Horseback vandals.

Last night at sometime way-past-Gabe's-bedtime I heard a loud, extended crashing sound accompanied by a long, pressurized stream of cursing from Dan.  I rushed to the bedroom and found the flat screen TV lying on its side on the floor (still playing his movie), the video game system also down, along with a bunch of stuff from the shelf.  Gabe had gotten out of bed to wash his hands and tripped over a cord, ripping the earphones off Dan's head and nearly taking down this entire shelf!

As anger finally turned to humor Gabe said, "Dad, I know it's not funny.  But my brain keeps telling me to laugh."  

Last night somebody egged Brian's car.  This morning the kids went to the stake picnic at Brian's church (which I missed because of Max's nap).  When they got home we found out that Granny and Gramps' house had also been vandalized.  So we went to check it out ...

The boys were excited to try to solve this crime!

Gramps had cleaned up most of it by the time we got there but you can still see some t.p. dangling from the trees.  Apparently this is the second time someone has wrapped the house, recently!  (The last time they smeared pudding on the windows too.)  Granny was watching TV at 11 p.m. and heard something hit the window.   Susie next door drove by at midnight and said the house was already wrapped.  Apparently judging from the tracks in the area last time, our vandals may be coming on horseback!  (You'd think that would narrow down the list of suspects considerably ...)

The victims discuss the crime ...

Max provided entertainment by trying to eat the grass and being generally cute.

While digging his garden, Mark discovered the burial site of this action figure from Dan's childhood.  Here's Gabe holding up the grisly remains of the unknown headless figure.  (Apparent cause of death was a bb gun.)

Some of the kids have colds today.  Gabe is sniffling.  Nathan has a fever.  Max is still okay.

Today we went to Target to buy new jeans for Gabe.  He decided to buy a Venom toy this week instead of the Spider-man pictured yesterday.  Because, ya know, he has plenty of Spidey toys.  And he needed another Venom ...