Somehow I thought some things from my childhood would not repeat themselves in my own childrens' lives. HA!

Autumn's has been six for only 10 days and already one of her presents bears the marks of...a genius? Not exactly. She received a piggy bank for her birthday and guess what is written across the forehead of her now "branded" bank? PIG.

Another instance....yesterday I found hair on Heidi's bed. Several locks of hair. Autumn cut Heidi's hair! The funniest thing about it though, is that you can't even TeLL. Heidi has such a mane that there seems to be NO difference. I often think to myself that her hair fits her wild personality. :) She's so spunky!

So tonight I was reading an adaptation of Little Red Riding Hood and had to laugh inwardly, several times, at what a silly story it is! It reminded me of the "physics" mistakes in Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

• Seriously, would you let your daughter go walking in the woods if you had just seen a wolf there?! I struggled to keep it in when Red's mother says, "Take these fresh buns...[blah blah blah], But stay on the main path. Don't wander off it! Your father thinks there may be a wolf prowling about in the woods." Yeah...right.

• And then of course when Red does meet the wolf, she assumes he's a little hairier than most people because she's never seen a wolf before! I guess if she's like a certain celebrity who doesn't know tuna is "Chicken of the Sea" - that'd make sense, but only then. :)

• Moving on, she tells the strange-looking perfect stranger her name AND where she's going!

• So she gets to the cottage and Granny is locked up in the closet...of the same room...ding ding ding...any "this story doesn't make sense" bells going off here? Granny's in the closet of the SAME room the wolf and Red are in. I'm thinking if I were Granny, I'd be screaming my head off or banging against that closet as hard as I could! And lest you think she's simply knocked out, read on for a few pages and you'll see as she relates the story to the woodcutter (Red's dad), that Granny heard it all!

• Next the Wolf runs away and takes a nap. When Red's dad finds him, he hears Red yelling for help from inside the Wolf....okay, we're beyond practical. We're beyond any amount of explanation. At this point we just have to accept that this story is beyond goofy and sit back for some more laughs.

• So Red is "alive and kicking" (literally?) INSIDE the Wolf....

• Father/Woodcutter cuts the Wolf open, but the Wolf is so tired he doesn't even wake up. Naturally.

• Red is safe and as payback, they load the still-sleeping Wolf's belly with rocks.

• They then stitch up the still-sleeping Wolf's belly...

• And all's well that ends well when the Wolf wakes up, goes for a drink, and sinks to the bottom of the lake.

Today I've been going through pictures playing catch-up. We had such a busy and fun summer and most of the pictures are already on here, but I found these two that are not. I love seeing my mom and Eric's mom playing with our girls. They're awesome!

On Grandma's couch in Japan. Grandma's trying to hide from the camera. :)

At Westmoreland Berry Farm in Virginia. The girls loved feeding and petting the goats but they especially loved having Oma & Opa with them.

Okay, here's my sad attempt at video footage from the Bon Odori festival. Unfortunately there is no sound. In our rush to move and fly overseas, we misplaced our camcorder portable battery so this was filmed with our digital camera which does not do sound. However, I found a place online that has the same version of one of the songs we did. Watch carefully in the first clip and you'll able to see my mom, Autumn, my dad, and Heidi. The second clip shows Autumn drumming -- fun! Again...it loses a lot of the effect without the sound...but I think you still get an idea of what it was like.

5 THINGS I WAS DOING TEN YEARS AGO
1) Working at Burger King -- never again!
2) Taking piano lessons from a CRAZY woman who stood behind me with her hands on my shoulders saying, "One, choo, three, One, choo, three..." and watching TV while she taught (REALLY)
3) Swing dancing (so fun!)
4) Staying up way too late (wait -- has that changed?)
5) Cheating at RISK (which I only attribute to the time of day and lack of attention paid by everyone else! YOU try playing neverending RISK till 3am with no end in sight and then you'll understand. Especially if you blatantly cheat and your buddies STILL don't notice! :) I love you guys!)

5 THINGS ON TODAY'S TO-DO LIST
1) Go to Jennie's for a play-date with Max & Kate (done)
2) Make a list of all the high school choirs in the area (done)
3) Give the girls a bath
4) Have Family Home Evening (I'm lesson tonight)
5) Kick back and watch TV

5 SNACKS I ENJOY
1) Toast and Cocoa (and my birthday Cocoa Latte just came in the mail today, so I know what I'M having for a late-night snack!)
2) FRESH pears (none of that canned nonsense - I forgot until recently just what a difference there is between the two!)
3) Chocolate (in almost any form)
4) a bowl of cold cereal
5) BREAD (mmm...yummy bread. And guess what? One of our Wal-marts has a great bakery and sells fresh-made sliced Italian or 9-grain bread for only $1.33...boy am I in trouble...Mom, Anna, you better come help me eat all this yummy bread!)

5 SONGS I KNOW THE LYRICS TO
1) John Lee Supertaster by They Might Be Giants (this is one of many that I love but was only introduced to because of Autumn & Heidi's interest in the CD "No" -- check it out! It's hilarious!)
2) Groovy Kind of Love by Phil Collins (well, not originally by him of course, but that's my favorite version)
3) Mysterious Woman by Christine Lavin (another one you just have to hear to understand why I love it...It's silly and a little quirky so it fits me well :0))
4) I Can See Clearly Now (yay for old songs with fun memories!)
5) Man on the Moon by Harry Connick Jr. (this one always cheers me up)

5 THINGS I WOULD DO IF I WERE A MILLIONAIRE
1) Buy a grand piano
2) Go on a cruise (hopefully I'll do this sooner! They're not as expensive as I always thought!)
3) Buy a house up front (it'd be fun to see just what that amount of money would look like...maybe I should pay for the house in CASH, brand-spanking-new bills, ONES? Well...maybe 100s...)
4) Invest! Somewhere...somewhere smart. Eric knows all about that. I'd leave it to him (mostly).
5) Buy some new clothes.

5 BAD HABITS
1) I put dirty dishes in the sink when the dishwasher is right next to the sink (BAD, BAD, BAD...this one's on it's way out, I'm proud to report!)
2) making lists (there really should be moderation in ALL things, even lists!)
3) Putting my keys in a different place almost every time I set them down!
4) Leaving unfolded clean laundry in my laundry basket for way too long!
5) not asking for help (why is that so hard? It's silly!)

5 THINGS I WILL NEVER WEAR AGAIN
1) HEADGEAR
2) Black and white polka-dot skirts that have enough fabric to twirl all the way up to the waist (tell me, when is that EVER fashionable?)
3) TAPERED jeans
4) Glasses with lenses more than twice the size necessary.
5) Biker shorts (and we're not talking about biker shorts worn when biker or under exercise clothes here...we're talking about that age when it was "cool" to wear biker shorts as stand-alone SHORTS!

5 FAVORITE TOYS
1) a stuffed cow I insisted was a HE for the longest time, despite the fact that I knew very well that wasn't biologically possible.
2) A baton I got for Christmas when I was six. I used to dance for hours in a leotard (with tu-tu and all) to "Feliz Navidad"....
3) Depending on the definition of "toy", I'd include my piano!
4) puzzles (currently kakuro but I love sudoku too)
5) books (I just randomly thought of "Gus-gus" in Cinderella when he sees the cheese and says, "Oh goodie, goodie, goodie!"

Alright, Anna & Jenny - TAG, you're it!