Squeaking the Mom Things in Late this Evening

It still cracks you up that your seven year old refers to your four year old's drawings as "potato people"....

...but it's less funny when you find one of these potato people sketched on the side of your washing machine. (But still a little bit funny.)

You know better than to leave stray pens lying around the house because...well...this happens:

You fear your daughter is going to become a graffiti artist when she gets older seeing as how from the moment she could form the letters, she began tagging all of her belongings with her name.

You are elated to realize that your expertise on how to make Nintendo work again has been passed on to the next generation - apparently blowing on the bottom of the game cartridge helps Leapster games work too.

It only takes a half-second glance at one photo of the bottom of your four year old's foot for you to make a mental note not to dress the kids in white socks the next time you go to Monkey Joe's.

Not unlike the temptation to throw a trash can in front of the speeding cars in your neighborhood, at drop-off and pick-up times at your son's school you must resist the urge to throw a bookbag at all of the parents who think they are too-cool-for-school-rules and do whatever the BLEEP they feel like no matter how potentially dangerous and undeniably rude it may be.

With each passing day you are further convinced that the reason God gave you children is to try to even-up the balance between truly terrible kids and pretty okay ones (like yours).

You can't help but be a little bit proud when your 20-month old's inexplicable climbing skills are the talk among the moms at Monkey Joe's.

Maybe it's because she's your third, but you think it's funny that your toddler has developed quite a taste for coffee, to the point that when she sees you drinking it, she runs to get a spoon so she can lap up some sips of her own.

You think you might have the only child in the world who asks if he can go home and research the water cycle before you even get to the car after school.  (Nerd.)

When your toddler locks herself in the pantry, you laugh at her and take a picture as she nonchalantly calls your name from the crack under the door, because why have kids if not for entertainment?

As much as you hated it when people touched your belly when you were pregnant, you find yourself resisting the urge to reach out and touch the cute little bellies when you see them.  It's just undeniably miraculous.  (And everyone else's bellies seem way cuter than yours did when you had to lug all of that around.)