The Best Reason to Home School...

Everyone in the Treasure Valley had school today. But when you home school, your mom can call a snow day. So I did.

If the snow looks sparse in these pictures, it's because they were taken early this morning. My kids were outside with the first snowflakes and have only been inside long enough to create several loads of dripping wet laundry and drink our year's supply of hot chocolate.

My favorite part of the day was taking the kids sledding. As Parker started careening wildly down the hill, he called out, "S.O.S.!!! Save our sled!"

Household Conversations

I've overheard the following conversations this week.

Chris (rearranging the dishwasher): "Kids, when you load the dishwasher, please put the tall glasses on this side of the dishwasher, and the short glasses on the other side."

Me: "You're being anal retentive again."

Chris: "No, it makes sense. This side is slightly larger, allowing for bigger cups. It drives me crazy when the kids load the dishwasher wrong."

Me: "I was the one who loaded the dishwasher. If you're going to freak out about it, you can load all the dishes from now on."

Chris: "Children, I rescind my previous comment."

Me: "I rescind my annoyance towards you."


Deacon is singing the BYU fight song. As he gets to the end, instead of singing, "Go, Cougars," he sings, "Go, Boogers!!"

Parker: "Make him stop, Mom!"

Me: "Parker, he's just teasing you. You tease him all the time."

Parker: "But this is different. This is offensive."


Mom: "McKay, for your school assignment you are supposed to draw a picture of a magical place. Can you describe a magical place to me?"

McKay: "There would be small hills covered everywhere with flowers. And on the hills would be unicorns and pink and purple ponies. Bunnies would hop in the grass, and butterflies that aren't afraid of people would fly in the air."

Oh, the girliness.


I bought Deacon socks for Christmas. The socks were a little too big, but I figured he would grow into them. Apparently, I should have returned them.

Deacon: "Mom, why are you putting grown-up socks on me? Don't you know I'm still a kid?"

Saturday Stripper

"I've been a lousy mom today," I confessed to Chris.

"Is it because we had doughnuts for breakfast, leftovers for lunch, and now you want to eat out dinner?"

"No. I wasn't referring to my neglect in feeding my family; I was referring to my neglect of my children in general. I think Deacon has been playing on the PBS Kids website since he woke up this morning--with the exception of the time he watched a movie while downing a bag of Cheetos. McKay was supposed to be grounded until she cleaned her room, but I forgot about that and let her watch a movie. Her bedroom is still a disaster. And I'm not exactly sure where Parker is. He told me about two hours ago he was going to go play with friends, so I have a pretty good idea..."

The door slams downstairs. "Mom...," Parker calls.

"Whew. He's still alive."

Parker bounds upstairs with his friend Kaleb right behind him. "What's for dinner?"

"Shake-n-Take."

I have a good reason for not cooking all day. It's Saturday. But my other reason is that I am in the midst of refinishing my kitchen table. The table's unusable and my kitchen counters are cluttered with stain and sandpaper and other non-edible ingredients.

My family, plus Kaleb, is sitting around a table at Shake-n-Take downing a ridiculous quantity of fries, when Parker tells Kaleb, "I think we're going to have to redshirt Reslon."

Reslon is one of the four boys that make up the neighborhood football "team." Give it three months and that group of boys will make up the neighborhood baseball team, but right now they're still on a football kick.

"You can't redshirt, Reslon," I say.

"Mom, he fumbles the ball all the time." Kaleb is nodding his head in agreement, and Parker is shaking his head at me. Apparently I just don't get it.

We return home to our in-process table. When we first started to strip the table, I suggested we put hand sanitizer on the table. I'd once spilled a blob of it on the table, and it had taken the finish off perfectly. So I spread hand sanitizer all over the table, and it took part of the finish off, but not all of it.

"This isn't working," Chris said, looking at the table. "I think we need something more powerful."

"Are you asking me if you can get a table stripper?"

One table stripper later, the letters "BYU" that Parker carved into the table are gone. So is the glitter glue, the unwashable washable paint, and the spots where our children pounded their forks into the finish. The table is beautiful.

And now I have no excuse for not feeding my family. Except I think tomorrow might be fast Sunday...

Sunbeams

Deacon has been telling me for a month that he's not going to Sunbeams. He loves nursery and wants to stay there. So it was no surprise that today's adventure into Sunbeams involved a lot of tears, meltdowns, and mother-clinging.

But after fifteen minutes of emotional drama, I was able to leave a smiling Deacon behind in Sunbeams. Tomorrow we will be eating Happy Meals at McDonald's for lunch, and the two events may or may not be related.

At dinner tonight, McKay was chattering non-stop about her new teacher and primary class.

Not to be outdone, Deacon piped up, "Yeah, well, my teacher said, 'Be quiet, Deacon.'"

Watch out, Sunbeams, we've unleashed a cyclone.