I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day weekend.
Ours started with a bang (translation: semicontrolled chaos. Who am I kidding? It was complete chaos and I loved it.) To kick off the holiday weekend we drove 45 minutes (one way) to our son's farm to pick up a couple of the grandsons for a weekend of fun. All the boys would come home with us if the opportunity arose so I guess it's a good thing our vehicle can hold only three extra passengers. Frankly, Papa and I do better if we keep it two-on-two and by that I mean I do all the entertaining etc. David's a big help with the overall care giving and I'm very grateful for that.
Why is it that boys are ALWAYS hungry? Boys being boys, ours like to nosh nonstop. Combine this with my lackadaisical style of cooking and you get a lot of already prepared food. If I were to cook every meal, I'd never get out of the kitchen. A typical day can go like this: Breakfast: cereal, milk, orange juice Snack: String cheese Snack: gummies Snack: goldfish Lunch: Hot Pockets, Chicken Pot Pie or grilled cheese and chips with pop Snack: chips Snack: cheese and crackers Snack: cookies Supper: This one is tricky since some of the boys (Saul) tend to be picky. Sometimes I cook. Sometimes I'm exhausted and we get take out which is quite frequently if they came early enough in the day to exhaust me.
It seems like I barely get the table cleared before they are scrounging around in the pantry or refrigerator for something else to eat. I liken it to living with a swarm of locusts attacking the fields.
I can spend a full day prior to their visits trying to make meal plans, with plenty of snacks included, just to find my stores woefully inadequate when they arrive. I don't know what the problem is. I can spend enough money to support a small country and still there's never enough to satisfy their little tummies.
It doesn't help when one grandson has to watch his carbs for health reason and the others cannot have anything containing red dye. Why do manufacturers still insist on using this stuff? I think a lot of children's issues would be lessened if they were to stop using it to make foods geared to children. (This is just my opinion so take it for what it's worth which is probably nothing.)
Anyway, on night one we fed the boys and settled down for cards games and a movie. The boys love challenging me (Ha!) to a couple of particular games because more often than not, one of them wins. To keep hurt feelings and arguments to a minimum we had to enact the “mercy rule” for the card game that has ten rounds. For rounds one through eight, after someone has played all their cards, you get two more chances to get your cards laid down. For rounds nine & 10 you're on your own. It really has prevented more than a few arguments although the grandsons can still get a little dramatic.
Day two we took the boys with us to our corner for the annual Tour De Meers bicycle race. The monies raised go towards funding the Meers Volunteer Fire Dept. By helping, they throw a few bucks our way for our VFD. Winwin. We enjoy watching an amazing amount of riders go past our corner knowing they riding 60 miles! I couldn't last six blocks. The boys did great and we treated them to lunch at the local fast food drive in before heading back home for more card games and movies.
Day three was a little shorter. After breakfast everyone took showers and gussied up for the celebration of their big 'little' sister graduating from high school. She may be small in stature but she has a big heart and an even bigger smile. The party was held about an hour away from our home and wouldn't you know it, it started raining hard about the time we wanted to leave. Troupers that we are, we hopped into the car, crossed our fingers and made it to our destination in one piece, physically speaking. Mentally, I was a wreck. We left the boys with mom and dad, fended off the remaining ones wanting to come home with us and hurried home to our comfy bed.
We spent Memorial Day visiting our parents' graves where we placed flowers purchased from the local big box store, ate grilled burgers at my sister's house then it was back home to our comfy bed.
I hope everyone had a great weekend like we did. Happy Memorial Day to everyone.