(My kids lost one of their grandmas (my mom) back in 1999, and my youngest never even met her. When I recall stories about her, I try to tell them just to perpetuate them, and help them get to know her a little bit better.)
April Fools Story #1
Anyone who knew my mom can attest to the fact that she had a wicked sense of humor. She would occasionally use it to mess with us- her own offspring – for her own amusement.
One Saturday morning, when I was maybe 6 or 7 years old, my mom woke us all up and had us gather in the family room. She had an announcement.
The good news? It turned out that she had just gotten off the phone with some of our older cousins, and they were coming to town and were going to be staying with us.
The bad news? The house was a disaster, and we needed to get it ready for company. (Which I have always felt was patently dishonest – pretending to be something we are not…but I digress…)
We spent the entire day scrubbing, sweeping, vacuuming. My older sister recalls that it was such a deep clean that we even cleaned the oven! We spent the entire day making the house sparkle.
Then, after we were finished, she broke the news: “April Fools! Nobody is coming – I just wanted to get the house cleaned up.”
Hilarious.
The reward for our efforts? A bucket of KFC – which I still consider fair payment.
April Fools Story #2
For some reason, we had set a camping tent up in our backyard, and were preparing to sleep in it. Why in April? I have no recollection.
But I do remember my mother frantically calling us to the kitchen, where she stood pointing out the window.
“Look, look! A skunk went in the tent!”
We immediately believed her, because we did have a neighborhood skunk that liked to traverse our backyard in the middle of the night.
Dad was out of town, so it was up to us to deal with our tent intruder. Mom warned us to be careful, so as not to get sprayed. We were not worried: We had seen the Brady Bunch episode where Tiger got sprayed by a skunk, and knew that all we would need was some tomato juice to make everything copacetic.
Into the backyard we went to find the skunk. I wish I could remember what we armed ourselves with…shovels? rakes? badminton racquets? We crept up ever so carefully to the door of the tent. What numbskull left it unzipped anyway? Poking our heads inside we tried to catch a glimpse without getting a face full of stink.
There was no skunk.
But there was a mom standing on the patio laughing hysterically.
“April Fools!”
Way to go, Mom.
These were hilarious. I’ll have to try the bucket of KFC sometime and see if mine will work for it. I’m betting you got KFC so her pretty, clean, oven didn’t get messed up.
Sometimes I think about the Oscar the Grouch story you shared and my heart aches for your mom. That had to be about as hard on her as you. Then I read these and laugh. What a great mom!!
Dad was always the prankster in Our house…He could keep the straightest face and tell the tallest tales of Anyone I’ve ever met!
You Never knew whether to believe him or not ;oP
xoDaleB.xo
I love your mom, what a lucky boy you were to have her as your mom. Other than a testimony of the gospel and the ability to work hard the best thing we can try and give/instill in our offspring is a sense of humor.
If I ever get to heaven I really want to meet your Mom. I hope we can still play jokes on our kids.
I like her get the house cleaned trick, genius! And a deep clean no less 🙂 Thanks for sharing this, she sounds like an awesome lady and that is cool that your kids can get to know her through your stories…Nice post!
That’s hilarious! I should try the cleaning one sometime! Haha