Settlers and Killer Bunnies

Board games are the epidemy of family nights, family memories, and family rivals. But this Saturday night, I had a great evening with friends learning two new games. Well, really, I had learned how to play Settlers of Catan a couple of Christmas's ago, and played a few games over that season. But that was the last time. So Saturday night, it was really like starting fresh again for me. I had no idea what I was doing... but after a bit, I finally started to remember and got into it... Alliances were made, and enemies too... even though, its not really a game of enemies...those things just happen. hee hee.... While Terry was the "woodsman", Brian was the Sheep and Wheat guy. I was really suppose to be pretty good at acquiring ore... but thanks to Terry's clever planning, both Debbie and I became victims of a "robber" several times... and the rivalry began!
Now that I have one game under my belt... I am excited to play it a few more times.... now that I know what I am doing. Of course, Debbie and I were clearly the better players.... but somehow between Terry and Brian's roads, and Terry's monopoly on wood... Brian was the winner by one point!

After Settlers... we moved onto a brand new game, I have never hear of.... Killer Bunnies...
It is a pretty big deck of cards, and every card has either an innocent bunny on it, some "dolla" (money) or some pretty funny and sometimes evil things you do to the bunnies (and your apponents).
We started the game with Terry and I know really understanding the game.. but by the end of the game.. I thought I was doing pretty well. I was the owner of the most bunnies, and had a mitt full of cards... and had made enemies with almost everyone with my sinister card plays... directing most of my evil on the two men on the other side of the table... but..... at the end of the game.. it turned out that no matter how good you play the game... it all depends on the flip of a "carrot" card.. to see who wins... and dammit... that stinky Brian won AGAIN!....
What a blast, learning two new games (sort of) and I am now ready to play both games again... and I will give Brian a run for his bunnies! Thank you Debbie and Brian... and I didn't dream of bunnies... but I still had some pretty weird dreams.. anyway.!

Reflecting on a summer gone by......

Well, here I sit. Summer is over. I have been to school for 2.5 weeks now and the beginning of the year is now over. We are 5 days into school now, and pretty much everyone is getting use to the routine.

So far in the last five days of school we have had several lost children, both on the bus and within the school. We have had "Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease", Chicken Pox, two "pee pees in the pants", two classroom pukers, one "wanderer", 3 kids suspended (twice) and

... one broken arm.

Over the summer, I had time to reflect on my now "peaceful" life at home. It took a very long time to get use to the quiet routine of no kids, no grampa, no dog, no wedding preparations, no company. But after a while, I started to take the peace for granted. I walked about the house, admiring my plants, I sat on my deck and watched the birds at the feeders. I watered the gardens, counted my frogs... watched afternoon TV and snoozed. I traveled when I wanted, I socialized when I wanted... I sat alone, when I wanted.

When the time came to go back to school, I looked forward to the routine of getting up and getting moving. I relished the thoughts of eating my lunch with my friends, and enjoying the fun and quirky lunches I make, that I only eat at school. And, as expected, work was full of busy productive days... with wonderful people I consider friends... all catching up with each other after not seeing each other for a couple of months.... There is such a nervous excitement in everyone.. the week at school before the kids come. Everyone is high on the smell of new notebooks and freshly sharpened pencils. The laminator rolls full time, coating everyones' posters and word strips... little cute shaped name tags and file folder games.

Now.. that week is over, as well as the first week of school. The glitches are smoothed out, and the lost are all found... the unknown are now found out... and the days are speedy by. Although there is absolutely no routine at school, there is a sense of routine, in the non-routine. And now .. the summer is over.. and I wonder where it went!