Life as it comes.

Okay, so. I sliced my index finger open on a food can a few days ago. The thing is, I'd be more likely to lose a digit with a kitchen knife, seeing as I cook with fresh produce almost exclusively. But there I was, opening a can of Cream of Celery.

I can never do these things during the daytime, when I could head over to my doctor's office.
Oh, no. Not me.
Off to the ER at 11pm to have my cut glued together and splinted, along with a tetanus shot (with a little Diphtheria thrown in for good measure). And I looked so, uh hem, lovely in my green workout shirt, black shorts, and Cincinnati Bengals black and orange doo rag.
I have to say (and I have witnesses, mind you), I came out of that ER with an enormous finger that looked like it belonged on a Fraggle Rock character.
Swell.

Now that I've covered the finger, let's segway into the toes, shall we? (thanks, Miss Sniz and Big Doofus, for my new favorite word, segway).
So, Sunday morning, we arrive at church a bit early since my oldest was serving in the nursery first hour. As we pulled into the church lot, I noticed that my toes had very obvious chipped nail polish on them. I'm not overly fussy about such things, but this particular polish was a bold iridescent deep shade of purple.
What to do?
I realized I had the tiny bottle of polish in my purse so I did the only thing there was to be done. Propped my little piggies up on the dashboard and began a quick overcoat. I mean, it was early so who was going to see, right?

Right?

While I was feverishly polishing away, a car pulled in next to us.
"No big," I thought. Surely, no one would actually bother to take close notice of such a thing.

Right?

KNOCK! KNOCK!

Oh for crying out loud! Sure enough, a member of my church family found it funny enough ("funny" no doubt meaning odd, peculiar, TACKY!) that she actually knocked on the window and let me know that in fact, my piggy painting was cracking her up (and her expression told me that she was a bit taken back by my actions).
Alrighty then, busted!

Then, during communion, Reece put me through yet another "trip down the aisle" (because if you haven't read about our communion adventures with Reece, I assure you it's always a trip, so to speak). This time, the lovely Jones' were serving communion. The same Jones' who, just a week earlier, entrusted their dear little piggy to our care (sheesh, didn't plan on this being a piggy post). Their daughter is leaving for college and needed a new home for her sweet guinea pig, Edgar. So he now resides with us and will be our official "class pet" in homeschool this year.
Reece, seeing that Edgar's former family was handing out communion, began.

"Oh Mommy, LOOK! It's Edgar's old family."
(we're standing in line at this point)
"Shhh! I see. No talking in the line."
"Hahaha! That's funny, Mommy. She was just at our house and now she's gonna give me my bread. Isn't that funny, Mommy?"
"No, Reece. This is not the time to talk about funny. Now, shhhh!"

He quieted down (a feat for Reece) and I felt momentarily victorious.
That is, until he reached the front of the line.

"Thank you for giving us Edgar. He's a nice guinea pig!"

Sweet mother of all things inappropriate. We were in line to "Do this in memory of me," said Jesus.
And all my son can think about is thanking the server for a guinea pig.
Will I ever win the communion line battle with that child?
Stay tuned.

My Sunday would not have been complete without another incident involving our family pets. Why stop when we're on a roll, right? So, Olivia had just fed the dog and was doing a craft at the kitchen table. Next thing I knew, she shrieked so loudly that I nearly fell into the laundry basket I was sorting.

Me, still a bit off balance and slightly annoyed. "What? What are you screaming for,Olivia?"
"Ants! There are tiny red ants on my arm. Where did they come from?"
Where, indeed. I thought for a moment, when Hubs finally declared, "They must be in the dog food."
Let's all have a moment, shall we? EWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes. They were in the dog food for sure.
LOTS of them.
And it was a brand new bag.
And dog food is expensive.

I wasn't about to throw the whole bag away. So I immediately came up with a plan.
"We can't get the ants out of the bag," declared Hubs at my mere suggestion that the food would be salvaged.
"Oh. Yes. We. Can. Too." was my reply.
"But," (that scared look in his eyes whenever he thinks I'm about to launch one of my hairbrained schemes)...,"but," (as if it killed him to utter the next word),
"How?"

Next thing he knew, he found himself out on the driveway with me, an entire bag of dog food dumped on the blazing hot pavement.
"Spread it all out reeeeal good, honey. We'll wait a few minutes for some of the ants to begin to crawl away, then we'll collect the food again with dust pans."
There was the look again. The "She's clearly lost her mind and dragged me down with her" look. But it didn't stop me. I was NOT throwing out an entire bag of dog food. I was NOT letting the ants win.

I'm very happy to say my little plan worked well.
We collected the food and placed it in a plastic tub with a lid.
It is ant-free and I am the official rescuer of dog morsels.
And I saved us from an unncessary replacement purchase.
Even if it cost me my dignity.
Even if a few watchful neighbors mumbled it under their breath,...you know,....."Clampetts!"

Now if I could just figure out how to remove the huge dogfood-induced grease stain on the driveway, my efforts will reeeeally have been a complete success.
Uh hem!

Toni