How about some cheese with that whine?

Today I woke up with one goal. To wear out the children. So this morning we took Brady for a nice long walk and stopped at the park on our way home to play. Then we went home and changed into our swimming suits and headed to the pool for what will probably be our last time this summer. Bummer.

After lunch I read many books to Emma and put her in bed for a long nap. While she was sleeping and Jake was "resting" I was going to clean out our linen closets because I'm sad to say we still seem to have a mouse problem and I found mouse droppings in the closets today. Gross.

(These are no ordinary mice, people. I'm afraid that word may have been sent out in the rodent community that we provide safe harbor for cute little gray field mice. They figure they can come in here to get out of the heat and roam around eating crumbs while we sleep. I think they know we don't use poison and our non-lethal traps are filled with delicious cheese.)

Anyway. Emma Mae did not end up taking a nap. She played for an hour and kept telling me that she couldn't go to sleep. So finally, I let her out of her room even though I knew that meant the closets were not going to get cleaned until after dinner. They have been going non stop ever since. I wish I had half of their energy. I so love it when they play together. Tonight they were running around all over the house and I heard Jake tell Emma "We've got to get some more clues. You be Fred and I'll be Daphne." They were so playing Scooby Doo! I also over heard Jake calling Emma Mae Daphne and she was calling him Freddie so my five seconds of worrying about Jake having gender issues were quickly alleviated.

My favorite quote from the day by far was from Jake. It happened just after bathtime and he was whining about the fact that I made him put away his bath toys before he got out (which I do every single night by the way). I looked him square in the eye and said "Jake, you have got to stop whining. Whining is not acceptable in this house." And he stopped and looked at me and said "You're right mama. We need to throw these whines away!" And that lasted for approximately 20 minutes until Emma Mae head butted him while they were watching Spider Man.