Charlyn’s Web

The kids and I went to stay with my parents for a few days last week.  My good friend, Boo Boo was unexpectedly in town for business plus relatives from out of state made good reasons to make the drive.

The van was great to travel in.  KJ actually made it without any throw up mishaps, which is wonderful.  It is, unfortunately, a common problem for her.

The visits with Boo Boo and husband were short but very nice.  Husband had not seen the two girls in person yet so now he can envision the “live” versions.

It was fun to visit with my Aunt and Uncle and their kids.  Two who were visiting from out of state- one brought her boyfriend.  Checking the poor man out- how many times did he have to answer the question “is this your fist time in this state?”  And none of us thought to ask him what he does for a living.  I am sure all of our faces are a blur to him.  There are two large families for him to get used to but I don’t think he was exposed to all of us/them at once.  Let him adjust slowly- don’t want to scare him off too soon.  It was good to be able to sit around and talk some- as much as we could with three wild kids cooped up in the house- it was hot outside.  Whose kids were those, anyway?  And why did they come home with  me?

My Mom’s back started bothering her again.  I didn’t know shingles could reoccur so often.  She gets stressed from the extra pressure of the garden needing attention and my Dad crabbing at her about it.  She even got a shingles shot this year.  She has help in the house this year, and had some last year too but it doesn’t seem to help.  She likes to have the garden and preserve the produce- she’s “frugal” ya know.  And she likes it better than what you can get in the store but I’m beginning to think they really need to do something different.  I will have to start making “noises” about cutting back and maybe in five years or so it will sink in and she’ll actually do it.  It took me years of talking to get her to get help in the house.  Some of what she has “put up” is getting pretty old too which is a little bit scary but she will NOT get rid of it.  Wasteful, ya know.

On the way home I felt the beginnings of a headache.  I took some medicine at the gas station but it still was hurting pretty bad with still an hour of driving left.  So I fumbled around in my purse and took more.  I made sure there wasn’t too much traffic around- so don’t you worry.  Speaking of traffic- it’s getting heavier out there.  I expect it to be heavy right out of the Big City and also some when we get closer to home but the last few times we have made the trip, it has seemed to be continually busy.   The girls were entertaining themselves but unfortunately, they were using their high little girl voices and making lots of noise- not good on a Mommy’s headache.

We made it in time to unload and get the Church’s Block Party, which was good fun.  I talked, Brett took photos and herded kids.  The kids had fun getting their faces painted, watching the dunk tank and bouncing in the bouncy house.  Life is good.  🙂