For those of you who know me, this next statement will come as no surprise.   For those that don’t, please be patient.  It took me two weeks to figure out how to make this blog look and work like a blog.  I had so many starts and stops, erasures and “error” windows pop up.  And WordPress is supposed to be the easiest for techno-idiots like me. Let’s look at the facts, though.  I’m dangerous to computerized things.  I’m lucky I can make the microwave work without injury.  Just ask the husband.  I have caught a cookie on fire in the microwave without anything metal being involved.  We’re talking flames, people.  I have that kind of skill with anything digital.  And yet, here I am, spewing the fun that burns through my brain onto a digital format.  God save us all.

To be honest, though, I really just wanted to set this up to store my kid’s lives for embarrassing moments to be used against them during the dating years.  I’m willing to learn how to not make a computer smoke if I can use the knowledge to help my little minions and keep the paws of future bad boys and dirty little girls off my kids.  I’m THAT mom.

I titled this blog “Herding Chaos; Raising Evil Geniuses and the Scars Received.”  I thought about titling it “Herding kittens”, but let’s be honest, my kids aren’t kittens.  They are little Tazmanian devils on speed, chaos defined.  Ergo, the title should be self explanatory.   I have three kids.  Yes.  Three.  I can’t handle keeping a dog alive and someone upstairs thought I could handle three little humans and get them to adulthood without somehow causing serious damage to them, myself, or the national infrastructure.  I’ll try, but, damn it, no guarantees.  My kids are going to have scars to match the scars they give me, and God knows what the infrastructure will look like when I’m done.  If you value anything, hide it now.  The good news is my kids can use these experiences in their books when they grow up.  If I was any other mother, they would have nothing to write.

Now about having three kids, you’d be surprised how many times I hear “You have THREE kids?”  As if that number is poison.  I’m not a Dugger for G-D sake!  It’s not 22 kids!  It’s three!  Next time you meet the mother of three, do NOT act all surprised that she bothered to have three kids, as if that was irresponsible or wrong of her.  They are her kids.  She feeds and clothes them.  She’s not asking you for your help.  So get over the number three and move on.  Its not like she had a litter of kittens so you can stop treating her like she did.

A brief background…  We fought infertility for YEARS.  It took just under two years and lots of meds to get pregnant with our first… and she was born with cancer (you will probably see a rant related to that fun later in the blog.)  We had to get her through that before we started again, and even after she went into remission, it took another 3 years to make the second kid, with lots more, even worse meds that made me psycho.  Not psycho as in the movie.  Think more, screaming, crying, twitch, paranoid, angry psycho.  And no, that’s not me normally.  I’m not a psychopath.  I’m a high functioning Aspie, it’s different. 😛
We have 6+ years between #1 and #2.  After what amounted to over 5 years of blood-work and tests showing that I can’t get pregnant without LOTS of intervention, we figured we were safe after #2 to do nothing.  Yeah…  I know… stupid.   The day before our son’s first birthday I got a positive pregnancy test.

Don’t get me wrong AT ALL.  I always wanted three.  Dan (husband) has known this since we were engaged.  We just weren’t going to fight infertility a third time.  Those meds do horrible things to your body and I was over it already.   And I’m pretty sure Dan was over being married to the evil twin of the woman he married… (again, the meds make you NUTS).  So our third, a little girl, was PERFECT and wanted and all that, just very unexpected.  She finished the family for us… even though I probably shouldn’t have been trusted with any of the three of them.  (~wicked laugh~)

So here I am…. the mother of three  perfectly “normal” kiddos.  Notice the quotation marks… cause let’s be serious… in my family normal is not used in the standard manner.  We are colorful… as in “that crazy aunt you keep on the front porch to yell at the kids that walk on your grass” colorful.  Yup, that’s us.

My oldest is 7.  She is an arteeest (this is how she pronounces it and we just nod and say okay.).  She dresses like punky brewster on meth.  But she’s so darn cute that it’s hard to correct it.  She’s opinionated, smart, witty, sweet, sensitive, and can be a mean little snot sometimes.  Her name is Sophie.  Lately she has been trying to change it to Tempee (her middle name. Shut up, you aren’t paying to raise her, you don’t get a vote on her name.) Yes, another way that she is announcing her arrival to the world as a strong, independent, colorful woman.  I’m trying to change what I call her, but God help me, I’m starting to resort to calling her “small” as a cute nickname cause it’s just easier to remember.

My middle child is a son named Archer, and he’s 2, but no, he’s not in his terrible twos.  We’ve been lucky so far.  His sister picked his name out of a list of names that we gave her, and it fits his personality perfectly.  He’s a miniature fighter.  He’s a hugger and a tank and has no idea that he’s twice the size of most 2 year old boys (my husband is a beast of a man with a gushy computer geek center… he will probably be the fall guy in most of these posts).  Archer running tackles his 7 year old sister and takes her down.   Every time.  He’s like Bam-Bam without the cute girlfriend… and it had better stay that way.

Our little one is Vivi.  She is 7 months old and just coming into her personality.  I get the feeling that she’s going to be the quiet, sweet one.  She snuggles and will talk in babble to me to get my attention, but unlike her sister who was shot from a cannon at birth and loved everyone she ever saw, Vivi wants her momma and that’s it and anyone else is wrong in more ways than she can vocalize in baby curse words.  She, also, is twice the size of most 7 month-olds.  Seriously… seeing her sitting next to an 8 month old little boy at school, it looked the Eiffel Tower sitting next to that miniature Eiffel Tower from Law Vegas.  Kinda comical.  I kinda feel bad for that boy.  If Vivi stays in his class, she’s going to wipe the floor with his teeny little bottom.

So this is my little introduction to my minions.  The little sweeties that have a streak of evil running through them (care of momma, cause daddy is too nice to have spread anything evil through his kids).  AND I have successfully made a blog post without a fire or the accidental wiping of some database 800 miles away (I’ve done that before…. story for another time.)  Sooo I’m going to go get myself a cookie, pat myself on the back, and log off now before I do something inadvertent like launch a nuke or something.   These are legitimate worries, people.  Legitimate worries.