*** Wordzzle Challenge ***

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): acrobat; grocery store; ceiling fan; dandelion; bumble bee; alabaster; scissors; chartreuse; strenuously; cube

Mini Challenge (5): iPod; poison ivy; computer; interpreter; optometrist

And it's always fun to do an extra challenge, combine the 5 + 10 and do a 15 word challenge.

The story started in last week's Wordzzle Challenge... and now it continues.

My Mini Challenge (5):

"Lizzy Darling, Momma's busy on the computer right now. I am looking for some iphone accessories and need to concentrate on what I'm doing. Why don't you go play with iPod... or find Grandpa and get him to play with you?"

"Wew is iPod kitty, Momma?" asked the three year old, or at least she would be three in just a few weeks. She was the apple of her grandfather's eye, and doted upon by her parents.

"I don't know Dear. Why don't you go call him? Or see if Grandpa can help you find him?" her mother asked, only half paying attention, deep in her internet search. The little girl said something her mother didn't quite catch, and toddled off. Several minutes later, Linda absentmindedly looked out the window at her daughter in the yard, searching for the cat, and went back to her work, but only for a moment before it hit.

"Lizzy!! No!! That's poison ivy you're in!" the mother yelled as she jumped up, nearly knocking the computer desk over as she dashed out the door to rescue her daughter. She didn't need an optometrist to help her see the beginning of red on the little arms and legs already, nor did she need an interpreter to tell what this meant, to tell of the reaction the little girl was having to the plant.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

Oliver J. Mustard, retired Brigadier General, picked a dandelion for his granddaughter as he walked back home from the grocery store. It was a beautiful, hot, late spring day and Oliver was thinking about what it would take to install a ceiling fan in the living room when a bumble bee floated past his nose. Oliver laughted out loud, "You're quite the little acrobat aren't you, little buddy!" he said to the bee.

Since a sudden and severe case of apoplexy had nearly cost Oliver his life, and had cost him his career, his military attitude and strength of character had stood him in good stead. Life as he'd known it had been cut off, as if with a pair of scissors, and yet he had, thanks to the return of his daughter and her family, taken his new lifestyle in stride as he strenuously worked to regain his health and mobility.

As Oliver entered his yard through the garden gate, he was thinking about the bottle of Chartreuse he had chilling in the refridgerator, and that thought left his mind with mock speed when he saw his daughter. She was crouched down, and her face looked like alabaster as she stood up with her daughter in her arms. Taking in the scene in a nano second, he knew what had happened and went into action. "Get in the car, Linda. I'll grab some ice cubes for her and be right with you. We're taking Lizzy to Emergency!"

My Mega Challenge (15)

It was a week since what the family now referred to as the "poison ivy incident", and little Lizzy was doing well. You could barely see that she had had a terrible rash on her little arms and legs. The doctor had said it was a good thing they'd used the ice cubes to cool the skin as they brought Lizzy in where she was given medications to combat the reactions. The minute he heard what had happened to his little girl, JJ had taken a pair of scissors and cut it all down, following that with a treatment of boiling salt water to kill the roots of the plants.

JJ was now working as a computer analist and part time interpreter. His father-in-law had been forced to admit that his genes weren't from the shallow end of the pool after all. The tough ex-millitary man had grown to love the young man his daughter had taken up with, and he often laughed now about how he'd been so against it all back then.

"I think I need to go see an optometrist, Hummingbird," JJ said to his wife, still using the name she'd gone by for awhile 'back in the day'. I've been having some problems with my eye site. Nothing serious, but I might need some glasses. Can you make me an appointment tomorrow?"

"Okay, Sweety, I'll call tomorrow," she responded. When Lizzy was a baby & her father was in the early stages of recovery from his stroke, Linda had created an online business which paid fairly well, though now that her father could look after his granddaughter for part of the day, she was also working part time at the local grocery store, and loving it. "Dad, did you look into getting that ceiling fan for the livingroom? I'd like one in our bedroom too. If we're getting an electrician in to install one, we may as well have him do two." She wiped the sweat from her face with a chartreuse colored cotton napkin.

"Yes Dear, I've been busy as a bumble bee taking care of you," the old man grinned at his only child. "Is there anything else you'd like, my Dearest Dandelion?" he teased.

"Ya, Dad, I want an alabaster statue for the garden," she teased right back. Some days she had to be like a verbal acrobat just to keep up with her father's wit.

" iPod!" Lizzy said in her cute little almost-three-year-old voice as the big old cat walked through the door, into the house. She toddled off across the room to welcome her furry friend home.

"Hey, Dad," interjected JJ, "we have some wonderful news for you. You tell him, Hummingbird," he said to his wife.

"Ohhhh, there's the 'mushy name', what's up?" Oliver teased them as always.

"Daddy, we've been working strenuously... to give you a new grandchild and Lizzy a new sibling," Linda said sofly."And..."

"Are you...?" Oliver cut in with hope in his voice.

"Yes, Daddy... we are."

And here is One Sentence using ALL of the 15 words/phrases:

The acrobat with poison ivy, having been to his optometrist, listened to his chartreuse iPod as he strenuously walked home from the grocery store, carrying a 'Bumble Bee' ceiling fan, an alabaster dandelion statue, a pair of scissors, and a bag of ice cubes while planning to do some computer research into being an interpreter.

Now, just for fun, here is a bit of
poetry using all 15 words/phrases:

The ceiling fan goes round and round
Pushing grocery store air to the ground.
The acrobat, and interpreter too,
Pound bumble bee into glue.
Scissors cut chartreuse from red,
Making comforter for alabaster bed.
Dandelion pushes strenuously from ground,
You know the cube is not round.
Optometrist squints his eyes to see
Damage done by poison ivy.
iPod entertains a commuter
Working on his lapotp computer.
And there it is, for you unfurled,
A story of our crazy new world.

Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: prefix, art festival, income tax, chicken noodle soup, jump rope, Dutch Treat, flowering plum tree, bats in the belfry, diamond earrings, tigers

Mini Challenge: book club, organic tea, the cow jumped over the moon, paragon of virtue, wench