If you missed part 1, read it here.

Ty’s first day of kindergarten was filled with highs and lows (the lows can all be attributed to Fefe). There was excitement as well as sadness and a little bit of anger mixed in too.  Most kindergarten first days run pretty smoothly, ours resulted in us getting kicked out of the school. Read on to hear all about it.

As you can tell from the vid, Ty was pumped & ready to go bright and early in the morning.  His comment about not wanting to be small in school actually struck a nerve with me and I’ll be addressing it in a later blog post.  What you couldn’t see from the video however is the excitement of the other members of our family.  Fefe got up super early, willingly I might add, and cooked a big breakfast for the whole family to send Ty off for his big day with plenty of nutrients.  Little does she know, she has now painted herself in a corner because I’ve been begging for breakfast before work for months now and she’s always “too tired” to wake up early enough to do it.  Well well well missy, if you can do it for Ty, then you can do it for me!!!

Continuing on, after breakfast the entire team got ready for the required photo op:

Let's Go Already

I Can Already See Tears

During the picture taking, Tre must have felt a tad bit left out & ran upstairs to get a book bag for himself.  Even though he wasn’t going to school, he was ready for the cameras and looking the part of a school boy nonetheless. 

Tre's All Set To Go

When it comes to event planning, Fefe should be avoided at all costs!  She was in charge and running point for the big day and had two MAJOR snafu’s.  First up, I don’t know if she was just eager to get rid of the boy or her excitement took over her better judgment; whatever the case, her timing for drop off was all screwed up.  She was well aware of the fact that the first bell rang at 8:45am, but for some unknown reason, she got us there at 8:20.  Okay, 25mins isn’t all that bad.  Yeah, it’s not that bad until you end up getting kicked out of the school.  What type of message does that send to Ty?  Kicked out on his first day? He’s destined to fail with a start like that! 

It wasn’t so bad, we were simply asked to wait outside until the bell rang because students aren’t actually allowed inside until first bell.  I thought that this “suggestion” was just a little too well timed however, because it came immediately after Tre threw a fit regarding going to pee in the potty.  Never mind the fact that he had already peed twice in a matter of 5 mins, he wanted to go again and made sure the entire school knew it.

Once our reprimand had been lifted, we entered the school and took Ty to his classroom.  After a quick paperwork check in, we were all giving hugs and saying our goodbyes.  Once Ty was completely covered with slobbery kisses, we sent him off to enjoy his first day; the kid didn’t bat an eye as he left us to walk into his class.  Everyone was prepared to let Ty take his first steps towards being a big kid; well everyone except Tre.   

The Kindergarten Mugshot

Fefe's Face Intentionally Cut Off; Too Many Tears

Tre began to express his desire to accompany Ty as he walked away heading towards his class.  We explained that Ty had to go to school to do work and Tre gets to go home and play with Mommy.  He didn’t care and fired back “Daddy, I got book bag, I go to school too”.  The little guy said it with such conviction that for a split second I actually was under the impression that a book bag was the only prerequisite for attending Kindergarten.  Luckily, Fefe was front and center to pick up the slack and enticed him with the promise of a popsicle at home.  He agreed to the terms and we were off.

Remember those snafus that I told you about?  Well the second one occurred when it was time to pick Ty up from the bus stop.  Fefe had the “bright” idea to walk to the bus stop to pick him up.  It’ll be nice she said, we can hear all about his day on the walk home she said.  Yeah, it would have been really nice IF IT WASN’T 97 DEGREES out!  After walking in blistering heat, and subsequently standing in the sun for 15 mins because the bus was late, Ty finally arrived & we were all pumped to hear about his day.  Unfortunately, it didn’t play out that way.  All Ty was concerned about was getting out of the heat and vowed not to say a word until we met his demands of air conditioning and ice cold water (we’re gonna have to work on his negotiating skills).

Once we got back home, Ty explained his day to us and it went something like this:

Me: So how was school?

Ty: It was GREAT!

Fefe: What did you do?

Ty: We did a bunch of stuff!

Fefe: Like what?

Ty:  Like, um, like, well a bunch of stuff

This banter carried on for a bit longer, eventually we were able to squeeze out that they watched 4 episodes of Clifford the Big Red Dog until the bell rang, went to the playground, he made 2 friends, they ate lunch, he colored some pictures but couldn’t bring them home, he can’t wear his Silly Bandz (thank God), the bus ride home was long, they read a book, and learned a new song.

Yup, that was pretty much his day in a nutshell, well actually it wasn’t in a nutshell for us because these little bits of information just kept spewing out periodically throughout the day.  There was no rhyme, reason, or cohesion to his story, but it was his story and he was proud of it!

A Quarter Can Change The World

Allow me to take you back, back in time to a place when things were much much simpler.  Close your eyes for a moment and imagine…wait a minute, if you close your eyes, how can you read this post? Okay scratch that, keep your eyes open and imagine your oh so wonderful childhood, when you had not a care in the world.  Ah the good ole days right, a bag of chips cost 25 cents, summer actually meant 2 entire months of freedom.  Yeah, life was a lot easier back then and as much as we’d like to stay young forever, it’s not very feasible.  However, when there are kids around, you can be forever young, reliving your special memories through them.  That’s what happened to me the other day, Tre made a comment that showed my exactly how simplistic his world view is and it’s been the highlight of my week, possibly the whole month.

A few days ago, I get a call from Fefe while I’m at work. It was a short call, straight to the point: “You better bring home a quarter, gotta go”.  Just read that sentence for a moment; now imagine how baffled I was on the other end of the line listening to it.  I’ve recently introduced Fefe to the joys of one of my favorite television shows, “The Wire” so I thought this was some half-ass joke. Maybe she was pretending our phones were tapped and she was talking in code to set up a drug deal?  Whatever the case, I spent way more time than I should have trying to determine what was going on.  Completely stumped, I pushed it out of my mind and carried on.  Until I got a text while on my way home: “You get the quarter?” Okay, enough is enough, somebody’s gonna explain to me what’s going on here!

So I called her and demanded that she explain all of this quarter talk that she had been rambling about throughout the day. She gladly obliged and told me about a conversation that she had with Tre earlier in the day.

Tre: “Mommy, Daddy at work?”

Fefe: “Yes baby, Daddy’s at work”

Tre: “Daddy went to work to get quarters”

Fefe: “huh?”

Tre: “Daddy went to work to get green quarters for me, that’s why Daddy at work”

Fefe:  “Yes baby, you’re right.  That’s exactly why Daddy’s at work”

If you don’t speak toddler, that gibberish may not make a lot of sense to you, what Tre was trying to say is that Daddy goes to work to get quarters so that he can buy green gumballs.  How green gumballs became green quarters, I have no clue.  Quite frankly, I’m a little disturbed by the fact that I’m actually able to translate such things.  Maybe Tre has been watching “The Wire” and has learned to speak in code better than we have. 

I’m not sure how this kid already knows to associate me going to work with money, but somehow he has learned a basic understanding of the way the world works.  However flawed his understanding may be, the concept has been instilled in him.  The more I thought about it, the more it made me smile.  At two years old, the little guy has learned that his Daddy must leave him every day for several hours and go to “work” to bring home quarters to buy gumballs with.  It’s still taking a little bit of time to get use to the fact that my son is willing to pimp me out for 8-10hrs a day to receive a lousy quarter.  But you see, that’s really the beauty of it all.  At his age, a quarter is all he needs to satisfy his wants and the fact that Daddy has to work all day to get that quarter is acceptable because it’s what’s important to him at this point in time.  As he grows older, what’s important will change and become more complicated; with that change comes stress, worries, and disappointments.  So I hope he holds onto this simplistic outlook on life for as long as he can.  As long as he does, I’ll be happy to slave the day away for quarters to make my little guy happy.

I’ve learned something from this encounter with Tre.  When the weight of the world is on your shoulders, and things are becoming too much to handle, just think back to when times were a lot simpler, when your biggest worry was getting a quarter for the gumball machine.  Something that seems so trivial now, was actually very important to you way back then, and you somehow found a way to carry on, whether you got that quarter or not.  So while your current troubles may seem enormous to you now, in the future you may look back on them as being nothing more than a quarter in the gumball machine.

Wow, so today is August 6, 2010 and that means that it has been one complete year since my first post here at Daddy’s Fish Bowl. Now normally I would make a huge deal out of this, pop champagne, and break out the noise makers. You guys would send all types of lavish gifts to congratulate me on my 1 year blogversary and we would all party like it’s 1999 (wait, is that saying still relevant?) Well hold on to all of your presents because I’m not making a big stink about it due to the fact that I took a 6 month hiatus. It doesn’t really seem proper to celebrate an anniversary if you’ve only been together half of the year. So today is just another regular day in the blogosphere for me. Maybe next year we can have a party.

Don’t get all down and out just yet however, because today is special for a much greater reason. Today is Fefe’s birthday, so that’s more than reason enough to party and celebrate!!! So with that said, I’m going to step away from the computer and go enjoy some quality time with my wife for her birthday. As a parting gift, I leave you with an original poem that I wrote and “performed” for her, which describes how truly special she is.

I Love You Babe, Happy Birthday!!!!

So you know how the old saying goes: “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas”. Well, you guys know me, I don’t abide by those rules, my life is an open book for you, the reader, and Vegas is no exception. So I’m getting ready to give you all the nitty gritty, down & dirty details of my recent Vegas trip! And I do mean everything. Prostitutes, check! Vegas scams, check! Staying up until the wee hours of the night, check!!! This trip was one to be remembered, unfortunately not for the typical reasons that you may think.

Now that I’ve got your attention, & you’ve popped the popcorn & settled in to read this graphic “tell all” post about our wild and crazy Vegas adventure, I have to let you know that it was anything but wild & crazy. It was more like tame & lazy. I said this trip was one to remember & it was, because it truly showed me how much I’ve changed in these short few years since children have become a part of my life.

I listed a few crazy activities at the beginning of this post, followed by a check to signify that they occurred. But now with the revelation that this trip was anything but hot & steamy, you may be feeling cheated, like I lied to you. Well rest assured, your resident Daddy blogger has the utmost respect for you guys & continues to keep his dignity intact. There were prostitutes involved in this trip; I grabbed several calling cards from the street vendors for inclusion in Fefe’s upcoming scrapbook. So we did have somewhat of an encounter with the ladies of the night. Also, there was definitely a Vegas scam being run. Unfortunately, I was the recipient & not the conductor (more on this later).

This all feeds into my realization of how much I’ve changed (in my mind for the better). During my only other Vegas trip, I was essentially a vampire; sleeping during the day, partying all night & then scurrying back to the hotel as the sun came up. This time around, I was a full blown tourist, waking up at the crack of dawn to go see the sights, & barely staying awake past midnight. During my last trip, I got hustled by a tag team of strippers (a story for another time that I’ll never tell). This time, I got hustled by street vendors while I was attempting to get my son a great souvenir (See Vids Below). This trip, I went to see a few of the shows Vegas has to offer. Cirque du Soleil’s “O” & The Price is Right were both awesome & I highly recommend them, even though the Price is Right gets added to the long list of Vegas scams in my book. But the point is, this time around, I did old people stuff (sorry old people) and went to view some of the shows Vegas is famous for, while during my last visit, we basically created our own show which could have made Vegas famous had it not already been a world renown city.

Video #1 – Street Vendors Performance: So as we were walking the strip, we ran across this ultra cool demonstration of a “magical” pet. As you can see from the vid, it follows you everywhere.  I immediately thought how cool it would be for Ty and purchased it after a quick “tutorial”.

Video #2 – Ty’s Performance: Boy oh boy was I disappointed when we got it home and found out the stupid thing was just attached to a string, did you see a string in that damn video? I sure didn’t!  Suprisingly, Ty still loved it and is convinced that he’s a master magician now, although after watching his performance you may choose to disagree, lol. Enjoy.

All in all, this was a great way to celebrate the wife’s birthday. We had a great time seeing the sights and hanging out with friends.  It was also damn nice to get away from the kids for a bit, but to be honest, I really missed them.  As much as I tried not to admit it, those little buggers were on my mind constantly, as witnessed by my FaceTime calls every time I got around some free wifi.  Vegas showed me many things this time around, but most importantly, it showed me that I’m a Dad and being a Dad is what I love to do. Things that used to excite me, just don’t anymore. At first I was saddened by this fact, but when I really think about it, there’s nothing to be sad about. I have an entire new catalog of things that excite me now and they all stem from Ty & Tre.  When you compare those two little guys to clubs, gambling, and strippers, I say Ah, Vegas, you can keep that stuff, I’ve got all the excitement I need.

Good morning everyone, hope you all had a great night’s sleep and are feeling well rested this morning! Yeah, well if you did, then at least someone was able to obtain a peaceful night’s sleep, because I surely wasn’t able to! Guess what, it wasn’t because of our resident terrorist either. Tre wasn’t the culprit this time, it was Fefe, as often times it is! Read on as I take you through a tale of deceit, horror, and brutality! Well actually, I’m just going to talk about how Fefe acts out her dreams in the middle of the night. Nonetheless, it should still be pretty entertaining.

The clip you are about to hear was recorded at 2:15am a few weeks ago, it is 2:13 in length and the second clip was recorded at 2:18am. Although the clip implies that I was causing harm to Fefe, I can assure you that I was merely laying in the bed holding my phone.

Fefe’s Nightmare

The Aftermath

Let me start by saying it wasn’t always like this! I don’t know if in the beginning of our relationship she had some secret formula that suppressed her urge to talk to herself and attack me during my sleep; if there was such a thing, Fefe, I implore you to stop at our closest Wal-greens and get a refill. Maybe now that we’re married, she feels comfortable enough to let her true demons shine through. I don’t know, but I still love her all the same even through all the bruises and verbal abuse that I endure.

Casualty Of War? NO, Casualty Of Fefe's NIGHTMARES

It started off simple, a few quiet laughs throughout the night while she was sleep, and then gradually escalated into full blown arguments with HERSELF. Have you ever witnessed someone in a screaming match over the phone? You know, you can only hear one side of the conversation, but you can tell whatever the other person is saying is really pushing the buttons of whomever you’re observing? Now imagine that same scenario: in bed, without a phone, at 4am. Not really the type of things sleepovers are made of is it? It’s really a sad case when I’m the only one in the house who REQUIRES a nightlight to feel safe when going to bed. That nightlight is a 36” TV. Fefe sometimes gets annoyed with me because I never go to sleep without the television on, little does she know, it’s for my own safety and protection. Without that TV, going through this type of madness in pitch black during the wee hours of the morning would be detrimental to any sane person’s metal wellness.  Let’s just say that monsters don’t live under my bed, they live on top of it.

Let’s take last night for instance; while it has been one of the “milder” incidents, it was still wildly frightening. We both had pretty long days so after we got home from our bowling league, Fefe went straight to bed around 10:15pm. I on the other hand, refuse to go to bed before midnight, regardless of what my body is telling me. I drifted off to sleep a little after 12, only to be snapped out of my precious beauty sleep by a very loud grunting noise. Since I don’t have audio of the grunting, just picture the really buff dude at your local gym as he strains to bench press 400lbs. So I hear the “buff dude popping a neck vein” noise and immediately sit up, because of my “nightlight” I quickly discern that we aren’t under attack. As I lay back down, I hear the following:

Fefe: “Oooooh, you getting on my nerves right now!”

Me: “huh?”

Fefe: “Say something else and I swear….”

Me: “huh?”

Fefe: “See that’s it, I can’t take this no more, you’re gonna be really sorry now!”

Me: “Who’s gonna be sorry?”

Fefe: “YOU ARE (in a freakishly scary tone), you keep making me so mad right now”

Me: (preparing to defend myself from eminent attack) “I’m sorry babe”

Fefe: …..*snoring*

And OF COURSE, as always, this morning she has no recollection of the previous night events. I’m seriously considering going “Paranormal Activity” style and set up a video recorder in our bedroom (no, not for that reason, you dirty minded people), to show her the type of abuse I endure throughout the night. Some people have a bad night’s sleep and wake up and say “Feels like I got beat up in my sleep” well in my case, on any given night, that could actually be a true statement. Please keep me in your thoughts.

To be fair, when Fefe does start talking to herself, I often egg her on and have a conversation with her while she’s sleeping. Most times, it provides great comic relief before bed, but sometimes it all goes wrong and I end up getting attacked. Serves me right I guess.

Fefe's First Harvest

As you can see from the vid, tomatoes really aren’t my thing, but I love my wife & support her in all that she does. So I bit the bullet & bit the tomato. Contrary to my facial expressions, it was the best tomato that I’ve tasted in my lifetime. Keep in mind that I have only eaten but a handful of tomatoes in my life & each time there was literally a shotgun pointed in my direction with the threat of violence. Okay, not a shotgun, but a small handgun can also cause significant damage.

All kidding aside, she really has done a great job. I should have recorded a video of the first time I ate the green beans from the garden, they were excellent. Most of the things that she planted, I honestly don’t care for, but those green beans could keep on coming and you’d never hear me complain. It’s been a fun experience so far, watching her get so excited when crops sprout up, I honestly don’t think there is anyone who could have been happier about a measly 20 peas. Don’t believe me, just look at the picture below. She was so ecstatic that her peas had popped up that waiting was not an option. Those peas would be picked, cooked, and ate all within a span of 12hrs. Remember, there are 4 of us in this family, do you have any idea how unsatisfying it is to eat only FIVE peas? Well actually, Fefe & I had 6 peas a piece. We cut the boys rations down a bit since we’re the ones who put in all the hard work, damn right WE were gonna enjoy the fruits of our labor, literally.

She actually cooked this smh

So as it turns out, my wife does actually have a green thumb. She loves her garden and is quite good at it, so I applaud her and all of her efforts. She’s successfully harvested green beans, peas (regardless of the quantity, peas were harvested), lettuce, cucumbers, and a cantaloupe is just about ready to be picked. She’s even given out a few cucumbers to friends and lo and behold we’re all still alive and kicking! Besides the upset stomachs that Tre and I have, everything’s been exceptionally painless. Matter of fact, for the sake of continued praise to my wife; let’s just say that stomach bug that Tre & I caught was totally unrelated to her garden.

We went from this

TO THIS!!! Great Job Babe

Should of got me an iPad for Father's Day

So yesterday was Father’s Day huh?  The one day of the year were Dads around the world are given unanimous appreciation for their efforts as father’s.  For me, Father’s Day is always a great and special day (because I love getting gifts, lol).  However, this Father’s Day ended in pain and suffering and with me being all alone.  That description sounds somewhat similar to the type of information that I was receiving from my Twitter timeline and Facebook feed,   It appears that Father’s Day isn’t a great holiday for everyone, I witnessed a lot of male bashing, which is probably well deserved, but it definitely showed me The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly of Father’s Day.  Since, my day started off great, but didn’t end in the same fashion, it seems like that good, bad, and ugly trend that I noticed on social media in reference to Father’s Day isn’t only restricted to bad Dads.

THE GOOD

It's our house. The windows are pics of the familhy

Well my day started off with the relaunch of this site, which was excellent! The response and support from all of you guys was exceptional and I honestly appreciate it.  Things only got better from there, once the wife and kids woke up, I was showered with hugs & kisses (after a short delay) as well as Father’s Day wishes and an exceptional amount of attention.  The wife cooked breakfast, and the kids showed off their gifts, one of which is pictured above. Things were going great, I felt like the King of my castle and was loving every minute.  The boys and I had an awesome wrestling session and played with cars, action figures, and play tools; you know, all the activities that great Dad’s are made of.  After that, I was allowed to enjoy a nice PS3 session, courtesy of Fefe occupying the kids time. I was under the impression that things couldn’t get any better.  Then it happened, the wife told me that she was taking me to HOOTER’S for lunch!!!! WOW, so it’s Father’s Day and my reward is to look at chics in skimpy outfits without detrimental consequence?  Plus I was promised a nice Angus beef steak dinner and massage to top off the night! Does it get any gooder than that? I don’t think so! (I know “gooder” isn’t a word, but it fits with the theme of the post, so roll with it)

THE BAD

A grown man with Silly Bandz? SMH, FML

Let me explain something here, the good, bad, and ugly don’t always come in that exact order. In my case :”the bad” started on Saturday and didn’t get really bad until the evening of Father’s Day. I received a package from my mom on Saturday and while I thought this would be a nice gift to celebrate my upcoming day, it turned out to be another prank in our long going feud (to be later explained in a future post).  As soon as I opened the package, I knew it was going to be a problem.  She sent me a card, but for some reason it was really puffy and soft, that could only mean one thing; my mom had done the unthinkable and sent me a pack of Silly Bandz for Father’s Day. She knows that I despise those stupid things so she got a kick out of hearing of my reaction when opening them.  The Silly Bandz were bad, but it was a good joke that I could live with.  What I couldn’t live with was the fact that Fefe through manipulation of our child, Ty, forced me to wear them on Father’s Day.  I think the things look completely ridiculous on kids so imagine the shame and embarrassment that I felt while walking around with these brightly colored rubber bands around my wrist.  Matter of fact, you don’t have to imagine, just look at the pic, it’s written all over my face!

THE UGLY

This is where things got really bad! We decided to have a nice family night out at putt putt to celebrate Father’s Day. It started out great, besides the fact that I was wearing a rainbow of rubber bands on my arm that was cutting off my circulation.  Our local putt putt spot was running a special where Dads got to golf free. The weather was great, and I was with my family, what else could I ask for?  Well I guess I should have asked for my wife to be blessed with the reflexes of a ninja because the first swing of the game ended up being the last!  This was Ty’s first miniature golf outing and Fefe was busy demonstrating the proper golf swing technique used by all of the greats.  After the demo, she moved to the side and prepared to watch Ty make history!  Well he almost made her history as he proceed to swing his club as if he was in the US Open.  Ty completely missed the ball, the putter continued moving forward until it connected with Fefe’s right temple.  It was extremely frightening, it happened so fast that I didn’t know exactly what happened.  After ensuring that Fefe was still breathing and giving her a 20 question quiz, we headed home and she went to sleep.  Ty and I worked on a super special get well soon card for Fefe and shortly after I put the kids in bed and was all alone for Father’s Day.  Instead of my steak dinner, I had left overs.  Instead of sipping fine wine, I drank cheap vodka.  Instead of a massage, I let the dog walk on my back. Yeah, to end Father’s Day in a manner such as that is quite ugly indeed.  But I’m thankful that my wife is okay and wasn’t badly injured, plus you have to love Ty’s thoughtfulness of his card, so I guess the good prevailed!

Can you decipher the message? "GET WELL SOON MOMMY"

No, this post isn’t going to be about some newly discovered venereal disease that I contracted during a recent trip to Tijuana.   I haven’t been to Tijuana in years, so that would be old news (I kid).  Instead, this post is about turning even the smallest event into an educational opportunity that can be used to teach kids something new and exciting.  These chances pop up every so often and if you’re not careful you can definitely miss them.  So keep your creativity hats on at all times; because to the untrained eye, bodily fluids may not seem like the best tool to use for teaching a pre-schooler, but by putting a little spin on it, they can learn something new and have fun doing it.

It all started with Fefe and her superwoman cleaning abilities. Sidenote: Fefe is like a new age Mary Poppins or something, the kids demolish the house everyday and yet she still manages to have it sparkling when I get home. I tell her to just let it be, it’s a waste of energy, but somehow she turns the chaos created by the boys into a normal looking home. It’s still a mystery to me, but she won’t tell her secrets.  Okay, back to the story: Fefe decided to get some of those toilet bowl things that turn the water blue.  We haven’t had these in quite some time, I can’t remember why, but it’s been a while.  So she pops one in each bathroom and we think nothing of it, not realizing that Ty probably doesn’t remember the last time that we used these in the house. 

After waking up from a nap, Ty goes to the bathroom and then runs downstairs with a look of bewilderment on his face.  We ask him what’s wrong, and in a some what frightened tone he asks “why is my pee green?”  Totally forgetting about the blue toilet bowl stuff, I immediately begin to question him: “What do you mean it’s green? Are you sure it’s green? Did you eat anything green?” Now I’ve been pissing for 25+ years and not once has something I ate been able to turn my pee green, so why I would think food could affect Ty’s pee is beyond me.  My only explanation is that I was worried; let’s see how rationale your thinking is if your kid comes running to you talking about their pee is green!  Don’t judge me.

Fefe on the other hand was calm, cool, and collective the entire time; obviously realizing what I should have, that blue and yellow make green.  She didn’t immediately clue us in though; I think I’m rubbing off on her.  She told us that maybe I’ve infected Ty and now he’s turning into an alien (read this post for background).  Ty shouts out that WE are not aliens and I tell Fefe that this isn’t a joking matter; we need to find out what’s wrong with the boy.  She starts laughing and now both Ty and I share his look of bewilderment.  I’m thinking why doesn’t this woman care about the well being of her child who all of a sudden started peeing green?  After she’s done having fun with us, she reminds me and informs Ty that when you mix blue and yellow you get green.  I immediately felt as dumb as a door knob and Ty was just standing there looking like what do colors have to do with my pee.

Ty didn’t believe that the blue color in the water and the yellow color of his pee caused it to turn green, so we spent the next 30 minutes discussing primary colors and how mixing different colors can create new ones.  We probably went thru a few trees in the process, because once Ty understood the concept, all he wanted to do was mix, mix, and mix some more.  After going thru the basics color combinations, we let Ty get creative and he made a few really cool colors and many many shades of doo doo brown.  But the point is, he had fun and learned something valuable all because of something as simple as going to the bathroom.

This is gonna be a tough one to write; not so much because of myself, but more so for Fefe.  But she felt it was necessary, as did I, that we spread the word and express some valuable information regarding the IUD & pregnancy, that we’ve come across by being put in a not so ideal situation. In short, for those of you that found this post specifically for that information: yes, you can become pregnant with an IUD inserted AND yes, it can produce false negative results for your pregnancy test!!!  Now if you’d like to learn more read on, if not, I hope the information serves you well.  For my regular readers, don’t fret, there is a good story to be told here and although it is a difficult subject, I tried to make it somewhat entertaining. So here we go.

Fefe’s body and contraceptives have had a long going feud for the past few years.  Maybe I shouldn’t say feud, maybe I should just say “misunderstanding”.  It’s like they can play nice together for a year or two and then they get into an argument or something and all hell breaks loose, with the outcome being a brand new unplanned bundle of joy.  In the past, this massive “misunderstanding” between Fefe’s body and the contraceptives has happened not once (Ty), but twice (Tre).  Each time while using a different method that was supposedly 99.9999999% effective.  Okay, maybe not that many 9’s but still, you get the point.  How could something that is supposed to be so good at its job screw up two times in a row?  I thought lightning didn’t strike twice.  Well apparently it can strike twice, and can also strike a third time as well!

A little over 5 years ago, Fefe was on the patch (Ortho Evra) and things were peachy.  That is until one day when she went to get a prescription refill.  Before the good doctors refill your prescription, they administer a pregnancy test to ensure that you aren’t pregnant.  That’s because contraceptives and pregnancy are kind of on opposite ends of the spectrum and don’t play to nice together.  Well low and behold, the test came back positive and after the shock and confusion dissipated, plans for a new baby were being made.  Now I’m going to be honest, I truly thought that Fefe just screwed up somehow, that she didn’t put the patch on correctly, or forgot to take it off one week, I didn’t know what, but I knew it was her fault.  I mean come on, the thing is 99% effective “when used correctly” so what were the chances that she was in the 1%?  It had to be the “when used correctly” part that got her right? Well it took another “misunderstanding” to occur for me to find out that I was wrong, she truly was in the 1%.

After the patch mishap, it was decided that maybe the shot (Depo Provera) would probably be more suitable.  No user error involved, it lasts for 3 months, and it’s 99.7% effective.  I was able to come to grips with the fact that maybe we were actually 1 percenters, but there was no way in the world that we could be 0.3 percenters right? Wrong again, after a few years during one of those routine visits to get the shot administered, a pregnancy test was given and the results once again came back positive.  Now we’re both sitting here like WTF, seriously, like what are the odds? Really, I’m asking you, what the odds are because I can’t figure them out; I need a statistician to help me.  Well anyway, Tre was born and we were just relieved that both he and Ty were born healthy and fully functional, because I do know the odds of having healthy babies that were conceived in the presence of birth control aren’t always favorable.

Well that’s where the fairy tale ends and things start to go down hill.  After Tre was born, we ONCE AGAIN put our faith into contraceptives.  Silly us right, fool me once shame on you, ah forget it, you all know the saying.  So anyways, we decide this time to use the Mirena IUD, it’s again 99% effective and lasts for up to 5 years without any maintenance.  Also, it’s an actual device that is inserted inside to prevent pregnancy, unlike the patch and the shot which were hormonal only, so we figured it’d be something different that would actually work this time. WRONG WRONG WRONG! It worked for almost two years and then that “misunderstanding” between Fefe’s body and the contraceptives occurred again.  Only this time, it wasn’t simply a misunderstanding; it was something much more serious.

About a month ago, Fefe’s belly started getting a little larger, but we really thought nothing of it since she was actually trying to gain weight.  But she also started having some pain and irregular bleeding, so I suggested that she take a pregnancy test.  It came back negative, but I still wasn’t convinced so she made a doctors appointment just to be sure.  She went and had an ultrasound and there was no baby, the IUD was still in place so we carried on and chalked it up to being over cautious.  Fast forward a month and she’s feeling a bit queasy, and began having some of the other typical early pregnancy symptoms.  So once again, I’m like screw this dude take another test, once again negative.  Now, things just aren’t adding up to me, by this time we’ve gone through 4 pregnancy tests and an ultrasound and everything was negative.  But negative just felt like the wrong answer to both of us.  So I hit the net to see if the IUD could cause false negatives for home pregnancy tests and couldn’t find a DAMN thing to confirm my suspicion.  By this time, Fefe’s bleeding had continued and became considerably heavier so she made another appointment last week.  At that appointment she found out that she had indeed been pregnant and was having a miscarriage.

Wow, it was kind of surreal for me and saddening for Fefe.  The previous two times that this occurred, we were blessed with two beautiful baby boys and although it wasn’t planned, we had a choice and our choice turned out to definitely be a blessing.  But this time that choice was taken from us and the thing that angers me the most is there was no readily available information that could have helped prevent it.  Had we known that the IUD could actually produce false negatives for pregnancy tests, maybe we could have had it removed and saved a life.  We weren’t trying to have a child, didn’t know that Fefe was even pregnant and yet the loss still affects us.  We’re both fine now and are looking towards the future, but wanted to tell this story in hopes that it will one day be able to save another couple the trouble and misfortune that we’ve endured.

Fefe & I have 3 anniversaries: our wedding day, the day of the proposal, and the day we met. Why we have 3 is beyond me, but I guess that’s the price you pay being married to a beautiful woman.  Once we got married, she told me that I didn’t have to remember the proposal anniversary anymore if I didn’t want to.  But that just sounds like entrapment to me, you know, I forget and then land myself in the dog house for the next week.  So today, October 12, 2009 we celebrate the 2 year anniversary of the day that ruined (I joke) enhanced my life forever.  In the spirit of celebration, I present to you my first unofficial blog post ever!  It was taken from my Facebook notes and describes how I orchestrated the proposal. Enjoy!

The Idea:
Fefe is really into horoscopes, so I figured creating a phony psychic hotline would be a good idea to set the stage for the proposal. I could get one of my friends to play the psychic (thanks Jovan), and tell them information about Fefe and our relationship. After letting the psychic divulge the information that I had given, she would then explain that she sees marriage in Fefe’s future and that Fefe should look to the stars for all her answers. I would use a black light to conceal a hidden Marry Me message surrounded by stars.

Eyes of Cassandra Flyer

The Execution:
I created this flyer (pictured above) that said she receives a free 5 minute reading from the Eyes of Cassandra psychic hotline and mailed it to the house. The reading would take place on a specific day and time and a passcode was required.  When it arrived, she opened the letter, and immediately says “this is fake, it’s a scam, they’re gonna take 5 mins to get to know you then charge you” and threw the paper out. So I’m sitting here literally watching my plans go down the drain and immediately had to go into damage control mode.  I was able to convince her to call the psychic by telling her it would be fun to screw with the psychic and ask her crazy questions like “how old will I be when I need dentures.”  She agreed to call and I was glad.  Things were going just as I had planned.

A few days before the date I called Jovan, who graciously agreed to be “Cassandra”, lol. I told her some information that she could use to build Fefe up.  I told her to mention that we had just bought a house, had a baby on the way, and Fefe’s profession.   She said that she knew just how to make everything flow and sound believable.  Jovan is from New Orleans so I had all the faith in the world that if anybody could pull off the psychic persona, it’d be her.

The day of the proposal, I got to the hotel early and set up the room. I couldn’t find a UV pen anywhere on the planet Earth so I had to end up using hairspray. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to create stars and write a message with hairspray??? Well if you don’t, let me fill you in – it’s pretty damn difficult!  But I was able to pull it off, quite well considering the circumstances.

Happy “Anniversary” Sweetheart, I love you!