Yesterday we went off the island to pick up J's glasses. He and H had to pay for the portion that wasn't covered by insurance, because they had been fighting and had been warned repeatedly to cut it out when the glasses broke. To J, 25 bucks is nothing. He hoards money like a geezer who's been through the depression, but all H could see was 3 action figures slipping through his fingers. It was a tough lesson, made worse by the fact that the comic book/action figure store is right NEXT DOOR to the glasses place. Then we went to hell, I mean Costco. It was a long day in the car, and I forgot to switch to M's car, which has the DVD player, so the whole day was a steady stream of each of Gr's waking thoughts being verbalized, punctuated by O's loud whining that her "butt was too sweaty in this dang car seat."

Today was lovely. We spent the day outside making a ginormous pile of fallen tree branches and cleaning off the basketball court so the kids could ride their trikes. It was fun, and the kids enjoyed a new kind of chore. Probably the last time they'll ever want to do it, but hey. I'll take what I can get and I didn't have to hear about anyone's sweaty butt...