I would ask, "How in the hell did that happen?" but I know dammit. I know.

Dear Father-in-Law –

Have a safe flight home.  While I have enjoyed your visit and our spirited discussions about whether to get a colonoscopy is a smart thing at your age and how you're sure to meet your next wife on the plane home, I have just now stepped on the scale and realized I’ve gained five pounds during your visit. 

FIVE!!! 

I blame you. 

Now, I realize that I am currently thirty-two pounds (!!!) over my high school weight and that twenty-seven pounds (!!!) of that is not your fault.  Those pounds are the fault of your son.  And the invention of potato chips.  And my current recipe of eating said chips with ice cream late at night to make my monsters shut up. But still - until now I was able to convince myself that the weight was mostly wisdom and that a uniform of flared jeans and baggy tank tops was acceptable, stylish even.  I was sure being happy in the crazy that is Husband made the fluffy bits acceptable.  That a little food medication was better than crying in corner or licking the walls. 

I was wrong!  This morning I put on my ‘yoga pants’ to take you to the airport and it was much like shutting the zipper on your suitcase is going to be; near impossible without serious shoving, squeezing and cussing. 

It is because of this, I revoke your visiting pass for next year. 

Or rather, I am amending it.  You may visit but eating is not permitted. 

There will be no breakfasts at the International House of Pancakes, no matter your love of their pancakes.  We will not have dinner out nightly having had lunch out daily and breakfast – well, we’ve already discussed our breakfasts.  And we will spend more than the two minutes it takes from getting from the car into a restaurant or mall or Best Buy, outside in the garden or walking one of the many leafy green trails I've heard Nashville has hidden somewhere.  We will not watch hours of car buying shows and trade your new love of American Football for active sport of some kind.  

No, Curling does not count as an active sport.  Yes, I know you think it does.

Have a safe flight home and get your ass – literally and figuratively to the doctor.  I have one month to drop all these dinners and face my doctor with at least the same weight as last year or all hell is sure to break loose. 

Yours truly,

~ a much, much  jigglier Daughter-in-Law than when you arrived.