Grandma and Grandpa Visit

Grandma and Grandpa came for a visit!  All the kids wanted to pick them up from the airport on Sunday.  I advised each and every one of them that it would be a long drive (hour there, hour back) just to make sure they were prepared.  They all still wanted to come.  We were sitting in our driveway ready to leave, I turned the car on and Caroline piped up, "How much longer?"  She made sure we knew that it was "taking a long, long, long, long time" to pick them up and get back home.

Having two fresh babysitters on his hands, Josiah couldn't shoo Todd and I out of the house fast enough.  We ended up going to a store and dinner.  A delightful dinner in which we got to eat our food and talk, and we didn't spill any of our glasses, and we didn't crawl under the table to pick up dropped food, and we didn't yell or scream or walk around the table just to "take a lap."  When we got home, we could hear the TV first thing.  Josiah had the volume up to 81 and informed his new sitting duck babysitters that "Mommy lets me do that."  I don't think so....    

Some highlights of their trip included:

All the kids rode Grandma & Grandpa's luggage across our wood floors.  This proved to be quite the fun entertainment...until someone got hurt.  I don't know why?  It seemed like a perfectly safe and wise decision to ride luggage.  (And, yes, I did take pictures before the inevitable injury occurred.)

The kids were all enamored to touch a real-life, fluffy beard.  

The boys showed their bike-riding skills to Grandma & Grandpa.  We also played a lot of baseball in the backyard, until we lost our ball when Josiah hit a home run into our neighbor's back yard.  Hard to fault him, it was a good hit.  

Grandpa fixed our light fixture, which was awesome.  When we bought the house, the previous owners wrote that they wanted to take the light shade in the breakfast room.  Thinking it not to be a big deal we, of course, signed off on that.  And then we could not find a shade to fit that fixture to save our lives.  We have been staring at a naked bulb since June.  Grandpa comes along, we made a quick trip to Lowes, and he had it fixed in 20 minutes.  It could have taken even less time, but he had "helpers" that kept trying to climb the ladder with him.  It's amazing how quickly things can happen when you know what you're doing.

We tried to find a few local antique stores for Grandma & Grandpa to visit.  I found one that was very close to a restaurant where we intended to eat dinner.  So, we made a stop so they could check it out.  From Google, I could see that it was a house that had been converted to a store.  We pulled up and it had the same "Antiques" sign out front.  My parents walk up to the house, open the closed-in porch door, and a woman kindly asks, "May I help you?"  The store closed a year ago.  It might be time to take the sign down.  

We had better luck the next day and they got to shop a little (and enjoy the quiet) while the kids and I went to the Railroad Museum literally across the street from the antique stores.  It was a very small museum, but really great for the kids.  They got to see all the old railroad equipment.  We were able to walk through a caboose and a fancy Pullman car.  We were even shown the train tower to see how they used to switch the tracks and change the signals.  The volunteer docent gentleman was very nice, but I'm pretty sure the two adults on the tour went away with more information that the kiddos.  

To go along with our Ancient History lessons, Henry found this "computer" hilarious.  They loved pushing the keys and seeing the typebars swing up to type their letter (and, yes, I did have to look up "typebar.").

We ate way too much food as we always do with company.  Henry fell into a food coma at one restaurant.  

Fortunately(??), he perked back up during his ride home in Todd's car.  He informed Todd that the "police pulled Mommy over, but we didn't get arrested."  And so I got to explain that one.  I got pulled over shortly after we moved here because I made a right hand turn on a red light during school zone hours.  Not a rule in Virginia.  And he gave me a warning after first asking Josiah if I was a good driver.  Thank goodness he said yes.  (That was the most nerve-wracking part of the whole ordeal - waiting for Josiah's answer.)

We told the boys that it would be an early morning to drive Grandma & Grandpa back to the airport.  I told them I'd wake them up and they could eat breakfast in the car.  I should have known never to mention such a thing to them.  Josiah woke up at 5:00 a.m. and Henry shortly after at 5:20 a.m., much earlier than necessary.

Josiah has spent some time this week working on his house.  He has made it out of branches and pulled up weeds.  He has a garden and he even paid Henry a dollar out of his own money to clear the weeds out.  

He was not very happy when Caroline sat right on his house.  

Upon expulsion from the library due to excessive noise (according to the parental figures), I took Henry and Caroline to the car to wait for Todd and Josiah to finish up inside.  Henry educated Caroline on the finer points of library etiquette.  "Carwowine, when you're in a library you have to be quiet, you cannot run around, and you have to listen to your father and your mother."  Then he messed with her face and made her laugh.

Of course, you should notice that Henry was in the car with her.  That was because he kept trying to give Caroline a piggy back ride through the library stacks.  He's not capable of doing such a thing, but he sure tried.

It's been cold here - in the 30s and 40s.  We would have loved to enjoy some of the East Coast blizzard - maybe just 6 inches of it, not the full two feet.  

Next week, it's back to reality again.