He took our rented DVDs from the weekend with him to return and all the kids begged for new movies. “Sure.” I said. “Let’s just get dinner and this kitchen cleaned up and I’ll take you to the video store.”
Everyone started on their assigned tasks of clearing and wiping the table, sweeping the floor, washing the dishes and loading the dishwasher. While all this was going on Mary and Gabe crawled in the pantry and began making a paper towel/cereal box fort. Ben went upstairs to do homework and Stefan and Xander played with Automoblox cars while Hansie finished the dishes.

OK, so those are pretty bad Wonder Woman drawings. That’s a W on her chest! 🙂
“It’s bedtime cuties! Let’s clean this up and go to bed.”
Whine, whine, whine, whine. “But you promised.”
“I never promised and look guys, you don’t pack up happy creative kids in the car to go and rent movies– especially on a school night. It’s in Mothering 101.”
“Well,” Stefan observed with a grin, “obviously you have the 1990s version of Mothering 101– you need the 2000s.”
Resigned to their sad fate they began cleaning up. But Hans made the colossal mistake of telling Gabriel that picking up the plastic cups was his chore. You never say “chore” to Gabriel. It’s no biggie to say, “Please pick this up.” or “I need your help.” But you absolutely cannot say the word chore to that boy. It’s in my Mothering 101 manual. After fussing and whining he finally began to pick up the cups singing at the top of his lungs, “It’s a boring chore after all, it’s a dumb chore after all, it’s a rotten chore after all, it’a a bad, bad chore!”
StubbyDog
Michelle –
It sounds like a delightful night! But I confess that upon first glance, the left-hand drawing of Wonder Woman struck me more as “Middle Aged Super Mommy”…complete with sagging bre@sts…LOL
– Jeri