Thor and Gifts

After we finished Calvert 6th grade, I sent our math books to Paula. She hadn't used Calvert math previously, and was contemplating its use for 7th grade for her son. I was happy to have our books take a trip across country - after all, they'll not get such an exciting vacation again - and happy to help a friend make an informed decision. Well, I got the books back today, and she sent them with gifts of chocolate for me and the boys, plus Nutella. This was mentioned by Kevin in a post about crepes a couple of weeks back, and dummy me, I'd never even heard of it. Everyone else was raving about it, and I'm the dope saying, "Is this a commercial product?" Well, when one of my daughters saw the Nutella, she was dancing in glee around the kitchen with it, and Jeffrey scooped up her with the Nutella, and ran through the house, singing, "We stole the candy! We stole the candy!" So, Paula, the boys had their chocolate in a picnic basket with Nutella sandwiches, Cass had a Nutella sandwich, Thor had peanut butter crackers, and you provided great amusement for all. Thanks!

My youngest son has had issues in learning to speak clearly. Brilliant kid, articulate, but less than fully intelligible. So, this summer, I hired a speech therapist to come to the house twice a week to retrain Mark. He is making astonishing progress. But the funniest thing of all is that Thor always attends speech class. No, don't get me wrong; Thor is not becoming more articulate. But he always sits or lays between Mark and the teacher in my dining room, presumably protecting his boy. When Mark has to stand at the mirror to watch himself talk, and see how he's forming his words, Thor stands between Mark and the teacher. He is really a funny dog! This was yesterday, when he didn't want to lay down, and Mark was hugging his dog while speaking.
I tried to make a fabulous sounding orange cake last night, but my almost new Kitchenaid stand mixer, which is 3 months out of warranty, developed some serious issues. If Kitchenaid resolves them fairly, I'll let you know. But, if they tell me to suck it up and buy a new mixer, you'll hear about that, also.