"Are they ALL yours?"

Kathleen has been faithfully taking the dog out for his early morning potty break while I get Keva ready for the bus. This morning, she was a little harder to get up than usual, having gone to bed too late the night before. However, she dutifully got up, once she actually understood what I was doing by shaking her awake, slung on her jacket over her nightgown, put on her flip-flops and took a very anxious Kody out.

Then, Kathleen came up to me secretly to let me know that she had gotten a quarter from Keri Lynn to put under Kylie's pillow. Kylie lost yet another tooth yesterday, You see, we have the LAMEST tooth fairy of all time. She has had to have some extra assistance from Keri Lynn over the last four or five years and now Kathleen to even come close to remembering what she's supposed to do when a Johnson kid looses a tooth.

We hate Halloween, we don't do Santa, and we certainly do not take kindly to the Easter Bunny, but we do have the Tooth Fairy. Kylie, though, quite seriously asked me point-blank last week, when she had lost another tooth, if I was the Tooth Fairy. I could not lie or even evade. Nevertheless, she still looked under her pillow the next day!

She's probably my most literal child and needs straight answer. She heard it from Molly, down the street, that there is a Santa Claus because Molly had seen him herself right outside an airplane!

"It's true, Mommy! Molly said so!" And thus ensued some difficult times with friends as they argued amongst themselves about the veracity of a guy in a red suit.

We got a good jump on our school day today after being so sadly lazy yesterday. Then, after lunch, I took all of the boys and Kylie to get immunizations. The little boys at last got caught up on their five-year shots. We went to the Coweta County Health Department because we can pay a whole lot less for shots than we would otherwise through our primary care doctor, When you're getting multiple shots, this is very important. All of the kids did fine. They're always pretty stoic when it comes to stuff like that. Kylie, it turns out, didn't need any boosters at all. So just the boys came out nursing sore arms. Kristofer was the worst, complaining of his arm being numb. I tried to give him some adult Tylenol, but he's never swallowed pills before, so after a dozen failed attempts, he just took some children's Tylenol. Kade, too, was a little put out that the shots actually hurt, but he didn't complain until we were out of the building.

Tomorrow morning, I'm taking Keva to her eye appointment. She hasn't seen an ophthalmologist since she was about four. Obviously, she's long overdue. What's so upsetting, though, is that in my poor little brain, I thought the appointment was Thursday. It wasn't until this afternoon, that I realized that it was Wednesday and I would be missing my Bible study! Bummer. Bummer. Bummer. I look forward to that so much! At least the lecture is televised on the local channel, so I can catch that, but I won't be able to meet with the ladies in my small group.

I also get to sleep a little longer, too, since I'll be taking Keva to school after her appointment. With the mornings being so dark before the time change, it's so hard to get up lately.

When Keva got home from school today, and we had finished up the last of our school work, I got ready to go to the grocery store. Kristofer, Kathleen, Kylie, Kade and Konner all begged to go with me. So I decided to take them all. As we were walking into the grocery store, a woman coming out asked, "Are they ALL yours? And you still have a smile on your face?"

"Yes, of course!" I said, "And I have two more at home."

Then she repeated, "And you STILL have a smile on your face?"

I'm always embarrassed by such questions, mostly because I feel bad for my kids. How is that supposed to make them feel? I know the lady was just amazed that we could manage to be a happy family with so many and that she was complimenting, but does anyone see the underlying message that the kids get from this? Not just my kids, but her kids? That kids are a general nuisance and don't bring joy? When it's actually the opposite!

My kids do stupid things (like Kylie throwing glass bottles at a new house). They cost a lot. (Like our immunizations today). They make us crazy sometimes. But what a blessing! Complete and utter blessing.

Before I get too long -- like I'm not long every single time! -- I have to brag about Keri Lynn. We've been memorizing Colossians 3:1-17 this year in school. We've just about got the whole thing, but I want the bigger kids to be able to say it to me word perfect and I'm willing to give them incentive. Whoever says it to me word perfect, with only two helps or corrections, can go out to dinner with me at the next available time. For Keri Lynn, this was a huge incentive, because she loves to go the our favorite Mexican restaurant, El Charro.

So, she said the verses to me tonight while I was making dinner, and after the others ate, we hustled ourselves over to El Charro for dinner. We talked about Euthanasia and organ donation, of all things, because the A Beka DVD teacher had been discussion those issues.

Now my stomach is saying, "Jackie, you ate too late!" It's a good thing I'm sleeping in a little tomorrow. I'll need to recuperate, but it sure was good and so was the company.