Mother's Day

This Mother's Day was a wonderful. My own wonderful mother left to visit her wonderful mother, so we didn't have any real plans for the day. Or so I thought. Chris brought me breakfast in bed. AND he wouldn't let me do any chores. None whatsoever! He even cleaned out the litter boxes, no mean feat when you have as many cats as we do! It was a lovely day, and the next thing I knew, Chris was packing up the truck for a trip to the park! This isn't the park, it's our front yard. We were getting ready to leave and I decided I needed a picture of the peonies in bloom. Aren't they lovely?

Chris drove us to Target to buy kites. Timothy finally got the Elmo kite he's been begging for. Big brother Gabe already had a Spiderman kite. Then we went to Chandler Park. Chris and I have been to this park several times for the Scottish Games, but I've never really explored it. It's a great park!

Here's a shot of Gabe, flying his kite. That's one of the upsides of Oklahoma. It's nearly always kite weather. The down side is when you leave for a meeting of the Wine Club in a very full skirt, catch an updraft, and show some unfortunate jogger that your underwear does indeed match the rest of your outfit. But that's a story for another time.

Gabe and I got our kites up really high! Timothy got his going, then spotted the playground and was so excited he let go of it entirely and ran off. I wish I had pictures of Chris running after Timothy's kite!

When Gabe and I were done flying our kites (aka dive-bombing passing pedestrians and motorists with them!), we joined Timothy and Chris at the playground. Nothing will make you feel better about your own kids than watching other people's.

My kids seemed more interested at climbing the rail fence than playing on the playground. Go figure.

Timothy hadn't had a nap all day, and he was falling asleep in the swing. Then he'd get mad that he was falling asleep, and yell at himself to wake himself up. It was hysterical!

I spent the playground time sitting on a blanket, sewing up the seams in the baby trousers I had crocheted. I also watched the bees, made some clover flower chains, and stared at the clouds. Time well spent, if you ask me!

By the time we finished at the park, it was 4 o'clock, and we decided to go to the Hideaway for some gourmet pizza. The lunch rush was over and the dinner rush had not yet started, so we ended up getting the patio to ourselves. It was a good day. In retrospect, I wish I'd remembered to put some sunscreen on myself after I'd finished putting it on the boys! My shoulders look like boiled lobster!

Gabe's zoo field trip

Yes, it's that time again. I have once again fulfilled my civic duty. No, I didn't vote. I chaperoned Gabe's field trip, for the third year in a row. I am happy to report that everyone survived the experience. It's getting easier each year. By fifth or sixth grade, I expect I won't break out in hives when the note announcing that chaperons are needed arrives. On second thought, by then new problems are sure to have arisen. Like puberty. Help!!! Anyway, a good time was had by all. The kids were supposed to be filling in a map of the zoo, and locating various buildings and exhibits. Here we see Elisha, Aidan, Gabe and Jordan hard at work.

My boys seem to have learned a thing or two about climbing from the mountain goats. This was their favorite part of the whole field trip. We spent a LOT of time climbing this rock. By "we", I mean them.

Here are Gabe and Aidan during our lunch break. The playground where we ate lunch accounts for our second biggest expenditure of time.

Here we are, preparing to go into the rainforest. I LOVE the rainforest. Animals get to roam free in there. Besides, there are three-toed sloths. And a zoo keeper who lets me pet three-toed sloths. Shhh! Don't tell!

Elisha and Gabe are just plain goofy. I'm denying that there is a picture of me doing this exact thing at this exact spot, but at a much greater age. Denying, I tell you!

We met up with various other groups throughout the day. Here we are with Summer's group. Summer is the adorable little girl on the right. I'm sorry to say that I can't recall the name of the other adorable little girl. Gabe would know, but I'm too lazy to get up and ask him. Besides, he's in his room watching "Iron Will" right now.

I have a picture of my group from kindergarten in front of this penguin. I should find it to compare. Nah, I'm too lazy.

This was a high point for me. After years of trying to learn to speak flamingo, this year one came right up and started a conversation with me! I tried to stuff him in my bag to take home as a yard ornament, but the zoo keepers caught me at it and made me put him back. Don't you just want to pick him up and use him as a croquet mallet? No? Just me? Alice in Wonderland, people! The Queen of Hearts! No? Still just me?

Don't know if you can tell, but the tiger is yawning in this picture. Apparently, we bore him.

Zoe asked us to join her group at the elephant house. Zoe is the little darling in the baseball cap, sporting the huge black eye. Zoe and Gabe have simultaneous crushes on one another, best I can tell. My son has excellent taste in girls. I love Zoe! Is it too soon to hope that this crush lasts through middle school, high school and college? Perhaps a little, but that won't stop me!

So, there you have it. Zoo field trip '08. I'm off the hook until May of '09!

Amy's Bridal Tea

Amy is getting married next month, and I am her matron of honor! As such, it was my honor to host a bridal tea for her last weekend. I use the term "host" loosely, since it was actually held at my mom's house. Had it been held at my house, every picture would show seventeen people crammed in like sardines, and me with glowing red eyes and white hair that stands on end. Here is a picture of Amy and me in our hats and tea party dresses.

Here are the goodies! It doesn't look like it, but this was a LOT of cooking by my standards. I never would've gotten it done, except Nichole came over the night before and helped. Otherwise, these pictures would show a pile of lunch meat, un-iced cupcakes, and me with glowing red eyes and white hair that stands on end.

Amy received many lovely gifts, including some very soft towels. As you can see, she was very happy about having soft towels.

Here's the whole group of us, minus my mom, who was taking the picture. We all look so demure and ladylike! I'm thinking that I like wearing hats. From now on, I'm going to wear one everywhere I go. I find that they do a lot to hide the glowing red eyes and white hair that stands on end!

Undignified...

So many of the others that share my house have no dignity. None, whatsoever. For instance, Moses doesn't seem to mind at all when Timothy makes him wear sunglasses. Cats should have more dignity than that.

Then there's Timothy. He got new shoes and he's very proud of them. So proud, in fact, that he likes to wear them all the time. Even if he's not wearing anything else. To be honest, you can't really expect him to have much dignity. He's only three, after all.

Sometimes, however, I can't help but think he's doing it on purpose. Like last week, when he showed up wearing my shoes and socks. The socks kind of look like lederhosen, don't they? Or possibly furry legs.

This is Moses lying on my bed. I don't want to know how he ended up like this. But I'm sure however it happened, it was undignified.

Here's another undignified tummy. This is Miss Mouse. She's experiencing some psychological problems and is pulling out her hair. I saw a special on this disorder on 20/20 and made her watch it, hoping to help her realize that she has a problem. It didn't work. Our vet suggested kitty prozac. He also suggested that might be more trouble than it's worth, since she doesn't seem to mind being bald. Oh, and if you're wondering, she's on top of my pattern book and yarn on my lap. This is why I'm so slow at crochet and knit projects.

Finally, as undignified tummies go, this one takes the cake. Chris was supposed to be overseeing Timothy's attempts to pick up his room before bed. It seemed like it was taking a REALLY long time, so I went to investigate. This is what I found. Remarkably, the room was clean and Timothy was playing happily.

If Chris sees this picture of himself on my blog, he's not going to be very happy with me. Please don't tell him it's here!

This one's for MorningMedusa!

Because I don't even know what the heck a URL address is, much less how to find my picture's address, I'm going to post Elinor's picture here!

As you might have guessed, she really loves to have her tummy rubbed. She will flop over at a moment's notice if she thinks there's a chance someone will give it a scratch.

I don't think she appreciated my attempts at photography.

Wherein Gabe asks questions I don't want to answer and Moses nearly has to be shaved...

It has finally happened. My baby is growing up. I have been informed by Gabe's martial arts instructor, Mr. Jensen, that Gabe should probably think about purchasing a cup. It started like this:

Mr. Jensen (while sparring with Gabe): Are you wearing a cup?

Gabe (looking confused and dropping his guard so that he gets bopped squarely in the face): A cup?

Mr. Jensen (looking awkward): Um, never mind, I'll explain after class.

He never did get around to that explaining thing. So on the way home, I had the task of explaining to Gabe what a cup could do for him. I thought I did a pretty good job. As always, I was wrong. Because as soon as I finished my fabulous explanation, Gabe came off with this:

"It's not like those parts have any bones in them or anything, so it doesn't really matter if something hits them. They can't break!"

I gave up and assigned the rest of the explaining to Chris. I do that a lot.

In further news, Moses and Jack got out last night and spent an evening prowling the back yard of the abandoned house next door. They both came in with their fur full of burrs. Jack has short hair, so a quick brushing took care of him. Moses most decidedly does NOT have short hair, and therefore, we spent the better part of an hour picking 10,000 burrs out of his fur with a fine-tooth comb while Moses screamed and wailed his rage and horror. At one point, I was in despair and considered just shaving him bald. It would serve him right for frolicking among the burrs. In the end, humans prevailed and Moses was deburred, with his fur more or less intact. He exacted his revenge by throwing up on the surround sound speakers. Such is life.

Timothy: Always Good For A Laugh!

Timothy has decided he's a superhero. In case you wonder how I know, he runs through the house with his Bear blanket around his neck and announces loudly that he's a superhero. It's a dead give-away. Since he isn't the first son I've had that's gone through the superhero phase, it didn't surprise me much. He has a bit of a different take on a superhero's duties, though. In his version, he chases the cats through the house, roaring loudly at them. They don't care much for it, and with seven of them inside, it tends to lead to dangerous stampedes.

Today I sat him down and had a talk with him (because I haven't yet learned, after 8 years as a parent, not to try to reason with preschoolers). "Timothy, superheros don't scare," I told him. "They help!" He took it well. Or so I thought. Then, a few minutes later, I heard a stampede coming down the hall. Sure enough, he was behind a herd of cats, roaring for all he was worth.

"Timothy, what are you doing?" I asked.

"I'm being a superhero!" he replied.

"But superheros don't scare, they help," I reminded.

Timothy thought for a brief moment. Then he answered, "I'm helping the kitties run away!"

One of these days I'm going to give up on matching wits with my children. Obviously, they are smarter than I am.