It's Coming!

Allow me to quote today's Greenville Journal newspaper, in the TBA column:  "Trader Joe's, the affordable grocery know for its dirt-cheap wines, will go into a 12,500 square-foot building next to Academy Sports on Woodruff Road..."  When I told Joseph this news, he got very excited.  I said, "Do you know what that means?"  He said, "Gnocchi!"  Poor Joshua was too young when we left California.  He does not remember the deliciousness that is Trader Joe's Gnocchi alla Sorrentina.  But Joseph and I have never forgotten. 

No word on when it will open....

Cars

Some thoughts on this picture:

• 
  
  Jeremiah lined these cars up himself.  Which of his older brothers does this remind you of?
• 
  
  It makes me so happy when my children do things like this.  Is that wrong?
• 
  
  If you look closely, you'll see that all the Cars movie cars are together, followed by all the NASCAR cars.  Also, the duplicate Lightning McQueens are side-by-side, as are the Jeff Gordons.
• 
  
  Some day, when my children have stopped playing with cars, we will replace the coffee table.  Until then, we'll say it is "distressed."
• 
  
  Jeremiah is basically potty-trained now (note the underwear).  Soon we'll probably start wearing shorts over the underwear while at home, but now it's just easier to yank down only underwear when nature calls.

Here's Jeremiah in action.  For some reason, everybody needed to scoot down the table a few inches.

How to Fill a Summer Afternoon Part 2

Joshua got into our miscellaneous box (yes, that's really how it's labeled) and put on many of the bracelets, rings, and necklaces he found there, plus the hat from his birthday party.  His plan was for Joseph to do the same, and then I would judge which outfit I liked better.  (This is based on an activity in Webkinz World called "Fashion Show" or some such thing.)  Unfortunately, Joseph opted out before completing his own outfit.

So, really, this post should be titled "How to fill 10 Minutes of a Summer Afternoon."

How to Fill a Summer Afternoon

Earlier this week the big boys decided they wanted to be detectives and solve a case.  Joseph wanted me to hide something somewhere in the house and then create clues to find it.  That sounded like it would consume more time for me than it would for them (not currently my goal for summer activities).  Instead, I told them their assignment was to search the house for 10 things that are sticky.  They each had a magnifying glass and a little flip-top notebook to record their findings.  They also decided they should wear their writing utensils behind their ears.  I guess that's what detectives do.

Joseph is totally posing for this picture.  There is nothing sticky on the placemat.  And no, I don't know why the hat needed to be on backwards.

Joshua is not posing--he was really writing something down.  And yes, he is wearing shorts.  Just not a shirt, for some reason.

A really good blogger would include pictures of the lists they created.  I, however, didn't take such pictures and don't feel like going to look for the notebooks now.

The magnifying glass reminded Joseph of his Uncle Chris's favorite childhood summer activity:

In case you can't tell, he's burning a piece of paper using the sun's magnified rays.  Eventually he moved on to the whole Lowe's ad instead of just the tiny piece.  He was excited to burn a (tiny) hole through 7 layers of the ad.  Joshua was not at all interested in this activity.  Maybe that was because it was 90-something degrees that day!

When Jeremiah Gets an Idea...

One evening we were hanging out in the dining room/piano room area.  I don't remember why at this point--it's not one of our usual hangouts.  I think I was doing something with Joshua at the dining table.  Anyway, Jeremiah discovered that he could crawl under the buffet and lie down.  Before I knew it, he had gone upstairs and gotten his pillow, brought it down, and put it in his new "nest."  Then he went back up and got his blanket so he could get really comfortable.

Then we told him to close his eyes: