Say What?

I am not a fan of playing Monopoly! I'm female what can I say. When I was younger and my brother wanted to play I would only do so if I could be banker and yes- I cheated. Often.

I can tolerate this Junior Monopoly version of game if the boys really want to play because it's quick. I leave the REAL Monopoly playing to Chris.

Pretty sure this game the boys received from friends last Christmas is a knock off (as usual for here).

Our first clue was this:

It should be XLR8 not XLRB.

I was able to overlook the misspelling below:
It says our instead of out.

But this misspelling had us rolling:

Instead of Parts Stored Below.

Proof Of The Tooth

Dad got tooth pulling privileges this time around.

Now you may be thinking: is she going to post about every lost tooth?

My response is.... Only if there is more to the story. I took this picture of Zach placing the tooth under his pillow but later, I'm not sure why, he brought it back out and during the get your last snack, get ready for bed, don't forget to clean up that mess chaos that ensues every evening it disappeared and never did turn up. Now I'm not sure how things will change in 2nd grade but in 1st grade it is still a very big deal to lose a tooth.

As tears of utter desperation began to fall (come on he's waited 7 years for this tooth to come out) I suggested that he just write the Tooth Fairy a note and explain what happened.

Here's what he wrote, errors and all.

Der Tooth Fiary
I lost my tooth. Plesae Give me some moneny any way. and if you Dont bleve me open my moth to LOOK!

It worked!
She came and deposited a nice chunk of change. His note must have been pretty convincing.

Whole Lot A Baking Going On

Sometimes I pleasantly surprise myself. Recently I baked this lovely loaf of bread. My mom makes Spinach dip then serves it in a round loaf of bread that has been hollowed out. Since that bread doesn't exist here I had to create it for a recent pot luck. See, Mom, you didn't completely fail me. I can do more than just boil water now.

The same week my Saudi friend and neighbor Haifa was asking me if I had a chocolate chip recipe she could have as the one she tried did not work. Not only did I have one but I invited her over to teach her how to make them. When she arrived I didn't even scream when answering the door this time. After unveiling we got right to work while Ethan and her son, a classmate played. The night before I had changed all the amounts from cups and tablespoons to grams, which she appreciated. We had such a fun morning talking about desserts, family life, and summer plans. She just kept smiling and scooping up dough saying how excited and happy this was making her. We cooked half so she could see the process all the way through and froze the other half for her to take home. It was a very pleasant morning and one I hope to repeat soon.

After lunch I was surprised to hear the door bell ring. And even more surprised to see Haifa's nanny with this beautiful plate of pasta with bechamel sauce. One thing about the Saudi people in general is that they are EXTREMELY hospitable and gracious.

A few days after this Chris mentioned, "By the way, Haifa's husband is my new boss. So, you might want to keep those cookies coming."

.......................................................................................

Now the two cakes below for the double birthday party I did not make. I am not that creative nor that talented, but my friend Marla is. She is one of those ladies that always brings the most amazing dishes to the potluck. If it's an international celebration you don't want to miss her table of Bahamian goods. She's a mom of four, styles/colors/cuts the hair for most of the westerners on camp, and can put the hurt on during cycling events; as long as her helmet is on correctly.

Not only is she gifted and talented; she is also beautiful both inside and out.

Boy was there a ruckus over who got to eat which character when it was time to serve the cake. The inside was amazing too with swirls of blue and green. In fact the next day Ethan was a little freaked out to see his bowels had turned blue and green. I reminded him of what happened when he drank the entire bottle of green food coloring and assured him it was the same phenomenon. He corrected me saying, "No, it's green because last night in my dream I ate a marker." I stand corrected.

An Evening Under The Stars

What do get when you combine, not one but......

two blue fiber optic lit mullet wigs and......
some pocket pen lights!
LUMANOS RAMONOS!
(Translation)
A two minute lighting extravaganza (pen lights behind our ears, in our mouths, and up our noses) all while rocking out to Blitzkreig Bop by the Ramones. Our act didn't really consist of much and we expected and hoped to be gonged after about thirty seconds.
But when the MC, just hours before the show, asked me if we had a grand finale finish I said, "Sure, of course." Then I frantically drove home wracking my brain for a finale to top it all off just in case the judges were amused by our performance and didn't gong us.
We decided that if we made it the entire 2 minutes, which sadly we did because the judges were so generous and didn't even try to reach for the gong, we'd end our performance by sticking our own pen lights up each others noses.

I think we really surprised the crowd with our hidden talents. The pen light part came to me one night while I couldn't sleep. Not sure if the sleepless night had anything to do with the fact I signed us up for the event with a requirement of mandatory participation to attend. When people kept asking me if we'd come up with an act I responded, "Put it this way. We don't sing, play instruments, dance well, or do magic, so it will be something completely unique and original."

Mission Accomplished!
Some people had "Boots Made For Walking" along with matching leopard print hats found at a junk/rest stop/convenience type store that is even more remote in the desert than we are.
Sunny and Cher stopped by.....
and then we saw an African Tribal Rich Man's Dance,
which happened to be the only real talent of the night.
There was a reenactment of a dog vs. rat vs. sticky trap...
where the dog ended up having massive facial hair removed when the sticky trap was pulled from his face. And the rat, well, it got its head chopped off with an axe by the lovely lady below while trying to escape; all before breakfast.
There was some kind of funky chicken act....
which thankfully did get Gonged.
A bit of bribing of the judges.....
didn't keep this hoe down from gettin' the Gong either.
We had a shocking Adam Sandler Christmas Special...
followed up by a Smashing Love Ballad. The only problem was, the one serenading wasn't serenading his own wife as she was out of town.
Instead he chose to serenade the bouncer's wife (seen below in black) and when he couldn't take it any more grabbed the guitar and smashed it to bits on the stage. It was hilarious after we all realized it was all part of the act.
Thanks to our MCs/Cheerleaders/good friends the Remsburgs we had a
Night To Remember Under the Stars.
One last note. The judges were awesome giving us feed back ala "American Idol" style. When they first discussed how and when they would gong us one judge in particular was adamant that he would gong any terrible act ASAP. But when it came down to it he said it was really hard to gong his friends and really struggled to do it.

A Silly Little Jingle

Our boys are of an age where they are curious about their bodies and all their functions. It's natural and normal to be so at this age. We are constantly reminding them what is sociably acceptable and not. And, we as most parents are concerned about their physical, mental, and spiritual safety. Even though we often feel as if we live in Mayberry International we try to stress the importance of keeping private parts private. I found some great books online for children to teach these principles but due to our limited resources here we've had to come up with alternative teaching methods. We came up with this song, after Ethan came home singing songs about safety belts and street signs, to teach our boys a few things so that if they are ever in an uncomfortable situation this will come to mind and they will know exactly what to do.

Warning: You may never think of the song Jingle Bells quite the same way again.

Private Parts
by Chris and Michelle Jenkins
Private Parts, Private Parts they are just for you.
Don't pull down your underwear unless you wet your pants.

Private Parts, Private Parts they are just for you.
If someone wants to see them, I'll tell you what to do.

Tell your MOM! Tell your MOM! Tell her what they did!
Private Parts are just for you so let's just keep them hid.

Now I know this doesn't cover (haha no pun intended) every situation or teach them everything they need to know but it's a silly song that they'll remember and hopefully keeps them on the right track and away from harm.

A Few Funnies

A few recent funnies starting from youngest to oldest.

Graham....
loves the Monkey Flight App on our iPhone. When he wants to play he asks for Monkey Dump instead of Monkey Jump. Then the other evening he climbed up on my bed and announced he would take a Monkey Dump off the bed and did just that.

Also, I'm sad to say, sometimes my older boys call people "Poo Poo Heads". Graham has grasped onto this and often, under his breath, when he's upset with you he'll call you a "Purple Head." Right now it's cute but when he realizes his mistake and starts using the original phrase he too will get the, "We don't say that in our family," lecture too.

Ethan....
has a habit of leaving his backpack and bike in the driveway when he comes home from school. I don't mind so much as he is usually on his bike the rest of the evening. I generally pick up his backpack on my way in. Yesterday as I picked it up it was UNUSUALLY heavy. I thought what does this kid have a bunch or rocks in here.....

Sure enough that's exactly what he had about 8-10lbs. worth. I'm still not sure why.

Zach...
woke me up about 2 am this morning with crying from his room. As this is completely unusual for him I got up to investigate. When I asked him what was wrong he told me he had a bad dream. He dreamt he got a Lego magazine in the mail and it started raining and got all wet so he couldn't read it. Not your usual nightmare but still devastating to him.

Then this afternoon he received a really cute card from his Great Grandpa Naquin. It said: Grandson- There was quite a hubbub in heaven the day YOU were born...

They couldn't decide whether to make you HANDSOME or INTELLIGENT, so they ended up doing both.

After he read it he started laughing saying, "That's so true. I am handsome and intelligent."

We agree completely!