Inspired by my friend Krista's gut-wrenchingly hilarious random posts, here are a few random things that have been happening around here lately...
One night this week, the phone rang at midnight. Tim didn't stir so I lunged over him to pick up the phone, fully expecting some bad news, as we tend to expect with 'after-hours' calls. But it wasn't bad news. It was a French-speaking man looking for a French woman whose name I can no longer remember. Somehow in my sleepy state I managed to carry on a conversation in French (poor French, no doubt!) where I explained that it was midnight and who was he looking for again? When he asked if he could have possibly called the wrong number, I concurred that yes, it was probably a wrong number... and "Bonne nuit". So strange that I thought maybe I had dreamed it the next morning, but Tim remembers it too. Now I wished I'd asked where he was calling from. He sounded European.
I have taken Maia to TWO chicken pox parties now -- one at which she even shared a juice cup with her cousin who came down with them the next day (ie. she was as contagious as she could be!). Still no chicken pox.
Maia has taken to adding "-ia" at the end of words. For example, boots are "bootia" and the dog is "puppia". Where does a 20 month old get such ideas?
Last night, I saw something moving in my peripheral vision. It was moving fast across the kitchen floor. By the time I realized it was a centipede, I also realized I only had about 1.5 seconds left if I wanted it dead before it escaped under the desk. I often wear shoes around the house but this time I was in my sock feet. No big books nearby. No husband in sight. With a gush of adrenaline, I worked up the courage to stomp on it in my sock feet. The mission was a success. Aren't you proud of me?
Maia has paid us back for not saying "no" very much these last few chatty months. She has gone to from the "yeah" phase, directly to the "no way" phase. (Do you want to play with your dolly? NO WAY. Nice.)
Ask Maia who her friends are and she will tell you now. "Jessie"... "Payton"... and "Obi". Clear as day. Very cute.
I got the flu a week ago. That in itself was unpleasant. But I had tried one of these PC Blue Menu pizzas for lunch, and though I'm usually a fan of PC products, the pizza just really didn't taste good. At all. So I made it through my last few piano lessons just in time to get home (where our dinner company was waiting for me) and immediately headed upstairs to hurl for the next few hours. Of course, I had the pleasure of experiencing the taste of lunch all over again. One of the finer moments of my life, to be sure.
I'm not sure who Amy is, but she's getting all the thanks at our kitchen table these days. When we pray before meals, Maia is keen to hold our hands, watch everyone around the table as we say our "thank yous" and when we close with Amen, she invariably exclaims,
"AMY"!
Monica (with wind blown hair), Jen (our weekend winner) 
