Channeling My Inner Mary Poppins

I have a cold. I don't feel well at all.

Don't feel bad for me, it will soon pass, as it always does.

I just felt the need to complain a bit.

It's been raining on and off for the past week.

Again, don't feel bad. It will soon pass, as it always does.

However, yesterday, while watching it rain I had a hankerin' for some home-made chicken noodle soup, and since I wasn't feeling well...ok, so you already know...blah, blah, blah.

So, anyway...around 5 o'clock I started the noodles. It turns out that this is the same time that Mother Nature decided to let all hell break loose. The rain was coming down in sheets, the wind was bending my palm trees to the ground, {this photo doesn't even show how bad it was!!}
my trampoline decided it was going to take a little trip over to the neighbor's house (although Tanner and I caught it before it could make it's get-away), and my gazebo's canopy decided to break loose and start flapping uncontrollably in the hurricane-velocity gusts of wind. Since I didn't want to be the crazy-running down the street in the pouring rain-trying to catch her gazebo canopy-in her pajamas-lady, I, instead, went out into the pouring rain to try to tie down the flapping canopy. Two sides had broken loose and were really flapping, but I managed to climb on a nearby chair and get a hold of them just as the other two sides gave way.
{Try to picture this in your mind: hurricane-like winds and me holding four corners of a very large canopy.}

In the blink of an eye, I was lifted off of the ground and felt myself flying in a not-as-graceful-as-Mary-Poppins-fashion. Luckily, it was a short ride, due to the fact that the center of the canopy was still attached to the gazebo. At this point, I take the elastics out of my ponytail, secure all four corners of the canopy in a funky knot, and make my way back toward the house, feeling pretty good about my quick thinking and useful hair elastics. By the time I made it the 10 feet to my back door, my hair was willy-nilly and rain drenched, but I was alive, and happy to be so. When I got into the house, the boys are all staring at the t.v., completely un-aware of my Mary Poppins-like exit from the earth's surface. With barely a glance, one of them says, "Mom, what happened to your hair?".

Instead of trying to explain, I finished making my soup, scooped me up a heaping bowl full, and let the beautiful voice of Julie Andrews run through my thoughts.

Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down...