Thursday night.

In the contest for "Busiest Night of the Week," Thursday night comes in at a close second, behind Wednesday night (belles night), of course.  And it is only second because we're only busy two Thursdays each month, though if we entered our Thursday Night Activities into the Gasconade County Fair, I think we would definitely get blue ribbons.  When we were little, we used to go visit Grammy and Papa every summer and they would take us to the Gasconade County Fair.  Grammy was always in charge of the quilt judging, so we all had to go help her set up all the quilts.  Even though we didn't live in Gasconade County, we always baked cookies or a cake or drew a picture to enter into the fair.  If you win, you got a ribbon and money! Papa always enters his vegetables from the garden and sometimes some canned goods. He's a good gardener. The other day I came home and he told me: "I planted you your favorite foods in the garden out there. Broccoli and potatoes." Then he said that I can be the weeder, but I told him that Rachel is better at that, so she can have that job. 

There are also lots of carnival rides at the fair, but I stopped riding them when Logan, Rachel, and I were on a particularly spinning ride and this kid threw up right in front of us and then just kept riding rides. We refer to him as Barf Boy.  My favorite part of the fair, however, is the bunny show!  One time my friend Abby came down to go to the fair and Grammy bought us a bunny. It was black and white and we named it Rosco. But it died. Another year, she bought me a floppy eared bunny and I named him Opie, but he also died. Actually, I've had 4 bunnies and they all died tragic deaths:

1) Babs. I got Babs when I was in elementary school. She was really small and looked like a Siamese bunny. All was great, until one day, she turned evil. And by evil, I mean that whenever I tried to pick her up, she would hiss at me and attack my hands.  Mom taught middle school at the time, so she took Babs to her classroom in hopes that being around people would make her nicer. It didn't. Anyway, she got a parasite and died.

2) Clover. Rachel and I both got bunnies one Easter. Clover was black and white and was so soft it felt like you were touching air.  One summer we went on vacation and when I came home, my brother, Andy, ran to a spot in the yard and told me not to look and just go inside. Obviously I looked, and Clover had been attacked by a dog. I'm scarred for life.

3) Rosco. Like I said, we got Rosco at the fair, and the thing about fair bunnies is they are pure-bred, which means they have lots of genetic diseases. One day, about three months after I got her, I walked down to see Rosco and she was just dead.

4) Opie. Once again, another fair bunny. I was holding Opie one day, when he all of a sudden went paralyzed. It was very tragic. Then he died.

Needless to say, I haven't had a bunny since.

Anyway, back to our Thursday nights.

The first Thursday of the month: The first Thursday of the month is community dinner at church. Basically, one group at church (Belles, Dorcas, Odds and Evens, church council etc) cooks dinner for anyone in the community that wants to come.  Usually we have spaghetti, salad, and homemade pies and cakes, aka the best part.  When Grammy's group, Dorcas, did the dinner, they made chicken and dumplings and it was a HIT. They even ran out of food. It is still a topic of excitement amongst the church ladies.  Dorcas was very proud of themselves, even though their name makes me laugh every time I hear it. Sure, Dorcas was a great Christian woman who was raised from the dead by Peter, but every time I hear that name, I remember how my siblings and I used to call each other "dorcas" when we were fighting.  Basically, we led a pretty sheltered childhood. When I told Mom how weird our childhood was, she just said: "I thought all families were going to museums, watching PBS, and practicing SAT flashcards on road trips!" She was wrong. There were also lots of words we weren't allowed to say; a few were:

-Butt (we had to say "bottom")

-Pee (we had to say "tinkle")

-Idiot (one time Rachel called Logan an idiot and Mom sent her to her room)

-Shut up (we had to say "be quiet")

-Stupid

-Hate (Dad always said: "Hate is a very strong word.")

-Jerk

Luckily, Mom never caught the fact that we used "dorcas" as a derogatory statement.

The second Thursday of the month: On the second Thursday of the month, Papa has Lion's club.  Since he eats dinner at the meeting, he usually just comes into the kitchen and watches Grammy and I cook, commenting on how he would do things.  The other night we had frozen pizza for dinner, so Papa stood in the kitchen and told us how he usually puts extra cheese and toppings on the pizza. We also forgot to set a timer, so Papa paced around the kitchen telling us how we won't know when it will be done if we didn't set a timer.  Luckily, the pizza cooked even though we forgot to time it. On Lion's night, while Grammy and I are eating, Papa stands in the kitchen and tastes everything we made. He always comments on how we did. He liked the pizza last week so he started yelling from the kitchen: "Julie, how do you like this pizza? It's pretty good, isn't it? It's the kind Grammy and I always buy." Before dinner, I was also making muffins for a brunch with some friends the next day and Papa came over and said:

Papa: Are you leaving with those?

Julie: Yup, I'm going far, far away.

Papa: How far?

Julie: I'll make you some, too.

Papa: Well, there are only two of you for dinner tonight, so you can sit in my seat. That way you can look at the flowers.

Julie: Thanks, Papa! I'm honored.

At the dinner table, Grammy sits on one side, facing the window, Papa sits at the head, and I sit with my back to the window. Grammy always tells me we need to re-arrange our seating so I can watch the birds, too. She probably just wants me to help her scare away the greedy black birds. Black birds are easier to scare away than squirrels. Grammy and Papa used to have a lot of squirrels in their backyard, so they got all these squirrel-guard things to keep the squirrels from eating the birdseed, but they didn't work. So, Papa climbed up into the attic and found my uncles' old BB guns. He would sit quietly in the backyard, his BB gun loaded, waiting for his unsuspecting victim. He would sometimes get my little brother and my dad to come down to shoot squirrels with him (keep in mind no one in my family has ever shot anything.) Papa only wanted to scare them away, but one day he shot one and killed it, so he put away his guns for good.