"Man, this ice cream really is frozen!" Brad slammed down the spoon next to the eleven other spoons that had broken in the process.

The ice cream was as frozen solid as an ice cube. It was hard to scoop into (barely able to scoop it up with a spoon. Most people have an ice cream scooper and we did too, but it wasn't working right. So, Dad volunteered to fix it. That meant that the scooper would be destroyed and we'd need to buy a new one. That was okay, though, but Hannah loved ice cream.

"How long until we get to eat it?" Mark asked as I held Hannah on my hip.

She babbled and I handed her one of the bent spoons to play with. She waved it in the air and laughed, putting it in her mouth. That was one way to get rid of one of the spoons was to give it to Hannah. She'd gladly play and chew on it which was why Mom and I gave them to her a lot.

"My guess is about twelve more spoons," I looked at the spoons.

"Tim, I found the video camera," Mom came down as Hannah squealed at seeing and hearing Mom come down.

Mom walked down in a nice black sparkly dress with a black jacket. She had her hair put up in a bun. She looked professional and like she was going back to work at the journal place again. Tonight, she was leaving Brad and me in charge of Mark and Hannah while she and Dad were at the library opening.

"Agh aasa saa," Hannah reached towards Mom and cooed.

Mom softly laughed and took Hannah from me, tickling her chin. Hannah laughed.

"Don't worry, Mom! You're gonna do great!" I grinned at Mom.

Mom held Hannah and was trying to find her a toy. "Thanks guys, I'm so nervous about this library opening. I've never spoken in front of so many people before."

"Oh, you have nothing to worry about," I waved my hand away and Hannah laughed, kicking her feet playfully.

"And by the way, did we mention that you look awesome?" Brad grinned.

Mom put her hands on her hips and looked at us. "Why do you have your hands behind your back?"

"Just a little change of pace from keeping them in front, you know," I looked at her.

"Let me see them," Mom frowned. "Both of them. Oh guys. How many times have I told you not to break the spoons in the ice cream? I thought we got an ice cream scooper."

She took the spoons from us and put them in the drawer with a sigh. Hannah was trying to reach for a spoon and Mom gave in to her. Since they were useless anyways, I figured she thought that the only use was for Hannah to play with them. It might keep her distracted from when Mom and Dad leave.

"It didn't work right, Dad's been trying to fix it," Brad looked at her.

Dad walked in and Hannah cooed at him, reaching for him to pick her up and cuddle her close. With a big grin, Dad took her from Mom and kissed her forehead, her hand wrapped around his finger. Like me, Dad's like a gentle lamb around Hannah and considers her a princess. He calls her a warrior too, but I knew that when she asked him to, he'd dress up as Beast and she'd be Belle.

"Dad did fix it. Didn't he, my warrior princess? Did Daddy fix the scoop?" He walked over to us.

"Oh great," Mom rolled her eyes and Hannah seemed enthralled with the spoon in her hand and it went in her mouth again.

"I took the 35-watt element out and replaced it with one of a curling iron."

Dad grinned and Mom hurried toward the door. "Tim, we don't have time for this. We have to go!"

"Now you not only melt the ice cream, you can style it at the same time," Dad grinned at us. "Just turn it on watch this baby go right through it." It fell through and put a hole through the ice cream. "Hey, look at that. Milkshake, anybody?"

Mom heaved a sigh and I knew that the ice cream was basically ruined now. I liked Dad's inventions usually, but sometimes they could be annoying. It had intrigued Hannah who was trying to reach for the ice cream. She wailed and tried to grab it, but I pulled her away.

…

"Hey guys," I walked in the hardware store and smiled.

To guys, a hardware store was a place where we could just hang out and talk. It was like how Brad felt about his bedroom with his friends. He likes to go there and hang out with his friends. What we usually did was talk about our wives which they wouldn't like if they found out.

"Hey, Tim, how's Hannah?" Harry was writing something down.

"She's great, she discovered crawling and it's hard to get her to stay still. Have you got a small screwdriver? Tape's jammed in my camera."

"Here you go. How's it going?" Harry asked as I loosened the tape and got it out, putting it in my coat.

"I'm numb. I spent three of the most boring hours of my life at the library," I laughed and looked at the tape.

Since what we told each other never left the hardware store, none of us feared that we'd get in trouble with our wives. We all knew how wives acted so we had a non-verbal pact that says we won't tell any of our wives anything we said. Al told Ilene everything so we didn't say anything around him.

"Three hours? You know if you put together all the times I was at the library, it wouldn't come out to three hours," Harry laughed.

"Who would've guessed? Jill had a speech at the library and told me to tape it."

"You taped that? Cause Ilene really wanted to see it," Al grinned.

Eddie walked over in his body shop uniform and was giving me a discount. I had wrecked the station wagon so it needed to be fixed for a while. He got me a rental station wagon that would do until we got the van back.

"Maybe one night this week Ilene and I can come over and watch it."

"Or I could just put my head in a vase," I joked.

"Timmy are these things hard to use?" Eddie asked.

"No, not anymore. Just point and shoot pretty much," I took out the camera. "Why does everybody wave at these things? It's perfect I do birthdays, holidays and all of our vacations. My favorite thing is an oddly misshapen buttcrack."

"Would you turn that thing off?" Al grabbed it and set it down.

That camera had costed a lot of money, but I knew he'd never intentionally hurt it. Since we had all the footage of important things, I wasn't worried about loss. The camera had been around since Brad was born. I filmed what happened after each of the kids' births and I was excited.

"So, that library thing was pretty boring, huh?" Harry laughed.

"Let's put it this way. Jill's speech was so boring, I had to check my pulse to see if I was still alive."

"Harry, Tim's exaggerating. Jill's a very fine speaker."

"Normally she is, but she started quoting poetry and it was blanket and pillow time."

"You wanna talk sleep? My wife starts talking about her antique button collection. I'm in a coma!"

"Forget coma! Last night my wife starts talking about decorating. I'm not kidding. I was clinically dead for three minutes! There she is, yakking about new fabrics for the sunroom. I didn't know what the old ones looked like! I didn't even know we had a sunroom!"

We laughed and I felt like these were my closest friends aside from Wilson and my little brother, Marty, of course. Nearly every day, I went to the hardware store just to talk to them and Jill knew that. They liked her too and treated her like family and vice versa with how she did with them.

"What kills me is when my wife wants to talk about our relationship," Harry laughed and I looked at him.

"Like you have one," I teased. "I've got a better one. My wife is studying psychology right now. Boy is she boring when she yammers on about these terms. Neurotic, psychotic, halitosis, cirrhosis, dysfunction, dat function. When my wife talks about psychology, she is the big bopper of boredom. I got this great strategy where I pretend like I'm listening."

"Maybe it's because I'm new in the relationship, but I like talking to Ilene."

"That's because in your relationship, you are the boring one!" I laughed.

I laughed and walked out of the hardware store with my camera.

….

Another part of the tape played and it showed Tim with his buddies at the hardware store which confused me. Why would Tim tape himself being with his buddies at the hardware store? Though it was confusing, I decided to let it play anyways and I could do the bottles when Al and Ilene left.

"So that library thing was pretty bad, huh?" Harry was behind the desk and working on something while Tim and Eddie were in front of him.

"Let's put it this way. Jill's speech was so dull that I had to check my pulse to see if I was still alive. I got it worse than either of you. Jill's studying psychology right now. She is so boring the way she yammers on with these useless terms."

"This is very illuminating. 'So boring?'" I cross my arms at him and head towards the sink again.

"That's not what I said. I said sobering."

"We'll just let ourselves out," Al and Ilene walked out.

They closed the door and I headed towards the sink again to wash the bottles. My anger was boiling but I knew we had sleeping kids upstairs. I wasn't about to wake them up by yelling at Tim. Hannah could sleep through the night now, but I still liked them to be quiet when she was sleeping.

"Well, I suppose you wanna talk about this," Tim walked towards me.

I started scrubbing the bottles and felt like I wanted to scream at Tim.

"Oh, no. I wouldn't want to bore you," I finished the bottles and put them to dry.

"That's alright, go ahead. I wanna hear what you have to say."

"I've already heard what you have to say," I glared at him and crossed my arms.

"I was in a hardware store with guys."

"Is this how you really feel about me?"

I thought I heard Hannah start to cry but I was wrong. With a glare, I frowned at him and backed away out of his arm reach. There was no way on the planet that I was about to give him a hug or a kiss. I was still willing to give them to the boys or Hannah (they hadn't done anything wrong).

"No! It's just what I say about you! It's a hardware store! We guys talk however we want to!"

"Because it's a hardware store, you don't have to be accountable for your actions?"

"You're blowing this way out of proportion! You know this is how men talk! I'm sure you and your girlfriends do it all the time!"

"That is not true! I have never once said anything behind your back that I've never said to your face!"

"It was a conversation that you should never have heard!"

"It was a conversation that you never should have had!"

"A conversation that you shouldn't have seen!"

"This is a conversation that is over!"

I stormed off towards Hannah who was wailing in her crib and left Tim to stand in the kitchen by himself.

….

I sat with Hannah in my lap, waiting for Dad to come out for Tool Time. With a laugh, I started playing peek-a-boo with her and she cooed happily. It was hard to believe that at the end of this month she'll be six months old. How has it been half a year with her here already? It amazed me that she had been here for a year and yet she still was growing fast.

"Does everybody know what time it is?" Heidi yelled.

"Tool Time," We chanted.

"Taa da maas," Hannah was trying to say it.

"It's rock and roll day here on Tool Time! Here are the two rocking stars! Tim Taylor and Al Borland!"

Dad walked out and Hannah babbled at him, opening and closing her hands to reach toward Dad to pick her up.

"Welcome to Tool Time. I am Tim the "Cool Man" Taylor and here's my assistant, the King, Al-vis," Dad joked. He walked over and the camera was on us. "And here are two of my kids yet again."

Dad walked back upstage and I laughed with a smile.

"Today we're gonna be having a rocking good time because we're building ourselves a rocking chair," Al joked.

"Yesterday, if you remember, we bent the wood of the frame of our rocking chair by putting it into this steamer box."

"The steam made the wood pliable and easy to shape."

"Speaking of steam. I wanna let off some. Why don't women understand that men need a place to be men? To get together with other men and discuss manly things. All kinds of men stuff from V-8 engines to smelly feet to what annoys us the most about our wives."

Dad walked back on stage and Al sighed in relief. I had a sleeping Hannah in my arms and I watched the show, wrapping her in the blanket. She was snoring away and was happily snuggled into me. I had her over my shoulder and she buried her head in my shoulder.

"Now, we're ready to make our legs and posts of our chair, using the Binford 6100 variable speed wood lathe."

"Now, we first use a rough gouge to take off the square edges. Al will use the half-round nose to start shaping our piece."

"There are various types of patterns to shape your leg. Or you can do it freestyle. It's a very difficult skill to master. You might wanna practice on a piece of wood."

"I'll give more good advice. Always think safety when working with a lathe. You'll notice I'm not wearing a necktie. No loose clothing."

The lathe grabbed Dad's shirt and I burst out laughing. I rocked Hannah and made sure that she stayed asleep.

"Is it chilly in here?"

….

"Do you know what I have?" I ran to them.

Randy and Brad were on the couch with Hannah sprawled across their laps and was happily playing with a toy. Again, Dad was out at the hardware store so Brad and Randy were put in charge of Hannah and I for the day. It wasn't really that bad since both were more focused on her instead of me. She needed more attention but we'd hang out while Hannah was sleeping.

"Rabies?" Randy guessed as he blew on Hannah's belly.

"No, this video tape. I heard Mom and Dad arguing about it last night so I snuck down and got it."

"Hey, that was pretty sneaky." Randy smiled.

"If you keep this up, you could actually turn into a person," Brad grinned.

I laughed. "Thanks, I wanna be a person!"

I turned on the video and it was about Dad at the hardware store. Harry was writing something down and Dad was in front of the desk. It just seemed like any other time that Dad was at the store so what had he done? Both Randy and Mark were watching with interest and Randy rocked Hannah.

"When Jill's talking about psychology, she's the big bopper of boredom."

"Whoa. Mom watched this and Dad's still alive?" Brad asked.

The door opened but I didn't hear Dad come in the house, so we watched the TV and Hannah was happily sleeping.

"Well, the night is still young," Randy whispered to Brad and Dad walked down.

Dad took Hannah from Randy and was glaring down at both of them with anger, but she was sleeping in his arms.

"Hey, shut that off, you shouldn't be watching it," Dad glared at us and took it out while still cradling Hannah in his arms.

"Why?" We looked at him.

"It's private adult stuff. You wouldn't understand."

"What's not to understand? You're making fun of Mom," Randy shrugged.

"I'm not making fun of Mom. I'm making fun of my wife," Dad frowned.

"Dad, they're the same person."

"Then why isn't she talking to you?" I looked at him.

"You're starting to act a lot like Brad and Randy."

"It's disrespectful to say anything about anyone when they're not around or when a camera is rolling."

…

I walked in and saw the boys head upstairs. Tim put Hannah in her playpen since she was sleeping and I sighed, walking towards him. It was still pretty heated since the fight we had last night and we were both angry. Well, my anger had died down, but I wasn't sure about his.

"Jill, I'm really sorry about the stuff on this tape," Tim showed me the tape.

"You are?" I looked at him.

"You know how I am. I started getting laughs. I got on a roll. When I get like that, I don't think about what I'm saying."

"What you said about my speech was humiliating, but what really got to me was that you put me down for talking about psychology."

"I didn't mean that."

"Tim, come on. Do you think I don't notice the way your eyes glaze over when I talk about it? I know you think it's a bunch of gobbledegook, but I love it. I'm juggling my life around this so I can make it happen. When you demean it, it hurts me."