It's A Gamble

Let's be honest, with the Two Year Old on the prowl, taking a shower is like high stakes gambling in Vegas: I'm probably going to lose.

It's like a light bulb goes off in his head once he hears the shower water start and all cylinders fire driving him forward toward chaos. He & entropy are at one in the universe-destiny wields its ugly hand & the fates conspire against me as I hurriedly shave my legs thinking,
"faster, faster, faster"

I turn off the water, & tune my ears into the silence that hangs in the air.

"this could be bad, this could be really bad" runs through my head as I dry myself & put on my clothes.

"I bet he's in the fridge again, little monkey--no, he couldn't have--not my nail polish again."

and then, I find this
ah, it was worth the gamble.

i win.

"CHEESE, PEEZE!"

The Two Year Old has had a roller-coaster history with the dairy sector of his diet. He loves yogurt, he hates it, he loves cheese, he hates it, white milk today, no--chocolate milk instead. . . you get the idea. Obviously, cheese is in again.

The Two Year Old is demonstrating the beginnings of good manners. 'Peeze' [Please]' when he wants something & 'Doo' [Thank You] once he gets it. This is encouraging after the last post.

He constantly wearies me with pleas of "ChEEESE, Peez!" which I happily oblige even if it means getting up ten different times during one Netflix movie, then picking up the discarded cheese crumbles scattered haphazardly on the floor and his shirt while he triumphantly announces "Auwll Dun".

(ok, i said beginning).

I'm Going On A Mission

The Two Year Old has entered stealth mode recently and is pleased to relate successful completion of the following missions:

*Operation Purple Eye: after numerous failed attempts, agent 002 has obtained Mom's purple eyeshadow while said Mom was in shower and quickly dispersed all contents on bathroom floor and self before capture.
*Operation Vitamin C: agent 002 dislodged one standard size carton of orange juice from fridge. staff is remiss to report that capture occurred before agent could enjoy 'fruits' of his labor.
*Operation Hot Shot: complete coverage of agent 002 in The Man's special formula Gold Bond was achieved before dismissal from the premises occurred. (staff notes that the agent lead a counterattack on The Man with minimal coverage occurring to the pant leg of combatant's Sunday ensemble)
*Operation Smore: agent 002 dispersed the contents of above pictured paraphernalia with extreme prejudice. complete ingestion of such was limited due to pursuit by The Man.

***staff recommends The Two Year Old for promotion to full-fledged trouble-maker and request that agent 002 be sent straight to bed. over & out.

On the Road Again

We hit the road with The Man again to tour the corn fields of Illinois. I'd like to thank a few people for making this trip a success: first, the folks at Hardee's--thank you for your greasy fast food, it sustained us well for the endless hours of driving. to the folks at Disney--excellent reviews on Ratatouille, Cars, and Enchanted from The Two Year Old. to our beloved GPS unit--you served us well and we will not mention the 'off-the-beaten' path directions you mistakenly gave us more than once--all is forgiven. and on a more personal note--thank you L.M. Montgomery for supplying me with reading material to pass the 1,000 miles of road we saw the past three days. . .

good morning

many roads, one journey

i'm SO hungry

somewhere--i don't know where

all you need is:

'off-the-beaten path'

gentlemen, start your engines

checking out the birds

of course, the upside down tractor

. . .and a little something to get you through the rest of the week

You Win Some, You Lose Some

We spent Labor Day Weekend enjoying the world of college football--two for one exchange rate going with BYU and U of F winning (Go Gators). Yes, Grandpa Furness we still bleed blue (it just has a little orange in it now). Monday had us at our ward picnic and by nightfall Colton gave us the opportunity to see the city lights of Des Moines on a trip to the E.R. for a cut on his head.

Our hypothesis is that he was standing on his table (not proud of that one as a Mom--call CPS) and fell off cutting the back of his head on his bookcase. I went to check on him and the poor little guy was just whimpering looking up at me with tears streaming down. . . and then I saw the blood dripping down his neck. Not good. Three staples, 2 Elmo stickers, 10 kisses, and one beautiful dose of Codeine later and we were on our way home for a restless night of sleep. Everytime I see his bandaid I feel like a failure--what if I had got up two minutes earlier to check on him? Oh well, no sense 'if'ing it--I'm resigned that this is the first, but probably far from the last on events like this for us.

sorry, not the best pics (cell phone style)

kinda 'corn'y (okay--VERY 'corn'y)

If you have ever been to the Midwest you know that the majority of the landscape is covered in corn and soybeans--I guess we knew that but our travels the last few days have reaffirmed that fact. Blaine let Colt and me tag along while he surveyed corn plots in Northern Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota. Surprisingly, our two-year old didn't lose his mind and was quite pleasant considering the amount of time he spent strapped in his carseat.