Spring Chickens

Okay, just had to add something that's been marinating in my brain.
Ella has been begging for an entire year, counting down the months even, to when we could get baby chicks. She's really, really wanted them. We decided we'd like to have the eggs as a family, so we gave in.
So finally, the Friday before Easter, we went and bought 2 chicks. And now they are twittering and pecking away only a few feet away from me, as I write this. We basically have a chicken run in our living room.
But, in spite of the slight farm smell wafting around our home, I am surprisingly enjoying these birds. Who knew that chickens had such personalities. Seriously. Austin's chicken is named Sonic, and she lives up to that name. She's a very contented bird, except she really would like to be able to follow us around the house. We've had to create new and better barriers (created from lego street pieces, no less) because if she gets bored when no one's home, she'll hop out and go wandering. And I worry, because of course you know, I'm not the cleanest of homemakers, and I don't want her to eat something bad.
She's very motherly toward Ella's bird, who is a Bantam - which basically means she's a smaller breed of chicken. Ella's bird, named Sally, is a bit of a spaz. Her first week here, she chirped loudly much of the day. She needed to be held, almost cuddled, to get her to calm down. Now she's much calmer, and will roam around. But still, if you take her out, and not Sonic, Sonic will fly out to check on her.
So after that long explanation, I'm just surprised at how much I enjoy these little birds. They really are like little companions, who are going to actually be useful when they grow up. They remind me of the birds Cam had growing up - so curious, so chatty, so into people.
In fact, I'm thinking they are going to be really disappointed when they have to go outside in a few weeks! And I may actually miss them.
Karissa

Funny Uncles

Okay, so I never really was into the April Fools thing, and I never really liked the whole Easter Bunny idea. Santa I could do - but the Easter Bunny, no.
But as a kid I loved our Easter Egg hunts. We'd always get together with our cousins, and everyone would be there. Then the Dads and Uncles would go out and hide all the eggs.
Looking back on it now, I can see how much fun those guys had. As a kid, I just enjoyed doing the hunt, because they always were so creative in their hiding. But seeing them in my memory now, I can see how their eyes twinkled, and the small smiles of mischief in waiting to see if we could find their treasures.
Our Dads and Uncles, especially as we got older, really, really enjoyed hiding the eggs. They'd come up with some pretty clever spots, and try to camouflage them really well.
That's the great thing about an Easter Egg hunt. It feeds into the hider's enjoyment of being tricky. But they want you to find their treasures because it shows their cleverness. And the lookers enjoy the hunt, enjoy the journey of being the "smart" one to find the tricky ones.
In fact, I remember that many years, we'd all run out, find the eggs, then dump the candy in our baskets and beg the Dads and Uncles to hide the empty eggs again, just so we could find them again. And they usually complied, sometimes even hiding the empty eggs 2 or 3 times more.
Now, as an adult, I too enjoy hiding eggs, and I actually look forward to when my kids are a bit older, so I can get creative and clever. It's neat to have traditions that are so fun for both sides.
Karissa

April what?

I never remember April Fools. The 2 memories I have are making orange juice from frozen concentrate and my brother thought the big clump of still frozen concentrate that I was trying to smash and dissolve was play dough and that I was playing a joke on him. He wouldn't believe me that it was actual oj.

The other one was when we told Nelleen we were pregnant our first year of marriage and she was so mad at us. Then we told her we were prego with Turner on April Fools. Yes, mean but not intentional. She didn't believe us for a long time.

But we had a fun Easter this year. I posted that on my blog.
There are about 3 or 4 posts about what we did, but mainly pictures.

No On April Fools!

When I was growing up my sister, Myra, was deathly afraid of spiders.  Being young and dumb I thought I would be funny and play an April Fool's joke on her.  So I told her I saw a spider sitting on her neck.  The sheer terror and panic in her eyes and her dance of horror as she tried to brush the "spider" off of her body is something I still remember fifty years later. It took us quite awhile to calm her down and reassure her everything was okay.  Therefore, I don't think I have ever done an April Fool's joke since and that is why I am not such a big fan of them.

Mom

April Fools, I loathe you! Easter on the other hand :)

Not a fan of April Fools tricks being played on me. In college, I had a roomie who loved April Fools more then Christmas. She put Seran Wrap on the toilet, salt on my toothpaste and my milk was green. Did I mention I'm not a fan?! :P

Easter was fantastic. That weekend was great. We did a lot of searching but HOPE we finally found a house. It's perfect for us and we're really excited. Now the waiting to close part. Nerve-wracking! That night we went to a San Antonio Rampage (ice hockey) game and sat in the Wells Fargo Suite (ooooh, ahhhh!) Sunday we went to church with David and Leslie because that's our new ward! Small world, right!?

We spent the weekend in San Antonio looking for homes and then went to David and Leslie's for the Easter Egg Hunt Extravaganza! Yes, ladies and gents, 300 eggs for four kids! Daxon, a cousin from Traci's side, Kyson and Chase. Chase tried to get the kitty to hunt for eggs and couldn't care less about them for himself. The boys had a great time and Uncle/Grandpa Rick goes WAY above and beyond with the money in eggs....Kyson came out $16 richer! Wow.

The cake I made :) Found it on Pinterest, of course!

Happy Easter, Y'all

A Chore Memory

Okay, since Cameron didn't contribute on the chore challenge, I'm going to contribute a memory of him and chores.

I know you all think we Moll kids hated outside chores, but you have to understand something. For the first 9 years that we lived in Antioch (and remember we lived there a total of 14) the entire backyard was a weed-fest. And we're not talking wimpy weeds. We had a deck, and those weeds grew higher than the deck every year - so we're talking 4-5 feet high.

And every year, every stinkin' year, Dad would make us weed it or mow it, or whatever to it, and he'd tell us, "This is the last year we have to do this, we're going to have a backyard next season." And the year would pass, and of course those weeds would grow back again. In fact, for at least one year, we kids were going to take matters into our own hands, and we were going to get dumploads of sand and make the backyard a beach volleyball court. The only thing that stopped us, actually, was the fact we'd have to put up nets over the fences because we knew the one neighbor, Sam, and the one behind us hated our balls ending up in their yards.

So anyways, during one of these years of worthless weeding, my Dad set us all up outside, and told us all we had to do for that day was a row of weeds. He put us all next to each other, so we each had about a two foot wide swath, and we had to weed from the back of the house to the fence, about maybe 20 feet. Cameron was on my right, Erik was on my left, and Jared was next to him.

So we all, grumbling, started in. After going about a foot or two, the three of us noticed Cameron wasn't there anymore. I'm not sure, but I think at that first point, Cameron had gone in and tried to convince Dad to let him just mow the weeds down, but he said no. So Cam came out and worked a few more minutes, and then he was gone again. He came back with the roto-tiller. He was going to till it all up and then pull out the weeds. This could have been a rather brilliant idea because the dirt was clay clumps, and pulling weeds out took a heck of a lot of strength.

The roto-tiller didn't work, though, so he took it back to the garage. But the thing was, we didn't see him come back. And we didn't see him come back. And the three of us were getting about halfway down our row, and still no sign of Cameron.

And of course, we grumbled at him, because we figured he'd found a way, again, of getting out of a chore, and "it wasn't fair!" Still, we dug on, and the three of us, sweating and achy, finished our rows. We then cleaned up and went and played with friends.

Where was Cameron? Well, if I remember right, he spent the rest of that Saturday trying to fix the roto-tiller. And nope, he didn't weed his row.

Even though that experience bugged me then, it was such a precursory to Cameron's key to his successes in life. He was and still is always looking for the better way of doing things. He sees a task that is totally asinine (like that stupid weeding was) and he says, "There's got to be a better, easier way to do this." And then he goes and finds that way, and people thank him for it. I mean really, if he would have gotten that tiller working way back when, I think that whole Saturday would have been a totally different memory.

-Karissa