the REAL story of the Naked Forks...and other truths

   In our house, all the kids have jobs.  Some are big jobs, some are small jobs and some are in between jobs.  The job usually coincides with the childs size/age.  (although due to unfair proportions (height) and Josh, we do try and divide things up a bit or he would be doing ALL the jobs based on the" size factor".)

   Miss Olivia has the job of unloading a small portion of the dishwasher, her portion is the silverwear/utensil caddy.  She is very diligent about doing this job and will take a bar stool, and the caddy and sit in front of the kitchen utensil drawers and hum to herself as she unloads the utensils into their correct drawers.  She is quite meticulous about this and likes to do her "job" just so.  All the forks in the fork slot, the knives in their proper spot, the spoons by the spoons and so forth.

   Well, one day her dad thought he would be a BIG HELPER and sit there with her and unload.

He grabbed a barstool and began sorting through the utensils, putting them away with her.

I was in the living room when all of a sudden out of the blue I hear a shriek, a wail, a cry of horror if you will.   My heart skipped a beat or two, heaven forbid had she been stabbed by a wayword utensil?  Had her father sliced through a finger while putting away a knife?  Surely there was blood and a visit to the Doctor in our future.   Just as I headed into the kitchen I heard her chastise her father in her BEST future mother voice, "Daddy!  You CANNOT put the NAKED forks with the CLOSED forks!!!"

   Naked? Closed?  What in the world was happening in my kitchen and who knew forks could be naked?  I will admit, I had heard a LOT of strange things in my time as a mother, but this possibly took the cake, or fork if you will.

   I marched into the kitchen to see if I could unlock the mystery of the FORKS.  Olivia was practially in tears as she was re-arranging and organizing Kyle's somehow fatal mistake with the forks.  He was equally as confused as I it appeared.  We both looked at our poor distressed daughter and rationally asked her to explain what the fork mix up was all about.

   Calmly, and looking at us like we were either 3 headed dogs, idiots, or BOTH, she grabbed TWO forks from the drawer.

   Laying them both side by side she explained that the "naked forks" could NOT be in the same compartment as the "CLOTHED forks"  (which i mistook for CLOSED, when in fact she MEANT CLOTHED, as in clothing bearing forks...who knew?)

   Since we have a couple of sets of mismatched cutlery in our possession, and we seem to have shamelessly mixed them for years (again, who knew?)  Olivia felt it only her place as our 5 year child to set the record straight once and for all.

   And so, now only the NAKED forks lay together in one slot (and who knows what goes on when no one is looking??  at least they don't seem to be multiplying rapidly--or AT ALL thank goodness!) and the CLOTHED forks lie together in another slot in the silverwear drawer.

   Peace on earth, or at least in the drawers, at last.  In case you are as confused as we were when this incident took place in our home....please look at the photo of our 2 kinds of forks posted below.  We are certain that any person with any degree of intelligence (hey, you only have to be as smart as either Kyle or I and that is not too hard!) will be able to figure out WHICH is NAKED and which is CLOTHED!

   And that my friends, is the TRUE story of the the Naked Forks!