Focus on the Entertainment Factor

It’s been an odd week. Mother hasn’t been feeling particularly well, so that’s been a bit of a strain, and work is a little weird, so it’s been an all-around prickly feeling creeping around my edges.

But hope is on the horizon. We’ve got a wedding featuring a mariachi band and the potential for some inebriated uncles on Saturday and a baby shower on Sunday featuring a mom-to-be who is planning a natural birth, which should provide HOURS of entertainment as people gasp and shudder and try to talk her out of it, so sunshine is right around the corner in my little world.

In case you misunderstand, I’m not being facetious, it’s just that there’s nothing more thrilling to a soul who journals than good material, and that’s a staggering amount in two day’s time. Especially since I'm bringing the Shorties in part and in full along to both events. That ups the entertainment value by like, oh, one million percent. I may have to take a pad and pen to make notes.

I think I’ll tell a little funny Just Because. A couple of weeks ago my friend B and her family moved into the most beautiful new house that they built mostly themselves. It’s gorgeous. (I coveted the bathroom mirrors and tile on the back splash in her kitchen to the point that I need to get in the altar on Sunday.)

The Husband and I are sort of the opposite of “handy” (as in run screaming if you see either of us carrying a hammer or gardening implement--Danger, Danger, Will Robinson), so we knew that it was best to stay far, far away from the new construction, lest we set something on fire or spill a gallon of paint on the new hardwoods (you think I’m joking again—-I have anecdotal evidence to these truths).

Being a Good Friend, I didn’t want to destroy their new home, but I wanted to do something special for them, I asked her to let me know when they would be taking up residence so that I could bring by dinner.

She immediately pooh-poohed me with, “Oh, you’ve got so much on your own plate, you don’t have to do anything.” To which I put my hand to my chest and pulled away, making a shocked face and said, “Oh, Honey, you didn’t think that I was going to COOK for you, did you? I was thinking more along the lines of walking through the grocery store and bringing food to you.” Then I laughed like I was making a funny. But I wasn’t.

Does this make me a good friend or incredibly lazy? I guess both. Is there some sort of etiquette breech if you take cold cuts instead of homemade cake? I can assure you that ham tasted a boatload better than any cake I’m baking. So, B, I’ll bring you some pie eventually. My family certainly won’t eat it. :-)

Well, I’ve got to go now. Lily just came in here to the home office at 10:18 in the P.M. and gave me a big toothpaste goodnight hug. No, that’s not a misprint, not a toothpaste goodnight kiss, a toothpaste goodnight hug, as in she’s squeezed an entire tube of Crest on the sofa and her pajamas, so I have to go salvage what’s left of the furniture and the Dora nightie and change my own nightgown. Dirty Word. (Incidentally, that felt completely inadequate. You should probably all pray for me. And for Lily. And for the sofa.)

(Note to self: breathe and focus on the entertainment factor, Charlotte.)

The Boogie Man doesn’t live under the beds at my house—it’s the Little Flower we fear around here. Does anyone know how to get toothpaste out of sofa? Anyone? Anyone?