Eggstra Time with Children

You know, for a fairly impatient, quirky person, I spend a lot of time with children. I believe I have now topped 10,000 class periods taught to young people and adults.

But this weekend I am talking about my own children.

My wife and a few of her pretty good friends decided that this weekend they would have an old-fashioned slumber party at Em's house. So Tara left about 12:30 today and I am here with the kids until either she chooses to come back or I crack up and put them up for adoption.

Actually, that's a bit extreme. All of the children are already in bed after an afternoon of...

1) Cleaning up egg messes. Our chickens laid two today and I brought them in and left them on the kitchen counter, thinking they would be fine. Not so. Aidan got ahold of one of them and in attempting to wash it (noble idea, just not when you're 4)broke it all over the bathroom floor.

2) Cleaning up more egg messes. The instructions note from my wife said to make pancakes and eggs for supper. Since I am pretty good at that, I make said meal for the children. The only problem is that our griddle has a section of the guard cracked off... got damaged a few months ago, I think. So when I poured the embryonice scrambled egg mixture onto the griddle, it ran towards the missing edge and leaked all over the counter. So I'm not so good with liquid eggs. Apparently neither is Tater.

3) Keeping Avery occupied. I think she had a vague sense Mom was gone which made her a little fretful. But nothing keeps that girl's appetite down, and she plowed through snacks and pancakes and anything else we gave her. Evan and Aidan were pretty tolerant of her and did some supervising and taking care of the littlest one.

4) Grandpa came out. He brought city water (everyone else can drink the water out here except for me) and some of his famous Grandpa cookies, which he bakes for us almost every week. Grandma taught him how before she died, and I have to say I think his are probably better than hers ever were. Go figure. I got a good picture of Grandpa playing castle toys with the boys. Grandpa has also started telling stories about Ridgeview and growing up, since he figures he might be the only one alive who still remembers them and he does not want them to die with him.

5) Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. Does it ever end with four children and all the stuff of contemporary American life???

Well, I am going to call this good. Our church's membership series starts tomorrow, and I happen to teach that. Part of my responsibilities as director of Adult Enrichment.