Families are weird

Today was a busy day for Corbin and I. We got up this morning and headed to Trinity School to volunteer. Corbin played in the fenced in playground with one of my friend's (Judy) daughters, Lissy. Lissy is in junior high and I have known the family for years. While this is going on I am diligently landscaping with the senior pastor's wife, Donna and a couple that I have not met before. I learned that architects do not always make pratical decisions about landscaping. If you have a bunch of Lutherans standing around, reading the plans, scratching their heads, ready to start swearing in frustration, you may have gone too far. I kid you not. Beyond that we are attempting to plant shrubs and ground cover and we find that just under the soil is the left-over gravel and crap from when they paved the parking lot. So, we started digging our holes with shovels and finished them with a pickaxe. My shoulders are very tired. About 2:00pm my husbands youngest sister shows up with her 10 month old daughter, Anika. I had promised to baby-sit till 8 or so tonight. This is not a problem. So after surveying the situation I decided that we were going to be done for the day and go home. By this point it had gotten pretty windy anyway. So, I pack up the children in the car and off we go. I figure this will be good practice for when(if) we have two of our own. The kids were great in the backseat on the way home. I was totally impressed. We get home and Corbin actually helps me collect all our things and get them in the house. I thought, this kid is awesome. We get in the house and I let them run around crazy for awhile. They are still doing good. Brandon gets home and has brought takeout for lunch, yay!!! We eat and after that, well things get interesting. At that point Anika becomes less novelty and more enemy as far as Corbin is concerned. If she picks up one of his toys, that becomes the toy he cannot live without. If she switches to a different toy, well then that becomes the toy he cannot live without. This kid was really trying my patience. Then Corbin decides to play a little game at the table that involves these little cardboard cards and he complaines several times that Anika has taken the cards. I chase her down and remove the slightly mangled card from her drool-dampened hand and give it back to him, reminding him each time that he needs to keep the cards toward the middle of the table where she cannot reach them. Imagine my reaction when I walk into the room and catch him. He has this sly, smug look on his face and is edging the cards close to the edge. The second she snatches one he smiles like a fool and bellows, "Mommy!!! Anika took my card!!" He is doing this ON PURPOSE. I decide in that moment that, at my first opportunity, I am going to repeatedly slam my head on the refrigerator door so that any sanity I have left will be right up front when I need it. The rest of the evening went about like you would expect. Grandma popped in with dinner and proceded to drink wine on my couch and cater to Corbin's every demand (like a good grandma should) and coo about how adorable Anika is. Anika's moomy eventually came to escort her home and Corbin went to bed.

The moral of the story?
Are you kidding me?!?! I haven't even figured out the point of it, let alone the moral.
Don't you people have something better to do?

Love,
The sanity-deprived Friend of Flappy (and Friend)