence of the third sibling makes a difference.

That difference being: They hate each other's guts.

Having only grown up with one sister, I expected fighting between my girls; I wasn't sure how Sam would fit into the picture, what with being the only male stuck between two sisters. Now I know his role perfectly. He's the agitator. In other words, he is my sister. Just with a penis.

My father declared many, many times when we were kids that he was going to legally change Tater's name to "Maytag" because she was so good at agitating. I have entertained the same thought regarding my son. Now, don't get me wrong, the girls have their moments where they do things to annoy the other two, but it seems that Sam has cornered the market. I love him to pieces, but I may staple his lips together before the summer is over.

Because of the whole nuclear enema experience Sunday night, I told Sam that if he went through all of that torture and his appendix wasn't the cause, that I would buy him the Indiana Jones Lego game for the PS2. I told him that to a) get him to drink the glow juice and b) because I really thought it was his appendix. So guess who gave up buying a tanning package this month to buy her son a video game where Indy is nothing more than a bunch of stacked up plastic blocks, the top one of which has a stubbly beard?

Kady and Sam could hardly wait to get home yesterday to play that game, but the longer they played the more they fought. I was busy, so I would just interrupt occasionally with, "Guys, stop it" or "That's enough, you two." You know, because I obviously have mad parenting skillz. Finally I had had enough and told them that if they fought one. more. time. they would turn off the game. Two more of those threats later, I actually made them turn it off. (Where's Super Nanny when I need her to remind me to follow through the first time) AND they are barred from it today.

So this morning they used up their alotted TV time, decided their rooms weren't exciting enough (not to mention you cannot walk through Kady's), played with Biscuit until he got too wound up and started biting, then settled on playing board games. However, when they sat down to play "Jam-Pack Jam" (Thank you, Cousin Courtney. I hum that little song the van plays all the time now.) they immediately started with the fighting again. BUT, because of my stellar eyebrow-raising abilities, I raised my eyebrow, glared until they both felt me boring into their souls and they turned around, risking their faces melting clean off just like those dudes who opened the Ark of the Covenant even though Indy told 'em not to.

No kidding, Sam handed Kady the piece she was whining about (that he had taken while grinning ear to ear), patted her on the arm - watching me the entire time, mind you - and said, "Oh here, Kady, I accidentally picked this up. I think it's yours."

That's when I said, "Sam. Dude, you got something on your nose." Of course, he immediately ran to the bathroom while I nearly fell out of my chair laughing.

It really is good to be the mom.