Shapeshifters

Okay, T-minus 6 days to camp and I have to do something other than prep for camp or my brain is going to explode.

So here's what I want to share today. My children are shapeshifters. They are really quite amazingly talented. Some of their forms:

STEPHANIE: Easily shifts into her octopus form any time I try to buckle her into something (carseat, stroller, shopping cart). Suddenly, it's like she has tentacles swirling around, in and out of straps and latches, all moving in different directions.

DANIEL: Perhaps the most adept of my shapeshifters, whenever he is asked to do ANY kind of work or chore whatsoever, he instantly becomes roadkill. Squashed flat, not moving a muscle, you would think he was actually dead. We then have to scrape him up off the carpet and do CPR. He is also excellent at shifting into a laughing hyena, a Tasmanian Devil, and a sloth.

NATHAN: Takes the shape of a fly-on-the-wall daily. Wherever there is a conversation to be overheard, that boy is there, eavesdropping and plotting to use the information to his advantage. He is very stealthy. Also morphs into a crow regularly--finding and keeping shiny objects in his "nest" of a room. Any discarded little metal object can become a treasure.

Despite how it sounds, I love my shapeshifters. Do your children have this super-power?

Buried Alive

Help! I'm being buried alive!

I've been missing in action for quite awhile now. Every once in awhile, I try to come back here and post something--I have ideas all the time of things to write about. Just no time to do it. So I'm just here long enough to say that, after camp, I will re-surface. I serve as the stake YW camp director and this time of year is crazy. Fun. But crazy. Here's what my days are like:

• Planning for camp
• Emailing about camp
• Phone calls for camp
• Brainstorming for camp
• Shopping for camp
• Pretending I'm listening when other people talk about something other than camp
• Feeding my children
• Promising my children I will make it up to them after camp

Nearly every night, I tiptoe into the bedroom between 12 and 1am and try not to disturb Eric, who is sleeping (and usually snoring). Then I toss-and-turn for quite awhile, eventually fall asleep, and dream about...do I even have to say it? One of my recent dream episodes included all of the following: our camp T-shirts were neon orange (they are, in fact, royal blue); my asst. director and I had to share a queen-sized bed at camp--bizarre; and last, I dreamed we finished our clean-up of the camp an hour early and there were 150+ people crammed into a sauna-of-a-cabin looking at me and waiting for me to give them something to do.

Following my after-hours return to the bedroom (we're back in my real world now), Eric gets up at some ghastly hour (I think 4:30) and kisses me on the forehead before departing. The sad thing is, I'm usually mildly awake and stewing again by that time.

See you after CAMP!