I looked at the entertainment center, and what did I see?

Look closer

closer . . .

A Brazil nut!

Ok, only my family will think that's hilarious.

You see, we have a slightly embarrassing family tradition involving Brazil nuts (come to think of it, it should be REALLY embarrassing)

When I was little, every Christmas among other stocking stuffers, Santa always left us a few handfuls of mixed nuts, still in their shells, which we did not enjoy and really only used to throw at each other. If any of us was interested enough to even try to crack open the nuts, we never could get the rock hard brazil nuts to open so they were always left sitting around. And we thought they looked a little like . . . well . . . ummmm . . . ok, they look like poop. And since we didn't know what they were called, we called them poop nuts. We used to throw them in each other's beds or onto chairs when anyone stood up and we would exclaim things like, "Oh, gross! Look what so & so just did!" Hilarious stuff when you're eight-years-old.

Anway, this went on for years, and when Candice was the first to get married she was mortified during Mark's first Christmas with the family when he stood up and the poop nut appeared and Eli said, "Mark, that's sick!" That same Christmas Mark created a family board game that the Borups play every year on Christmas Eve. It has all sorts of spaces that remind us of memorable family events or quotes, and in the middle of the board was the poop nut space. If you land on that space, you cannot continue in the game until you do a skit with a poop nut. That first year my mom landed on that space and refused to encourage our behavior or embarrass herself so she would not do a skit with the poop nut and she stayed on that space for the rest of the game, and it was a really long game. In the years since, as everyone else has conformed, I'm pleased to report that she has come around.

So when I looked up at the entertainment center the other morning and saw this, I couldn't help but laugh. Larry actually went to the grocery store and picked one Brazil nut out of the mixed nuts and purchased it for five cents and left it to surprise me. Now we have our own family poop nut. Great . . .