Grandma I Have Ants in my Pants!

Little man Drake absolutely loves ALL LIVING THINGS! ALL! His favorite critters are ANTS! Yes readers, little guy loves, adores, fixates, hovers, draws, and plays with ants, and would bring them all into his room if he could…but we manage to catch him in time.

His favorite pass time is to draw pictures of ants. He will even take markers and draw them ALL OVER HIS ARMS! “No my love,” I tell him. “Just draw them on paper…”BUT GRANDMA IT WASHES OFF,” he replies. With hands on my hips I tell him…”Listen to grandma my sweet boy, just draw on the paper.” With hands on his hips he replies…”But grandma it washes off…okay grandma?” UGH! Time to fasten my seatbelt and go for a ride.

Here’s the thing I tell him. You don’t want to have marker all over your little arms. Here’s the thing grandma…IT WASHES OFF SO IT’S OKAY…right? Noooooooooo…you have to draw them on paper…oh my where is my Advil?

After the marker fiasco he will say: “Grandma I love ants!” I will say, “I know my love!” He will say: “Grandma I love sugar ants.” I will say, “I bet you do sweet boy.” He will say: “I love carpenter ants too, grandma.” Choke…choke…I will say, “those are sooo cool too little man.” “Grandma,” he will say…while looking at me with those beautiful big brown eyes…”I LOVE FIRE ANTS!” I know you love fire ants I reply, but you can’t play with them because they will bite. No they won’t he tells me. Yes they will I tell him. They’ve never bitten me graaaaandma he tells me. YES THEY HAVE I look him in the eye and tell him. By now my hands are moving towards my hips and I’m getting ready to do the grandma hustle. Listen my love you can’t play with fire ants. You have been bitten a number of times and it made you cry. Now I hear “I’M FINE GRANDMA!” Oh Lordy, Lordy…

Listen mister, you can’t play with every bug. Some bugs bite. Some bugs sting. Got it? That’s when I hear “But grandma…” and I know I am dead in the water. Now he wants to bring them into the house. I try and explain that you don’t really want to do that because they can get into food. Of course that didn’t work because he thought that was quite funny. You don’t want to bring them in because they can get all over everything. That didn’t work either because he found that awesome…bugs everywhere! Doesn’t get much better than this.
Once we get into the ant zone there is NO escaping. This conversation can go round and round and round. Sometimes it can get ugly and he will start crying. Seeing as how I can’t take it when I see him cry I realize I have to come up with a plan. I thought this was brilliant on my part. I finally told him: “Ask mommy when she gets home from work.” He said: “I will do that grandma. I’ll ask mommy why she says no. You never tell me NO!” After spending a few minutes laughing to myself I started feeling sorry for my daughter…but I will never tell her what I did.

Dog Bones In Heaven?

Usually I try to write funny little anecdotes about my precious little grand”sun” Drake whom I affectionately refer to on occasion as “The Masher!” Today’s story has NO humor and tugs at your heart.

Not too long ago, a little dog that he loved with all his heart was killed after being hit by a car. The dog’s name was Snickers…also known as Snicks…and Snicker-doodles…and was his bestest bud. He and his little sissy adored that dog, as did everyone else. Unfortunately, the dog ran out of the house one night and before he could be rounded up and brought back into the house he was fatally hit by a car.

It was total CHAOS! My sweet daughter was sitting in the middle of the road screaming out the dogs name. Neighbors were helping and crying at the same time. I’m trying to calm the kids down and keep them from seeing Snicks who by now was moved to the sidewalk. What an awfully awful time.

It took a lot to calm everyone down but the tears didn’t stop flowing. Drake and Riles wanted to know if Snicks was now in HEAVEN and in-between sobs we told them that “yes, Snicks is in heaven with God and the angels.” They wanted to know if they would ever be able to see him again so we told them always look to the brightest star and that will be Snicks. They asked if he would be able to see them and all the Christmas lights and we told them he will probably jump onto a cloud and look down upon them, watching them see all the lights and having fun on Christmas. This made them very happy. Now when it starts to get dusky outside, they both lay down on he ground in front of their home and look up and tell Snicks they love him. When they see a bright star they get very excited and talk to him. Drake tells everyone that their Snicks is in heaven.

The other night he asked my daughter if they could send DOG BISCUITS to heaven. Boy does this kid hurt your heart…