HAPPY Meal?!?

Most people don't believe me when I say I can feed my entire family dinner at McDonald's for under $10. For those who doubt, here's the run-down: plain hamburger for me ($.89), fries and a side salad for Quinn ($2), a double and a McChicken for Carter ($2), ditto for Taylor ($2), and 2 double cheeseburgers for the little four ($2. The trick here is pulling the double cheeseburger apart- one burger and one bun on each side- and folding it up like a taco. The cheese helps stick it together, and... voila! Two "taco burgers!") Round this out with 8 small ice waters (free), and you have a van full of happy campers and a McDonald's store that officially hates you.

I used to to feel bad for ripping McDonald's off with my frugal (Okay, cheap) ways, but my McDonald's experience today completely absolved all guilt.

Tanner was at kindergarten (sigh) so I "only" had the triplets while running afternoon errands. It occurred to me that it would be much easier to throw lunch at them in their carseats than it would be to go home, laden with groceries, and put something together. As we pulled into the drive through, I made my first mistake: I actually looked at the Happy Meal menu instead of jumping straight to my more familiar friend, the Value Menu.

Hmm... I thought. I only have three kids with me today. It would be such a treat for them to actually have french fries and (gasp!) a soda.

And then I saw the featured girl toy: a miniature American Girl doll! It was as if I was 4 again myself- I was mesmerized by those perfect little dolls!

So I rationalized: getting an entire meal plus a drink plus an American Girl doll for $2.59 was a bargain! I excitedly ordered 3 little girl Happy Meals and was sure that this purchase would bring us a car ride of happiness.

Wrong!

Until today, my youngest children have been blissfully unaware that Happy Meals even exist. They probably don't even know that McDonald's serves french fries! They were simply thrilled to receive their meager little taco-burgers and ice waters. Boy, did I open Pandora's box!

When I handed the neatly-packaged meals to each girl, their eyes went round and large. They cautiously peered inside and their little mouths dropped. They couldn't pull everything out fast enough! Fries were flying, sodas jostling, and cheeseburgers falling to the floor. Food was entirely forgotten when they saw the toy inside. They were in sheer heaven! For like a minute. Until they opened the wrapping and saw that their "toy" was a book. A very small American Girl book with a teeny little American Girl doll sticker inside.

And then they realized that their books were all different, and that Riley got the American Girl with black hair when she has blond hair and that's not fair, but Sydney's American Girl had red hair so she didn't know who she should trade it with, and Bailey's American Girl was African American. And then they all wanted Addy, the African American girl, because her dress was yellow and she had stickers with quilts on it and she was "prettierest."

So I took their "toys" and told them they could have them after they ate their food. Five minutes of screaming later, they dug into their french fries and noticed that somebody had more fries in her bag than they did, and then there was more crying and counting of fries. So I pulled over and dumped out all the fries and redistributed them. And there was momentary food-induced peace until Bailey tasted her soda and yelled, "It's Sprite! I hate Sprite! I wanted cocoa!" (?) And then everybody wanted cocoa. And they all freaked out that they had "two breads" on their burger, and threw the top bun on the ground with disdain and made a ketchup-mustard-mess of folding their burger into taco formation.

By the time I got home, we were ALL crying and food was everywhere but in my childrens' stomachs.

All this "happiness" for a dollar more than I usually spend to feed our clan of eight! I think we were much happier before we explored this brave new world of fast-food options. Lesson learned: we'll unapologetically stick with our taco-shaped burgers and ice water, thank you very much.

Things I Never Thought I Would Say As a Mom (but, sadly, have):

1. "Sorry guys, but I already told you: You can't have lollipops until you finish your PopTarts."

2. "No! We do not flush somebody else's pee pee! Everybody gets to flush their own pee. It is a family rule."
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3. "Carter, you HAVE to stop practicing that piano! You've been on that thing for like 3 hours... go outside and play already!"


4. "Taylor, I love it when you get creative, but for the rest of the day, you may not make anything that involves paper or scissors or glue or yarn or stickers or paint or crayons or markers. They are now off-limits."

5. "Hey, guys! No using the remote control as a weapon! And same goes for the telephone. We do NOT hit each other with technology!"
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6. (at the dinner table) "Okay, we've had our fun but it's time to stop talking like pirates, okay? No more 'aaaaarghing' and calling each other 'mateys' and 'wenches', okay? No more pirate talk!"

7. (while playing pretend) "No, it's okay, guys. You can ALL be Quasimoto. Anybody who wants to can pretend they're Quasimoto. Nobody HAS to be Esmerelda."

Okay, so in my defense: A) They were eating whole-grain poptarts for a quick breakfast-on- the-go when the bank lady announced that she was sending through some lollipops for the kids. B) Never thought I'd have a family rule about flushing somebody else's pee, let alone make ridiculous comments to enforce the rule, but I potty-trained all four at the same time and they were very territorial about flushing. C) Carter plays the piano nonstop and, until we moved the piano from the family room to the office, it was very loud. D) I'm not one to stifle creativity, but Taylor's incessant projects can get very messy. You can only pick tiny yarn snips and pieces of tape out of the carpet so many times in one day... E) When the triplets were 2, it was like WWF at our house. Following one split lip too many, we actually had a list of "contraban" items. F) After watching Pirates of the Carribean with the big kids and having a pirate birthday party for Tanner, the pirate talk had been going on for hours and was driving this particular wench crazy. Aaaargh! G) For some reason, my little kids were obsessed with Hunchback of NotreDame, and Riley was in love with Quasimoto. Which meant that they ALL wanted to be him, and they walked around with their backs hunched and their faces squinched up, and tried to make somebody else be Esmerelda. Go figure!

But still...

Bailey

It looks like Bailey has made it her mission in life to slowly unravel what little is left of my sanity. She is a mischevious little imp, full of sheer will and determination. I am no match for her, really.

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We wonder if she has a Napoleon Complex. She has always three or four inches shorter than her triplet sisters. One night she asked me, "When am I going to get biggest, since I'm the big sister?" Ironically, she has convinced everybody that she is indeed the oldest sister, despite her lack of stature. (And despite the fact that she was actually Baby C- the last one out!) What she lacks in height, she makes up for in attitude. Or as one of Quinn's coworkers put it, she has a "high will-to-mass ratio."

She is a force of nature, and I wonder sometimes what makes this little one tick. She is like a cat: independent, affectionate only when she wants to be, and completely unpredictable. We never know what's going to make her pounce!

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Bailey refuses to wear anything but dresses. She accessorizes to the hilt with any headband/necklace/hair scrunchie she can find. She drags her mini tea seat with her everywhere she goes, and she is convinced that she is a princess. Her favorite game to play is "pretend" where I am the mean stepmother and she gazes longingly at a photo of Quinn and I (her "real parents who are very dead.") She could play that game for HOURS, and has even worked up a tear or two as she wishes that her "real mom and dad" hadn't been "zapped by Ursula the Sea Witch."

This morning I left my glass of water on the coffee table. As I walked back in the room, I was directly behind Bailey and, not seeing me, I watched her lean over my glass of water and peer inside. I was about to intervene (I hate it when my kids drink out of my glass), but instead watched in amazement as Bailey deliberately spit in my glass. A lot of spit. Then she peered inside, grinning. As she walked away she spotted me and smiled. "Bailey!" I said, incredulously. "Did you just spit in my water?!?" "No," she said, sweet as can be. "But I just saw you do it!" She shrugged. "I didn't SPIT in it," she explained. "I was giving you floaties. I always give you floaties."

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To think how many, many times I have left a glass of water within her reach . . .

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Lucky for her, she's pretty darn cute. A friend from church insists he could never discipline her because she's so adorable. I told him that it's her primary survival mechanism. She can turn on the charm when she needs. She loves to say in her prayers: "Thank you that Mommy is beautiful" and then she cracks open one eye to peer at me and make sure that this had the desired effect of making me smile. It always does.

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She was helping put a bandaid on Riley the other day and I said, "Wow, you're good at this, Bailey. Maybe someday you'll grow up and be a doctor!" "No," she said. "I want to grow up to be a Mommy, just like you." My heart started to melt, then she continued, "Cuz then I can wear your lipstick and you'll have to let me wear all your Mommy clothes and I'll have a real purse and a cella phone."

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And to balance out any compliments she doles out in her prayers, she always manages to get in a few digs to my self-esteem. Last week when I came home from jogging, she ran up and gave me a big hug. "I love you, Mommy... even when you're all sweaty and ugly."

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Beneath all her bluster and bravado, however, our mini-dictator isn't as tough as she thinks. She still sucks her thumb (though she hides it under her blankie). She is still the only one afraid to swim without floaties (the inflatable arm things, not the spit). She is scared of Sid "the mean kid" from Toy Story and refuses to open her eyes if he's on screen. She's terrified of thunder.

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Somewhere beneath the mischief and bossiness lies a tender little heart... if only she'd let us catch a glimpse of it more often!

SuperTanner graduates!

It is, apparently, exhausting to be a Super Hero. All that lizard rescuing, sister tormenting, and incessant question-asking wiped out poor little SuperTanner to the point that he couldn't even climb up the stairs to his bed before falling asleep.

I can relate. The month of May seemed bent on showing me that I am in no way Super Woman. The month of May, in fact, left me Super Exhausted. It seemed that at least once or twice every week there was some big event to attend for Carter and Taylor- concerts, performances, recitals, plays, award ceremonies. We were going nonstop trying to get the big kids everywhere they needed to be and it was a full-on effort to keep the camcorders and cameras charged up to record these occasions! (photos and video to be posted soon.)

The last big event of the month, however, was all about our SuperTanner. His Pre-Kindergarten graduation was a BIG deal, held at the local elementary school auditorium (which was packed with hundreds of camcord-clutching relatives.) Decked out in caps and gowns, (seriously) it was just too stinking cute for words.

Not everyone shared the sentiments of this momentous occasion. At one point, Carter turned to me and said, "Really? REALLY?!? He learned how to write his name and count to a hundred. This is a bit over the top..." (Sour grapes since he never had a preschool graduation ceremony?) Quinn also grumbled a bit, something about yuppy parents with nothing better to do. But that was before he saw Tanner in his graduation gear and came to appreciate the glory of that wonderful photo op.


And, in case we didn't get good shots, there was a professional videographer and photographer on scene. Seriously.

We were all proud of Tanner, who dazzled us with a smile and wave after accepting his diploma. He loved going to Goddard School, and he loved his teachers, Miss Mandy and Miss Shirley. And, I might add, he can pretty much read now. That's worthy of a ceremony in my book!

Congratulations, Tanner! We think you're Super! (now let's all go take a nap.)

Christmas in July-revisited

I didn't send out Christmas cards this year. Sigh. The shame still haunts me- six months later!

It wasn't for lack of trying. We had two "photo shoots" in attempt to get a photo of all eight of us worthy of printing on a card. All the photos were TERRIBLE... until we finally found a fantastic photographer who also happens to be a pal of mine. (Why didn't I think of her sooner?!?) But, every time the scheduled day arrived, it either rained or somebody was sick.

We finally had a great shoot- like 5 days before Christmas. Not in time to send out cards, but at least I kept our yearly Christmas photo tradition alive (much to the chagrin of my husband and children.)

Since my mind is oddly turned to Christmas right now, I thought I'd catch up and post some of these Christmas photos.

As for next year, I was already planning on having Erin take our pictures in September or October- just to be safe. Unfortunately... she moved to Wisconsin. Ugh!

Anything for a free meal?!?

As I'm sure you all know, today is Cow Appreciation Day. Shockingly, it is not a federal holiday. However, if you dress up in bovine-apparel, you get a free meal at Chick-fil-A. We love Chick-fil-A, and we love free meals even more (especially if it eliminates the need to cook), so I turned my herd of kids into a herd of cows in order to save a buck.

(Bear in mind that this was done on the spur of the moment with 15 minutes, a box of old Halloween costumes, construction paper and tape. Go easy on the costume critiques!)

Was it worth it? Oh, yeah. Free food, an enclosed play place, and the opportunity for the kids to run off some of their rainy-day-pent-up-energy...

If only every day was Cow Appreciation Day.

As a sidenote: take a moment to notice my children's shoes. I have polled other triplet moms and have come to the conclusion that shoes are the bane of our existence! Inevitably, at least two of the children have on the exact same shoe... on both feet. (as with Bailey- two left feet of the same shoe.) And then of course there are the almost-the-same-shoe-but-not-quite occasions (such as with Riley) where the girls put on the same style of shoe but in two different colors. Unfortunately for Riley, hers are also both left feet. I could fight it, but I've given up... I actually take them out in public like this! Hopefully the cow thing will be a distraction.

Christmas in July

So I'm staring down the barrel of a potentially LONG summer full of bored and whiny children. This always makes me edgy- until I pull out the calendar and make all kinds of pie-in-the-sky plans, half of which we won't get to. But it empowers me nonetheless.

Exhibit A: Christmas in July. We spent a long and fun-filled afternoon dressed up in our Christmas jammies, making a gingerbread house. Eccentric, yes, but it kept them busy. This little project was like a Rorschach for our kids' personalities: Taylor and Sydney doggedly stayed on the task (and got irritated with everyone else who didn't) while Bailey flitted in and out for the fun parts. Tanner started the project with a bang but got bored after about 10 minutes and wandered off to find something he could hit with a hammer. Riley sat on the table, watching the entire thing while sneaking pieces of candy and initiating a never-ending commentary. And Carter took one look and retreated to the office, where he practiced piano for 3 hours.

These are the days of our lives...

For any of you wondering, I didn't get out any Christmas cards this year (oh, the shame!), but you may just find one in your mailbox some time this summer!