Thelma Plus Five

I think if John and Kate (or is it Jon and Kate? I'm shaky with my pop culture knowledge) deserve a camera crew, I did too.



I just had a lunch date with three 6 year olds and two 7 year olds.



It was an adventure.



First I made them all close their eyes and vote for McDonald's or Burger King. This is not my first rodeo and I didn't want any peer pressure or wounded feelings.



Burger King won by a wide margin. So Mark, Liliana, Hyrum, Morgan and Gabe and I headed out.



Liliana belongs to Olivia, Hyrum and Morgan belong to Marianne (Morgan is staying with them indefinitely since his mother died) and Gabe belongs to family friends of Marianne's.



I ordered 5 kids meals and a chicken sandwich. Chaos ensued at the soda fountain. I got all the drinks lidded and straws inserted and cleaned up the spills and sat them all down.



Sort of.

Imagine trying to sit 5 puppies down at a booth at Burger King.

The kids meals arrived and the food was forgotten in favor of the toys. Transformers. They didn't have girl toys so Lili set her toy aside in disgust and sipped her lemonade. Gabe and Hyrum, the world wise seven year olds announced they were going to trade their toys in. Mark agreed. Morgan had already opened his toy. So as the three boys approached the counter Morgan turned to me and in his heart breaking and halted way he said, "Want new toy," and big tears welled up in his eyes and spilled down his cheeks.

Well that just about killed me.

I asked Lili if Morgan could have her (still packaged) toy so he could trade it in and she agreed. Morgan smiled and took the toy up to the counter. Lili stared at the Transformer Morgan had handed her. "Maybe you can give it to Ruben (her little brother)," I offered.

She nodded then burst into tears.

"Then I won't get a toy!" she wailed, "I want a toy."

OK OK. I promised we'd go to the tiny grocery store and buy her a toy.

"We'll get a girl toy," I promised her enthusiastically.

Lunch over, I cleaned up all the detritus and we gathered the Transformers and first graders and climbed back in the van.

The seatbelt ordeal took awhile.

Then to Roy's Market and Grocery Store. I told Lili we were getting her a toy and she said, "I'm not getting an imMODest one." Yeah, she's Olivia's daughter.

The teeny shelf of junky toys was about as exciting as you can imagine. Lili looked and looked and I couldn't blame her for not being able to decide. Nothing was very tempting. Meanwhile the boys were having sword fights with the nearby yard stakes.

Finally Lili made her selection and we were ready to go when the boys announced they needed to use the bathroom. All four of them. I sent Hyrum as the leader back to the back of the store and I kept Lili with me to buy the toy from the contemptuous clerk. I went back to find the boys taking chocolate, strawberry and banana milk out of the dairy case. (Did you know they had banana milk? Because I did not.)

I herded them back to the van and my cell phone rang. It was my mom. The ride home for my crew. She said she'd be there soon and I said, "We're going to the park." I was almost positive we were miliseconds from being booted out of Roy's Market.

We went to the park. Liliana proudly showed me the features of her little doll that we'd bought. I told her I was glad that she found a girl toy because "we girls need to stick together." Her smile rewarded the dairy case incident. Morgan showed me his Bumblebee Transformer car and said, "Go fast!" and grinned. Hyrum and Gabe and Mark climbed and chased and acted like boys and I felt like I was a lucky woman to spend the time with these rambunctious charming children.

I just need to rest up before I do it again!