7 Quick Takes about Buying Food for Burglars, Unconventional Furniture Placements, and Causing a Scene on Vacation Despite Our Best Intentions

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?

—1—

I hope you all had a nice Presidents' Day! 

Here are two commemorative drawings of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, courtesy of my 1^st grader:

Happy Presidents' Day!

She said she copied them from example pictures in class, but I'm unclear on whether the example pictures were equally hilarious-looking.

You have to be delicate when asking those kinds of questions about subjects like young child art. You never want to assume the goofiness is intentional.

—2—

I went to the grocery store and as I got my 5-year-old out of the car, he asked me earnestly, "Are we buying food for burglars?"

At the time I just told him matter-of-factly that no, we were not. It didn't even occur to me that it was a weird question until later on, which proves that motherhood indeed changes you.

I also told my 2-year-old the other day to "get that lettuce out from under your feet" and didn't think anything of it until my mother started laughing, so the transition is pretty much complete.

—3—

My mom is here visiting and having a great time with the kids. I'm not sure whose idea it was, but since our basement ping pong table has gone the way of every single ping pong table in history and become a completely unusable dumping ground for our stuff, they brought the ping pong paddles and balls upstairs and started playing on the dining room table.

Unconventional? Yes.

Regulation size? Not likely.

But I think it's brilliant because now the table is always clean.

If you, too, struggle with a table perpetually covered in crumbs, spilled milk, and dishes no one in the house admits to having used, I suggest encouraging your kids to use the table as a sport court and then they will actually clean it up.

 I've tried everything else, people. This is what works.

—4—

This week we had to move everything out of the kitchen and dining room in preparation to refinish the floors in there, and our house is a complete disaster right now.

Our living room currently contains an entire kitchen and dining room's worth of stuff, including an oven and a set of 8 dining chairs. There isn't much room to move around, but plenty of seating.

As we moved the refrigerator next to the computer desk, I had an epiphany: I'll never have to get up from blogging again! Everything I need to stay alive is now within arm's reach! Why didn't I think of this before?? And is there any way we can keep that arrangement once we move all the furniture back?

—5—

After moving out all the furniture, we went on a mini-vacation since the floor refinishing process takes several days.

I could tell it was going to go well when the same kid had to do an emergency change of pants and underwear twice at the same IHOP 30 minutes into our trip.

We made it to the hotel okay, minus a few pairs of pants, but we were quite a spectacle there. A group of nine people in two adjoining rooms is a spectacle all on its own, but on the second day one child decided to kick it up a notch and throw up all over the bed (and Phillip.)

We were scrambling to get everything and everyone cleaned up because we had non-refundable 5:00 tickets to go see an ice castle. Even worse, it was right before the hotel cleaning staff was supposed to go home for the day, so four employees were literally waiting for us in the hallway as we were doing our Home Alone rushing-out-the-door routine, probably thinking about how the last thing they wanted to do at the end of a long shift was clean up someone else's kid's smelly vomit.

You'd better believe they got a big tip.

—6—

When we weren't causing a scene, we took a winter hike through a sculpture garden, saw an ice castle, went sledding (little kids) and snowshoeing (older kids,) and visited a science museum.

We saw many interesting sculptures at the sculpture garden, including this one where nobody could agree on what the subjects were: anteaters? bears? armadillos?

The placard with the name of this sculpture was no help, either. It said the name of the piece was "Animals."

Some of us were less-than-impressed with the ice castle, especially Phillip who got thrown up on a second time in the gift shop, but I thought it was awesome. I really loved it.

The view looking up, a.k.a the reason we had to sign a waiver before going in.

I had to pull my 5-year-old off the ice slide, he was having so much fun. And honestly, I was having so much fun watching him I was in no hurry to go.

We also stopped in at the mall to kill some time and have lunch. My mom and I took the oldest pants shopping, the little kids played at the playplace, and Phillip gave the middle two kids my phone and some photo challenges.

He thought it would keep them busy for a while when he told them to find "clothes with puppies," but when they came back almost immediately he knew he was in trouble.

I thought his last photo challenge, to "find mom," was genius because he was ready to go but had no idea which store we were at, and this way he didn't even have to come find me himself.

They found me in J.C. Penney.

—7—

The last observation I want to share is that when you're sitting at IHOP filling out the MadLib on the placemat as you wait for your breakfast, if you ask your 7-year-old for the name of "a place," the answer is 95% likely to be "the toilet shop."

Just so you know.

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