Life is Good

The old phrase, "this is the life." came out of Ari's mouth this week and I have to say I could not agree more. Our first garden is in and things are growing and flowering. The girls are growing and learning. John has lost probably around 15 pounds. I am really enjoying running. We all have been loving each others company and playing a lot. We are getting ready to go camping and fishing and spend a lot of time in the yard. Hope all is well for all of you too.

How it works

Last night I was walking past the bathroom and stopped suddenly upon noticing that Ari had grown again. I said, "Ari, you got taller." in a completely amazed tone of voice. She said, "I know. I have been exercising." She continued, "If you put your hands on the counter like this (places hands on bathroom counter palms facing towards her) and do this (push up on your hands) you get taller."

Ground me

Last night Ari said, "Mom, if anyone comes over to play tomorrow I am grounded okay?" I said, "okay, what do I tell them you did." "Tell them I let Marco jump on the trampoline with his shoes." I said, "Ari, we don't have a shoe rule and your parents would never ground you, and we would never ground you for something someone else did." She thought about that for a second and then said, "Just think of something mom, I want to be grounded."

The funniest thing about her wanting to be grounded is that I used to do the same thing when I was in high school. I would come home on a Friday afternoon, inform my mom that I was grounded, and spend the weekend in my room.

Neccessities

Ari informed me that we cannot go hiking until she has a pair of binoculars. We really do need them but I never knew they were as important as shoes or water for this kind of thing. She said that she is going to be a bird watcher when she grows up. I wonder if she will just add that to her current future professions of doing tattoos, cutting hair, being a rock star, and teaching karate or if she has forsaken the others all together.

Sabbath

Mina and I were walking around the block this afternoon. Generally, we pick up neighbor kids whenever we are out and today was no exception. One neighbor boy said, "Can Ari play?" I told him Ari could play if she wanted to. He said, "On Sunday I can only play at your house outside." I did not ask why, but he went on. "If I play inside I might play video games or watch movies and not think about my religion and forget about Jesus and stuff."

As we continued our walk around the block the boys told me about the game they were playing when I happened upon them. They were recreating a video game they saw at another neighbor boys house that involved the SWAT team and shooting people.