Before 10am

The following are all things that happened before 10am this morning.

7:45 am ~ Justin wakes me up to say goodbye. He has a seminar all day today for work. I am sound asleep. He tells me that the boys are already up, dressed, and eating cereal in the kitchen. I sleepily look at him and reply "Huh?" ... ok, I'm up.

8am-ish ~ I go to check on the chickens. My routine is to go out and check on them after the kids are underway with breakfast and the dogs have their food. I am almost always in my "pajamas" (aka - an old sweater or sweatshirt and pj pants). It's pouring raining. No big deal.
I go to give them some more food and notice that rain is pouring off in a very miniature waterfall from part of the gutter. Again, no big deal.
As I bend over to put the feed into the feeder, the waterfall hits by butt. Slightly bigger deal.
As I am trying to finish getting the chickens set-up, rain still pouring down, my neighbor (whom I absolutely love!) opens her back door to chat. I am holding fresh straw, standing in the pouring rain. I do tell her to hold on so I can put the straw in the nest box. Murphy's Law, the one day someone wants to chat in the morning, it is pouring rain. It actually didn't bother me at all, I just found it funny.

8:30-ish ~ I am out of the shower, sitting on my bed, drying off and figuring out what to wear today. Whiskey, our 10 year old chocolate lab, begins walking VERY slowly towards the closet. Slowly enough that I take notice. She continues on towards the closet, the door of which is open. She looks like she is on the hunt, almost stalking something. I wonder to myself which is better: an old dog going senile or the possibility that she smells a mouse.
She goes all the way into the closet. She sniffs around. Then I see her sniffing my clothes. She lets out a snort and walks away. --- Apparently she was judging my clothing and I'm not fashionable enough for her. Great, even my senile dog thinks I look goofy.

9am - 9:30 am ~ I'm in the kitchen, trying to have some morning quiet time to myself. It's not happening. Both boys are now in here, Shannon to my right and Tristan to my left. Both are talking at the same time, and pretty much non-stop. The dogs are in here too. There is the random, sudden burst of barking and running towards the front door (from the dogs, not the kids). Once it was the mailman, the other times who knows. Passerby? Squirrel? Shadow?? All possibilities.
The boys are playing with their little scissors, construction paper, tape, and crayons. Shannon has mastered the the scissors and cutting things out, but Tristan hasn't quite gotten the hang of it. Tristan is attacking a piece of construction paper like a dog after a treat, cutting insane slices into the paper & forcefully using both hands to wield the scissors. Sweeny Todd he is not, but I am still a little scared. I finally picked up the paper and cut it in half for him. He saw it and breathlessly exclaimed "HOW DID YOU DO THAT?!?!?!" I swear, watching him try to cut paper is like watching Jaws (who is now old and has no teeth, just gums) try to attack and gum to death prey.
A few minutes later he is coloring. The following exchange occurs:

Tristan (drawing lines in a coloring book): Hey! Blue makes a color!! It makes a COLOR!!
Me: Oh yea, what color does it make?
Tristan: Hmm, let me think. (Pause while he draws a good long line) Hey!! It makes BLUE!!

He then begins taking out the other crayons, one by one, and testing to see if they make colors too by drawing more lines down the page. Each time he exclaims "Yup, that makes a color too!"

A few minutes go by. They get in trouble for continuing to try and make the scissors "walk" across the table. Scissors get taken away, attitudes flare up. Then they're fighting over the tape and whose turn it is to use it, how much tape they need, and so on. They're both yelling. Finally I roar "STOP IT!!" The fight stops. They finish with the tape.
Now they're onto crayons. The crayons are trying to walk across our year-old kitchen table. I inform them crayons may NOT walk on the table. Shannon begins lining his crayons up, standing them on end, on his construction paper, making them into "standing trees". Tristan still has his crayons walking, but this time across the coloring book. He is talking for them. "C'mon green, let's go for a walk."

Tristan: Mommy, what's that noise?
Me: I don't know.
Tristan: Hmm, let me think what the noise was. Let me find out what it was.
*I oblige and he begins looking around. He takes off his fuzzy croc.*
Tristan: Hey! I know what that noise was!! It was my foot!!!

And it still isn't 10am yet.