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On the way home from the Post Office with Biscuit and Wrangler is usually nerve wracking or funny. This particular car trip nearly made me rear end the car in front of me:
Biscuit: What year was Adam and Eve born?
Wrangler: Who is Adam and Steve?
Today Biscuit was sent home from school because he is now running a fever - the same one I keep thinking I’ve gotten rid of but returns around noon every day for the past week. 
As I lay in bed, he creeped in here from his own bed and crawled up on the bed next to me. Very sweetly, he said,
“I love you, Classic Mom”
Not sure if it was just the cuteness factor or because I’m deliriously goofy lately that was making my eyes water, so I asked him what a classic mom is…
Biscuit: It means you are a mom over 30 years old
Classic Mom: Uh what? How’d you come up with that?
Biscuit: I asked Daddy what classic car means the other day and he told me it’s a car older than 30 years old.
Classic Mom: So that makes me “classic”?
Biscuit: Yeah, I know you aren’t really 17, mom. That would make you only 10 when I was born.
Classic Mom: Ugh! (chunks pillow at Biscuit and rolls over)
First, let me just say right up front, on Sunday, I like to take it easy. I like to stay in bed and sleep, watch tv, veg out and just be as lazy as possible all day. Donald and some coworkers decided to play golf this morning and he took Biscuit with him. This blew my lazy day out of the water because Wrangler was upset about not getting to go. So I told him that we would eat at the China Star buffet to make up for it then we’d go to Dollar General and buy twisty balloons to make balloon animals when we were done. This pleased him, of course!
First, I must compliment Wrangler because he tried a variety of several foods that he has never eaten before and liked most of them. The buffet was packed with several people that had just left church and a family of Mennonites sat next to us. Because I am more of a spiritual person than a religious member, my two younger children have only attended church with my grandmother, and that was quite a while ago so they don’t think quite the same as other “Sunday School” taught children.
As we were finishing our meal and enjoying our “Mommy and Me” time, the waiter returned with the bill and fortune cookies. Fortune cookies were another new experience for Wrangler, so I showed him how to break it and pull the fortune out. I read his fortune to him as he ate his cookie: Your creative imagination will be useful in achieving your goals this week.
So after I explained what his imagination was and how he has an extremely healthy one, he got very serious and said, “Mom, I know who God is”. I swear, I could FEEL every church-goer in the room lean closer to hear this… I calmly ask, “Really? Who is it?” He points to the waiter and says, “That man that speaks Spanish and brought me my fortune! How else could he know about my ‘magination unless he was God?”
Yeah, everyone was speechless. I smiled and said, “Honey, this is a Chinese restaurant and the man speaks Chinese, but I’m not sure he’s God.” To this he answers as if I’m the most ignorant person in the room, “I KNOW he’s God. I’ve seen God before and he has a beard just like the fortune cookie man.”
So there you have it folks. God is a waiter at the Chinese Buffet. 
Have you heard the joke about the blonde that got fired from the M&M factory for throwing out the candies with “W” on it? This joke flashed back to me today when Wrangler walked in the room with a snack size bag of M&M’s.
Wranger: Mom, what’s your favorite letter?
Me: I don’t know. I’ve never thought about it. Why?
Wrangler: Because if I can find that letter in my candy, I’ll give it you because I love you.
So I’m sitting there trying to hold a straight face while also feeling warm fuzzies because he’s being so sweet about it and showing that he knows his ABC’s. I debate in my mind for a few seconds on if I should say “M”, “W” or throw him for a loop and ask for “Z”.
Me: My favorite letter is “M” for Mom because I love you too, baby.
Wrangler: Wow, Mom… ALL of these candies have “M” on them!
Me: Holy cow, they sure do! Do I get the whole bag now?
Wrangler: (slightly panicked because his sharing idea is quickly backfiring) Why don’t I just give you the ones that are your favorite color?
How could I say no? 
This summer, my mother (Nana) and I took the boys on a trip to visit family from my childhood hometown of Sonora. While we were down there, I realized that the entire time I lived there, I was only 90 miles from one entrance to the Mexican border. For some reason, this suddenly became extremely important for me to do and to share with my children because passports for American citizens will soon be necessary for this simple visit to a town on the other side of the river. I have a passport, but I’m not exactly in a rush to get one for each of my children… not to mention someone broke the friggin’ beautiful butterfly formation in the living cave, the Caverns of Sonora, that I visited in my hometown so many times as a child. So taking them now was sort of like a day late and a dollar short. I’ll take them later to see the partial butterfly… you don’t need a passport for that! Anyway, I digress… Nana was persuaded and took us down to Ciudad Acuna for a “learning field trip”.
Driving from Sonora to Del Rio, I gave the boys a rough overview of Texas, the United States, the Rio Grande River and Mexico. When we arrived in Del Rio, the moment of anticipation was upon us. We found the border, parked my mother’s huge SUV and arranged for a taxi ride. Juan, our driver, agreed to drive us across, let us walk around the shoppes for 30 minutes while he waited, then give us a tour of the city before driving us back over the Rio Grande for $40 US. Not too bad, right?
I have to say, I was immensely impressed with the boys and their interest during this field trip. They noticed so many little differences that I didn’t have to point out. They were polite and tried to incorporate Spanish words they had learned on Dora the Explorer and Diego in their conversation. When it was time to leave and we were stating our business, declaring our purchases and showing our ID to the Border Patrol, the kids clammed up like little criminals! We stated that we wanted the kids to visit before a passport was needed. When the officer looked in the back of taxi van, I thought “Great…” because they were acting so WEIRD and I had the most ridiculous answer in the universe. I casually asked if he needed to see their birth certificates… only because Biscuit could pass as a blonde headed Mexican with his huge brown eyes and dark tan. The officer chuckled and said he assumed they were mine unless they started screaming that they were kidnapped. For a split second I just KNEW Wrangler would try it. So, the field trip was a raving success, of course. The boys bragged about it for days.
One afternoon when we were back home, Biscuit and Wrangler called me out in the back yard. They wanted me to see what they had built. So, I’m looking down in this 5 gallon orange bucket from Home Depot and there’s two mounds of dirt and a puddle of water between them. On one mound of dirt sat a little frog they had captured from the yard. I said, “That’s nice boys. You made the frog a home. Did you find him some dinner, too?” and irritated, Wrangler says, “Mom! Don’t you get it? The frog is sitting in Mexico and when he swims across the Rio Grande River, he’ll be in the United STEAKS!”
When discussing why learning is important and why we learn to read, an interesting discussion surfaced between Biscuit and Wrangler. I had just finished giving the speech that no matter what you want to be when you grow up, you will need to be able to read to perform the job. Truck drivers must read maps and signs. Nurses must read charts, names and medicines. You get the idea…
Biscuit: Well, I don’t need to learn to read to do what I want to do when I grow up.
Wrangler: Why not? Momma said you do have to know how to read.
Biscuit: I’m gonna be a whistle blower when I grow up! I don’t have to read to teach people to whistle!
Frighteningly smart little turd, isn’t he? Too bad he doesn’t realize that whistleblower isn’t exactly a popular job title when you get older. LOL
Money is an obsession in our house. We all want to make more and spend less, right? Well, Biscuit’s new interest is learning the name of the people on every coin and dollar bill. His face was quite amusing when he brought me a peso and a wheat penny and told me someone gave him funny money and he wasn’t happy about it.
So, naturally when Wrangler brought me a quarter and wanted to know the name of the man on it, I wasn’t even surprised. After telling him it was George Washington, he informed me that I was wrong:
Wrangler: No it ain’t Mom!
Michele: So who is it then?
Wrangler: I can’t remember his name but that’s not what Biscuit said. (He then inspects the quarter as if ol’ George might give him a hint while I roll my eyes.)
Wrangler: Hey Mom, look! It’s got his phone number under his head. Why don’t you call him and ask him what his name is?
As you can imagine, this is my thick headed child. There’s no convincing him that the number is the date the coin was produced and not the man on the quarter’s phone number. I had to tell him that George moved because the phone number was no longer valid. 8-|
