Okie Dokie...

Okie dokie, I'm getting slothful with the blogging. I keep making mental notes of what I need/want to write about and then when I sit down to write, I can't remember any of them. So, I'm just gonna start typing and I'm sure they'll all come flooding back in no particular order. I won't win any prizes for the "flows the best" blog entry but I can live with that.
First of all, my day in the city last weekend was really fun. I enjoyed the Zumba class and learned some new moves. It's always fun to be a student now and then instead of the leader all the time.
Mamma Mia was spectacular! We had great seats and could see everything very well. The music was great, of course, and I knew all the words to all the songs so I could sing along in my head. The band/orchestra was perfect although they were situated under the stage so we never actually saw them...just the conductor. I can't imagine how much money those shows cost to put on but then again, every seat was full and most of those seats are over $100 each...and there were a LOT of seats!
While I was doing all this, Dave took the kids to Central Park and the Museum of Natural History. They were going to head home around lunch time but ended up staying 'til almost four o'clock so they must've been having fun!

Change of subject: yesterday Peter asked me how many inches there are between our floor and heaven. He was totally serious and so I said, Ummm, around 107...no WAIT--make that 108. He said that wasn't nearly enough and luckily wandered off to find Dave to ask.
Speaking of Peter, he had a friend over a couple of weeks ago...we'll call her Jane. Jane has been over once or twice before and although Peter loves her to death, she is a handful for me so unfortunately he only gets to invite her when I'm feeling ambitious and energetic. He has another friend, we'll call him Evan (tee hee, that's his REAL name!) who comes over at least once a week and they play so nicely and rarely get into trouble so it's no problem at all. Not so with Jane. I have to keep an eye on them all the time...not that they fight or anything, it's just that she is a busybody. She is into EVERYTHING. I'm surprised she hasn't been into my underwear drawer yet...seriously! Anyway, they had, what I thought was a very successful playdate this one day. No serious problems or interventions on my part. When it was time for Jane to go home, I was standing in the foyer making small talk with Jane's mom whom I don't know very well at all. Jane came bounding down the stairs with her cute brown hair and quirky crooked bangs.
Jane's mom said, "Jane! Did you cut your hair?!" My eyes bugged out as my head snapped to look at Jane's hair.
"Uhhhh, did she not already have bangs when she came here today?", I asked.
"...No" was her mom's reply.
Oh geez, I thought, can this really be happening? We did ascertain, at least, that Jane had cut her own hair and at least Peter hadn't cut it but still...her mom was very cool about it but I doubt she is going to let her come over again anytime soon. Which is actually fine with me; my nerves are frazzled.

Caleb was in the backyard looking under rocks (his favorite pastime) when he found this little fella.
It's either a salamander or a newt. He grabbed it by the tail thinking it was an earthworm and pulled it out from under the rock. Later he found a second one that was a little bit smaller. The one in the pic is named Louie and the second one was named Mike. I'm just glad it wasn't a snake.



And since we're looking at pictures of creepy things, here's a picture of my stovetop. This is AFTER I cleaned the heck out of it. You can even see scratch marks where my Mr. Clean magic eraser has previously scratched it up. I've tried EVERYTHING but steel wool because I'm sure that'll just scratch it worse. I had mild success with bleach at one point but even that is not working anymore. I'm posting it so maybe one of you can tell me how to clean it. It did not look like this when we moved in so it really bugs me. Any ideas?