Just a Wee Fetus and Already Completely Spoiled

I think I've figured out why my four year old niece, Ella, is so excited that Aunt Kimmie is going to give her a baby cousin. Turns out, she appears to be reaping many benefits from our procreational plans. Of course, this isn't to say she wasn't already pampered to begin with; quite the contrary, the kid has so many toys, games, movies, and books that you'd think there were four grandchildren living at my parents' house. However, since we've decided to start popping out my mother's grandchildren, some additional perks have arisen for the tike - see below.

This past weekend and probably at least another couple of weekends to come was and will be spent erecting the newest addition to the grandchildren's play paradise, aka, my parents' backyard. So far, they have an inflatable wading pool, a sandbox (which they do cover up when not in use so animals can't potty in it - the reason my mother preferred us not to play in sandboxes at the parks when we were little), a child-sized picnic table, and the beginnings of a huge playset monstrosity that will consist of two slides, a fort, two swings, a baby swing, and a glider swing. As you can see from the picture below, after the playset had begun to be erected, even my parents seemed to be a bit overwhelmed by the size of it. Will that stop their madness? Oh no. My mother is completely ecstatic over her plans to become ruler of all grandchildren near and far - the next project is going to be a playhouse.

My mother's ultimate goal? She flat out told me: Baby Neener will not want to be at home; Baby Neener will want to be at NeeNee & Papa's all the time. She even "threatened" that there will be some Friday evenings when she will come down straight after work, will pick up Baby Neener and take him/her back to her house (and I will not be invited), and if we're lucky we'll get him/her back on Sunday.

My response to that is, You call that a threat? My mother's quest to be the best grandmother ever could really work to our advantage. And, if we could just get Stephen's mother on board to strive to become most crazed grandmother, too, I have a feeling we'll be lucky enough to have all our weekends free and not have to spend a dime on babysitters.

Mothers are wonderful creatures, God bless them.