Childhood adventures

This morning at breakfast we were talking about our earliest memories.  The kids were completely unimpressed with mine.  I was standing next to a bed, and there was a baby on the bed.  That's it.  So, yeah, they were right to be unimpressed.  I think I'm only about two years old, though, based on the height of the bed and such.

Jacob's earliest memories are awesome.  He remembers sitting in a high chair obliterating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich while his dad played guitar a few feet away.  I was teasing him about his parents keeping him in a high chair until he was six, but he also remembers being handed off into his grandmother's arms, so I think Jacob wins for having the earliest memories.  My memories of being carried are all me begging and being told, "No, Amy, you're too big to pick up."  I was a rather sturdy child, but more on that later.

Mindy's earliest memories are from preschool, also at three or four years old.  She remembers having to take naps and being bored out of her mind.  She remembers playing quietly in the corner while the other kids learned words she already knew.  She also remembers having to remind the teacher that a universe is bigger than a galaxy.  Ah, nerd memories!

Isaac remembers his first night sleeping in a big bed instead of a toddler bed.  He was probably three or four years old.  He says he woke up when he rolled out and hit his head.  "There was some blood, but only a little bit."  I have no recollection of this at all, so here's yet more evidence of my lousy mothering skills.

Speaking of mothers not knowing what their kids are up to . . .

I've always been a fan of eating, and when I was a kid I sneaked a lot of food.  I'm assuming my mom is well aware of this since every bag of cookies always had just one left in it.  (I couldn't finish the whole bag.  Then people would KNOW.)

When I was eight years old I tried to make a cupcake.  I put a reduced amount of the ingredients from the Betty Crocker cookbook into a cupcake liner and mixed it up as best I could.  There was still a lot of egg yolk and such, but it's hard to mix well in a paper liner.  Then I stuck it into the microwave.  It didn't work well, and the smell was awful.  I threw away the "cupcake" in the garbage outside and sprayed the house liberally with Lysol, but when mom came home a few minutes later I had to 'fess up.

However, one time when I was home alone I decided I wanted to make donuts and pulled out the trusty Betty Crocker cookbook.  I managed to heat up a pan full of oil and make up some dough, but they didn't turn out right and the oil popped like crazy.  Somehow I managed to clean up all the evidence, or so I thought.  The next day my mom asked what the burns were from on my arms.  I, of course, feigned ignorance, so to this day she probably thinks one of my friends' parents was putting out cigarettes on my arms.  No, Mom, I'd just gotten marginally smarter since the cupcake incident.