Good Afternoon Beautiful Survivors!
I have always said that God has a sense of humor and I truly believe that laughter is the best medicine. There is nothing quite as rejuvenating as a hearty laugh that makes you double over until your sides ache. It just seems to wash away all that ails us from the inside out.
I have three grown children and seven grandchildren with another one on the way. One child can keep you laughing, but multiply that times 8, and I have a feeling there’s going to be a lot of laughing going on at our house for many years to come! What a blessing!
Yes, we are a typical family. It can get crazy. We don’t always have it as together as I would like sometimes, but it’s all good. It makes for another book one of these days. We have taken all of our grandchildren with us on two vacations this summer. As crazy as it was, it was the best time of my life. I had to speak several times, and I did make some serious threats for all concerned if they were caught being loud during my speeches. We made it up with ice cream later. A year earlier I took them with me to speak at a Luminaria Ceremony. I had speakers with headphones on, so I wouldn’t have dared to say one word to them, if they were caught acting up, because if I did, it would have been amplified out into the parking lot across the entire football field. God really does have a sense of humor! He had me right where he wanted me. I couldn’t have felt more helpless if I had been gagged and handcuffed!
We just watched some of our grandchildren a month ago while their parents went away for a much needed vacation. We never stopped for a moment. We had water fights with squirt guns and the kids won. We baked silly cupcakes, wore super-sized neon sunglasses, went to the park, played with play doh, blew bubbles, had a cookout, celebrated National Ice Cream Day, visited with Great Grandma and sang songs and danced like crazy. We had a blast, and I’ll admit, when their parents came back, I was tired, but I missed it. Kids just bring out the good in us. It was so much fun getting down to their level and being a kid again, even if it was just for a few days.
One thing I found difficult was the many fights I had to solve during the course of a day. Jackson and Jossalyn fought over the Lucky Charms cereal. It seems as though they both wanted the marshmallows. I bet all kids would rather have the marshmallows; after all, that’s the best part, isn’t it. It seems to me, that General Mills should just put in all marshmallows in the first place. Who needs the lucky? Just put in the charms for goodness sake! It would solve a lot of fights in the first place and prolong a grandparent’s sanity just a bit longer! Yes, there have been many times, too numerous to tell, of other weekends with the grandkids. Savannah was always doing something to kill herself when she was little, not on purpose. I’ll never forget the Easter that she was playing around with her Easter basket and put it on like a hat. She got it stuck on her head, or the time she inched her way in between the refrigerator and the wall and almost got stuck; or the time I stepped on one of Landon’s Lego’s and slid clear across the floor and ended up doing the splits. Who wants to survive cancer and end up stepping on a grape and breaking their neck?! Not me, that’s for sure! I think they need to make a new movie. Instead of Mom’s Night Out, they should call it,
“Grandparent’s Day IN!”
Yeah, this has been quite a busy summer. Amidst all of the traveling, speaking, and writing, Mark decided to have our giant tree cut down in front of our house. Our kids have grown up with this tree. The stump hasn’t been removed, so I have spent any extra time that I have trying to disguise the stump, which is really quite impossible. I’ve mulched it, and put flowers on it, so now, it looks like a grave. Oh well, you can’t win them all. I have to laugh at the differences between Mark and I. As for me, I could have used my money on much better things, but Mark said, “This tree has to come down.” So it did. And now we have a stump that looks worse than the tree. I’ll never forget the summer, many years ago when we were first married, he was busy planting everything he could get his hands on, until one of the things he planted was poison oak. All I can say is that the rest of that summer was pretty itchy. Not pretty at all!
Mark loves to read, so I solved that one. What do you do when you marry someone who likes to read? You write a book!
Oh well, keep your sense of humor. There is always something to laugh about every day! We can’t always choose the path that life takes us on, but we can change our attitudes and how we react to them. Make it a fun day. Find laughter. Some days, you may have to look a bit harder to find it, but it is out there.
I love you guys!
Brenda
He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with joyful shouting.
Job 8:21