Week 253: Religion, Illness, and Wishes

Mandy seems to like books as much as her big sister ever did, but while Sam’s interests always ran to dinosours, princesses, and the 50 US states (no, I’m not kidding), Mandy’s three favorite books seem to be, in order, the following:

Geralyn’s old first communion book
A Gideon’s Bible featuring the New Testament
An illustrated book of Bible stories

Indeed, Mandy seems to cling to these collections of good Words whenever she is distressed. The other night after we all got home from the restaurant, Mandy positioned herself in the middle of the kitchen and announced that she just might have contracted some kind of slight illness by vomiting copiously all over the hardwood floors. Things went downhill from there, and soon she was bawling her eyes out, clinging to Geralyn’s arm, and screaming “I WANT MY JESUS BOOK! I WANT MY JESUS BOOK!” as if it were the only thing that could bring her succor in her time of tribulation.

(Personally, I think the reasons for her preferences have more to do with how the shape and size of the books make them easy for her to hold and less to do with theology, but who knows –maybe she’ll be the first female Pope and I’ll finally get my revenge on that jerk who wouldn’t let us into the Sistene Chapel while we were wearing shorts.)

So, what else? Thanksgiving was last week, wasn’t it? My mom and sister both came in town to spend it here with us, which was great. This meant that they got to read that 50 States book to Sam about a billion times and I didn’t, so that’s also great. I took a few days off work to spend at home with the family, but by Sunday afternoon I was seriously ready to get back to work so I could get some rest.

Instead, we put up Christmas decorations. Sam has been busily perusing the many catalogues that come to us in the mail, and has compiled the following holiday wish list:

A Barbie (I’m pretty sure my mother suggested this, just to annoy me, since Sam couldn’t even explain what a Barbie was when I asked her)
Something with Play Dough
A Pretty pink pony on a motorcycle (your guess is as good as mine)

So there you go.