Day 26 -- Flexibility!

What a silly day we've had (so far).  It's only 2:20 as I type this, so there is more to come...look for an update later tonight.

For the past few days, the kids have been looking at the calendar & getting excited about our visit to this place.  It was on the calendar for TODAY.  http://www.brookshires.com/museum/  But alas, our morning did not go as planned.  I was up at about 8:15.  The plan was for us to do our chores real quickly this morning and then take off & hit the museum when it opened at 10:00.  It didn't happen that way, though.

At about 9:00, Samuel went out to the backyard to feed the dog.  Because the dog food is inside our (locked) shed, he had to take my keys out with him.  When he came in, he excitedly told me about a "parrot" in the tree in the yard.  He swore that he'd seen a big parrot & told me that it had distracted him.  (I was asking what took so long since feeding the dog only takes about 5 minutes.)  He really believed that there was a parrot in the tree out in the yard.  I have no idea what he actually saw or if it existed to begin with, but he got distracted none the less. 

A few minutes later, he went running back out the door in full-blown panic mode.  I wasn't sure WHAT was going on, so I opened the front door & did what any good mother would.  I yelled "What are you doing?".  He looked over his shoulder to tell me that he didn't bring my keys back in & he was going to get them.  When he came back, he was hanging his head because he'd locked the keys inside the shed after feeding the dog.  He was so very upset & kept apologizing.  Obviously it was just an accident & well...accidents happen.  I hugged him & assured him that I've locked myself out of the house & the car a number of times.  He still felt bad about it though.

I called & emailed Larry to tell him what had happened.  He'd have to come home & unlock the shed at some point today because that set of keys also has my van keys on it and I would need those to get to church tonight.  He called later & said that he was busy and it would be after lunch before he could run home to unlock the shed.  Hmm...ok.  We decided to forget the animal museum & move onwith our day instead.  Flexibility is the key when you're a parent!  Right?

We spent the morning doing our chores.  I did Savannah's too since she's out of town.  I listed some things on eBay that I took pictures of several days ago.  The kids played some silly game (I don't know what that was!) and just generally hung out.

Samuel must've felt like he had to pay pentance for his crime because he told me later on that he wanted to "cook" lunch for everyone since his mistake had cost us our trip to the museum.  While I didn't feel like he "had to" do this, I was proud of him for offering, so I let him.  He came up with some interesting meal choices....but it was ok.  The motivation behind our yummy lunches was all that mattered.

He & I had PB&J sandwiches with some chips.  Sarah got "vino" (vienna) sausages and a ham & cheese sandwich.  When Sarah came to eat her lunch, her robotic dinosaur got involved.  At first, he was just going to sit beside her & watch her eat.  She gave him a toothpick to look like Grandpa.

But then she decided that maybe he was hungry too.

Before ya know it, the dinosaur had eaten half her lunch & chewed up several toothpicks.  Bad dinosaur!  We made him go back to posing as Grandpa & would not let him keep eating.  After all, it's probably bad for his gears to eat vienna sausages!

Not long after we had lunch, Larry got here.  Hooray!  Our key-bearing savior had arrived!  I went with him to the backyard to retrieve the keys from the locked shed while the kids had their 30 minutes of reading time.  But surprise....the keys weren't in the shed!  Uh oh....now what?  Together, he & I sorted through all the shelves in the shed, looked inside the dog's house & box of food.  We even unlocked the OTHER shed (we have 2) to see if for some reason the boy had gone in there & left them.  Nothing.

I went inside & got Samuel to come out & help us look.  He came out saying "I am 100% sure I left them on the floor in the shed."  He looked all over the place & couldn't find them either.  At this point, I was beginning to panic a little.  This is my ONLY set of keys & while we do have 1 extra house key hidden away, the van keys cost nearly $100 to replace...trust me, we have had to price them before.  And then Larry spotted something across the yard, shining in the sunlight.

It was my keys.  They were laying on the ground in the grass.  Where they had been all day.  Which means that daddy didn't need to drive all the way home in the middle of the day to unlock the shed after all.

Apparently when you see mysterious tropical birds in your backyard trees, you lose all memory of what you're in the yard to do.

:::sigh::: Boys!