Merriment

So, last night I made gnocchi with Italian sausage and Savoy cabbage. I'm using this very cool food service called Blue Apron which you should check out all on your own as this is not a sponsored post nor an infomercial (I only hawk friends' books and creative endeavors). That's Saint Carmen in the background, helping with Sophie. When the boys sat down to eat, I learned that they had made a bet on whom could keep their hands the straightest throughout the meal for the longest time.

They set the table that way. They got drinks from the fridge that way, including ice. They sprinkled parmesan cheese that way, and they ate and drank that way. They also laughed huge guffaws throughout the dinner while Carmen, Sophie and I shook our heads and occasionally burst out laughing, too.

Reader, you know how you wonder what dark secrets lie behind families' seeming normalcy?

There is no darkness here, and there might not even be light.

There is idiocy of the merriest proportion.

When Oliver started screaming that his hand was stuck and then, for real, started to nearly cry because of the pain, when I stopped drinking my 22 oz. bottle of hard cider long enough to rub his cramped hands vigorously, Henry declared himself the winner.

Later, I had to lie down to digest all the merriment and my 22 oz. hard cider.

How lovely are my branches.