In case you can’t tell, that’s John coming home from school, and stomping mightily on Dandelions, which are the bane of Paige’s existence this time of year.
— Ryan
Month: May 2010 (Page 2 of 2)
I’m going to do you a little favor. I’m going to save you from wasting your money on bad granola bars. Because friends don’t let friends buy bad granola bars, right? And I’m pretty easy to please when it comes to granola bars. In fact, I’ve hardly met a granola bar I don’t like. Until now.
When I saw the Quaker True Delights granola bars, I was intrigued. I got a free sample and a coupon in the mail, and I must say that the chocolate/raspberry one was delicious. So, when I was at the grocery store I picked up a box of the Coconut Banana Macadamia nut granola bars.
I was intrigued. Macadamia nuts? Yum. Coconut? Yum. Banana? I’ll keep an open mind.
Yuck.
It was actually so not good that I spit out the bite I had taken. I was chewing and thought, why am I still eating this? It tastes like the dried bananas went bad or something. So I Spit it out in the trash and threw the rest of the granola bar away. Ugh. No WAY will my kids eat it, I’ll tell you.
I’ll try to feed the remaining bars to my friend’s chickens, but I don’t know if even they will eat it.
Please, don’t waste your money. And Quaker? Try again.
My little guy, John, has this weird thing about lunch. Every day when he comes home from a tough day at kindergarten, I make him lunch. It can’t just be any old sandwich slapped together and thrown on a plate, though. There must be 3 things on his plate for lunch. And in his words, “Drinks don’t count.” What? Who made this rule? I humor him, and when I make macaroni and cheese, for example, I’ll be sure to add two more sides to his plate, maybe a couple of apple slices and a cookie. Usually it’s not a big deal. But some days I just can’t seem to come up with two more things that he will eat. It’s about all I can do to scrape together a peanut butter sandwich. But no, that’s not good enough. Every day he demands his “Three things” for lunch.
Last week, I went to the BYU women’s conference on Thursday and Friday, so I was gone at lunchtime. Ryan worked from home those days so that he could be there when John came home and fix him lunch. I called one day a little after lunch to see how things were going, and he said, “What’s with John wanting ‘three things’ for lunch? Where did that come from?”
Oh, the 3 things rule. Did he mention anything about a drink in his demanding of three things? I asked.
“Oh, yeah,” he said, “Drinks don’t count.”
Exactly.
How is it that my child has turned into such a picky little person? Who says you have to have three things for lunch? It’s a good idea to eat a variety of foods, of course, but why three?
A few days later I asked John why the infamous three ingredient lunch law. Did his illustrious teacher tell them something about nutrition? Did a friend tell him there must be three foods at lunch? “John,” I said, “Why must there be three things (not including a drink, of course) for lunch?”
His answer was quite simple.
“One day I was hungry, and I ate three things, and then I was full.”
Well, then. That explains it.
This morning I told my kids that if they saw any Sabertooth tigers around, DO NOT approach. Especially the really really big ones with the huge claws.
They of course proceeded to laugh at me and tell that sabertooth tigers are extinct. Like I don’t know that. Sillies! But in my DREAM (which was brought about by howling wind that was so loud and obnoxious that it made me have crazy scary dreams) I not only watched some of our most valuable possessions blow away in the wind, (like my harp. I know, we don’t HAVE a harp, but remember, this was a dream) but we saw HUGE sabertooth tigers roaming the neighborhood. That was when I turned to Ryan and said, “We’re not letting the kids walk to school.” Like the kids would even be going to school in a tornado! As we walked in the front room, the door had blown in. I looked at Ryan like, “Well, you are the man–fix it.” and went about comforting the kids. Some old lady came to the door and I simply told her to come in. No idea who she is or if she was an important character in the dream. That was when I saw a red car (probably my dream car, a red Mazda 6, but I couldn’t tell you for sure) crashing through the front window, and in what seemed to be the same instant, Ryan was whisked away by the angry tornado.
That was when I had had enough. I couldn’t sleep with this noisy wind, and since I couldn’t find my earplugs in the dark, I grabbed a blanket and headed downstairs. It was 5 am. First I got comfy on the family room leather couch (my favorite couch for both sitting and resting) but with the motion sensors and the automatic lights, I seemed to be turning the lights on every time I adjusted my blanket. And there were windows right over my head, and it was still noisy. So I went into the front room. Less windows, and no motion sensors. I must have slept there until the kids started getting up, at around 6. The good thing was, I was awake to say goodbye to my son as he left at about 6:30 for early morning seminary. He asked me if I could bring his pinata to school during lunch. Hooray. Of course I will, darling. For that is my job.
Before the girls left, I imparted to them the little tip about avoiding the tigers, and Megan told me HER dream. It was much better than mine. She dreamt that she and Ryan were on the amazing race together, looking for clues in boxes, and they must have come in first place on the leg, because they won a trip for the whole family to go to Finland!
(Finland, Finland, Finland
That’s the country for me!
(VARIOUS ANIMAL NOISES)
MAYOR:
Finland is the country where we dance
Finland is the country where we play
Here in Finland boy and girl can find a true romance
In traditional Scandinavian vay!)
Sorry–I got carried away there.
Any-who, I like Megan’s dream MUCH better than my dream. I’m going to try to forget my dream ever happened, as well as the lack of sleep that the whole wind thing caused. And I’ll try to think about how cool it would be to be on the Amazing Race. (cue race music….)
I’m not one of those parents that goes overboard in their kids’ activities, I promise. They have piano lessons, some of them do band at school, and they do one or two sports throughout the year. Ok, I admit, Megan does go overboard on the sporting events, what with year round soccer, then basketball, softball, church sports, and whatever activity comes along that she wants to play. But they are all GOOD activities.
Softball/baseball is one sport that all of my kids will play. Well, not ALL of them, because my oldest son, Cole, doesn’t really do sports, and that’s ok. He has many other talents. But anyway, back to the softball. John has a cute little baseball team with all of his neighborhood friends, with one of the dads as a coach (not just any old dad, this guy played football for BYU back in the day, and he graciously coaches our little boys in all sports, and I’m very thankful!). Jenna is on a team with a friend, Natalie is on a team with a couple of her friends, and Megan’s on a team with three of her best sporty friends who she plays with on many of these rec leagues. I simply can’t sign a kid up for a sport unless there is at least one friend on the team, so that I’m not stuck driving them alone to every practice and every game.
Last night I took on the daunting task of putting all the games on the calendar. I used Google Calendar so that I could put repeating events on there, and make it easier to get every thing on, then I can transfer it all to the big desk calendar that is my “brain” and stays on the kitchen counter for everyone to see and add things to. Now I’m depressed. Because today’s schedule looks something like this:
3:00-4:00-Natalie’s practice at the rec center in American Fork
5:15–John’s game in Highland. It doesn’t start until 5:45, but we have to be there 1/2 hour early.
6:15-Megan’s soccer team starts the spring tournament. The first game is tonight at 7 at AF JR High. But since it’s a game, she needs to be there 30 minutes early, and I’m picking up at least one of her teammates, so I’ll have to leave at 6:15 to do that.
7:00-Jenna’s team practice at the rec center in American Fork
And this is MONDAY night. Monday night is Utah is supposed to be reserved for FAMILY HOME EVENING. How am I supposed to have a FHE when we are running all around the city taking kids to different sporting events? And dinner? You can forget about dinner on a night like this. I’m guessing it will be something in the crock pot that people can just eat when they are home.
And it’s not just tonight. Tonight is just the beginning. It looks like there is at least one sporting event/practice for every single day this week. Except Friday. And Sunday, of course. Add to that all the stuff we NORMALLY do, like piano lessons, bells practice, activity days, young women and young men, and it’s overwhelming. Oh, and did I mention it’s MAY? May is the last month of school, so each child will be having end of the year activities, field day, dance festivals, class parties and large assignments due. And, yes, it seems mom is required to be at or in charge of most, if not all of them. Dad? Yes, dad WILL help. He does go to his share of games, and he will be definitely going to a few of these things. When he’s in town. Did I mention that he seems to go out of town a lot now? And that this month he’ll be going to Japan? No, that won’t help me at all. I do have a 16 year old, but he doesn’t have his license yet.
So, Happy May! Take me out to the ball games, and then take me to the insane asylum. Or at least come and visit me there, because that’s where I’ll be by the time this month is over.
Oh my gravy.
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