Gravel, Tea and Eggrolls

Yesterday was a busy day for the DigitalRich crew. After our Saturday morning breakfast tradition, Michelle, K and L headed off to parts unknown for something called “clothes shopping.” I really don’t know what that means other than sitting in front of a computer and shopping at eddiebauer.com, suncancecatalog.com, target.com and theterritoryahead.com. I assume you actually walk into “stores” and buy clothes that are somehow lying around.

A, R and I headed out front in the 38 degree cold, bundled up, with a wheelbarrow, shovel, rake and hoe to attack the growing potholes in our driveway. It is a rather long driveway, just over a 1/10 of a mile long, with a bed of gravel and 4 potholes the biggest of which is about 3 feet in diameter and roughly 8 inches deep. Navigating the driveway has become a bit of a dance that I'm sure our guests, garbage man, milk man and UPS drivers don’t enjoy.

We recently had several tons of crush-and-run gravel poured over it, but all it did was accent the potholes in a lovely new shade of grey. The delivery guy warned of that, and said if I wanted them fixed I would have to go out there and scrape off material from other parts of the drive and fill them up. And so we did.

After that bit of fun, we headed inside to change so I could drive R to her best-friends house for a tea party for all the girls in her pre-school class. We got half-way there when R realized she forgot her doll- a co-invitee to the party- so we returned to pick up the baby doll and got to the tea party right when it started at 3pm.

So it was A and I in the car, with about 90 minutes to kill before having to pick her sister up. I had not had lunch, so we stopped by our local Chinese restaurant for a couple egg rolls and a cup of egg drop soup. A decided she would eat something as well and got her fave- chicken on a stick.

We had a great time, just the two of us. Chatting about school and friends, about things that made her happy, sad and scared. She mentioned that the rice she was eating was really good and I asked her what her favorite restaurant was. I was awaiting the standard responses I get from the younger ones- McDonalds, Taco Bell, Chucky-shoot-me-in-the-head-Cheese, et al.

She thought about it for a minute and said… “Chlay’s.”

I was shocked. Chlay’s is our local Thai place, owned and operated by a wonderfully nice lady named Saowanee and her family. We go there a couple times a month, and at first it was hard to get the whole family to want to go, but they have all found dishes they like and on several occasions lately Michelle and the two oldest girls have suggested it as we debated lunch or dinner destinations.

I recalled, in this moment of joy hearing my 8 year old say Chlay’s was her favorite restaurant, a bit of scripture from the Bible:

"Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it."
Proverbs 22:6

I am pretty sure God didn’t have Thai food on his mind when he inspired the writing of this passage, but I like to think he did.

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