Part Two: Grandpops

Hey, y'all - 

In May, Grandpops came to visit us from Missouri. Grandpops is one of those rare people who always has to be accomplishing something. If you clean the heck out of your house before his visit, he'll get restless and detail your car. I've seen him do it. Your dad is similar; sometimes I'll be cooking dinner and he'll ask how he can help and I'll say "Just stand there and keep me company." Then he starts kinda bouncing in place not knowing what to do with his hands, all anxious like a squirrel in a box and I end up saying, "Dang, never mind. Go away." He gets that from his dad. 

For this trip, I thought we'd combine Grandpops' visit with re-doing our downstairs flooring. Tex painted the kitchen a lovely shade of orange while he was here, with a little help from Hagen:

Then once they left, I kept going and painted the living room yellow and then re-painted all the furniture in the living room. 

The last step was re-do the living room floors that made me mad every time I looked at 'em. 

The folks who lived here before us installed reclaimed fir hardwood floors, but the wood was too soft for that purpose so it scratched like the dickens and the planks were too wide so we ended up with huge spaces between them, a.k.a. Where Hagen Stores his Play-Doh. You'd have to scrape it out with a butterknife and shop-vac it to keep it clean and that's just stupid. Equally stupid was the pale yellow flooring in the kitchen, which guaranteed that every time you stepped in the room, you'd leave a dirty footprint. Like my clothing, I want my floors to disguise as many sins as possible. 

Grandpops is a practical midwesterner, which means he's completely unfamiliar with the southern way of doing things. In the south, if a lady asks for help with her floors, there's a good chance the man in the question will say, "You just sit there, little lady, while I take care of this for you." Turns out Grandpops is a feminist (hooray! sigh) because he (rightly! sigh) expected me to work my butt off on these floors, too. When I said "Woo, this is hard," he didn't say "Take a break," he said, "You'll get faster." I wood putty'd every space in the floor and learned how to use a power sander. 

I rented a floor sander and followed behind Grandpops with the shop vac. 

In the end, the effort was 100% worth it:

Then he kept going and re-did my kitchen floor with this faux concrete look that hides all kinds of sins:

We did allow him some time off for good behavior, including an afternoon at the pond.

I love my new kitchen, almost as much as I love my old in-laws.

Love,

Mom

The Things That Carried Me: Part One

Hey, y'all - 

No two ways about it: This deployment stinks. Some days are better than others, so while I have some free time today, I thought I'd give thanks to some of the people who have made it a little more bearable.

Part One: My parents. 

Peg and Tex came to visit us in March. They flew into Spokane and we spent a few days exploring the downtown area, and going to the Discovery Museum. 

^ This is when Peg Peg held up the X-ray in the pretend vet clinic and said, "Looks like your dog's leg was shattered when he was hit by that truck, and I can't guarantee he'll make it," and I was reminded that it's not always the best idea to play Let's-pretend medical clinic with a real-life nurse. They won't sugarcoat your hypothetical dog's imaginary condition. 

Their timing was perfect on this trip, because some girlfriends and I had tickets to see Eric Church in concert in Spokane, and your grandparents were able to babysit you at the hotel so I could go to the show. On St. Patrick's Day. 

Y'all. I am not proud of my behavior that night, but here's a life lesson to tuck away in your back pocket for when you're of legal age:

IF you're going out with your friends to a country concert on St. Patrick's Day and there's even the remote possibility that you will imbibe more than your share, try NOT to promise your children on the way out the door that you will take them to Chuck E. Cheese's the next morning. Because boy will that come back to haunt you. 

...but here is why - even with the headache and the blinking lights and the hell of other people's children, I still laugh every time I think about this trip to Chuck E Cheese's:

My mama will tell you she hates that place. It's just a petri dish with pizza, etc. etc. But I bought $20 in tokens, and divided them up in cups for each of you to have an equal share. I asked Peg Peg to hold Hagen's cup of tokens for a second because he seemed to be content to crawl around in the play structure. I thought I heard Peg Peg say, "Laney, let's try skee ball" as they walked away. Fifteen minutes later, Hagen was tired of the slide and we went in search of his grandparents with the tokens. We found Peg Peg by the skee ball machine, draped in a paper boa of hundreds of prize tickets, holding an empty token cup. "Things just got out of hand," she said. Indeed. 

We drove them back to Missoula, and stopped on the way at what passes for an authentic Mexican restaurant in northern Idaho. 

Like all southerners, Peg Peg gets cold the second she gets north of Nashville or west of Amarillo, so she had to warm her hands in the steam of her fajitas. 

Back home, they helped me with all kinds of house projects (remind me to do a before and after house post later) and tackled some of the things I'd been putting off for years. For example, I have a big basket in the corner of my bedroom I call "Brooke's Home For Wayward Socks" that I stuff with all the solo socks that come out of the dryer. Peg Peg actually dumped that thing out and sorted it. 

Even with all the domestic projects, Peg Peg and Laney still found time to go shopping. I don't know which one of y'all is worse, but it's so nice when you each have someone to enable:

Towards the end of their visit, we took your grandparents to a kid's birthday party.

It was nice that Peg Peg was on hand to console Hagen about his questionable pinata skills. 

Because I work from home, with your dad gone I can go days without having a real conversation with another grown-up. Just having the folks around to talk to was a huge help.

...and the 128 pairs of socks Peg Peg put together is nothing to sneeze at. 

Thanks for coming and perking us up!

Love,

Mom

The Thor Update

Hello, all -

Here's the latest on old Thor:

He's holding up really well, considering. He seems to be in good spirits about 80% of the time, and the rest of the time I'm sure the reality of sitting in a plywood box on the other side of the world gets to him.

We've sent him so many care packages that he's asked me to go on hiatus because he's run out of storage space. The German base is somehow able to figure out how to provide fresh fruits and vegetables, and the American side is still pushing the kind of food you'd get at the state fair. I've sent soup and oatmeal and tortillas and peanut butter and muffins-in-a-cup. I figured out how to send milk and cereal. He could probably open his own 7-11 there. I've become a little addicted to Amazon Subscriptions, because I can sign him up to receive a package of the stuff he loves monthly and then forget about it. Then I can honestly say, "But Thor! I didn't send you another package! AMAZON did!" (those pesky bastards). Thanks again to Granny Jack and Randall for their Thor Fund donations.

Laney's class once again wrote letters to Thor this week, and they were hilarious as always. One girl in Laney's class wrote "I hope you survive!" and then decorated it with smiley faces and rainbows. It was a reeaaalll mixed message. 

This one, of course, was the tear-jerker:

Thor and I decided it would be fun to make a little video for the kids to say thank you for the letters and to answer some of their questions. So this morning, I interviewed him on Skype and then cut together this clip. Hope you enjoy:

Love,

Brooke

Some People Call Me The Space Cowboy. Some Call me The Gangster of Love.

Dear Hagen,

No doubt about it - you're the Joker.

Here are three recent favorites:

What do ghosts wash their hair with?
Shamboo!

Video submitted by your teacher:
Why can't you give Elsa a balloon?
Because she'll Let It Go!

Joke provided by Clay Mercer:
What do you get when you cross an elephant and a rhino?
Elephino! 

Finley's Fifth

Hey, y'all - 

Much to catch up on. I know. Allow me to ease into this. 

With your dad gone, I'm of course missing my better half but most of all, I'm missing SOMEBODY ELSE TO DRIVE YOU YOUNG'UNS EVERYWHERE. Y'all, I can't overstate how much I hate driving. I have threatened to put Hagen in an Uber, because that's how much I hate driving across town to his school. We have all these new roundabouts in Missoula and no one knows how to use them and no one yields appropriately, and I suffer from Roundabout Rage. When your dad is here, I mostly sit in the passenger seat, reading magazines and engaging in sparkling conversation about pop culture while your dad tunes me out. Heaven.

It's funny the things I didn't know to prepare for. I was hanging out with a group of girlfriends the other day, and they all started comparing how they share childcare duties with their spouses...like, "He does the teeth brushing and the bedtime story and tucks them in while I relax with a glass of wine, and then I get the up in the morning and get them ready while he sleeps in." And I'm not embarrassed to say that I teared up, because for now, I'm doing all of those things and having someone to share that load seems like ultimate luxury. I know there are single moms doing it all over the world, and my situation is only temporary and I need to get over myself, but y'all, it's hard. 

So let's catch up a little, shall we?

Hagen, your eternal best buddy Finley moved with his family to Idaho. They came back for one last weekend before they closed on their house to host Finley's fifth birthday party. 

"I'm this many!" "I'm this many now, too!"

There was face-painting, and everyone got to be some kind of animal.

Hagen, of course you couldn't just be "a dinosaur," and instead requested to be "A triceratops with electric powers who has three red horns and can shoot sparks and also evolve into a Mega triceratops who..." blah blah blah while the line built up behind you.

Then it was time to line up for the piñata.

Hagen, you have a billion wonderful, unique qualities that make you one of my life's great joys. But no one has ever said, "Boy, I admire that kid's athletic ability." This does not stop you from being recognized by a Rookie Sports Camp Counselor every time we go to the YMCA, where they shout out "Haaaagen!" when they see you and tell me "He was my favorite. I mean, he never did a day of sports, but still. We'd say 'Today, we're learning about soccer!' and Hagen would say 'That's too bad, because today, I am a coyote!' and he ran the perimeter of the field howling for an hour. He's awesome!"

Your lack of interest and participation in Sports Camp becomes apparent in situations like a group piñata bashing. 

You stroked the piñata with the bat. You danced with the piñata. You did everything short of taking the piñata on an official date. It was adorable and completely bizarre. 

Then of course, your sister got up there and smashed the snot out of it.

Hagen, your friend Kai shared his piñata candy with you, and you consumed enough to candy to suffer from a true piñata hangover.

The following week, we were invited to another birthday with ANOTHER piñata, and sure enough:

Eh, until the YMCA comes up with a Piñata Camp, let's just chalk this up to "stuff you get from me," and move on. 

Love,

Mom