The McMahon Family

Once Christmas is over, I usually drudge my way through January and February feeling like it will never end. March and spring seem so far away and can’t come soon enough.  This year is so different!  I don’t know if it’s the nice weather or my age showing, but time is just flying.  Even though I’ve been a bad blogger and just as bad at updating our photo site, here it is thrown together in a nutshell.

I’ve added all the pics from the month to a February album even though it’s now over. 🙂

Oh and I added a few more to the January album, too.

Me: Patrick, I love your porcupine!

Patrick:  Mom, it’s not a porcupine.  It’s a hedgehog!

At breakfast the other morning,

Mac: Look mom! I have orange and green!

Me: Huh?

Mac:  Green pancakes and an orange plate!

Me: Oh! Yes, I see…

Sometimes it’s not worth correcting his colors. 🙂

The boys have been working on their current sticker chart for weeks.  We haven’t been good about putting the actual stickers on the chart when they’ve done the chores, but they each had an item they wanted, so we promised that if they cleaned their room this past weekend, we would consider the charts filled.  But it didn’t seem to work.  The room was pretty messy and they just didn’t want to do it.  After four hours in there Sunday, they still hadn’t even made a dent in it.  Then we had to go shopping for a birthday present and Daddy picked up their rewards at the store.  The agreement was they could have them once they finished their room.  Finally! I thought.  This will motivate them to get it done!

Nope.  No such luck.  They still refused to do it.  Despite numerous, and I mean many, many, reminders that they wouldn’t get their rewards if the room wasn’t picked up, they still just couldn’t wouldn’t get it done.  Once the day was over, they both asked for the toys, which made me think they just weren’t getting it!  Maybe they didn’t understand how it worked…but no, this was like the 100th time we’d gone through this process!  Days and days went by.  Let me tell you, the mess in the room was overwhelming, but they were making it worse each evening instead of better, so I insisted that they must do it by themselves.  No help from Mom this time.

Finally, after four days in there, Tuesday night around 6:30 in the evening, Mac asked if they could have the toys.  I told him, as soon as their room was picked up, they could have them (the same thing I had been repeating the last four days).  Mac looked at me and said in an excited voice, “Then we’ll go pick up!  Come on, Patrick!” “Okay, Mac! Let’s go!” I warned them that bath/shower and then bedtime was in a half hour.  No way they would get it done and have time to play with the toys that evening.  Mac insisted they could, so off they went….and picked up that entire mess in 25 minutes.  Little stinkers.  So they got their rewards after bath/shower time.  Mac played his new game and Patrick loved on his new truck.

Then the reason for this post happened the next morning.  Patrick asked Mac if they could share.  He would let Mac play with his truck if he could play Mac’s DS .  So they did.  Since then, they’ve played each other’s reward…even going as far as to ask if they could trade permanently.  All that wanting and they play with each other’s toy.  Weirdos.

“They took that great place.”

This is what Patrick said as we watched them tear down our favorite family restaurant.

Although its last few months of life showed a decline in service and quality, Lonestar was a faithful favorite for our family since Mac was a baby.  For years, both boys consistently asked every Friday night to go there.  They loved the peanuts, bread, mac and cheese, salad and steaks.  We paused for moment today to say good bye to one of our family favorites.

We lost our first DS game a couple of weeks ago. Mac left it on a restaurant table.  I called several times, but was told that no, it was not there.  We had a great idea of going back to the booth and seeing if it possibly fell down the side of the seat, but couldn’t find a time when there wouldn’t be customers dining.  I know it’s just a game.  I know it’s not really a big deal, but I was sad.  He and Patrick are really into Sonic these days and it was his current favorite game.  Shannon and I have this ‘rule’ that we won’t replace electronics that get lost or broken.  It’s just too expensive and we’ve told the boys, that if they lose or break one, it will not be replaced (the only exception might be for a birthday or Christmas presents, but that has never really been discussed).  He was handling it well.  He didn’t ask for a replacement, but he was sad about it.

Then, tonight we headed to dinner at THE restaurant a little early and noticed there was no one in the booth.  When Shannon asked if we could maybe take a look, the hostess said she thought she might have seen it, and low and behold, it was at the front counter ‘lost and found’ bin!  Mac was very thankful and excited to have his game back.  I was so glad that he behaved so well with it missing, so he could enjoy his ‘reward’ of having it back.  He even thanked God for allowing him to have it back. 🙂