Oh, Look!

Oh, look!  George is so helpful.  On his own accord he put the silverware away.  I think George's theme song in life will be "Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better" from Annie Get Your Gun.  He tries to do everything he sees us doing and I think he may have a mean competitive streak as well.  Should be exciting!!

Oh, look!  The kids created a giant bird's nest and used our last egg as a centerpiece.  What charming lawn art.  Cannon carried the egg around for quite a while calling it "Eggie-Eggie."
This is why I don't believe in buying children nice toys.  They just want to play with weird stuff anyway.  I don't believe in nice bedding for children either.  They just end up sleeping together in a big pile on the floor.

Oh, look!  It's book club time again.
For our youth book club this month we read and discussed Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli.  The main character takes part in a speech contest, so we had ourselves a friendly little debate competition.  On the left we have Jakob arguing in favor of the superiority of Star Wars.  On the right, Clark arguing for Star Trek.  Everyone else was a judge.  I told the judges they had to vote based on who argued their position better, not just who you agreed with.  And after only three weeks of speech and debate class, Clark was voted the winner.
Shocking!!-- I had no idea Clark could argue so well.  He's really been hiding his light under a bushel all these years.

Then Bethany and Corrine took up the hot issue of the virtues of pants verses the skirts.  Bethany made a convincing argument for pants, but Corrine won out by pointing out that if you wear leggings under your skirt you get the best of both worlds.
How wise of her.

Oh, look!  It's Clark's future bride:)
Here's the story.  When Clark was a wee lad he loved, idolized, and adored Steve Irwin, the Croc Hunter.  The boy cried uncontrollably when Steve died-- and from a manta ray no less.  Well, Steve and his lovely wife, Terri, had a little girl born very near the same time as Clark.  Her name is Bindi Sue.
For a while now we've planned for Clark to go on his mission to Australia, convert Bindi to the Gospel (he is a good Mormon boy after all), bring her home and marry her.  No one else on earth could appreciate her late father like Clark.  
Apparently, Bindi Sue isn't just waiting around for Clark.  She is building quite the empire for herself.  At the Australia Zoo you can buy a whole collection of bendy Bindi dolls.  Our jet-setting friend Andrea found herself in Australia last week and came upon them.  Knowing of Clark's destiny with Bindi Sue she couldn't help herself and had to bring him home this souvenir.

Bindi Sue Irwin, if you're reading this (hey, it's possible) and you want a good-looking, nice American boy for an e-mail pen pal, that can be arranged.  And perhaps you could arrange a study abroad/internship at the Australia Zoo?

Oh, look!  It's Fall.
Not only that, but it is OCTOBER already!!  Hello??  Did we have September?  Because I don't really remember September.  I think we went straight from August to October.  Come to think of it August is very fuzzy to me as well.
Anyway, Fall means a quick trip to Gardner Village to visit the Witches.  Which trip entails a cheap visit to the candy shop for a treat and window shopping at the other darling, but dreadfully overpriced shops.  I suppose our family is really not their ideal visitors. 

Oh, look!  Potty humor.  It just never gets old.
Each year we delight to search out the witch in the outhouse reading the funnies.  But since we have a battle royal each morning for the funnies it seemed very apropos this year (ooh, good usage of a vocab word).  You see, for years, each morning Clark has "called" the funnies to read with his bowl of cereal.  Cannon has finally wised up, and although he cannot read, he knows if he calls them, he can get them first.   He says he likes to look at the pictures.  I'm sure he does.  And I'm sure that coming off the victor in a battle with Clark feels pretty good too.