A tale of three sisters...

Names changed to protect the innocent and the apparently innocent but devious...

Lily is 13 years old. Because she lives with her single mom and twin sisters who are almost 4, she does a lot of babysitting. Lily's mom, let's call her Kay, has to work two jobs to earn enough to pay the rent and all the expenses of living. Kay's full time day job pays enough to meet all the needs of the family...except for daycare. And without daycare, Kay can't work at all. So in order to be able to pay for daycare, Kay took a second job from 5-10 pm four nights a week, depending on Lily to watch the twins so that more daycare expenses wouldn't be incurred. It has been very hard, but Kay and Lily persisted and it was working.

Until Monday night. On Monday night, Lily put the twins to bed. Since the twins tend to be escape artists, Lily decided that she would sleep on the floor in front of the door inside their bedroom. That way, if they woke up and tried to get out of their bedroom, her body would be blocking the only escape route. It was a great plan. If only it had worked...

Lily thought her sisters were fast asleep, and she was so tired, she just couldn't stay awake any longer. In her sleep, she moved, just the tiniest bit, enough for the twins to open the door enough to squeeze past. They were careful to close the door behind them.

The twins, let's call them Thing 1 and Thing 2, went on their merry way downstairs. They went into the kitchen, broke into the locks that their Uncle Chase had put on the fridge and helped themselves to the cheese. All of the processed cheese slices. Why just open one when it is so much fun to open every piece? Bite this, spill that...what fun! Now what should we do?

Thing 1 and Thing 2 thought about other fun things they had done...lots of times, before they went to bed at night, Lily would take them across the street to the Arctic Circle and let them play in the Play Zone, and she would even get them ice cream cones. Wouldn't it be fun to do that again?

They tried to open the front door, but it was locked, and they hadn't --yet--figured out how to get around that...hey, let's try the sliding door in the kitchen!

That was hard work! Thing 1 and Thing 2 had to quietly move the table and chairs and other things that Kay had placed there deliberately to barricade this possible escape route. And then the catch on the slider was tricky, but never underestimate the power of a pair of almost four year old twins who really want to get out.

Success! The Arctic Circle is only a two-minute walk away, and there are lots of lights along the way. Cross one quiet street, and you are there! And Thing 1 and Thing 2 have walked this route with Lily hundreds of times...they know the way.

The workers in the Arctic Circle were a little bit surprised to see two small children in the Arctic Circle this late at night...unwittingly, they collaborated with the devious little Things by rewarding their escape with ice cream cones--and they didn't even have to pay for them! Awesome! Thing 1 and Thing 2 played and played and ate their ice cream and had so much fun.

The police man who came to take care of them asked them their names. They weren't going to tell some stranger that! He asked them "How old are you?" "Three," volunteered Thing 1. "Me too," piped up Thing 2. "Oh," said the police man, "You are 3, and you are 2." Thing 1 and Thing 2 didn't bother to explain their twin status to the stranger; they were too busy looking at that nice big revolver and wondering how to get it away from him. There is an advantage to being fraternal twins--people might not get you confused with your sister, but you can still confuse them. Like about your ages. Especially since Thing 1 is a whole size larger than Thing 2.

How fun to ride in the police car! How fun to run around the police station! So much to see, so much to do! It got especially fun when the police man was busy at the computer typing a report, and Thing 1 and Thing 2 managed to get the revolver. They were so fast, the police man didn't even know what happened! Thing 1 and Thing 2 were laughing so much while a whole bunch of grown ups were trying to catch them. Not so much fun when they took the revolver away...

Thing 1 and Thing 2 had to settle down for a bit and pretend to be quiet. The police man and the social worker (who had come to take Thing 1 and Thing 2 somewhere else for even more adventures) got busy on their computers typing away. Thing 1 and Thing 2 saw their opportunity--they made a break for it, running down the hall to that red thing on the wall. They knew all about that red thing--they had pulled one of those at the nursery a few weeks ago, and it made a fabulous noise! Thing 1 and Thing 2 thought the police man and the social worker might jump when they heard that big noise! Success! They pulled the red thing--there was the big noise, just like the time at the nursery! See all the grown ups jump and run and yell! What fun!

Meanwhile, here comes Kay, dragging herself home. She has been up since 6 AM getting the twins off to day care and Lily off to school. She has worked a thirteen hour day. And she is so tired! The night before, the twins were waking up every couple of hours, and Kay had hardly gotten any sleep at all. It had been like that for days in a row. As she pulled up to the apartment, Kay was hoping the girls were all asleep so she could sleep, too.

Kay locked the front door behind herself, and immediately turned onto the stairs to the left of the door without turning on the lights or looking in the kitchen. She went up to the bedrooms, where she knew her children would be. The house was quiet...they must be sleeping. She looked in Lily's room--it was empty. She opened the door to the twins room--or tried to. She couldn't open it very far because there was Lily, asleep on the floor of the twins' bedroom. "Oh good," thought Kay. "That was smart of Lily to sleep blocking the door." She was so happy that Lily had thought of a clever way to make sure the twins stayed in their room. It was all quiet, so Kay assumed the three sisters were all asleep. Breathing a sigh of relief, she crossed the hall to her own room and flopped onto the bed, falling fast asleep.

Kay had a good sleep--the first one in days! The girls had stayed in their room all night, thanks to Lily and her good thinking! Then Kay heard the scream! "Mom," Lily was crying and screaming, "Thing 1 and Thing 2 are not in their beds!" Kay and Lily ran madly around the house. No Thing 1. No Thing 2!

All the doors were closed...but the kitchen was a disaster! It looked like someone might have broken in through the sliding door--all the furniture was moved! Hysterical, Kay called her Uncle Chase, who lives nearby. Uncle Chase was in the shower, and heard his phone ring. Since it was only 6 AM, he figured it was important, so he turned off the shower and looked at the phone's display. "It's Kay," he said to himself, "Maybe her car won't start." So he picked up the phone, and Kay was hysterical. "The twins are gone! The twins are gone!" she cried. Uncle Chase didn't even bother to finish rinsing the shampoo out of his hair. He stepped into his pants and grabbed his shirt as he ran out the door.

He got to Kay's house, where she and Lily were very distraught. "It's my fault! I lost them!" moaned Lily. As Uncle Chase put his arms around his hysterical nieces, Kay, with trembling fingers, dialed the police.

"Well, Kay," said the police man. "We have good news and bad news. The good news is...we have a pair of little girls down here. Now, these two don't look like twins, and one is 3 and the other is only 2, but maybe they are yours."

"The bad news is...you can't have them back! We are charging you with neglect!"

Meanwhile, media circus..."A two year old and a three year old were found miles away from their home. Outside for hours. No coats. They were at an Arctic Circle on a busy street. In the middle of the night. Where is their mother? She must have been out partying. What a terrible person!"

Some party...nothing like working thirteen hours straight. Now that is a party.

Stay tuned for more...

Dad's birthplace

This is in response to my brother's blog. Here is a picture of Dad in front of his birthplace, taken in August 1978. The house still stands near the corner of 800 North and 700 East in Provo, Utah.

I went inside this house lots of times when Aunt Theresia lived there. (She died in Dec. 1973, when I was 16.) You had to walk around to the back, and she had a little apartment that had a narrow entry hall with a couch/bed in it, then her tiny kitchen, a bathroom and a bedroom. I remember eating very heavy pumpernickel bread at her little table.

I also had an acquaintance who lived in the upstairs apartment while at BYU, so I saw what that part of the house looked like, too. When Aunt Theresia lived there, the house was divided into four apartments. For a while, one of her married (step-)grandchildren lived in one of the other apartments. I remember thinking she surely didn't save very much of the space for herself!

Half-spent January

Yeah!! Hip hip hooray!!

January is half spent. I do not wish to give the impression that I am wishing my life away, but I am so happy to be in the second half of January. Because that means that every day is getting lighter, and there is hope for warmer weather, and maybe cleaner air so we all can breathe better.

So Yeah!! Hip hip hooray!!

I am not a big lover of winter, I am sure you can tell. Sad to see it come, glad to see it go.

Still, there have been good things this winter. I survived another Christmas. (They are always not as bad as I dread that they will be.) Patrick finished his Associates degree at UVU, and has a diploma to show for it. Josie and I had some fun looking at potential houses to buy and then gave up, but it was fun to look. And best of all, every day is getting longer! The sun is getting up earlier and staying up later! Yeah for that!