I missed my photo op today, so again, another posting without photos (unless the boys warrant taking their picture sometime real soon). Since I missed the photo op, I'll help you to visualize it. Close your eyes (well, wait until you read all the description and then close your eyes) a 6 almost 7 year old boy dressed still in his army green colored pj's (camo bottoms, solid green top that says 'Let me sleep and no one gets hurt') with 2 teeth missing in his smile. He comes running at me with his 3D glasses on from the Dinosaur book he got a few years ago for a birthday (either his or his brother's) (editor's note here: These are yellow foam glasses that have flame looking cuts at the top of them, not just your ordinary 3D glasses) and his crown that was made when we were defending castles and make believe villains around Taite's birthday. He's yelling at me "Monster - (still missing my squiggly thing) You are a Monster" and throws soft toys that probably won't break anything in the house, but that isn't a guarantee! I love how Brayton has such an imagination. When he is playing if he finds something to wear, he just puts it on and keeps playing. Usually it's his red "fishing" hat he calls it, but not always. Like now, he just brought me some "soup" he made in his restaurant (I'll tell you more about that in a bit) and sticking out of the mug/glass is a pipe cleaner thing. I didn't know what the pipe cleaner thing was so I tried to drink the soup from the glass and pretended to be poked in the eye by the pipe cleaner (always looking for a laugh, you know hehe). Brayton laughed (good boy) and pulls out the pipe cleaner to show me it was really a spoon! He'd shaped the pipe cleaner in the shape of a spoon and it looked very good! He really likes pipe cleaners (thank goodness for garage sales or we wouldn't have so many) because he can shape them into almost anything! Back when the crowns were all made (mentioned before in this article -- hehe, as if I'm a columnist!) I am so easily distracted and humored by myself, so for that, I apologize. . . Anyway, we made the crowns to go with the light sabers we were all making out of pipe cleaners! Yesterday he did really buy himself the real thing. A genuine light saber for only $7.99! I give it a week or so before it's broke. . .

Okay, now for the recipe mentioned before. Tonight we were finally going to try Monica's recipe for a Bobby Flay smackdown worthy Grilled Cheese (Hawaiian bread and Gouda cheese - which was excellent by the way!) and I wanted a good soup to go with it (tomato was out of the question because I just threw out the tomato soup I made who knows how long ago because no one would eat it. I ended up trying the Italian Sausage Soup on allrecipes. com (funny thing about that site is no matter what kind of recipe I am searching for, I always end up with more than one recipe - this time it was classic waffles). Everyone liked the soup and Brayton liked it so much he was going to make it in his pretend restaurant -- that's when you know you've got a keeper - it's pretend restaurant worthy!! He followed me around the whole time I was cleaning up from supper waiting for me to write down the recipe in his little notebook. Then he made the soup for my while I am typing. I just finished writing down the Classic Waffles recipe for him too so he could add to his collection and contrary to what he thought there is 'milk' in waffles, not 'milk weed' and yes there are eggs in waffles - he thought that was funny for some reason. It's good to hear him laugh!

Taite was invited to a friend's to play this afternoon and when I picked him up, they were just getting to the house -- they were being pulled behind the snowmobile on sleds. Taite was sharing a sled with Gunnar and whenever their sled would tip over, Taite did a face plant. His face was all read and his black hat and neck protector were all white! He was having a blast!

While he was playing, Chris and I cleaned out the new van for Chris' business trip this week. I still didn't have all the pink puke cleaned out of the seams and the stupid mess that snow/ice/dirt make on the floor of the van is unreal!! After we were all done (it took about 2 hours) Chris thought it sounded like a good idea to not drive that van until after winter was over. That or we could add "real" all season floor mats, the ones with edges to keep the water in the floor mat and not running all over the van - these all weather mats they sell specifically for the Odyssey are really meant for down south where they might have a little rain drip off their shoes, not for chunks of snow that slop all over!

In light of being happy and not complaining, I was going to post something funny that I had thought of earlier today, but of course now I can't think of it. I'll post it later and it will seem very random, but I warned you! hehe