Thunderstorms and tornadoes have marched through our area all evening. Philip is working. The kids are in bed. I am REALLY tired, but just wanted to document what a fun day today was...wacky fun until the deafening destruction and all. Plus also, there are whopper robin eggs in the cabinet, and if I blog, chances are I won't finish them off. When Philip is working a storm, I can't sleep, but have no problem soothing my anxiety with substantial late night snacking.
ok, back to today. The boys spent the morning tearing down the "Sacrifice" set while the girls and I bought groceries and ran errands. Evidently, I returned to the church to retrieve them just before they were to receive their reward: a BURGER. You can't be messin' with a workin' man's BURGER!
I agreed to provide Subway sandwiches to reward their efforts AND keep the kitchen clear for grocery disbursement. After lunch, the dark skies threatened, so we rushed outside to have another plastic egg hunt. Elizabeth enjoyed the game so much over the weekend, we thought it cruel to withhold another round.
Oh wait. I forgot to mention that I put the remnants of last week's eggs in a pot of water to boil, so as to simultaneously make room in fridge for the new box and prepare ingredients for salmon salad.
THEN we all went outside.
Oh, fatigue just clicked up a notch. I'll have to finish this post later. Remind me to show you the awesome baseball photos I took, and to tell you about the eggs. ohhhh, the eggs. The eggs.
*****
Ok, so the eggs were on to boil, and we were hunting dozens of colorful eggs outside.
I took pictures of Elizabeth squatting over opened eggs, with whopper slobber happily oozing from her smile. Since I had the camera, the other kids wanted me to capture some of their athletic finesse on film. Huge fun! Sports Photo-Journalism might be my next big thang:)
I got several shots of Ardyn snagging grounders. I scored by framing Luke mid-air as he caught a fly ball. I snapped several pictures of Ashlin throwing and catching and hitting --the theme of these was "eyes closed". (Philip was less than thrilled and barely believed her defense: "I was squinting because it was bright.")
We must have been out there for almost an hour. I strolled back toward the patio thinking, "Man, this is great. Fun kids, good photos, strong breeze..." Just then, Ardyn, who had gone inside for a drink of water, came screaming out into the yard.
I could not understand what she was saying, but she was completely frantic. (But, honestly, her typical response to normal events can be frantic and exuberant. I assumed my cell phone had rung or something.) I walked past her through the doorway, assuring her I was not in the mood to speak to anyone.
In the next few seconds, the collision of sensory perceptions jarred me from my apathetic opinion of text messages.
I saw smoke. I smelled funk. I heard popping.
As I quizzed myself on who might have authorized a snack, I recognized the pan from my earlier task. The eggs! Evidently, the water had evaporated several minutes earlier. And EVIDENTLY, eggs left near a heat source unattended will pop out of their shells like kernels of corn in hot oil.
Just as I tried to move the pan off the stove, another egg popped, rocketing sharp sulfuric debris into the air. I jumped back instinctively.
Ok, negatory on moving the pan without protective gear.
As I contemplated my next move, another egg exploded.
Ok, negatory on leaving the eggs on the burner.
I grabbed a large pot lid from the sink, and using it as a shield, I advanced toward the stove, slammed the lid down over the pot, flipped off the burner power, and retreated to my earlier point of assessment.
From safe vantage, I realized the pan (and my house) was filled with thick smoke. For some reason, water seemed appropriate to me. Carrying the pan at arms length, I shoved it under running cold water.
Oh, good. A geyser of rotten-egg steam billowed up and saturated the air around the sink...the air around my face.
B.L.E.C.K!
I took the pan of gym-sock-stew out to the yard. Back indoors, I opened windows, turned on exhaust fans, lit candles, and cleaned the kitchen with industrial strength citrus cleanser. The a/c kicked on, and I let her ride! Thank You, God for central air filtration systems!!
Mari saw the pan and heard the tale, and simply shook her head in pitiful dismay.
She offered to walk out to the WAY back yard and dump the slump. On her way back, the storm system approached from the west, and rain began to fall. We gathered around the picnic table to make sure we had consumed all the candy from the overshadowed egg hunt.
Once we came inside, the horrid stench had downgraded to merely an awful smell.
But wait, don't answer yet...
No one noticed that Oscar-dog sneaked back to the woods to see what all the fuss had been about. Well, no one noticed until he regurgitated the contents of the pan onto the floor in the hall.
BLECK. DOUBLE-BLECK!!!!!
And....that was our very exciting day! Luckily we only have photographic evidence of the good stuff. We're all good. However, I have removed all egg-associated meals from the menu until July.
It's just too soon.
Thank You, God, for your mercy- for not allowing our house to burn down. I confess I am NOT good at multi-tasking. My memory is frail, and my attention is distracted and diverted much of the time. Thank You for watching over us. Thank you for my wonderful kids. Thank You for Philip. Did we make You giggle today? Just wondering:)
