Babysitting

Mom was invited to a 'mothers tea' for Mrs. Clayton. The Claytons have three boys and a little girl and now are expecting again! Their boys are great friends with ours, and are in CCC with us. Since we live near where the Mothers' Tea was held, Mom volunteered our house as a dropping off place for kids and left me in charge. The Clayton kids didn't come... they were taken care of by their grandparents. However, even without the Claytons we had 8 kids come over, so it was pretty crazy! Mom took Rosemary, but that still left six Petersons! So altogether there were 13 not counting me. They sure did have fun! It was such a wet day that no one could go outside, but inside is pretty exciting. Up in the attic, which Papa has transformed into a beautiful library with paneled walls (those which are not covered in bookshelves) and ceiling, is a secret room and secret passage. The entrance to the secret room is a bookshelf which, when you pull on a 'Bible', opens into a little playroom! There is a little tunnel opening in the corner which leads to the kids' library, a small room with picture books and some of the children's chapter books. In the kids' library there is a beautiful painting on the wall of a queen knighting a soldier. When you push on this painting, it opens to reveal the other end of the secret passage!

The secret room and secret passage are always a hit with guests to our house. However, it's not the only attraction. Knut and Thor have a large room in the basement which is their Lego room. There are... um... I think three or four Lego tables, one constructed by Papa and painted with grass, roads, ponds, and streams. In the middle is a hole for Knut to stand in when he plays there to reach all over the table without moving from that spot. Whenever Knut has friends over, they disappear to the Lego room and usually don't reappear for quite awhile. However, when they do reappear they usually head straight for Knut's room where there is play armor and weapons and a large dress-up box. Then life becomes dangerous as they have play battles and swordfights and slay dragons and capture castles and everything else you can do with a group of boys armed with wooden swords and shields which Papa and Knut make.

As for the girls, older ones go with Cecily to her room to play dolls or dress-up. There are beautiful gowns Grandma Davis made Cecily and me years ago, a Japanese kimono and Indian beaded dresses made by Mom, and much more. Then, when they're all dressed up, they usually go upstairs to the secret room which is their castle. Or, instead of dress-up or dolls, there are board games to play and plenty of unimportant things to be talked about and giggled about. When Cecily's friend Kira comes over, they have been known to just sit and look at each other and giggle about nothing at all.

Gloria always takes charge of younger girls immediately. They usually play with all of the dolls in Gloria's and my room, but sometimes they dress up in the finery from the box in the boys' room. I don't know what all they do; it's usually somewhere where I don't see them except for occasional glimpses. I think Gloria brings them on a tour of the house, stopping to play whenever they see something interesting.

Today, though, after playing for awhile, Knut set up a puppet show- without puppets. He has written these hilarious little skits called: the Adventures of the Llama Brothers, the Further Adventures of the Llama Brothers, the Further Further Adventures of the Llama Brothers, and the Further Further Further Adventures of the Llama Brothers. Instead of having puppets, Knut puts his middle and ring fingers on his thumb and locks their joints, then sticks his pinky and index finger up in the air to create... a llama! The main characters in these skits are two llama brothers named Luke and Lucas. They get into all sorts of trouble with tigers and talking tennis balls (with mouths cut into them and faces drawn on) and all kinds of things. Anyway, Knut set up a puppet theater in the living room and put on all four of these skits. They were very well received.