A Marriage in Trouble

Today I fought with a thistle and lost. (This has nothing to do with my marriage, btw. I do not regularly call John a thistle.)

I did a lot of yardwork. I also cleared off our white-trash front porch, taking time to move the woodpile from the porch to the side of the house. Ella and Daniel then took it upon themselves to move the wood from its new location to the middle of the driveway where they stacked it like blocks. It kept them busy, happy, and in my eyesight, so I let them do it.

Holy cow those two can stack kindling like it's their job. This winter, I'm totally sending them out to get wood for the fire. By the time I was done pruning the bushes, pulling out a zillion weeds, cleaning up the garage, and tending to my thistle wounds, I really didn't feel like picking up the little village they had created out of firewood.

Again, it kept them entertained and kept Ella from playing in the ant colony by the sidewalk, so it was worth it. (I was seriously afraid she was going to eat the ants. She eats dirt regularly. I'm beginning to suspect she has pica.)

We all went out to get ice cream at Tim Hortons. The Tim Hortons in Chili now has a Cold Stone Creamery. I have to say that the employees didn't seem so thrilled about their new ice cream shop. One actually said to me, "are you sure you don't want a donut instead?" I guess hand-mixing ice cream all night is hard work, to which I say, try having twins and make me a cone, buster.

After our outdoor adventures, all of the kids looked terrible- dirty fingernails, ice cream dripping down their shirts, hair sticking out in all directions... and they smelled a bit earthy. Caleb and Ben haven't quite gotten the ice-cream cone thing down yet. This is me when they eat an ice cream cone:

"Lick over there! Now the other side is dripping! Lick all around the bottom! Not the very bottom! The bottom of the ice cream part! Don't bite down, just lick around! Oh, just give me the cone."

And then I devour the whole thing.

It's times like those that I look forward to our impending anniversary cruise the most. It will be a lovely timewhere I can eat food without eight little eyeballs staring at me, pleading with me to share a bite. You'd think I lived with four starving puppy-dogs.

John and I really need to get away. Our marriage is in peril. John has done something unforgivable. We might not even make it to our ten-year anniversary.

John has brought video games into our marital bed.

It was late at night and he was waiting for a load of laundry to get done so he could throw it in the dryer. I was tired and ready for sleep. He brought his laptop into our bed and played Civilization while he waited.

This has never happened before.

I think playing video games in the marital bed is akin to going to the bathroom in front of your spouse. When these things occur, the marriage is in big trouble and drastic measures need to take place. I don't care if your husband claims he's close to being the ruler of ancient Greece, keep it out of the bed!

I gotta go now. I'm an emotional basket-case, as you can imagine and Shark Week is happening as I write this. Goodnight.