Our beloved babysitter is leaving for college in a few weeks.  When I found out that she was accepted into an elite program only the best and the brightest students get into - I was all "So you're abandoning me to better yourself and your future instead of watching my children so I can go to yoga?  That's crap, Lauren, crap."  Which didn't even make her change all her life plans to stay here - if you can believe that.  No one from the college even called to ask if this was going to inconvenience me or my workout schedule.  So, we have been forced to allow her to leave us.  Grrrr....

The girls want to make a going away card for her and decided each of us would make one part.  I picked out wooden letters for the girls to decorate.  Emmeline wanted her name and "Yoren".  Lena wanted her name and Lauren.  And they both wanted mine to say "We Love You."  We raided my teaching supplies and loaded up on: card stock, crayons, colored pencils, stickers, glitter, sequins, sparkly glue, feathers, pom poms, pipe cleaners and anything that looked girlie, fabulous and able to be hot glue gunned to the artwork. 

We spread the goods out on the table outside to begin our crafty project for our soon-to-leave family member. 

Here is the Norman Rockwell version of this project: 

The girls worked together harmoniously to create beautiful memories for our wonderful babysitter as she departs for the next chapter in her life.  No children, feelings or furniture were injured during the making of the cards.

And, then there's us:

We all crowd into our tiny seats at the table outside on the porch.  Lena wants to glue this pom-pom thing onto the poster.  I discover that the top to the Tacky Glue has glued itself shut.  I walk 10 feet into the kitchen to grab a toothpick to poke through the glue to open it back up.  Emmeline tries to "ba-whoa" Lena's colored pencil.  Lena yells at her.  Emmeline brandishes the absconded pink pointy weapon.  I walk back out just in time to see her stab Lena in the hand with the pencil. Crying ensues.

Back on track.  Coloring with fury. The girls are stickering up their cards like you read about.  Lena asks Emmeline if she can have some of her Hello Kitty stickers.  Emmeline says "Yeah!" and then immediately takes the stickers over to my wooden storage chest and decorates it with the coveted smiling felines. Crying ensues.

Lena accidentally glued the "n" in Lauren backwards.  Crying ensues.

Emmeline has used the last of the purple square stickers.  But, she has not actually used them on her poster.  That would be prosaic.  Instead she has stuffed one up each nostril.  I am able to get one out but am panicking because the other is so high up.  I begin to worry I am going to have to take her to the emergency room.  I call my husband in for reinforcement because I am at a loss for how to remove this purple obstruction.  He teaches our 2-year-old how to do "snot rockets".  It's another proud mothering moment in our home. Emmeline is singing "Snot wockets! Snot wockets!" Lena is pissed because Emmeline "wasted her stickers."  Crying ensues.

Lena shows me a yellow pom-pom with a pipe cleaner wrapped around it.  She asks if I like it. I confirm that it is the cutest bumble bee I have ever seen.  She freaks the freak out because it is NOT A BUMBLEBEE.  It is a ninja duck.  Crying ensues.

I have used up the remainder of my patience as I try to unglue Emmeline's poster from the coffee table.  The glass is now a lovely shade of green glitter mingled with blue paper.  Emmeline is off in the corner of the yard, marking her territory on a palm tree.  I tell her this behavior is for animals and not humans and is "highly inappropriate".  She walks around the yard like a penguin with her pants around her ankles saying "In-a-poop-pwiate, in-a-poop-pwiate."  Lena is pouting because it's not fair that Emmeline gets to pee in the yard and she doesn't. Crying ensues.

I am considering calling Lauren's college and letting them know that she has highly contagious leprosy and measles and probably had someone else take her SAT's. And, after the card making debacle, I can't fathom why she would ever want to leave us...

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