Meet Steggie

It was my anniversary...Five years together.. my husband was on the ocean, I was having kidney stones, my mom came over to help out with Joshua, and my dad had just gotten off a 12 hour shift at work.

We were all exhausted.

So when dinner time got closer.. we sat there and stared at each other. No one wanted to cook. I didn't even know if I had anything to cook. So we made the decision to go out to eat.

And then we sat there and stared at each other even more.

You see, in my family, NO ONE can decide where to eat. I am actually surprised we can make it to a restaurant before they start locking the doors and turn off the blinking "OPEN" sign. I have no idea where we get this from... We love to go out to eat. We have tried every restaurant in town... and believe me, none of us look like we have missed a meal.

Mind you.. my family runs several businesses on their ranch, has staff that works for them and has to make decisions on a daily basis.

But when it comes to something our life depends on, like eating, we just sit and stare at each other for a hour ... or two...  

Finally, I spoke up and cringed at the same time as the words "Cracker Barrel" came out of my mouth.

Now, for those of you that don't know what Cracker Barrel is... it is a excellent home cook restaurant. I love it there! In fact every time Joshua has movie night at school, I run there to grab some take out. Their restaurant is comfortable and friendly. They have the cutest stuff in their front shop.

And that is where I cringe... Their shop.

Along with all the cute stuff they have, they have a toy section. Where you can buy a dollar store monster truck for $9.99. (Cringe!!) And, its always a fight to get Joshua to stay seated with us, because he wants to play in the toy section.

The Cracker Barrel people are geniuses when it comes to money making. They are headaches for people who like me that 'for the love of God' just want their kid to stay seated for more than a millisecond.

However, I just wanted some good comfort food... so we went.

After fighting with Joshua over a plastic train that costs $7.99 and was sure to fall apart within a hour of opening it, I found a Dinosaur egg that was three dollars cheaper and I proceeded to give my sales pitch to the three year old.

It worked. He was intrigued. So we paid for it.. wrapped it up.. and took it home.

All you had to do was put it in a container of water and wait...  for it to hatch.

Trying to explain to a 3 year old that you HAVE to wait.... SUPER FUN!

The idea is that the egg hatches within 24 hours and then you leave it alone and it will continue to grow for another 72 hours in the container.

So it's like growing your own baby dinosaur. And, you have no idea what dinosaur you are going to get, so there is a fun element of surprise there too!

24 Hours:

At this point, the wait game was over. That little boy tore into his egg like it was Christmas morning...

"For unto you is born this day, in the House of the Smiths is a Dinosaur... and ye shall be called "Steggie" after ye species, Stegosaurus."   ... says the Lord.


And from this point on we now have a dinosaur whom lives in our bathroom.

Welcome to the World Steggie!