Melanie's Sleepover

We had a wonderful Saturday. It began with a long walk around our neighborhood. Dad and I had lots to talk about.

When we returned home he grouted the tiles in the bathroom and it looks really nice. We picked up the house and changed the sheets on the daybed where Melanie would be sleeping.

We drove to Washington to pick Mel up and say hello to everyone. She was so excited and jabbered on and on non-stop for the return trip to Portland.

The first thing we did was to stop and get a bite to eat. Melanie decided that she wanted a hamburger so we stopped at A&W. She was intrigued by the juke box.

We were amazed at the amount of food this little wisp of a child could put away! A great big ice cream float and a burger!


We joked around and enjoyed listening to all of her stories about school. She said she had been packed for several days awaiting her turn to have a sleep-over at our home and pretty much made plans for every minute.

Next we went to the movie theater. Spiderwick was playing and we thought this would be interesting for her.

I had joked with Don that we wouldn't think of taking Courtney to see it because she would think it too scary.

We found our seats and munched on popcorn and drank lemonade while we waited for the movie to begin. The theater was packed so we had to sit quite close to the screen. It seemed to me that the speakers were very loud.

The jist of the movie was explained with Mom and three kids arriving at the old home that was handed down through her family. With the separation of the parents, naturally, the kids were not pleased with being uprooted from their home and friends to live in this horrible old house and without their Dad. Two of the kids were going with the flow but one of the twin boys was a real grump.

Intense would be an understatement of the introduction of the first very angry creature who was protecting the sealed book written by Mr. Spiderwick 80 years earlier and I sensed that Melanie was pretty scared. She stopped eating popcorn and got a little closer to her Grandpa who was seated between us holding the "GIHUGANT" bucket of popcorn. When she put her hands over her ears and then her eyes I knew we were in trouble.

I invited her to sit on my lap. Her little body was tense and she jumped each time the creature got angry. I asked her if she wanted to go out. It took a couple of minutes more of being terrified for her to agree to go to the lobby. I encouraged Neal to stay and watch the movie since he was enjoying himself.

Mel and I walked around for about 5 minutes and then she said she wanted to stand by the door so she could hear what was going on. She decided she wanted to go back in. We walked down the dark hall and stood by the wall watching the screen. She was squeezing my arthritic hand so hard. Yikes! After about a minute she felt confident that the scary parts were over. (I wasn't so sure)

We sat in the first two seats nearest the door and Neal came over to join us leaving the lemonade and popcorn behind. Wham! The screen was full of the scariest looking animated frogs. Yeah, that was the end of the movie for all of us and we quickly exited the theater.

We stopped at the Dollar Store because that's what we always do when we have the kids over. I picked up some magnet toys for Sacrament in case she got too bored and she found some cute beads for her hair.


Melanie had a menu for our meals during her visit. She had planned two dinners and two breakfasts in spite of the fact that she was only staying over night.

We stopped at the grocery store and while Neal stayed in the car with Melanie who was chatting with her Aunt Lori on the telephone, I headed for the produce area of the store to pick up the things that Mel wanted.

We purchased more than we needed but I figured I'd use it during the week anyway. We finally made it home and while I was putting the groceries away and Neal was upstairs reading the book that Teresa and the kids had given him for Christmas and Melanie opened her new beads. She had no trouble figuring out how to get the beads into her hair and all I had to do was help with the little end clip.

After she played with the beads and watched a little television she came to the kitchen and said she wanted to cook our dinner. We weren't hungry because we'd had such a late lunch and some popcorn but I wanted the stay to be perfect (and make up for scaring the wits out of her with Spiderwick).

I became her sous chef and she ordered me about. "Cut these like this. Get this. Get that." I was having a blast.

In this picture she is ladeling the soup into our bowls. I must say that the "Crunch Vegetable Soup" was delicious. She was proud of herself.

As always Melanie spent a lot of time taking photos.

I snapped one of her. And before we left for Church she snapped one of me.

She had fun playing with the other kids in Primary when we attended the "Break the Fast" meal after church.

She caused me about 15 minutes of sheer panic when I couldn't find her. We had people combing the church inside and out. She was in a room next to the kitchen with the other kids. I, apparently was the only one who was worried. Some things never change!!!

We had a wonderful time. We rested for a while after we got home from church and left to take Mel home at a little after 4:00.

We visited with Don and Gaylynne for a while. They hadn't eaten yet so we didn't want to stay too long. They shared a yummy lemon dessert with us and we headed for home before it got dark.

Gaylynne wasn't feeling too well, Don was suffering with an awful headache, Melanie was hungry, Emma was waaaaaay too tired. Dayton and Courtney seemed to be just fine as they entertained us. Courtney with the piano and Dayton with his new words.

It was a great Sabbath Day for us. We spent the evening with Lori and Matthew via the Internet and that made everything very nearly perfect!