2 Restaurants, 2nd Birthday, 2 Sets of Twins, Basketball's Greatest

We made plans to meet the Sullivan's at the CPK in Encino to celebrate the Princess' 2nd birthday. We got to the restaurant, sat at our table for 10 and ordered drinks. After 20 minutes, no Sullivans and my phone rang.
They asked - Where were we?
We said - We're at the CPK in Encino at our table.
They replied - Well, we're sitting at our table at the CPK in Encino.
We said - No way. What's your cross street?
They said - Reseda.
We said - That's Tarzana.
They said - Oops.
We said - We'll be right there.
And we got back in the car and drove the 3 miles to the CPK in Tarzana.
We sat at our table of 10 (6 kids under 6) and ordered. Then, Dad Sullivan asked Tom if he saw John Wooden and gestured to where Mr. Wooden was sitting.
Tom's eyes flashed and he and Dad Sullivan started talking excitedly.
I asked the obvious question - who's John Wooden.
Much excitement and gesticulating followed - he's the winningest basketball coach ever. He's one of basketball's greatest. Maybe THE greatest. He's written books on leadership and has coached UCLA to more basketball champions than any other coach.
Oh.
As we were waiting for our dessert, Mr. Wooden and his wife rose from their table to leave but before they did so, they came to our table to chat. With 2 sets of twins we generally get some attention when we're together. Dad Sullivan pointed at me and told Mr. Wooden that my family has land out near Purdue and that most of my family went to college there. He smiled and said that was nice. He mostly wanted to talk about the kids - the 2 sets of twins and the lone girl. Then, they said goodbye and made their way to the door. Once they were near the front desk, Tom noticed that they had left their togo container on their table. He sprinted to the table and rushed to the door to catch them, calling out Mr. Wooden! Then, he caught up to them and handed the bag to them and walked back to our table.
Jack asked - Daddy, why'd you run?
Tom replied - Well, he was getting away!

And we laughed and laughed.

Snippets

There's so much and so little going on right now. So much that it's hard to find the time to write regularly (duh, as Dean would say). So little because lately it's the littlest things that have Tom and I keeled over with laughter. Take, for instance, the conversation that took place the other night at dinner. We were talking about how good yogurt is and Tom even went so far as to say it was a special treat. I mentioned that I never got to eat yogurt when I was a little girl at which time Dean looked over at me, patted me on the shoulder and said, "You will Mom. You will."
Or, I could tell you about the other day when we were saying goodbye to some new friends we had made. Another set of twins, boy-girl in this case, and the girl had taken quite a liking to our Dean. As Dean was about to get in the car, she ran up to us to say goodbye. She walked past Jack to Dean, gave him a hug then began to walk away. Jack looked after her and said, "HeLLLoooooo?"
Sometimes, Tom can't even look at me because he's trying to hold it together and, to be honest I don't try to hide my amusement most of the time. It's hard for me to not laugh out loud when Dean is channeling Spongebob. He's got his laugh down pat and has memorized most of the funny lines and will often spout Spongebobisms. When you factor in that he weighs 27 pounds dripping wet and looks like an elf, it's hard to not giggle.
Jack is . . . well, Jack is like a nursery rhyme. I'm thinking of the one in particular - the one about the little girl who had a little curl. It goes like this:

There was a little girl
Who had a little curl
Right in the middle of her forehead.
And when she was good
she was very, very good.
But when she was bad she was horrid.

That's Jack. He loves to help. He wants to help clean, and will often clean up all the toys in the living room without being asked. He loves to put the groceries away. He loves to go to the grocery store with me and will beg for the most expensive pasta sauce and pasta that they have because it will taste so good, so good Mom. He loves mushrooms and freshly grated parmesan cheese, the stinkier the better. He wants to eat oatmeal for breakfast every day, not the quaker instant kind but the old fashioned steel cut oats that could pass for wallpaper paste once cooked. He's getting so big, as he's quick to remind me, and he can run so fast. He desperately wants to be 4 1/2 and, I imagine that once he finally reaches that milestone that he'll question me daily if he's 5 yet. But, don't cross him because then he will shout, "YOU'RE NOT NICE, ___". You can fill in the blank. It's usually me, or Dean or Tom. Now I can almost see my mom nodding as she reads this paragraph because I imagine it reminds her a bit of someone she once knew. The script is somewhat different. If I remember correctly, I used to say, "I'm not going to be your friend". All I'm saying is the kid comes by it honestly.

Yee Haw

The boys rode horses for the first time last weekend. We went up to our friend Tony's house to test his electric fence. He just finished installing it last week and he wanted to test it out before we left Tikka there. Oh. Hadn't I mentioned that? Tony lives on 7 acres out in the boonies. He has an old German Shepherd and has been wanting another dog but hasn't had time to look. Well, Tikka has proven to be too much German Shepherd Dog for us and so we talked to Tony about adopting her. He met her for the first time a month ago and thought she was cool. But, he also lives near a busy road and wants to make sure the electric fence works and that Tikka obeys. We're keeping Tikka for another 6 weeks until Tony is on hiatus and has time to work with her. So, we went to his place last weekend to test the fence. It didn't work and he has to figure out where the break is. He has a couple of old horses so he threw saddles on them and led them around the pasture with the boys on the back. Jack was not a fan but Dean liked it. He even yelled "Yee Haw" a couple times.

Golden

Dean: Golden doesn't like tails.
Me: Who's Golden?

Dean points to his stuffed giraffe.

Tom: You named your giraffe Golden?
Dean: Yeah, that's his name. But his nickname is 69.