omg what a day!

A little bit of excitement to interrupt the sameness of January, but oh dear, I could do without it...

Jonathan, poor Jon, he did not pass his road test.  The instructor informed me that he drives quite well, but unfortunately he got a "failed to yield" because he drove across the intersection when there was another car coming, closer than four car lengths away.  Jon said he had plenty of time, but he does acknowledge it wasn't a good move on his road test.  poor kid.  

This afternoon, it was time for Camille to visit the orthopedic dr., and I asked Jon if he wanted to accompany.  He likes driving, figured he could use more practice.  After the appointment, a quick trip to Aldi for ground beef, bananas, avocados, onion rings (for the new air fryer!), butter, tortilla chips, lime juice...we headed home.  There we were, three o'clock on a sunny afternoon, which is btw statistically when most motor vehicle accidents occur...and bam.  We were driving straight through an intersection, green light, Jon driving, when another car made a left turn RIGHT IN FRONT OF US.  I screamed, Jon braked, and we connected with his rear quarter panel.  I was whatever the polar opposite of calm, cool, collected.  Yeah, I freaked.  My NEW CAR!  

Now, of course, I'm thankful, super thankful, that we are all okay, no one got hurt.  Jonathan wasn't at fault, but the poor kid driving the other car.  I'm going to cry myself to sleep tonight.  He's only four months older than Jon, and he was so nice.  We pulled into the gas station, he came back around and parked behind us.  He offered to pay for the damage, but I called the police, filed an accident report, because...my new car!  He got a ticket, I do feel bad about that, but he told the officer, "We had a green light, and we just didn't see other, I guess..."  Well, he should NOT have been turning left on green with someone coming, but he didn't seem to realize it.  It was his dad's car, and he was upset, and I felt like throwing up.  It was not a bad accident, just a fender bender, but oh dear.  Jonathan is learning lessons today, isn't he?  This accident wasn't his fault, but still.  Anticipate what other drivers MIGHT do, pay attention...if I hadn't screamed STOP, STOP, WATCH IT!, who knows?

Anyway, what a day.  

But, do you want to hear a story?  Once, a long time ago, when I had nine  kids, and my sister had seven, we went camping.  Paul ended up having to work, so he helped me get the camper set up, then went back home.   Same with my sister, Cheryl, her husband set her up in her camp site, just around the corner from me, up on Lake Ontario, and we were on our own.

We brought our niece Laura, who was all of maybe 12 years old, to "help".  Hey, one more set of hands, right?  So we camped with 17 kids.  My site was right on the beach.  I remember making lunch, dinner, for all those kids, it was crazy, but SO MUCH FUN!  One night, we sat there around the fire, Cheryl and I and 17 kids, singing, "George, George, George of the jungle...", over and over again, because Sam was two, and he wanted us to.  Two park officers showed up, (Right after Cheryl said jokingly, "We're running out of firewood, someone will need to go purloin some more...").  We're pretty sure they heard that.  Since she had just said that, she was kind of stutter -y when the officers asked what on earth was going on.  (What?  Are we the only ones in the world who have a camp fire with 17 kids?). What she answered was, "Well, we're here without our husbands, my sister and I..."  It was so funny, because it sounded like...well, like she was coming on to him, and she realized it, and we were laughing our heads off.  The officers had gotten reports of a large party going on, and were satisfied that it was just a bunch of kids, and they left.  Cheryl and I still laugh our heads off when we think of her saying that...oh dear.  

There was a storm one night during that week, a terrible storm.  We didn't all fit in our camper, so two of the kids were in a tent.  I went and got them and told them to come in and squish into the camper, and as soon as they left the tent, it blew away, with poor Abigail's glasses in it.  She was hysterical, couldn't see, and I was NOT going to leave all the kids and go out in the storm and find the tent.  (We found it the next morning, near the woods, and her glasses were fine.)

Oh the fun we had.  Now, it's time to get some dinner, but I'll leave you with a pic...

(the oldest, my sister's Katie, was no more than 15...)