The Mr. Clean Company is Going to Be Bummed

teno face

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

Teno is basically a professional colorer. He colors the walls, the floor, the tables and chairs, the desk, his crib, my notebooks, my wallet… you name it, he’s colored on it. And it’s not like he’s doing it unsupervised, he has crayons stashed all over the house. I’ll catch him coloring the table one minute and while I’m grabbing for the Magic Eraser he’s digging another crayon out from between the couch cushions and coloring on his lunch plate. So today he colored a big patch of orange on the desk and I’m out of Magic Erasers. I’m too tired to go to the store to get more and he can’t go anywhere without finding, and demanding a new ball despite the 5 he has in the back yard right now.
So I looked up DIY Magic Eraser recipes and found that baking soda and water is a good substitute. A bunch of message boards suggested wetting down your white or light-colored walls with plain water, tossing on some baking soda and scrubbing it back off again. I tried it out on the colored-up desk and it worked like a charm. It was free and easy and it didn’t leave weird drippy milk stains like Magic Erasers do. So there you have it. Hopefully that’s as useful to some other mom as it was to me.

Gross and awesome.

teno and Vegemite

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

I always have great ideas for additions to the Teno blog. Ironically, the ownership of a Teno prevents one from blogging about him 99% of the time. He’s pretty content finding clues all over the house right now, which give me just enough time to make two short lists of the grossest and awesomest stuff Teno does these days. He’s eating Vegemite out of a tube in this photo. Consider it a bonus to the gross list.

Gross Stuff Teno Likes to Do:

1. Get into my bed naked and fart on my pillow.
2. Play with money. Filthy, gross money.
3. Age his food under the couch, then find it weeks later and eat it.
4. Lick window screens.
5. Drink his own bath water.
6. Pick other people’s noses.
7. Eat cold toaster waffles.
8. Lick the bottom of his own shoe.
9. Touch things on the bus, then put his fingers in his mouth.
10. Eat pinches of dry ingredients while I’m baking. Think baking powder and flour.

Awesome Stuff Teno Likes to Do:

1. Punch Tony. (He also likes to punch me, which is less awesome.)
2. Demand chai at least twice a day.
3. Help with everything.
4. Pretend to sleep by jumping into my bed, getting under covers and screaming, “Sleeeeeeeep!”
5. Find clues, write them in his notebook.
6. Ride his tricycle.
7. Play nicely with Bishop.
8. Use the computer.
9. Show you where his eyes, mouth, hair, nose, head, belly and weiner are on command. I know the weiner one is probably in bad taste, but it makes him really happy that he knows where it is.
10. Give hugs and say “awwww!”

So there’s your update.
We’ve made lots of videos lately, too.
Bye!

Some new videos.

I drove the car!

Bishop played Guitar hero at my birthday party:

Two.

Cuteness at Superdawg.

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

Hi, I’m Teno and on Monday I’ll be two years old. I thought I’d take this opportunity, on one of my last days as a not-two-year-old to tell you a little bit about myself.

Well, first of all my name is pronounced Tee-no. It rhymes with bambino. A lot of people call me Ten-o as in 10-oh. That would be a stupid name when, in fact, my name is pretty awesome. It’s not short for anything, that’s another one I get a lot. It’s just Teno like my great-grandpa Teno Petitti.

So, let’s see. I was born on St Patrick’s Day which is pretty cool because neither of my parents is Irish and they don’t drink. So now they have something to do on St. Patrick’s Day besides try not to get hit by drunk drivers. I was supposed to be born at the end of March but I knew my mom was pretty sick of being so fat so I came a little early.

When I was a baby I didn’t really do a lot. I mostly hung out in my swing and ate smooshed up food. Sometimes Lila would come over and once I started walking that was pretty fun.

For my first Halloween I was a goat. No one saw me, though, because it was freezing and my mom didn’t want me to get sick. She still shows me the pictures, though. She’s retarded.

Last year my parents had like, 50 people over for my birthday party. Personally, I think that was a bit much so this year it’s more like 20. My favorite part was getting to eat an entire cake by myself but everyone else seems to remember something about me licking Bishop’s head.

So, since that party I’ve been busy climbing on things, coloring the walls, refusing to eat one day and then eating non-stop the next day, not taking naps and then taking 4 hour long naps, obsessing over Thomas the Tank Engine only to get 10,000 toy trains for Christmas and immediately deciding I like Blue’s Clues now… stuff like that. I’m starting to wonder if my parents changed my name to Butthead, because they call me that a lot nowadays.

I also say some words now. Mostly I like to say “Oh, a clue!” and “No.” But sometimes I say “mama, daddy, is it hot, shoe, sock, pants, foot, belly and Blue.” My mom never stops asking me “whose belly is this?” If she doesn’t know by now that that’s my belly I’m not helping her.

There’s been a lot of talk about me getting a “big boy bed” lately. I don’t know how I feel about that. I really like to fill my crib with hangers, stuffed animals, diapers, sippy cups, crayons and step stools and then jump on top of all of it until something pokes my eye and I cry. I don’t know if you can do that sort of thing in a bed. I’ll ask Lila when I see her Saturday.

So far it’s been pretty cool being born. I get to go to Superdawg and eat in the front seat of the car and my dad buys me milkshakes when we go out so mom can do her homework. I get a lot of cupcakes and carrots and bananas and people here seem pretty nice.

I’d like to spend the next year learning my colors and some letters and numbers and maybe learning how to use the potty. I know how to flush it, I just don’t understand any of the rest of what goes on there.

So thanks for reading my blog. When I learn to read I’ll read yours too.

-Teno Slater

Gigantor!

Looking for clues.

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

Teno decided to grow about three inches this week. It’s never a surprise when he has these insane growth spurts, he eats and sleeps like a prize fighter for like, two weeks leading up to the up shoot. Yesterday I swear he ate THREE mac & cheese cupcakes before I even left for school in the morning.
Needless to say all of his pants are too short now and we can’t find black baby jeans anywhere. Last time he needed pants we got tons of black jeans at Old Navy and now it’s like no one makes them. A Slater isn’t a Slater without black jeans. it’s just weird.
I finally gave in and decided to go ahead and make Blue’s Clues cupcakes for Teno’s birthday next week. I was hoping he’d move on to something more fun to make before then but he’s still sleeping with his Handy Dandy Notebook. Maybe I can get creative and do some striped cakes so they look like Steve’s shirt. We’re all about Steve here. Joe is weird. No one likes Joe.
Here’s the skidoo in action:

Things I Didn’t Think About

We’re Midwestern

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

I never thought I would beg a boy with dried oatmeal on his face to kiss me.
I also never thought I would plead with anyone to lie still while I have the honor of wiping his poopy butt.
I had a feeling I would say things like “Don’t color on the windows.”
And I do.

Oh, a coo!

Blue

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

Teno is obsessed with Blue’s Clues. I don’t know how it happened. one day we were spending $500 on stupid wooden trains because he was all about “Toot Toot” (Thomas the Tank Engine) and the next day I’m taping paper paw prints to my wall just to hear Teno say, “Oh, a coo!” and then scurry to collect his Handy Dandy Notebook.
It’s hilarious, I have to admit. He’s on a never-ending quest to find the perfect notebook. Requirements include a spiral on top large enough to fit a crayon through and plenty of pages on which to scribble clues. He has two actual Blue’s Clues brand notebooks, but that doesn’t stop him from always wanting the ones he sees in the store or from stealing my sketchbooks.
Teno no longer simply walks from place to place- he skiddoos everywhere. If you have somehow escaped every seeing an episode of Blue’s Clues, Blue “skiddoos” into books with a little dance that either Steve or Joe calls a skiddoo. A very similar dance is done when the characters get mail and when they figure out Blue’s Clues. So it’s just non-stop skiddooing over here with Teno. To skiddoo, you bend your knees a little bit, throw your elbows around almost like you’re moshing and walk sideways with a goofy look on your face.

Oh, and the other weird side effect of Blue’s Clues is that every single day we have to write Teno a letter and seal it in an envelope with a sticker where a stamp goes so it looks real. Then Teno does the “we just got a letter” dance and opens the letter and pretends to read it. If there are numbers on the envelope he says, “Oh, two. Two. Six? Two? Six?”  Those are the two numbers he knows. Also a gang in Joliet. I don’t know if they’re still around, but they were when I was a kid.

I keep reminding Tony that we need to learn our lesson from the five-second Thomas obsession and NOT buy Teno every Blue thing he sees. Well, he already bought Teno a hide and seek Blue and made him the skateboard you see up there. It’s a real skateboard from AWH, Tony just painted it and cut the griptape to make a clue. So we’re trying to keep the merch under control this time.
As I type this Teno is actually pushing around his trains and singing “toot toot.” I really tried to push Yo Gabba Gabba on him, but he’s not interested. In turn, I’ve decided not to have a theme for Teno’s birthday party outside of “stuff Teno likes.” So the invites have squirrels on them because he lose his mind over the squirrels in our yard and we’ll just have all his favorite foods and stuff. No Blue’s Clues paper plates or Yo Gabba Gabba cupcakes (mostly because I like that show, Teno doesn’t.)
Well, time to get most of my cereal taken away from me by an almost-two-year old who is nearly as big as me.

Superdawg Fridays!

milkshake

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

Today I mentioned to Tony that I couldn’t wait until Teno got excited about going to places like Superdawg, our local old timey drive-thru. When I babysat Lila almost every Friday was “SUPERDAWWWWWWG!” And then she would do this dance that went “hot dog mommy, regular mommy, hot dog mommy, regular mommy, now I’m a shake! Now I’m fries!” For like, $5 her dad was her hero once a week. I look forward to such bribery.
We figured Jo’s never been to Superdawg and worst case scenario, Teno hates it and we’re already in the car so we can just drive home. Turns out, Teno is not too young to love Superdawg. He LOVED it. Mostly he liked sitting in the front seat and pushing all the buttons and pretending to drive. I tried to make him look at the giant, glowing hot dogs the entire time we sat there and he was far more interested in the gum Tony had in the glove compartment.
He ended up basically eating fries and a vanilla milkshake for dinner, but whatever. It was the first meal Tony and I haven’t had to rush through in ages and it’s just fun to sit there and pretend you aren’t in Chicago for five seconds.
Teno’s pre-bath period has recently become known as “nakie craz-o time.” He takes most of his won clothes off, diaper and everything, and just runs around screaming and making animal noises and throwing himself on the floor and rolling. Tonight he was running around ass naked with a pair of camo sunglasses on. He kept them on in the tub.
We settled on a Yo Gabba Gabba party even though a couple we know did the same thing for their kid’s birthday party last year. I was trying to find a way to make Thomas the Tank Engine less gay and it’s just not possible. Cinders and ashes Thomas sucks! Bust my buffers, I really hate it! Grease and oil!
I think I’m more fond of Yo Gabba Gabba than Teno is, but whatever, he’ll eat the shit out of a DJ Lance Rock cupcake and that’s all that really matters.

Teno’s Amazing Talent

Ask Teno for any Thomas the Tank engine character and he’ll bring you the right one. He was too busy playing with them to give them to me in this video sometimes, but I think his genius is quite clear.

Noooooooo!

crazy face

Originally uploaded by Bake & Destroy!

The other night when I was getting him ready for bed, Teno grabbed the Vicks vapor rub and tried to rub it into his butthole.
The end.