Happy Birthday Rynee!

I hope you're safe and happy and have a few candles to blow out today!

Honesty may be the best policy..........

But it certainly isn't the easiest. At dinner tonight for Zach's birthday, we had a waitress who was less than stellar. So David was telling Zach about the Steve Martin SNL skit about the forgetful waiter who forgets everything, including how much money he's paid, so he gives the couple back a few hundred dollars in change, even though they pay with a $20 bill. David said something about "we won't be that lucky though; she'll forget our drinks and dessert, but we won't get extra change".

So after paying with a $100 bill, we got our change back. The waitress provided the right change, but forgot to take the hundred bucks. It was so hard to not justify keeping the money by saying that God was providing a nice dinner for us for free:) What's that saying about the Lord providing in mysterious ways? Maybe that's not quite what the saying is. Yes, we left the money. But, heavens, it was tempting to keep it. Shouldn't doing what's right be easier??

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Just now Naomi sneezed, and of course had a trail of mucus about to drip off her chin. So since I didn't have a Kleenex close by and my shirt was already dirty, I just used the sleeve to wipe her nose. She stared at my sleeve, then at her sleeve, and then pulled the sleeve down on her jammies and started dabbing at her face with it.

Hope has started showering with me rather than taking baths. Yesterday when we were getting in the shower, she took off her clothes, put them in the hamper and walked directly to the scale and stepped on. I guess we know what I do every morning before getting in the shower!

Here Comes Santa Claus

We went to the mall to buy gifts for the Tree of Sharing, and Santa was there. So, since the line was pretty short, we decided to let Hope talk to him. She spent the entire time in line trying to think of something to ask for. Never came up with anything, so she asked Santa if he was ready for Christmas, and what the reindeers' favorite snack is. (Last year we left a carrot for Rudolph, but she had to make sure he liked it.) We knew Naomi wouldn't like him, so we just stuck her on his lap at the last second to take a picture. I actually wanted to get more of the open-mouth wail, a la Mandy, but we were only supposed to take two pictures (since, cheapskate that I am, I wasn't willing to spend $29.99 for the picture package). I bet poor Santa hates kids.

There's a comeback for you!

On the way to daycare today, Hope was telling me how one of the boys had been teasing her and saying she was a boy. It was upsetting her, so one of her friends came to the rescue and told the boys she was indeed a girl. Oh, the issues of 4-year-olds! I was telling Hope things she could do if she were ever in a situation like that again. She could say "Stop saying that please", say "I don't want to play with you if you aren't going to be nice" and go play somewhere else, and a few other suggestions. She was very concerned that she wouldn't remember those words. I told her she could use whatever words she wanted, but she had to be nice and not say mean things back. So she told me, "I know what I'll tell him. I'll tell him he'd better be nice to me or else Santa won't bring him any presents!"

But mom............

This morning I was helping Hope get dressed. We lay her clothes out the night before, and she wanted to know what something was. I told her it was her shirt. Well then she wanted to know what was on it- it had a lace collar and she didn't know what the lace was. So I told her it was her collar. She gets a horrified expression on her face and says "But mom, I thought only dogs wore collars!?!" Not that kind of collar, Hope.