Scenes from a Sunday

I...

...can...

...do it...

...MYSELF! 

Yea Molly!!  But baby, you forgot your socks.

Good bye BLUE nails!  

Watching her purple toe nails dry. 

(She was told NOT to sit on the couch with wet nails, soooo she called the piano stool in to very active duty.)

A little warm up of "Jesus Loves Me".

After the service...the bag brigade!

(Gotta love a man secure enough to carry a pink purse!)

The PKs in waiting...

(PK = Pastor's Kids.  Waiting for the pink purse guy to pick them up at the door in the family van.)

Molly--shared the nursery today with 11 other babies!  She's plum tuckered.

 (Notice I didn't say she shared with 11 other babies in the nursery today - that certainly didn't happen.)

Cole - bag stuffed with oodles of sermon notes and is ready for some lunch!

Meg - grew into a winsome young lady during the sermon!

Kate - snagged the pink purse from her Dad and is feeling rather sassy while she waits.

After a filling lunch with a wonderful gang of friends ...

Looks like this is gonna be a spectacular pitch...

...and quite a hit too!

Unwinding with some popcorn and a favorite show.

Then, off to bed to start the week all over again!

Do You Want To Be A Millionaire?-The Dinner Edition

It was approaching 4:30 in the afternoon, I had been out running errands allllll day and had made absolutely NO preparations for dinner.  Why do I do this?  Don't I realize yet that dinner happens every night.  Every single night whether I've planned for it or not.

To make matters a bit more challenging, I had been, for the last week and a half putting off the dreaded trip to the grocery store.  We were getting down to the nitty gritty of ingredients.  I was well stocked with eggs and sticks of butter, but little else.  There was no ground beef, no chicken, I was out of sugar, Kool Aid, milk AND COFFEE.  I was even out of cooking spray. 

It felt much like "Do You Want To Be A Millionaire" for this desperate housewife.  I'd already used the option of eliminating the wrong answers:  no beef meant no Hamburger Helper, no chicken meant no chicken enchiladas, and no time meant nothing from the freezer.  Next was the Poll the Audience option but they were out in the yard recovering from being cooped up in the car all day. I knew to leave well enough alone with the Audience.

I was left with a final option:  Phone A Friend.  I picked up the phone and called my youngest sister, Sudeana, (click on her name to see her cute blog) who's usually good for an easy dinner suggestion or two among other things.

We have many of the same cookbooks, however, she actually knows what hers contain!

She suggested that I prepare Tangy Turkey Tenderloin.  "Is that your final answer?" I asked.

 ~Tangy Turkey Tenderloin~

Here's what 'cha do...

1.  Take your five-year-old and your one-year-old and throw them in the car.

2.  Next, drive like a crazy woman quickly, but cautiously to the nearest grocery store and purchase:

• One bottle of Kraft Tangy Tomato and Bacon Salad Dressing
• Rebuckle one-year old into grocery cart.
• One turkey tenderloin (or pork tenderloin)
• Call sister from meat aisle and see if pork will work in absence of turkey tenderloin.
• Remove five-year-old from lower rack of grocery cart.
• One bottle of Honey Mustard 
• Catch one-year-old in middle of attempted swan dive into the cookie aisle.

3.  As you are pulling the family van into the driveway, it is important to remember that your loving husband asked you no fewer than 37 times to remember to pick up check registers at the bank while running errands today.  
4.  Look at clock on dashboard and realize that the bank has closed 10 minutes ago, but hang on to the hope that today, which is really Thursday may, in fact, have turned into Friday at the bank, which would cause the closing time to be six o'clock and not five.

5.  Make a snap decision to make dinner and attempt a bank run while dinner cooks.  Mentally begin singing the Whitney Houston song, "I'm every woman, it's all in meeeeeeeeeee."

6.  Gather ingredients from plastic grocery bags:

7.  Mix mustard and dressing and slather on to pork or turkey loin.

8.  Shout, "Voila!" and throw into oven for 30 minutes.

9.  Load five-year-old and one-year-old into van again. Return to kitchen set oven timer, and make a hopeful trip to the bank.

10.  Pull into bank lot on two wheels and watch the tellers lock the doors and get into their cars.  

11.  Return home just ahead of husband.  Confess about the forgotten check registers, brag about paying the car taxes with four children in tow, and check on pork/turkey loin.

12.  When the oven timer sounds, remove loin from oven, (I like to check the temperature with a meat thermometer-- 155-160 degrees when done), cover with foil and let rest for 10-15 minutes before slicing.

13.  Think wistfully for a split second that you, too, would enjoy resting for about 10 or 15 minutes as you toss some frozen veggies into the microwave and pour the beverages for your adoring family.

14.  Slice the Tangy Turkey/Pork Tenderloin.

15.  Eat.  

Simple.  15 steps.  No big deal!  Not one bite remained.  Check registers obtained the next day.  All is right with the world...until dinner time rolls around again!


(Would you believe that Sudeana brought me extra check registers this weekend when we celebrated Mother's Day with our family?  That's just the kind of girl she is.)

A New First

This spring, Molly graduated from sleeper with footies to a nightgown with Tinkerbell!  She thinks she's big stuff now!  Upon receiving this gown from a sweet friend, Molly gave it an aggressive test run.  

Surely it would be suited for some backyard adventures?

Does one wear tennis shoes with a nightgown?

Or bath toys?

The PERFECT thing to wear for TV watching with Kate.

Wow!  I can peel my own banana now that I'm big enough to wear a nightgown!

Unfortunately, Mommy doesn't agree that I'm also big enough to chew gum too.

A good outfit for hide and seek...

...and for upside-downs with Daddy.

Looks good with my SweetTarts chapstick...

Doesn't interfere with the sound in Mom's earphones.

Excellent for stowing away in Mommy's suitcase!

Sometime I might even see how it works for sleeping...

...but not anytime soon!!

Happy Mother's Day!

Live @ 5!

It all began with an early morning voice message that was relayed to my Man as he returned from an appointment a few towns away.  Would he, the caller wanted to know, be willing to come to the local television station to be interviewed for the five o'clock news?


After no small amount of arm-twisting and begging on my part, He agreed.  Late in the afternoon, my Man stopped by the house to change in to something befitting a local news interviewee and paused for inspection and final instructions...

and then...he was off.

"I'm just so nervous for him," Kate fretted, "it's his very first time on TV!  Well, not his very first, but I'm still a little nervous."

"He'll be just fine," I assured her, wondering if he'd remember what he wanted to say and if he'd say it just like it needed to be said.

"Do you think he's down at the station yet?" she asked a few minutes later.  "Is he on TV yet?" she wanted to know.

Finally, finally, finally it was five o'clock and the sound of the news channel's theme music hit our ears.  We gathered round the smallest television in our home for some reason, and waited.

Happily, my Man's "story" was up first.  The anchor woman introduced him, and all of a sudden, there he was.  

"He needs to smile a little," said a girl who never does when she's in front of a crowd.

"He looks so serious," said the boy who's always ready to crack a joke.

"His collar is a little crooked," said the lady who had just ironed that blue shirt and adjusted the collar thirty minutes earlier.

Kate was silent.  

We listened as our Man answered the questions and added a thought or two of his own.  Just as quickly as it began...it was over and the center of our attention disappeared from the screen.

"Can we turn it to Disney now?" Kate found her voice.

I began watching the clock and when about thirty minutes had passed, I called my Man on his cell phone.  Upon getting the voice mail I wondered aloud, "Hmmmmm wonder where he is?"

"Probably being mobbed outside the station by all his adoring fans," joked Cole.

"I don't think so," said Kate very thoughtfully, "that never happens after church!" 

(snicker)

Double Digits...

We've been celebrating birthdays left and right around here lately.  Last month we celebrated our firstborn's 11th birthday.  It began as all Wright Place birthdays do...

We moved on to gifts...

Then one month and one day later...we did it all over again!

Two kids in "double digits".

Those two, those double digit kids, wonder what could be better.  So happy are they to be 11 and 10.

I'm wondering something too...

... just where have the last 10 years gone???