Day One

Well, day one of Fall Break hasn't even come to a close and yet it has been action packed.

We started the morning early. Very early. Noah's best friend Ryan slept over and they, along with Emily, Katya and Rachel, slept in the tent in the back yard. So, they were up early giggling and talking very loudly. Something I'm sure the neighbors were thrilled about since I was so excited to be awakened that way. (I neglected to mention that I had already been awake a couple of times before that since Noah woke me at 4:00 to tell me he was freezing--although the shivering and chattering of teeth gave it away before he even spoke. He warmed up in our bed and then went off to get sweats on--why that didn't occur to him in the first place I have no idea. And then Sam left for the airport at quarter to five for an early flight to Florida waking me with a jolt when he leaned over to kiss me goodbye. Mom Radar was apparently still on from our 4 a.m. visitor. Lots of sleep for me last night.)

I took Tommy to the eye doctor this morning and found out that he needs glasses. Yippee. So, we ordered two pair in anticipation of him losing and/or breaking them. I'm just as much of an optimist as the next guy, but I'm thinking a dose of realism is necessary in this situation. He is cute and funny and keeps the adults in his life on their toes, but one thing he is not is responsible. So let's strap something breakable on him and just tell him to be careful. I'm sure he'll be fine. For the first week. He is the poster child for "don't give me anything expensive." So, we got 2 pair of cheap Wal-mart glasses! I didn't look at anything other than the cheapest ones they had. I drew the line at geeky though. I would have been willing to pay up if the cheapos were all nasty, but we found a couple of pairs that he liked and I liked. He was funny when he was first trying them on. He kept saying he didn't like any of the ones he tried. Then we finally figured out that he didn't like them because they weren't helping him see better!! Once he finally understood that we were looking for a pair that looked good we were able to find some quickly.

Soon after we got home we discovered that our dog Macy is the Welcome Wagon representative for the block. The neighbors next door are dog sitting and Macy, who takes her responsibilities very seriously, went over and above to greet the new dog. And I mean over and above literally. She jumped the cinder block fence without much difficulty and made a new friend with Joey. I was thrilled to have to go next door and retrieve her. She obviously didn't finish informing Joey of all the ins and outs of the neighborhood amenities because at her next opportunity she bolted out the back door and attempted to vault over the fence again. Katya threw herself at Macy and pulled her down off of the wall just in time. Macy is back in WW training on the proper way to greet a neighbor (the front door is the Welcome Wagon way). Let's just say she'll be spending more time in her kennel until Joey heads back home.

(Somewhere in here I discovered that a certain child had left their tooth under their pillow last night. Guess what happened? Nothing. Someone (me) dropped the ball. Now it's under the pillow in the tent. Brilliant. How am I going to do that with that many kids trying not to sleep?)

So then a little while later, the kids were playing monkey in the middle with the football and I received a phone call from one of the nurses at my oncologist's office. She was telling me my blood counts from last week (which incidentally are pretty good--white count is at 3400 and red is in the normal range). Raynham (the nurse) is also a Christian and was very sweet to me while I was in chemo five years ago. So we were chatting and catching up for a few minutes and she was asking how the kids were doing. I could see them running around the back yard and didn't think anything of it while I chatted. Tommy came running up with a freaked out look on his face but seeing I was on the phone he went back outside without a word (good job Tommy on not interrupting--but this time maybe you should have!). A minute later I looked a little closer at who was running. Katya was chasing Noah around the yard. Hmm. After a couple of more laps, it occurred to me that he was not holding the football. When I looked closer it was obvious that Katya was out for blood. Yikes! So I got off the phone and stepped in to stop the potential bloodshed. It turns out Noah was a little too rough in his attempts to get the ball during monkey in the middle and Katya grew tired of it and snapped. She had no idea what she was going to do when she caught him, but it clearly wasn't going to be a hug. I'm sure Katya was confused by my response, but I couldn't help but laugh after it was all settled. I mean, this was totally out of character for her and totally comical. If there is one person in this family that you would not want to go after it is Noah. He has a streak of anger and if he had gotten mad this could have been really ugly. Praise God he found much humor in it and just wanted to save himself from the wrath of his sister. It's also a good thing he is a fast runner and that she was crying and not able to run faster! The whole thing looked like a scene from a sitcom or a Baby Blues cartoon with them zigzagging across the yard. It still makes me chuckle when I think about it.

And that is just the happenings as of 3:30 this afternoon. What lies in wait for me tonight??? Or the rest of the week?? One thing is for sure, Macy will be in her kennel. We also have Ryan and his sister Cassie sleeping over tonight for round 2 of the Tent That Doesn't Sleep. Maybe I'll slip a little Benadryl into their hot cocoa...