7 Quick Takes: Volume 20

And this week's Friday is going...going...GONE! Sold to the lady with five kids who clearly didn't make it to the shower today!

Please go visit our lovely host at Conversion Diary for the original 7 Quick Takes; visit the links of other people playing along this week.

~ 1 ~

I had to spend $845 on my car today. This brings the grand total of car maintenance bills in the past two weeks to something around $2K. Right before Christmas. As usual. We have all kinds of bad luck with car repairs during the Holiday season. Last year, we bought the kids a new transmission. Hope the kids like the new brakes I got them this year! I'll just wrap the receipt in a big box and stick it under the tree for Christmas morn. And Jen (aka Minivan MacGyver), I'll be sure to videotape their reactions.

~ 2 ~

My kids have some annoying habits. One of those is that they think it's funny to exaggerate some behavior that I have just asked them to stop doing. So if they are all yelling too much, and I ask them to be quiet, they think it's hilarious if they all scream at me: "OK MOM, WE'LL BE QUIET NOW!" Or if one of them is flicking the door lock in the van up and down and up and down in rapid succession, and I ask him to stop, he thinks it's a scream to speed up the intensity of the flickety-flicking. There are endless variations to this little game. So. A. Noy. Ing. Why, oh why, do they do this?

~ 3 ~

My son wanted to help me make a fire this afternoon. So he handed me some logs, which I arranged in the fireplace. I added kindling and crumpled up newspaper.

He lit a match. And lit the newspaper. And then sat back and played Wii.

I spent the next 45 minutes wrestling and wrangling with the flames, cajoling, cursing and coaxing them into permanent life. I brought that thing back from the dead 3 or 4 times. For the past three hours, the fire has been roaring nicely.

And my son has been telling anyone who will listen that he made the fire tonight.

~ 4 ~

My 8 year-old daughter has four soccer games scheduled this weekend; her team is in a tournament. It is going to be raining. I believe it is testimony to my complete transformation to Soccer Mom that I am going to be seriously bummed out if the games are canceled. Who wants to stand in the freezing cold rain watching 8 year old girls run around and supervising younger girls at the same time?

Uh, me, apparently.

~ 5 ~

I recently instituted a new chore chart. Because of the stepped up responsibility we are asking the kids to develop, we have also finally instituted weekly allowances. This week, a few of my kids have shirked their chore responsibilities, despite the fact that I have reminded them several times.

Imagine their surprise when the kids in question learn tomorrow morning that they will not get their allowance this week! I kind of can't wait for the horror to sink in.

Is it wrong of me to take such delight in teaching them a lesson?

~ 6 ~

Here's a question: If someone (a child) spills a healthy amount of clear glue all over your dining room table, one of your dining room chairs and the hard wood floor beneath the table, would you attempt to clean it up while it is still wet? Or would you let it dry so that you could just peel it off later? And would you keep the t-shirt that also got doused, or would you just toss it? Keep in mind the shirt is absolutely not a special, favorite shirt and actually is pretty stained and in bad shape. Just hypothetically speaking, of course.

~ 7 ~

I heart Old Fashioneds, with a crazy, desperate, all-encompassing, back seat of the wood-paneled station wagon kind of love.

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