Saved By A Visit From Grandpa

This week at a glance:

Monday - good cleaning day, scrubbed the house from top to bottom

Tuesday - walked all over the city pushing the double stroller, sore feet

Wednesday - barely survived two grumpy girls all day, decided to go the extra mile and prepare a good dinner for Josh because he called and said he would, amazingly enough, be home for dinner only to have him call back just as I was taking everything out of the oven and off the stove to say...he wouldn’t make it after all, spent the rest of the night cleaning up after the grumpy girls ALONE

Thursday - tried my best to pull myself together and be a nice mom, only partially successful, SAVED BY A VISIT FROM GRANDPA LARRY!

We haven’t done too much while Grandpa has been here. Mostly we have just enjoyed being together. I think we all needed that more than a visit to the Liberty Bell. We did go to Longwood Gardens and enjoyed a slow paced day amidst the beauty of Autumn. We did a little shopping. Dad fixed our door, which was beyond the handy man ability of anyone living in this house. The boys & Kate went for a long run down Boat House Row and along the Schuylkill River. Josh needed a nap afterward. Dad was a good sport about accompanying us to a BBQ yesterday for the LDS Wharton students. He talked to everyone and played with the kids. And then today he stayed home from church with a croupy Kate. As Kate said when we were approaching the airport, “Can we keep him forever?”

In anticipation of the arrival of Grandpa we made Hand and Foot Cookies. Not familiar with the recipe? Here is the background. My dad loves to play the card game Hand and Foot. When we were packing our boxes for our move to Philadelphia Kate discovered the cookie cutters. She entertained herself for a while playing with them and then came walking over with a hand shaped cookie cutter in one hand and a foot shape in the other and announced that we needed to make Hand and Foot Cookies for Grandpa. I told her we would pack up the cookie cutters and send them to Philadelphia and then when Grandpa came to visit we would make him cookies. She didn’t forget. Every time I told her Grandpa was coming to visit she would ask if we were going to make cookies. We did--shortbread cookies shaped like hands and feet with yellow, orange, and purple frosting. They were the first things Kate showed Grandpa when he came into the house.

Kate & Jane have kept Grandpa busy reading books. Every time I turn around one of them is handing Grandpa a new book to read and then snuggling up his lap to listen. Today I overheard a conversation about a picture in one of the books.

Grandpa: This looks like your family.

Kate: Yeah, except she needs to have blonde hair like me.

Grandpa: And this one could be Jane.

Kate: And there is Mom.

Grandpa: And how could we change this one to look like your Dad?

Kate: Cut his hair off. ☺

Every morning during breakfast we read from the Book of Mormon. I am amazed at how much Kate gets out of it. I wouldn’t think a three-year-old would get anything out of daily scripture study, but she does. In church when she hears someone talk about Nephi or keeping the commandments or other familiar stories and phrases she lights up and tugs on me to make sure I heard. The other day she looked at Josh and said, “Today we read about the holy places.” Then while counting on her fingers, “home, church, and temple.” I was blown away. One morning when we were reading about the tree of life I pulled out my scissors and paper and glue and made a picture of the story as we read. Now we keep the picture on our book shelf and refer back to it whenever we read a verse that ties into the Tree of Life. While we were listening to conference one of the speakers started talking about Lehi’s dream. Kate, who we didn’t even think was listening, ran to get our picture. She sat there listening to the talk and pointing to the elements of the picture as the woman talked about the tree, the iron rod, the path, & the mists of darkness. Kate was miffed, however, when she failed to mention the great and spacious building.

As long as I’m on the topic of being amazed by my kids. I was reading stories to the girls one night before bed. I picked up a book and said, “Jane, should we read this story about Jesus?” Jane had her back turned to me because she was rummaging for a book, but when I said that she turned around and folded her arms. Jesus = Prayer in the mind of a 16-month-old.

Now a story to bring us back to reality. Josh and I were down in the dungeon last night putting some things away when Kate rushed to the top of the stairs and said, “Mom! Dad! I saw a squirrel in our house.” I wish it had been a squirrel. It’s a mouse. We decided to name him so that Kate won’t be scared of him. We’ve also been hunting him, but he’s smart. He eats all the crumbs and avoids all the traps. I demanded an acknowledgment from Josh that catching a mouse is A MAN JOB and I will have nothing to do with it. The hunt is on. Will Josh or Marcel come out on top?

Tune in next week for the rest of the story.