Documenting a Very Crazy Saturday Afternoon

Some days there is so much going on, so many people in the family going so many different places, that your head cannot help but to feel like it’s spinning.  This last Saturday afternoon there was simply so much going on here at home that my head could not help but to feel like it was spinning.

Three kidlets were painting bird houses on the back deck.  It was a beautiful sunny day, perfect for painting birdhouses.  This has become a fun annual  spring tradition for us, because strangely enough, we have chickadees who nest in all the birdhouses we hang up in the backyard, and watching them fly in and out of the houses all summer while we sit on the deck is a lot of fun.  

There were several kidlets with a lot of practice time to make up on Saturday, and one decided to spend some time serenading us . . .  from the roof.  Have I mentioned that we have very, very patient neighbors?

I gave a kidlet the job of cleaning the kitchen, but of course they didn’t.  Late in the day they presented me with a coupon declaring that they had a free pass from evening work.  Sigh.  Then I had to clean the kitchen.  Sadly, it doesn’t look any better today even though I did clean it. 

It was prom day!  YaYa had a whirlwind week getting ready for the prom after she and a friend from church youth group decided to go along with a group of other kids.  In the end she decided to wear a dress she rented online, which was paired with her sister’s fancy shoes.  She asked me to braid her hair, and after a late night trip to the grocery store to obtain supplies, the crafty kidlet made a flower for her date to wear.  We stuck an extra flower in her hair.

YaYa appreciates that her youngest sibling likes to dress up, and so she told him that she was expecting to get a picture together with him in his suit before she left for the prom.  He was more than happy to oblige, and it turned out that she made him a flower too.  He was very impressed.  It was super sweet.  It’s a strange world that the fourth sibling grows up in.  When she was his age I don’t think she even knew what the prom was.  He thought it was wonderful that she was going but ridiculous that she planned on staying out until midnight.  “Wouldn’t eight o’clock be plenty late enough?” he asked.

Four in a  Frame:  Someone found a stack of top hats in the attic.  YaYa was not a fan, but all of her siblings insisted that it was a wonderful photographic opportunity and that the hats would add a lot of class to the image.  The fuzzy blue bathrobe was a last minute addition, and the Devious Snail turned his sweatshirt into an appropriate cape.  

Here’s the real date, who was very gracious with the afternoon mayhem happening when he arrived to pick YaYa up.  For example, the kitchen still looked like the photograph above (not pictured were the cupboards all open, and the unswept floor, and I’m pretty sure this guy comes from a house with a clean kitchen), and a trumpet was being played from the roof or deck, or someplace outside, meanwhile the harp was being practiced right in front of where we were taking pictures (mood music anyone?  It was maybe a little creepy),  the table outside was covered with paint supplies, and there were miscellaneous items strewn everywhere, and all these siblings were a little crazy.  Luckily he has a few siblings of his own.

The harp migrated back inside for another practice session, and the Devious Snail began his second rooftop practice session.  

The Banana decided that she could be the Fiddler on the Roof.  Then she started playing scrubbies.  Scrubbies are the most annoying sound a violin can make, when you grind into the strings as a double stop with your fingers on the bow.  It’s earthshatteringly terrible, worse than chalk squeaking when you are writing on a chalkboard. She’s actually supposed to be doing scrubbies all week to help with spiccato bowing.  The Devious Snail had been fortunate enough to not have heard them before.  I love his facial expressions below.  The Banana took a lot of joy in doing a lot of scrubbies.  

Have I mentioned we have very, very patient neighbors?  Sigh.