We have an atomic clock at our house that has been the cause of a certain level of DISPUTE. The problem is that about once per month, it checks in with its radar thingie and comes back with an utterly wrong time/date. I consider that a reasonable frequency for errors. I glance at the clock in the morning, I immediately grasp that 11:27 PM FEB 2004 is not correct, and I change it to the right time. I go on with life, unscarred by the experience.

Paul, though. Paul feels this clock is in violation of the sacred oath of time-keepers. A clock that is EVER WRONG must be THROWN AWAY. An atomic clock, because it has access to the correct information but chooses not to use it, must be publicly shamed and THEN thrown out.

I have fished the clock out of the trash twice. Perhaps it is time to research a replacement.

Before I get to the severely limited options, here’s a picture of almost exactly the clock we have: it’s a Sharp atomic clock (photo from Amazon.com) that shows time, day, date, and temperature. The one I’m linking to shows indoor and outdoor temperature; ours only shows indoor. I don’t need the outdoor temperature (in fact, I’d prefer NOT to have it; we’ve gone through a dozen such devices, so I don’t want a notoriously glitchy feature on a clock), but I do like having day and date and indoor temperature.

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Paul has started a new annual tradition of taking the two older kids on a road trip each summer. Here are some of the supplies I bought for them this year, when they were ages 11 and 13:

The Hunger Games trilogy (photo from Amazon.com). Both kids read the first book, but we’ve spent the rest of the summer on the library waiting list for the second one. This was the perfect moment to finally give in and buy the set. And there was no fighting over it, because one kid wanted to re-read the first book before reading the second one, and the other kid didn’t.

Brain Quest for the Car (photo from Amazon.com). We’ve loved these Brain Quest cards for littler kids; I hadn’t realized they had sets for older kids. I first considered the set for 7th graders (one child is going into 6th, the other into 8th), but this car-trip set seemed more fun. I worried it might be too young for them (it’s marked ages 7-12), and probably would have gotten the America set (ages 9 and up) if it hadn’t had a predicted shipping delay.
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We are in the market for a new telephone. It’s a purchase that COULD be fun, but is GOING to be boring. Perhaps it is ridiculous to be buying a new telephone at all, and we should get rid of our landline like most people we know. But when I tell you our current telephone has a cord, perhaps you will see that I need a decade or two to catch up.

Crosley Candlestick Phone (photo from Amazon.com). We had a Crosley vintage-style phone once! It was the corded wall phone style.

I am sorely, sorely tempted by the pink pay phone style (photo from Amazon.com). But no: we want a cordless phone this time.
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I’m going to lead with my favorite backpack, and in fact you could suspect me of writing this entire post as an excuse to show it to you:

L.L. Bean Jr. Backpack in Blue Woodland Critter (photo from LLBean.com). Look at the little owls! The sweet baby deer! I’m so sorry it’s in a junior size and that it’s not available until late September and that none of my kids need backpacks this year anyway.

They do have good prints in the regular-size backpacks, too: here’s a shark one (photo from LLBean.com) I would be tempted to get for Henry, if he didn’t already have the next backpack I’m going to show you.
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August. The end of summer vacation is in sight. I go from feeling a little silly/premature about school-supply shopping to feeling a little panicked about school-supply shopping.

One thing we need this year is something to put sandwiches in. I had a HUGE stack of Crayola sandwich boxes I bought on clearance for a dollar each, and I am not even kidding when I say the children lost a DOZEN last year. So obviously re-training is step one, but in the meantime I need sandwich containers. Ideally they should be inexpensive ones, in case the re-training isn’t very successful. I’ve got a few sandwich boxes from the dollar section at Target, but the characters are too young for the two older boys: an 8th grade boy is not going to go to school with a Woody sandwich box.

If cost were not an issue, my favorites are the Crocodile Creek ones (photo from Amazon.com). I love the look of them, and I love the idea of getting one of each type, and I love that they have cool designs like dinosaurs and solar system. But I haven’t yet found them locally, and at Amazon they’re $7-10 each. I’d be mad if the kids lost them.

I like these Trudeau sandwiches boxes (photo from Amazon.com), but you can’t choose the color and the shipping is ridiculous (nearly $8). Plus, I have some Trudeau measuring cups, and I LOVE the way they look but their handles have been snapping off one by one, so perhaps the sandwich boxes would not be durable enough either.
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