Why There Are No Photos of My Parents' Visit

Because my mom and stepdad are angels sent from heaven. As such, they cannot be photographed -- mere humans would never see them.

My parents were scheduled to arrive on my children's last day of school, to watch our girls on Thursday and Friday when we didn't have daycare but both of us wanted to save our vacation days. Two days before their scheduled arrival, Marissa was sent home with lice.

On Tuesday, she was sent home with lice...again.

On Tuesday night, my previous post on my imaginary itching was proven untrue -- I did indeed have the little buggers in my hair. At 3:30 am I found myself de-lousing myself in the bathroom, liceMD kit in one hand and comb in the other.

And to top things off, after checking her for two days and declaring her lice free, on Wednesday Lindsey's hair finally began moving of its own accord as well.

My laundry room was knee deep in laundry both clean and dirty. All our pillows and stuffies were in garbage bags tied up tight in the porch, and both girls were one pair away from being completely out of underwear.

And then my mom and stepdad arrived, despite my having called them ahead of time to warn them that we had lice in the house. They didn't cancel, they didn't say "let us know when it's all gone." They showed up, did loads and loads of our laundry, combed and picked all three of our heads, and didn't shudder at the thought of these nasty little bugs (even though I am still).

In between domestic chores inside the house, they managed to sweep out our garage, organize the kitchen pantry and plant 92 marigolds along our walkway.

And then, before leaving on Saturday morning, they threw one more load of laundry in the wash.

Angels, I tell you.

There are no pictures because, really, who wants to see pictures of children getting their heads picked, or of all the laundry, or of the nit combs all lined up like soldiers after being sanitized.

But most of all, I didn't want to singe my parents' angel wings from the photo flash.