NFN: VBS and Hosting Hilarities.

Normal for the Nichols Time!
For our 3rd year, we are blessed to have new family members from China (Chengdu) for 2.5 weeks. Not nearly long enough in my opinion.
I eat them up like they eat rice. That's not rude, they really do eat rice a lot- they told me so! It the equivalent to the way I eat cheese or popcorn rather.
 Lay off!

As John would say, what I think my wife means is that she loves them. Yes, I do. I love them. They are both 13 and Leelah loves having big sisters. She is in heaven. And John, well he is so sweet that guy. We almost lost our witness over our dog jumping all over them this weekend. John kind of "went off" and threw the dog bed at her to get her from acting like Kujo on them. JUST PET HER AND SHE WILL BE FINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But we prayed and asked for other peeps to pray and wouldn't you know it, all is well.

Why do they sleep with the lights on? Don't know.

And there have been several fails.
- Drinking any kind of liquid and some of the meals. Not so much.
- Me: "Y'all like Harry Potter?" Them: staring and then an abrupt, "No!"
- Me: "Hey we've got cheeseballs! (not actual cheese which they hate but the cheeseypuufs in ball form)." Response: Nothing.
- Me: "Do y'all like American music like Michael Jackson?" Them: "NO! We like Taylor Swift."
Oh.
- They've already got Apple stuff so that's not a big deal this year. But they want to buy "iPad 3 for my father." They both have iPads and iPhone 4's. Our family's iPadless, I'm rockin' an iPhone 3GS and fine with it.
- "Swimming?" - No.
- "Bowling?" - No.
- "Shopping?" - Which in the past has not been a big deal, but they were like:
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!

So yesterday we shopped it up at Charming Charlie, which makes Leelah act like she's on straight acid (whatever that must be like, but it's scary). There was some "glamour glitter dusting spray" at the check-out. I will let you extrapolate on what happened next with that....
I've never seen so many necklaces purchased at one time. I thought about busting out some Dave Ramsey talk, but then my eyes started to glaze over and I realized I was getting an early instance of what I like to call "10:30 (PM) eyeball." This happens when my over-surgeried eyes get fatigued usually at 10:30pm, not 5:30pm. So I just headed up front to the cashier. Sans kids- incl. Leelah. Whatever, they will figure it out. They did.

and then as if that weren't enough to set my child off at 5:30pm we hit Hobby Lobby, mid monsoon. Did you know that my child has actually prayed loudly before:
"OH, LORD PLEASE LET MY MOM LEAVE THIS PLACE!" Speaking of HL.

VBS was last week.
If you are a church goer I need not explain to you. But let's just say, I'm old. After sitting on the floor (non-carpet) for the Big Show for 35 min or so, I attempted to stand up and looked like my body was being reanimated like I was in the Thriller video. I felt like the Crypt-Keeper. "Ms. Gillian, are you okay???"
No, Ms. Gillian has issues kid.