SUNDAY SMILE

I laughed out loud.  

I STAND CORRECTED

Remember when I bragged about my detective skills?  It seems my observational prowess is not nearly as great as I thought it was.  Yesterday I left my bank card in the debit machine at the grocery store.  In my defense I was distracted by the conveyor belt at the checkout I used.  It wouldn't stop moving and the cashier and I were struggling with it as I tried to remove boxes of jars off the conveyor belt and into my cart.  Fortunately it was at the very next store that I realized the bank card was missing from my wallet and I made a return trip through town to retrieve it.   I approached the cashier at the first till and asked where I should go to inquire about my card.

"Right here" she replied as she opened a drawer and pulled out a stack of bank cards.  "Can you tell me the last three numbers of your card?" she asked.

"ummmm.....no?" I ventured "but it's got my name on it."  I proceeded to tell her my name. She proceeded to tell me that there were no names on either of the two cards from my bank.  My heart skipped a beat.  Perhaps my card had dropped in the parking lot and was gone for good.
"Could you check the back of it please?  I know that my signature is on the back."
She checked.  No signature on either card.
"I was just here less than half an hour ago, and I left it at that checkout there." I explained as I pointed out the lane I had used.
"This would be the one then. "  She said as she handed me a card. "Maybe you could try and purchase something with it."

I did.  It worked.  Don't judge.

When you shop at a store that displays signs like this though,  it's hard to feel overly stupid.

YOU SPIN ME RIGHT ROUND

You would think that playground equipment geared for young children would be fairly innocuous.  You would think...right?  Not so my friends, not so.
Take for example this little number....

See the little poles with the seats atop them?  They look pretty safe don't they?  William and Maia had a great time spinning on them with my close supervision.  William didn't want me to feel left out so he suggested I take a turn.  I climbed on and it made a couple of slow turns at first. I smiled at William as if to say "This is fun", he smiled back and then ran off to go play on the slide.  I made a move to get off the spinner but it picked up speed and the momentum threw me backwards.  I must have been at the perfect angle to induce maximum speed and I was now holding on for dear life as the world spun around at a dizzying million miles per hour.  I threw out my legs to try and reach the ground with my foot to stop the stupid thing, this seemed to increase the speed even more. I failed to reach my target.  I knew at that point I needed help so I called out to Kere to come stop me. Keep in mind that this was in a playground area filled with young kids and their parents and I can only assume that all eyes were on me but at this juncture in my adventure, my eyes were shut tight in attempt to keep the spinning world from making me nauseous.  Kere came to my side and I pleaded with her to stop me as she laughed and commiserated that she didn't have her camera with her. In one final desperate effort, I stretched my foot down as far as I was able and made contact with solid ground.  My indignity would not end there, I now had to make my way to a bench to sit down but my spinning escapade left me walking like a drunken sailor.  After I had regained my faculties, I packed the kids and my pride into the van and drove them home.

Beware! these are KID friendly only.

IT'S A BOY?

As I mentioned yesterday, nobody in the house (besides me) knows how to roast a chicken so even though it was Mother's Day, I ended up making dinner.  Emily was in the kitchen taking a lesson, watching carefully so that she could do it next time.

"Oh look" I said as I cleaned out the cavities "It's a boy chicken."

"Ewwww " Emily replied "Is that its thingie? ......oh wait...it's the neck right?"

I have my work cut out for me.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY

The other day while visiting Matthew and Kere,  I was able to sneak in a few moments alone with William and Maia to plan a special Mother's Day treat for Kere.  They were so excited to answer a little questionnaire I had found on the internet and I had to stifle a chuckle or two at some of their answers.   I am sure you will too.

WILLIAM

My mom is 10 years old.
She weighs 20 pounds.
Her favourite colour is pink.
Her favourite food is pasta.
My mom always says "No."
She cooks the best scrambled eggs.
My mom's job is working upstairs.
She laughs when someone tells her something funny.
If my mom had time she would love to play games with me.
My mom and I like to clean up that's what we usually do all day.
She really loves chocolate.
I love my mom because she is nice.



MAIA

My mom is 5 years old.
She weighs 2 pounds.
Her favourite colour is purple.
Her favourite food is mushrooms.
My mom always says "clean up".
She cooks the best soup.
My mom's job is cleaning up.
She laughs when I climb in her bed.
If my mom had time she would love to work all the time.
My mom and I like to colour.
She really loves hugs and kisses.
I love my mom because she gives us play dough to play with.



William noticed that there was a list for grandma's so he wanted to answer those questions and of course Maia wanted in on the action too.

WILLIAM

My nona is 26 years old.
She weighs 13 pounds.
Her favourite colour is beige.
Her favourite food is pasta.
My nona always says "yes".
She cooks the best roast potatoes.
My nona's job is taking care of everything.
She laughs when people tell her jokes.
If my nona had time she would love to spend more time with us.
My nona and I like to do crafts.
She really loves hugs.
I love my nona because she does fun things with us.

MAIA

My nona is 26 years old.
She weighs 3 pounds.
Her favourite colour is purple.
Her favourite food is lasagna.
My nona always says "go downstairs to play."
She cooks the best buns and soup.
My nona's job is cooking.
She laughs when William dances funny.
If my nona had time she would love to play colouring.
She really loves hugs and kisses.
I love my nona because she plays fun games with us.






As you can see from their answers, both Kere and I are fulfilling our respective roles in a very stereotypical way.   As a mother, she always says "no" and as  grandmother I always say "yes".  Truer words were never spoken.  Well to be honest I do sometimes say "no" and Kere often says"yes".

I love that my grandkids think I am so young and skinny.  I knew there was a reason I loved them so much.  William's comment about cooking the best roast potatoes is pretty much true, I'll be making them tonight. I know exactly what you're thinking.....she has to cook on Mother's Day?  Well since we are having roast chicken and no one else in the house knows how to do that.... like WIlliam said, I take care of everything!

I am proud of my both my daughter and daughter-in-law.  They are wonderful mom's who take the time to play with their children, teach them right from wrong, and love them unconditionally.  I know that Olivia will be an excellent mom come September when her little one arrives and I have no question at all that Emily will be a loving, patient mom when the time comes.

Happy Mother's Day

THE CRYING GAME

Last week I received a phone call from Brittany.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Crying" I laughed.

"Is everything okay?"

"I'm fine, I just this moment finished watching a commercial on youtube."

"Oh....the Olympic one?"

"Yep"

"I cried at that too."

This past weekend when Olivia was here, she, Brittany, and Emily were sitting on the sofa together watching clips from Britain's Got Talent.  I was sitting on the love seat opposite them and suggested that Brittany show them the Olympic commercial.  I started to giggle a bit when I saw tears fill Brittany's eyes and then Olivia's but before I knew it, tears were filling mine too and I wasn't even watching it.  Emily played it cool.  Brittany and Olivia are both pregnant so they have an excuse.  Me?..ummm...it's allergy season?

5 SECOND RULE

I bet you think this post will be about food that has fallen to the floor and how long it can sit there before being deemed inedible.  In our house that 5 second rule can run into the 5 day rule depending on the age of the eater.  Personally, I wouldn't eat anything that fell on my floor because I know how often (or little) it gets cleaned.

Tonight we played a new game called 5 Second Rule.  It's a fast paced game where you are asked to name three things in a given category and you have 5 seconds to do it.   We had some good laughs as we played.  I'm a little concerned that Brittany and Emily do not know what a prime number is nor what a preposition is but they can be forgiven because like I said, it's pretty fast paced and had they been given half a minute to think about it they would have remembered.  The funniest moments of the night though came at Emily's expense.  When asked to name three countries in the northern hemisphere she quickly called out  Canada, USA, Europe.  Later in the game Brittany's category was professional basketball players. Steve Nash, Michael Jordan, and Jimmer were her answers.  Unimpressed, Emily asked Brittany "Yeah, but what's his first name?"
"I don't know." replied Brittany.
"Jimmer" I said "His first name is Jimmer."

*Emily is much smarter than I have made her out to be. 

THANKS A LOT

Remember way back in February when I posted about my run in with a jerk at Kelsey's?  I wrote a complaint to Kelsey's and about a week after that, I received a call from a customer service rep. He apologized for the lack of wait staff on the floor and promised to send something in the mail to make up for the unpleasant experience.  Do you know what I got in the mail? Nothing...zilch...nada... and that's exactly about the same amount of business they will be getting from me.