Southern Wannabe

Thankful to be a Dineen

For the first time since 2003, we are spending Thanksgiving at my Dad and Alicia’s house and I cannot wait. Thanksgiving is my all time favorite holiday and I have the best memories of this holiday with my family. We have the best non-traditional traditions I think.

We’ve tended to kick the day off with champagne brunch.

We also do that for Christmas and Easter.......we likey the drinky.

One of the first years that Alicia made Thanksgiving dinner for us, she made croissants but they didn't rise. Instead they spread out and stayed really flat. They were just as delicious but they were flat. Because we are an especially sensitive crowd we laughed raucously and dubbed them flahssants. Get it? Flat + Croissants=Flahssants. Its spelled phonetically. We ask for them every year.

Another year my Dad sat down to the fully loaded Thanksgiving table, looked around in agitation and demanded to know where the jelly was. The rest of us were perplexed as nobody could recall there ever being jelly on the Thanksgiving table before. Nevertheless,  he swore there was supposed to be jelly on the table for the flahssants. At every Thanksgiving thereafter (and many other holidays and sometimes just for the hell of it), jelly is placed on the table and within sight of my Dad’s chair. We all take turns reminding him that the jelly is there.

Yet another year, my Dad passed a bowl of corn to my brother, Ryan. Ryan declined the corn, saying that he did not like corn. My dad stumbled over this,"You don't like corn!? Since when? You love corn!" The remainder of the meal was spent discussing how much Ryan had loved corn as a child. Each of us recalled specific times we had witnessed him eating corn. I think he might have finally agreed that he could tolerate creamed corn just to make us stop. From that point forward the bowl of corn is placed directly in front of Ryan and we take turns offering him servings.

My Grandma joined us for Thanksgiving a couple of times. One year, as my Dad served himself some candied yams, she warned him sternly not to eat too many yams. She recalled a time that he had gotten sick from eating too many yams. The rest of the family, of course, stored this information away on the spot. At the next Thanksgiving we all warned Dad not to eat too many yams. Lest he get sick. We still warn him to this day. He might forget!

It seems all our traditions are based on mocking each other.......I guess that's why we start off with champagne...

Whenever I talk about holidays with my family, Jeff likes to throw in the “remember when you all passed your Dad’s new gun around the table after Thanksgiving dinner?” and then I roll my eyes and correct him, “that was EASTER, get it right!”

Saucy

Anna just leaned over and have Denny a great big kiss on the forehead. As she sat back up she started screaming that Denny had bloody ouchies on his head.

I came a-running.

And found that her kiss had transferred spaghetti sauce from her face to his.

Whew.

Way better than the time I had to scrub pancake syrup out of his hair. Love is so messy.
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Honesty

Colored my hair today. Just asked Anna if she likes my new red hair. She said no. I asked why not. She said,"because I only like green."

Maybe next time....
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Au Contraire

Anna was more like a cat than a baby. She arrived, slept all day and all night, ate occasionally and generally kept to herself. When she did want attention she preferred Jeff, right from the very beginning. I was very relieved my her preference towards Jeff. I like my personal space and had worried that a baby would be too clingy and suffocating to me.

And along came Denny.

We call him The Mon Frere, as in,"Well good morning The Mon Frere, do tell me what has your diaper in a twist already?" Mon Frere means "my brother" in French. We butcher it with the "The" part because its my understanding that Americans are supposed to annoy the French at every opportinity and I like tradition.

The Mon Frere likes to co-sleep all up in my personal space.

 

 

The Mon Frere likes to have lots of attention at all times from everyone available.

 

The Mon Frere is awake all the live long day and many hours of the night.

And The Mon Frere favors me. He loves me so much that he wants to be right next to me all the time. 

 

Really, on paper, The Mon Frere sounds like he is a pure nightmare for me. But I cannot get enough of him. And he tolerates the Chicken Suit, which is key.

 
 
 

Altercation

Brody thinks Denny is delicious. We are always asking him to stop licking the baby. Thank goodness Denny is a good sport.

 

 
 
 

Skillz

At Anna's daycare there is a curb out in front of the front door. You can park 4-5 cars along the curb. There is a parking lot around the corner of the building for times when the curb is full. 8am drop off is prime time. The curb is often full or nearly full. When its full, I huff and puff like a good lazy assed American about having to park around the side of the building and lug the children into the building. Its a harrowing, I dunno, maybe 50 foot walk? Ish.

Now often when I pull up there is a spot available along the curb out front but it will require parallel parking. As most of the parents are driving big SUVs and minivans, these spots often get dismissed. After all who wants to deal with parallel parking a large vehicle when you could just park around the corner and walk 50 feet? See this is where my extreme laziness comes into play. To avoid walking that 50 feet I have become the MASTER at parallel parking a minivan.

I mean maybe the rest of these people don't have better things to do with their time but I gotta make a quick triple coupon run on my way to work and no parking spot is gonna get between me and my FREE KETCHUP.