Chuckie's Bride Lives With My Sister, so Watch Out!

My sister starts out a conversation during opening her daughter's birthday gifts with something along the lines of how sweet and cuddly her neighbor is. Who also happens to be older and missing a few fries from the order. Whatever. Then she goes on to say things like how nice this lady is, she just "shows up" and gives her kids her old stuff from her closet. Toys and games and whatnot. And then she says, "And look what she gave Brooke...just because!" Showing us this: After my initial shock and revulsion and multiple expletives, and gasps of "What the HELL? What in the hell is that thing?" I was informed it was some Madame Alexander doll. Uh, not to me baby. That is pure Bride of Chuckie material.

I don't know about you all, but I am NOT a doll fan. I used to pull Barbie's heads off because, well it was Barbie. And her head just came off soooo easily. After seeing this real Shirley Temple Doll now I know why I ripped their heads off...so they couldn't see to attack me and eat my face off while I was sleeping. My brother in law wants to get rid of the doll. I can't say I blame him, because it looks cursed. But my sister thinks it's worth a lot of money. So I say sell it, get rid of it. That is the stuff of nightmares.

You can almost hear it intoning..."Animal crackers in my soup...monkeys and rabbits loop the loop...don't fall asleep with me near, I just might nibble off your ear!"

This Is How We Do the Egg Thang

On the day before Easter (for those of you with memory issues, it would have been Saturday), We had an egg hunt (our 3rd of the season), a baseball parade, a baseball game, and then the neighbors came over for what I call a White Trash Pizza Party. Thats where you bring your own frozen pizza and we all share it after it's cooked up and ready to go. Incidentally, they stayed until well past 11 p.m., because we were playing some dice game, betting quarters, and after I had a few glasses of wine I started telling completely irrelevant stories. Mostly about nothing. Does anyone else do that after having a few? You just start telling stories with no point and that don't make a whole lot of sense? I seriously can't be the only one.

I wanted a picture of the kids all together. This folks, is maybe as good as it gets. This is after John yelled at Nate to "Look Up!"

"But my Ear is itchy!"

Let's try one more time....

Finding eggs tossed on the grass at various intervals is apparently serious work.

She was happy about this egg hunt. There was a lot of chocolate involved.

Here we are dying eggs. Maddie has decided that anytime her picture gets taken she wants it done in her 'crazy eyes' pose.

This is pretty typical for this kid.

As is this. Never mind the magic wand you get in the dye box.

Happy Easter, Love, Crazy Eyes.

The Science Fair

Let's be honest and say my parents are gamers. They came over a couple weeks ago and helped Nate with his science fair project, appropriately titled, "Do You Taste With Your Eyes". Nate is pretty much the boy version of Amelia Bedelia and wanted to let everyone know that NO you do not. However, the point of his science experiment was to find out if just because food looks different, does it taste different.

And so, we had a declicious meal of blue turkey burgers. This is the final "plated" meal. I thought the presentation was class A. Yes, we did make green and red french fries.

The second part of the experiment involved putting coffee, sugar water, salt water and vinegar on various parts of your tongue to see where the taste was the strongest. This was a blast. Opa refused to participate, but seeing as Oma puts vinegar of her nasty vegetables (like spinach and brussels sprouts ick) she didn't mind this part at all.


Mmmm...red food dye. How bad is this stuff for you?

Here's Nate, mixing it up.

Jack also did an experiment on electromagnets. First he made some battery powered thing that was supposed to spin. It didn't work. Then he made telegraphs. It didn't work. Then he made a magnet using a battery, a nail, and some wire. That DID work and it was a great segue to talking about how sometimes, even when we work super duper hard on something it doesn't always work out. And that was okay. We made that part of our display and results board.

Oma keeps saying that coming over for the taste test was fun. Based on that first photo, I'd say that my parent's definition of fun has been warped since they became empty nesters. Next thing I know they'll be sitting there making spoon jewelry and macrame plant holders.......

Do YOU Feel Safe in Your Home? It's a Loaded Question

I am, finally, inexorably down for the count. The kids were sick, I felt icky last week, finally went to the doc, got a diagnosis and some antibiotics and then proceeded to get worse. So this morning I called off my little baby patients, because it seemed to be the ethical thing to do, and drove my sorry butt to urgent care after I took the kids to school. I still have mom duties, you know. So, at urgent care, they start going through the questions. The first one being, "Do you feel safe at home?" I looked the nurse guy square in the eye and said, "Um, well, I'm a mom of 3 kids, two of whom are boys. Define safe". He then says, "Well, it's a state question, and we have to ask it in cases of domestic violence." Well, then, "Oh, well, they like to shoot me with their Nerf Dart Guns. I really don't think those are safe". And as serious as a heart attack, the nurse looks at me and he says, 'i'm just putting it that YES you are safe in your own home." And he laughed, so I guess in all my nastiness of sickdom I haven't lost the ability to keep the mood light. In my temporarily bronchially fogged mind, I sort of wondered what exactly would happen if I had seriously answered with a "No". Hm. The Doc came in, looked at my throat which is red and raw and nasty from coughing and ordered a chest x-ray. It looks pretty bad, but it's "just" bronchitis, so she doubled my dose of drugs-which I cannot take until I get the kids from school for fear of driving under the influence and suggested a salt water gargle. My palette is literally an open wound. I am not keen on throwing salt on an open wound, so have taken to swallowing tablespoons of honey and sucking on Riccola's like they are going out of style. It helps though. I keep thinking the upside of all this is that since I have no appetite unless I'm drinking hot liquids and sucking cough drops, maybe I'll drop these last 5 dastardly lbs, that I've been trying to get rid of. The downside is that since I can't really breathe, exercise, or at least cardio isn't an option, so i'm really just losing muscle tone pounds and will just be thinner and jiggley-er. Being sick requires one to think on things that are abstractly odd. I mean, is it just me, or is anyone else freaked out by those little iphone symbol thingies popping up on tv and in magazines? Hello? 1984??? Did anyone read it? Because I'm pretty sure that's a good way for "Big Brother" to keep his proverbial eye on us. I've seen those creepy Morgan Freeman movies. I know. I know. Also, WHY WHY WHY is daytime tv so awful? I'm into a really good book. I'm working really hard on my artistic recovery, but sometimes I need a brain break. Except, the only thing on is the View and it makes my brain take not just a break, but a complete all inclusive vacation so that I am mush, as are my opinions and original thoughts. Sherry Shepherd should really stick to her "Queen of Jordan" Schtick. At least on 30 Rock she's funny. I must run and get my little peeps now. Then I get to medicate. Maybe if I have some drug induced perceptual breakthroughs I will blog more later, although they may sound like the ramblings of a mad woman. And in my defense, I'm not that far off without the meds.