14 JAN 26

“I had a Christmas dream last night...” Patience is explaining cheerfully to me while preparing a plate of eggs and chopped salad for her dad's breakfast... “I was competing against the Grinch in Irish dance!”...

Blink and both parties have returned from play therapy and school volunteering shifts to the lunch hour where Yali is menacingly sharpening his brother's old (and quite dull) machete in the kitchen while death-staring down his sister who has annoyed him a little too far... “What do you have? BRAIN LOSS?” he bellows... “I'm gonna BREAK you LITTLE MAN!” // “Don't break her little men...” I coax him... and he laughs...

So after learnings on “A Tale of Two Cities” and thunderstorms and 3D objects... “Uh Yali... are you eating sea salt?” // **shrugs** // “Did you eat all of that sea salt?” // “No... it's it my pocket...” // “Why is it in your pocket?” // “Because I save salt! For occasional reasons... like for science projects or... sometimes I use it to clean my teeth...” **begins tying Spiderman to some webbing underneath the dinner table** “...some people in history used it to clean their teeth and rubbed it against their teeth...” he demonstrates rubbing his fingers against his braces... uh... huh...

And so... we're concluding books for the day and I scoot them both out the door into high cold wind and sunshine until... as usual things are a little too quiet...

A message dings on my phone...

“Mom help I'm being kidnapped”

“Uh huh”

“Help!!”

[crickets]

“I'm in a black van being droves away”

[wolf]

After I finish what I'm doing I walk towards the least quiet part of the house... sniggering in the weight room... culprits uncovered...

“WHAT? HOW DID YOU KNOW?”