my daughter is much too precocious. 

anyone out there who has kids, or who knows people who have kids, or who know that kids exist, know that it's a bad thing when your children are out of your sight and are quiet.  silent even.  this is not good. 

a good parent will get up and go to see what their child is doing.  bad parents, like me, simply get worried and holler, "keyzia, what are you guys doing?" 

now, most children, the average child, the child who doesn't want their parents to come and see what horrid thing they have done or are doing will yell back, "nothing!"  and then the parent goes to see that nothing really means they have cut their little brothers hair and drawn makeup on his face with permanent marker the day before family pictures.

not my child, my child leaves all possibilities open.  when i ask what she's doing she quite calmly responds, "ANYTHING."  and when asked again, "I'M DOING ANYTHING, MOMMA."

i really do think that this is quite a good response.  i mean, nothing means nothing, but anything could be anything.  and really, it isn't usually that she's doing nothing but that she's doing anything.  although, usually the anything that she's doing is nothing good.

so, silly me, took the kidlets to walmart today.  i had to return a few things, and i wanted to pick up ephraim's tres cool christmas present while it was on sale. 

first things first, to get gas.  the poor guy at the till was having trouble getting someone's credit card to go, so he asked this girl (had a manager's tag or something??) how to manually put it in...  there was a pretty good line up of people waiting to pay, but this poor kid couldn't really do anything with this card that wouldn't swipe.  instead of being nice and just helping him out, she takes the card, gets it to go through, and then proceeds to reprimand him (in front of the rest of us waiting to pay for our gas) for asking her for help...  says that he can't do that when there are customers waiting to be served.  ummm...  okay, so what was he supposed to do?  say, "sorry buddy, you're going to have to wait until i ring these other thirty people through because i don't know how to get your card to register."  yah, now that's customer service.  why do people do that?  does it really make the manager or whoever feel bigger to tell someone how to do their job in front of other people?

this happened to me once when i was working at a cigar store in belleville while i was in college.  i had been there for several months, had opened the store that morning by myself, which meant i was there since 6:30 or 7 in the morning, and then my relief person (who had only been working for a couple of weeks) saunters in at noon and wants to know why i haven't swept anything...  because, you know, you should be sweeping and cleaning while there are people in the store.  then she yelled at me for standing on something to get an item for a customer.  i quit that night.

as a customer, i don't want to hear it.  as an employee, i don't want to hear it when i'm supposed to be waiting on other people.

anyways, at walmart, after waiting in line for the return for a good twenty minutes, and after a lady butted in behind me by pretending to chat nice...  and after i kept telling keyzia to be patiend, and after trying to keep ephraim from crying...  off we go to finish off our shopping.  but, by this point, it was time for lunch.  quick detour to macdonald's, then pick up our stuff, then pay and run home.

but, man, was it busy.  and, what is it with people standing in the middle of the aisle in a giant pack and chatting?  can you not move off to the side?  seriously, i am going to start ramming people here!  it's only november and the christmas idiots are already out shopping.  today made me realize that shopping with my children from now until christmas is really going to be out of the question.  not a possibility.  i actually heard someone walk by me say, "is it stupid day today, or what?"  i think it must have been.  and i think stupid day is going to last from now until january 5th.  i guess we'd might as well face it....

yes.  that's right.  the sickness has descended upon the wolters' household once again.  ephraim this time.  i think it's been about...  seven days since i had any real sleep.  the past few days, and off and on last week he's had a fever and been coughing.  now, the cough and the runny nose don't really worry me too much.  it's kind of that time of year.  but, the fever that just won't quit is quite worrisome.  especially when he's content to cuddle his hot little face into my neck and just stay there... 

so, sunday and yesterday i've kept him pretty much continuously doped up with tempera and infant motrin.  packed him full of juice to keep him hydrated, and cuddled like crazy.  he was cooler as long as the drugs were kicked in, but as soon as the started to wear off the fever would spike again.

and being awake at night.  once an hour after midnight.  sure, sleep straight through til midnight and then be up once an hour.  not nice for momma, that's for sure. 

but, by the grace of God, this morning he woke up and he was cool to the touch!  he was actually cool!  i'm so glad.  now, my little boy is back to tearing the place apart...  but, i kind of miss the cuddles.

me:  ephraim, you'd better not be in the water dish.

keyzia:  momma!  ephaim's in the water dish!

me:  keyzia, you'd better not be tattling.

keyzia:  momma!  i'm tattling!

keyzia:  momma!  i'm wiggling!

i wonder why ephraim insists on putting his foot in the cat's water dish constantly?  it's cold...  it's kind of slimy...  and yet, every time he walks into the kitchen, he sticks his foot in there.  whether his foot is bare or not.

ja sent this to me so i could post it for you all to see!