In Which My Children Run My Life

So, I haven't written for a few days because this week has been so exciting that I hardly had the time to sit, let alone pen enough witty repartee to entertain my readers. In reality, this week was full of the mundane, trivial things that constitute my life. I don't want to brag (yes, I do), but I did loads of cooking, cleaning, and gyming this week, the latter of which is not a real word. The fatty in me enjoyed banana bread, English muffin bread, pumpkin and black bean chili, and some particularly fabulous taco soup, the recipe for which came straight from my brain, scary as that may be.The skinny-kid-wannabe in me went to yoga twice, swimming once, and cross training once, and worked out in the gym at least once every day this week. My awesome level almost caused Franklin itself to spontaneously combust. 

But the real highlights of the week included my spilling mayonnaise in isle four and going to the "punkin" patch twice, because once is really never enough. 

Upon venturing into Walmart for what was most likely the third time this week, I had one of those moments when my brain utterly failed me, something that happens way more often than I care to dialogue about. I was walking down the dressing and condiments isle with the girls, when I had a complete memory lapse. I literally could not remember what I was there to buy. Hoping that my copious notes would jog my memory, I reached for my phone and scrolled through. Ah, yes. Mayonnaise. So, I reached for a jar, only to lose hold of it, and suddenly I became that person. Clean up in isle four, I said out loud to the Walmart worker who happened to be a few steps away in the same isle. Not to worry, she said. We will get it handled. I moved the jar to the side and spend a moment directing traffic around the small mess I had made. Ever mummy's little conscience, Lils spent the next five minutes screaming, "Mummy! Why did you do that?" Well, Lillian, I was hoping to inconvenience an unsuspecting Walmart worker naturally. Not. Said Walmart worker appeared a moment later, only to pick up the cracked jar in such a way that most people would have assumed that it was human excrement or cat vomit or something equally detestable. She actually carried it around for a few minutes, handling it only with her thumb and pointer finger. Look, lady. It's just mayo. Not nuclear waste. To top the incident off, the obligatory, "Calling maintenance to isle four in grocery for a broken jar of mayonnaise," blared over the store intercom. Color me mortified.

At the "punkin" patch.

It's the great pumpkin, Charlie Brown!

The pumpkin patch was a good time. I had never been, so I was pretty excited to pick out my own pumpkins, mainly because I have very high pumpkin standards that I now feel can only be satiated by my picking them out myself. Lils spent the afternoon playing with friends in the corn kernel pit and hay maze. My main parenting fail for the day was encouraging her to wear her tennis shoes. After tying and untying and retying her shoes about a dozen times throughout the course of the day, I let her walk through the parking lot and to the car in just her socks. Yes. I was that parent. 

Evidently the pumpkin patch was such an overwhelming success that it was the only thing that Lils could talk about for the next two days. And I do mean the only thing. I suppose it didn't help that I promised her that we could go back with daddy. As such, we decided to go back yesterday afternoon. 

A girl and her plastic.

Thus began another insanely wild and crazy, strictly R-rated weekend. Saturday was primarily spent tooling around at Chaney's Dairy Barn and seasonal pumpkin patch (stifle your giggling immediately) and at a children's consignment store. Happily for us, it wasn't just fall festival day at the dairy, but it was also the mascot's birthday. What joy was ours to find that this not only meant inflatables but also free cake and ice cream. Our day could have ended here, but then we would have missed out on the particular pleasure that is used children's goods. Since we only own 95% of the world's plastic, it was only fitting that we made a valiant effort to close in on that last 5%. We make a good go of it when we bought Too a giant standing saucer. Thank you, China, for another finely assembled contraption to add to our ever growing collection. 

We topped off the evening with wine, a (reheated) dinner, and a rousing edition of Lincoln Logs, or "Daddy Builds, Lils Watches." Tim spent a solid 30 minutes building what he considered to be his finest accomplishment to date (procreating notwithstanding), while Lils, true to form, directed the project and insisted upon her involvement at its completion. At the project's end, Big Baby (i.e. Too) destroyed the precariously constructed log village with a single walk-through, though, had we allowed it, I'm pretty sure she would have used her laser vision to incinerate it. 

Happy family photo, complete with photo-bombing alien baby.

Today was a Mass, taco soup, Steeler football kind of day. Overall, it was a pretty great weekend. It was one of those times when the fact that you are, in fact, a parent sort of slaps you upside the head, and whether you like it or not, most of your weekends for, oh, say the next 20 years will be spent in much the same way. I'm still coming to terms with this fact...
 

I can only hope that y'all had as much fun as we did. 

J.