Toddler Threat and Aquarium

Our weekends need some guidance. Neither Corey nor I went to the temple last week, so I said he or I or both of us should go today. He seemed a bit stressed by the thought cause he had a lot of work to catch up on after his trip to San Jose. So I decided I would just go. I went to the 11:00 session, and then went by Walmart for bananas on the way home, and I thus left him alone with kids for over three hours. That usually puts him in a grumpy mood. When I got home, I learned that a neighbor had dropped off some ring pops for the kids. But they hadn't done their music practice or cleaned their rooms, so they couldn't have it yet. Daniel wasn't about to take that kind of treatment. He began to threaten and harass Corey. It went on for 20 minutes.

The kids had been literally hanging on him most of the time that I had been gone. He did not like it but was enduring that like a patient father, but when it came to their pestering for candy, he was not giving in. Here are two videos of Daniel's standing up to his father for this unjust treatment... (Part 1 and Part 2) and then at the end of the showdown, Daniel must have felt he had no choice but to follow through with his threat, which he did. We found it pretty hilarious. He has not learned this from school yet, as he is not in public school at all, but I did overhear Natalie telling him recently "DO NOT lift up your middle finger, it's really bad!" so of course he was intrigued to see what power this action held. Now he knows. It has the power to destroy a bag of ring pops in less than a minute. I didn't get a picture of Corey with his hammer, nor of the pulverized candy, cause I was holding Daniel as he mourned his decision.  

So after that, I read Owen's school book with him, and the kids were still climbing on Corey, so I decided to tap him out and take the kids somewhere. We headed off to Thanksgiving Point, but after we left I decided to cancel those reservations and we went to the aquarium instead. Peter watching a shark.

Natalie pointing out the turtle to Peter. Peter loves turtles. 

Some weird big shrimp-like looking thing.

Kids in the aquarium with the fish!

Then we went to the play room and I read "The Fearless Mind" while the kids played, and I pulled out Natalie's tooth too.

Down to the penguin encounter and deep sea stuff.

One reason why I decided the aquarium over the Dinosaur museum was because it closed at 6 and I wanted a fixed deadline. The Dinosaur museum is open until 8, and I didn't have it in me to go that long. Sitting on the orcas before we headed for the exit.

And hallelujah, this is like our 6th time going I think, and they make you exit through the gift shop which has been a pain the past 5 times since I don't want to buy anything, but this time they all walked right through without harassing me! Maybe they got all the harassing out of their system today with bugging Corey. It was nice to just leave, and I wish they didn't make you exit that way, it's dumb.

So then we went to Costco and the kids were good there. I told them I was already buying some cookies (for a baptism on Tuesday) and so I was not going to buy any extra junk for them or anything. "Please don't ask for extra stuff, I am choosing the things we buy cause I already have a list." They did good. Back at home Wes and Abi did homework, then Wes left to work his second time as a skate guard at the CHRC. He is excited about that job, as it gives him more time on the ice. Corey seemed to recovered from a few hours of peace and semi-quiet. I need to catch up here on the blog, as the last I recorded was on Halloween. I've been a little AWOL and feeling like garbage, thus sleeping a lot. Hopefully I'll be able to catch up on a few posts tomorrow. G'night