The Appropriate Way to Pet a Chicken

Oh good. I have a few minutes.

The kids are laying around the livingroom rug in a pre-diabetic coma from all the sugar over the weekend, and I realize that's at least good for something.

Yesterday was Easter.
The weekend was full of fun and fatigue.

It kicked off Saturday with the church's annual Easter egg hunt.
Every year it's the same with us bustling around the house in a frenzy, hoarfing down scrambled eggs and combing the girls' hair while walking out to the garage in order to get there on time.
It always starts at 10:00, and anyone who knows my family knows that us getting anywhere earlier than 11:00 might as well be getting there at 5 a.m.
Nearly impossible.
We rushed to get there as it started, only to have the entire thing be basically over in 3 minutes.

I think they make the eggs too visible.

There's not much "hunt" involved when there's a 10 egg maximum and you basically step on and crush 6 upon opening the door to the room.

I could find 10 if I was blindfolded.

Parents everywhere can be spotted slyly taking the eggs their toddlers find and re-destributing them around the room so the kids don't go over the limit.

I guess it IS easier to just fling eggs willie nillie than to actually HIDE them anywhere...

It always seems like the kids don't even care that much about finding the eggs anyway. In my experience it's the parents saying, "Look up here! What is this?! Can you see it? Get it! Get it!" while the kid eats plastic grass or cries because they're overstimulated.

At the end of the egg hunt there's always a pen of some sort of animal, be it chicken or duck or bunny.

That's always a favorite.

There's always a brief discussion with our girls about what is and is not the appropriate way to pet said animal.
Tessa has been pulled aside for refresher courses every year so far.

Because chickens' eyes aren't supposed to do that when you touch their heads.

The girls seemed bored through the actual hunt. They put up with the picture taking by the giant carrots and trees with dangly eggs.
But once they caught sight of the bounce house and craft table they ran to get through, taking out several poofy dressed toddlers.

Big burly Joe sat at the exit like a bouncer waiting to count the eggs and remove any extras that were trying to be smuggled.

Of course Tessa had too many.
When he took her 11th egg, I saw a look pass that I thought nothing of, really, until later when I couldn't find her and realized what she'd been thinking.
Where was she?...........

Then I caught of glimpse of her yellow dress.....

from under Joe's chair.

That little sneak had formed a plan in 2 minutes that belonged in a spy movie.

No one had seen her slip under his chair.
No one was really watching as she grabbed the eggs he discarded before they even landed, opened them like a Capuchen, ate the candy out, then replaced the eggs into the basket.
Sneaky, yet BRILLIANT.

She'll show THEM an egg limit.

And I guess it makes me a bad parent that that kind of action, rather than send me over to scold, only made me smile.
I have to feel SOMEWHAT happy to know that should the world be one day, as my reoccurring dreams make me fear, be taken over by a zombie envasion, my children will have skills to survive.
Nothing if not resourceful.
My little Mini-Me.

I did feel bad, though, when my friend Brian came over to his wife Katie and requested she discipline their daughter because
"she's been grabbing the discarded eggs and eating the candy out."

Tessa had created a prodigy.

I apologized and told them not to go too hard on her. That it was Tessa that had taught her.
Brian just said, "I know." and walked away.

And it is just an approximation, but I would have to guess that Tessa ate about 14 pounds of candy that day.
Again, Bad parent.
FUN parent, but also somewhat questionable on that day.

That sum total was second only to what would be the sum total of the NEXT day.

They bounced, they made crafts, they ate hardboiled eggs in between chocolate ones.

A thought that makes me throw up in my mouth a little.

And while they did that, Alena sat on the stairs to the stage with her head in her hands and made that face.
That pre-teen one.
I knew without asking she was feeling depressed about the fact that she was deemed too old to hunt eggs this year by the youth leaders.
Too old for 10 eggs.
As if she needed the candy with the bucket o' Nutella she eats nightly...

And, we had guests this weekend.
They showed up Saturday afternoon after the egg hunt as the sugar highs faded and craziness ensued. Perfect timing.
Welcome to our home.
Please don't call the authorities.

They are college students from my mom's choir in Oakland.
They came all fresh faced with their texty thumbs and cute clothes.

I felt like I had friends over and tried not to ingest a bottle of pills when I realized, no, I was actually 10-15 years older than they were and in some countries I could be their mother.
A fact that I later bemoaned to Lisa about over the phone.

They were the best kind of guests, too.
Clean, quiet, helpful.

The girls' pupils were the shapes of hearts all weekend.
Well, the little girls over THEM, and Alena's over their i-phones.
She said that's what she decided she wanted for her birthday.
I told her she'd better also ask for a JOB for her birthday, too, then, because
until Mama has more than a $70 pay-as-you-go phone, Alena will not have a phone capable of being one's life partner.

I was just surprised we didn't scare the girls off.

They may never want children after that.
I'm sure they were a bit surprised at the game of Run Around Buck Naked that the girls played before bath time.
The scary part was it wasn't a special show for the guests, it is just a thing we do.
Every bath night.
1) Take off clothes
2) Run in circles naked
3) Bath
4) Bed

Too bad they didn't also get to witness the new favorite game of
Step on Eachother.
We actually could have played that as a group.

They were also brave guests, as they are from Georgia and are die hard Braves fans.

They just happened to be here the weekend the Braves had a series against the Giants and ended up completely sweeping the Giants.
They knew to keep their mouths shut as Justin dove into depression and cried into his ham.
I almost expected him to bring out his grass skirt and cannibal pot to make Georgian Soup, but he was on good behavior.

Easter morning was hectic as well with a repeat of the previous morning.
All that extra hair curling and pinning.
Dusting off the iron and remembering how to turn it on. It probably hadn't been used since last Easter.
Yet another plus of yoga pants and layered tank tops. No ironing necessary.

Posing the girls for a picture where they're all three looking at the camera takes a good 20 minutes in itself and I have even then given up having one where Tessa is doing a normal smile.






I was surprised we got to church on time.
Actually, I always am when it happens.

The service was great.
As was the baby holding and the chatting with friends that feel like family.

We took pictures at church. Justin got razzed about his purple shirt.

And then I proved my theory about tights having the same life cycle as a fly as Chloe ripped holes in the knee of hers when she biffed it chasing bubbles and Tessa came around the corner looking like she'd changed the oil in the van in hers

(It's still a mystery what happened there.)

We had a great lunch that included my famed creamy polenta with mushrooms and mascarpone cheese. My brother called me "Rude" on the phone for making it at a holiday where he wasn't here.
Even the Georgians ate it. I was afraid they'd think I desacrated their beloved grits with the addition of Californian hippie food.

We hid eggs in the front yard and laughed as Tessa repeatedly dropped them on the concrete until they were completely smashed and the air was wafting of boiled egg.
I told Justin his egg salad was going to be full of grass and snails. He gagged with flashbacks of the year he ate 4 giant egg salad sandwiches in a row and swore off egg salad forever while he did those weird puffs of exhaled air he does when he's too full.

We found out Chloe doesn't like the smell, I guess, as we brought out the eggs and she kept saying, "EW! Phoebe!" because she thought the dog had bad gas. Again.

All in all. Great weekend. And now we're back to the daily routine with the addition of telling Tessa she actually can NOT have chocolate with her breakfast.