Memories

Over this last week I have been reminded of a memory 3 times. I had forgotten all about this memory until I was at my sisters house the other day. I was there helping her get stuff ready for a huge crowd of people coming over for lunch after her little baby's sweet blessing. We were cutting stuff up for sandwich's when she grabbed a pickle and asked for a slice of cheese. This is something that as kids we used to eat all the time for a snack. A pickle with cheese and sometimes a slice of meat wrapped around it. So when my sister asked for one the other day I could only smile as the memory came flooding back and i just had to chuckle. Dad and LJ do you know where I'm going with this? My other reminder was 2 days ago. I was siting down stairs folding laundry while my kids napped, or so I thought, when i heard a big thud from up stairs. As I'm running up the stairs I'm thinking someone fell out of their bed. Wrong. Einstein was up and trying to be a big boy and help himself to a big cup of red koolaid. Yep you guessed it. The cup spilled because he over filled it, then he dropped the pitcher to save the cup. Unfortunately he was in the dining room and my carpet was covered. The walls were covered. It was just one big red mess. So as Einstein and I are cleaning the mess I told him that he was grounded from the koolaid. He was clueless, he's never been grounded (yet). I was totally serious about no more koolaid. Then the memory came flooding back and I started just laughing. Now today I was standing in front of the fridge with the door opened trying to devise a plan for lunch and I saw the jar of pickles and laughed. That is when I decide that 3 reminders in one week was some kind of sign and that I needed to tell my dad that I totally understand now why he did what he did.

Along time ago when I was 12 or 13 and my younger sister, LJ, was 10-11 we were just home from church and looking for a snack to hold us over till the big Sunday dinner was done. We being me, LJ, my 2 younger brothers, and youngest sister. We were downstairs and we told LJ to go make us all a snack. She complained but she knew she was way out numbered so she went up stairs. She came down a few minutes later with a plate full of pickles with cheese wrapped around them. Being the bratty kids that we were, we decide that those were not good enough, and told her to get back to the kitchen. So apparently she went up and threw them away. I'm sure she brought something else down but I don't remember. The next thing that I remember is all of us kids being called upstairs by my dad. As we gathered around the garbage can he asked us " who had thrown away all these pickles" now my dad being very mild mannered usually, was pretty upset. So of course I and the rest of my siblings offered LJ up as the culprit. She was told that she could of put the pickles back in the jar and LJ was trying to explain that she had done something nice but we didn't want them. Somewhere as this is happening my dad very seriously and sternly tells LJ that she is grounded from the pickles. Now I don't remember if we thought it was funny at that moment but I know for the next month or so while LJ was "grounded" from the pickles we all got a great laugh and made tons of fun of my dad and LJ. Still to this day something will come up and we all joke that dad might ground us from that.
So now as I am a mother and I have now officially grounded my son from koolaid, I must say dad sorry for laughing at you and thinking it was the funniest thing in the world. When now I know you were dead serious. I think LJ has always known though cause after all she couldn't have pickles for a month.