Make-up Artist

Frankie was a bit too quiet today while I was putting away laundry upstairs. Ignoring my motherly intuition, I finished the job at hand before going to check on him. I had to say goodbye to an entire tube of lipstick (the color looks better on him than it did on me anyway) and then spent quite awhile washing his face, hands, feet, legs, shirt and inside his left ear. 

This is what I found:

It's about time

After 11 years of parenthood, we (and by we, I mean Seth) have finally made them a sandbox, and they are loving it. We had friends with a large amount of very fine, beach-like sand out in their pasture, and they were generous enough to let us take a truckload of it for free.

It's beautiful sand for playing in, perfect for making sand-castles and burying people. And it took us about 5 minutes to realize that we have created for ourselves a new battle. In addition to being as fun as beach sand, it's as sticky as beach sand. So every time the kids play in it, they are covered in a clinging sand that doesn't easily rub off. We've filled a little pool as a washing station for the kids and have the back porch fully stocked with old towels in hopes of keeping the sand from getting all over our house. Time will tell whether this endeavor was worth it or not. So far so good....

Hired!

I'm thinking of giving Charlie primary job of answering the phones here. If I can get to the phone in time, I can usually tell if it's a scammer or telemarketer, but occasionally the kids beat me to it and end up answering.

Charlie was with us as Seth was telling us about a new scam call that had been hitting homes in our area, and we were talking about the importance of never giving out any information over the phone to people who call. Charlie wanted to know why so I said something to the effect of the callers just being after our money.

The very next morning, the phone rang and Charlie answered it. I could overhear a man asking to talk with "your Mom or Dad." Instead of handing me the phone, Charlie narrowed his eyes and said, "Wait....Are you just trying to take our money?"  It ended up being an impressively believable recorded voice  (impressive because it was apparently able to tell that a child had answered the phone), so there was no reaction to Charlie's impertinent question.

Winter fun

First off, I offer my apologies for writing about snow and winter when we are just beginning to thaw out and forget that a month ago we were buried in over a foot of snow around here. I meant to share these picture sooner, but you know, kids, life, blah blah blah. 

Anyway, we did manage to have quite a bit of fun during our extended winter here in MN. During the late March blizzard, I was gone for the weekend so Seth was on his own with the kids. When I came home, I was greeted by the biggest snowman I have ever seen and a very impressive igloo-type fort. The fort doesn't look that big, but we actually fit 7 people inside it at once (one of them was Seth so we didn't even cheat by squeezing in only tiny people). Both of these feats are something this mom would never be capable of doing with the kids - my best snowmen usually end up around 3-4 feet high. Seeing this made me once again thankful that our kids have such an adventurous and creative dad who can do those things with them that I'm too small or feminine (or lazy) to do. 

Speaking of things I would probably never do with the kids, Seth also brought the boys ice fishing this winter with our brother-in-law. It took Charlie about 5 minute to catch this guy! Looks like he has his Great-Grandpa Lawrence's knack for fishing!

Grandpa Lawrence (on the right)

More questions from Charlie and other observations

Why are there such things as scary dreams? I wish we could delete nightmares and scary dreams.
Why did dinosaurs live before people and why did they all die?
Why do people wear earmuffs and why do they look so weird?
Why don't hornets have horns?
Why don't moms fart?
Do our tongues go all the way down to our tummies?

"I know why Reed's name is Reed. Because he likes to read.
And Noah's name is Noah because he likes to say No.
And my name is Charlie because I like choring (doing chores). Except I don't like to do chores!"

Charlie: Mom!! There is a black coat on the back porch!!
Me: Ok.
Charlie: It can sting people!!
Me: What?
Charlie: Black coats sting people!
Me: (going to look) Do you mean a yellow jacket?
Charlie; No, it's black! It's a black jacket.