Martin Family Adventure

Ready for another round?

I know I say this a lot, but there really IS never a dull moment in the Martin household. Sometimes I picture God sitting up in heaven, his feet propped up on some pillows and he's enjoying a bowl of popcorn while he watches the goings-on in our family. He doesn't need TV because he has the Martin family to watch. 

Saturday night, we had planned to have some family and friends for poker night. It was kind of last minute since I had driven to NH to meet my mom half-way from RI to pick up my grandfather and bring him home. One by one, people backed out and by 7 pm, we assumed it was just going to be a quiet night at home. 

Quiet night at home? Yeah, right! Girly decided she wanted to do a make-over on David because I'm allergic to make-up. Since she can't do make-overs on me and there's no way Zach would let her, David is usually game. He's let her paint his nails in the past and he's gone to work like that. The guys made fun of him but he's quite secure in his sexuality. 

Girly put bright blue eye shadow on David and made it go all the way up to his eyebrows. It was at that moment, when she finished, that the dogs started barking and we knew someone was here. His buddy from work had shown up with his girlfriend, so that's how David met them at the door. They made sure to tell him that he looked quite sexy, though I think it will be a while before the world can accept someone bringing sexy back that looks like that! I only wish I had a picture to share with you!

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Zach is up to his usual antics today and it all happened before 8:30 am. 

I looked in the kitchen to find Zach all the way at the top of the cupboards (we have a slightly valuted ceiling in our house). He was doing it to get laughs from Girly and my neice and nephew. He got laughs from them but he didn't get any from me. I told him to get down and that the cupboards are not made to hold his weight. His answer?

"Well, they didn't break!"

Whatever, Zach. 

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In the midst of writing this, before 10 am, Girly has managed to dump over a pitcher of pink lemonade all over the kitchen floor. Her way of cleaning it up is to throw a dish towel on the floor, stand on top of it and shimmy across the floor while pushing lemonade across the floor and not really cleaning it up. 

Seriously? I give up. 

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But back to Zach. He has a habit of cussing at inanimate objects when they don't do what he wants them to do or something isn't working out to his liking. 

He also has an affection for peanut butter. He'll walk around with a jar of PB and a big serving spoon. He'd finish off a whole jar in 15 minutes if I let him (which I don't). 

This morning, he was trying to get as much of the PB out of the jar as he could so he was digging the spoon and his hand into the jar. That meant that he got PB on his hands. He went to the sink to wash off his hands...but if you remember, we don't have hot water right now so it's kind of hard to wash PB off unless you're patient, use a lot of soap and wipe your hands in between with paper towels. 

He was getting really frustrated that it wasn't coming off his hands, so as he usually does with inanimate objects, he let loose with, "F&*% YOU, Peanut butter!"

Oh, Zach, you do have a way with words.

Now, remember, this is all before 8:30 am!

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A little while ago, the DHL delivery guy just stopped by with the last of my college textbooks that I need for this semester. My niece met the guy at the door.....looking like this:

Complete with uni-brow, goatee and swirled mustache. 

Damn, we're on a roll! 10 am and we've started  the day off strong. 

I told you the day wasn't over yet!

This is a continuation of the day that I posted about HERE.

My kids don't start school till next Wednesday so there's still a little time left to enjoy the rest of the summer here in northern Vermont. Since I had my neice and nephew here today, as well, we all took a trip down to the lake, which is only 2.5 miles down the road. 

Girly and Hannah rode bikes down and being the mother and aunt that I am, I was a bit cautious to let two beautiful young blonde girls ride 2.5 miles down to the lake through a stretch that didn't have too many houses around, so I drove either behind or in front of them (at times) and kept them in my sights. Yes, it took a lot longer to drive to the lake this way, but they're precious to me so I wanted to make sure they were safe. 

The lake was a bit on the cold side, but that didn't stop the girls from going in and it didn't stop Zach from going in to the still part with his net and his jar to catch minnows. It DID stop Ethan (my nephew) from going in so he sat on his towel and ate food. 

Zach started off by catching two minnows before they realized that they needed to get the heck away from him. When he realized the minnows had left, he proclaimed, "My eyes have turned to shit." This is as opposed to when things are going his way and he claims, "My eyes have turned to hearts." 

That was just the start of the cuss words today. On the way home from the lake, he told me, "Mom, when you tell me to do something I don't want to do or to go somehwere I don't want to go, my ears turn to f**kers." 

Eventually, the fish came back and he caught quite a few. He asked if he could put a couple into the fish tank at home and I said it was okay. Later that night, David said, "Erika, remember that baby bass that Zach put in the fish tank a couple weeks ago? I think it laid eggs because there's a ton of baby fish in the tank." 

That's when I realized that Zach didn't put a "couple" fish in the tank. He put ALL the fish he caught in the tank. 

(Yes, I know Zach is insanely skinny. He eats like a pig, though, and the doctor says he's healthy and active and that's all the matters.)

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It's pretty crazy to see what kids come up with to play with. We didn't take anything with us to the lake, like floaties, buckets and shovels, etc. Kids are usually pretty resourceful when they don't have any toys with them. 

My poor kids have the shallow end of the gene pool, but so do my niece and nephew. Their mother is my sister and their father is my husband's brother. Yes, if you do the math right, it's not as gross as it sounds when you first hear it. My sister's kids can be just as crazy as my own kids. 

Hannah found a plank of wood and a piece of charred wood from an extinguished bonfire and made a sign. Yes, it says, "Welcome, now go away." 

When we left, we propped it up on the beautiful and artistic looking piece of driftwood at the top of the beach, where everyone can see it when they arrive. We're just evil like that. >:) 

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So, that was my Friday. I hope yours was less eventful than mine. :)

This child will be the cause of my heart attack some day

There's never a dull moment here at the Martin house. 

Zach has recently taken to climbing trees. He said that he wants to start a camp for kids called "Tree Climbing Camp." Of course, in order for him to have a camp, he has to know just how to climb trees. 

Zach is pretty much fearless when it comes to stuff like this. For a while, he was climbing trees with his Crocs on. Never let it be said that there's nothing you can't do with Crocs on. I think Zach has pretty much found a way to do everything with Crocs on, including tree climbing. I got too worried about him slipping in a tall tree, so we got rid of the Crocs so that he has no choice but to use his sneakers. 

Not everyone is as excited about Zach's talents as he is. We've been "talked to" by the grounds keeper at the doctor's office, he's been scolded by the lifeguards at the community pool and he's been chided by the manger at Toys R Us. He's told to get down and his response is usually, "Stupid, dumbass people. I'm a careful climber. Jackasses. Ruined my day. Now it's a stupid, shit day." Hey, at least he's honest, though we do have a talk afterwards about appropriate language. 

I'm sure you can imagine the potential cardiac arrest when Girly told me to come outside and see where Zach was. 

Yes, I'll admit, that I came back in to get the camera AND the video camera and then went back out. For the record, when I went out the first time, Zach was ALL THE WAY AT THE TOP of this tree. This tree is about 50-ish feet tall! I told him to get down but to do it carefully. He was laugning and giggling at the top of the tree while swaying back and forth. The potential cardiac arrest became even more potential when I realized that on the other side of this tree were power lines. Needless to say, tree climbing in our trees along the hedgerow is banned. I prayed the whole time he was on his way down. 

While he was at the top of the tree, he said, "This is SO cool, Mom! Things look so different from up here. You look so small down there." He was completely fascinated by the perspective on his yard from way up there. I hate to be the one to crush that curiosity and fascination, but come on, he was at the top of a 50+ foot tall tree - with power lines on the other side!

I swear, I'm gonna have to wrap that kid in bubble wrap and put a helmet on him. 

On his way down from that big, tall oak tree, he jumped over to a smaller tree for the rest of the climb. 

I'm tellin' ya, this kid is going to be the cause of my heart attack one day. Well, him or his father. At least I know that's where he gets it from .

I'm changing my name to a 4-letter word

As much as I love being home on the weekends, I'm not-so-secretly wishing that we were away on one of our Meadowbrook weekends. Things tend to be more mellow and calm when we're away from everything. Life seems simple when we're camping. When we're at Meadowbrook, that also means that I'm teaching a class with adults so I can have adult conversations. 

I must be getting older because I long for peaceful moments. As I told my therapist, I'm used to having almost 10 months out of the year to myself during the day so the summer is always overwhelming to my senses. I used to feel selfish and bad about wanting those days back, but I don't anymore. Going through therapy has taught me that my reality is MY reality and mine alone. We all handle things differently and I'm okay with how I handle it. If other people don't like it, it's their issue and not mine. 

When I was in my early teens, my parents got our family wrapped up in a fringe Christian cult (look up "Christian patriarchy" on google and you'll discover the ridiculousness of it all). It was constantly pounded into women that if you didn't homeschool your kids, you don't love them. If you're a mom and you work outside the home, you don't love your kids. If you're a mom and you want to be by yourself for some moments of peace and recharging your energy, then you don't love your kids. If you're a mom and can't wait for your kids to be back in school, first off, you don't love your kids because you send them to school and secondly, you don't love them because you WANT them to be back in school. And by the way, these moms are considered selfish, too. 

Ya know what? I want all of those things and I still love my kids. Immensely. More than the people who claim that I don't love them will ever know. And believe me, I'm a better mom to my kids because they go to school, because I work (though I work from home because I like being my own boss), because I like peace and quiet to myself, because I like to recharge myself so I'm not a zombie and can actually show my kids love, because I'm counting down the days till my kids are back in school (we all thrive on the structure of the school year). 

If that makes me selfish, then so be it. But let me tell you something. If it weren't for all of those things, I wouldn't be emotionally, physically and mentally available to my kids. It's because I love my kids that I do all of those things and I'm able to show that love to them because of it and they know that I love them. 

So, I must be getting old. Noise bothers me more than it used to, I crave peace, the hot weather isn't my favorite thing in the whole world (I MUST be getting old because I used to hate winter and now I'm longer for cooler weather in the middle of my favorite season of the year), and people getting too close to my invisible "3-foot personal space bubble" gives me a touch of anxiety.

Constantly being asked to do things, look for things, having a whistle blown in my ear, listening to the dogs with their squeaky toys, seeing my son trying to cut an acidophilus pill he needed to take with a bread knife, hearing my daughter telling her brother to "shut up" for the zillionth time......all while hearing, "MOM!" I thought of changing my name to a 4-letter word. Something like "F*ck you." This would mean that my kids would not be able to call to me any more since that kind of language is supposedly unacceptable in our house. I say "supposedly" because my son (12 years old and autistic and who didn't take his Concerta this morning) feels this is completely appropriate and acceptable language. I realized that changing my name to a 4-letter word wouldn't work because Zach would still be calling for me. 

This is my reality. Want to challenge it? I'll trade houses with you for a week, but I guarantee that after one hour, you'll be begging for your old life back and you just might have a little more respect for how I show my kids love. 

And ya know what? I wouldn't change it for anything.

Welcome to our adventurous world of OCD and cussing

This is definitely one of those "The Good, Bad and Ugly" posts. Where I let it all hang out.

Some people ask me what a normal day with Zach is like. Well, that depends on what his OCD is focusing on at the time or what autistic quirks are showing themselves at the time. Since his recent "thing" is swearing, that's pretty much what a normal day is like with Zach right now.

I was just going through my video camera on the computer to download videos I wanted to save, make room on the camera and get rid of the ones I didn't want to keep. Every now and then, the kids will take the camera and it's always a surprise to me when I download videos. I get some keepers, for sure.

Here's one that Girly took. She was apparently spying on Zach so that she could bust him and tattle to David with video evidence in hand. Since they're at school right now, I can laugh without them hearing me.

Needless to say, this recent OCD behaviour with the swearing becomes a big issue in school and it's pretty much pointless to tell people in public that this is due to his autism and OCD because I don't always want to be labeling Zach and especially not in front of him. We're working on this, but we're at a loss at the moment. 

You have your fair warning. There's lots of f-bombs (that's his favorite cuss word) and other unsavory words.  In the meantime, welcome to my world! It can be frightening, hilarious, frustrating and rewarding all at the same time.

101 ways Zach finds to use the F-word...Way #3

We have a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses that come by on a regular basis. Probably for the past 5 or 6 years. We usually talk about crafts and family since that's what we have in common. A couple weeks ago, we were all really sick when they stopped by so they didn't stay. They came back this past Saturday and Zach happened to be outside while I was talking to them on the deck. The woman said, "The last time I came by, you were all so sick." That's when Zach piped up and said, "Yeah, it was because of all of those f*ckin' germs!" The JWs looked at me with a bit of a startled expression and I explained, "That's his thing lately." 

To top it all off, he let a huge fart rip off the deck and then laughed maniacally and said, "I FARTED!" 

They may or may not come back. It's tough to call on this one.

101 ways Zach finds to use the F-word...Way #2

My kiddos are both home today as they haven't been fever-free for 24 hours. They should be good to go back to school tomorrow. In the meantime, being home and having their normal routine disrupted by this yucky virus has turned them a bit bored and cranky with each other, even more than they usually are. 

Zach loves to watch "Dora the Explorer." He never got into it when Girly was in her "Dora Phase." Girly, being almost 11 years old now, thinks Dora is stupid and childish and Zach, at 12 years old, thinks the show is fascinating. 

After Zach watched an hour of Dora this morning, Girly wanted to turn the channel to something else. This is conversation that I was treated to:

Zach: But I want to keep watching Dora!

Girly: But you watched Dora for an hour already!

Zach: But I want to keep watching Dora!

Girly: I'm turning something else on. Dora is stupid.

Zach: But I want to keep watching Dora!

Girly: No, I'm watching something else.

Zach: But I want to keep watching Dora!

Girly: Too bad. I'm changing the channel.

Zach: Holy F&CK!

Girly: Mom! Zach dropped the F-Bomb!

 

Yes, welcome to my world and Zach's Way #2 to use the F-Word.

101 ways Zach finds to use the F-word...BIG FAT UGH

Remember when I said that I would be sharing the good, bad and ugly here? Well, here it is. My son has an affection for the F-word. A big affection. Not sure where he picked it up, though he did mention something about the high school kids on the back of the bus and the way the neighbor talks to their dog.

One of the quirks of Zach's autism is that he's all about cause and effect. I'm sure there are people that would think that some of the things Zach does is to be naughty but that's not usually the case. Much of what he does is because of cause and effect. Action and reaction. He wants to see what will happen if he does something. It doesn't matter if it was throwing the cat down the stairs when he was about 4 years old, flushing a dixie cup down the toilet when he was about 6 years old or using the f-word in social situations now as a 12 year old. Each thing he does has cause and effect, action and reaction. As he gets older, though, shock value is an added incentive.

It's hard not to snicker inside when you hear that word come out of your kid's mouth for the first time, but after a million times, it loses its humor. There are times, though, that Zach comes out with a new way to use the word and I laugh inside even though I do tell him that there are better ways to express himself. 

For instance...Way to use the F-Word #1:

The other day I told him that he could use other words in place of the F-word. Something like darn it, shoot or even things that Spongebob says: Barnacles! Fish Paste! (which he's done in the past). His response to me was, "But Mom, my mouth is in love with f&ck. It makes me feel better and makes me not so frustrated when I say it." This is the same response I get when he chews all the erasers off of every single pencil in the house. "But Mom, my teeth and mouth are so in love with erasers!" 

Really, that's just comparing apples to oranges, but I doubt he would get that concept. And seriously, how do you not laugh inside (or cover your mouth with your hand so he can't tell you're laughing) when something like the above comes out?