The DH: dear husband, department head, or designated hitter (as in, “I. Have. Had. Enough. Take your children for a few hours.”). Depends on what he’s doing. My husband, the privacy guard. Also happened to be a classmate of mine at the Naval Academy.
Diva: my oldest daughter, 7. Who adores pink. aka “God’s joke on mommy- who detests pink”. She has finally learned to read, and now we can’t stop her from reading absolutely everything she sees.
Crash: my middle son, 5. The one most likely to be upside down and yelling, “Hey, Mom, watch this!” Give him some peace and quiet (i.e. no sisters!), and he’ll happily play with his plastic army guys or Legos for a long, long time.
Empress: my youngest daughter, 2. She knows what she wants, she wants it now, and she’s got an hysterical pout practised for when she doesn’t get it. Which is often. We adopted her from China (in case that isn’t obvious; and I’ve had two Chinese waiters tell me she looks “almost Chinese,” so I guess it isn’t completely obvious, so I’ll say it). She got home and promptly wrapped the entire family around her little finger.
The Big Dummy: our local pile of fur that the vet calls a German Shepherd Dog. He treats Empress with perfect manners and deference to her age. The rest of us have to shove him out of the way frequently or just yelp when he steps on our feet. Adores chasing birds. Not so good about squirrels. Like the rest of the family, he knows how to point out not-so-tactfully when his expectations are not being met. “Excuse me, I already dropped the bone loudly once, did you forget to throw it? Yeah, yeah, you’re hanging laundry on the line; so what?”
