So it was the last day of Easter Break and it was a nasty day...of course it would be, we live in OHIO! I can't remember who came up with the idea first, but once the word leaked out, no matter how softly it was spoken, it was out...LETS BUILD A FORT!!
I know that this was something I totally loved to do as a kid. I remember lining up every chair we could find in the house into the dining room to make the fort as large as humanly possible. I remember going around to each room to gather up every blanket we could use to provide us with the *Best Fort Ever*. I know the joy this process brought me as a child.
So WHY is it that blah, blah years later, I find myself on the opposite spectrum of the love of forts.
Hmmm...Maybe it's because the timing for the fort building is ALWAYS poor. Let's do it when the house is all clean, beds are made and blankets are neatly folded in the hall closet. It's almost like a beacon goes out from with in the fibers of the blankets to the children...*must build forts NOW!!*
BTW...this is a VERY similar beacon to the one that goes out when mommy quietly sneaks off to use the bathroom. It's a beacon that adults do not have the ability to hear, but I know it's being rung through out the entire home and yard *Mom is in the bathroom...GO FIND HER, give her NO PEACE!* Oh yes, it's the same beacon. If only I could find where it's origin is, where is that thing located? No one seems to know and when I question the kids about it they are in complete denial! Is there somekind of oath that they have sworn to? What would happen if they told me? Anyway, moms get no peace when in the bathroom...EVER!
Back to the forts... so Monday one of the kids brought it up and I was WAY overpowered ... 4:1. So I caved and the process commenced. It's amazing the process of pulling, yanking and dragging such soft cozy blankets can be SO LOUD! They ran up and down the hall, coming up with amazing strength to pull heavy queen-sized blankets 12 times their size with such ease. It was strangly effortless and somehow when it's time to put them away the super-human strength shown here vanishes.
The girls quickly claimed the large dining room table as THEIRS and No Boy Was Allowed in. They added pillow after pillow and it was now a haven of comfort. They decided a friendly game of Monopoly was the BEST thing to do while *Forting*.
The boys were left to their own and with the lack of experience they were at a loss. I'm not sure how, again super-human strength took over and out of the garage appeared an old heavy square card table ( which belonged to sweet Grandma & Grandpa Gessaman- the table has got to be as old as I am, at least!) Their blankets were all over and around it as it became * Sooooo much better than the girls* and of course the appropriate game was chosen to be played under it *Battleship*...perfect!
The Forts lasted for hours...seemed like days for me. And as the evening approached the Big Mean Mommy commanded that they be DESTROYED. The crying and wailing was heard for miles and miles I'm sure. It was pain that seem to peirce their souls. It seemed like it must have been the equivalent of requesting them to murder a puppy.
At this point the process of puting the blankets away was a task that was seemingly unachievable to all involved.
Around this lengthy time of unresponsiveness I believe the words came out of my mouth * That's it!!! No more forts for FOUR months!!!*
You may laugh, I about did. Four months?? Four months. Where in the world did I get four months? Usually if one of our children loses a privilege for making a poor choice it's for a day, a week....but I've never even used a month. All of a suddden I somehow think *this* act of rebellion should result is a FOUR MONTH hiatus. Who knows what I was thinking. Regardless, it was a good motivation to move the cleaning up process along as badly as I may have felt about the severe time punishment.
This is where I was quite bewildered with the absence of the prevoiusly seen *Super-Human Blanket Pulling Strength*...it was GONE! Logan was bearly making it out of the Living Room dragging his comforter was apparently the hardest task this poor boy was EVER asked to do. The repeated falling onto the ground was becomming quite humorous, I caved and helped. The Mean Mommy DID have a heart and the joint folding ended the adventure. So in August, I'll be posting another Fort Story...but NOT before then!
