Have you ever wondered what insanity looks like ….

Have you ever wondered what insanity looks like …. For real…. in real life????
I should have had a video camera going. Looking back on that night I really wish I had…. Well kind of…
It would have been funnier if it happened to some other family and I could sit back and hear all about it or watch it play out on the big screen with a diet Pepsi in one hand a bowl of smart food popcorn in the other – but as circumstances would have it …. It happened to us….. and it WASN’T FUNNY at the time.
The younger kiddlings were fast asleep in their beds; they had been down for a little while. My Husband and the Teenager were sitting by the fire downstairs in the family room, watching something on television. I was enjoying some quiet solitude in the living room. A rare opportunity to have some “Me time” and catch up on things I needed to do on the computer. Replying to an email, I had just clicked “send” when I heard a noise. “Shhhoooop!” It sounded like the noise of the bedroom door opening so I watched in that direction with anticipation. “One of my little girlies must be out of bed” I thought to myself. I stared at the door but it didn’t open. “That’s odd” I thought “that sounded exactly like their door opening.” I shrugged my shoulders and turned my attention back to my computer ….. Then I caught something out of the corner of my eye. It was a quick movement – so I almost missed it….but there was no mistaking the flapping sound of wings rushing past my head at an incredible speed. I quickly ducked and froze. “Is that a bird???” my mind asked immediately. But I knew from the chill in my spine and the scream caught in my throat that it was NOT a bird…. It was a BAT. His long leathery wings flapping furiously, flying in circles from the living room to the dining room and back again. Narrowly missing my head each time! I couldn’t contain myself any longer and let out a blood curling scream “AAAAHHHHH!!!!!! Husband! Husband! AAAHHHH!!!! Husband!!!!” I didn’t have the opportunity to run from the room – or I would have. I happened to be right in this winged creature’s path and couldn’t get out of the way. I scrambled down off my chair and crawled under the computer desk … well, as far in as I could (whose idea was it to put the printer under here anyway?) I reached up and blindly grabbed my desk calendar and put it over my head – to protect myself??? Hahahaha. I screamed for my husband again and heard him racing up the stairs. “What’s wrong?!” He hollered, voice full of concern. “Where are you? What’s wrooooOOO!!” OH MY GOSH!!” CRASH!!! Down he went. Right the floor. Eyes wide in fear and amazement. He lay on his back and yelled for the Teenager. “Bring me a towel or a blanket!” No answer. “Teenager! Bring me a towel or blanket – QUICK!” he pleaded again (lying on the kitchen floor on his back slowly sliding himself backward by dragging his body along the floor) screaming “Aahh!! Aahh!!” every time the flapping bat circled over top of him. “Get him! Get Him!” I screamed, like a mad woman from under the computer desk. “Where are YOU?” my Husband inquired. “I’m under the desk” I shot back “don’t leave me here! Where are you going?” I screamed….hysteria rising up within me. Flap, flap, flap, swoop. “I have to go get a blanket to catch this thing.” He reasoned. “Don’t you leave me here alone ….. Unless you want to be divorced!” I whimpered back. “Teenager!” He yelled “Hurry up!” “I’m locked in the bathroom and I am NOT coming out!” she squealed back. I could hear my Husband sliding across the kitchen floor on his back – he must have made it to the basement stairs cause I heard him scrambling to get up and then his footsteps fading away as he ran down the stairs. I was alone with the flying creature. Flap, flap, flap, swoop. Flap, flap, flap, swoop. Around and around. I was listening so intently to the wings flapping to determine where the bat was that I didn’t hear my Husband creep back up into the kitchen.

Suddenly a blanket landed on the floor in front of me. “I think I got him!” he hollered triumphantly. “Aaahhh! Don’t throw it in front of ME!” I squealed as I pressed back further into the corner under the desk. I heard my printer creaking and groaning and I was sure it would be busted up before long. “Oh NO! It’s on the floor – IN FRONT OF YOU!” my darling Husband yelled. “Aaaah!!! Aahhhh!!!” All I could do was screech and close my eyes, imagining the nasty night flyer crawling across the carpet, inching his way closer and closer toward me. “He’s up again!” My Husband informed me. I sighed with relief then scrambled to pick up all the pieces of paper that fell out of my calendar (that I was holding over my head) “Stop throwing the blanket in MY direction!” I screamed as the blanket landed near my knees again. Flap, flap, flap, swoop. “Aahhh! Get him!” I pleaded. “I’m trying.” My Husband yelled back exasperated. Suddenly he burst into the centre of the room screaming (in a war cry-like fashion) and growling like a mad man he tossed the blanket toward the winged invader. In an instant everything stopped. “I think I got him” my Husband whispered. I peeked out from under the desk. I slid the calendar back in place and crawled out from my hole. My knees were complaining to me already and my body let me know that it didn’t appreciate being cramped up in my poor choice of hiding places. “Aahhh!! It’s crawling out!” my Husband yelled. “Get it! Get it!” I screamed, dashing toward the kitchen to find a way of escape. I collided with the Teenager as she came up the stairs with wide eyes. “I got him!” My Husband chimed. “Quickly, get something to put him in.” I ran off to the garage to grab an old hamster cage. “Where were you? Why didn’t you come to help us!?” my Husband boomed at the Teenager. “I didn’t know what was happening. I heard Mom scream and some scuffling upstairs then I heard you scream Dad, and a crash … so I thought it must be a home invasion or something … and I was scared so I locked myself in the bathroom downstairs.”

She explained. I came back in with the cage and we got the bat inside. Immediately it started trying to crawl through the bars to escape. My Husband threw the towel over the cage as the Teenager and I yelped and backed up toward the basement stairs. “Oh man, I think I killed it.” My Husband said with regret in his voice. We came closer to have a look. He lifted the towel and saw the bat’s head and part of a wing protruding through the top of the cage. The bat’s mouth was wide open in an ugly scowl, baring all his sharp pointy teeth. “He’s dead.” My Husband surmised. “Oh no he’s NOT.” I exclaimed. “He’s just pretending, that’s what he wants you to think … he’s just waiting for an opportunity to….Aaahhhh!!!!!” The Teenager and I screamed and simultaneously ran for the stairs. We shoved each other down the stairs and ran into the laundry room, closing the door behind us. The bat had started wiggling and writhing against the bars and was coming out of the cage – my Husband stood there wide eyed and frantic shouting “What do I do, what do I do?” “Put it outside” I yelled over my shoulder as we fled the room. “It will die out there – it’s freezing out!” He argued. “Do I LOOK like I care whether he dies or not?!?!” I asked sarcastically (from my hiding place in the basement laundry room.) A few minutes later we heard the door open and close again and my Husband hollered down to us “It’s all clear now … I put the cage outside.” We sighed with relief and started back up the stairs laughing at our own childishness. I locked the door and shoved the towel against the bottom of the door (just incase he tried to crawl back in under the door.) “It’s gonna die in that cage, how’s he gonna get out?” my Husband asked, suddenly feeling sorry for the awful creature who savagely held his wife captive under a desk for more than fifteen minutes. “Don’t worry,” I replied “that winged Houdini can easily fit through those bars – he’ll be free in no time. I just hope he doesn’t decide to come back indoors…..by the way, where do you think he came from?” I queried.

We clung together, grabbed a flash light and cautiously wandered from room to room peering in closets and behind doors trying to decide where the bat came from. We couldn’t find any obvious place he came in and my Husband grew tired of playing hide and seek with us. He went back downstairs to finish watching television. The Teenager and I continued to look in closets and cupboards and in light fixtures (I know – I can’t think of why we’d look there either.) We were cautiously investigating the hallway linen closet with the flash light, peering up over all the stacks of sheets to see if we could see any cracks or holes in there. There happens to be a vent in the floor right in front of the linen closet. The vent also opens up as a ceiling vent in the basement family room (the kiddlings use it as an intercom type of thing to communicate with each other through the floor) well, the mood was tense as the Teenager and I cautiously investigated the linen closet, ready to slam the door at any sudden movement or flapping ….. “ROOOAARR!!!” growled my Husband through the floor vent … causing us to scream and drop the flashlight. Thinking back now it is a wonder that the kiddlings all slept through the madness. There was so much screaming and banging around that night if we had neighbours we would have had complaints for sure …. I’m glad they’re sound sleepers though…. Can you imagine one of the little girlies wandering into the living room as the wild bat flew in circles over head? Hahahaha. And where were her brave parents who would rescue her from the wild beast? Hiding under the computer desk and crawling along the kitchen floor and her big sister was hiding out in the bathroom behind a locked door.
That night I dreamt of bats hiding in my bed sheets and in the closets…it was a fitful sleepless night to say the least. I got up in the middle of the night to use the washroom and sat there praying the whole time that no flying winged creature would swoop down on my head. The next morning we told the other kiddlings about our adventure and showed them a few pictures (yes, even in times like this I still find a moment to grab my camera and catch some drama) The boys opened the back door to check out the empty hamster cage on the back porch (where in the world did he go???) and then Shane got seriously quiet and said to me “Mom, why were you so scared? Weren’t you a wildlife rehabilitator before? You’ve taken care of bats before haven’t you?” Red-faced and embarrassed I tried to explain myself “Son, the bats I rehabilitated were orphaned or injured and could not fly around and swoop down at me – they were hurt and I helped them … This bat didn’t need my help … besides, I haven’t had rabies shots in a very long time now” :)

Later on that day I discovered how the bat got into our house.
As I sat in the bathroom with the Baby, waiting for her to “go potty” I noticed a large tear in the screen in at the top of the bathroom window. After a shower or bath I often open the window to clear up the steam. I remembered doing that a couple nights ago after the little girlies had their baths. I opened the window and forgot about it – I shut it again just before bedtime. It was late the next night that we had the “Bat Incident.” The only place the bat could have hidden out and not been noticed for a day and a half was on the dark shower curtains …. Sooooo …… are you squirming yet???? That means that my Husband (in the morning) and my Teenager (in the evening) both had the pleasure of showering with the nasty home invader…..Hahahahahaha. Can you imagine what would have happened if the bat decided to “make an appearance” in the shower? Although we just got new windows installed with brand new screens, we all check the shower curtains now before we hop into the shower…. Just incase.


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Blessings to you - from my Fish Bowl to yours :)

Lucy

The Baby is naked and happily rubbing a kiwi across her forehead

The Teenager has learned many ways to get out of doing her chores. One night she found the ultimate solution.... she caught the flu :) Right in the middle of a sink full of dishes she dashed off to the bathroom. A few minutes later I heard her muffled voice calling me. "Mom ..... Mooooooom." I opened the door to find her hugging the toilet bowl. Poor kiddo ..... and she was just bragging that she was the only one out of the nine of us that hadn't been sick with that bug yet. I sent her to bed and crawled into my own bed shortly there after... too tired to finish up the dishes or tackle the laundry. Suddenly I was being woken up abruptly by my husband. "It's 7am, is the Teenager going to school?" he enquired groggily. "Oh NO!" I moaned. She was supposed to be out the door ten minutes ago to catch her bus .... she obviously didn't set her alarm clock last night. I jumped out of bed and raced to her room. I gently shook her shoulder. "How are you feeling? Are you gong to school?" I asked. "Yes," she mumbled under her blankets "I feel better." "Get Up! Get Up!" I whispered urgently. "It's seven o'clock already - you slept in. I think you missed the bus."
The Teenager sweet talked Daddy into dropping her off at school on his way to work and within twenty minutes they were out the door and gone.
Now everyone was behind.... WAY behind.
Typically the Teen is up at 6 am and gets ready. I get up and put the coffee on, preapre breakfast, and make lunches for all the kiddlings and pack their back packs. Then at 6:50 am I wait at the end of the driveway with the Teenager for her bus. Once she's safely aboard I head back to the house to wake up the little ones and get them ready for school. They have to get dressed, eat breakfast, brush their hair and teeth and all that good stuff then climb into their snowpants, coats, boots, hats, scarves and mitts then put on their back packs and then we head out to the end of the driveway to wait for their big yellow school bus.
Once I get them on the bus I go back to the house to pour another coffee because the first one I poured is untouched and stone cold. Like I said, this is a typical morning. But this morning wasn't typical. We were all runing behind .... WAY behind. Once my Hubby and Teenager left ......

Daniel (who doesn't do mornings well) is very difficult to get up and motivated. The whining and arguing that comes out of that little darling is unbelievable ... and he doesn't like to suffer alone. If he's grumpy he makes sure everyone has the opportunity to get on the "grumpy bus." I have to stand in his doorway to ensure he gets out of bed and dressed otherwise he will crawl back under the covers and go back to sleep. He is miserable in the morning but sometimes it's hard not to laugh. "WHERE ARE MY SOCKS!" he growls and sobs. "NICHOLAS TOOK THEM I KNOW IT!" "Daniel, they're already on your feet...." I remind him calmly. "OH..." he says angrily. Keep in mind that we are running late and have to get to the bus stop on time. I follow behind Daniel as he stomps upstairs to the kitchen table. He throws himself onto his chair and drops his head to the table. (BANG!) "OUCH!" he hollers accusingly. "You did it to yourself silly." I respond. "I KNOW, but it hurts." he grumbles.
The Baby, sitting in her booster seat at the kitchen table,  is now naked and happily rubbing a kiwi across her forehead while she sings "Spider, spider, spider" (her rendition of "Itsy bitsy spider")
Little Susan and Latoya are in their bedroom doorway in their undies giggling and taunting their brothers calling "Nanny nanny boo boo" as they scurry behind the bedroom door. "Girls, get dressed!" I holler as I swipe the fruit from the Baby and hand her a spoonful of cereal instead.

"Daniel get your head off the table and eat - NOW!" my "serious" voice booms. "I'm tired." He whines at me and grudgingly sits up and shovels cereal into his mouth.... spilling milk and cheerios across the table and down the front of his clean shirt, then wiping his lips across his sleeve.
"Stop staring at me!" Shane hollers to Nicholas. "I'm NOT!" replies Nicholas. "I'm just looking in your direction" he refutes. "You are so - you're just trying to make me mad!" Shane yells. "I'm NOT! God gave me eyes so I can look at things!" Nicholas yells back. "MOOooom" Shane calls (although I am only two feet away from him) "Make him stop looking at me!" "Both of you - eyes on your cereal. Hurry, we can't be late!" I reason impatiently.  I hear a scuffle under the table... "Ow! He's kicking me." "Am not!" "Are too!" "STOP IT!!!" I raise my voice above theirs. "Right Now! Just STOP IT! We have to go - finish your food. Girls go brush your teeth." I order. "But we didn't get our cereal yet" the older one whines. "Why not?" I ask. ""Cause we didn't get dressed." she says in a tiny sheepish voice. I turn around to give her my full attention and am surprised to see two partially clad little ones in the livingroom. "Why are you still in your underpants?!?" I ask in amazement. "Cause we don't have any clean clothes out." little Susan says matter of factly. "Why didn't you tell me this twenty minutes agon?" I ask in frustration and bewilderment. "We were busy playing!" they answer happily in unison. *SIGH* "Sit down and eat in your underpants" I say to them. "Giggle, giggle, giggle" from the boys. "ENOUGH!" I hiss as I race downstairs to get the girls something to wear to school. I brush their hair between spoonfuls of cereal and order the boys downstairs to brush their teeth and "put your deodorant on!" I remind them.
"Girls, go brush your teeth" I assert "Hurry boys, bring up the snowpants and grab the backpacks ... I'll grab the lunches."  Oh my gosh!!! No one made the lunches lastnight....I discover as I open the refrigerator door. I rip open loaves of bread and begin to butter everything in sight as I shout out directives from the kitchen.  "Daniel, get the girls boots and stuff ready please?" "Why do I gotta do it all?" Daniel grumbles as he kicks the boots down the stairs, stubbing his toe on the door frame, making him angrier and fiercer than before.
"Latoya and Susan, go get your things on" I persuade. "Little Susan doesn't have any boots" Shane remarks. "What?!? Of course she does" I return.  "Well I can't find them" he utters desperately. "Hurry up - Get ready!" I shout into the air as I skip down the basement stairs, hurdling the mess of coats, boots and snowpants that have accumulated there. I look in the dryer ..... I think I remember putting the wet boots in there lastnight (I hope I did anyway.) "Okay, got them" I declare to myself. Back up the stairs I go, finding Little Susan struggling to get into her snowpants and Latoys frustrated because her zipper is stuck AGAIN. Over my shoulder I can see Daniel standing in the garage making faces at the girls through the window. "Quit it!" they yell collectively. "Nicholas, put the lunches in the bags please" I implore. Sandwiches, fruit and water bottles are flying faster than ever before. "First Bus!" hollers Daniel. "Oh Lord, the next bus will be here any minute" I think to myself as I urge my body to move even quicker. "Go, go, go, grab a bag and get outside" I direct as I toss the back packs onto the garage floor and push the button to open the garage door. Up goes the door and out runs the dog. Little Susan is still struggling to get into her snowpants and my stress level is soaring. "Will someone PLEASE help your sister" I ask exasperated. "Make sure you all have your hats and mitts on and zip up your coats! Go! Get to the end of the driveway! Hurry!" I exclaim impatiently as I shove them out the door. "I don't have my boots on" Latoya cries as I drag her down the driveway. "What? What the heck have you been doing? Where are your boots?" I petition. She points back to the house. "Go get them - Hurry!" I pronounce. "I am NOT driving you to school" I announce to all of them "there is not enough room for everyone ... you HAVE TO catch the bus - HURRY!" We get to the end of the driveway - breathless and red faced with adrenaline coarsing through my veins.
I try to relax and breathe as I look expectantly toward the road hoping to catch sight of the big yellow school bus. But the road is quiet.

The birds are happily singing their songs as they dine on the birdseed we put out for them each day. The sun is shining and the stark white snow is crisp. The air is still bitter cold. The kind that steals your breath away when you first step out into it. Everything around me is serene and peaceful but everything in me is still on edge and out of balance. "God why do some mornings have to be this way?" I think inwardly.

"The bus isn't coming" Shane says flatly. "What do you mean?" I ask irritated. "That bus that just went by was OUR bus. The first bus went by earlier" he informed. "Well why didn't you say something earlier - when you saw the very first bus?!?!" I asked incredulously. "I don't know, I just didn't" he said quietly. I turned around and stomped off back to the house. I was fuming and overwhelmed. I felt like crawling back into bed and crying for a while.  I didn't have enough room in the vehicle to drive them all to school by myself so I called my husband at work..... I explained our dilema and he said he was "on his way."

So I stood at the window and watched the kiddlings standing at the end of the driveway, looking up the road, waiting for the bus. Eventually, one by one, they turned around and slowly made their way back to the house. My Husband showed up a short time later and we loaded the kiddos into both the vehicles and drove them to school. On the way back home my frustration overflowed and I cried all the way home. The Baby sat quietly in her car seat and offered a "sowwy" every now and then. It wasn't until I was home and busy tidying up the house that I realized I didn't have to call my husband and interrupt his work day .... I could have driven the kids to school myself. I only had six kids with me not all seven (as my Husband had already taken the Teenager to school earlier that morning) so we WOULD HAVE all fit in the van ........ What a morning it was .... thank God these days don't happen all that often.

I didn't bother telling my Husband about his unnecessary trip home to rescue me - I am not sure if he would have been ticked off about it or not ... but it tickled me to know that he would drop whatever he was doing at anytime to come and rescue me :) He's my knight in shining armour (somedays he's just my goofball in aluminum foil) either way, he's mine :)

Happy Valentine's Day my Husband :) I appreciate you!
______________________________
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Have an amazing week and enjoy the milder weather :)
Blessings to you - from my Fish Bowl to yours :)

Lucy

She's "gonna sell it to bald people."

We've started to do some upgrading and renovations to our new place. What better place to start than insulation .... so we had lots and lots of nice warm insulation blown into our walls. I was excited at the prospect of waking up in the morning feeling a little warmer. By mid morning, I had to run out to pick up the Teenager from school ... exam week ya know :)

When I got back home I went to the kitchen to start a pot of chili for supper. "Why in the world is it so dusty in here?" I inquired out loud to nobody in particular. I was mistified at the thick layer of dust covering my microwave, cans of tomatoes and beans, the lid to the crock pot .... "Where had this come from all of a sudden?" I wondered. Then I realized it must be dust from the insulation being blown in - but WOW, that sure is alot of dust. " Funny though, it's just in the kitchen" I thought. My eyes scanned over the dust and then I saw it .... an odd looking pile of "something" sticking up behind the microwave??? "What is THIS?" I said out loud. I pulled the microwave oven out from the corner and was shocked to see a hill of insulation that appeared to have come from behind the cupboards in the corner. Somehow the insulation found it's way indoors through the wall. I couldn't help but laugh. I asked the Teenager to go outside and get one of the guys to come see this. The poor guy looked at it like he didn't know what to do - so he grabbed a vaccum and cleaned it up and back to work he went.
I managed to clean up the rest of the kitchen and got back to work preparing the pot of chili for supper. I flicked onthe light over the sink and it didn't come on. "What's going on NOW?" I grumbled to myself as I flicked the lightswitch off and on (why do we DO that anyway?) I wondered if the guys had somehow messed with some wiring while they were doing the insulation. The a wave of dread washed over me. I grabbed a chair and climbed up onto the counter and pushed up the plastic up to inspect the light .... but the plastic was too heavy to lift..... and there was insulation falling out of it..... the whole cavity above the sink area was filled with insulation that somehow managed to find a hole to blow through. I hollered for the Teenager to "get that guy in here again please!" and when he came in he looked up toward the light and shook his head.... he had never seen this before.... (We ARE a unique family so why shouldn't all our situations be unique?) He carefully vaccumed out the light space and cleaned up the mess.... When he removed the plastic and the insulation started falling down all I could do was laugh. I told him that "I was NOT paying any extra for the insulation they had to vaccum up and take back" :)



In addition to our house renovations and upgrades we are beginning to add a few animals to our Hobby Farm. The first of our additions were a few Bunnies. The Teenager named them TimBit, Fritter, and Muffin (Yes, I think she is a fan of Tim Hortons),  Next came a pot bellied pig named "Pinky" and some chickens. Seven hens and a rooster ... and we have baby chicks coming in March. The children are thrilled with the animals, especially the chickens .... it's like having an Easter egg hunt every day. Speaking of egg hunts, that reminds me of the fun the Teenager and her cousin Lynn had this past weekend.
The girls wanted to have eggs for breakfast but there weren't any in the fridge so they decided to go check the barn and see if the hens had anything for them. They bundled up in their coats and boots but stayed in their PJ's under it all. They were out there for a while and came back empty handed but not defeated. The Teenager was laughing at Lynn because she had been begging the hens for an egg and when that didn't work she began threatening the hens. I guess Lynn got pretty excited at the prospect of an egg when the one hen huddled down in her nest making lots of noise, arched her back and lifted up her hind end .... then pooped. The girls left the barn to warm up inside but not before Lynn threatened to eat the chicken for breakfast if she didn't produce before she came back. When the girls went back out to collect on their promise the hen stood up from her nest and low and behold there was a nice warm egg for Lynn :) The girls were thrilled. They made eggs for breakfast and the chicken got to live another day.
After breakfast we tried and experiment suited for a bitter cold day like today. We boiled some water and tossed it into the frigid air outside and it instantly turned into frosty fog and snow. The younger kiddlings watched from indoors through the livingroom window.


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Here are a few funnies from our house to yours:

* Latoya's birthday is coming up. She wants to get her hair cut for her birthday (really she just wants to get it cut in hopes that it will be a little more managable for her... less tangles.) Because her hair is gorgeous and so long, I explained the benefits of donating her cut hair to an organization that makes wigs for children suffering from hairloss due to cancer and other illnesses. She thought this was a wonderful idea and decided that this is what she would like to do. So now when you ask her what she's going to do with her hair she will boldly inform you that she is "gonna sell it to bald people." Hahahaha (we may have to clarify things for her a bit still.)
* We are currently working on potty training the Baby. The other little girls like to encourage her by getting excited about her "going potty." They can often be heard chattering away to the Babe asking her if she is "going on the potty train?"
* Here is a quick snap shot of how our potty training is going so far....
NOTE TO SELF: 1.strip the Baby naked before putting her on the potty ... that way socks don't get used as toilet paper. 2. Never, never, never let the Baby brush her teeth while sitting on the potty...... (Thank God toothbrushes don't flush so easily.)

And here are a few funnies from Grandma's Archives:

1980

Watching the children grow, we find ourselves trying to figure out what kind of futures are in store, what possible careers they might choose.

Annette up to now has shown great love for animals, especially cats. We figure she'll either be a veteranarian or open up a store strictly with cat furnishings and probably employ cats to wait on customers as she thinks cats are smarter than humans anyway.

Melissa is most likely to end up in politics. She has all the right answers, knows more than anyone else and usually succeeds in getting her own way no matter what. She is definately NOT a quitter when it comes to winning an arguement, making a point, or making her mind up to do something - get something or go somewhere.

Renee is definately going to be in business. Since she learned to speak her first few words, it's been wheelin' and dealin' all the way. She started out finding pretty stones outside while playing in the driveway. Someone told her the pretty black ones were coal. For almost a year she kept all the black stones to make a fortune for her and Grandpa. She was going to make a coal mine. I don't know how far the coal mine would have gone but the day I decided to clean out the toybox I had wished she had invested in some heavy equipment. She still had alot of other pretty stones and didn't want to see them discarded so she came up with the idea of selling them. Surely other people would consider them just as precious as she did. Uncle Jim came over at lunch time and she managed to sell him one big stone for a quarter. He stayed for a coffee, left for work in a hurry and  forgot his stone. Renee noticed right away - never missing a business opportunity she immediately put the stone back in her collection. He returned that night with his wife and she re-sold him thie same stone for double the price. He reminded her they were cheaper earlier in the day and she realized that what she was doing wasn't quite honest. So she agreed to sell him the same stone again but for a quarter instead of fifty cents.

We had a party for Annette's birthday and had decorated the house with one cent balloons. Renee wanted some of her own so she went to the store and bought ten penny balloons. She blew them up and attached each one to a twig off the tree and proceeded to sell each one to the neighbourhood children for a nickel or a dime. Each time she made money she went back to the store for more balloons to increase her stock.  We finally had to stop her because the tree was looking bare but all the kids on the block were thrilled to have boughten a neat toy so cheaply and Renee was content to have made some money and still had quite a few balloons for herself to play with.
Another one of her trades was selling pet rocks (before we had even heard of them). I had stated we were to have no more pets in the house so she made herself a pet rock complete with a box for a bed and fur lined comforter. She asked if she could keep it because it needed little attention and no food or watering. As soon as I said yes she was making them and selling them.
 She also made strips of cardboard, coloured and decorated them and sold them as book markers for a nickel each. When we moved from that neighbourhood I'm sure the children around missed all her great ideas but I bet they have more money in their pockets!
In the same neighbourhood she went around selling orange juice. She started with a stand out front of the house. Being on a dead-end street it didn't take her long to realize business wasn't picking up. No Problem. She picked up the jug and some cups and went and sold juice door to door and made eighty-five cents. Not bad for one hour work and half a package of Tang to a quart of water. She was saving the other half package for the next days business.
When Kirk was in his own antenna business servicing and installing antennas we had to travel with extra business cards. If we were out shopping or just for a ride, she could spot a broken antenna a block away and wanted us to stop the car so she could deliver a business card to the home. Even after he gave up the business she was still finding jobs for him.

She's got more in her savings account than I do and she's only eight years old. We expect her to be a millionaire by the time she's twenty-eight or at least well on her way!
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I just wanted to take a minute to endorse a product I am currently using at home. Shaklee's Cinch weight loss products .....  the results have been very good so far - I'll keep you posted. Shaklee carries many products that are good for you and the environment. If you're interested in any information or just browsing the catalogue click on the link below :) (No, I am not being paid to endorse these products.... but I should be. Haha)

    I also wanted to thank a friend of mine who did an amazing job presenting our church with a financial seminar not too long ago. It was a very informative day and I personally learned alot. Thanks Will, for always being available to answer all our questions and for educating us on how to be good stewards with what we've been entrusted with. Your advice is invaluable and we appreciate you.   If you're interested in talking with Will about any of your financial needs or if you just want to learn how to better manage your money - contact Will at FaithLife Financial!

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Have an amazing week!
Blessings to you - from my Fish Bowl to yours :)

Lucy