The More Fruit on the Hat, the Closer to God

Sorry it's been a while....it's been busy!!!!!!! Between dressing like " The Lady with the Fruit on the Hat/ or You Can Call Me Chiquita" , teaching and having fun with my little fmaily...I have been one busy lady.

PLumkpers is now a gang member. She's been ridin' dirty for a while with ADG. That would be Apple Dumplin' Gang to you folks not in the know. That little gang banger has been hitting the apple rice cereal hard these days. She just can't get enough. It makes her dealers quite proud.

She has really become a little person here lately. She used to have to "stand" on a Monet art book ( yes, she's very sophisticated...don't look her in the eye) to play in her exer-suacer...now her little feet touch the bottom!! she loves her exersuacer...she's figured how to really manipulate the little thingamajigs on it. It's really cute....

We just had our 8th anniversary! I'd like to say it was nice and quiet...but Plumpkin was probaly the grumpiest she has ever been on that very day. When I cam home from work that day, Bing said that if hadn't have been our anniversary, he would have had to leave and go sit in his little truck down the street and drink. haha....good times.

But she got over whatever that problem and has been quite the good girl...laughing and playing and eating that cereal like a champ.

3 MORE DAYS~!!!! yippeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i am soooooooooooooooo excited!!! then off to Louisiana. Can't wait to have some warmth and sun. Have I mentioned lately that Washington is bleck? A Dio Mio. The sun did come out Sunday though...it was nice. We went for a drive...all piled up in the truck ( Jones stayed behind to watch the house). Picture it....two very grown adults and a baby in a bench seat small truck with two dog heads hanging out each side of the camper window. rainier was gorgeous....it's still my favorite thing about living up here ( a short list but a good list)

My 8th graders had their formal Friday. Those girls spent fortunes on their dresses. Below is a picture of my dress. There were 2 other middle schools at the dance.....my kids were explaining to those kids that "it's ok...that's Mrs. Smith...she's funny." And just like that...alll was right with the world. If only everything could be explained that easily.

Mr. Rogers for President 2008

one of my favorite stories ever was reading how Koko The Gorilla ( who used sign language) used to love to watch Mr. Rogers. Well, Mr. Rogers heard about it and wonderful man that he was, decided to pay her a visit. She often got jaded with regular visitors but when she saw Mr. Rogers she just started acting like his number one fan, hugging him and signing over and over' " Koko love Mr. ROgers, Koko love Mr. ROgers". He visited with her for a long while, talking and hugging each other.

I get teary just talking about it. Apparently Koko would talk about it till the day she died.

I love those two.



Plumpkin did a lot better eating cereal today. I sat her in her Bumbo and she actually kinda chewed and swallowed and DID NOT have a screaming fit. Sweet success.


We got fish for our pond today. We named them El Jefe, Orangina, D'arbonne, Punk Fish, and Boudreaux the Fish ( bot to be confused with Boudreaux the Dog, Alligator, or Bench). We put them in and they immediately disppeared. We haven;t seen them since. I'm guessing they're magic fish. Perhaps we should have named them Houdini, Siegfired, Roy, David Copperfield & Boudreaux the Magician.

The cover of the Seattle Times was "JUNE GLOOM"...they are forescasting this sucky weather for the rest of the month.



Luckily, I have a wonderful family or I would go on a shooting rampage. Louisiana in 18 days...sun and warmth, here we come!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hahaha...this picture is for Grit. hahahaha....we grew up having Moma read is "Berenstein Bears" among other things. Who doesn't love a family of bears living in a the best treehouse ever? I still have my late 70's copy of " Scratch and Sniff Berenstein Bears" . ( You don't actually smell the bears though, which was both good and bad.)That thing still smells!! It shows how papa makes a pizza and you can smell each ingredient. I keep it in my hope chest Bing made me...I still sniff it from time to time. Is that weird? The mushrooms and garlic are my favorite.

Anyway....margaret has this horrible phobia of people in mascot uniforms. She just freaks out. Well, one day we're at Books A Million...just perusing books. Imagine a well lit book store....light breezy pop music bopping in the back ground. Then you hear it.....

shuh...shuh...shuh...shuh..

what was that?

you keep walking.

shuh, shuh, shuh.....

getting closer. what is that noise?

SHUH, SHUH, SHUH, SHUH....

We turn around and there right uponst us is.....Mama Bernstein creeping stealthily up in all her giant mascot-costumed glory. Her teddy bear head the size of a small bathtub. Her big furry slipper feet shuh-shuh-shuh sounding like her own "Jaws" soundtrack.

Margaret jumped straight into the air and did that thing that Wily Coyote always did in mid air---- that running to stand still thing. In my mind she even said " Woomp-woomp-woomp" like Curly from the 3 Stooges.

Needless to say, I had to escort her out of the store. Leaving Moma Berenstein to fend for her own next victim. Shuh, shuh, shuh.........

Bing said Plumpkerstilskin got so tickled today. He said she was on her mat just kinda fussing for fussing sake. He went over to her and said " Pipe down, youngster!" APparently, this is the best baby joke ever. She cracked up and for about 30 minutes - a comedy routine of alternate Popa giggling and " Pipe down youngster" ensued.

The kids were exhausting today. 13 more days!!!! i can't wait for the end of school!!!!!

I love to watch the birds in the backyard. The hummingbirds remind me so much of caroline. So tiny, yet so fiesty.

I would like to smush a magnolia all over my face. I love that smell. And the little yellow things. I used to draw with the purple ends of them. I thought I was so avant-garde. ooh, look at me...I'm drawing with the reproductive parts of a plant. ooh la la. somebody call masur musuem.

I miss magnolias. I want Lady Bird to know all about them. One day!

Well, I'm off to see the Wizard......hasta luego.

Ladybugs love weekends. I do too. Finally!! poor Plumpkers has the sniffles...Popa does too! Somebody is a bigger baby than the other though. haha...and it's not the actual baby.

dadgummit, i'm gonna grow cucumbers this year. I have never had luck growing those things. They can't be that hard to figure out...but I guess I've focused on other things...but this is the Year of th Cucumber. I will have an English Long, oh yes, I will.

I love the way garden hose water smells. I must admit I like the way it tastes too. Not in a chugging way...but rather a appertif sipping way.

i had a dream I was on the Sopranos last night. It had come back on the air and I was a very spunky outspoken woman of some sorts. And the best thing about it was that Tony was a big fan of mine. He even let me sit in his chaise lounge by the pool and nobody else got to sit there.

Hahahahaha...Bridger just tooted!!! She gets so mad when she poots...she looked at her butt in disgust and jumped off the couch. hahahahahaha..... Bing once said " farts never cease to be funny". What a wise old sage I am married to. So true, so true.

Might try to take the colonel out this weekend. It's supposed to be pretty but probaly not.
Iay atehay ashingtonway. That was Pig Latin for all you monoglots.

A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest man. Willy Wonka said that. I still pretend to open my candy bars like I was expecting a golden ticket. Grown woman, Iam...yet I do it still. I slowly peel back the shiny silver wrapper, hoping for that beautiful contrast of where gold meets chocolate. I think if I ever stop doing it, i will have turned miserably old and wretched. I like how wretched is two syllables. But ditched isn't. Unless it was in a Shakespearean sonnet...then it would be ditch-ed. Which would be awesome. Whitch-ed.
haha....
no big plans for the weekend. i can't wait for caroline to get a bit more mobile...we are gonna have so mcuh fun. maybe she can show me how to get those stupid cucumbers to grow.
hasta luego......

Amen!

I think I need me some Action Jeans.

Ever since Turkey's baptism ( May 4th) ( I've included a pic for you perusal), I've been singing " Amen, Amen, Aaaaaamen, Amen, Amen" to her and she just smiles and smiles. It is so funny...she can be in a rotten mood but sing Amen and she is an angel for the duration of the song. Shame it isn't a longer song.
I like that pic cuz it looks like Bing is wearing Caroline on a lanyard. yeah... that's how we roll. heard of soap on a rope? Well, we got baby on a lanyard.

I took up more sod today. Heehee. Bing loves it when I say I have sod to take up. Actually, not really.I always start it but he is such a sucker. :) He always comes out and finishes it for me. I am spolied rotten. ;) But I did remind him that it was for more veggies for us this summer. Pretty soon, there will be no sod to take up as the whole backyard will be a garden. No, it won't go that far.....gotta leave room for the doggies to do their thing.

Bing fed Plumpkers rice ceral again.today. A Dio Mio, what a fiasco. Everything I read says wait till they want to eat it. Well, she definately doesn't want to eat it. But the doc said to do it, so we do it. I guess she is getting better. I seem to have more luck than Bing does feeding her, but not much.

Ewww, gotta go back to school again tomorrow. Not too bad though. We're doing our Baby Lab, where the kids do Punnet Squares/probability to decide what a baby might look like between them and their partner. They always have fun with it.I make a big deal about it not being sexual, just a DNA swap, so it's mostly same sex couples. :) Don't want the Jehovah Witnesses after me again. I have one pair, these two adorable boys by the last names of Chmiel and Miller. They combined their names for the last name of their baby: Miel. The full name of their baby: Tastee Miel. heehee...that's why i love 8th graders so much...they are as immature as I am.

Would you say I have a plethora of pinatas?

"When pure men are happy, the universe reveals itself in it's truest splendor." St. Augustine

Hmmmmm...it might be quite pompous of me to do this. I haven't made up my mind. My dear friend Charlane's is not, however, and I suppose that is why I decided to do this. I do so enjoy catching up with her through her musings.When you live thousands of miles away from friends and family, and if they are the least bit interested in you....perhaps this might be a good thing. Perhaps I am just full of myself this morning. Regardless, I will do it. I have always loved to write both good stuff and not so good stuff. And maybe here is where the twain shall meet. Twain...nobody uses that word anymore. Or twixt. i really like twixt and twain. but if you say them together it sounds like you have a speech impediment.

However, I SHALL ramble. And I shall use fanatical run-on sentences, overuse and underuse proper punctuation and will definately give the proverbial finger to acceptable grammar and spelling. Such is life as I live it. Amen and hallelujah.

See this baby? She is cuuuuuttteee!! Bing and I have so much fun with her. She is just the absolute best. She is such a happy baby...smiles all the time. I got her to honest-to -God giggle yesterdday for the first time. it was adorable!! I sang "patty cake" with her and shook her arms real fast when I said" roll it and you roll it.." She thought that was the funniest thing she had ever seen. I, however ,have seen funnier...


I told Bing about it when he got up from sleeping....he was so jealous. He grabbed her up and was intent on making her giggle. I was crossing my fingers that she would. He loves that child so much and hates to miss out on anything. He had just said something about our state of financial affairs and told Caroline she needed to go out a get a job. then he started singing a song about if she did get a job, she would still be broke 'cause she didn't have any pockets. Hahaha...both caroline and myslef thought that was hilarious and the giggling began. Bing was so excited. I love to see that man happy...he smiles so big and those sweet eyes get all scrunched up. I sure do love this silly little family. We have lots of fun.


I think this is Bing see himself at work. Heehee. Apparently so do his peeps.....Sarge took him out for coffee the other night and went on and on about what a great cop he was. And Bing also got kudos from the SWAT guys when he had his ACT training ( he was chosen because of his bad-assness to do a special week long SWAT type training.) A buddy of his on SWAT said all the guys were sitting around talking about the training and who sucked/ or was a standout. They all agreed that the "big bald guy with the southern accent" was really good. Bing acted like.."whatever" but you could tell he was so excited .


It's a long weekend for me. thank God! I should be doing something contructive since Plumpkers is sleeping. Bing calls her " Turkey Dressed as A Baby" I made up a song about it that she really likes. Sometimes she is " Turkey Dressed as a Frog". Haha...wouldn't that be a great kids' book? I have always said that one day I would do that...I have part of one already written. But I'm the queen of half-finished and half-baked ideas. They mostly get done....but it can take a while.


School is almost out. Then Lousiana bound!! I can't wait to get home and show off PLumperstilstskin. Yes, she hardly ever goes by Caroline....like the rest of our family she has 300 nicknames.
Lady Bird awakens. I must bid adieu.