The Extended Family Crashed the House Today for a Surprise Visit

My doorbell rang today and it was my grandmother, mother, five year old niece, and one year old nephew, who decided to surprise my family with a visit. They had just come from my brother and soon-to-be-future-sister-in-law’s house, where they played with the new puppy. We ended up making a day of it; they stayed for almost six hours, the spouse ran out and picked up a pizza, we played games, and pounded on the piano.

Then, my niece really wanted to try her hand at baking cookies by herself. She decided that I was to be bestowed with the honor of walking her through it so I grabbed the cookbooks and let her go through them to pick out what she wanted to try. She settled on a heart-shaped, pink frosted-filled, vanilla-topped-with-sprinkles Valentine’s day cookie. With the pantry storage project in progress, we were more than stocked up on all of the ingredients so how could I say no? I closed the doors to my home office, decided to just give up hope of all work today, and, instead, bake with her.

I felt bad at the end of the afternoon, though. She was sobbing because she wanted to spend the night with us and watch more of the Scrooge McDuck cartoons and comic books I let her marathon binge on during her visits. Unfortunately, she had an early appointment tomorrow and grandma said we’d have to take a rain check. If you’ve never had a five year old sobbing, wiping tears out of her eyes because she can’t stick around to watch cartoons with your family, it’s a heartbreaking thing. I can’t help it if our house is nothing but video games, music jam sessions, cookies, hide-and-seek, and fancy tea parties.

Her finished Valentine’s Day heart cookies …

I checked her measurements as lunch / dinner was ordered, an animated television show was playing in the living room, my mom was holding the baby, and grandma was trying to catch up on Downton Abbey. She was insistant that she had to do it herself. She actually said, “I can learn anything if you show me how to do it and teach me the steps. It doesn’t matter if I don’t know how to do it, yet. I can always learn.” Yep. She’s going to turn out okay.

She wanted to roll the cookie dough herself …

Before serving, she had to cool the Valentine’s Day cookies for everyone …

Now that almost everyone is gone or in bed, I might sneak back into the office and work for a couple of hours. I really need to get the proofs done on a huge catalog order that is going to the printers on Monday for one of the businesses. I need to look it over and sign off on it. It’s one of those things that shouldn’t matter – it’s already been checked by everyone else countless times – but if a mistake is made, it’s going to be visible for a long time given how many thousands upon thousands of copies are going to be shipped into the factory.

Michael Starke

I love the tiles in the backsplash of your counter. LOVE. Our kitchen has a tile backsplash for the one set of counters that includes the sink and the stove, but they’re much smaller 1″ tiles, they’re not on a bias like that, and they don’t have the glossy lustre.

One day when I build a kitchen for myself, I’m going to have to remember your pictures.
- http://www.joshuakennon.com/ Joshua Kennon
  
  Print and/or save this newspaper article for your files, too, while it is still available. It’s one of the best sources I’ve found giving a brief run-down of the best stoves on the market. All of the prices referenced are retail; if you’re smart you can pay much less.
  
  (Re: The backsplash: If anyone can tell you what that stone is, it’s probably Gilvus. It’s because of him I know that the countertop itself is a 1,000,000+ year old Ubatuba Charnockite from Brazil and not granite. I just thought it was nice looking when I bought the house, haha! Unfortunately, I don’t know much more about it than that.)
  - Gilvus
    
    I don’t actually know much about it :-p and I guarantee you, 9/10 geologists have no clue (and don’t care) what charnockite is either. I commented because I recognized it from personal experience, and the first time I saw it I was slightly indignant at the appropriation and subsequent misuse of geologic terminology. It’s on par with someone trying to sell a glockenspiel as a “metal piano.”
Gilvus

Is this the niece who you gave sidewalk chalk lessons to?
- http://www.joshuakennon.com/ Joshua Kennon
  
  Yep, this post was about the same niece. This time around, we ended up watching an episode of Ducktales and she was looking at all the Scrooge collectibles in my office asking me, “Why does Scrooge want money?” so I ended up explaining how money isn’t just to buy stuff – you can use it to help make the world a better place by funding cures for sick people, or building schools so kids can get a free or low-cost education, or even just because you think business is fun. It’s definitely all sticking. If she doesn’t have a portfolio by the time she is 18, I’ll be surprised. In another couples of years, she should be old enough for me to break out a Value Line sheet of The Walt Disney Company and walk her through how she can own part of it.
  
  I’m thinking about periodically mailing her sets of Scrooge McDuck comic books. The comic “A Financial Fable” from September of 1950 remains the single best explanation of the true nature of money, and the role of supply and demand relative to basic biological needs and available resources determining price, I’ve ever seen in print, anywhere. It’s hidden in a children’s story but it’s extraordinary. It first appeared in Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #126 in March of 1951 but it has been reprinted in this more recent edition.
  - Gilvus
    
    Do you ever worry that the things you’re teaching her will fall by the wayside when she reaches adolescence? Chances are she’ll feel peer pressured into “normal” behaviors, such as getting on the consumption treadmill or adopting an I’m-entitled-to-a-Benz-for-my-sixteenth-birthday mentality.
    
    I’m guessing that you’ll eventually teach her about mental models such as social proof and the tall poppy syndrome.
    - http://www.joshuakennon.com/ Joshua Kennon
      
      The best you can do is give people the tools and knowledge to help them make good decisions, using your own life a living, breathing example that show the principles in action (people pay more attention to what you do than what you say).
      
      In the end, everyone has to decide what type of man or woman they want to be, defining their character by their actions. My role is to expand the tools and knowledge that they have when making those decisions, and try to shape the worldview rationally while it is still able to be influenced. The smart ones will emulate the behaviors that work, and in some cases, improve materially on them. The others won’t, and their lives will reflect it.
      
      Beyond that, you just have to hope for the best.