Thursday, March 25, 2010

Grandma and Hand Baskets

My husband and my kids have this game they play in the mornings before school. He takes them to school in bad weather, so he swings by the house at around 7 a.m. and grabs some coffee and the boys. Whoever gets in the car last is 'Grandma',  hee hee.  Usually it is my youngest who always gets to be 'Grandma'.One morning, before Spring Break, Sully was moving at a speed I didn't think he was capable of - typically, my boys have two speeds; slow and slower. This day he was dressed, teeth brushed, shoes on, coat on, backpack loaded, and waiting by the front door, while Tucker was moving through the house looking for his coat and muttering about not wanting to be 'Grandma'. Finally, it's time to go, and Sully races out to the car. Tucker is still looking for his coat, finally finds it, and goes tearing out to the car, but of course, he's too late and he is 'Grandma' this day. What I didn't find out until later is that while they were waiting for Tucker, Sully was sitting in the back all smiles and humming to himself, and since he is just like his dad, my husband immediately asked him what he had done. He got no answer except a big smile and a giggle. About that time Tucker got in and told his dad that he finally found his coat -  in Sully's bed, under the comforter with a bunch of toys on top of that. Gotta admire the poise and skill with which he pulled that off, hee hee! He was tired of being 'Grandma' and so he devised a plan, implemented it, and achieved his goal. He's a pistol,that's for sure!

I told you all of that, so you would have a bit of background for what I'm going to tell you next. The first day back to school after Spring Break saw about 8 inches of snow still on the ground from the weekend. The boys thought maybe they would get another day off, but no chance. The roads were pretty good, so there was school.Bobby had spent a good portion of the morning pulling people out of the snow out in the county, so he was a little later getting back by the house than usual, so consequently, the boys were ready & waiting for him. They decided that Dad was going to be 'Grandma', so they moved his travel coffee mug to buy them a few seconds and when they heard, "ok boys - time to go" they made a mad dash for the car, which was funny because of all the snow still out there. That also bought them another 30 seconds, because the older you get, the less you like falling down. By the time he got to the car the boys were seatbelted in and yelling "c'mon Grandma!" Wonder what our neighbors think?? Never mind - I have a pretty good idea, lol.

The day before that, a friend of mine had an interesting Facebook status. It said, "Where are we going?...and why am I in this hand basket?" I thought about it and didn't get it right away, then promptly forgot about it. Yeah, yeah, I know, I know...  Anyway, the next morning while driving to work and looking at the snow, it suddenly popped into my head and I got it! Actually, to be honest, I was thinking about the new Health care Reform plan at the time...Yeah,this is not really related to 'Grandma' but it happened the same day  :)

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Happy Spring??

The first day of Spring in Kansas was, well, less than Spring-y. See photo below:

This was taken early in the day. By the next morning there was about 8 more inches out there and it wasn't sticking to the trees by then because the wind had blown it all off. Ugh...

Crazy weather...2 days ago it was 68 degrees! Now today it's gray, drizzly, & dreary and 44 degrees. 
Of course it's not just Kansas, but the typical response is 'Welcome to Kansas Weather'

Since I am posting pictures, now is as good a time as any to post some of our Bearded Dragon, Skittles:



Here she is when we first got her at just 6 weeks. Such a little thing and so cute! She is in my 9 year old's hands, and perfectly happy.

Here she is now!
She is now 6 months old and her body is a good 8 inches long with the tail just about as long. To put this photo into perspective, the truck she is on is roughly the size of an adult-sized shoebox. 

Here is a close-up, LOL 
She is so much fun! She sees everything from her chunk of wood perch. When I so much as walk by the boys room, she spots me and gives me the head tilt as she watches. She loves to climb up to high places, so anytime she gets a notion to run she always winds up on top of the couch. Other times, she will sit on the couch and snuggle down into it like it's sand and watch TV, or watch the boys play with Legos.  Sometimes she will climb up onto my shoulder and peek through my hair like it is blades of grass and she is stalking something, lol.  Crickets, I imagine...


Wednesday, March 17, 2010

The Little Things

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  Are you wearing green??  I'm not, but I do have some green with me everywhere I go 24/7. I have green eyes :)  I don't usually 'celebrate' the day, I don't really like beer, let alone green beer - ugh!  I'm sure it tastes the same, but for me what food & drink looks like has a huge impact on the puke-ability scale. I'm sure "bondaegi", boiled silkworm larvae on a stick, is yummy, but I'll pass because it looks like what it is - a bug on a stick. I don't eat bugs, at least not willingly or conciously. So, even if I drank beer, I probably wouldn't drink green beer...or eat green eggs & ham. Call me quirky...

A couple of weeks ago one of my wonderful bosses was shopping for some new equipment for the funeral home and one of the things he surprised me with was a new computer for my desk! I have to say, I LOVE Windows7! I liked Vista, even with it's issues, because it had many cool features and looked so slick, but 7 is smoother and faster and simpler. Anyway the same day, my desktop at home died. I think it's the graphics card - I can hear the Vista welcome chime, but my screen is black. It's not the monitor, I already checked it. Two days later, my laptop just shuts off! I think it's getting too hot, so I'll have to try buying one of those cooling fan thingies.
I'm just a little depressed. I can't afford to do anything about it right now - my little man is turning 6 at the end of this month. I don't have all my graphic stuff loaded on my laptop so trying to create on it is awkward. I do have a lot of my stuff on an external hard drive, but that just adds to the awkwardness. God help me if I have to get up in a hurry with wires and cables all over me - yikes!

I'm loving my brand new shiny work computer, though.*sigh* it's the little things in life that bring such joy, am I right?