Five on Friday: Recent Discoveries and Realizations

It may be "No School November" here in New Jersey* but the learning never ends! Well, maybe my kids' Halloween Sugar-adled brains are on vacation but their Mother has been making all sorts of discoveries and realizations lately! 

For example:

1. Apparently little brother has grown quite  bit since February! No wonder he couldn't get his khakis from last winter on! Thank goodness his favorite sweatshirt still fits him.

February 7, 2018

November 4, 2018. Didn't even realize the sweatshirt thing until later.

2. Pretzel pancakes aren't as bad as they sound. I wouldn't go so far as to recommend them but in the Halloween-goodies-into-pancake frenzy of last weekend, they surpassed my expectations and were 1,000 times better than the Jolly Rancher, M&M and Skittle combo a certain youngest child created.

Note the red left in the pan. Skittle? M&M? It's a mystery nobody wants to solve.

3. I recently read Catcher in the Rye for the first time since I was a teenager. I realized that I still could relate to Holden as that young kid trying to figure it all out but at the same time I found myself repeatedly thinking, "Oh honey, no." One part that I know I chuckled at then and again now:

Funny because it's true.

4. My youngest son is an athlete and a musician, not much of an artist. Whenever he sits down to make a card for someone he relies on his go-to . . . a cookie truck. This is adorably cute and I will rue the day he abandons it. Recently I was cleaning  and found this drawing . .  . the MYSTERY COOKIE truck!! Best discovery ever!

Is it a good cookie or is it a bad cookie? Do you like a mystery? Try our mystery cookies!

5. Last weekend  I got to remember just how fucking long it takes to put yarn extensions in my daughter's hair. But I also got to rediscover just how cute she looks with them and how happy they make her. She even remembered to say "thank you" without being nudged.

I stopped counting the cumulative hours when I got to three and a half.

Can't pose, Ma, gotta run, dance and swish my long, long hair now

* They do have school but there are a slew of half days for conferences, two days off for the teachers' conference, half days and days off for Thanksgiving. I also refer to the conference week as "New Jersey Goes to Florida" week.