It’s choir concert week here, so with dress rehearsals and extra practices and two performances, everyone here is TIRED. In addition, Bryan was gone from Monday to Thursday evening. Unrelated, a week or two ago, Micah got the entire  Frances book collection on cd to listen to during quiet time. On it, we have Frances and the New Baby or something of the sort. In that story, the incredibly spoiled Frances has a problem. Because of the new baby, her mother hasn’t had a chance to iron her favorite dress or buy raisins for her oatmeal. She begins by saying, “Things aren’t very good around here anymore, Mother,” and ends by saying she’s going to run away to under the dining room table. So earlier, Emma announced in her whiniest British accent, “Things aren’t very good around here anymore, Mother. I have to hold my brother while you make my food, and I have to do lots of school, and I have to do my own laundry.” I complained like Frances for Isaiah, “I have to wait 15 whole seconds for my milk, I have to be held by my sister instead of by you, Mother, and no one will let me crawl around on the kitchen floor after someone breaks a glass.” Then, Emma looked expectantly at me, and I said, “Things aren’t very good around here anymore, I think I’m going to run away to under the dining room table. There are many, many dishes to wash, and I have to fold several hundred pieces of clothing, in addition, people keep expecting me to make food for them five times a day. Yes, things are not very good around here anymore. I think I shall need a kiss from you, Isaiah.” And he gave me a little baby kiss and made it all better.
So, today, we’ve been imitating Frances and sighing over how things aren’t very good around here anymore, and tomorrow (or tonight when the older ones are at the concert), we will work at making things a bit better around here because even though Frances freed us up to whine a bit while we are tired and it is cloudy and windy and gearing up for our first snow of the season, to stay there is a dangerous thing. We must get up, we must work, we must do the things that are ours to do. And we must remember to be thankful for those things because although there is much to do, it is for the best of reasons: children, food, books, education, clothing. These are undoubtedly somethings for which to give thanks.
Tell me in your best British accent. Are things good around where you’re at?
