Our weekend

We had plans to go to my parents cabin in Strawberry over the weekend and hopefully have some fun playing in the snow. There was a chance it would be melted by the time we got there, but we thought it would be fun to get away regardless. Friday night Rylie woke up about 11:00pm and didn't fall asleep again until 4:30am. I tried all kinds of things to get her to go back to sleep but nothing worked.

There is little to do around the house between those hours of the night. After passing up the opportunity to make tens of thousands of dollars PER WEEK from 3 separate paid television ads (by simply calling the 1-800 number and buying their product, no education necessary, not even high school; I may live to regret this decision) and resisting the urge to buy a steam-sanitizing mop with extra extensions, a food processor that cuts through veggies like... a food processor, a slick see-through oven from Mr. T, and various other products late night America can't do without, I settled for a movie and watched Matrix. It's amazing that the computer technology shown in that movie is already outdated, like CRT monitors.

Because Rylie and I didn't get enough sleep we scrapped the Strawberry and snow idea. Saturday Heidi took Daniel to the store and Daniel told mom that he wanted to go to town. Heidi said that they were in town but Daniel replied that he wanted to go to the OTHER town, which means traversing the 20 miles of expansive desert to get to Chandler or Mesa. So we decided to eat at TGIF as a family.

We ordered the kids food first knowing they would not sit still long. Daniel had to go to the bathroom so I took him. He closed himself in the stall and locked it. I didn't want to be a "psycho guy in the bathroom looking under the stalls" so I patiently coaxed him out after he was finished. He had to use both the Pink soap and Purple soap from both sides of the counter, which is more than one guy could say as he came in and left without washing his hands at all.

Their food came and they ate. Rylie had to go to the bathroom too and although she still wears diapers, she will not be outdone by her older brother and insisted she visit the ladies room. When she got back Daniel said he had to go too, again. Our food still hadn't arrived yet so I took him again. This time I think he went number 2 although I'm not sure because he locked me out of the stall again and flushed at least 4 times. By the time he washed his hands twice again (4 times total now) our food had finally arrived.

After literally two bites from my plate, they were done being there and wanted to leave. That of course means I either take my food to go or eat as fast as I can before Daniel gets all the sweet and low packets open and I suffer heart burn later. Heidi had actually finished hers, mostly while I was in the bathroom with Daniel and decided to take the kids next door to the Petsmart. So I got to finish eating dinner at TGIF with my family by myself. At least I didn't get heart burn.

At Petsmart I got a status report of the lizards and fishes and snakes. On the way home Daniel treated us with 5-10 second stories. For example: Once upon a time, there was a stop sign and we stopped, the end. (we were riding in the car at the time).

Daniel has quite an imagination that often involves monsters or spiders. Sunday on the way to church, Daniel mentioned the package of diapers we keep stored in front of him behind the passenger seat. He said, Mommy, these diapers have two eyes and a mouth and they scare me! I don't know what to say to that.

At preschool, Heidi taught Daniel the Australian version of Rudolph the red nosed reindeer called RooRoo, the red nosed Kanga. So, at church today one of his nursery teachers was wearing a reindeer tie that had a button that lite up Rudolph's nose. When I picked him up Daniel said something about RooRoo the Kanga and how he was teasing his teacher. I can only imagine.

Daniel is such a teaser, just tell him what you don't like him to do, he will persistently exactly that from that point on just to tease you.

It's so nice to have the next 3 weeks off of school, I'm looking forward to playing with my kids the whole time.