and Michael Jackson's hair to blow up.........

So I turned 40 this past Sunday on the 12th.

To me this signifies(God willing) the beginning of the next half of my life. I certainly want to do things a little differently now than say I did 5 years ago.

It turns out that D and I were able to go to the Biltmore Estate for a couple days by ourselves. My mom came in town from Atlanta to keep our kids on Friday. Shortly after that, D and I headed toward North Carolina. We were to stay at his parents mountain house in Bryson City then tour the Biltmore on Saturday.

On our way over we stopped for lunch at this place called The Apple...something or other.....it consisted of a few nice log type buildings. One building a cafe, one a super cool general store with old fashioned candies, jams, jellies, banjo bird houses and stuff. The third log building sold quilted goods, candles, and other things women generally go nuts over like cool book marks, nice dishes, and monogrammed stuff.

Lunch was delicious. The stand out items from lunch were the house made potato chips, they were outstanding. I could have eaten way to many of them and in a hurry. I had a peach fritter that wouldn't stand a chance against my Momma-Bet's(grandmother) apple fritter.

Walking into the general store you get slammed in the face with the smell of rock your world flavored coffee beans ready for the scooping. There was this one maple coffee that I was just about to stick my face in and suffocate myself, but I refrained. So this hiker/runner type couple enters the store behind D and I. They are from the north and not very chatty. I know cause they commented on the smell of the coffee and I had just lifted my head from the barrel of maple delicious goodness...

A- You have to smell this one, it's amazing. They all smell great.

Husband (half smiling like he smells dog dooky) - yeah

Wife - Well we bought coffee last night. (she moves on past me without ever looking at me)

A- OOookay then.....

I move onto the old fashioned candy and what do my wondering eyes spy but CANDY CIGARETTES and bubble gum cigars. Remember the kind that you would puff and powdered sugar came out like smoke? I hadn't seen those in like forever. Because who buys candy cigarettes for their kids to pretend to be smoking for petes sake.

uumm ....me.

I bought a pack of the bubble gum, powdered sugar smoke ones, a pack of the candy stick ones that taste like stamps with the red tip insinuating fire, and 4 bubble gum cigars......cause that's the kind of parent I am.

The kids and I had just been discussing how when I was a kid, we walked to the Tenneco gas station up the street. we'd buy 3 cent a piece gum or if we were lucky enough to have a full .35 we'd get a candy bar.....an by the way while you are there get your mom some Benson & Hedges Lights. I'd buy my mom's cigarettes and buy myself candy ones and pretend to be smoking. All the kids I knew bought their parents cigarettes. We'd pull in the gas station and our parents would send us in to buy the cigarettes so they didn't have to get out of the car.

For real, I mean we didn't think anything about it. Today if you sent your kid into a gas station to buy cigarettes somebody would probably report you for abuse.

Nonetheless, the kids were intrigued by the thought of bubble gum cigarettes that blew out powdered sugar like smoke. When I saw them I knew I had to get them. I also found honey sticks in all flavors. They wouldn't touch the ones we bought fresh in Santa Fe though.

When I got the stuff home Cole wouldn't touch the bubble gum cigs. The powdered sugar looked like smoke to him and he wasn't having any part of that....even when I showed him the cigarette was purple and you could eat it. It was funny and it made me feel good about his decision making too. The other 3 were basically just trying to puff the sugar out and thought the gum was horrible. It was back then, and it still is now... horrible tasting gum.

The stamp tasting candy stick ones...Z ate like they were steaks. Of course he is at the stage where he might eat a stick of butter if there is nothing else within his immediate grasp.

I am glad they got to see them. It showed me that my kids even the young ones are quite able to distinguish between things that are good for them and things that are not. They understood these were for fun and it was fun to puff the sugar and turn red in the face trying to get it all out, but that was all it was.

I love that my kids are cool that way. They react accordingly cause they aren't expected to overreact. They don't have to be explained all this philosophical hullabaloo about ......Now children these aren't REAL cigarettes and they are just for play...we all know cigarettes aren't good for your body....isn't that right children? Now we all know matches start fire and fire, young people without the brains to think, causes cancer and Michael Jackson's hair to blow up...blah, blah...blah...blah...blah, blah....

Okay where was I?

In the store. I bought some awesome Minnetonka Moccasins also.

While I was paying for my bad parenting products and my shoes, I totally saw the hiker wife going beserk in the scoop your own coffee beans section. No lie she was scooping hard and so fast filling her clear bag to capacity. D said he saw her spilling beans all over the floor. In my heart I felt like hiker wife was an idiot. She talked to her husband like he was her pet, I didn't like it. The hiker husband was kinda sniffy too. I didn't respect him too much for letting his wife talk to him like that....but he was wearing the coolest Keen shoes and I did respect that he treated his feet well.

Gotta a lot of stuff to get out...it may take a few blogs but it'll all get here eventually.......

Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does.......

When I was growing up my mom would always say this about my brother, "Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does."

**catch a bush on fire, "Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does."

• **put the car into gear trying to be helpful at age 7 or 8 or something, then get out and get behind the car to try and stop it from moving, "Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does."


• **throw trash down the ravine instead of walking it to the dumpster like he was supposed to, then having to make him pick it all up, "Well, God love him if that 's the worst thing he does."

You know how crazy boys are......they just do stuff that literally drives one to a state psychotic lunacy.....

.....okay so Sarah comes over to help Maysie make some tags for her gift bags for her birthday party early last week. We do some embossing with pink embossing powder. The tags turn out beautifully. I hadn't fully cleaned off the table, mostly but not fully.

I hadn't wiped up the pink embossing powder. Zac strolls over to the table going on about whatever he is going on about and sees the pink powder on the table......

......since boys eat anything that looks remotely edible at this age he licks his finger sticks it in the embossing powder says, "mmm, who spilled the fun dip?"

I'm like nobody has any Fun Dip what the heck are you talkin about.....When I look at the table I tell him he has eaten embossing powder. He immediately starts to gag and runs to rinse his mouth out.....but I'm like just a second ago you said "mmmm"...now it taste gross?

"Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does."

...okay so Sunday church is just about over, he is sitting behind me with his buddies and their dad. He goes walking out of the sanctuary at pretty fast pace holding his face. I think he has lost a tooth and its bleeding or something. A friend of his in front of us looks at me, I shrug, cause I don't know what's wrong with him, I just work here. I turn behind me and look at Logan, who relays to me that he thinks Zac has gum stuck on his face.

I say to the dad, who knows my kid pretty well, "Who gets gum stuck on their face?"

"Your kid," and he laughs...we're all leaving to go home and saying our goodbyes and blah, blah, blah, Z pushing through to me holding his face in a panic... telling me how he can't get the gum off.

First, it's not just a little gum on his face......it's a lot-tle gum on his face, it starts at the outside of his left nostril and makes an oval onto his cheek towards his ears down his face onto the bottom side of his chin and back up towards the left corner of his lip. He has apparently been in the bathroom scrubbing it with a piece of paper towel.....I know this cause now paper towel is stuck all over the gum stuck all over his face...... which is red where he has been scrubbing.

He is telling me something but I don't understand him & can't hear him that well cause two other people are talking to me at the same time. I am trying to multi task by listening to all three. I go on out the door heading to my car chatting it up the whole way to this one and that one, Zac is no where in sight.

That is because he is waiting on me in the bathroom to help him clean his face up.

So now we are at the car talking with our youth pastor, Tony, and we are about the only ones left in the parking lot waiting on Z. He comes running down the handicap ramp and jumps into the van trying to hide because he doesn't want Tony to see him although Tony already knows he has gum stuck all over his face. We tease him a bit and Tony pretends to take a cell pic with his phone we all laugh at the fake pic. Zac doesn't know whether to be mad at me or laugh with us. He wants to laugh cause he knows how ridiculous this is but, refuses to get out of the car so I can help him.

Just so you know there was no chance I was going to ever crawl in the very backseat of our van and scrub gum off his face. He could get his gummy butt out of the car. So we all say our goodbyes to Tony and finally Z gets to the front of the car wear I can see his face. He still has paper and gum wads all over his left cheek and chin. His face is totally redden from scrubbing......
I say, "Why didn't you just use some hot water and some soap?"

uuuuuuuhh deer in the headlights look and all the angels from heaven with their trumpets sounding, shined light on my words in his mind.

Z- I don't know, I just didn't think..........

Today is Monday, he has a 2 inch scrubbing scab from his left nostril to his left lip corner, it's insanity.

"Well, God love him if that's the worst thing he does."