Sister took some time yesterday to create a television from an old cardboard box.  She and Brother went outside and rehearsed for some time their “Spring News Report” - all about groundhogs and shadows and such.  Finally happy with the results they called me to watch.

Sis: Okay, Brother.  Go over there and hide like we practiced.

Bro:  No.

Sis (clearly annoyed): Broooother! Go hide like we practiced.

Bro (arms folded):  No.  I want to be the star.

Sis (with a voice that’s changed to honey):  But Brother, you ARE the star.  The groundhog is the most important part.

Bro:  Then you be the groundhog.

Exciting!  I wasn’t just blabbering on about my boring life yesterday.  See this …

Not so boring, eh? There’s a story behind this one but it will have to wait.  I’m over at Leslie’s today with a guest post.

Hey there folks!  I know I haven’t written in a while but I’ve been saving up.  This promises to be a really exciting post… or really boring.  I haven’t decided which yet.  If it is really boring and you stay, you might regret it.  But if it turns out to be really exciting and you leave; well, you might regret that too.  Choices, choices….

• About three years ago I swore off teflon and went in search of a better skillet.  Will suggested cast iron and I was game so we got one.  It pretty nice as far as cast iron skillets go - pre-seasoned and everything; but it was heavy and hard to clean and things stuck to it.  That skillet and I made an uneasy truce and parted ways.  My replacement came from Calphalon.  I paid way too much for two incredibly easy to use hard-anodized skillets that worked marvelously up until about 3 weeks ago when they started to peel…just. like.teflon. Grrr!  So, I am back to cast iron.  It’s going okay so far.  I’ve matured some since my last attempt and I’m more patient than I used to be.  In any case, iron is said to be good for people like me so at least that’s a plus.
• We’ve been doing some gardening around here.  At least we’re trying.  Sister and I started some seeds in March which means that we should be planting seedlings about now.  “Should” would be the operative word here.  We are not planting seedlings.  Our cat found the seedlings to be irresistible.  At least I assume that’s why she pulled them from their containers and used them to play kitty soccer around the house.  Despite this ‘cat’-astrophe, (Oh, I am so clever.) we are undaunted.  We have re-done our front flower garden.  The morning glories went in today.  And for veggies we will just have to suck it up and visit a nursery. Yep, it’s spring and things are growing, growing, growing.
• Speaking of nurseries reminds me of the one we’ve been going to and that reminds me of the custard store just outside its gates.  They have the most out of this world frozen custard.  In particular, I like “The Salty Dog.”  It has vanilla custard and caramel mixed with pretzels and roasted pecans.  Mmm, the perfect blend of salty and sweet…. if you crave that sort of thing.
• I tried my hand at bread baking again a couple of weeks ago.  I really, really want to make all of my own bread but numerous disappointments have left me feeling like an inadequate baker and I was about to give up when I happened upon this recipe.  It seemed easy enough so I tried it.  And it worked!  It really worked!  I made two loaves just like she did because I didn’t want to mess with the recipe the first time out but it occurs to me that if you have the dough you could make all sorts of shapes in your oven:  loaves, twisty things or even buns.
• Finally, I can’t believe it’s April already.  April is almost May and May is almost June and June is summer.  Last year I promised myself that I’d lose some weight so for once in my life I’d actually look good in a swimsuit but let me tell you, I just don’t think it’s going to happen.

So.  Boring?  or Exciting?  If you think you know what this post is really about leave your guess in the comments.  Leslie, Jen & Jenni can’t play.  Hmm, that would exclude 3 of my 5 readers.  What the heck. You girls can join in too.

I feel like maybe I’ve not been completely honest with you so I’ve decided to come clean.  My children watch television AND they play video games AND I don’t put limits on how much they can do either. . . and without limits they don’t actually do either that much.  Shocking isn’t it?  But just to prove that it does happen I snapped these pictures.

This is what they were playing …

and this is how they were playing it.

Following their Mario Party bonanza, Dad got a wild hair to visit Safari Park.  So, we did. (Unfortunately my camera lost power minutes after our arrival so I don’t have any pictures of the lions or tigers or bears… oh my well.  I’ll get them next time.)

At home again, Sister pulled out the cotton balls and glue (among other things) and got crafty for an hour or so.

Later, we conducted a very scientific experiment.

Observation:

Brother’s Fire Engine can move small objects.

Hypothesis:

Brother’s Fire Engine can break through a domino wall.

Test(s):

(Sister’s) Conclusion:

Brother’s Fire Engine is weak.

(Brother’s) Conclusion:

“I need a new engine.”

For clarification these activities did not happen all in one day but they deserve to be recorded and I kept being lazy and not getting around to posting so anyway… here you go.

Take a random trip to Tulsa and visit the Oklahoma Aquarium.  Discover a fish you’ve never seen before, pet the stingrays, and almost get eaten by a crocodile.

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Find yourself in an urban jungle.  Use all available resources to build a shelter.

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Spend a morning making elegant capes for every horse you own.  You never know when they might get invited to a fancy ball.

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Play with fire.

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Finally gather enough courage to ride sit on your “big boy bike”.

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Discover there are bandits hiding out in the backyard.  Assemble trusty steeds from brooms and paper bags.  Don’t forget to dress appropriately for bandit hunting.

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Decide the bandits aren’t worth your time.  Organize a parade instead.

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Make a sad, sad attempt at gardening.

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Test your architectural skills using only imagination and 4 L brackets.

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Spend time playing with My Little Ponies ….

on the front door.  They’re magnetic, you know.

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Assume an alter ego for the day.

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Produce a self portrait.

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Throttle your mother at “Let’s Go Fishin’ ” and a number of other games.

Yesterday, when I (Sister) went in the den to get my karate suit on I saw a mouse run across the room.  I screamed and I ran and told Mom that there was a mouse in the house.  The picture you see is of Serafina, our cat stalking the mouse in the house.  When we came back from karate, we helped Serafina catch the mouse.  To help her catch the mouse we lifted up the couches with stools and she went under the couch and caught the mouse. It was too bad though that she never got to eat it.  We let it go outside.  And since yesterday, she has not caught any more mice.  And I hope that she catches them in the house but brings them outside and eats them not play with them in the house.

You know your hubby loves you when he takes a large chunk of his only true day off and devotes it to a major overhaul on your computer.  (He may have munched on chips n salsa and watched Talladega Nights while waiting for various installations and such but those are not details I want to go into right now. … Though I would appreciate it if you’d offer up a prayer to the Lord Baby Jesus for his soul … and his sense of humor.)

For some time now my computer has been grinding and halting and throwing up random error messages in protest of its use.  Prompted by Heather’s Ubuntu adventures, I seriously considered switching to a new OS altogether but because I love my Money (That’s Microsoft Money as in financial tracking software not as in “the love of … is the root of all evil” money.) there was nothing for it but to restore the factory settings and then spend the next 3 hours uninstalling all of the unwanted junk.  Finally, things are back to normal… technologically speaking, of course.  I make no such claims about the rest of life.  I may at some point try the Linux path but for now I’m going to give Windows a few days and let the dust settle.

Some parting thoughts:  If you don’t like your current blogging editor I found a couple for you to try.  ScribeFire (which will be my choice if I every do make the Linux leap) integrates with Firefox seamlessly.  The set up was incredibly easy (It’s just a Firefox extension.) and the features while not as rich as my next suggestion are far less cumbersome than Wordpress (which powers this blog) or Blogger (which I have used in the past.)

My next suggestion and my personal choice (for now) is Windows Live Writer.  I wrote about it before while it was still in beta.  Actually I expected it to stay in beta forever.  After all it was Microsoft and it was free and never shall those twain meet except in beta.  Even so, I’ve been using it successfully for quite a while and after the big cleanse needed to reload it to, if nothing else, retrieve my out of control draft folder.  You know, all those thoughts I quickly jot down in reflective moments but never find the time to expound upon.  Don’t laugh - I know you do that too.  So, I re-installed the program and what to my wondering eyes did appear? … no, not Rudolph … but something almost as mythical.  A free, non-beta, Microsoft product.  I will warn you that the install included several “extras” that I had little interest in but you can opt out of them if you stay alert.

Okay, enough tech talk.  Let me know if you try one of these or if not, what do YOU prefer?

If, because you discovered he’d written on the piano keys (all 88 of them) and then found him scrawling his name on a wall, you took away your son’s pencil and later banned crayons for the day, don’t be surprised when you find caveman like drawings on your chair and table and sofa; carefully rendered by a dirt covered rock.

Did you ever play marbles as a child?  No?  Me neither.  But I totally wish I had because… what fun!  By no means did we follow these rules… waay too complicated instead we made up some simple house rules.  Big circle, 10 marbles, take turns trying to knock them out.  Around here a bag of marbles with a “Tolley” (or Shooter) is about $2.50.  I’ll bet they’re at least that cheap in your area.  Why don’t you go find out and reclaim some childhood.

*edited “until I could resist any longer” - because in my haste to avoid a double negative I failed to put any negative at all.

For about a week now Brother has bounded out of bed each morning to delclare, “Oh, mom the sun is rising it’s time to go to school!” He then collects his backpack, packs a lunch and walks down the hall to the toy/computer room. There he will play for almost an hour before returning “home”. Today had only one variation. He “waited” for the school bus. And waited and waited until I could resist no longer. I donned my schoolbus driver persona and picked him up along with two or three pretend passengers and drove them all to the toyroom. There he is now. Happily playing school. To each his own, I suppose.