Adventures in Living Olson

I am having the time of my life getting to spend a full week with my whole family, and in NYC to top it off. In between our times together it can be easy to sometimes forget all the ridiculous fun we have together, and all the shenanigans we always get into. But the second we come back together, it all begins again! And I love every minute of it.

Here's the recap of the most noteworthy Olson shenanigans from the past 24 hours:

* As the 5 of us (AS included) were cruising down 3rd Ave. in my parents' car, my brother all of a sudden says he felt something on his arm. My dad says, "It was probably just a plastic bag or something." My brother sits back for almost a full minute, before springing back up and asking where his wallet was...apparently it was on the dashboard of the car (for whatever reason), and had flown out the window while we were moving. My dad pulls a quick U-ey at the next intersection, and parks illegally while the other 4 of us go running up 3rd Ave. searching for the wallet. It was quite the sight, to say the least. We were bobbing and weaving, and dodging traffic...and luckily, found the wallet after about 7 minutes of looking. But a bunch of stuff had flown out of it, so then we had to go searching for the credit cards and what-not in the street as well. We found everything eventually, but it ended up being about a 20 minute kinda-insane detour from our day. Only the Olsons, right?

* My mom brought a gingerbread house-making kit along to NYC for the holiday. Obviously the best idea for this would be to start assembly just before midnight when we're all quite a few drinks deep, right? Of course. After probably a good 45 minutes of effort last night, here is where the poor thing currently stands:
Yup. Those are, in fact, cut-up toilet paper rolls holding up the sides of the thing. The directions said to use normal size cans...but those definitely don't fit. Too tall. So my brother came up with the toilet paper roll idea - genius. Unfortunately, that's not enough to save the thing...it's a bit crooked, the roof isn't entirely connected to the walls, and one side is starting to cave in. We're letting it dry for now, and hoping that when we decorate "the crap out of it" (as my brother says) it will look quite lovely. Stay tuned.

* We made a "quick stop" at the grocery store to get 3 things, but ended up there for well over 30 minutes. Then we had a big hold up at the self check-out (this ALWAYS happens!), and we slowly started to disperse to other areas, leaving only my dad at the check-out for a time. We started to get bored, and I ended up on the 50 cent elephant ride at the insistence of AS. Even though I'm a tad too big for it...just a tad.
Aaaaah, so many good times. I'm just so excited that we have 4 more days together yet...just think of all the fun that's yet to come....