We have a car, and I mean A car. One. It’s a 2002 Volvo station wagon that is beginning to show its age. The leather upholstery has been completely kid-ified, the central console is broken (by a kid standing on it), and I don’t even want to know what’s under the backseat. But it’s paid for.

Anyway, last Friday the yellow “check engine” light came on while we were running errands. Just knowing it was something terrible, I called the dealership to have them look at it. In the meantime we went through the owner’s manual and checked everything we could check. One of the things mentioned that can cause that light to come on is a loose fuel filter cap.

OMG, what is that?! It sounds serious! Nope, they mean the gas cap. I was the last person to gas up the car so I went out and check it. I couldn’t remember if I had tightened it down at the gas station but I did so when I checked it. The “check engine” light still mocked me from the dashboard. Stupid light.

After driving rather gingerly, waiting for the engine to grind to a halt, I took in today. The guy at the dealership asked if it was shifting fine, I said it was, then he asked me about the gas cap. I told him that couldn’t be it because the light didn’t go off after I tightened the gas cap. He told me that the light actually has to be reset. I told him that I would be embarrassed, but delighted, if it was just the gas cap.

I called Mr. Prairie and told what the guy said, and HE said, “So there’s a chance you broke our car?” I tried to protest that I didn’t like to tighten the cap until it clicked because I was afraid I would break it. Mr. Prairie informed me that was stupid, because the clicking tells you it’s closed.

The dealership guy just called me, I owe them $98 for the diagnostic and $54 for a new gas cap. The rubber seal was worn out, you know, because it got all dried out. Because I didn’t tighten it down.

Stupid gas cap.

Before you freak out and start checking local hospitals to find out where to send flowers, I’m perfectly fine and it wasn’t as serious as it sounds. Let me just state for the record that people drive way too fast and/or recklessly in our neighborhood, especially in front of the school.

I had just collected Monkey from school and we were walking back to the car when one of his friends hollered at him and asked us to follow him to his house, so I answered back that we had to go to the store. We had just reached the front of the car and I was trying to get Monkey to his door safely (thank goodness I was walking to the outside) when something bumped into my elbow. I thought somebody was trying to get my attention, turned out to be the driver’s side mirror of a car! He got my attention alright, but apparently I didn’t get his. He kept driving.

I am extraordinarily lucky that it was not more serious. It didn’t really hurt that much, just made my arm felt like I’d bumped my funny bone, hard. Well, my arm felt funny and I was trying to shake it off and making a pained face when Mr. Prairie asked my why I hadn’t screamed when the guy hit me. I’ll tell you why, because being hit by a car is just such a stunning experience that I was shocked into silence. Even more shocking, the guy just kept driving. Mr. Prairie said he did slow down a bit, but since I wasn’t lying in a bloody, mangle heap in the road, he just kept driving.

Then Mr. Prairie asks me, “Is it that serious?” And I answered, “No, it just feels like when you bump your elbow really hard, because, you know, A CAR HIT ME!” And he just kept driving. If I’d had the foresight to plan for the day when I was bumped by a car,  I would’ve banged on the car Midnight Cowboy-style and yelled, “I’m walkin’ here!” But alas, who plans to be HIT BY A CAR?!

Monkey, who was holding my other hand when the guy hit me with his car, and did I mention, just kept driving, seemed to be unaffected. We proceeded to the grocery store and got our shopping done. (One child per cart, trust me on this one!) When we were done and loading up the Prairie Family Truckster, Monkey spotted a semi  backing up to the store’s loading dock. It was backing up and beeping and he panicked. He was sure the truck would hit us all (it was quite a ways away), so he hurled himself out of the cart and demanded that we all get in the car. RIGHT NOW!!!!

Even though I wasn’t really hurt, he had just seen his mama get hit by a car. He’s way more sensitive than he lets on. Monkey did not calm down until I was safely in the car.

By the way, I plan to lead every conversation with, “I got hit by a car,” at least for a couple of days.

Baby oil removes “permanent” marker marks from skin. How did I come to acquire this little tidbit of knowledge, you may ask? Because I have a 3, soon to be 4, year old, that’s how.

Yesterday morning, Pumpkin somehow managed to access my purse, which was hanging on a rather high coat rack. Seems the child has gotten taller since we hung the pegs on the wall, imagine that. Anyway, the little pickpocket found one of my Sharpies, lucky for all of us she found the pink one and not the black one.

I didn’t find out about the theft until I noticed the silence. That eerie silence that occasionally descends upon the House; the kind of silence you hear in old Westerns when the notorious gunfighter walks into the saloon; the kind of silence that usually only exists in libraries or funeral parlors; the kind of silence that always means a kid is up to no good. Mr. Prairie walked in and asked what Pumpkin was doing and I decided that I should find out. Together, we opened her door and peered in just as she threw something under a box, spun around, and yelled, “Nothing!”

When Pumpkin yells “Nothing!” you can bet that it’s something, and it’s never a good something. She had stashed my pink Sharpie under the box, after liberally applying said marker to her hands, arms, lips (just like lipstick!), and bellybutton. We didn’t immediately discover the bellybutton thing. Mr. Prairie called out from the back of the House, “Check her bellybutton!” I did, and she had. Why she is so fascinated with coloring in her bellybutton I will never know, but this not the first time she’s done it so it wasn’t exactly a surprise.

Getting the stuff off of her was quite a chore. Scrubbing didn’t work, fingernail polish remover didn’t work, lotion didn’t work. I was down to my last idea so I gave it a whirl. So if anyone ever asks you how to remove Sharpie marks from toddlers, tell them to try baby oil.

Then just a couple of hours later, while we were shopping in Big Warehouse Club, we got a call from Monkey’s school. The school nurse called and left me a voicemail telling me that he had been in an accident at recess. She said that his lip was split and swollen, but that he had already returned to class.

Monkey looked like the losing side in a prize fight. His sweet little upper lip was very swollen and red and there was blood on his clothes. He told us that he fell face first on the blacktop while engaged in a rousing game of something he and his little cronies call “Midnight Joker.” I’ve never been able to determine the exact rules of “Midnight Joker,” but it seems to involve climbing to the top of the tallest piece of playground equipment, throwing oneself off of it, and yelling, “I’m the midnight joker!” I hate that game. And now I’m mad at that song.

So I started a new tradition, when a child get hurt in school, he or she gets special treat. I took him to the store and let him pick out some candy.

This morning the last thing I said to Monkey when I dropped him off at his classroom was, “Be careful!” Apparently he didn’t listen.

When I picked him up this afternoon his teacher greets me with, “You are never going to guess what happened today. Monkey tripped in the classroom today, got a big scratch under his eye, and hurt his lip in a different spot!”

Today, I bought him some ice cream. If he does this for a third day in a row I’ll assume he’s doing it for the snacks.

As I sit here on this historic day, watching that history unfold on my TV, I am struck by the utter disregard my daughter has for the solemn events we are watching. So far I have received one request for Pink Panther, one for “Pongo” (101 Dalmatians), and two crying fits when I told her “No.” Now she is rapidly emptying a tissue box and making a small mountain out of the tissues.

Well, it’s ridiculous to expect a toddler to appreciate something I consider exciting but that she has proclaimed boring. And it is exciting, instead of gazing longingly to a past that never really existed, we, as a country, are once again looking resolutely into the future. And once again we will have a president who addresses the American people as the adults that we are.

I think the chief failing of the out-going administration (and most conservatives) is that they do not see the American people as adults that are capable of making our own decisions, they do not trust us to handle the hard stuff. The Great Depression could have destroyed the country but the strength of the citizenry kept it alive. During WWII, the tough-minded American people did what was required to defeat the greatest threats our world had ever faced. Tire-rationing, food-rationing, women taking over “man’s work” to free men to fight, Civil Air Patrol, black-outs, the American people coped very well, soldiered on, made do, made it work.

After 9/11, did the administration ask the people to sacrifice any material comfort for the good of the country? No, they told us to go shopping, to travel, to spend money as if there were no tomorrow. Oh, we sacrificed all right, our civil liberties, the assumption that our private telephone calls were truly private, our dignity at the airport, too many of our brave service men and women. We weren’t even asked to forgo paltry tax cuts so our troops could have little luxuries like body armor. But now many people have unwillingly sacrificed much of their life savings, many have sacrificed their homes.

Were those who benefited the most from the CEO-president asked to sacrifice their golden parachutes when their companies began to falter? Are you kidding me? The CEO-president asked us, the tax-payers, to bail out his buds!

At a time when it was easy to blame the “other”, were we asked to set aside old prejudices and come together in unity? No, grievances were allowed to fester, bigotries were encouraged. We were told to fear the “other”, to fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here. Innocent people, whose only crime was practising a different faith than most other Americans, were detained in airports and escorted off planes.

I interrupt this post with the joyous news that Obama is now officially our president even before he takes the oath of office. Great day in the morning!

The old administration did not trust us with the truth, they did not trust us with their mistakes, they thought we were too weak to handle the difficult road ahead and tried to deceive us that the road was a smooth one.

President Obama trusts us enough to admit that the road ahead is a tough one, but that we can meet and exceed the challenges. He understands that we come from tough stuff. Every single American born in this country is the descendant of people tough enough to cross land bridges during the last ice age, to make perilous ocean voyages, to leave the comforts of home to carve a new life out of the wilderness, to survive and surmount slavery, to fight for independence, to fight to keep our country united, to survive deadly epidemics and find cures for them, to claim, demand and fight for the inalienable right to be treated as full and equal citizens, to rise up and demand the right to vote, to walk The Trail of Tears, to retain their sovereignty in the midst of hostile forces, to have their land taken away and forced to move to reservations and survive, to endure internment with dignity. Our naturalized citizens all took the difficult steps to leave their homes and start a new life here. No matter how desperate their previous existences may have been, no matter how war-torn or destitute their old homes were, it is still painfully difficult to pull up stakes, forsake roots, leave family and friends, say farewell to familiar sights and faces, to chose to live among strangers, to learn a new language, to adapt to new ways of doing things, yet thousands of people do just this every year.

We are, all of us, tough-minded people, capable of surmounting any difficulty that we face. And I have complete faith that President Obama’s administration will treat us as competent adults. I believe that his administration will trust all of us to make our own private sometimes difficult medical decisions for ourselves. I hope that his administration will usher in a new era of tolerance, compassion, and acceptance for all people.

But my little daughter doesn’t grasp any of this because she has no knowledge of the past eight years. And apparently neither do these people up in Wyoming and many others just like them. People were so concerned about Bill Clinton “taking away their rights” that militias multiplied like cockroaches. But it was Bush who presided over the biggest retreat on civil liberties in decades. And now these same types of folks are worried about Obama infringing on their rights!

I wonder exactly what sorts of rights people are concerned about losing. The right to have guns? Contrary to popular opinion, Democrats and other assorted liberals do not want to disarm the public. We want hunters to have their firearms, we want law-abiding citizens with the proper training and permits to pack heat, when appropriate. We just want to keep the criminals, the mentally unstable, the rage-driven nutjobs from having easy access to guns. We want waiting periods and cooling-off periods, we want children to make it through childhood unscathed even if daddy has a handgun, we want places of business to be able to keep guns out of the workplace if they so choose. WE DO NOT WANT TO TAKE ALL YOUR GUNS!!!!! Please get over yourselves.

Are they afraid that now with a black man in the White House, they won’t feel as comfortable making racist jokes? Good. Discomfort is a sign that you should stop. Are they afraid they will have to stop hating gay people and, you know, start treating them like human beings? Hatred and fear are terrible things to harbor in your heart and your soul will shrivel and die as a result, and we can’t make you stop hating, but we can insist that you treat other human beings with dignity and respect.

They seem to be afraid that their religious liberties will be compromised. I simply don’t get this. This country was founded without requiring religious tests for holding public office and without establishing a state religion. Our founding fathers had seen first-hand the dangers inherent in a state religion and many colonists came here to escape real religious persecution, not the “persecution” some modern church members claim to experience. Religious persecution tries to keep you from practising your faith. Not being able to force others to abide by your faith is NOT persecution. Get over yourselves.

Are they as worried about leaving a huge national debt as they say? Too late, baby! Bush already did that for you. It’s a little late to be getting your underpants in a wad over it.

I’ve got it! They’re afraid that all their trans fats will be replaced by olive or canola oil, that the air they breath may become cleaner under a president who doesn’t despise the EPA, that some of those lazy, useless, good-for-nothing endangered species may be protected. After all, who needs healthy oceans and diverse habitats? Soylent Green, anyone?

Wow, imagine the affront to one’s dignity should the partially hydrogenated oil in snack cakes be replaced by polyunsaturated fats! The horror.

Honestly, can’t the right come up with anything better to be concerned about? Oh yeah, terrorism. Well those wars have totally turned out great, huh? There have totally not been any more terrorist attacks anywhere since….oh, wait, there have.

We already live in a surveillance society, unless you never leave your home, you are photographed or filmed in lots of public spaces, from banks to department stores to parking lots. Your banking habits are subject to scrutiny, as are your overseas calls. And all this happened way before President Obama was even elected.

I personally am looking forward to the next four years, the new era we are entering promises to be exciting and scary and ultimately fulfilling.

Congratulations, Mr. President, you earned it!

Happy Holidays to All our Friends and Family!

Well, this year has gone by fast! And it was an action-packed year, at least by Prairie family standards.
I turned 40 this year. (40!) Monkey started kindergarten and discovered cafeteria food. And since kindergarten is now an all-day affair, Pumpkin finally gets some time to herself, some time with Mama to herself, and some much-needed peace and quiet. It’s tough to be the baby.
In the interest of finding some peace and quiet myself, and some money, I got a job. One that pays. I work part-time in a bank call center now. I told Mr. Prairie that even if every single caller yelled at me (they don’t) it would still be quieter than our house!
Then we had a House fire. OK, a garage fire. There was an electrical fire in the garage and due to the fact that John was home with the kids while I was at work, and did everything right, and also to the incredibly fast response time of the Tulsa Fire Department, the fire’s damage was confined to the garage. But we lost power, of course, and part of the house filled with smoke.
So, we stayed in a way-too-small-for-the-kids hotel room for three weeks that felt like an eternity. The good part—it was, in reality, only three weeks and not an eternity. I owe those firefighters a batch of cookies!
Mr. Prairie, who is my big-time hero for saving my babies from a fire!, has gone into business for himself. He is now doing web design, information architecture, user experience, and lots of other things that I don’t understand, from home. Part of the reason he chose to strike out on his own was to spend more time at home with the family.
Well, in the just-over-a-month that he has been working for himself, he has flown to Tennessee and New Jersey! And he’s busier than ever, but at least he’s got a great boss. He has wanted to do this for a very long time, but it was the fire that gave him that extra little push to do it.
It was as if the fire cleared out the underbrush that obscured his path, and then lit the way. Fire is such a mainstay of human experience. For thousands upon thousands of years we have both feared fire’s awesome, destructive power and valued its usefulness. Fire warms our hearths, cooks our food, and heats our water. And while we no longer rely on fire to provide light for our homes, we still fondly recall the days when we did. Ever wonder why candle shops do such brisk business in this electric age?
Candlelight has long played a roll in holiday traditions. Candles in a menorah are the central symbol of Hanukah, representing the re-consecrating of the temple ordered by Judah Maccabee. The menorah needed to burn all night, every night for re-consecration but there was only enough oil for one night. But miraculously the oil lasted for eight nights, long enough to prepare more oil.
Kwanzaa uses a candleholder called a kinara, containing seven candles of red, green, and black, to represent the seven principles of Kwanzaa. Those seven principles are: Unity, Self-determination, Collective work and responsibility, Cooperative economics, Purpose, Creativity, and Faith. (Much thanks to the Official Kwanzaa Website.)And while candles aren’t the most important symbol in Christmas celebrations, they do play many traditional roles.
In Ireland it was traditional to place a lit candle in the window and leave the front door unlocked, as a sign of the hospitality Mary and Joseph were denied on the night of Christ’s birth. And in many countries the candle in the window is a sign of welcome for the Christ Child, Himself, who is said to wander the countryside looking for homes in which He will be received. He could be in the guise of a beggar or a poor, hungry child. You never know how He will appear to you, so it is important to offer hospitality to all who come to the door on Christmas.
Candles in the Advent wreath are lit in the weeks leading up to Christmas. There are accompanying prayers for each candle, one lit per week, that remind believers to focus on the true meaning of Christmas.
Queen Victoria popularized Christmas trees in England. Her German-born husband, Prince Albert brought Christmas trees, a German custom, into their home. The queen was well loved and widely copied, so since she had a Christmas tree, everybody else wanted one, too. Candles were placed directly on the branches, and later in little holder-clips attached to the branches. These lights on the Christmas tree symbolized the Star of Wonder that illuminated the Magi’s way.
Today we have replaced the candles with electric lights, which makes me happy because one house fire was one too many. People even put electric “candles” in their windows. The fire itself was replaced, but we retained the light.
The lights that surround and infuse theses holy days remind us to BE the light so desperately needed in this world. We need to be the light that illuminates others and ourselves. We need to be the light that shines into the darkest, dankest recesses of humanity. We need to be the light that beams into stormy seas and guides foundering hearts to a safe harbor.
If we would all be that light, we could banish hatred and intolerance. We could drive out ignorance and fear. And we could extend a beacon of hospitality and hope to those who need it most.

Happy Holidays from the House of the Burning Prairie!

It is a beautiful, warm, Oklahoma fall day, perfect for casting an historic vote. I proudly, and with tears of joy welling in my eyes, cast my vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden. And all the other Democrats on the ticket. I vote straight-party ticket, always have, always will.

I even managed to escape without injury!

Honestly, I don’t know how any person of good conscience could still vote Republican, especially after the past eight years. I am utterly baffled and truly wish that someone could explain it to me. How can a so-called “values voter” find common ground with the robber barons of the right? How can a so-called christian reconcile the teachings of Christ with the depredations of the GOP? How can a struggling family ally themselves with personification of the economic policies that authored that struggle?

Do people honestly believe that the party that gleefully sacrifices the lives of our valiant soldiers and innocent civilians and licks its chops at very thought of lethal injection or the electric chair shares their views about the sanctity of life? Anti-choicers, you are being used and you will be jettisoned when they find you no longer useful.

How can folks who claim Christ as their savior reject His instructions to love our neighbors as ourselves,  to clothe the naked, feed the hungry, heal the sick, to not stand on the street corner to pray, to be peace-makers? And by the way, that’s “suffer the little children” not make the little children suffer. The Republican party stands at direct odds with the teachings of Jesus, and yet so many of the faithful cling to false hopes that the GOP feeds them, lapping up the lies that ooze out of the mouths of the right wing pundits, preachers, and politicians. Starving at the feet of their masters, they pant after whatever crumbs fall off the table of the greedy.

The only thing I can understand is that the GOP feeds the fears, petty hatreds, and ignorance of its base, the basest of its base.

As for me, I will not be a prisoner of fear, I will not allow hate to rule me, and I forcefully reject ignorance. I vote for the future, not the past. I vote for bright hopes. I vote Democratic. And I voted for Obama!

My supernatural klutz powers are as strong as ever. I’ve always been a klutz–that saying about not being able to walk and chew gum at the same time? That’s about me. But this week has been a veritable showcase of accidents.

Tuesday evening I stopped at the store for a few things and went through the express lane. Just as I was turning to leave I slipped on a puddle on the floor and nearly hit said floor. But I only hit the puddle with one foot, slipping while the other foot remained in its original position. So I ended up nearly in splits position on the floor, which is no small thing for a chubby 40-year old woman with a bum hip. As always, innocent spectators were appalled while it was no big deal for me.

Then on Wednesday morning I fell on the front porch. It was raining and the porch was wet, and I was retrieving the stroller from the car. I hit a slick spot and then hit the ground. When I fall out in public I make a real effort not to yell or scream or cry or yelp, that way fewer people take notice of my humiliation. But that morning I was at my own house and nobody else was in view, so did I ever holler! Hubby heard me while he was in the shower. I told him that I fell, again, but that I was ok. I wasn’t, but what was he supposed to do about it? My leg is feeling much better now, thank you, but I re-hurt the foot I tore a ligament in when I was preggers with Pumpkin. That is not a happy foot.

The central problem seems to be shortage of synapses. If I try to do too much or even think about too much while trying to perform some kind, any kind of physical task, something fails. Usually my feet. You see, my body wants me to give my full, undivided attention to every little physical task. Not that I blame it, every time I don’t remain perfectly motionless my body is in mortal peril. But I’m not sure that remaining perfectly motionless would solve the problem. I’m the kind of person who would be struck by a meteorite while sitting on her own couch.

Apparently, when I’m walking, I should only be thinking “Right foot left foot right foot left foot…” This also applies to simple things like making lunch.

Today, while making lunch, I experienced a synapse malfunction of epic fail proportions. Boil water, insert pasta, sounds easy right? But there was a problem–I wasn’t just thinking “Open bag of pasta, pour into water.” I was planning an anti-Palin post in my head, and then I started thinking about grating some Parmesan for the pasta and wondering where my rotary grater thingy was. The cheese was the last straw, the straw that broke the synapse’s back.

Somehow, only slightly less than half the bag of pasta ended up in the pot. The rest spilled on floor and on the stove top, right around the burner I was using. Just barely on time, I remembered to turn off the flame before I started a massive kitchen fire. I’m pretty disappointed, it was a bag of tri-color fusilli from Italy. My favorite. Still, Pumpkin and I did have enough for lunch. And it was good.

Now if only I could manage to stay upright.

When did my baby boy become a big boy?

Today was Monkey’s first full day of Kindergarten. He’s got his own locker and a brand-new lunch bag. And a mama who just can’t believe he’s growing up so fast. Monkey was so excited that he barely even acknowledged me when I said goodbye. I made it half-way back to the main doors before I started crying.

When Pumpkin and I picked him up, he just seemed like it was no big deal! But he had a lot of fun and got to eat his lunch in the cafeteria like a big kid, so he was happy about that. So far, I think lunch is his favorite subject.

Today was Monkey’s last day of school for the year. Actually it was his very first last day of school! There was a pizza party and everything. But frankly, I don’t know how I’m going to survive summer, spring break was almost the death of me. He’s not my little toddler anymore, he’s been out in the world away from me, and he just won’t be content in our old unstructured ways. He’s made friends at school, friends he’ll want to see, so there will be playdates. There is a recommended reading list and activities to help him prepare for kindergarten. I’m actually going to have to plan stuff!

We walk up to school most days and I really enjoy it. I’m going to miss our walks; I guess we’ll just have to walk to other places. The exercise, the fresh air, the nature, all of them add a nice aspect to my day. Especially the parts back home after dropping Monkey off and when we walk back up to pick him up. It’s not that I don’t like walking with Monkey, but that time alone with Pumpkin is special. She’s just so new to all this human-stuff and absolutely everything is this bright, shiny wonder to her.

On the way back up to the school, we played one of her favorite games-”Mama, what’s your name?” She asks everybody present in just that fashion. “Daddy, what’s your name?” And the answers are always the same, “Daddy.” “Mama, what’s your name?” “Mama.” And then you have to ask her, “Pumpkin, what’s your name?” “Pumpkin” she answers. Luckily this round didn’t last too long.

Then she picked up a stick that she declared just the right size for a walking stick. She told me it was for walking up the dirt. Then she said, “Mama, today is Dirt Day. I love dirt.”

I knew it. Kids don’t just get dirty in the pursuit of other things like play. They get dirty because they love the dirt itself, on its own merits. So the next time I look around my kid-full House and wonder how all the dirt got in, I’ll know that the children have invited it over. Because they love dirt.

God, it’s going to be a long summer.

Today was a special and scary day for Monkey, it was his very first school program. His adorable little Pre-K class stood on the stage in the gymnasium and sung seven cute songs. Well, the rest of his class did.

Hubby came home from work to go with me and Pumpkin. Grandma and Grandad drove in and brought Cousin L. with them. Cousin L. was born six weeks before Monkey and they are very close. She’s as shy as Monkey is outgoing, but somehow always ends up the one who gives the orders when they play. Pumpkin managed to keep her dress on long enough to get through the program. She likes to wear pretty dresses, for about 2 hours and then they start to bother her and must come off! Now! Of course, we always have to maintain a bit of an edge, so she wore her pink high-top Chuck Taylors with her flowery dress.

Well, maybe it was the crowd or just standing up on that stage, but Monkey started crying during the very first song. First, he had that deer-in-headlights look, then he started wiping his face with his hands, and then his frown got bigger and his little chin started to quiver. It was all I could do not to run up to the stage and gather him in my arms and head for the hills. But he was a trooper, he pulled himself together and went on with the program. Of course, I didn’t see his lips move very much, but he did his best to keep up with the hand motions and dance moves.

After the songs, the teacher showed pictures from throughout the school year and everybody “oohed and awed” about them. When that part was over, Monkey ran to his daddy, wrapped his arms around him, and I didn’t know if we’d be able to pry them apart. You know, ol’ Mama’s there for everything, but having Daddy there is something special! Well, Hubby had to get back to work so he missed out on cookies and punch.

We didn’t think to take a camera, because you know, we’re dumb. But luckily the iPhone takes pretty nice pictures and I have some grainy shots taken with my cell phone. One picture I got was Monkey with his “buddy.” The school offers a type of mentoring program where classes of older students partner with the Pre-K classes and have “Buddies Days.” I finally got to meet Larry, Monkey’s buddy. I have heard about that kid since the beginning of the year and I was so happy to meet him. Larry is such a nice boy, and he seems to genuinely like Monkey. Tomorrow is Ice Cream Social Day with the Buddies. And the last day of school will be Pizza Party with the Buddies Day.

Later, after we got home, we talked about what happened. Monkey said he got scared at first, but then he got better. But all in all he had fun. And next year he starts Kindergarten. When did all this growing up happen?