“Do you know what’s on the flyswatter?” I said to John.
“Fly guts!” says Jenna from the next room.
“That’s right. Fly guts! And we don’t hit people with fly guts, do we?” said mom.
John hangs his head sadly and says in a small voice, “no.”
Page 110 of 181
I just realized, after reading Lisa’s post, that I haven’t posted any Christmas pictures! Shame on me!
So, here’s a few from Christmas morning.
And here’s what we did after Christmas.
A while back Megan went to a friend’s girly birthday party. They all went to a beauty school and got dolled up for an hour. I didn’t think Megan would enjoy that AT ALL, but she was good sport, and let them do whatever they wanted to her hair. Maybe if I had a cool salon chair at home and knew what I was doing, she’d let me do this to her. After the girls were all fancied up, they went to the mall for some lunch. Here are some pictures of her in her fancy up-do.
Isn’t that darling? The problem was, she had to go to a soccer game immediately after she came home from the party, so then she looked like this:
I took this close up picture thinking that maybe someday I’d try this hairstyle on my own. Ha. What was I thinking?
When she took this do out, she was amazed that there were 28 bobby pins holding her hair together. No, I don’t think I could ever do that. But it’s nice to know that my little tom-boy can actually look girly once in a while.
My husband and my white suburban have been gone since last Thursday. They drove South to experience the joys that are CES (something electronics show) in Las Vegas. I’m hoping that Ryan has a good time and a successful trade show, although I wouldn’t really know, since I’ve only talked to him thrice since he left. (Maybe he’ll read the blog to find out what we’re up to–who knows?)
Yes, I’m a single mother. Not only that, I’m a single mother with one car.
The kids apparently remember that Dad’s not here, but they seem to forgotten about the car. Today when I told them we were going to the library (I’m sure they’ll let me come back, if I just pay that pesky $5.20 fine), Natalie said, “Can we go in the white car?”
“Sure, honey,” I told her, “why don’t you go out and get in the white car. I’ll meet you out there.”
Observant, isn’t she?
John was saying his prayers last night, and it went something like this:
HeavenFather (Yes, it’s all one word)
Thank you for this day.
Bless us to be nice.
And not fight.
Bwess me to feel better, bwess Cole to feel better. ( I don’t know how long it’s been since either of them have been sick, but once he starts to bless people, he just keeps them in his prayers for a long time.)
Bwess Parker to feel better.
Bwess the minors.
Bwess Joseph–
(then he stops, and says, “Mom, Joseph–not our cousin Joseph but the other Joseph Smith–is dead.” “Yes, he is,” I told him. “But can we still pray for him?” he asked. “Yes, we can,” I said.)
Bwess Joseph Smith.
NameoJesusChristamen.
Congratulations to Kimberly, who says she never wins anything. She is the winner of the book this month!
It’s a new month, and that means a new book to give away to one lucky reader! I actually got this from another blog contest (Thanks, Deb!), and read it over my “Christmas break”. It’s called Dangerous Admissions.
Book Description
Miranda “Rannie” Bookmanâ€â€43, divorced mother of two, with a recent love life consisting of a long string of embarrassingly brief encountersâ€â€is beginning to feel like a dangling participle: connected to nothing. Her career as a copyeditor is down the toilet (she makes one little slipâ€â€a missing “l” from the last word in the title of the Nancy Drew classic â€â€and suddenly she’s Publishing Enemy #1!), so she’s been forced to take any gig she can get. And that means giving tours at the Chapel School, the ultra-exclusive, ultra-expensive, private academy that her children attend. Certainly not the most interesting of employments . . . at least until someone stumbles across the dead body of the Director of College Admissions.
Investigating a murder was never in her job description, but with her soon-to-be-college-bound boy Nate a prime suspect, Rannie has little choice. Besides, who better to dot all the “i”s and cross all the “t”s than a self-proclaimed “language cop”? Her diligence might even lead her to a brand-new love. Or to a killer. Or to another corpseâ€â€hopefully not her own.
Now as for my personal review, while I liked the story and found it interesting, there were a lot of “language issues” that I had a problem with. Enough said. But I enjoyed the book, especially how she mentally corrects or edits everyone around her. I’ve known enough English teachers and proofreaders to understand her little quirk of expecting everyone to have a mastery of the English language.
So, if you would like to enter to win this book, just leave a comment on this post, and I will pick a winner next Monday (January 14, is it?) And if you’d like to enter more Pay-it-forward book contests, check out Overwhelmed with joy, where she hosts this every month.
Yesterday I had the great opportunity to be a part of the re-dedication of the Utah State Capital Building.
(And yes, I am actually in that picture. I’m the first tiny black dot just to the right of the men’s section of choir. On the balcony. Behind that pillar. Yes, that’s it! You found me!)
The 92 year old building has undergone a 4 year remodel, and was dedicated yesterday, on Utah’s Statehood day. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Orchestra at Temple Square, and Bells on Temple Square were there to help celebrate, along with the International Children’s Choir, the 23rd Army Band, the Cathedral of the Madeleine Choir School. It was quite an event! You can read about it here, or if you want to watch the whole program, you can view it here.
I must admit that I had a little bit less than a good attitude about the whole thing when we first rehearsed on Sunday. The bell part for the one song that we were asked to play was not extensive, and I rang less than 10 times. “And we are going to spend how many hours this week to do this one little song?” I grumbled. But after rehearsing with the choir in the beautiful capitol building on Thursday night, I was more excited about it. The whole effect was going to be amazing. They also added a few bell parts to other songs, and we got caught up in the realization that this is really a once in a lifetime opportunity to be there at this historic occasion.
“My friends and fellow Utahns, today we celebrate Utah’s 112th birthday. How appropriate, therefore, that we have gathered to rededicate this great symbol of statehood: our Capitol,” Gov. Jon Huntsman said.
So, even though it was a long day away from my family, and I felt like a bad daycare mommy in the morning when I dropped John off at his friend’s house and he cried, “I don’t want to play with Hunter! Mommy, don’t go!”, it still turned out to be a marvelous experience. Each person in attendance got to ring a little bell, and it was indeed a grand affair.
I really felt bad for the Choir. As you can see in the picture above, they were just crammed onto the stairs like sardines, with hardly room to read their music, and definitely no room to sit down. And they had to stand there for the entire program! I talked to one choir member who did sit down, as she would rather sit down than pass out. She was light hearted about it, though, and she said, “If someone had to go down, it might as well have been me, since I was in the back and could actually sit.” She made it back up for the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and was fine. We at least got to leave after our part was over, then come back for the very end.
It was quite a spectacular experience. I feel very lucky to have attended. Now that it’s done, I want to take my kids up there to see the capitol building. I’ve only actually been there a few times myself, and my kids have never been there, so I think it would be a good field trip for us.
I was shocked and saddened, however, when I watched the news last night to hear that the body of a construction worker was found just as the dedication ceremony was getting under way.
In today’s mail was a little card that said “Odd Jobs” on the top of it. It looked kind of like a business card, only a little bigger. It has the name of a 9 or 10 year old kid in our area, with his address and phone number. Then in small print it says, “I made a series of mistakes and need to make up for them. If you have any odd jobs, please call me.”
I don’t know what to think of it. Part of me wants to call up his mom and ask what his mistakes were and how much he needs to earn. I guess I could have him shovel some snow or something. I wonder if it was his idea, or if his mom is making him do all this to make up for something stupid.
Just wondering.
Happy New Year to you, and Happy 2008. Yes, we’ve had a wonderful Christmas vacation and I’m looking forward to the kids going back to school tomorrow. Of course, Ryan also leaves for Las Vegas tomorrow, so that means I’ll also be a single parent. The good thing is that I don’t really have to cook for the next week, though, as there’s no point cooking fancy food for these macaroni and cheese lovers. But after eating non stop for the past couple of weeks, I really need to just buy one big bag of salad and eat only that. Right.
New Year’s Eve is a pretty casual holiday around here. Nobody invited us to any parties, so it was just us. During the day we used up a bunch of free things that were going to expire, and that’s always fun! We ended up going to Boondocks and the 3 oldest kids played laser tag and the rest of us just played the arcade games for a while. The kids took in their report cards and they get tokens for each A, with a maximum of 18 tokens. Well, 18 is just about right for an hours worth of fun. Ryan and I just bought some to share with John, and we had a great time. We also went out to lunch at Mimi’s cafe, and made a quick Costco run before coming home.
That night, after dinner, the kids watched movies and played Wii. Ryan worked on stuff, and I folded laundry. The excitement was running high, I tell you. At about 10, we ate leftover birthday cake, and then I went to bed. I did hear some noise at around 12, but I didn’t bother to get up. I watched the ball drop at midnight New York time, and really, what more celebration do I need?
But there are some people in my family who are much more ambitious than I. My brother-in-law has built a huge luge in his front yard again, and it looks incredibly fun. We haven’t made it over there to slide yet, and since I am carless today, we may not get there before it warms up in the next few days. But if you are in the neighborhood of South Jordan, you should drive by and see it–it’s quite amazing! Here’s what the Channel 5 news guys had to say about it.
This morning I took Megan the the pet store to buy a new parakeet. They were closed yesterday and she’s been trying to wait patiently. She picked out a cute little yellow female and she’s named her “Bubbles”. I hope that she and “Skyler” (her little blue parakeet) will get along happily.
So that’s about it. We’re kickin’ back and enjoying not having pressing to do for a couple of days. Happy New Year!
Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me! 
Happy Birthday to me-eeee,
Happy Birthday to me.
Is it a bad thing to plan your own birthday party? I’ve had several people question why I’m planning my own birthday party, and really the reason is… because I want it to get done, and I can’t really just ask someone to plan it for me, now can I? My husband is a dear soul, and I love him very much, but when it comes to birthdays (mine, in particular), he’s hit and miss. Some years he really surprises me (like a couple of years ago when he got me a new fridge), but some years he completely drops the ball. Yes, I realize it’s hard to remember to buy a birthday present AND a Christmas present, and I do understand that having a birthday just four days after Christmas is quite inconvenient, so that’s why I didn’t want to burden him (or anyone else) and ask them to plan my party. And really, there wasn’t all that much planning involved. Since the nice couple in our neighborhood who has a wonderful cabin agreed to let me have my party there (provided there were no kids), I didn’t even have to clean my house! I just made up some invitations, sent them out with the Christmas cards and gifts, ordered some balloons and way too much food, and that was about it.
And it turned out wonderfully! It was the most perfect birthday I remember in quite some time. 
In the morning, John came into our room like he usually does. He even told me happy birthday, with a little coaching from Dad. “Where are the presents?” John asked. I told him there were probably some presents down under the tree, and if he wanted to, he could go and get them. “No,” he said, “I want to give you a present from me!” I told him to talk to Dad about that, since I didn’t buy myself my own presents this year. Dad didn’t have any for him, and he was disappointed. Since I had recently stopped by the clearance sale at Bath and Body Works, I told him to pick any item out of the bag on the floor, and he could wrap it up for a present to mommy. He picked something, and was happy to wrap it up. Someone must have helped with with the wrapping, because it wasn’t bad!
Friends call on your birthday! I got phone calls, emails, and cards from friends! It was so much fun! We then had a family Christmas party with Ryan’s family. Robin and family came, too, and we had a fun time, although we ate way too much food. Cinnamon rolls the size of my face, people. And I ate the whole thing. Crazy.
After that party, Robin took the kids sledding again! Bless you, my friend! They had such a fun time sledding, and I didn’t have to go out in the cold and take them (I’m such a whimp, I know!). While they were gone, I got things ready, cooked up some meatballs, wrapped a few presents for door prizes, and got changed and made up. Since it was my party, I had to at least looked like I tried, right?
At about 6:00 we started to take things over to the cabin. Of course we forgot some things, but Ryan and Robin got those while I set things up for the party. It’s a beautiful place, with lots of room for guests to eat and mingle. But while I was setting things up, I got a phone call from a distressed child, telling me that her bird was acting sick, and she didn’t know what to do. I told her to hold the poor little parakeet and just pet it and comfort it and that was about all she could do. I got another call in a few more minutes asking if they could call Cole’s friend’s mom, who used to be a vet. Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt to call her, but I didn’t know what she would be able to do. This sweet friend came over, put the bird under the heat lamp, even gave him a shot of something (but she admits that she thinks he might have been dead by the time she gave him the shot), but he didn’t pull through. Another death of a pet, and mom and dad weren’t even there to comfort them. Kind of a sad thing to happen on a birthday, don’t you think?
But we had a party to attend to, so attend we did. It was a wonderful time with friends and family! I had people sign my little birthday book, and they also entered their names for the door prizes when they came in. I had friends from high school, friends from college, friends from my old ward in Lehi, even my old boss from when I worked at BYU stopped by. My parents and my sister came, along with a few aunts and uncles. Ryan’s parents and sisters came, and it was really so much fun! Some people brought food, some brought gifts, my good friend Melinda even gave me a beautiful plant! It was such a wonderful birthday! It’s worth it to turn 40 if you can have so much fun doing it!
Like I said before, there was way too much food. My friend Serena brought a huge Costco cake, and we barely even cut into it! I had to bring it all home. The kids happily ate some cake today, but it will take a while before that cake is gone. And crackers, and cheese ball, and meatballs, and mozzerella sticks, and…. let’s just say no one was very hungry for more sweet food, after the Christmas holiday. But even with NO Food, it would have been a fun party–for me, at least. I got to talk to friend after friend after friend. It was a lovely day, and I will not soon forget it. Well, who knows, I am 40 now, I may forget really soon, I guess. But when I do, I guess you can all just direct me bag to this blog post and I’ll be reminded of what a wonderful and fun birthday it really was.
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