Things kids say and hear: 3

Monkey Bread

While sampling monkey bread at Trader Joe's, I asked my 4-year old if she would like to try a piece. If you're not familiar with monkey bread, it's fingerfuls of dough that have been dredged in butter, sugar, and cinnamon, then dumped into a pan and baked. It's not healthy at all, but oh-so tasty! (and sticky.) Here is a recipe from Pioneer Woman, if you'd like to try it. It's easy and kids love to help make it and eat it. Well, some kids don't.

So, I offered a piece to each my 3 girls, with the older two happily sampling. Child C, however, looked at me with wide eyes and insisted she did not want to try it, which surprised me. So I asked her, “Do you know what monkey bread is?”
Her: “Yep.”
Me: "You do? What is it?"
Her, in a shy squeaky voice: "Uh-uh."
Me: “Is it made of monkey toes?”
Her, giggling: “Nope.”
Me: “Is it made of monkey eyes?”
Her, giggling more: “Nope”
Me: “Well then, what is it made of?”
Her: “CAT!”

I guess I wouldn't eat it either, if I thought it was made from cat!

Weekly Wrap-Up: Starting up again

This is my first Weekly Wrap-Up, hosted by Kris at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. I've been reading hers and Cheryl's (Adventures of a Somewhat Crunchy Mama) for quite some time and always think how I'd really like to participate, but don't necessarily want to show everyone just how forgetful I am. After all, in order to give a highlight of our week, I'd have to remember what we did during the week, right? Gosh, I'll give it a go and maybe even participate now and then. So, thanks for hangin' in there with me and seeing how we spent our week...

We spent Labor Day weekend at my in-law's, about 5 hours away. We wouldn't head home until Tuesday, so Monday was spent at my sister-in-law's house. She has a huge garden and a very giving heart. My husband is so very blessed to have such a loving and accepting family and I am blessed to be a part of it. So, on Monday, we picked green and wax beans and a few eggplants. I sorted through 2 tables of tomatoes, filling our cooler with 5 layers of tomatoes to bring home. Stephanie also gave us some squash, as well as some already canned goodies like pickles, jams, and salsa. Yum. She is amazing. Can you believe she works outside of her home and tends to this garden, picking and canning and freezing?

Tuesday we headed home. We didn't get on the road until about noon, so with 2 stops along the way for little bladders to empty and a brief scanning of available fruit at Fruit Acres in Coloma, MI, we made it home a little before dinner. I'm going to back up a minute and talk about Fruit Acres. I haven't been to their u-pick farm, but have stopped by their roadside stand a number of times. Depending on season and availability, they have a nice variety of apples, large selection of peaches, and plums. I always glance at the vegetables, but this time I didn't spend too much time because the van was already bursting with goodness from Stephanie. My family absolutely loves the various jams (blueberry, cherry, and jalapeno) from Fruit Acres. And did I mention they have boxes of fruit for sampling? My girls got to try an apple, pear, and plum. After selecting some delicious honey-crisp apples, sweet plums, and cherry & blueberry jams, we were back on the road. That was our last stop.

We made it home, unpacked, and got hubby packed and ready to head to Toronto for work on Wednesday morning. I wasn't really ready to see him go and be on my own with the girls for the rest of the week. I had planned on us starting school this week and look at all this produce in my kitchen!

Wednesday morning I woke up praying for the girls to be good and for God to be gracious to me and help the next few days be easy. Don't get me wrong. I love my girls. But they can be a handful. They are sweet to each other one minute and ripping each other's skin off the next. Well, not really. OK, sometimes they have. But that's what I'm talking about. And sometimes I just need a few minutes of quiet and I have girls, so that never happens. Are you following me here? Let's just say that God is so good to me. He knows exactly what I need and what I can and cannot handle with Him.

The girls woke up and wanted to help take the ends off the wax beans. They also wanted to get started on some school work. Admittedly, I wasn't ready for a full day of school and had planned to ease into it, so I excitedly gave them a verse to write (because if I show enthusiasm, they are more likely to want to do it), Child A in cursive (yes, despite some schools ditching cursive, I teach my girls a complete education, including cursive) and Child B in print. What was Child C doing during this time? I'm not quite sure, but it involved a couple Slinkies, emptying her purse all over the floor, and leaving a trail of clothes from one end of the house to the other. When they went out to play, I blanched the wax beans and froze them in dinner-size portions.

Thursday would be a close repeat of Wednesday, but more. The kids all worked together to take the ends off the green beans, then they wrote a new verse. While A and B were working on math and language, C was repeating scripture and stretching and exercising to Praise Moves. What a wonderful morning! I started blanching the green beans and some tomatoes. Twelve cups of tomatoes in the freezer, a whole pot in the fridge for spaghetti sauce to be canned... And 60% still to be canned or frozen on Friday or over the weekend.

Friday we went to the kickoff for one of our homeschool groups. It's a fun day that involves a park, picnic, and bounce house. We started reading from The Book of Virtues and getting ready for hubby to come home in the evening. Nothing special, but excitement brewed just because we aren't used to him being gone for days.

In the upcoming weeks we will have a little adjusting to do as we start our full schedule. We are doing things much differently this year than we have in the past, with more group reading and learning rather than each girl working independently and one-on-one with me. I can only do so much, y'know. So I think this will be better. Monday evening used to include gymnastics, which we aren't doing for the first time in 9 years. I can't believe it, but with finances being tight, something else had to be given up. And Awana will be starting up in a week. So, lots of changes, hopefully lots of fun, and lots more time in prayer for all of us.

This concludes my weekly wrap-up. I doubt future ones will be as long, but this week wasn't just about homeschooling. Hop on over to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers to see how others wrapped up their week.

Walmart Chronicles part 2

I'm a coupon-clipper. In fact, recently, I have become one of those mega coupon-clippers. Yesterday, I bought toothpaste and two 8-packs of Aquapods for 25-cents each. (I don't normally buy Aquapods, but we often drink what we bring with us when we play at the park. It helps to have something I can keep in the van all the time. And for 25-cents for 8 bottles of water, I wasn't about to walk on by! Did you get that, 3-cents per bottle!) If the stores near me offered double-coupons, I'd be getting paid to grocery shop!

But that was all just to tell you how much I love my coupons and how much I use them. One day I was at Walmart buying paper towels with a coupon. The cashier scanned the coupon and nothing happened. She scanned it again and again and again. It just wouldn't scan. I guess, if it won't scan, it's not accepted. I personally think that's laziness and poor service. The manufacturer will still reimburse for it as long as it is completely in tact, and it was. But this particular cashier wouldn't do anything. She looked at me like I was supposed to come up with a solution, so I told her if she wouldn't take my coupon, I didn't want the paper towels. And I want my coupon back! I did tell her that she could enter the code on the coupon and it would still work, but she said she could only scan coupons. So, intending to write a letter, I asked for her name because her name tag was turned around backwards. She told me her name and that she was a customer service manager and not politely, I might add. Did I tell her she could use some additional customer service training? Yep, sure did. Did I ever write that letter? Not this time.

But I remembered who she was. Not that it mattered much, but I avoided her lane. I don't think it was personal; I had never even met her until that day. I just think she was lazy and not wanting to do anything out of her way.

One day I was buying canned cat food. My old man cat who passed away earlier this year at the nice age of 18-1/2 had to be hand fed for quite some time, so I bought his favorite: Nine Lives Super Super, in a combo pack that was shrink-wrapped. When I got it home, I went to open the shrink-wrap and one of the cans exploded. Yuck. It was still all contained in the shrink-wrap, so I just put it back in the bag, tied it shut, and hung it on the front door knob for next time I went to Walmart. Yes, I was going to take it back. I honestly can't tell you how long it was there. Not days, maybe a couple weeks... I couldn't smell it, but the bag seemed to inflate a bit. I was not about to open that bag, but it was still going back to the store.

Finally the day came that I was taking it back whether I had another reason to go or not. Child A and I hopped in the van and went to Walmart. I said I couldn't smell it in the house, right? Well, I had to open all the windows in the van and we still gagged all the way there. Fortunately, Walmart is only a few miles away.

When we walked into Walmart, I expected people to clear the way to avoid the contents of the bag. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had called the haz-mat suits. But no one seemed to notice. We were about the 27th person in the customer service line when someone told us that we could go over to Register #1 to be helped. Sounded great to me, until I got halfway there and saw who was opening up that lane. It was her. The same customer service manager (CSM) that refused my coupon. I looked back at the service line to take my place back and saw that my spot was gone and there were now about 40 people in line. Great. Oh well, here goes. This is the conversation that ensued:

Me: "In this bag is a 4-pack of cat food that exploded. I'd like to return it. Here is my receipt. I wouldn't open the bag, if I were you."
CSM: "Why would you like to return it?"
Me: "Uh, because it exploded when I tried to take it out of the shrink-wrap. I'm not going to feed it to my cat."
She's opening the bag.
Me: "I really don't think you want to open the bag."
She just looked at me and opened the bag.
I actually backed up two steps and pulled Child A back with me. I thought the CSM was going to lose her lunch! And the look on her face!!!
Then she says, "What am I supposed to do with this?"
What, I have to tell her how to do her job?
I just looked at her. So she repeated herself.
Me: "Give me a refund?"
CSM (gagging): "Well, how am I supposed to scan it?"
Me: "I don't know. What do you think?"
CSM: "Well, I need to scan it."
She's really stuck on this scanning thing, isn't she? Why does the customer have to come up with suggestions for the customer service manager?
I let her stew about it for a minute or so, during which time she gagged a few more times. {giggle}
Finally, I offered to go get another off the shelf and we'd just exchange it - she could scan the good one for both transactions. And she was OK with that.

But I sure enjoyed watching her gag a few times after I had warned her.

But, really, she couldn't have come up with the idea to go get one off the shelf?

Disclaimer: I really do love Walmart. I know not everyone does, but I do. I get some great deals at Walmart, save a lot of money, and can find so many useful things there. My only problem at my local Walmart has been with customer service managers who really should receive some additional training if they are going to carry a title with "customer service" anything in it.

Walmart Chronicles part 1

A little over a year ago, I gave a high-level summary about something that happened at Walmart about a year before that. It was on my other blog, which is rarely updated, and it really didn't do the story justice. So here is the unabridged version.

I was taking my 3 children to Walmart for various groceries and prescriptions. They were A-7, B-5, and C-2. I know, what was I thinking??? While, Children A & B were holding on to the cart with one hand, like they were supposed to, Child C was having a freak-out attack that 2-year olds are known to have. She was sitting in the child seat in the cart screaming that she was falling backwards. (She wasn't falling backwards!) This was relatively new and had been going on for a couple weeks for no apparent reason. Although it may make sense to you, it really did not make sense to me at the time. At some point she was moved from the child seat to the big basket. (Yes, I know that's not recommended, but I am an attentive mom and she was sitting and I always had my hands on the cart. thankyouverymuch.)

When we arrived at the pharmacy, there a line and and we waited behind 2 or 3 people. My kids asked me a hundred and four questions about products designed to prevent pregnancy that were right there next to us. The line gradually progressed forward and we found ourselves next in line. After paying for my prescription, Child C stood up in the basket, and I, being the attentive mom, turned my back on Child B (I should know better!) for about 20 seconds to sit Child C back down. I turned back around to Child B who was holding something out to me. She said, "Mom, help, I can't get these back on." They were black pieces of plastic and I had no idea what those things were, so I asked her. She said they were "here," and showed me the cash register on the counter.

She took apart part of the cash register! In about 20 seconds, while I had my back turned, she just did something and the pieces came off in her hand! The cashier had already moved on from me to the next person in line and had gone to retrieve their prescription. No one saw how B did it. When the cashier returned, I handed her the pieces and told her she'd probably need them and I was sorry I didn't know how to put them back on. She asked what they were and I showed her they were part of the cash register. Her face lost color. She set them aside and tried to ring up the customer, but the cash register wouldn't work without those pieces.

The cashier called someone else to help put the pieces back together. He fumbled with it a little, seemed half amused and half annoyed when he turned to her and asked her, "How did you do this?", to which she replied, "I didn't do it!." Have you ever wanted to just disappear? Yep, me too. I quickly turned the cart around and we walked very quickly right out of there!

A year and a half later, I had another amusing moment at Walmart. To be continued...

Vacation - part 4

This is the last in the series of our vacation to Oklahoma and my 20-year high school reunion. Finally. I know it's taken a lot longer than I had planned, so thanks for hanging on with me and being patient. If you missed the first 3 parts, you can read part 1 here, part 2 here, and part 3 here.

Monday morning we brought our trip to an end. It was time to start our drive home because Hubby had to return to work on Wednesday and Child A had a softball game Tuesday evening. We were hoping to have her at the field in time for practice at 5:00PM. Ambitious, I know...

My dear friends were so generous to welcome us into their home for our entire stay. (Thank you, again!!!) Their boys were a joy to be around and the living faith of their family was very refreshing. I kept saying while we were there that their influence was very calming. My friend is a real inspiration in so many ways. If you'd like to be inspired, she blogs at Our Ordinary Life. Since we had to say good-bye on Monday morning, I read her blog frequently. It helps me feel close to her again.

When we departed, we knew that we'd have to make to St. Louis in order to not be rushed on Tuesday. Illinois highways are under perpetual construction. We have 2 seasons in IL: winter and construction. So, off we drove. One required stop for us at Braum's in Joplin, MO. It's tradition. We stopped there when Child A was 11 months old for her first lick of ice cream and again when Child B was 11 months old for the same. This was Child C's first trip to Oklahoma and she has already experienced the bliss of ice cream, but tradition is tradition, so we stopped for a treat. It was quick and then back on the road.

(Public note to Joplin, MO: Please don't let stores refer to themselves as "toy stores" on their signage unless they actually sell toys. It's not right to confuse children and put parents in awkward positions of having to explain why we can't stop there. At least we were in a hurry and could just use that without lying.)

Our next planned stop would be Cuba, MO for dinner. Who can plan bathroom and gas station stops? So, we were just on a mission to get to Cuba around dinner time and then head on to St. Louis for some shut eye. In Cuba, we stopped at a delicious BBQ joint, Missouri Hick BBQ, which was recommended by the folks at the Route 66 Outpost on our way down. There were various degrees of BBQ sauce, the portions were generous, and we all were very satisfied after. We didn't stop, there, however. Dessert, various cobblers, were also available. We chose 2 to split between the 5 of us: peach and cherry. Oooh, yummy!

Each of the kids made frequent trips to the bathroom and this was why:


They were fascinated by the faucet. Isn't it cute? If there is one thing my kids notice, it's detail!

After dinner, we played around a bit outside. There were those headless people that you pose behind and get funny pictures. Everyone had to have a turn with each one. Here's one of them:
I was driving when we left and it was dusk. I don't like to drive at dusk. I have a condition in one of my eyes that causes a glare in certain lighting conditions and dusk is one of them. But I wasn't really uncomfortable until we were driving on a stretch with woods just to the right of us on Route 66 going back to I-44. For a moment I had a flash of a vision of a deer darting out in front of me. It wasn't real and I didn't react because I knew it was just a feeling. I was gripping the steering wheel and I just prayed. Fear like that is not from God and I put Him back in control. I prayed for protection and for Him to move that fear out of me. I took a deep breath, relaxed my grip, and had peace. Within a minute, a deer came out of the woods; I slammed on the brakes and was down to 5 miles an hour as we passed it. It had stopped or else I would have also, but with deer you just never know if they will keep on running or even jump right into the side of your car. Amazing how God answers prayer, isn't it?

"You are my hiding place;

you will protect me from trouble

and surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah.

I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go;

I will counsel you and watch over you."

Proverbs 32:7-8

The rest of the night was uneventful, as we arrived in St. Louis and checked into a hotel. We checked out just before mid-morning and hit the road again. Driving past the arch brought about conversations of our trip down and we enjoyed talking about what we might do or see differently next time.

As we drove into Illinois, there were traffic jams as we expected and soon the clouds started getting darker and we drove through some rain here and there. Right around 2:00 PM, we were about an hour and half away from home. Hubby was driving and I looked off to the left, through his window. Now look carefully at what I saw:
Can you see it? I spent 13 years of my childhood living in Kansas, Iowa, and Oklahoma. I grew up taking shelter a lot. But there was no place to take shelter this time. (Of course, my main goal was really just to get a good, clear picture of this baby!) I probably have 5 pictures of trees when I was trying to get this.

It dissipated rather quickly, so there was no cause for alarm. Not until about 3 more miles up the road, traffic came to a complete stop, the sky turned gray-green, it was pouring, and we were stopped on a bridge over railroad tracks. All I could think about was, "What if another one spawns and we don't see where it is? What if we don't know it's there?" Hubby asked if I minded if he spend $2.99 on a storm-watcher app for his work-provided iPhone. Nope, sure don't mind a bit, honey! Then it cleared up and we were on our way again. Yep, just like that.

We arrived home around 4:00, just in time for the storm to arrive and A's game to be rained out. She only missed one while we were gone because the others were also rained out. She was disappointed about this one, but got over it quickly as we all settled in to being home.

It was truly a lovely trip. We were blessed to see so many family - my brothers, sister-in-law, nephew, aunt, and grandmother. We were blessed to stay with God-loving friends and spend time with Aunt Winna, all of whom really keep their focus on Christ. We were blessed with safety, despite a few quirks with our van and a couple of deer sightings (I don't think I ever mentioned the one after the reunion, around 1:30 in the morning.) We were blessed with a lot of joy and laughter and fellowship. I couldn't have asked for a better trip.

Thank you to everyone who was a part of it. Thank you, Lord, for orchestrating it.

Vacation - part 3

I totally thought this series would take a couple weeks and be done in 3 parts, but noooo, I just can't stop enjoying summer enough to focus on anything and get this done. (We've been at the pool nearly every day!) And it's going to go into 4 parts, just so ya know. Sorry. The return trip deserves it's own post. If you missed them, you can read part 1 here and part 2 here. The conclusion, part 4, is here.

Let's pick up on Friday evening. After finishing up with mom's stuff, my sister-in-law and I planned to have an evening out, just us. It's been a long time since we've shared that time together and we always have a good time and usually laugh a lot. But when it came time to decide where to go, we were torn. Should we just go have a quiet bite where we could visit or should we go to the informal reunion get-together, which was supposed to be a casual evening for anyone to just drop in and catch up with others - really aimed towards seeing people who didn't plan to attend the adult only reunion the next evening that had a registration fee. Since we graduated together and she was planning to go to the picnic, but not the reunion, it was worth considering to stop by. We actually had a good time just trying to decide where to go and finally decided to drop by and see who was there. It was in a local restaurant/bar and it was hot, but lots of ice water helped keep the evening cool enough. The only thing I wish I had done differently was give my camera to my sister-in-law so I'd have some pictures to share. Instead it was in my purse nearly the whole time.

Sure enough, there were a few people who came who were not going to attend either the family picnic or the actual reunion the next night. Overall, I was glad we went and we stayed quite a while. It was a little weird to me to find out that some of my classmates are grandparents and some are brand new parents. It seemed like such a wide gap of where people are in their lives. I realized that I was having a hard time seeing everyone in terms of being an adult and not the same kids I knew in high school.

On Saturday afternoon, we were planning to attend the family picnic event of the reunion. It was being held in a local school so we'd have air conditioning, which was a real blessing! We had promised the kids that we'd take them to Oklahoma's largest playground, Funtastic Island, which is fun, but not at all an island. We stopped there along the way and got the kids some fun:

Child A:

Child C:

Child B:

This stop was dual purpose: get out their excess energy before we expected them to be good and provide some spin-therapy for Child B, who endures social anxiety along with sensory processing disorder. Spinning is very relaxing or her and she doesn't get dizzy. Child A, on the other hand, nearly got sick from the combination of spinning and 95 degree heat with high humidity. Oh well, can't win them all, huh? The kids did have fun and were ready to get to the picnic.

The girls would know no other children other than their almost 3-year old cousin and the point of this reunion event is to include the whole family, so we planned ahead and bought those jelly bands that were popular in the 80s for the girls to giveaway. It would give them a reason to approach other kids, rather than wait to be approached, and it would be a way to possibly help other kids be more comfortable if they were also apprehensive about being with so many other people they didn't know. For less than $20 (yes, we bought a lot of them), it was well worth it!

I enjoyed catching up and getting to know some of my former classmates again. Some people hadn't changed a bit in personality and others hadn't changed much in appearance. There were others who had changed more than I would have expected. Most everyone I talked to was just very down home and friendly, but that's how I remembered them, for the most part. I think I mostly enjoyed observing how the women interacted with their children - it's the mom in me!

Saturday night, my sister-in-law and friend's sister watched my girls while Hubby and I attended the evening reunion. It was at a local casino and I had no idea what to expect in terms of who would be there or what the reunion would be like in that environment. Again, my camera stayed mostly in my purse and I forgot to take very many pictures. I so wish my sister-in-law had been there to share the evening with. I probably would have talked to more people and certainly would have more pictures to show for it. At the same time, I am very appreciative of the sacrifice she made to stay with my girls.

Me & Hubby:

The evening started off with us walking into a room where I felt like I didn't know anyone anymore, much like the night before to be honest. My graduating class was just a little over a hundred students and the reunion had about 30% attendance. I pretty well though I knew who everyone was in high school, but walking into a room of people approaching the age of 40 was just not the same. So, we walked around the room and looked at the table decorations, which were record albums of music from the 80s. It was really neat to go back in time like that. And at the same time, I could read people's name tags without staring (because I was really looking at the record albums.)

There was one classmate in particular who I was talking with about where we are in our lives - geography as well as what we are doing in life and whether we work or stay home with our kids. I mentioned that we don't get out much without the kids because we are very family oriented and do most everything together. I don't know if she thought I was dissatisfied with that or if it was just unfamiliar to her, but she said she was sorry. I corrected myself by just telling her it is a choice we've made to homeschool and be present in our children's lives by parenting all the time. I don't know what she took away from that conversation, but it made me appreciate more the choices we've made. I tried to make a point to mention in conversations God's blessings in my life. God has changed me a lot since high school and I certainly didn't want to overlook His hand in who I am today.

We had planned to leave right at midnight, but as we were getting ready to leave, there were some classmates who hadn't attended the reunion, but had stopped by to see who had. Some of them were people I had really hoped to see, so we stayed a bit longer to catch up. I'm glad we did.

There were still some people who I wish had come and some that I wish I had made more of a point to connect with. I know there were a few people at the reunion who I just never made it over to talk to. I also found that I was visiting an awful lot (not that it was awful, because it wasn't) with spouses of my classmates. Maybe that's because many of my friends were guys and now I just have more in common with their wives than with them. I also was very conscious of rekindling some of those friendships that probably should be left alone.

I made a promise to one classmate, whom I had lost track of the fall after graduation, that I would finally get onto Facebook. Yeah, now you know why I haven't been blogging much...

One thing I was very happy about was that this reunion was just a nice gathering of people who used to be friends, for the most part. Whereas, my husband's 20-year reunion was not only more formal, but some of the women were way out of control. I told my husband, based on the formal gowns that were worn at his reunion, that this is not prom. Later that evening, in the bathroom, one woman's hair was falling out of her updoo, and she was having a hissy fit. She told her friend, "You have to fix it. This is bigger than prom!" Yes, she actually said that. I am so glad my reunion was not like that.

My kids had a great time with my sister-in-law (Aunt K) and my friend's sister (Aunt Winna.) There were planned activities involving making bracelets and crowns (because they are princesses - daughters of The King.) They also made me a little coupon book that I can redeem for chores and love. We had a good time and so did the kids! In fact, the kids are still talking about it two months later! They wish both Aunt K and Aunt Winna lived closer (so do I, but not because they watched the kids, but because I would love to spend more time with them, myself.)

On Sunday, we went to the zoo. Monday would be the first leg of our trip home and I wanted to do something fun as a family and include my brothers again. It was hot and miserable and I stuck to my guns that the zoo would be a lot of fun. What's wrong with me? But we made the most of it for a while and tried to enjoy it.

This is one of the exhibits we saw. Really, Tulsa Zoo? You have to make the USA look like this? In the elephant exhibit, there was this display case. It might be hard to see here, so I'll describe it. The picture at the top of the picture, which is cut off, is "Prehistoric Images" (of elephants), the display on the left is "Buddhist Images" with an elephant lying down and a figurine. "Hindu Images" in the middle has a Hindu figurine. Then on the right, we have "Modern Images" with Babar, a republican elephant, and two books: Dumbo and Horton Hears a Who. Yep, that's the modern elephant... {sigh}

We also had a science lesson with these little guys, who were not intentionally on display. My sister-in-law saw them on a tree in the petting zoo.


They were strong and would grab just about anything. The zookeeper put them on his shirt and they chomped right down and didn't want to let go.

Child B with Uncle Andrew:


Child A & C with cousin & Uncle C:

My 3 girls with Uncle Andrew:

It was hot, Uncle Andrew had late afternoon plans, and we seriously needed some ice cream to cool off, so we called it a day and went to Braum's. It was nice to spend the afternoon with family, but next time it's that hot, will someone please convince me to do something indoors?

Observations

Observations from today that made me laugh out loud...

Today I was in the kitchen cleaning when I overheard the neighbor kids playing with the dollhouse in our living room (hey, we have a small house so every room is lived in, m'kay?) The neighbor's cousin was explaining to the others how the game was going to go: , "Guys, guys! They're home-schooled. Oh, and home-doctored."

Still in the kitchen, now cleaning out a junk bucket (don't ask), I found a collar. I am so ready for cat again and said something about the collar and now we can go get a cat. This conversation followed:

Almost 4yo neighbor boy: "What's that?"
Me: "This is a collar."
Boy: "For a dog?"
Me: "No, for a cat, or a kid."
Boy: "Oh, I have a collar."
Me: "You do? You have a collar?"
Boy: "Uh-huh. My mom does. On me."
Me: "Your mom puts a collar on you?"
Boy: "Yeah. And puts in me in the yard."
Me (laughing): "She puts you in the yard? With a collar?"
Boy: "And a leash." and he walked away laughing. and so did I.

(I know this family and know they don't do this, but it was a hilarious conversation!)

Finally done in the kitchen, I walked into the family room (converted from a bedroom) to blog about this, when I found my husband making some adjustments to a pair of pants. He's been meaning to put a string or elastic in the cuff of his pant legs. That's what he was doing. With twine.

I am having such a good day full of laughter today. And if you didn't catch this on Leno or when I posted it on Facebook, enjoy this for pee-your-pants kind of laughter (or is that just me?)



Have a great day!