The Great Missionary Olympics

Greetings fellow Boneheads!

A wonderfully warm and woefully waffle-less welcome to you all. The weather has been weird for a while, we've had wind whipping things up for weeks and weeks. Okay okay enough with the "W" thing, I was just curious to see if I could make something sensible. Almost worked. Way cool.

The topic today is Missionary Olympics. Now, anyone who knows us knows that we have 4 boys and having 4 Latter-Day Saint boys means that in the not-so-distant future there will be 4 Elder Johnson's running around the globe over the span of 8 years. For any of you who aren't familiar with what it takes to be a missionary, it's incredibly challenging. We pay our own way to serve somewhere not of our choosing for two years. We don't hold a job, date, go to school or anything else during that time. We write home every week and talk to our folks on Christmas and Mother's Day. Father's Day gets the boot for some reason. We have to cook for ourselves, do our own laundry, keep schedules, be able to ride a bike through the rain in a suit and everything else. We want our boys to be prepared...

Scene shift: Family night. We told the boys that we were going to have missionary olympics and came up with 12 different events to compete in. The boys split up into companionships and rolled a set of dice to determine what events they would have to compete in. Hilarity ensued. The first event was the "Eat Something New and Say 'Thank You'" event. The something new? Cottage Cheese. Now all the boys had to do was eat a very small bowl of the stuff. The timer kept track of how long it took them too finish and say "thank you". Here's how it went:

Josh and Parker were the competing missionaries. They both sat down and I shouted, "GO!" Each boy shoved a spoonful of Cottage Cheese in his mouth and as though they had practiced for months, each boy spit their something new all over the table, cursing, gagging, spitting, and fighting for the first chance at the sink for a glass of water. Results? Absolute and complete failure. How on earth is anyone supposed to feed them when they reenact the longest death scene in movie history every time they don't like something?

Another event dealt with precision bike riding through 10 cones that were set up in the road. The boys had to ride through them, ring the end cone and come back. Well, everything was set up and Parker was about to test his mettle when from down the street came the UPS man. (insert dramatic musical tags here). All the boys cleared the road but the driver, seeing orange cones in the road must have felt that he was being tested and commenced trying to navigate the cones, pumping his fist in the air as he rambled by. I'm sure a bunch of people wondered why their stuff was all broken the next day. :)The boys ended up doing great riding their bikes while Marcus rode his official missionary wiggle racer.

Other events included writing a letter and mailing it, writing out a check, putting on a suit the fastest, packing a suitcase, and making up a one minute church talk based on an object they pulled out of a hat. They had a great time and Neish and I will pray that they never have to eat Cottage Cheese.

Well that's the news that's fit to print so until next time, wear a winning smile. It makes people wonder what you're thinking.

Love, the Johnsons

Parental Bribery and a Lesson in Honesty

Man I love that title! No better way to start off a post than a healthy dose of conflicting values! So to start, let me be honest: There is no excuse for the deplorable laziness in my posting. I could say that in addition to work I'm back in grad school and coaching two competition soccer league teams but that would be an excuse. A good one, but still. I'm just saying. :)

Let's start with the soccer. One night over too much pizza and rootbeer I got talking with Neisha and some friends about how there isn't any soccer for our middle school kids and that that was probably the reason our high school soccer team was lousy. One thing led to another and I found myself along with 3 other dads holding tryouts for the first ever Page competition soccer league. What was I thinking!? To adequately describe my feelings about this realization let me use a comparison. Imagine, if you will, jumping off the golden gate bridge holding an umbrella because you saw someone do it once on youtube and thought "I could totally do that! That's easy!" And then, after leaving the safety of the bridge you have a moment of pure revelation. A moment when the world and the meaning of life is absolutely clear and you say, "I'm not sure this was such a good idea." that about sums up how I feel. The kids are really great though and they have even won a few games in the So. Utah RCL League. Josh is playing on one team and is really loving the game. Everyone still calls him Weasel and he's kind of become a rallying point for the team. Good times.

Now onto jusiness! (pronounced: weezness. Spanish for 'Business' I think). Right now Alex and Marcus the Amazing are cleaning their room in record time and they are laughing and having fun. Impossible you say? Well, not when you use the power of parental bribery! Some of you may not agree with this tactic. If so, you either don't have children or you have only one child or your children don't possess the psychic power of telekinesis in which they can just walk into a room, raise their arms and have everything they own suddenly fly onto the floor all by themselves. My kids have this power. Just ask them.
"Alex, how did your room get like this? It's destroyed! I just cleaned it 5 minutes ago!"
"I don't know mom, all my stuff just got on the floor by itself."
Bingo. Anyway, if you're like me once in a while you just get tired of the pleadings, the demands, the consequences, the threats of 3rd world slavery and you bribe your kids. The bribe? I hid a handful of change in their room throughout the mess and told them so. 10 minutes later, clean room. No fuss, no muss. Currently Marcus is "fsssshh"-ing around the house in his batman costume. He also ran up to me and looked me in the eye and yelled, "BURN!" Either he is referring to Superman's ability to melt things with lazer eyes or else he's practicing his power of pyrokinesis (see above). I think my forehead feels warm.

One last mentionable. We always do our best to teach the kids honesty in everything they do and the other night my 8 year old Alex took a huge step toward becoming a man. Now I don't share this so that anyone will think us great parents because we make all the same mistakes as anyone else. I share this because someday Alex will read it and I want him to remember how proud I am of him. We have a rule that if someone hurts you and you get really angry about it and retaliate out of anger that you spend the rest of your day in your room. Kind of harsh but an important lesson to learn given the lack of adults who can actually do this. Anyway, I'm in the kitchen when I hear Alex yell "Ow Marcus!" and then a moment later hear Marcus begin wailing. Alex came out to the kitchen and here is the conversation as close as I can remember it:
Alex: "Marcus pulled my hair"
Dad: "I'm sorry. I'll bet that hurt. Is that why Marcus is crying?"
"I kind of freaked out."
"What did you do?"
"I picked him up and threw him on the bed."
"Was Marcus angry when he pulled your hair?"
"No."
"Were you angry when you threw him down?"
- Now here was the critical moment. He knows the consequence for retaliation in anger. He could lie and say that he was just wrestling and I would have believed him. He hates to be stuck in his room. I watched his little shoulders slump and he started to cry a little bit and then finally, in a barely audible voice he said, "yeah I guess so."

It was my turn to cry then. I couldn't help it. He chose to be honest when choosing it was most difficult. It was enough for me. I got down next to him looked him in the eye and said, "Alex you know the consequence for this don't you?" He nodded, crying. "Well, you were honest anyway. You could have lied but you didn't. You did what needed to be done and that is what it means to be a man. I think we're square on this one." After he left I sat by myself for a while awestruck at how much I still have to learn from my kids.

Well that's all the news that's fit to print so until next time remember that life only comes around once. Make the most of it.

Love, The Johnsons

Have Presents Will Travel

Happy Bonehead Holidays!

It's almost here. Christmas. What a wonderful time of year! In true Johnson style we didn't send out any Christmas cards this year, so if you didn't get one don't feel rejected. In fact, most of the people that read this didn't send us one either so don't feel guilty. :)

Life at the Bonehead Ranch is still as exciting as ever. School is out and the kids have taken a page from the union thugs and gone on strike, refusing to do work. Maybe we'll do the same thing and when they wonder where dinner is, we'll say that we're on strike. That should end negotiations quite amiably.

This year we're traveling to Neisha's parents' house for Christmas, which requires us to take our presents so the kid have something to open while there. Ok, let's do a little bit-o-math here:

2 Parents + 4 children + 4 or 5 presents each + luggage for 5 days + one minivan = interesting. Now I'm not the world's greatest packing expert but I'm fairly adept at making things work and I'm thinking to myself "Self, why?" "How?" "Who am I trying to kid?" We don't even have one of those roof rack containers! After mulling it over for a week, I've decided to first place the children in their seats and hook up the catheters. Second, put in the luggage. 3rd, pack the presents. In the event we actually had to stop, the children would have to be level 4 yoga masters to be able to get out. We'll try to take some pix of the event and post them here.

The other little bit of news is the Christmas village. It took me longer than expected to make it but here are a few shots. Merry Christmas everyone!

Love, Team Johnson

"NO" Prayers and Scary Moments in Parenting

It is time to continue this month's theme and what better way to do it than to remember a few of our more scary parenting moments!

But first, news from the parenting front... Marcus aka The Opinionator is learning to pray. I think. You see, most normal (emphasis there) 2-3 year olds are learning to speak and will copy everything you say, which makes teaching a child to pray very easy. Well here's how it goes:
"Ok Marcus, say 'Dear Heavenly Father'"
"No!"
"Say 'Thank you for my family'"
"No!"
"Say 'Please help me to sleep well'"
"No!"
"Say 'I say these things'"
"No!"
"In the name'"
"No!"
"Of Jesus Christ"
"No!"
"Amen."
"Amen!"

What the? Sometimes if I'm whispering to him what to say he will also whisper "No", which I suppose is at least a little bit respectful to God. Oh well. This comes from the same child who quotes Mr. T on a regular basis. Thanks for that A-Team DVD mom!

And now a look back in time to two of our more scary moments in parenting...

One night in 2004 I came home from work and discovered two of my children in their room sulking. This would be Parker and Alex. Parker’s favorite line is "Hey Alex I got an idea." Alex’s favorite line is "Cool!." Invariably this leads to bad things. I asked them what they had done and Parker said, "We were having fun with the toothpaste." Oh boy. Walking quietly, I reached my bedroom door and listened. I heard my wife mumbling something about our boys having the brains God gave a duck. Glad that it wasn’t me she was upset with I opened the door and saw her on the floor with a towel scrubbing at a small patch of blue on the carpet. I asked, "What's up?" She promptly handed me a towel and told me to watch where I step. Sporting a genuinely bewildered look on my face I thought, "What does she mean by that?" and then when I saw what she meant. I wished I hadn’t.
Our bedroom, our place of sanctuary had become a mural entitled, "Ode to Crest, Bubblegum flavor." It looked like they had climbed up and attached tubes of toothpaste to the blades of the ceiling fan and then turned it on "Hurricane."
Everything I looked at had fallen victim to the toothpaste bandits. My bed, the walls, curtains, dressers, computer, floor, closet, lamp, you name it and it had become blue. My wife informed me that they had only been alone for 2 minutes. I honestly did not know this kind of stuff was possible. In a matter of an hour we learned to hate the smell of bubblegum flavored Crest. The boys apologized and promised never to use toothpaste again. Super.

Back in the year 2000 we learned an important lesson: kids and cat litter are a bad combo. It was a fine day and our son was playing with his friend. We were all enjoying a nice lunch when we heard him yell, "It's raining! Whee!!" followed by what sounded curiously like, well, rain. Both of us looked at each other with that "I don't recognize that sound, do you?" sort of look. Just then we heard it again, "It's raining, whee!" and then the sound of falling rain. We knew two things at that point: One, it wasn't raining. Two, we were inside. Not good. Those two thoughts occured simultaneously to us and in one smooth movement we got up from the table and headed toward the bathroom, actually hoping that it was raining. Upon opening the door we discovered that our happy child was indeed in the middle of a rainstorm. A thin coating of Fresh Step mixed with brown hail lay everywhere. I said, "Oh crap." I couldn't resist. Well, I spent my lunch hour vacuuming and our son spent his lunch hour in the tub.

That's about it from the desk here at Bonehead Central so until next time, keep your toothpaste locked up and buy a fish.

Horror Survival Tips and Musical Marcus

Now that you've all survived the first installment of our tribute to the greatest holiday ever, I'd like to present for your spine-tingling pleasure a list of tips I've accumulated over the years of watching quality entertainment which, I am sure will help you survive any number of catastrophes including zombie invasions, cataclysmic meteor collisions, giant spiders (or ants, scorpions, roaches or women), hostile alien takeovers, having your brain harvested by a mad scientist or having the IRS audit your tax returns. But first, a little news...

Marcus is a real favorite around the house. He can always be found helping someone do something, or else climbing into the cupboards to drink Ovaltine mix. Night time is another story. Usually he just can't be found. It's a very odd thing to put your son in bed and then check on him later only to find that he's disappeared. This happens several times a week. Keeping in the spirit of Halloween it's possible he's being occasionally abducted by aliens or perhaps his bed happens to sit on a couple of intersecting ley lines and he gets transported to other parts of the house. Either way, we have to go looking for him and usually find that he has magically reappeared in someone else's bed. Occasionally we find him on the couch. Or in our bed. Or in the cupboard drinking Ovaltine mix. He's sort of like musical chairs except the chair keeps moving to a new location. Always an adventure, that one.

Now on to the heart of the post. You all know that many, many innocent people have met their demise in scary movies. What you may not know is that had those people been in possession of my little suvival guide, they might have survived to scream another scream. So without further delay here are my Horror Survival Tips. Don't be caught dead without them.

1. If you live near a field move away. 9 out of 10 alien abductions/invasions/crop circles occur in them. It might also be helpful to have a dog. Be warned however that your dog will either be eaten or vaporized. Best to get a cheap dog.

2. Never inspect a fallen meteor site. Especially if a gooey substance is oozing out of it. And really especially if that gooey substance eats your girlfriend. If you are trying to get your girlfriend eaten by a gooey substance, inspecting a fallen meteor site is not a good option because it will most likely eat you as well. And your dog.

3. Avoid fog at all costs. It may turn you inside out. It was also responsible for nearly 6000 automobile related accidents between 1981-1989 according to the NTSB. Also, 38% of motorcycle related fatalities are caused by fogging eyewear. Fog. The new evil.

4. Aliens always speak monotone english. Therefore to survive an alien invasion you should practice speaking in monotone using as little facial expression and emotion as possible. If you're having trouble with this, work with a tax accountant or CPA. *Note: Aliens try to "fit in" as much as possible before destroying earth and therefore are most likely to BE a tax accountant or CPA. If you are worried that you are talking to an alien, or that your friend, spouse, or mother-in-law might be an alien, look at their ears. They always forget to disguise them. Those wacky aliens.

5. Farmers are usually the first people to die. Right after their dogs. Sadly this is true. Farmers are a curious breed of homo-sapien. They love guns and dogs, and usually have a grudge against would be trespassers. This is a bad combo when staring into the face of a huge insect. If you are a farmer and your dog starts barking wildly only to suddenly yelp and then remain eerily silent. Send out another dog. Just to check. If it happens again, leave.

6. Atomic energy makes things grow really big. The Amazing Collossal Man and the Attack of the 50ft Woman are not fictional. They used to be a happily married couple on holiday until they went to inspect a fallen meteor site and decided to walk through the green cloud of fog and touch the oozing gooey substance. Sigh.

7. If you are using atomic energy to grow insects as a scientist, inevitably you will get into a fight with a collegue and break the glass windows, behind which lay the atomic energy injected insects. These insects will get very big and eat cattle. If, as a farmer you take your gun and go to find out why your cattle suddenly stopped mooing and discover a pile of bones covered with webbing, please don't follow the trail of webbing back to a dark cave. It's pretty obvious that it's a big spider. Trust me.

8. Atomically enhanced insects/spiders like cattle even more than they like dogs. But dogs still make a good snack. See note #1

9. Never, EVER poke the dead monster. This is a monsters' favorite trick. They learn it in monster school, usually as a child. The game is called, "Dead Monster" amazingly enough.

10. Women scream bloody murder at the sight of zombies, but are amazingly calm when they find out that their mad scientist husband digs up corpses to create said zombies. Although a common phenomenon, this is not healthy. A ground breaking new book entitled, "Mad Scientists and the Women Who Love Them" is a good place to start for those wishing to find tranquility.

11. Don't imprison your monster behind a door with a small, barred window in it because if you do, you will be choked to death when feeding it dinner. Plexiglass, electric fences, and pictures of Oprah Winfrey are good substitutes for monster imprisonment. Many Mad Scientists now lie 6ft under because they did not heed this simple safety precaution. As an interesting side note, many zombies are actually reanimated Mad Scientists which would explain the natural proclivity toward brains. Perhaps the reason women scream bloody murder at the sight of zombies is because they realize they used to be in love with them. Before they were a zombie.

12. The Army and the Air Force always have just the right invention to deal with aliens. If not, give them 20 minutes. This is a failsafe. When the military is nearby you're always covered. It is a good thing to keep the personal number of a General or two on your cell phone speed dial.

And finally, When someone says to you "You're not afraid of a little egyptian tomb, are ya?" Tell them "Yes" and get the heck out of there. This famous last line ranks right up there with, "I think it's dead. Go poke it to make sure." Please reference #9

That's all I can do. Now it's up to you to survive.

The Law

I have recently discovered a new Law. The impact this law has is enormous and should be considered in the same realm as the laws of physics and gravity. If you have children you will undoubtedly be effected by this law though you may not know that it has a name.

The law I'm referring to is the Law of Diminishing Utencils. In order to understand how this law works, let me explain first Johnson's First Law of Excessive Utencil Usage which states: A child will use utencils in direct porportion to the number of utencils owned multipled by 5. Allow me to explain...

You buy utencils enough to service 12 people. That's 12 spoons, 12 larger spoons, 12 forks, 12 larger forks, and 12 knives, plus 12 bowls, and 12 plates. That's 84 pieces of serving hardware. Right. Add to that enough cups to serve 23 people and you have 107 total pieces of serving hardware. Now, add to the equation 4 children. Given the current number of serving pieces, that's 29.75pieces of silverware/cups/plates etc. per child. A parent with children will tell you that 26.75 pieces of silverware/cups/plates per child is not enough. Why?

I once did an experiment at my house to determine the answer to that question. At 8am all the silverware was in the drawer and all the cups and bowls, etc. were in the cupboard. (this was when we had 83 pieces of silverware, more on that later). For Breakfast, the kids all ate cereal. Normally this would be 4 spoons, 4 bowls, 4 cups right? Wrong. Marcus used two spoons and the other kids didn't use their spoons at all but threw them in the sink anyway so technically that counted as being used. Then they all went for seconds, but realizing they had already put their bowls and spoons and cups in the sink got more. Add to that 1 more cup. 4 to be used for milk, and one more for Parker who doesn't like to mix milk and water. Breakfast total: 26.

Between 8 and 12, another 9 cups went in the sink because each child got two drinks and Parker had 3: 2 waters, one milk. Lunch time brought out 5 plates, 4 forks, and 4 cups. Marcus knocked his first plate on the ground. Snack/Lunch Total: 23

At some point between 12 and 5pm the last 5 cups got used along with 6 "other" cups. At our house, "other" could mean mugs, thermos's, bowls, funnels, jars, anything that can hold liquid. 8 more plates were used because they all ate chicken nuggets at snack time and chips, and then had more plates later when they wanted more nuggets. Can't use the old one cause it's dirty right?

And finally at dinner time at another 4 of everything. By this time the dishwasher was done so the boys happily used another 6 or 7 cups getting drinks of water (and milk) before bed. Evening Totals: 46

Grand Total: 95

"But wait!" you say. "95 is less than 107. That should be enough." Ah, but you forget my young padowan, the Law of Diminishing Utencils! This law states: The amount of utencils owned will decrease at an increased rate in correlation to the number of children living in the home. We have 4. That means that on any given day, we will lose 13 pieces utencils. For example, yesterday I loaded the dishwasher with nearly 20 forks. After they were clean, I put them back into the drawer. All 20 of them (remember that number). A few hours later I wanted a fork, opened the drawer and there were two forks. Just two. I looked in the sink. No forks. I looked in the dishwasher. No forks. I asked my 4 children, "Have you guys used any forks?" This is what they said:
Josh: "Parker used some."
Parker: "No I didn't! You did!"
Josh: "No I didn't Parker, you used one to stab ants."
Parker "That was Alex!"
Alex: "It was not, it was a beetle."
Josh: "Well Parker still used some"
Parker: "Yeah, to eat chicken nuggets"
Marcus: "I like forks! Can I have skittles?"

It kind of deteriorated form there so I left the room and continued my search. I did manage to find some here and there and by the end of the day we managed to scrape enough together to have dinner. So the morale of this story is to remember to support the Global Warming movement and buy lots of paper plates and plastic utencils.

Two Vacations and It's All in the Attitude

A very stiff and sore "hello" from Bonehead Land! Why am I stiff and sore? Because we've spent the last two days on Lake Powell with Scott "Sharky", his wunderclan, and his boat the Chum Bucket. We had a lot of fun. Hopefully pics will follow. Josh, Neisha, and I all learned how to wakeboard and Josh and I learned what a rug must feel like when you beat it with a stick. Allow me to Elucidate.

Scott bought a tube and told us "this boat really makes a great wake for tubing. I can even fill up some ballast tanks on board to make it bigger!" Well, who can ignore that kind of boyish glee? Not us for sure so out we went in turns, like little sheep fish to the slaughter. Scott starts going around in circles creating waves that would sink a battleship, and then, just when Josh or I was behind one of his Tscott Tsunami's he turned the boat straight and gunned it, effectively launching us straight up in the air. Here's the fun part: Gravity. As we came down we landed on another upwards traveling wave. Smack! Repeat ad nauseum. Literally. Kristen and Christopher also took a sound beating and Kristen took the height record, performing a twisted gainer with a face plant. Cliff Diving was great too, except for all the kids making fun of me for being scared of heights. Not cool.

Our other little vacation was to the Grand Canyon, big hole of the west. Mark and his clan came down and spent a couple of days here. The canyon was really beautiful except (Mark decided) it must have been half off for stinky people day. He was right! It was like being down wind of a turkey farm, a pig farm, a cow farm, and a used diaper heap all in one! Lot of French people there too...

Well anyway, we took a lot of pics and had a great time. On the way home we got stuck behind an accident which kept us stuck for two hours, but in true Johnson style we all got out and played catch. It was really great to see them.

In other news, Parker has once again shown us the power of a good attitude. Tonight we had pizza for dinner and it was awful. Truly some of the worst we've ever had. And as everyone started complaining about it Parker piped up and said, "Well, we can at least be grateful that it's food and not poop," and the laughter that followed more than made up for the pizza.

That's about it from the desk here at Bonehead central, so until next time be grateful for food. It could be worse.

The PTG and the Crux of Therapy

Well, it's been a great few weeks here at the Bonehead Farm. We recently went to the DCI performance in Ogden, UT and for those of you not familiar with it I've included a link to a video you can watch. The boys were mesmerized for nearly 3 hours and I think it's safe to say that they all want to play brass or percussion instruments. Marcus especially liked the performances and vomited profuse amounts of praise. Ahem.

Speaking of Marcus, he has learned how to be polite when saying "No" (which happens a lot). Now, instead of just yelling "NO!" he yells, "No Sir!" Well, it ain't perfect but what're ya gonna do? He is learning new words everyday. Yesterday's word was "Tremendous." I took a big bite of apple in front of him and he yelled "Wow! That was tremendous!" Not sure where he learned it, but ok we can deal with that. Marcus has also entered the PTG, that mystical path which a young man must travel before reaching the noble position of "big boy" at the Johnson house. The PTG, or Potty Training Gauntlet has always held a place of trepidation and anxiety at our house and now that we're in it, there's no going back. Ugh. Thankfully he's learning fast although he hasn't quite figured out what to do with poo when it comes around. Usually he'll come and ask us which, as you might guess is the makings for a fecal fiasco.

The other boys are doing great as you can see from the pix. They are enjoying every last second of summer on the trampoline and digging in our huge pile of dirt which they have named "Skull Mountain" after digging a couple of holes in one side that eerily resemble a real skeleton head. BTW, how much dirt do you put in a grave? A skele-ton. Get it? I made that up last night.

The last part of today's title deals with what I do. You learn in grad school many of the intricate processes that combine to create change in a persons' life. A person comes in at a point of conflict in their life and our job is to help them get past it, to make the needed change in order to have a more fulfilling future. In layman's terms we sell change. But the path is sometimes delicate and hard to follow. There are times when it isn't clear where to go or what to say. Therefore I have included this short video from Bob Newhart that demonstrates in a clear manner what so many therapists long to say to their clients. Follow the link here: http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYLMTvxOaeE

And that is the news from Bonehead Central so until next time, keep smiling. People will wonder what you're up to.

Learning From Experience

Mark Twain once said, "Only take from an experience what value there is in it. A cat who sits on a hot stove will never sit on a hot stove again. But he won't sit on a cold one either." So here is the situation: 3 of my children-Larry, Curly, and Moe went swimming at the local pool. It is about two miles away from our home. Neisha said, "I'll pick you up here at 2pm." At 1:30 they decide they are tired of swimming and figure they'll just walk home. No problem, except they have one pair of shoes between the 3 of them. So off they go down the road in 90 degree weather. They discovered two very important things: First, that the sun makes cement very hot. Second, that it is a lot further to walk somewhere than to drive. By the time we found them Josh was carrying Alex and Parker was walking on his tip toes and all of them had blisters on their feet. Poor kids. 

That was the hot stove. Lesson learned, right? Wrong. Not a week later two boys, whose names shall remain un-named (ahem) go to the pool and were told, "DO NOT LEAVE THE POOL UNTIL I COME GET YOU AT 2pm. IT IS NOW 1pm." That is some pretty clear communication. So at 1:40 the two un-named boys leave the pool and come to my office. But they don't come IN to the office they just stand outside in the parking lot and hop up and down on one foot because it is very hot outside and they are sharing one pair of shoes. sigh. 

What would Mark Twain say about those two I wonder? 

In the home front news, we finished putting the trampoline into the ground and finished putting a sprinkler system in the front yard. We've built a deck, stained it, and have more big plans in store. I have to thank Doug for helping me make sense of deck plans and for taking time out of his weekend to boil out in the sun while I learned how to aim a nail gun. And I have to thank my own Dad for helping me make sense of electricity when it came to wiring the sprinkling system. Dads are the greatest thing in the world. Anyone who is reading this should go right out and purchase their father a gift card to the Home Depot or Lowes. :)

Well that's the latest update from the desk here at Bonehead Central so until next time keep your shoes on. 

Sayon-aura and the Mud Brothers

Once again, hello to all of our Bonehead Readers across the land of the free, and the home of the extremely dirty Johnson boys who have decided that since we don't have a pool, having dirt to swim in is the next best thing. It was so great to hear them: "Hey Parker, let's go roll in the dirt!"
"Yeah, let's get the dirtiest of all."
"I can dirtier than that!"
"No way! I can put dirt in my hair!"
"Cool! I want to try!"

I've included a pic to prove this. And yes, it is true that our home is still mostly dirt outside but that is quickly changing. We've started putting in a sprinkling system and will be putting in sod within the month.

In other house news, Neisha has tackled the building of a block wall around the in-ground trampoline and is having a lot of fun with it. She's doing a fine job of it too. Check out the pic!

And now for a little check-in with the Johnson Boys...

Josh continues to amaze us with his love for life and his ability to achieve. He received the Presidential Fitness award in school, the only one in his class. This means that he needed to be above the 85% in all of the categories. He even ran a 6 minute mile! He also qualified for the gifted program at the middle school and is participating in a special summer school program for those kids. Weird. He put summer school and excited in the same sentence.

Parker has been enjoying quite a bit of sports related success too. He won the National Fitness award and was one of just a handful of kids who did it. And he's had a great time playing baseball and in fact his team took first place in his bracket and they all got a big trophy. He also participated in field day for his school. He was a part of a four-man 400 meter relay. Out of 20 teams his took first and Parker was very instrumental in that win by running the first leg faster than anyone else.
After the race they received 1st place ribbons and as Parker got on the bus to go back to school he (in total humility) waggled his ribbon back and forth and said, "Who wants to sit by me?" Later he told me, "Five girls raised their hand, Dad. And Taylor, she raised her hand but she didn't get to sit by me. But Alexa, she raised her hand and she got to sit by me." What a kid.
One other Parkerism: The other day Neisha got in the car to go to church and when he smelled her perfume he said, "Mom what are you wearing?"
"It's just my natural aura," she replied.
"Well then wear less of it," he said.

Alex is just enjoying the heck out of life. He and I recently went to Indiana for a week and while there he got to go the Indianapolis Speedway to watch the Indy 500 cars run their qualifying laps, and get REALLY close to a lion at the Indianapolis Zoo. And what did he say to the lion?
"Here Lion lion. Come and eat me, I've got a nice fresh leg here for you. And look at this nice head, lots of tasty meat. C'mon Mr. Lion, I've got ketchup and mustard and everything! Look at that nice arm!" I have the video. The people around us just stared at him. Then they stared at me. I laughed and I'm sure they thought I was a very sick parent.

Marcus is still a wonderfully independent and capable little guy, and sometimes as weird as a three-dollar bill. Last night when I went in to tell him goodnight he reached up and pulled my head down onto his chest in a hug. It was very cute. After a couple of minutes of total silence, I felt his little hand reach down, grab my nose a little bit, and then I hear "munch munch munch." He ate my nose! We weren't even playing a game. The things that go on inside his head, I tell you.

Well, that's about it for this edition so until next time, keep your hose handy.

Home Run

Well, it's nearly complete. All that's left is to put up a wall around the house and we're golden. Here are the latest batch of pics. If you take a look, you'll see a before and after shot of the land. Pretty neat..

The Law of New Carpet

There is a law irrevocably decreed before Heaven which states: Within a week of purchasing new carpet, your children will destroy it. Amen.

Truly we were hoping that we had somehow escaped the wrath of the carpet gods which take great delight in orchestrating the downfall of newly installed carpets all across the country. But no. Not us. We are Johnsons which translates into "Ruin the heck out of it!" if you happen to be a carpet god. Now the powers that be cannot ruin the carpet on their own so they usually contract with smallish type children to do the actual dirty work. Enter Marcus. 

Marcus is just starting to get curious and is pretty strong for his size and likes to carry things around the house (Note: those three things are very bad if they occur in the same sentence). So yesterday morning as my wife was sleeping peacefully, Marcus Curious spied the large syrup refill bottle and decided that it would be fun to carry it around for a while. After reaching his bedroom he began to get curious about whether or not he could open it. The answer to that question, unfortunately was yes. I believe it was about here that the carpet gods put the thought into his mind to do a quick gravity check on the syrup. Sigh. Then, with the carpet covered with a quart of syrup the carpet gods suggested to Marcus's mind that it might be fun to sort of throw the syrup around the room as though he were tied to a mechanical bull. I'm so glad I wasn't home. 

Later that day, after the syrup had been cleaned and the smell of maple syrup no longer hung in the air like a thick fog, the carpet gods suggested to Marcus that shampoo would be a much better thing to pour on carpet because it is pink and bubbly. 

Suffice it to say, Marcus is still alive albeit barely and the carpet--well, the carpet is not new anymore. The carpet gods have once again succeeded in their duty. As for the rest of us, Alex is enjoying baseball, Josh is learning about ebay, and Parker is enjoying stumping around with one leg stuck into a thick, cardboard poster tube. He calls it his "wooden-leg named 'Smith'". 

That's all the news from the desk here at Bonehead Central, so until next time consider tile. 

Dad Wisdom and Boogers

Shoot, with a title like that I can't go wrong! I have come to the conclusion that disgusting as they may be, boogers attract an awful lot of attention. I suppose you can make them sound less gross by calling them "bogeys" like some little wizard children, or you could make the whole matter worse by calling them "nose poops" like bad little wizard children. Either way, they're here to stay and tonight at the Johnson household is no exception.
Enter Marcus, our extremely-independent-in-an-obnoxious-sort-of-way 2 year old. We were resting after a great game of tickle monster, in which mom or dad chase down screaming children, tickle them, then throw them in jail. Anyway, Marcus sticks his finger in his nose, pulls out a bogey and offers it to me. "No thanks" I say, "I don't want it." So without another word he put it back into his nose. Well you know what they say; "One in the nose is worth two on the floor". Or something like that.
The other bit of news comes from a couple conversations I've had with my kids in the past. As all parents know, kids ask a lot of questions. And more often than not, the answer is far more complicated than we'd care to discuss. It is this quandry that gives men the inspiration to fabricate some of the greatest answers of all time, or as I like to put it: Dad Wisdom. I have two that I will share with you and invite you to send me some of your best wisdom too. The first comes out of a conversation I had with Alex a couple of years ago when he asked the question: "Why don't people just bury dead people in their backyards?" Well the answer would have been quite complicated. How do you explain Cemetary's and respect, and a quiet place of honor and reflection and all that mimble wimble? So I said "Because it would be too hard to put in a sprinkler system with all those dead people in the way." Perfect sense. The other happened with Parker and to be honest I don't even remember saying it but the fact that he did makes it even better. He reminded me that once upon a time he'd asked me how I got nose hair. I didn't remember. "And then", he said "you said that one time you sneaked up to a cow and sniffed really hard and the hair came off the cow and got stuck there." Wow. I don't remember saying that but I sure hope I did. That's a great one!
That's about it from the desk here at Bonehead Central so until next time, be wise.

Introduction

As I looked up the definition to “Bonehead” I was struck by the fact that the word showed up in 1909. I’ve done a fair amount of family ancestry and I’ve never found anyone in my line that knew Webster. Guess I’ll have to check into my wife’s line. In any case, coming up with a title for this book took some thinking. And as you can see, it didn’t take very much.
The Bonehead News started out in 1999 as a family newsletter, outlining life in the great state of New Hampshire. From there it just sort of morphed into a compilation of weirdness that chronicles the life of two parents raising four aliens and trying to pretend that we are normal when we go out to eat.
Seriously, being a parent has been the greatest joy of my life. It has been wisely said that the most important work we will ever do will be within the walls of our own homes, and that has proven to be true over and over again. It is especially true when your children discover where mommy hides her lipstick and they paint pictures for you on the walls and on the baby, who, after being assailed by “Mocha Freeze” and “Raisin Berry” looks like some sort of freaky circus leprechaun. I’m not exactly sure that’s what President Lee meant but hey; when you’re right you’re right.
Being a parent is hard work. When my wife and I got married in 1995 we had no idea how much work went in to being a parent, nor did we know the joy that children could bring to our lives. I can honestly say that my greatest happiness has come from hearing the word “Dad”. Whether it’s “Dad will you read me a story?” or “Dad do you want to play a game with me” or “Dad do you want to go to the store and get candy?” I never tire of hearing that word. I know there will come a time when my kids will be embarrassed to admit that they’re related to me so I want to make sure that I never turn down an opportunity to be with them while they are young. That’s not to say that I don’t feel other things when I hear the word “Dad”. For instance, when I hear “Dad, Marcus (the baby) is throwing cat litter again”, I feel panicked and when I hear “Dad remember that nice cabinet that you built for mom?” I feel a sudden spike of father angst. Sometimes my kids play jokes on me, just to see what I’ll do. They think its great fun. Like the time they came running around the side of the house yelling to me that someone had thrown a baseball at our van and cracked the windshield. They watched me take off running full tilt toward the front of the house with absolute glee. Once I saw the fake baseball stuck to the windshield I knew I’d been shanghaied and my 5 year old said, “Wow Dad, you run really fast.” That day I felt angry. And I felt that someday revenge would be mine… (Insert evil laugh here)
What follows is not a story, nor is it book of sagely advice from a wizened father unless you’d consider “Lessons I’ve learned from scary movies” or “Feeding your baby is like chasing a greased pig” sagely. No, It is simply a collection of tales about my unusual family and the importance of having fun with life.