Yeti, Teeth, Forts, Fans and Futbol

It was Saturday morning and Alison was scurrying to get ready for the day when she was attacked by a band of yeti living in the forest behind our house. Oh wait. That didn't happen. She was, however, trying to get her shoes on, and as she was gritting her teeth trying to tie her shoes as tightly as she could she suddenly noticed that her front tooth was missing. She came running up the stairs in tears saying, "I'm bleeding" and "It feels really strange." After about 10 minutes she calmed down when she realized that her new incisorless mouth was about to result in an economic windfall. It turns out she was right. That very night the Tooth Fairy (or Tooth Elf--I'm not exactly sure since photographic proof of its existence is sketchy, just like the yeti) exchanged her tooth for a nice, new $1 bill. I think I'll try convincing her to invest it...

Since I know you're dying to see, here's our little toothless girl having lost her first tooth:


Kaitlyn responded to Ali's loss with a startling realization: "I'm definitely going to brush my teeth now. I don't want my teeth to fall out!"

Kaitlyn (and Alison) also had a great time this past week making a "fort" that took up our entire living room using our good church reference books as stakes to anchor down the comforters. They carefully arranged the Dora fold-out bed underneath as well as every other blanket, pillow or soft material they could find. This fort was all good unless you got stuck on one side of it and needed something on the other side. Probably. (Note the nice chair rail which we installed personally.)


As for Max, it looks like the Terrible Two's are starting early. He is into everything. The other afternoon, after it was apparent that Mr. Max had woken up from his nap, Megan kept hearing a clicking sound. When she went in to investigate she found that he had arranged the toy in his crib so that he could stand on it and was reaching the switch on the wall--turning the fan off and on. Apparently, he was quite entertained by his superior mastery of fan control.

One more Ali story and then a Nathan and Megan story.

In church on Sunday the children were learning a new Primary song. Ali's teacher (who happens to be Megan's mother) asked her to sing along. Alison responded, "I don't know the words to that song but I know all the songs from High School Musical 3!" I'm not sure they're going to do any songs from High School Musical in the Children's Sacrament Meeting Program this year--but I'll check, because if so, we're golden!

Lastly, you may recall that we visited Washington D.C. several months ago. As were at a stoplight the car next to us rolled down its window and the driver asked us for directions on how to get across the bridge. Since we had been lost multiple times going back and forth across the bridge, we tried, as best we could to give her directions. Unfortunately, the light turned green and the cars behind us started honking so we ended up just saying and pointing, "Go that way!" As soon as we had turned and rolled up our window I said, "Sucka!" We gave her right directions, but given the situation we may as well not have. Ever since then we have used "Sucka" in a variety of ways: to mean, "fooled you" or "I won" or "I got you to listen to me" or in about a baker's dozen other ways and times. Well, the children have started using it a little too frequently, and while cute and funny, we decided that it's probably not the best habit to be in, so we've had to outlaw the use of the word. Megan suggested that we could say, "Soccer!" and that would be funny. I concurred, but thought it was probably too close to the original, and wouldn't discourage the kids from saying it. The word for "Soccer" in Spanish is "Futbol." Now we just say "Futbol" to mean "Sucka." Try it out. I think you'll like it.