aprils fool----ME!

so, i love april fools jokes.....good-natured ones---not mean ones....
with my kids, i have always tried to do something on april 1st to commemorate this important holiday....usually dealing with food....
examples of our celebratory events:

• waking the kids up early to have banana splits for breakfast
• eating dinner with random kitchen utensils
• picnics on the front room floor
• breakfast for dinner (before it was cool and accepted!)
• coloring food ---- yeah----dont try this one---i colored scrambled eggs red...looked like muscle...it was gross..... green was received much better

one of my favorites was to make my kids lunches.....BUT

I'd give them empty lunchsacks....(elementary kids are not that bright---they didnt check inside their lunches)....i would weigh it down with something to give the impression that there was more than just a NOTE that said:

"april fools!"

then, of course, I would show up at lunchtime with a Happy Meal or a Subway sandwich or such----

Ace, my baby, is 4 years younger than his closest sibling---so by the time he started going to school...i was tired....and up to my ears in teenagers....so he didnt benefit from my cleverness.....

but this year, my focus has been to give Ace the experiences that my other children had as a group.....sit-down family dinners, playing games as a family, consistent, quality family home evenings,.... stuff we got away from while we were up to our ears....

so....ace would be the beneficiary of my clever 'substitute the lunch' april fools day prank.

ace put a Lunchable in his backpack for his lunch (okay---the other kids NEVER got lunchables---but there has to be a benefit of being the youngest).... so i snuck...yes, snuck.... and pulled out said lunchable---and inserted my own version of lunch:

• v-8 can which i had poked a hole in the bottom and emptied of its liquid
• grapes---but only the stems---no fruit
• sandwich----with the filling being a piece of paper that said "Happy April 1st!"
• 3 $1 bills under the paper (inside the bread) so he could actually buy an edible lunch.

CLEVER---RIGHT? OF COURSE, RIGHT! (name the musical--absolutely nothing to do with this post)

at 11:30 i get a text....from ace...."mom, look in the front room...i think my lunch fell out of my backpack"

YAY! MY CLEVERNESS WORKED! HAHAHA---WHAT A GREAT JOKE.

"Ha-Ha! Ace! check your backpack---look in the sack! gotcha!"

pause............. "I thought it was an old lunch. I threw it away".

"Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! there was money in the sandwich!"

"Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"

yeah---my cleverness bit me back.

but....ace....smelling cash.....got a pass and went back to his previous class...pawed thru the trash....found his sack....pulled out the money...and had quesadillas for lunch.

april fools on me!