rainy monday morning

1. On the trip, Emily would frequently remind me of what would be waiting for me when I got home...and I am not talking about the kids and Paul and how nice it would be to see them.( you know, the dishes and the laundry and the picking up and things to straighten out...) She would say, "Mom, remember, when you get home, you can clean the living room..."

2. On the trip, Aaron and Joseph were precious. They are 19 and 18, and they are different. They like different music, and are just different. But they respect each other, and get along just amazingly. They both seem to think the same things are funny. It's hard to explain, but there is just a good spirit there, no malice towards each other at all. Just this one facet of the trip made it worth it....seeing these two boys together.

3. On the trip, I appreciated Abigail. She was voted The Best Driver. She cut the most minutes off the Estimated Time of Arrival on the GPS, and she handled the van carefully at the same time. She would always get up early and enjoy breakfast with me, and she would always think of the lazy siblings still sleeping, and get them some food. She can laugh at herself, and at me, but she is very thoughtful.

4. On the trip, Ashley got to know us well. And she doesn't hate us. The boys treat her just like one of their sisters. (they even started calling her, "your majesty", and "the princess"...) She fits in nicely.

5. On the trip, we were in close quarters for the whole time. So there were a lot of "don't looks", as in, "I am getting changed over here..." I mean, six people staying in one hotel room...which could have won a prize for being Slobbed Up, as I call it.

6. On the trip, we didn't want to eat all junk, so we went to the Lawton Walmart Supercenter and bought green peppers and carrots and cheese....we also had strawberries and some fresh fruit. That was our dinner for two nights, as we tried to balance out the trips to El Chico and Buffalo Wild Wings.

7. On the trip, much junk WAS consumed, as we had pretzel M&M's, peanut M&M's, Skittles in the van. And peanuts. And pita chips. No potato chips though. And mostly water to drink. And plenty of coffees.

8. On the trip, we noticed that this country is overflowing with McDonalds. We lost count, but they are everywhere. And the coffee is always cheap there, and always good. Drinking a lot of coffee is a must when one has to drive and stay up all night, but it makes for having to stop for bathroom breaks all the more....which in turn gives opportunity to Get a Coffee....

9. On the trip, we decided we will never drive this far again. 48 hours in the van in one week, not including the hours we spent driving around Lawton to pick up Ben and go to Walmart three times and also Kmart and the music store and the park....48 hours is 96 half-hours...that is 192 fifteen minuteses. It is too long. Especially since we drove all night long both ways and Missouri was just dark hills. Although we did see The Candy Factory (Emily wouldn't stop) and a billboard for The Vacuum Cleaner Museum, which my sister wants to go to.

10. On the trip, we heard people talk funny. In the Starbucks in Oklahoma, the guy behind the counter swore he had "never met a Canadiennnne", which we took to mean a "Canadian", as in a person from Canada. We are not Canadian, but in his mind, we are very close to that big country. He added that we had probably never met any Mexicans, and that he knew several. Wrong, but okay. The waitress in Buffalo Wild Wings said she wants to go to New York just once in her life just to see all the buildings. When I told her I have lived there all my life and never gone to the NYC, she couldn't believe it. And yes, she talked funny. Hilariously funny. But we enjoyed the differences, and really enjoyed the niceness that is the norm down there. The cashier in Kmart was ready to invite us over to dinner. I would have a good old time living down there.

11. On the trip, I learned that my kids, although they tease me about my driving and and laugh at me, they love me. In Starbucks one lovely evening, Joseph got up and gave me the comfy chair as I approached the group of them with my latte....(oh yum....) And Aaron, the worse perpetrator of mocking me, all in good fun of course, is actually very respectful.

12. On the trip I discovered that I really like Mexican food. The closest I have had around here is TacoBell. I also tried salsa for the first time, it was homemade, and served with warm chips, oh yum. And the chicken fajitas with avacado...and the rice...and the beans...oh yum. We had an excellent lunch that day. It was just so enjoyable to be with Mr Benjamin...we all sat in a booth, the restaurant was darkish and warmish..(.I slid into the booth first, and wondered all the time how in the heck I was going to get back out...) Ben was required to keep his uniform on at all times in public, so he had to eat tamales or whatever he had, very carefully.

And now I am home. And I have things to do. I have to call the local car-fixer mechanic about Abigail's old car, to get the tire fixed, and send a nice picture of Benjamin to Gramma, and a grocery store trip is in my near future. Last evening, the kids kept asking me when I was going shopping, and I would just ask WHY, very innocently, like I haven't noticed how they cleaned out the food while I was gone....and there is laundry, how strange! I have to unpack my stuff and sweep this livingroom and buy a posterboard for Suzanne's book report for tomorrow and get something for Sonja's snack on Tuesday, and make some calls about getting Aaron's pecoral bar removed before he goes to Norway....oh, Mali got accepted to the nursing school that Emily went to! I am proud of her, only not quite 17 years old, and she got in! It isn't easy to get accepted....Mirielle is on the waiting list, and I am not sure about Aaron....he got a letter but I forgot to ask. I am a terrible mother! So off I go.....