Mushrooms

Yesterday at work I was looking through my purse for something when I find a small can of mushrooms. I don't even like mushrooms! I think Miss Elinore has something to do with it.

If we don't shut the pantry door, she noticed and goes to play. Usually she pulls out a box of cereal, but sometimes she goes for the cans too.

Toilet Brush or Plunger?

Yesterday at work just after 3 in the afternoon, Keith called me.  That itself isn't unusual since he gets off work about that time, but what he proceeded to tell me had me laughing, snorting, and crying I was laughing so hard.

Yesterday morning when I was in the kitchen for breakfast with the kids before school and work, I noticed what looked like our toilet bowl brush sticking out of the kitchen trash can wrapped up inside the shopping bag from the bathroom tash bag.  I thought it was weird, but didn't pay much attention to it and went about my day.

Then Keith called that afternoon. 

He proceeded to tell me that a few weeks ago he'd noticed there was some formerly wet toilet paper sitting on top of the toilet bowl brush, but he hadn't paid much attention to it.  The toilet bowl brush sits in the bathroom in the back half of our house that isn't used regularly by anyone but him.  This morning he decided to investigate further.

He described the toilet brush to be over the phone by saying that it looked like someone had used the toilet bowl brush as a plunger before putting it back in its holder.  (At this point, I immediately started laughing.)  He said not only was there the toilet paper on the brush, but there was poop caked all through the brush.  There was also what appeared to be the poop water on the floor under and around the brush. 

So Keith called me at 3 in the afternoon at work to tell me we needed to buy a new toilet bowl brush.  Which is totally something I would leave work for right away for to run out and buy...not. 

Caden has recently started to plunge the toilet himself in our other bathroom.  It cloggs frequently, and he's self-taught on the plunger over there.  I'm assuming he's the culprit in the other bathroom too, and we may need to have a discussion about the difference in a toilet brush and a plunger...

Curtains, Doors and Forts

Today, while we've been working, our contractor has been putting new doors in our house!  I am very excited about it.  Elinore though, I don't think she's going to be excited about it.

You see, as of last night, we had an 8' foot wide, old, inefficient, hard to open, often frozen shut sliding glass door with plain, boring brown drapes covering it.  The drapes helped slightly to keep the cool air out of our family room, when they weren't frozen to the door anyway.  Elinore loved to play in the drapes.  The were big and flowing.  When someone would to go close them, she would run to stand in front of it, so they would have to close around her. 

Other times, she's go sit behind them and play.  Keith said yesterday after school, she and Caden built a fort between the curtain and the window and were playing in it together. 

Our new doo, which I haven't seen yet, is only 6' wide, and is supposed to have blinds between the panes of glass.  So one, I can't wait to get home from work to see how it looks, and two, no more drapes! 

What I Want To Be When I Grow Up

I used to think about what I wanted to be when I grew up meant what job I would have, what career I'd be working on.  How silly I was, because now that I am grown up, what I want to do has so very little to do with my job and so much to do with everything else. 

I want to be a good Christian, a good wife, a good mother.  I want to be compassion and giving.  I want to work hard and serve others.  I want to care about other people and let that be known in my actions and my words. 

Sure, I am an underwriter, but that is just my job, how I am doesn't change when I'm working.  It's just another place I am that I have the opportunity to interact with people and hopefully make a difference. 

Elinore Learns

Elinore is about 20 months old, and she's started doing quite a few fun things lately, that I wanted to write down to remember.

• We taught her to say how old she is.  We'll ask her how old she is, and she holds up a finger and says, one! one!
• When she takes her clothes off (somewhere other than the changing table) or sees someone else's dirty clothes lying around, she picks them up and puts them in her hamper.
• She is developing more and more vocabulary everyday!
• When her brothers are both in time out, usually for fighting or not getting their clothes changed, she likes to go sit with them and just smiles!  She wants to be like them.  (It might be fun to remember this when she's serving her own time outs!

I'm sure there's more that I want to capture, but for now, this is all I can think of.  

Cake Decorating Contest

Over the weekend the boys had a Cub Scout Banquet that included a cake decorating contest.  The night before I baked them each a round cake and I put white frosting on it for them to decorate the next morning at their request.  They each had some ideas and they each knew how they were going to incorporate beef jerky into their cake decorations.  The jerky was a requirement for their cakes and they had to have a cub scouting theme. 

Caden decorated his with a bow and arrow.  

Caleb decorated his with a campfire.  

I think they looked awesome!

People Matter More

Dear Animal Right Activitis:

I disagree with what you do.  And I don't mean to start an argument, I just want to say one thing here.

Aside from the fact that I believe in conventional agriculture and allowing everyone to make their own choices about the food they eat.  (Please note that this statment does not say that I agree with animal abuse; there is a differece.)  That has nothing to do with why I disagree with what you're doing.

My question is, what about the human race?  You spend all this time advocating for better care of animals all the while people are being hurt, abused, mistreated and worse everyday. 

In my book, people matter more.  If we cared as much about people as we do about animals, the world would certainly be a better place.  If people know how to care and love and be compassionate, that would transition to the animals too. 

So while you're busy collecting money to protect homeless animals, we could be using that to help homeless people and families that need love and care.

People matter more.

(By the way writing this makes me feel uncomfortable, but I feel like I need to say people matter.  I know I'm not perfect, and I do things wrong all the time, but this really bothers me.)