Ask me how to strap a giant whale to my minivan and drive 1600 miles home with it! I'll tell you how. Ask me to define the word sharing. It's different than what you might expect. Ask me how to get your child to learn there's more to life than pb&j. Wait, don't ask me that. Ask me what it's like to have an autistic child. I'll try to help you understand. Ask me to show you my Mom of the Year award! Oops, usually I'm out of the running for that about 10 minutes after getting out of bed.
Yet, it's all good. Sure, the paycheck is lost in the mail but I still wouldn't trade this life, quirks and all. In my posts, I'm hoping you'll find humor and honesty and that you'll be able to relate to my humble acceptance of motherhood's ups, downs and in betweens.
Welcome to my world!
Open For Business
Important facts about running a successful lemonade stand as taught to me by Logan and two of his friends:
1. There are no free refills. Each glass is 25 cents, no exceptions (when a cute one year old toddler spills hers accidentally, that sucks for her, but she’ll need another quarter if she needs another drink).
2. Running up and down the street screaming “LEMONADE FOR SALE! LEMONADE FOR SALE!!” and harassing neighbors that happen to be out in their yards is considered effective advertising (although to me, it smacks a bit of coercion).
3. If you want a cut of the family business earnings, you’re expected to earn it by hard work. No just showing up an hour later, circling the stand with your scooter, and running off with the money jar (sorry Ryan, have to agree with Logan on this one).
4. Speaking of the money jar, it must be counted each and every time someone puts a quarter in it. Then you shout out “WE’RE RICH WE’RE RICH WE’RE RICH!!” and dance around the yard (but watch out for really pissed off little brothers who have soaker guns and are hiding in nearby trees).
5. Random people from the neighborhood that show up to buy lemonade are called real live customers. When you have real live customers, especially if they are people your mom has never seen before, you have to go get your mom and then she lurks around in the bushes to make sure these real live customers didn’t arrive via scary kidnapper van (and none did, but it was a fear of mine).
and finally…
6. At the end of the day, count the money jar once again, and when you find that you have surpassed your goal of $10 by $1, declare the day a success and agree with your business partners that you definitely have enough for your clubhouse laptop and maybe even a little left over.
Probably that wasn’t the time for me to remind them that they owed ME a cut of it for use of all of the lemonade in our house, for use of most of the clear plastic glasses that I keep on hand for when I feel like entertaining, and for providing the working lunch on the lawn. I’ll let it slide this time since they gave me some good posting material.
Heck, if it hadn’t have rained, they could have been millionaires! You betcha I’d have taken a cut of that.
Hillary,
Comment by Mary Irvin — July 24, 2009 @ 8:23 amLove your “attitude!” You have a great sense of humor. Keep up the good work!
Mary
YES!!! We live three doors down from a church and I recently let my girls set up shop right at the end of one service and the beginning of another. Pure genius or opportunistic? :)
Comment by Janalee — July 28, 2009 @ 4:11 pmWhat??!!! They need to learn about overhead and, loans, and interest.
Comment by CTB — August 8, 2009 @ 8:37 pm