The Flour Game

I had forgotten about this game for many years, but Sunday night we were playing Uno with the kids for the 78th time and it came to me. My aunt Retha taught us how to play when we were young and then in high school I remember playing it with some of my friends and having lots of laughs.

What you do is fill a small cup half way full with baking flour.  Pack it down and then put a clean penny in it. You have to wash it with soap and maybe rub a little sanitizer on it if you are anal like me about germs. Then fill the rest of the cup with flour so that the penny is hidden in the middle. Place a plate over the cup and carefully turn it over so that the flour comes out on the plate in the shape of the cup. 

Now to start the game, everyone slaps ther hands on thier legs twice and then claps once like what you do when you listen to the song, "We will, we will rock you."  Slap, slap, clap.  Got it.  The first person says a subject like books, or colors or spongebob characters, or whatever you like.  The next person has to name a book or color or whatever on the next clap and you keep going around the table until someone messes up.  If they mess up, they have to take a knife and slice off part of the flour.  You don't want to make the flour collapse though.  Whoever makes it fall has to find the penney with only their face and pick it up.  It is hilarious.  Once they find the penney, you carefully pick out the slober they may have blown in there when they were laughing and pack it back in the cup again.  Good times!

What a week

Or at least half a week since all the fun started on Wednesday and ended on Sunday.

Wednesday was a good day. Dallon was nominated by one of his teachers to be Falcon of the Month (doo doo doo...hear the trumpets sounding). They give this award out not just for academics, but for kids that have shown kindness to others, leadership skills, or have improved somehow. Mike and I got to go down to the junior high library and they had a little program for the kids who were nominated. They read the letters out loud that the teachers had wrote. 

I'll have to admit that I had one of those proud mom moments where you almost cry, but I didn't want to embarrass myself in front of a bunch of jr. high kids so I kept myself under control. I'm getting better at that. The cookies and chocolate milk afterwards topped off a great afternoon.

And then there was Friday.  Glorious 5th Grade Maturation Program at the elementary school. Michaela kept telling me that I really didn't have to go. She said the only reason they invite parents is so that they keep the kids from laughing. Now, my kids live pretty sheltered little lives you have to remember. So do I, so I wanted to see if I could learn something along with Michaela.

They started the video and it was pretty cool and hip and everything until they cut to the drawings of our body parts. I seriously almost bit my tongue off trying not to laugh. You know, one of those nervous laughs that happen at church when you aren't suppose to laugh. 

I would look at Michaela and she would shoot daggers at me. I knew she had no idea before this video about what her little tom-boy body was going to do to her in a year or two. I wasn't going to be the one to tell her and ruin her carefree love of life. 

Finally, it was over and I had to force her to take the little prize bag that they give the girls as they leave. She wanted nothing to do with what was in that bag. As we walked to the car, I asked her if she knew any of this lovely information before today. "No!  They are lying.  That is NOT going to happen to me." (I'm glad she's not showing any signs of denial at this point.) I had to be the bearer of bad news and let her know that yes, it actually is going to happen. When we got in the car, she ripped the beloved prize bag open and threw the winged friends at me and told me that I could have them and she'd keep the deodorant and the granola bar.  These are those bonding moments you look forward to as a mom.  

Now fast forward to Sunday morning, 9:00am.  My little family that tries to be real inconspicuous is sitting up front and center at the pulpit in church. Yes, that's right, we had to speak in church. 

Everyone of us.  

Even Mike.

Yes, I said Mike.

Don't fall off your chair for those of you that know Mike.

It actually went well. Mike did awesome and didn't seem nervous at all up there. Especially since he informed us after, that half way through the talk he got this monster cramp in his left butt cheek.  He had all of his weight on one leg and was just a little tense. He said under normal circumstances, it would have dropped him to the ground. I'm so proud of him!

Reagen wanted to talk about Noah's Ark. Dal and Kayla both wrote their talks on their own. You couldn't hear my knees knocking...I think, so we'll consider it a success.  My friend Kathryn, who besides looking like Miss America, is sooo musically talented, sang a beautiful musical number for us.

It was sure a half a week to remember.

It's good to have friends

And even better to have friends with connections! My buddy Chelsea is friends with some developers in her neighborhood and therefore has access to 4 model homes that are really cute. I bribed Reagen into being our little model as we both worked on our "indoor skills". We've found that taking pictures indoors isn't that easy because of the whole lighting situation. It was really fun to have time to make adjustments without a family sitting posed and ready. Reagen had a lot of patience and I paid her well with a humongo frozen yogurt afterwards. Here are some of my favorite pics.

Reagen's version of Rockband

I may be raising a nerd...

...but I'm ok with that. He's already way smarter than me. I come home and find stuff like this on a regular basis. Little test tubes filled with who knows what. I don't even like to ask what may be in them. I'm constantly out of cornstarch because he makes experiments with it. He blew a fuse in his room last year because he wanted to try and make his own lightbulb and plug it into an outlet. I always sanitize my tweezers before using because I don't know what insects he's been inspecting with them. The internet history on our computer has interesting searches for things like inertia, surface tension, and nuclear fission. What the heck is this kid going to brew up? I don't know what most of that stuff even is, but I don't want to ask him because he might figure out he's smarter than his old mom. When he talks about sciencey type stuff, I just nod my head like I know what he' s talking about. I'm not sure where this kid got his brains, but I know at 13 I wasn't trying to make my own lava lamp, I was prank calling boys with my friend Mindy.

Resolutions?

I usually don't make new year's resolutions because I hate to deal with failure so early in the year. I love the idea of having a "word" for the year, though. My good friend Ade explains it here. Last year my word was focus. I'm going in a little different direction this year. My word for 2009 is "enjoy". It sounds a little corny, maybe a little too easy, but I thought about it a lot and I want to enjoy 2009. I want to apply it in all aspects of my life. I want to enjoy my kids more and relax and have fun around them and worry less about what they are doing wrong or that they are annoying the crap out of me some times. I want to enjoy more time with Mike. The kids keep us running pretty steady and we don't make too much of an effort to make time to spend together. We're actually together a lot, but there's always three extra little people hanging out with us. I want to even slow down and enjoy my food. I guess I'm used to always being rushed so I notice that I don't even chew my food half the time. In I throw it and down it goes. Maybe that's why I eat twice as much so I can get to taste it a little longer. I want to enjoy my surroundings. I love nature and I don't make enough time for that either. I feel so much peace when I get out on a nice day and I usually give that up to plop down and watch Survivor or some other mindless show. So there you have it.  Now I'm going to go and try to enjoy the Primary meeting I have at 6:00.  Ha!