Off to another funeral.

Trust her. She knows what she's doing.

Melody: I want to play the pianto.
Gretchen: It isn't a toy.
M: I know. I am not going to play it like you play a toy, but like a grownup would play it. Trust me, I know what I'm doing.
G: Oh, you do?
M: I know how to read the music and play the pianto.
G: I am not so sure about that. I mean, can you even say 'piano' without the T in it?
M: I could, bot eye yam speeking zee french. Clar-te? (pause) Do you know what Clar-te? means?
G: No.
M: Well, neither do I. But I know what I'm doing with the PEE-ANN-KNOW.

My grandfather died this morning.

Reasons why a hotel is every kid's dream come true

10. No excuse but to co-sleep.
9. Uninhibited TV access.
8. More people to wake up at the crack of dawn.
7. Breakfast includes cereals that mommy would NEVER buy for us at home. Lucky Charms, anyone?
6. Texas-shaped waffles and a bacon pile worthy of inclusion on a topographical map of the state.
5. TV during breakfast. (Which Melody saw and exclaimed, "My favorite show in the universe! It's The Weather!")
4. Long hallways.
3. Multiple swimming options with plenty of free time in which to use them.
2. Miniature coffee makers, hair dryers and tissues that vend from the side of bathroom counter.
1. No one makes you clean your room.

Growing Girls

Yesterday was preschool graduation. I am almost the mother to two kindergarteners. Boy, does time fly.

I'll post pics later.

I only have about two more weeks of insane amounts of work. I'm quitting one job so that I can see my family more and feel crazy less, so you'll see more of me, too.

Slumbering Ballerinas

Dowlan and the diseased children stayed home from church this morning. I went, but only because I was teaching and, well, I wanted out.

I came home from work and from hanging out with work friends after work very late Friday night to have Dowlan give me the gruesome news: Dixie picked up pinworms at preschool. Also, Charlie isn't breathing so well.

Do not google images of pinworms.

Fortunately, the treatment is fairly simple. One dose of medicine per household member now and another fourteen days later. Stay away from other people for a day or two to let it kick in. Wash all the bedding.

Keeping three children indoors on a beautiful spring weekend is much more complicated. No swimming, no playing in our yard because we share our playground with the neighbors behind us. No going to the park or having friends over. Instead, we watched way too much TV and destroyed home furnishings for entertainment.

See why I needed out? I can find a sub for teaching a lot more easily than I can find a better excuse to leave the house for a bit.

I came home to find the girls dressed up in their fluff and stuff and watching Prokofiev's ballet of Romeo and Juliet on PBS. At one point, Melody wore her self out twirling and laid down to nap on the couch. Dixie, needing a deux for her pas de deux grabbed the cat instead, then complained bewilderedly, "Mo-om! Abb . . . y is clawing me!"

[Abb . . . y is the name of our calico. She has no tail, so her name is Abbreviated Kitty. Abb . . . y is the abbreviated version of Abbreviated Kitty and my personal preference is to use ellipses to show the dropped letters because Abb'y is just too Wal*mart for my tastes.]

[Wal*Mart names, on my mommy board, are children's names that are kre8tiv in spelling and often include random punctuation.]

[I think that's all.]

*drumroll*

And the winner is . . .

Trace! From Little Patch of Clover. Her guess of $312.15 was only a smidgeon off from the total of $307.72 (but I wish some of you optimists had been closer to right!)

If you'll email me at tuba_g@hotmail.com with a name and address, I will get a prize sent out.

And here's what I won!



I've had three cabinets in the living room for over a year and have been waiting for the spare cash to buy two more. Now my living room looks like this:



Look, ma! No visible toys!

And, to answer the question on the last entry:
Dixie's fear of heights made Melody's claim of the top bunk pretty easy to accept. Melody's thrilled because she gets a tent and Dixie's happy because she gets a little cave. I'm thinking of sewing her some curtains.

Monkeys and Bunkeys

I had no idea the girls could do any of this:






Soon, they had company:


So they moved to the monkey bars. I REALLY didn't know they could do this:


They can't make it completely across, but four or five rungs is still pretty impressive. Charlie hung out with my coworker Scott. Recognize the RAWR shirt?


We went home to sleep in their new bunks:






Thanks Oma, Papa, Kris-kreen and Tasha for the bunk funds!

A picture of the wagon wheel wreath I made out of a pool noodle, three dowels, a roll of purple duct tape, three spools of gold ribbon, a roll of green sequins on a string, 6 bunches of fake flowers and two bouquets of real ones:



And a link to her obituary:
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/theadvocate/obituary.aspx?n=carol-anne-christensen&pid=127180524

Don't forget to vote on my inheritance total:
http://adventureswithgretchen.blogspot.com/2009/05/i-just-cashed-in-my-inheritance.html

A time I was a good friend

So I've read a lot of papers lately about 'A Time I Was A Good Friend' and would like to write my own.

I was a good friend when I had these goofy co-workers and I made them things. First, I made them bread and homemade jam:



Then, I made them dinosaur shirts because one of the papers we read had a picture of a dinosaur. It said RAWR and that "RAWR means I love you in dinosaur."

Scott got the first shirt:


I got the second:


And they both said, on the back:


And now I have more shirts to make this weekend. That is how I was a good friend.



(Okay, I upped the essay quality by quite a bit by actually spelling my words correctly and using the occasional bit of punctuation.)