Category Archives: flashbacks

Flashback: Malt-o-meal

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I’m a grown woman. With children of my own.
Isn’t it funny how our childhood messes with the way we raise our own children. Even in little ways.
Case in point…

I don’t like oatmeal, or malt-o-meal. It’s a throwback to childhood. And, as an adult hasn’t ever been something I think about.
But, my son made himself a bowl of coco-wheats.
You know the kind.
Like chocolate malt-o-meal. It really is delicious. I just don’t make it.

At the store he says…
“Mom, why don’t you make Coco-Wheats? You know we like them.”
I have to tell him that it’s because of lame reasons and he can get a box and make them…himself.

Fast forward to the next morning…
He follows the directions on the box and makes himself a bowl of Coco-Wheats. But ignores the part about stirring. Doesn’t stir, just dumps everything in and leaves.

“Ewwww….it’s lumpy, and gross.” Piles of uncooked wheats lump together in the bowl. It’s not nice. At all.

THERE IT IS…
the memory.

My 10 year old son gets to experience in a small way my mornings as a child where we had some version of the dump and don’t stir malt-o-meal.
And now I know exactly what it was my mom did wrong.
She didn’t stir. At all. Ever. Never. Not. One. Single. Day.

Oh the horrors. And the joy of my child getting a similar experience.

 

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sibling1

At some point I will be able to write about the last few weeks.
Right now, my brain is spinning. Although, I recognize my family brings drama and crazy in mass amounts I am still shocked again and again at the new records that are set in the drama department.

For now, let me tell you a story…

One upon a time there were many small children living in a small home.
These small children weren’t allowed to watch television.
But…they heard of the legend of Letterman.
They heard that when the children were put away for the night…the adults were able to turn on the beloved t.v. and watch this legend.

So, they devised a plan and put it in practice for much of the remainder of their childhood in that home…

1. the children went to bed nicely. no whining, no complaining, no stalling.

2. when their parents came to check on them…they pretended to be asleep. they learned the art of drooling, deep breathing, and dead limbs. one of the siblings became a master at hanging their arm over the top bunk as if it were dead weight. worked every time. he was a hero.

3. when their parents settled into the couch and turned on the t.v., it was time…

4. the siblings quietly crept down stairs, around the corner and behind the couch.

5. they sat on the dining room chairs (which were behind the couch) and the 10, 8, 6, and 5 year olds became Letterman fans.

Were they ever found out? Sometimes they were heard creeping down the stairs. But, one sibling always acted as if it was just them…a lone rogue child. Better to sacrifice a single sometimes then the whole forever. But, getting to the dining room meant you were home free. If the parents acted like they were getting up…we just quietly went through the kitchen and back up the stairs.

So, if you were to peek into our home on a weeknight at say…11pm… you might see a living room with a couple adults on the couch oblivious to the 4 children silently watching behind them. Maybe you could sneak them some popcorn? That would be lovely, thank you.

 

clean mouths and broken spatulas.

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sibling1

“what’s the worst punishment you can remember as a kid?”

my kids asked me this recently. probably after receiving the naughty step or grounding.

so, I didn’t answer them truthfully. they are kids. they have no concept of some things.
so, I searched my brain for something tame and kid friendly…

“drinking dish soap”

they were horrified. oops, I guess that isn’t tame. I tried again.

“having spatula’s broken on my butt”

again, not a good choice.

“having my nail polish taken away?”

whew…that was met with horror. of a good kind.

My kids just aren’t ready for the hard stuff.
Now, my childhood is over. It’s done. and we have no intention of dragging anything out that is unhealthy.

But… we view our consumption of vast amounts of dish soap as funny.

If we said something inappropriate, sassed off, or any number of things we had to drink dish soap. of the liquid variety.
Lucky for me, it rarely happened.
Not so for my brothers.
It’s a wonder they ever got sick…that had to have had the cleanest mouths around!

And the number of spatula’s broken on my brothers behinds must be a record! (do they keep that sort of record)
It was funny.
See, you can only “spank” so hard with a cooking spatula. They often bend (sending us into giggles…NOT a good idea when you are supposed to be acting apologetic). They deliver hardly any pain (again…don’t EVER mention this) and best of all…
they break.
the little flippy end just flies right off!
So, you are in the middle of a whupping with a cooking spatula pretending to be in pain and whoooooppp there goes the spatula. You try not to giggle. It’s darn funny.
I had a brother that had so many spatulas broke on his behind that I think we started keeping a record. And he was proud that he held the title.

So, although my kids don’t understand the humor…we are able to find humor.
Clean mouths and broken spatulas.
the stuff are childhood was made of.

Lawsuits

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Once upon a time…our mom tried to sue my work.

I guess that isn’t completely rediculous.  I mean, people sue each other all the time in the U.S.  She claimed that she stepped on a nail in the parking lot one time when she was coming to visit me, and it caused her nerve damage in her foot that had to be fixed via several surgeries.

A good reason to sue if she had been telling the truth.

But she lied.  I was with her the WHOLE time she visited.  No nails. No blood.  No screaming.  She drove off unharmed.

At some point before she got home, she’d managed to do everything she claimed happened at my worksite. (Sibling 1 has a great story about that!)  I have no idea how, she apparently has mad skills in the destruction category.

So she gets a lawyer, contacts my work, and threatens to file a suit if they don’t pay her.

My bosses were afraid to ask me about it,  but were really thankful they did.  ‘Cause I laughed out loud.

I mean; really?!

When I called my mom to ask her what the heck she was thinking, she actually said, “You remember, the nail that got in my foot…maybe you don’t, I didn’t want to make a big deal about it at the time.”

When I didn’t budge, she decided not to sue.

Childhood games…good times

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Coming from a large family has it’s advantages, one of the biggest being the awesome games we were able to play growing up.  I mean, how many kids can play kick ball or baseball without having to recruit the entire neighborhood?

Here’s my personal list of gaming favorites:

6. Mailman:  I really have no idea why we liked this game so much.  We would all just hole up in separate rooms and designate one person to carry letters back and forth between us.  That’s it!  It occupied us for hours at a time.

5. Sneaky-sneakiness:  I don’t know if an actual game was involved in this, but we would sneak around our property all the time.  We would wade through marshes, army crawl in the mud, do awesome summersaults between buildings, and anything else we thought was “sneaky”.

4. Rubber band wars: We would buy a huge bag of rubber bands, flip the couches in the living room over, and go crazy.  The younger ones (yep, that meant me!) had the mission of entering no-man’s land to collect fallen missiles to bring back to our separate strong holds.

3. Snowball fights: We used to play this great hostage version where one team would hole up in a barn or other outbuilding and try to hit everyone on the other team before the hostage was freed.  If the hostage was hit the game ended with both teams losing.  I tried to be the hostage (snowballs hurt!).

2. Lawyer & Wedding: You’ve already heard about that here.

1. RISK:  I know, this is a strange game for young children to enjoy playing, but we did!  We would set the game up on the porch and spend days playing… (insert evil, dramatic video game voice from one of those shoot-em-up death games)…”global domination“.  It was epic.

a dress and a tricycle.

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The girls wore dresses as children.
It was part of our “religion”.
Nothing against that part of religion.
Okay, that’s a lie. I think it’s stupid.
But…people believe what they believe. And it’s their right.

But…an image that is both funny and sad…

A 4 year old little girl… a tomboy through and through.
Desperately wanting to pedal her tricycle across the sidewalk.
Impaired by her dress. Getting in the wheels.

No, she can’t put on pants or shorts and play.

Girls wear dresses. Not drive tricycles.

Shock and Awe.

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After 11 Siblings, I shouldn’t have been surprised that there would be a Sibling 12.

I was.

In fact, I was so surprised I went into labor.

No joke.

6 hours after I was told about the upcoming Sibling 12…
My kid#1 was born.

I was shocked.

Stupid me. Nothing this family does should shock me.

Weird Churches

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Our family church-hopped quite a bit growing up.  Here’s a listing of some of the really off-the-wall congregations we were part of for different lengths of time:

1) Cults-R-Us. Yep, the government considers it one.  It had really crazy rules, expected everyone to give most of their paychecks to support it, and believed caffeine was a stimulant that needed to be avoided, along with fast food and pastuerized milk.  Oh, and you couldn’t tell “outsiders” what happened within the church.

2) Adoption-central.  They didn’t call themselves that, but it would be a fitting name.  It was generally understood that you could only be a “real” part of this church if you had adopted.  Anyone else was a second-rate Christian.  Our family got by this rule because we already had so many kids 🙂

3) Hat-head.  Once again, not actually what they called themselves.  But women sat on one side of the church, wearing head coverings, and couldn’t be involved in any part of the service in any way.  Women were mute.  I don’t think this church liked me very much…

4) Sex-on-the-mind.  These people were so concerned about people thinking about sexual things, that even the little kids’ Sunday School hours were separated by gender.  I mean, really? Do you really think that my first-grade mind was thinking of doing THAT with the little boy a few rows forward in church?  That’s just wrong!

5) Warriors Against Satan.  Every sermon, bible study, and conversation with this church eventually became a dire warning against allowing Satan a place to enter into your life.  Beware!  Be on alert!  Don’t let him in!

Because that’s exactly what my plan was in the first place.  I was right on the verge of saying “oh, Satan…?  Would you pretty, pretty please come into my life and destroy absolutely everything you possibly can.  I would be most grateful.”  It’s such a good thing you warned me not to do that!  Whew!  That was close.

Serious Note: This post is not meant to be offensive to Christians.  Sibling 1 and I are both Christians, and attend churches in our home areas.  But the religious history is part of our family story, and there really are some pretty weird and creepy churches out there.  That’s just the truth.  Hopefully you don’t belong to one.

Lucky Charms=Evil

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So, based on earlier posts, you should have gotten the general idea that our family held some…interesting…religious beliefs.  One of those had to do with luck, magic, and really pretty much anything else “whimsical”.  They were forbidden.  No exceptions.

Harry Potter was from the devil.

Snow White, Cinderella, and the Swan Princess were only slightly less evil.

Wishing someone “Good Luck” was considered just as bad a throwing the F-word around.

And Lucky Charms could never enter the house.  They might corrupt our innocent young minds.  Those devious little marsmallows, looking all sunny and delicious!  What trickery!

I watch all the Harry Potter movies at least once a year now. Mwa-ha-ha (that’s my evil, rebellious laugh if you can’t tell).

cargo van

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All this talk about Geo’s has me remembering pre-Geo…

the cargo van.

It was gray.

and old.

without seats.

and bad tires.

and we all rode in it.

without belts.

in winter.

in fact…

Sibling #1 learned how to drive in it.

in winter.

sigh.