Use only as directed...

I have a strawberry on my arm, and I'm not wearing the pants I intended to wear today. It's making me nostalgic for my childhood. I was cleaning the kitchen when my nephew ran in and told me to hurry up and get outside or I'd miss something fun. I found my brother pulling the kids in a truck bed liner attached to the back of his tractor. I jumped in with them. The rules are that you're not allowed to hold on, and when you (inevitably) get thrown out, you run and try to dive back on.

When we were kids, John would come up with these insane plans that mostly ended disastrously. Aaron and I were sometimes participants, sometimes casualties, and practically never the recipients of subsequent discipline.

John has not outgrown this but has honed his skills. His children, nieces and nephews are the beneficiaries. Every time we see him he comes up with something new. Here is what I remember over the past few years:

1. Crash test baby. He attached a toddler riding toy to a bungee cord and slung the kids into an oversized pillow against the wall.
2. Hunting. He hid stuffed animals in the front yard and gave the kids PVC pipe for guns.
3. Lotion torture. After baths, he made them lay down on the floor. He dripped cold lotion on them as "torture."
4. Motorcross skiing. He got a water skiing rope, a motorcross bike, an old pair of skiis and a chair. He attached the skiis to the chair. We sat in the chair holding the ski rope he'd attached to the bike. He pulled us through a snowy field. He came up with a similar game using boogie boards in the flooded creek.
5. Munchkin knights. He set up staged jousting matches after we took the kids to Medieval Times.
6. Farmer David. Today he stood on the back of the tractor and let David drive it.
7. Steamroller. Lay the kids on the floor and roll over them like you're a steamroller.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone