It's raining this morning, and I am glad.
Yes, we still need to finish sanding/priming/painting the garage, and painting the front of the house (it's primed), so a sunny day would enable us to get some more of that work done.
But....
My eyes feel all gunky from the dust yesterday when we were sanding, and there is so much to do INSIDE that I was hoping for a break. I know. I feel disloyal to the cause. Or something. Ah well.
I need to write some food posts. We actuallly HAVE been cooking, but I just haven't been taking the time to take pictures, so I haven't been posting. But that's started to change, so hopefully this week I will get some of them up for you. Especially the two recipes that include the red noodle beans we've been growing.
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Yesterday Alex was heading off with our friends across the street to a block party on the next street over. We told him to put a shirt on, and he said "I'm a man! I don't wear shirts!" This in his little 8-year-old boy voice. Very cute. He put a shirt on.
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Julia had a birthday party to go to, so around lunch time I took off my dusty sanding-the-garage ensemble, wiped the dust off the rest of me, mostly, and off we went to the store to buy a birthday gift.
It's not easy being six, you know. Especially when you have to pick out something to give as a gift to one of your friends and NOTHING for yourself. We've had this difficulty a couple of times now - shopping for a friend, and Julia picks out something she thinks they will like, but it's also something SHE would really, really like. But then she has to walk out of the store with just a gift for the friend and NOTHING for herself. So hard to be okay with that.
So yesterday she really really really really wanted to get something for herself. And I reminded her that she'd spent most of her money on stuff for herself while we were in Seattle, and that she didn't have a whole lot left. But if she really really really really wanted to get something, we could see how much she had left and she could spend it. But I told her that I wasn't going to buy anything for her. So we went into her money/jewelry/junk box and dug out some coins, and I told her she had about five dollars to spend, OR she could save it and wait til she had more and get something at a later date.
Naturally, she wanted to bring the money and spend it. Fine. I understand that. So off we went.
She found the birthday gift quickly and easily enough - she'd already given it some thought, in fact. So I held onto that while she began looking around for something for herself.
Thing is, there aren't a lot of really cool things for five bucks. There are accessories, mainly. Stuff to go with more expensive stuff you already own. Like clothes for your 8 hundred Barbies. Or little clothes or a little carry bag for your zhuzhu pets. Or...basically...lots of...junk. Little things that are destined to get lost under the bed, or underneath the bureau, or at the bottom of the bins full of other bits and pieces of the past 6 years of gift-getting. Stuff I was hoping she wouldn't opt for.
I needn't have worried. She didn't pick junk. She couldn't decide. Too many choices, but none of them really desirable.
"How much is this?" Fifteen dollars. You don't have enough.
"How much is this?" Twenty-two.
On and on like that for oh, fifty hours.
"Julia, I've already showed you the things you have enough money for. Why don't you save your money for another week and after the yard sale (which we're tentatively going to have) you'll have more money and you will have more choices."
I tried to sell that over and over, but she wasn't buying it.
She wanted her Oompa-Loompa NOW.
I was patient for a little while. Some lessons take a while to sink in, and I was really hoping she would see the wisdom of my lifetime of experience (hahahahahahahaha - I know, I'll be waiting for another twenty years before that happens), and decide to, figuratively, tuck her money back in her purse and march out of the store with me proudly, like a big girl.
But no. There was angst. And torment. And sorrow. And indecision. And frustration (mine, mostly), and counting down the last couple of minutes of my patience, and tears.
Finally though, still tearful, she took my hand and we left the store, with purchases ONLY for the birthday girl.
It's not always easy becoming a big girl.
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