The "Shed" and other funny stories

Oh.  The shed.  Let me start at the beginning about our new "shed."  Way back last August, when I was racking my brain trying to decide what to get Eric for his birthday, I landed on the brilliant idea of a shed.  Our garage is at capacity with just our cars, and during the summer when we need the mower, we've been moving one car into the driveway so that the mower can have a garage spot.  Fine, whatever.  But now that we also have two kid bikes, a wagon, a plastic pool....you get it.  It's a full house in there.  So, last August.  I toyed around with a couple of options, then ultimately decided that Eric needed to have some input since it was going to be his space.  Surprise out the window.  The time it took for us to go see a few buildings, make some calls, etc pushed everything back to so close to Ben's due date that the whole thing got scrapped.  Then winter came and the mower went over to the barn and the car moved back into the garage.  Problem solved!

But, I still owed Eric a shed, and of course the whole situation started back up again this spring.  So, finally, almost a year later....we got our shed!  And when I say "shed" I guess what we really ended up with is more like a barn.  It's giant.  But, we erred on the side of a little bigger thinking we could always use more space rather than not have enough.

Here is the spot all prepped and ready for installation:

I don't know a whole lot about the shed business, but I was really expecting it to come in maybe like 5 pieces: 4 walls and the roof, then a few guys would show up and put it together for us.  Nope!  I was blown away when the ONE guy showed up at our house with this:

(By the way, that's our's in back...the one in front looks like a dog house 

compared to the ginormous building we bought.)

So the sole guy that came to deliver the shed hops out of the truck and let's me know that he'll just unload it on the road and bring it back by dolly.  Again, knowing nothing about sheds or outdoor buildings, I'm thinking this guy, built about like me, is the Hulk.  When he said "dolly," I pictured the two-wheeled thing you might move a refrigerator with.  In hindsight, that might be better described as a "handtruck," but whatever...one guy, giant building.  

Obviously he used some sort of motorized dolly, and came cruising down our driveway like this:

...and right on by the house, and into the yard:

...and after a little maneuvering, the shed landed in its home:

Happy Birthday, Eric!

Yesterday was beautiful.  And I'm not talking sunny, I'm talking perfect temperatures, low humidity.  Very atypical for around here in the middle of summer.  So, we (along with every other family in the tri-state) headed for the zoo.  Not surprisingly, we left a little later than I wanted to, and as a result ended up having to find parking on the street.  No problem.  However, all that extra driving around plus the extra long walk to the entrance really ate up our time from when Nat had last used the bathroom.  That, in addition to her obsession with public bathrooms, meant a trip straight to the bathroom upon entering the zoo.  Juggling an infant on one hip and a toddler in a public bathroom is a real circus.  Keeping curious hands off of disgusting public bathroom fixtures, lifting her onto the potty, pulling pants up and down on sweaty legs.  It's all a recipe for driving one to head straight for the beer stand.  Once we got through with that ordeal, Ben naturally was ready to eat.  For those playing at home, we've now been at the zoo a solid 30 minutes and have yet to see a single animal.  Ben is in the midst of transitioning, unhappily, to bottles and so it takes him just shy of forever to take a bottle.  While I was trying to muster any last scraps of patience and give him his bottle, I was watching Natalie out of the corner of my eye.  I noticed her messing with a string on her shorts.  Then she got quiet.  Always a sign of trouble.  But she wasn't running away, rooting through someone else's stroller, or having a temper tantrum about riding the train, so everything was ok.  Until I looked back.  And the string on her shorts was actually a string on her underwear.  She had now pulled it to the length of about 2 feet, and it was wrapped around both of her feet and still coming.  When I lifted up her shirt for closer inspection, the entire waistband of her underwear was also off and hanging off the back.  She was now completely tangled in the fraying string and elastic.  So I ripped the string, and pulled the waistband off and tried not to make a big deal of the fact that her undies were going to be goners as soon as we got to the car, as long as they didn't fall out the leg hole of her shorts first.  

At lunch, I thought we had won the lottery when we came up on a table with an umbrella that was about to be vacated.  I had to starving kids, one of whom was on the verge of creating a real scene about needing "MMMIIIIILLLLLLLKKKKKKK!!!!!"  But I hung back about 8 feet in order to give the people getting up time to gather their things without feeling like they needed to get up five seconds ago.  Just as I was walking up to sit down, a group of 4 adults.  Not young adults, adults.  I would say between 35-45.  Took our table!  I tried to be calm, you know, in order to model good behavior for little ones, but trust me, inside was a litany of expletives.  We circled the area, and just when I was about to set up camp on a curb, a table opened up under a shady tree.  Score.  It was all going along just fine, blood sugars were rising, tantrums had ceased.  Then, Ben's stroller was a direct hit by the sweetly singing bird overhead.  Ordinarily, no problem, but it landed right on the tray and looked a little too much like something he thought he needed to smear around.  So, while I was cleaning up the mess, Natalie said in a panicked voice, "mama, what is this?" I looked over to see her hand and leg covered in bird poop.  With two kids wiped down, we moved the chairs and the table as much as we could, tried to eat fast, and got out of there before we got hit again.

And, as if all that wasn't enough for one day....in the tub last night, Natalie began referring to Ben as "Coco."  She informed me, "No, that isn't Ben.  That's Coco.  My monkey.  He doesn't talk yet because he is just a baby monkey."  Right.  She was giving him hugs and kisses and saying things in baby talk to him and every few seconds I could make out "Oh, it's ok, Coco."  After a few minutes of this, I gathered that Coco is actually Pete's monkey on Mickey Mouse Club House.  This morning when we got Ben out of bed, I said "Good morning, Ben."  Natalie looked at me very sincerely and said, "That's not Ben, that's still Coco."  

Nat & Jack

And all three kids playing "train" all afternoon.  I just love their little imaginations.  And look at Ben getting right in there with the big kids!