He's a good sport

Growing up Dad always got asked how he did it. As a father of 4 daughters I thought he was the luckiest man alive, but most people would just look at him, shake their heads and smile with sympathy. I still think he is pretty darn lucky, but I now chuckle to myself and wonder how he survived.

I love April Fool's day, but my favorite person to play tricks on is still dad (actually he is the only one who I play tricks on). This year I happened to be home on this most opportune day. My niece and nephew were also there, so I took it upon myself to do my auntly duties and teach them how to play tricks on grandpa.

1. Braden helped rubberband the spray nozzle in the sink and then proceeded to ask grandpa for a drink of water. "Not from the refridgerator Grandpa, but from the sink". Well, you know what happened, when he turned on the sink the sprayer sprayed water all over him. Braden laughed and laughed (we all did actually-I think Dad hadn't realized it was April Fool's day . . . yet!)

2. We were having lasgna for dinner and Kendra and Grandma had made sugar cookies earlier in the day, so we decided to make some cookies that looked like breadsticks for dinner. (Dad actually really liked this trick and said we could do it every year!)

3. Kendra helped put honey all over the backs of Dad's silverware so when he picked them up for dinner he got all sticky. (Don't worry this one kept back firing on Kendra and I and we got pleanty sticky because we kept forgetting we had done it and had to wash our hands several times :))

4. We put sticky tack under his glass and then filled it up with milk so he wouldn't see it. He had a very hard time getting his glass off the table! We were careful to only fill his glass half full-we didn't want a milk shower!

5. We made salt water ice cubes and then offered him a glass of ice water-a pretty typical trick that even though he knew it was a trick he played along nicely.

6. Dad said this was the worst one, but we didn't do anything for it-really. I was dishing up the lasgna and asked which piece did Justina wanted, indicating that there was definately some that we didn't want for whatever reason. Then after she got her piece I dished up dad's piece "this is the right one, right Justina?" she agreed and dad wanted to know what was wrong with it. "Nothing" we responded, which was true. He proceeded to eat it and then when he went back for seconds we made a big deal about the fact that he had ate the whole thing-"you didn't notice anything different dad?" "you just ate it like normal?" "are you sure?" "oh, this is not good". . . "oh well too late now" and I proceeded to dish him up another piece. "You guys" he said, "what did you do to it? Am I going to get sick?" We would have loved to play along with it, but noticed he was really turning green and had to tell him that truely we didn't do anything and that nothing was wrong with his lasgna! Oh the power of suggestion. . .

7. This one is a late entry. I forgot all about this one until I went home about a week later, but Kendra and I had blown out an egg and then decided not to use it for a trick so not knowing what else to do with it we put it back in the egg carton. Mom actually got tricked by this one thinking there were still 2 eggs left and when she went to make pancakes realized there was only one (opps sorry mom) so had to borrow one from our neighbor-thanks Sister Bird!

We had so much fun at his expense. Don't even tell me you feel sorry for him. I think there might have been a few more, but I can tell you are already feeling sorry for him. Let me tell you he holds his own and I'm sure we have a few coming our way, but in the meantime, thanks for putting up with us! I think Kendra and Braden are hooked on playing jokes on Grandpa too!