The License Plate Game is Soooo Last Roadtrip!

Whew, time to dust off the ol’ blog and crank out a new post. Sorry. We’ve had an action-packed summer and not a lot of down time! The fun musical Annie occupied most of the time until our road trip to the World of the Mouse.

Which was going swimmingly, mostly because the hubby had us on the road by 4:45-in the a.m. Also, technology is a wonderful, mesmerizing thing. I have to give some serious props to the kids, though. Five people in a car, 965 miles in one day, and virtually no fights? It’s a record!

"Pretzels in the youngest's mouth. Nice." 

Remember the Griswolds? Remember the conversation between Clark and Roy Wally about road trips? We had a little bit of that. I know I referenced feet on a few occasions. We even pulled out of the driveway with “Holiday Road” blaring. Had to. That was just for us, the parents.

 We had sailed through four states and were halfway down the long panhandle of Florida when the natives started getting truly restless for the first time. It was dark, we were an hour-and-a-half out from our hotel, and they were hungry. It was getting desperate.

Then from the third row, the middle child piped up with a suggestion.

"I have an idea for a game until we reach the hotel.”

Bring it.

“Everyone makes up a new sport or uses regular sports smashed together to make new sports.”

Great concept.

“On each round you have to add on one new rule for your sport until you can't anymore. The one who makes up the last game rule wins. I'll go first"

Of course.

“My new sport is Rythmic Gymbling. It is a combination of rhythmic gymnastics, gymnastics and tumbling.”

Okie Dokie. First rule?

“You have to be able to do a pirouette or any turn and go into a back handspring with rhythmic gym ribbon in your hand.”

Riiiiight... Next?

The youngest child was ready: “Soanceer-soccer, dance and cheer. While doing a back tuck, you kick the soccer ball then jump out and catch the ball.”

So far, I couldn’t play ether of these sports.

The oldest was next: “Swimlerball-whirley ball and swimming. You get into carts that work under water and get the ball. You have lacrosse-looking sticks with a button on them to extend them. You have a magnet on the end that you have to reach down and get the ball (it’s metal) and all the other players’ sticks vibrate when someone gets the ball.”

Wow.

The hubby had a more aggressive sport: “MMSoccer-Soccer and MMA. Played on regular size soccer field but caged in with walls to have no out-of-bounds like MMA. Defense can play full contact if the man has the ball. There is a safer, non-contact version for kids.”

That was decent of him. What a good dad!

I jazzed up a contact-free sport. No, I didn’t rip off Caddyshack II. Much.

Mine was Grugby-Golf and Rugby. “When all players get on the green, there is a scrum to determine first to putt.”

The rounds continued. I wont do this thing round by round. That took us nearly the rest of the drive. And gave me finger cramps as I tried to type it all on my phone!

Rhythmic Gymbling: “On beam you have to do a back tuck while balancing stick thing on your nose. On vault you have to do a round off back handspring with your feet touching the springboard, you go up and do a double full and land on the ground with the hula hoop still on your waist. On bars, you have to do kips while balancing the rhythmic ball going down your legs and balancing perfectly on your head. Then you have to do a monkey giant then jump to high bar. The ball moves to between your hands and feet and when you kip up the ball moves down like a ramp and pops up and when you back hip circle and front tuck off it rolls down your back and lands in your hands and you finish.”

Ummmmmmmmmm, okay?

Soanceer: “So, there’s a soccer ball off in a corner and ballet shoes in a corner diagonal from each other. Do a back handspring to get soccer ball, hold it and do a back handspring and get ballet shoes. Kick soccer ball while doing ballerina spins then do a front handspring and then kick soccer ball again. Repeat three times. Put the soccer ball under one arm with your hand on your hip, and put on your beautiful ballet shoes. Your hair is pulled back and you are wearing beautiful cheer clothes. You do cheer moves then kick out the soccer ball then bounce it on your head and then it lands between your feet.”

Have these kids heard of gravity?

Swimlerball: “There is a box next to the switch that lengthens your stick. It shows who you are supposed to guard when someone on the other team gets the ball. Specially created pools are big enough and square. There are a bunch of bumps on the bottom so it is hard to get around. The ball sinks so it is hard to get it from someone because it sinks right away. Your head isn't under water, just the carts.”

MMSoccer: “In the league, players are allowed to push off against each other when nobody has possession and they are going after free or 50/50 balls. Goalie for each team is the only player on their side that gets to wear full pads. You can only attack the player with the ball.”

Grugby: “Other players may tackle the guy teeing up after five seconds if he doesn’t hit the ball. The points are scored higher not lower. Sand is replaced with mud. Higher points for landing in mud traps. You get to tackle opponent in mud pit like on tee box. Higher points scored in mud pit than on tee box.”

I think technically the middle kid won. Surprise, surprise, surprise! If you want to start any of these leagues in your neighborhood, please let me know

104 Days of Summer Vacation? Maybe Not, But It's Still Pretty Sweet

It has been a whirlwind summer for us so far. Not too many of the lazy days of summer here. Or are there?

Seattle beckoned the morning after school got out. The eldest went straight to church camp two days after we returned. Next we careened into VBS. And now, I'm rehearsing for the musical Annie at our church and preparing for church camp with the middle child. We have another trip in August right after Annie wraps.

Gymnastics, basketball and tumbling continue to energize and distract the kiddos as well, with day camps fit in here and there. Work and managing the chaos keeps us busy but we've also had plenty of friend time to fill in the spaces around these events and I am very thankful for the fellowship, fun and memories.

Pool time, sprinkler and popsicle time. Museum, family and treats time. Train rides, American Girl Dolls and Just Dance time. Library, golfing and trampoline time. Coffee and chatting time (Discussions of Dawgs and Dawters of cawse!) Thrift shop shopping time (I don't think we popped any tags, but I'm not really sure). Dinner, movie and laughter time (I'm talkin' to you: The Guru, Pork Chop, T-Bone, Sewer Rat and Queso Grande! We need to give The Nurse/Maid a nickname too!)

All of this has made Summer what it is supposed to be. Running kids in the dusk, sweaty and laughing, hoping to evade their bedtime for a few extra minutes. Damp and sticky faces, fresh from the swimming pool and otter pops. If fireflies could survive our blistering July heat, I know my kids would have jars full of them by now.

They definitely have bellies full of junk food-thank you Free Slurpee Day, Cow Appreciation Day and Happy Hour slushes! Junk food is even better when its free. Don't get all crazy, we have been slipping a steady diet of fruits and veggies in them this summer too. Some from our garden and some from gardens around the world, but all better in the summer-especially if they are shared with friends.

We continue to ignore piles of papers and clothes in favor of, well, anything else, but there will be plenty of time later for that. For now, we have just about six weeks left to "live deep and suck all the marrow out of life," so to speak. We don't get the luxury of Phineas and Ferb's "104 Days of Summer Vacation," but we can make the most of the 80 we do have. I am thankful for our friends and I hope you make some memories this week too!

Duck, Duck, Loose! Part 2 - Return of the Mallard

Well, as luck would have it, I can’t leave well enough alone. Remember our little duck friend from the other day? Good. I did too. That’s the problem. It was eating at me that we had so harshly turned our back on her when she needed help. I didn’t like the way the other catty, mean-girl ducks were quacking as we left her. They didn’t like her. You could tell.

So, we went back up to the pond the next day, to just look from afar and see how she was getting along in her new setting. We walked everywhere, man, we walked everywhere. No duck. She just wasn’t there. Feeling especially crummy and bad duck-neighborish, we went home.

It was nagging at me for a few hours so I rallied the troops, aided by my super-supportive and loving hubby who truly is a, “good man Charlie Brown”.

We rolled off in the family truckster, armed with water and little cups of ice cream to placate the whiners. Oh, and bug spray. Always bug spray. After choking our way through the DEET cloud, we walked down to the pond. While it seemed a fruitless pursuit after the afternoon’s failed excursion, we forged ahead anyway. After seeing no duck (did I mention we named her Yvette? Long story but it stems from the genius movie Clue) we stopped to have some water. I saw something moving on a nearby tennis court. Low and behold, it was Yvette!

How and why she made her way to the court is beyond me. The youngest child was busy sinking up to her knee in sludgy mud, the eldest preoccupied with her iTunes and headphones and the middle child wanted to climb the middle-school football obstacle course. Very concerned for the duck. I went and picked her up and filled my hand with water. She gulped it down for what seemed like forever. I don’t know how long she had been up on the court, but she was a pretty hungry and thirsty little duck.

We headed back to the car, successful, Yvette peeping along behind us. The unfortunate thing was that she had been rejected by the other ducks. Now what? Home, I guess.

We put her back in the sandbox pond in our yard, dug up some worms and caught a moth and some grasshoppers (this nice July weather must have them sluggish or something) and she gobbled away.

“That little girl is pretty hungry! She ate the biggest earthworm I ever saw,” said the youngest. “Well, almost the biggest. There was that one we saw in the rain that time and it got all stretched out because it was wet and the rain washed it on to the concrete and it was trying to find the dirt so it got really long and it was going to die because the sun was coming out and it couldn’t get to dirt so I moved it before the birds of the sun could get it. Do you remember?”

Yes, there was that one.

After a bit of splashing, snacking and preening, we tucked her in to an old cat kennel with a towel and a small dish of water for the night, hoping she would rest easy and get some strength back.

We called a duck rescue the next morning to set up a delivery. The nice lady is a teacher who lives on property with a pond. She rescues ducklings and raises them for release into the flock on her property and lets them make their way from there. She was delighted at the prospect of Yvette as she had a duckling, Mallory, that really needed a friend. (Yes, Mallory the Mallard).

We met at the PetsMart parking lot-seemed perfect for the drop. It was here that the youngest child staged her mutiny. Flinging herself over the kennel, she wailed, “I want to keeeeeeeeeep herrrrrrrr!!!!!!”

I explained the obvious and logical facts:

Yvette is a duck and we are not.

Ducks are social and need other ducks.

We have dogs.

Dogs eat ducks.

We have no pond.

Ducks like ponds.

Yvette is a mallard and mallards migrate so in 6 months, no more Yvette.

That did the trick, right?

Have you met the youngest? She’s got a bit of a stubborn streak.

“Nooooo, don’t take her! She loves us! I want to keep her!”

I had to pry her off to get the kennel out of the car. The nice duck rescuer and her daughter took Yvette out to transfer her to their kennel. She commented on how imprinted on humans Yvette was and how gentle. “She was probably somebody’s child’s pet and when she got bigger, they just let her go.”

Sad.

At only about a month old, she still needed a mother’s guidance. For another month at least. The nice rescue folks said they would feed and love her until she started dismissing them in favor of other ducks. Then she would move out to the pond.

For the next three hours, the youngest intermittently cried and fell into despair. “I miss Yvette!”

We took them for ice cream and it seemed to get a little better.

Good luck Yvette! We know you will have a great life at the Duck Spa. Don’t forget to write!