Sundays with Stretchy Pants

I’m busy and maybe I’m still in mourning. I don’t know. I paint stuff and take the kids to the pool and think about Michael Jackson and Walter Cronkite and run and play variations of hide-and-seek, but blogging hasn’t been on my to-do list.

We’re heading to Michigan today (not Cluck & Tweet’s Michigan, but still). My sister and I will beat my my nephew’s girlfriend and my niece in tennis on Saturday morning and then we’ll spend the rest of the day gloating about that while the kids swim in the pond and play with their cousin Riley. Sunday, there will be an Aldrich family reunion, and then a childless trip home as the kids are staying a few days in order to camp with my inlaws. What will we do with no children? Paint, of course. I’m going to paint 14 hours a day for 3 days. I hope I finish the whole house. After  my 14 hours of painting, Bryan and I will eat at restaurants and maybe go to Zoombezi Bay one night. Who knows? We’re crazy kids, we could do anything! ANYTHING! As long as the painting gets done, I mean. The painting must get done. I will miss the children because they rock, but they’ll be in good hands and they’ll still rock when they get back. And the walls will be painted. Yay!

Oh, and new toilet! Monday! Plumber!

As usual, don’t break in while we’re gone and make sure you cry because you miss us. If you could videotape yourself crying and post it on Youtube, that would be a bonus. I’ll give you bonus points. (You didn’t know I’ve been giving you all points all this time? I won’t take away any points for that).

And yet I’ve lost a whole week since my last post. Huh.

Well, there was packing and then a trip for Kids Know Stuff. The kids and Kristen have to review the trip, but I don’t. I just pretended like I was Kate and used my precious twins for the free stuff they could get me. It was fairly satisfying. Part 1 of the kids’ review (Lincoln City, IN) is here, if you wanna know. Spoiler Alert! Abe Lincoln spent some time there as a young man. And there are several monuments so you can never, ever forget it.

Then I had to unpack and I got a new clothesline so I did all of my vacation laundry on my new clothesline. It smelled good, but it took a long time to dry. Stupid sun.

And then I vacuumed the basement.

And I might have cooked something and then cleaned it up. Aren’t you glad I skipped blogging for the week?

Tomorrow the kids and I will drive halfway up to Michigan to pick up my niece, Riley, for a nice long visit. Taylor isn’t coming for the long visit this year because she has a life. It happens. Cody never visits anymore, but I texted him and asked him if he would start visiting us again once he reached legal drinking age and he said, “duh,” so that’s something to look forward to. Riley’s still too young for a life. Except on Woogi World. Anyway, the kids have been squealing non-stop since before the trip and now they’re squealing again because Riley’s visiting. Thank god I didn’t finish all that tequila. That’s gonna come in handy.

I’m trying to blog but I keep getting distracted by Mario Kart. And I’ve been doing laundry, making food, and packing for the unschoolers conference thingy at Kalahari. And Maya puked a couple of days ago so I had to snuggle on the couch.  And Kristen’s son broke his arm yesterday so I had to fret over that. And I have nothing to say, but I usually don’t let that stop me. I looked for a funny video for you, but I couldn’t find one. Why isn’t anybody making funny videos anymore?

We’re going to the Unschooler’s Winter Water Gathering at Kalahari Resort  tomorrow morning with some of the weekly potluckers and other locals, so that’s fun.  Dawn has to work, but we’re making her son come with us because our children cannot bear the void caused by Noah’s absence.

Oh, I know! I read this book called I See the Moon by C. B. Christiansen and I got choked up on every single page and then I cried through the last 3 chapters. It’s about a 12-year-old girl whose 15-year-old sister is pregnant and placing the baby for adoption. The little sister dreams of being an aunt and she’s so excited and she wants to be just like her favorite aunt who now has dementia and it’s just so sad. Every page. Read it and tell me what you think. But lower your expectations because when I finally got around to seeing the movie Titanic, I did not shed a tear. For weeks everybody kept saying, “It’s sooooo sad! Bring a whole box of tissues!” And then it was soooo lame except for the musicians’ continued playing and the images of the old people and parents and children holding each other on the bed and waiting to drown. That part was sad. Oh, and the part where Rose didn’t die. That was sad, too. Don’t judge me.

Anyway, that book was sad, but maybe you won’t cry. It doesn’t mean you’re cold and dead inside. Probably.

We’re taking off for a night in Cleveland with the Pepper Paints family. In my absence, please enjoy this video. It’s an oldie, but a goodie.

We’re back! And we are tired. Lots (but not enough) of friends and relatives, a funeral and a wedding, some camping with the inlaws and lots and lots of driving. I feel like a zombie so, instead of posting, I’m going to give a you a link to a zombie dating site because it’s my blog and I can do what I want with it. And then I’m going to watch Shaun of the Dead and go to sleep in my very own bed. It’s funny if you like that kind of thing (the movie, not my bed). I swear you’ll like it even if you don’t like zombie movies. If you don’t, you can have your money back.