Raising Him to Be Just Like Me...Only Better!

I was awoken in the sweetest of ways this morning.

I should state that I am usually NOT awoken in a nice way. I usually wake up because I have become a road for cars or trains and that road is going through some sort of a forest that is my head and my hair is suddenly gripping tiny little Hot Wheels and not letting go. The other day, I swore I was going to be bald by the time I am 35.

But today was different. I heard footsteps but they didn't come and jump on my bed. Instead, they started digging through my night stand. (I pretended to be asleep-I wanted to see what was going to happen next. "3 Year Old Performs Acupuncture on Mother While She Sleeps," perhaps?) I heard the voice my sweet Nathan uses when hes talking to his imaginary friend Karia (pronounced care-ee-uh) and he was talking about the GIANT pencil he pulled out of my nightstand drawer (don't ask why it was in there) and then about the regular pencil he also found.

Then he looks for paper on the nightstand. He talks and says he is writing a note to Mommy. He scribbles on the paper he finds and slides it under my pillow. But wait! He found an envelope! The small hand that I love so much slipped under my pillow and took back his note. He climbed up onto the bed and colored and drew on the new envelope and then proceeded to put the note into the envelope. Luckily for this nice tender Hallmark moment, I "woke up" at the very moment my son's frustration reached a pinnacle and this whole beautiful picture explodes with the Frustration of a Toddler. (Come on Moms-Holla Back Now)

He had two envelopes, one much larger than the other and was trying to fit the big one inside the little one. I showed him how to FOLD. And he thought that FOLDING was the coolest thing since Kraft Easy Mac. We then spent the next few minutes FOLDING. I showed him techniques and lining up corners and was pleased that he would not settle for a messy fold.

Ahhh, my quest for raising the "Anal-Retentive Toddler" is shaping just as I planned! Look out Pre School teachers!! MWAH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA! (that was my evil laugh)

Even This Section is Scary...

Why does this screen terrify and thrill me so very much?

Please Turn in Your Bibles to 2 Hardrive 5:30

If you have the time, say a short prayer for our extra drive (Known affectionately as the E: Drive). It decided to go on some sort of vacation without telling us taking EVERY SINGLE ON OF OUR PICTURES WE HAVE EVER TAKEN WITH IT.

I put all my faith in the healing powers of Priest David at this point-don't really have a choice otherwise.

We Save Flat Soda From the Bottom of the Cans Too...Because You Just Never Know

When my son had his 3rd birthday, we threw him his first "friend party." It was filled with kids and loud music and adults running around trying to keep anything under 3 feet within our picnic area. We fed the kids peanut butter and honey sandwiches. (Nathan has eaten one of these every day since he was 1. If you squeeze his tummy and smell his breath, you will detect the scent of Skippy Creamy.)

Look at those fascinating sandwiches!
Neither of these children are mine.
But they sure are cute, aren't they?

To make the sandwiches not your ordinary sandwiches, we cut them into star and flower shapes. Actually, David pitched in for this one since-in standard Bethany fashion-I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown and found myself flinging peanut butter and cake and party favors all over our kitchen. He made the sandwiches and cut out the shapes and loaded them up very neatly into a big Tupperware container. They were a big hit. The kids totally loved them, Nathan said I was the best mom ever to walk the face of the earth and my friend's son who has a brother allergic to peanuts was able to try peanut butter for the first time. The kid inhaled the sandwiches.

It was a few days-OK, fine more like a few weeks-later when we were cleaning out the fridge that I found it: A big gallon sized Ziploc bag in the back of the fridge. I looked at the contents crammed into the bag and figured part of it must be bread but what in the world is the rest of it? I held the bag up to my husband with a questioning look on my face.

"What is this?"

"The crusts from the cutouts of the sandwiches from Nate's birthday party."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"The crusts-"

"You SAVED them?"

"Well, look at them! Put them all together and they make-like-5 whole sandwiches! We can't throw those out!"

**cricket, cricket**

When I Am With You, I Am Home

Wednesday we packed up the kids and car and drove a couple of hours north to Santa Barbara to visit Kristy and Jeremy. We didn't know what awaited us but we did know that no matter what, we'd have fun. The drive was a smooth one but not because I am one of those amazing mothers who can entertain their children with a piece of paper and the magic of origami. I am instead one of those mother's who borrow the neighbor's DVD player and rent movies from Blockbuster to keep her kids happy. The good news? It works.

We went on a hike our first day there and had so much fun walking on the rocks and seeing the stream and Mommy especially loved keeping her eyes peeled for poison oak. I am an expert on what it looks like by now.

Here are a couple of the pictures.....









Nathan took this one...












Nature called and my boys answered!






Life is not always grins and giggles...even for the Goose.


I made them wait till the camera was ready so I could get the great shot of David and Nathan falling into the water. Darn it, they made the jump.





The next day Kristy and I did more hiking but this time we were hiking on State Street spending all kinds of money. I like that kind of hiking a lot.

Kristy always cries when it is time for her to leave when she is visiting San Diego but I don't usually cry like she does. (The family joke: I am dead inside. I kind of am :) ) But leaving HER was hard. She was crying, I was crying and even David teared up. It was perfection being there with her. Seeing her life, her apartment, her table at the coffee joint she always sends me camera phone pictures from. Everything was as it should be and leaving only messed it all up.

Being with my sister is like being home.

What I'm Reading

One hippo all alone...
Calls two hippos on the phone.
Three hippos at the door,
Bring along another four.
Five hippos come over-dressed.
Six hippos show up with a guest.
Seven hippos arrive in a sack.
Eight hippos sneak in the back.
Nine hippos come to work.
(Are you ready?????)
All the hippos go berserk
(Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!)
All through the hippo night,
Hippos play with great delight.


It is my great delight and greatest joy to have this book be the book I have read, re-read and re-re-read every day for the last 3+ years.
Happy Mother's Day to you all.

I Will Always Love You Han Solo.

You've heard how 40 is the new 30?

...brown is the new black?

Well, Kurt Russell is the new Harrison Ford.

What I'm Watching

Even though I think Shane is a bit of a-pardon the expression- douchebag, I am realy glad he got to hang out with his son. That's one last person he has to e-mail on his Blackberry on the Tree Bark Network. (All Exile Island minutes free!) Kudos to Terry for letting him go.

But Shane is still a douchebag.

Because to Get Anywhere in Life, You Really Gotta "Put Yourself Out There"

David and I have a mini photography hobby that occasionally brings a little extra money into the House of Zab. One day we may make it more of a side business but for now, we do family portraits for our friends, pictures for our church events and provide the world with an endless supply of photos of The Short One and The Shorter One.

We decided to enter a couple of our family favorites in the Del Mar Fair-wait, the name is different now. God forbid people think the fait isn't in San Diego. It is now the San Diego County Fair. Whatever. Anyway...we will see if anything comes of this whole thing. At the very least, you San Diego people might be able to drop by the various tents and see our photographs live and in person. Cause if you read this blog, it isn't like you don't have Zab pictures already clogging up your Inbox.

"Due to Weather Conditions, Superman Cannot Fly Today" by David Zabrosky

My amazing brother-in-law used Nate the Great (AKA The Short One-now that my big dinner theatre production is done, I finally remembered their names) for a photo shoot for school and he needed Nathan dressed up as Superman. It was hilarious to watch Crazy Uncle Jeremy attempt to give direction to a determined 2 year-old who skipped his nap that day. David photographed the whole process.

"Beginnings" by David Zabrosky

This was my finger being held by our sweet Lucy Joy (AKA The Shorter One)

Train of Thought" by Bethany Zabrosky

One of our favorite places to go is the San Diego Railroad Museum and Nathan was given a stool to sit on by one of the old men in the background of the shot. He sat there, perfectly still for the longest time. I wanted to let him sit there as long as he wanted but his sister wasn't really "down with that" so we had to move on. But I love how much the picture says without seeing Nathan's face. And, amazingly enough, it was captured by my camera phone.

Untitled by Bethany Zabrosky

I am frustrated that I couldn't come up with a good title for this one. Especially because this moment captured one of the greatest days in my life as well as my son's. We went to see Thomas the tank Engine in Perris, CA. and this is us riding Thomas. Nathan once again, sat so still and watched "the world" (the backyards of the local Perris, CA. homes) go by. David and I wisely left Lucy Joy with a friend so we were able to drink in the excitement of our son. It was an amazing day.

We will see what happens...

Law and Order: Toddler Crime Division

They have Christopher Meloni on my kid’s station, Noggin now. He is in the little “commercials” reading books and stuff. I will all of a sudden hear his voice and it messes with my head. Elliot Stabler should not be on my TV when the kids are watching.

Unless being a talking hand is a felony, 'cause that Oobi guy really freaks me out.

"I Approached the Computer, The Words of My Blog Sitting on My Fingertips"

Last night, I finished my new book I bought on my wedding anniversary shopping spree. This book, "Vanishing Acts" was pretty good, I got through it in about 3 days with my traditional last night, all night reading session because the book has captured me and I can't put it down. I have a severe problem when reading books in that when I cross over the hump of the middle and feel fewer pages in my right hand than I do in my left, a sort of panic sets in.

"YOU WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO READ AGAIN EVER IN YOUR LIFE-FINISH THIS BOOK NOW WHILE YOU CAN!"

Next thing I know, it is 5:30am, the hubby's alarm is going off and I am asleep with my face on the book club discussion questions in the back.

Last night was no exception other than I didn't have to pull an all nighter, this panic was a mild one that only required an extra hour of my time. The story was told from the point of view of the major characters and each of them took a chapter. We would hear Delia's story, then something that happened to Andrew and then it would switch over to Fitz. It was an interesting style-although sometimes overly flowery and romantic- and, for some reason, penetrated my BRAIN. After finishing the book, I was falling asleep and found myself narrating my day:

"Overall it was a good day, Nathan got to play on the computer and Lucy and I played a forever memorable game with a blanket she got from Grandma Carol..."

(I didn't nay my narrative was interesting.)

"...and involved hiding with her under the blanket. In reflecting on my day, I stop to ponder as I find myself drifting off as to whether or not Lucy will remember the game tomorrow. I enjoyed playing it with her so much and I hope that we can do it aga-"

What?!?!? Am I seriously narrating my day? OK, shut your brain off Bethany, GO. TO. SLEEP.

Somehow that worked, I went to sleep. But upon awaking this morning, my brain picked up where it left off...

"I heard the early morning cries of my daughter and wondered if she was up for the day or if she was just making a little noise in her sleep. I desperately clung to the sound of her cries being ones of noisy sleep. But I stopped myself from letting her cry too long as I would any other morning because that is when I remembered her 103 degree fever I put her to bed with."

I rolled my eyes at myself.
That is how I started my day, rolling my eyes...at ME!

"I pondered briefly as to how my blog readers would read this post. Had I been too trite in my comments? Should I add more detail or will this be their last visit once they discover how their beloved blogger is completely insane?"

The One Where I Wish Change Never Happened

It's so odd the patterns of life. I planned to sit down tonight and blog about my severe upset and actual rage-that's right, I said rage-at Price Club (don't correct me) for changing the type of tortillas they sell.

For years I have been blissfully feeling myself, my family and specifically Carol and Kristy the sweet and wonderful taste of Porkyland tortillas. They were practically a religion in our household and now that they are gone, I think I am changing my religion to the "Filling the Price Club Comment Box With Complaints About The New Stupid Rubio’s Tortillas Until They Wise Up and Bring Back Porkyland" religion. Join me will you? We have weekly services at our local Price Club and the only tithe we require is you filling out a complaint kindly asking them what happened to their buyer's taste buds that he or she would feel the need to torture the innocent burrito or quesadilla lover with the filth now packaged as tortillas. Contact me if you want to convert.

But tonight I received a phone call about a friend of mine whom I have worked with for many years retiring from her position. She and I have been through hell and high water, literally. She has taught me the meaning of being an effective leader in a church, she has been the perfect example of grace under pressure and no matter what the problem, I have always been able to come to her for wisdom and advice. She has seen me get married, go through two amazing pregnancies and has loved my children as if they were her own grandbabies. She has held me when I was falling apart through the most painful time of my life and she has helped me heal and move on through those times.

She isn't going anywhere. She is simply retiring but as I sit alone on my couch wallowing in my self pity, I realize that I don't plan on stopping by the office as often as I already do. I don't want to go in there and not see her. I don't want to not see my babies' pictures on their computer monitor; I don't want to collaborate on a project without her. It isn't that I don't like the person replacing her, in fact, I love the person replacing her but my friend is the reason I visit. I miss working with her on a daily basis and I miss sharing my life with her. I don't know when I will get to do that now.

I hate change. I like things to be the same always. This is change and I hate it.

Tomorrow they will be announcing all of this in church and I don't want to go. I know that by the morning I will feel better. By tomorrow I will be able to see my friend free up her time to travel with her wonderful husband, visit her family more and simply relax from the pressure of literally keeping a church running even when we were leaderless for a few years. I will hug her and hold her and smile for her. But tonight I will be sad for myself...I wish I had a good tortilla.

David Does the Shopping

Spirit of the Resurrection Filled Eggs

The kids got their first foray into the commercialization of Easter this week with their first Easter Egg Hunt. The idea of which, at least when I was a child, was absolutely blasphemous and you might as well not be wearing an Easter hat to church if you hunted plastic eggs filled with candy. In our house, we decided that the two concepts can, indeed, coexist and thought we'd give it a try.

We got all dressed up, showed up at our friend Gwen's house and the chaos began.

The Shorter One (TSrO) is still one of the littlest of the walkers of our playgroup so I kept an eye on her to be sure that she was trampled by the candy craving hordes of kids darting back and forth on my friend’s lawn. But I also really wanted to see The Short One (TSO) find his first egg. I had a small one in hand, a giant camera around my neck-drop the camera and don’t come home-and I also realized that I forgot to wear a belt. (That is not part of the story, more of a non sequitur that suddenly occurred to me at the beginning of the hunt.) I look around for TSO and suddenly, he shows me a FULL basket of eggs! He’d only been out there for maybe a minute. The bigger mongrels were still hunting and hadn’t started lawn wrestling for the last melted Crunch bar just yet.


RIGHT ON KID! THAT is the TRUE Spirit of Easter! Grab all the eggs before those friends of yours get to them!

This Week's Secret Weapon

Beautiful fabric
Hanging from the walls
Cutting out light
Red: to match the blanket
Green: the perfect shade

Perfection
Found at Wal-Mart (only $14.99)
The Smiley Man comes through again.

Simple fabric
Bringing so much joy
..........and about 1 hour more of sleep in the morning because the kids still think it's dark out.

BVDUn9e4r58wfjdeiHvhdo...Sorry, My Brain Just Exploded

Ahhh dear readers (who consist mainly of my family and a handful of friends who somehow find me amusing) I give you my apologies for neglecting this blog. I set it up, tease you about it in every e-mail I send you and then never post anything new or original. Please forgive me.

I want to write pages and pages on about the interesting things that my mind ponders but these days I only have room in my brain for the production of my dinner theatre, and, occasionally, my children's names. (Well not really, I have just been taking to call them "The Short One" and "The Shorter One")

We had our first live audience last night and our show was met with kind reviews. People laughed, my boss (and the church's pastor) really liked it and we even fooled a Homicide Sheriff who was sure someone else had committed the murder. Tonight is opening night and, oddly, our smallest for attendance. I am hoping we get a ton of people showing up at the door to buy tickets.

All of this is to say that I plan to post my thoughts, revelations and commentary that Will Change The World soon. Right now I have to go feed The Short One and The Shorter One has a runny nose.

My Life Has Felt Like an Epilogue

"Ever since Walt died, my life has felt like an epilogue."
T.S. Garp "The World According to Garp"

I am currently toward the end of the book that this quote is taken from and it has been a journey to read. Before you go away-this blog is not a book review. Instead, it is a LIFE review.

We all have moments in life that change us. It could be a bad hair style on the wrong day to some thing like a family member dying. I myself have experienced many life changing events. My parents had an awful and very public crisis and consequential split, I had a very dear and wonderful uncle pass away unexpectedly, the very odd and still not understood split of my husband's parents, the process of helping rebuild a church I love so much while in the wake of destruction my own father helped cause. There are a few of mine that I could use in the quote from above...

"Ever since my parent's split, my life has felt like an epilogue."
B. J. Zabrosky, October 1998

OR

"Ever since Uncle Jim died, my life has felt like an epilogue."
Bethany J. Zabrosky, Every March 3 of Every Year to Follow From Now Until Forever

However, despite these circumstances I have avoided the epilogue lifestyle. Instead I have picked up, moved on, and started a new chapter with Vista Grande Church. Started a new BOOK by having Nate the Great and Lucy Joy and even had to learn a new language as relationships rebuild from divorce.

You who are currently reading this and following this late evening train of thought, may I encourage you to participate in this exercise? Take your life changing event. The one that pops up in your mind each day. The one that is stopping you from moving on with your life. The one that can grip you with such fear that even your strongest of wills finds itself immovable and fill in the blank.

"Ever since ______________________, my life has felt like an epilogue."
You, Today and Right Now

Face it! Accept it! Look at it and stare at it. If you think have a moment in your life that you can put here than you need to realize it right now. Your life HAS become an epilogue. A moment of time has taken away all your future moments and captured your permanent attention. That's it. You are done. You will forever view life through that experience, that time of anguish. Say it out loud if you need to. It hurts. Let it hurt and allow it to leave your body with each exhale you take.

Can invite you to take another deep breath? Because I feel I might have some hope for you.

I have a Friend. A God who Reigns my Life. Who is Knower of All Things Good and Bad. And, what's more important, who is Knower of All Things Good and Bad IN MY LIFE. He has been called the Great Author for it is He who writes our beginnings and our ends and...our epilogues.

Who it is that can complete the Book of Anguish you filled in the blank with? My God.

Who has a fresh page, a brand new chapter for you to begin a whole new beginning? My God.

Who is it that loves you so much that He is begging you to ask Him to help you? Your God.

I say Your God because, frankly, most of you know of Whom I speak. Most of my blog readers are Christians who walk daily with the Lord Jesus, who call upon the Holy Spirit and who rely on their Heavenly Father for the things they need.

But

I also know that most of my blog readers have something to fill in the blank with. I know many of them so intimately that I could fill in the blank FOR them. But that is not my job.

My friends, God is begging (and I am begging) for you to take your Moments, your Disasters, your Life-Changing-Epilogue-Creating Times and hand them to Him. Find the strength, the courage to remove yourself from the book of your life that you are currently writing and start a new book. One of Hope for the Future, one with greater strength than before.

I started this posting as a way of commenting that I don't WANT to be like T.S. Garp and look at my life as an epilogue. I planned on talking of people I know who have been able to accomplish that. For example: While I lost an uncle, my aunt lost a husband. One who was the rock of his family and while she mourns his loss and acknowledges his absence from her everyday life, she picked herself up and married an amazing guy. One who was NOT my uncle but who LOVES her and together they are conquering the world airport by airport on all their adventures. THAT is a fine example of ending an epilogue.

But as I began writing, I felt the urging to do more than comment on the quote. I felt I needed to challenge someone out there to follow my aunt, follow me and others and begin that new chapter of life with God as the author. I felt so strongly that I cannot type fast enough, I am not concerned about my grammar or consistent metaphors because if this urging is from God, than He will have the Holy Spirit interpret my writings into an amazing spiritual revival for someone.

And so, dear reader...dear sister...dear friend...or total stranger. I invite you to join my exercise and I will be praying that your outcome can be nothing like the sad character of T.S. Garp's. I wish you Hope.

"Ever since ____________, my life has felt like an epilogue."

Step AWAY From the Baby (From the Archives)

This is one that makes me laugh and swell with pride over how much my sister loves my babies..but mostly laugh. We were selling our first house and searching for a new one. (We didn't find a new one for a few months and even got to stay with our good friends Scott and Susie for a few weeks before finding our current Poway home.) From Tuesday, July 8, 2003

So Kristy watched Nate the Great last night for the first time ever and she had an interesting experience …

Jeremy was out getting dinner and Kristy was holding Nathan when a lady comes to the door. She had looked at the house and had but a bid on it but was out bid by someone else. Then, she tells Kristy, she told her agent to counter back to us at $6000 higher and her agent said no. She wanted to come and talk to us in person and see if her agent was screwing her over or something. I guess she has tried to get 2 other places in this complex unsuccessfully. So all she wanted to do was talk to us.

Kristy said that the lady was visibly upset and is pretty sure that she didn't believe that Kristy wasn't the owner. She left a business card and asked Kristy to have us call her back.

Here is the funny part…(well, actually the story itself is the funny part but this part is all Kristy)…Kristy was holding Nathan who-I am sure-was being super cute but she didn't trust this woman and when the lady offered the business card Kristy said, "Put it in the mailbox." Then, shortly after that, Jeremy gets home and comes through the front door to get in the house. Kristy, when telling me the story, couldn't believe that he did that! "He opened the door and she could have darted right in!"

When she said that, I pictured some woman running into the house, mascara running and kissing my kitchen floors or something.

I told Kristy that I really appreciated her cautiousness. I teased her that she should have had the lady leave the card and then told her to "step away from the baby."

Nathan Zabrosky...2031

When looking back on the sounds of my childhood, mixed in with the sounds of laughter, music and the microwave cooking up dinner, I remember my mother talking to the laundry.
She didn't do laundry very often. There never was a "Laundry Day" in our house, just a "Hey Mom, I'm All Out of Clothes Day."

So my mom would park herself, bowing in front of the gleaming white washer (she had an odd need to keep it sparkling clean) and talk to the clothes. She would groan at the stains that slipped by and sweet talk the marks on a favorite shirt. All done over the sounds of a pumping spray bottle.

As much as she believed in God, Jesus Christ and the TV show "Friends" to make her laugh, she also believed in the power of stain removers. My mom never stuck to one kind either. She brand hopped and consistency jumped in the attempt to eradicate stains from the lives of her family. Although she was most partial to a subtle mix of the Shout Gel, Spray-n-Wash and a daub of the Clorox Bleach Pen. That's right, her bravery took her to concocting mixtures of all the stain fighters onto one garment.

The laundry took hours in my home. After talking to the clothes and throwing them in the washer (and after watching the beginning of the wash cycle swish and swirl through the front loading machine’s glass door-something that always thrilled her) my mother would hover over the machine, waiting for the "Laundry Complete" buzzer to sound. The magical glass door was thrown open and the clothes were up for inspection. Nothing could hide from my mom's watchful, stain fighting sight and the muttering, spraying, smudging and daubing began again. My mom refused to allow a stain to get the better of her and was known to wash my sister's shirts 3 or 4 times until the stain finally gave up. To quote her often heard phrase, "You picked a fight with the wrong mommy."

Now, 26 years later, I mutter at my own clothes and while my apartment washroom doesn’t give me the privacy my mom’s garage did, I too find myself sticking around for the magical beginning of the wash cycle through the glass door.

-Nathan Alexander Zabrosky, Age 28

Flip. Flip. Flip. Uh Oh. (From the Archives)

Before I started blogging, I used to send all my stories via e-mail. Some of them were funny, some were emotional and touching but they all were sent to the people I cared most about.

I started digging in the archives and decided to bring out some of my funniest and most memorable experiences over the next couple of days. For those of you who have read them before, I hope you laugh and cry like you did when they were new. And for those of you new to these stories, I hope you enjoy them.

This one is probably my favorite all time Nate the Great story...from Wednesday, April 14, 2004

So last night I was getting ready to get Act One. This was special because I was bringing one Nate the Great with me. I needed to pack his bag with his cup, toys, and PJ's. I also had to call Carol about something. I grabbed the phone and dialed while I stepped out in the garage to get clean PJ's from the dryer. Chatted with her husband for a bit and right when Carol got on the phone, I placed my hand on the doorknob to go back inside.

"Hello?"

"Oh my gosh, I am locked out of my house."

I didn't yell it, it was a statement of disbelief and yet total belief as my mind flashed a picture of Nathan earlier this week discovering the little tabs on doorknobs. Oh look Mommy, you can flip them and flip them back. Flip. Flip. Flip.

I had been "flipped" out of my house. Daddy isn't home. I am in the garage. I can at least try the front door.

Locked. Darn us for being so responsible!

I stood at the front door trying to see through the LOCKED security screen. I hear kitchen cabinets opening and closing. "Nathan, that's not your cabinet!" I yelled in there. I pictures glassware being pulled from the shelves. It is then that my helpful friend Carol (who I am still on the phone with since this was such an amusing and entertaining event) tells me the story of when her twin girls locked her out of the house on purpose and went to the fridge and got out the CHOCOLATE CAKE. "That's not your cabinet, Nate!"

I go back and forth between the garage and front door, trying the doorknob in case he'd "unflipped" the lock. Nope. Peering through the screen so he knew I was there, I would give him reassuring words, "Don't worry baby boy, Mamma's right here." I was very concerned that he might freak out if he didn't see me after a while. Yeah, he didn't care.

I resigned myself to just waiting for David to get home from work so he might either have a key or come up with a brilliant entry plan. I wondered what my neighbors thought. I laughed at the story and immediately thought that I had to call everyone I knew how hilarious my son is. I also wondered if I should go to Target or Wal-Mart for those doorknob covers.

I decided Target, because I always love and excuse to go-wait a minute! The back door, the sliding glass door is open! I remembered that because I had GONE to Wal-Mart earlier and forgot to close it (we may be responsible but we aren't TOO responsible!) Now, how to get in. The latch to the gate is in the inside to that people can't walk in off the street and enter your house from the backyard. (Brilliant thinking.) I had to get creative. I saw one of my bigger and musclier neighbors and thought about asking him to jump over or hoist me up or something but it was then that I spied David's work ladder in the garage. Easy, set it up, climbed up, opened the gate, I was in!

"Nathan, I am back! Mommy is inside!"

I received the equivalent of a toddlers, "Oh. Hi."

David walked in the door only seconds later.

He agreed that we would go to Target as well.