Friday, October 16, 2015

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! (And I'll ask you to remember that Friday doesn't end until 11:59 P.M.)

1


Phillip's been listening to random history podcasts on his commute home from work and likes to share what he learned with us at dinner. He was telling us about the Mongol warriors the other night and my 7-year-old interrupted with, "Why do you know all about the Mongols?"

"Because Daddy used to be one," I joked.

Quite seriously, he looked Phillip over and said, "I thought you used to work at Pizza Hut."

Same difference.

2


Accidentally, I ended up falling asleep on the couch one afternoon and how's this for irony?

I woke up with a start 30 minutes later, thinking of how awesome it was that my toddler and preschooler had let me sleep and kept themselves busy without me.

Then I went and found those wonderful children: one with a red crayon and a guilty look on her face, and the other covered in Turtle Wax.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

In a double layer of irony, my daily question on the blog's Facebook page had been: How good are your kids at entertaining themselves?

Cue the muted trumpet that goes, "Wa, wa, wahhhhh!"

3


Really, if you're not on my Facebook page you're missing out. Click here to visit the page and if you like what you see, you can:

  1. Answer a question or leave a comment (you can do that even if you don't commit to the 'like' button)
  2. Post to the page or send me a message to say hi
  3. Hit 'like' (go under the 'liked' tab and hit 'Get Notifications' to be sure you get my status updates, because you know. Facebook.)

If it helps you make up your mind, I made the Today Show's list of funniest parents on Facebook again this week. At the very least, go read the list: they really are funny.

4


When he came upon me doing a Google shopping search for prosthetic elf ears, Phillip thought for a moment that I was having the strangest midlife crisis ever.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
Not going to lie to you: I'm slightly creeped out by these fake rubber ears.

But that's only the beginning of prepping my kids' Halloween costumes. Buying the elf ears was the easy part.

5


As usual I'd gotten myself in over my head, but lucky for me, Phillip's mom was visiting this week and bailed me out. 

My energy level has been so low with this pregnancy that I basically need a nap after brushing my teeth, but for some reason I thought it would be a good idea to make an owl costume from scratch for my preschooler and sew a hooded cloak for my other daughter (the elf.)

I bought the fabric and helped cut out some of the pieces, but Phillip's mom basically did the whole thing. I really don't think Halloween would be happening this year for my kids without her.

She went home yesterday, leaving a few finishing touches for me so I didn't feel like a complete failure.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
Look, honey! I glued on the beak! I did something!

6


At church, there was an art show featuring work from the kids ages 3-11, and it was awesome! The leaders set up furniture like in a real art gallery, and you could mill around looking at the matted artwork to some tasteful recorded harp music.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
My favorite piece

My kids looked at the art but spent most of the time at the refreshment table scraping the last drops of chocolate off the chocolate fountain with broken pieces of crackers that were left when we arrived late.

Yeah, we're pretty classy.

7


We also went for the first time to the annual apple cider press party of some friends of ours, where my one-year-old loved putting apples in the press. When it was full we managed to redirect his attention to moving apples from one bucket of rinse water to the other.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

I had to stop him several times from falling in head-first, despite the illustrated safety warning on the side of the buckets that he clearly did not bother to read.

7 Quick Takes about the Genghis Kahn of the Restaurant Industry, Ordering Elf Parts Online, and One Ineffective Way to Raise a Safety-Conscious Toddler  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
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8 comments:

Unknown said...

AuntSue
Looks like you have a GREAT LIFE going on in your family!

Queen Mom Jen said...

Haha you are awesome! I think we pretty much live life out of the same kind of playbook. I love that idea for an ART show. Totally going to steal that one for next year. Thank your primary presidency for inspiring other primaries :)

Unknown said...

The fabric I bought to make a Halloween costume for my daughter during my last pregnancy is still laying untouched in my sewing room.

Jenny Evans (sister, not author) said...

Haha, I love how the comment about how the little guy "clearly did not read" the safety warning. I love reading your blog. And mom has saved many a Halloween costume if mine (just in the last few years even). It's kind of her thing.

Jenny Evans said...

She's amazing. The owl costume looks storebought, it's that good.

Jenny Evans said...

That totally would have been the fate of the brown felt had my mother in law not saved the day.

Jenny Evans said...

I thought it was such a great idea, too! I'd never seen a Primary art show before. They chose the theme "I know my Savior loves me" but really it could be done a number of different ways. They also had a table with clipboards and a "still life" scene with fall gourds set out for people to sketch (which my oldest daughter loves because she's so artsy.)

Anonymous said...

You always cheer me up!