Crumpled Home

It’s a little quiet at home right now. LR is away at horse riding camp and the normal level of intensity at our place has dropped a bit – although only a little bit, the RJ reality distortion field is still fully operational.

Pony camp is an amazing place — I get all fluttery just thinking about it — a magical land where you spend all day riding horses, cleaning and scrubbing horses, feeding horses, and (be still my beating heart) shoveling horse manure and cleaning out stalls. Mom insists that this is little girl heaven, but I’m not totally convinced.

For the first time in her life, she has ‘her own’ mobile phone with her (it’s a spare that we’ve borrowed from Poppa for the week). We told her it’s just for emergencies or if something goes wrong and she needs to talk to us. After giving her one or two instructions on how to use it, we carefully put it in her backpack and waved goodbye.

Five hours later, while deep in the middle of one of my projects,  I was interrupted by an unexpected phone call… from LR and a room full of 7 year old girls suffering some kind of ‘emergency’ involving a large amount of giggling. Apparently, she had to test to see if the phone was still working properly…

Regardless, I’m looking forward to having her back when she gets home… as long as she leaves her boots outside.

Just before she left, she drew this on the fridge for us.

The fridge cow will keep you company while LR is away.

With a huge overseas vacation looming, the first half of December was filled with the last days of the school year, some early Christmas celebrations… and a lot of silly hats.

December means the Advent calendar gets brought out. We like to pretend the kids appreciate the tradition and fun puzzles and clues that we leave in there for them...

(while jumping on the trampoline)

RJ: (bounce, bounce) I don’t believe in Santa, you know.

Dad: Really? Why is that?

RJ: (bounce) Well, there are too many problems with his story.

Dad: Such as?

RJ: (bounce) Well… We don’t even have a chimney in our house. How could he get anything inside?

Dad: Couldn’t he sneak in a window or something?

RJ: (bounce) That’s the other problem! He’s way too fat! He wouldn’t fit and his hat would fall off!

Dad: Fair enough. Then what –

RJ: (bounce) BUT! I do believe in Sinterklaas. He’s the Dutch Santa.

Dad: Really? Why do you believe in him?

RJ: (bounce) Because he has Black Petes to help him out. He is way smaller, and fast. They can sneak in anywhere with the presents. Also, his hat is smaller and round, so it wont fall off so easily.

RJ: (suddenly the bouncing stops) … AND Sinterklaas rides a horse. Who ever heard of a such a thing as a flying reindeer? It’s just so ridiculous!

This is the third ‘present’ from RJ that I have found this week. They’ve all been decorated similarly. This one contained a rusty old bolt, but the other two contained carrots.

As usual, we have no idea why.

LR awoke to a huge pile of presents. Yeah!!!!

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(while eating breakfast)

RJ: We could write a book called, “How to Scare Yourself.”

Dad: Yeah? What would be in it?

RJ: Only one page… Only words and no pictures.

Dad: What would it say?

RJ: (making eerie wind-through-the-trees sounds) “Just blow and whistle.”

Dad: Great idea, but I don’t think many people would buy it.

RJ: It’s okay. I’ll just give them away… As birthday presents!

Another birthday rolled around and this time it was Dad’s turn to blow out the candles. It all started off with a luxurious sleep-in. The kids left Dad alone for an extra twenty minutes, waking him up at 5:35AM, instead of 5:15!  We followed up with the normal Saturday morning craziness, with a brief “Rescue the Cat” interlude, when Violet Miaowmix decided that spending an hour attempting to find entry into the neighbours’ aviary from our roof might be a fun idea.

Mum and the kids whipped up a delicious cake, which we ate immediately, and then sent everyone over to the park to burn off the resulting sugar rush. After Amanda showed up to watch the kids, Mum took Dad out to dinner and then off to see a local production of Spamalot. Great fun!

Nothing like starting a birthday with a whirlwind of shrieking children wearing underpants outside their clothes and on their heads.

LR’s birthday rolled around and, despite appearances, we managed to keep it fairly simple (no giant parties, sleepovers, movie nights, etc.) LR loved every minute of it and is already making plans for next year!

After searching nearly ten bike shops in the area we finally found a bike cool enough for LR.

(over breakfast)

Mom: (to LR) RJ and I need to go buy a birthday present for your friend.

LR: How about something from the horse shop?

Mom: Good idea!

RJ: How about something from the Indonesian Shop? They have lots of things and even horse stuff. It is expensive.

Mom: What do they have there?

RJ: Toy horses… and ones you can paint… You can even get food there! Like bagels, giant pretzels, juice… and almond dessert!

(For the record, we have never been to or even heard of an Indonesian shop, but it does sound pretty cool!)

(while eating breakfast)

Dad: So guys, what should we get mum for Mother’s Day?

LR: I’ve already made something for her at school!

RJ: So did I!

Dad: Great! So what about something from all of us?

RJ: We should get her a toy because grown-ups like toys.

Dad: Umm… Sure. Got anything in mind?

RJ: How about… a toy goat!