Like Royalty

My childhood was charmed.  The first eleven years of it were especially wonderful when we lived in Village Green.  Village green is the name of the trailer park we lived in.  It was all so much like a dream.  Or a reality TV show.  Maybe some of each.  But I loved it.  

I recently decided to look up our trailer park on Google Earth.  Okay, that feels weird.  We never called it the trailer park, we called it the trailer court, so let's just get that out in the open so I can stop trying to remember to keep from typing what is actually coming out of my brain after long years of usage (i.e. trailer court) and translating it into the-rest-of-the-world-ese.

So Village Green was the trailer court (sounds so much more regal and so much less "white trash"*) in which I grew up.  And I decided to find it on Google Earth.  

I entered the address: 222 N. 1200 W., Orem, UT, and here is where it took me:

 I stared and stared at the area directly above where the address is written and couldn't for the LIFE of me make sense of trying to wander through those streets.  Wait.  Where is the park?  Where are half the streets?  And what, pray tell, is that huge parking lot to the left of it?  I don't remember any business in the area large enough to require such a huge parking lot.

I seriously looked up and down the street and zoomed way out and back in again.  I made sure I was looking in the right area compared to Trafalga Family Fun Center, which was just down the street.  Yes. this was the place.  What in the world happened?  Where was the place I had grown up?

Then, after turning the map and thinking and thinking for far more minutes than I care to admit,  I took a closer look at the parking lot.

Yeah.  Duh.  Not duh ME, of course!  Duh, Google Earth, who wrote my address out under the adjacent neighborhood.  How was I to know that the parking lot, which happened to be located exactly where I remembered the trailer court being, actually WAS the trailer court when the address was written so far off?  Sheesh.  

Once I got over that (I feel like an idiot again just thinking about it), I starting wandering in my mind through that trailer court.  And it was all there.  All the places I rode my bike and the hill on which I'd wiped out on my roller skates countless times.  My best freind's house and the park.  Oh, but the pool.  Looks like the swimming pool is gone.  Other than that, it looked like home.  And then I found home.  

In the lower left hand corner, with a brown roof, was the double-wide I grew up in.  The one that started out as a single-wide and, as our family grew, was transformed into a double-wide by my dad, who can do anything. 

Oh the memories!  Thousands of them flying at me in the most random of orders.  And so I realized that I need to put them down.  And so I'm going to.

This is the first of a series I will be doing about life in the trailer court.  I can't wait to get it all out.
*For the record, I really hate the term "white trash", especially when used to describe a person for the same reason I despise the term "loser".

Solving Yet Again

Am I the only one who's noticed that the joke's on us?  That the the term "resolution" comes from the root word "resolve", and that the word resolve* means RE-SOLVE, or in other words, to SOLVE AGAIN (don't check your dictionary, just take my word for it, please).  So at the beginning of a new year we all make lists of how to solve the same problems over again.  Because we failed last year.  Obviously.  New Years Try Again, Losers (and fail again, too!) might be a more fitting term.

But whatever.

I've been inspired by so many of my friends who've made lists and really enjoyed reading them, so I will post my own to look back on next year, before I type them up again at the beginning of next January.  So here is my list of problems to try solving again:

GET SMART:
I'm getting tired of being dumbish.  I've always wanted to know more stuff, but always been too lazy to learn it (I just want to know it, please).  This year
I will:
* study scriptures NOT for a few minutes before I fall asleep, but in the morning when I'm not half asleep.  This might be easier because we've already started being ready for school early and spending that last ten minutes or so before Greg takes the kids to school sitting together in a quiet living room, each doing our personal scripture study.  I LOVE this.
* Do more than a quick scan of Wikipedia when I want to know about something.  I do that far too often.  I  will research subjects that interest me in more detail.  I will also learn more about things that other people know/think they know so I can be better informed.
* Read fewer status updates/comments and more non-social-type writings.
* Learn how to do things.  On the computer/phone, playing basic hymns on the piano and maybe the ukulele if Evie ever gets off long enough for me to learn.  Etc.

STOP BAKING SO MUCH:
I always think it's so funny when people tell me that the wished they baked more.
I will:
Bake dessert no more than twice, and a sweet breakfast (muffins/scones) only once, per week.  I've made this resolution before and only lasted for a few weeks.  I will do better.

MOVE MORE:
I don't sit down very much, but I also spend very little time making my heart pump rapidly.
I will:
Get out on my own or with Greg and walk fast at least 15 minutes a day (preferably 30+) after the kids get home and we've chatted over their lunch.  I am exempt on days when the blizzard is so fierce that a person cannot move in any direction.  Or when there is a flood, fire, tornado or hurricane.  Or earthquake.

TEACH MY KIDS MORE:
I've been getting better at this, but ohmygosh I have a long way to go.
I will:
Teach Aaron the alphabet/reading basics, whether he wants to learn or not.
Talk to Aaron and Spence more about things as we go along.
Start more discussions with Ev and Dave.  Have more gospel-centered conversations.

EXPRESS MY OPINION LESS OFTEN:
for Pete's sake.
I will:
On facebook.  Even when people say dumb or offensive things.
And in real life.  I'll stop myself when I feel a room going quiet and realize that I'm expressing my opinion about something as if it is the Holy Truth.  (although I still call some of those things holy truth.  Like how Poles should not pee in plain sight on the side of the road. :)
On my blog, however, I will write whatever I want.

BE MORE EASY GOING:
I will:
Stop acting like everything matters so much.
Smile more.
Forgive more easily.
Let other people decide things more often.
Never lose my temper.

Well, that oughtta do it!  Wish me luck!!
*and to those who are saying, "doesn't resolution come from resolute?" I say, "Don't sass me."

Feel the Top of Your Head to Find Out If You're Me

If you have some of the same issues as me (which you don't) or you are me (which you're most likely not) then I recommend you stay out of my attic.  Strange things have been known to happen when people like me go up there.

For example, if you do go up, the same crossbeam that you duck under to get to the toddler clothes will be right there in the SAME PLACE when you carry those clothes out, ducking not quite as low as you did on the way in.  Freaky. 

Also, if you go up again a couple of days later, the exact same crossbeam, for some indeterminable reason, will STILL BE IN THAT VERY SAME PLACE.  Only a psychic could foresee something like that.  Seriously.  Attics freak. me. out.

They also give me scabs on my scalp that don't go away for two weeks.  Which is nothing compared to the feeling of standing alone, laden with bags of clothes in a dim and dusty room, head throbbing, feeling a deep sense of embarrassment.  Is it even possible to feel embarrassed when you're the only one around?

It is if you have some of the same issues as me (which you don't) or you are me (which, lucky for you--and your head--you're most likely not).

Getting My Point: A Cross?

Spencer just loves this toy:





He could play with it for...minutes on end (i.e. forever, in toddler time). With my background in early childhood ed I can sit there for as many minutes as he does doing my parallel play and self talk (or whatever those things were called. No longer comfortable with the ECE lingo).



This toy is excellent for teaching. You've got colors, shapes, matching, fine motor, filling and dumping; what more does a toddler need?



Well, this toddler's mother needs something more. Take a look at those shapes. We have a triangle, square, circle, star and a... a... well, I have no idea what that other one is. Is that an x? A cross? A t? What on earth do I teach my child that is!?!



Why THAT? When did the rectangle cease to be one of the Very Basic Shapes. Even one of the slightly more obscure shapes would have been better, like an oval or a crescent (less sophisticated parents would be free to call it a moon) or an OCTAGON, for pete's sake. With an octagon at least you can find something else with the same shape and show for comparison, "Octagon--octagon!!" With THAT thing you can't even figure out what it is, much less find anything to compare it to.



I could go on and on, but I don't want anyone to think that my frustration lies in the fact that one of the few subjects in life that I feel fairly confident and comfortable with, shapes, has become yet another subject about which I cannot converse intelligently. Even with my toddler.

Bent Out of Shape

One thing that bugs Greg about me is that I do way to much rushing and bustling. I far too frequently operate on "urgent" when it's not really necessary, and sometimes actually makes things worse.

"Move more slowly!" he'll say. "We really need to learn to calm down around here" he'll say.

I can't take the stairs less than two at a time. While cooking I work my way through all the bodies in the kitchen like a professional race car driver weaving through and past the competition. When my in-laws are visiting, whenever I enter a room they kind of automatically move to the edges/flatten themselves against the walls to let me whoosh past. And I wish that was more of an exaggeration than it is. I just move fast, especially when we're working on a time frame.

On Thursday morning I knew, as I breezed past Greg standing in the doorway to the kitchen, that he wouldn't like my rushing, but I had to grab the kids' lunches so they could get going and wouldn't be late for school. Heaven knows those 3 or 4 seconds I saved by running around could be the 3 or 4 seconds that made all the difference! Before Greg had a chance to get bent out of shape about my rate of motion, my toe did. Get bent out of shape, that is.

I stubbed it on the door frame. Really, really hard. And it hurt. Really, really badly. And I thought, Greg is so right. I really do need to calm down and move more slowly/carefully.

And he stood there while I wailed and cried (yes, I pretty much did. Baby.) and nary an "I told you so" escaped his lips.

As a punishment (well, natural consequence, really), instead of going to breakfast for our usual Saturday morning date, we only had time to go to the ER to see if they could fix my toe, which I'd only realized was looking extra crooked on Friday night. Then, even though I had us all completely packed and ready for our weekend trip (for church), it was too late for us to make it to the hotel before bedtime (a recipe for a disastrous hotel stay, especially with napping in the car), so Greg went on his own and I stayed home with the kids. But it wasn't all bad. Since we were all bummed we wouldn't get to go, Greg took us for a little 1/2 hour adventure before he left, and that was totally worth everything. More on that later.

And my toe is totally fine. Crooked and swollen, but apparently the crookedness is from the last time I stubbed it a few years ago. When I was rushing around to save another 3 or 4 seconds during some other life threatening crisis, no doubt.

Hidden Treasures

I'd like to "find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures". There's just something so appealing about that promise.

So I'm going to finally try to follow the Word of Wisdom, or its spirit. Moderation in all things. Or, not really. Moderation in some things and abstinence in others. So, for me, this is about complete forbearance. Adapted to the capacity of the weakest of all saints. (that's me)

In order to find that wisdom and those hidden treasures, I am going to reveal some hidden treasures of my own with my family:

The caramels are on the baking chocolate shelf,
the Oreos are in the school snack box and
the chocolate covered orange sticks are in the fridge.

I'm not gonna eat them anymore. Neither snack on them throughout the day when I should be eating fruit or yogurt, nor sneak nibbles here and there while making dinner. Or every time I enter the kitchen.

Because I desire wisdom.

And to stop this steady approach to the weight I told myself I wouldn't ever reach again. "No zeros before the decimal," I said. (We're a half a kilo away. Or maybe a whole kilo now, thanks to Fast Sunday.)

But mostly for the wisdom. That's a better treasure than having the figure I want. And I'm seriously NOT being sarcastic. But between keeping (my interpretation of one aspect of) the Word of Wisdom, Fast Sundays and the promise quoted at the beginning of the post, I'm going to be incredibly attractive in both mind AND body.

I can't wait.

Quickly! Turn Me Upside Down!

It doesn't happen very often, but some days I just spend a lot of time thinking about the things I can't stand about myself. And

1. I think about how poor I am because I get so tired of bathing children and doing the entire Before Bed Routine at the end of the day when I'm already all mothered out, and my husband almost never does it.

2. I listen to Aaron stomp his feet and declare that he "doesn't like the stupid (insert noun)". He makes angry faces and sometimes screams and is a total grouch. Then he has to stand facing the wall because he said one (or more) of his favorite bad words (hate, stupid and shut up).

3. Evie and David bicker and annoy each other and seem to have absolutely no positive feelings for each other. Even after the long discussion we had on Saturday about how we're all playing on the same team and should be encouraging and supporting each other, which they seemed to totally understand and agree with.

4. Spencer wiggles and giggles and generally makes changing his diaper an extremely frustrating minute and a half, no matter how seriously I tell him to stop or even if I get mad.

Then I think about

1. How I'm terrified of being a nagging wife so I rarely ask Greg to do the things that we seem to have established (non-verbally) are my responsibilities. (and there are a hundred other reasons why it's not his fault). Instead I just sit around feeling sorry for myself and my terrible lot in life.

2. How often Aaron sees me get frustrated or annoyed with something small when I should really just fix it and move on.

3. How often I forget to be positive and encouraging to my kids when trying to help them overcome their little faults, but come across as critical or annoyed instead.

4. The few times in a row that I tickled and played with Spencer just before or after changing a diaper, even though I knew I would pay for it later when he wanted to play before/during/after every diaper change.

And I realize that I've created all these monsters. And I think even more about how I sick I am of me.

Then we get out of the house and when we cross a street I help Aaron walk his bike and he says, "I can do it, but thanks, mom, for helping me." And when we pass a little store he asks if we can go get an ice cream. When I say no he says, "But you only have to buy it for one guy: for me!" And I smile.

And my phone rings and Greg says he has a question for me, "Tell me what you think about this: When the kids come home from school we go for a picnic. Just you and me."

And I think that's a great idea. And I think I'm going to pull out my scriptures*, for goodness sake, and start being more like the person I want to be instead of thinking about how different I am from her. I'm gonna smile this frown away.
*A very real key to my happiness and one that I forget about waaaaay too often and just read a quick chapter before bed instead of actually studying.

Cut Short

I finally did away with the terrible haircut I've been sporting for the last few months. The cut I got on Monday was nice except for the three major things that were wrong with it.

So I took scissors to my own hair for the first time ever. Let me tell you, in case you are unaware: cutting one's own hair requires an entirely different level of skill than cutting one's children and husband's hair. In case you have never tried it I will paint you a picture:

It's like writing a story in a foreign language left-handed while looking at the paper upside down and in a mirror. The one difference being that if you get it wrong you can't just crumple the paper up and try again. Instead you are doomed to feel lame or wear a paper bag over your head whenever you're in public OR cut your hair really, really short.

I now have a renewed respect for people who cut their own hair well. Respect and also a slight hesitancy to believe them. (still, mine isn't bad enough to require a paper bag or shorter cut, but I'm not sure yet about how embarrassed I should feel to be seen in public.)

So anyway,

Actually, never mind. That was all lead-up to what I actually wanted to post about which has virtually nothing to do with poor haircuts, cutting one's own hair or even writing in foreign languages. But I'll post that one another day because going to bed sounds so very much better at the moment than trying to remember my point. And plus, cutting this post off awkwardly seems very fitting.

"Please Refrain. . .

. . . from using profanity while I'm in the vicinity."

My sister, Anne, and I were probably 13 and 14 years old and at the height of our cleverness when we came up with that little gem. What a perfectly polite and intelligent way to let those around us know our tender ears were being defiled by their undiscriminating vocabulary. I'm not sure we ever actually used it, though neither of us was reticent when it came to making our displeasure at the sound of foul language known to those who used it.

On one of our trips to Disneyland we heard some profanity and lots and lots of "Remain seated please. Permanecer sentado por favor", which was our inspiration for a little addition to our catch phrase, "Please refrain from using profanity while I am in the vicinity. Exit to your left and thank you for your support."

Oh, my. It really is a wonder we had any friends given our level of dorkiness. Sure we didn't actually say this to anyone but the very fact that our brains came up with it and we thought it was awesome are clear evidences that we probably did not deserve any.

Once in my 10th grade Spanish class we were taking turns reading some dialogue. When it came to me, instead of "Dios mio!" I said "Ay, caramba!" My teacher did not appreciate it and asked why I could not just read the text as it was printed. There is a slight chance that I was one of the few who understood her extremely dry and harsh sense of humor and the only one who responded with sarcasm, so she did not especially like me. When this incident happened I explained that I do not take the Lord's name in vain. She assured me that this is perfectly acceptable in Spanish. I assured her that I would not say it in any language. She stared at me in silence for a long while before moving on.

I grew up in a home where there was very, very little swearing. I remember running to my parents and tattling that one of my older brothers had said the f-word. My dad asked what he said, and I whispered in his ear, "fagot".

When my mother was at her whit's end she would say things like, "Oh, fiddlesticks!" or, on a really bad day, "Dang, dang, double dang!" I believe my dad swore on the very, very rare occasions he got really angry.

I remember the first time I ever swore when I was about 13. I had a friend who used mild swear words occasionally. She was at my house and we were sitting there chatting and I said, "What the he**" in the conversation. I stopped suddenly, in shock. My friend laughed and told me it was okay! I... started crying and never swore again until after I had children. (no more about that later)

So the concept of using bad language just to color your normal sentences is one I don't get. It seems so very jr.high and high school to me. Some of my old friends from high school still use language like that occasionally on facebook and I feel like, "did you never grow up?" The answer, of course, is "no". I mean, the answer is that they just live in a different world than I do. And also a different country.

And speaking of which: I love living in Poland. I never hear any swearing here at all. This is not because this is the only country in the world that doesn't have or use swear words, but because I don't know any of them. The only way I ever know that someone is using bad language is when my husband or children say something about it.

Teenagers over here live in the same world as teenagers (and former teenagers who became adults and still use obscene language all the time) in America . We were reminded of this one day when Greg was planning to wait in the cafe area of our grocery store while I did the shopping. As always, there was a group of teenage boys hanging out and being extremely cool. Their language was awful. Greg sat there for awhile and then told me that he could not stand it. I told him I was sorry for him and left to shop.

Forty-five minutes later I paid for the food, returned to the cafe area with my loaded cart and saw that the boys were just leaving the area. As they walked past Greg they gave him the "sup?" head tilt (what do you call that?) I asked him what in the world had happened.

He told me that one kid saw him looking at them in disgust and the kid asked Greg if he had a problem. Greg asked him if they had to use that kind of language. The kid was insolent. Greg explained that some people simply do not want to hear that kind of talk. The kid said that it doesn't bother them. Greg explained that he was sure it didn't but that it did bother many of the people who had to listen to it. It was as if this kid had never heard such a crazy thing.

The boys kept cussing but had somehow come to respect Greg for expressing his difference of opinion. They seemed to understand that he was living on a different planet than them and could respect his alien culture. Not enough to give up their swearing for a few minutes, but still.

The Fruits (Vegetables) of Procrastination

(Herbs are vegetables, right? Or vegetable-like, anyway? Good.)

Greg's parents are here this week. This is a wonderful thing. I hardly ever have to wash dishes and apart from meeting some very basic needs of the little ones, the only thing I have to do is remind Aaron to let babcia breathe now and again.

The night they drove in I decided to make chicken noodle soup. I'm a bad soup maker. Yes, I tend to point out flaws in everything I create but with soup I am not being overly critical when I say I really am Very Bad at it (i.e. whipping it up without a recipe).

Actually I think that was sort of beside the point, but I had to mention it in case anybody might think I make delicious soups. I can't have people thinking that.

So I only had chicken, broth, carrots and some spices. I really wanted parsley, but we didn't have any.

Then, when I heard the kids playing out back I remembered something. In the middle of November, before it had snowed I went out into our teeny tiny garden (foot-wide strips in the shape of an L maybe 8 feet and 20 feet long) and tried to dig up everything that should have been dug up months before. It was way too hard (I didn't use any tools because I didn't see how they could help. I'm an idiot.) so I left most everything there. Especially the parsley. We had a lot of parsley and it was stubbornly stuck in the ground. I planned to try again later (meaning tell Greg that it was Man's Work and he should really do it).

Before we had the chance to procrastinate for more than three days it snowed and everything was covered in a foot or three of snow for two months. Last week all that snow melted and what was underneath it? Beautiful, green, fresh looking (albeit smashed flat on the ground) parsley.

That parsley was just exactly what the soup needed to make it approximately as unimpressive as every other pot of soup I've ever made. Hooray for procrastination!

Brownies for Lisa (a Charity)

People who give up on their diet three days in deserve congratulations too, don't they? I mean, that was a hellish three days. Sure they may be quitting and showing a serious lack of stick-to-itiveness, but do you realize what that person went through?

For example, she (let's assume it's a girl) may have not had any starchy foods at all that whole time, even when she went to a local bakery and bought a drożdżówka z serem (yeast roll with sweet (cream) cheese) and broke it up and fed it to her little boys. By hand. Not even a crumb! H-E-double-hockey-sticks, I tell you.

She may have made regular dinners for the rest of the family containing things like pasta and homemade bread dough (for pigs in a blanket. Said dieter may not be very strongly opposed to good quality hot dogs (making the resisting of the pigs harder than you might expect). In fact she and her birthday brother may have requested them every year for their birthday dinner growing up.)

She may have been deprived of sweets. Sure she could possibly have used sweetner (ICK!) in more than a few cups of fat-free hot cocoa. And maybe she's allowed diet coke (which she doesn't care for but drinks because it's something resembling something sugar-sweet.)

But if this is a person who has spent years living on baked goods, doing away with starch and sugar and fat is literally HELL. (just kidding. I DO know what hell is and what literally means. I'm using hell as a metaphor so therefore I don't actually mean it literally.)

So, yeah. I totally feel like giving up! But I won't! See, I fooled you into thinking I'd quit, but no. Not me! Especially since I lost half the weight I want to lose in the first three days of the diet. I'd be stupid to stop now!

The thing is, I REALLY need some peanut butter brownies. I absolutely must make these ones, which are good, chewy, brownie textured brownies that are deliciously peanut buttery. Simple but fabulous (if you cook them the right length of time). Or maybe these ones. A bit more involved and with a different texture but completely addicting. I've made them both many times and I need to make them right now.

Unless someone would be so good as to do it for me? Maybe someone who's not on a diet (oh, who am I kidding, it's the week after New Years: everyone is dieting.) Please bake a batch of one or the other and eat it for me, would you?

See, this is exactly my problem. Sure I am excited about getting down to my ideal weight; who doesn't love sweaters to look better on them? And sure I hope to have amazingly beautiful skin like Greg's, but mostly I want to cut back on baked goods.

I am, apparently, incapable of just plain cutting back. I can't bake something and then not snack on it all day. It is lame. (and I can't just not bake, either) Knowing quite a bit about the Dukan diet, and having seen Greg and both his mother and sister benefit greatly from it, I thought it was the perfect way to completely break away from my eating habits. I needed an actual list of foods I cannot eat if I want the diet to work. And brownies had to be on that list.

So here I am, not eating cookies or brownies for three days in a row. And I'm not even dying! Almost, but not all the way. This extreme phase will be very short for me and then I'll be allowed a splurge twice a week (eating a completely regular meal or even a dessert. Of course I will choose dessert). When the diet is over I will only allow myself to bake dessert one night a week and have to make it last two or three nights for dessert. The other nights I'll buy exotic fruits or give the kids chips or some other treat we don't eat a lot of.

I can do this. And I will! Especially if you'll go and bake and eat that batch of peanut butter brownies on my behalf!

P.S. I never thought I would do a "fad diet" like this. I have never dieted, but I feel like this one makes sense, especially for what I need it to do for me. Also, I apologize for all the swear words in this post.

Accidental Child Abuse and Fudge

For some odd reason I did something different today. Usually I think to myself daily that I sure wish I was the exercising type. Today, instead, I exercised.

Oh, I used to exercise every day. I spent about ten minutes doing a little workout I'd clipped out of a magazine that for sure would give you a flat tummy. I'm not dumb, though. I didn't expect a flat tummy. Didn't get one, either. But I did get a tiny sense of accomplishment every morning for a few years and off and on for a few more years after that.

I could tell it had been a long time since I'd done the routine this morning when there were little boy legs and baby heads and bums everywhere I needed my legs and arms to be. Small children used to know to give me a wide berth when they heard me chanting, "One, two, three. . ." (spoken aloud for purposes of educating young people in the vicinity in the numbers, their order and a practical way to use those numbers.)

If I don't start exercising more regularly Spencer may grow up thinking the proper way to count out your leg lifts and torso twists is more like this, "One. . . tw--excuse me!. . . two. . . three. . . oops, move your little bum sweetie!. . .four. . . five. . . six--oh! Sorry honey! Did I bop you on the head with my elbow?. . . " because he'll hear that a couple times a month and will never learn to get the heck out of the way.

*******

So that was all way too many words to dedicate to exercise (see, I haven't quite got the exercise bug yet, even after doing it for seven minutes today). On to fudge.

I'll share with you the recipe I used for orange fudge. I have never had such smooth and delicious fudge. Never. I grew up on Christmas fudge that contained chocolate, sweetened condensed milk and marshmallows. I think. It was yummy, but only now do I realize that fudge can be both yummy and inferior.

Maybe it was a fluke. After all I DID mess things up a little. I only had cheap (Store brand. Ick.) chocolate of the milk variety and I was supposed to use two different kinds (milk and semi-sweet, I planned). I didn't have any sweetened condensed milk and had to make my own. I swapped out the vanilla or mint extract called for and replaced it with some orange flavoring.

It was delicious. Just like everything else I've made from my Chocolate Never Faileth cookbook. I've had the book for four weeks, one of which I was away from home, so I have made five* recipes out of it in three weeks. (plus three** more that I made before I got the book).

I'm only saying this for your benefit and not as an advertisement but you really ought to get this cookbook for everyone you know who loves chocolate and loves to bake and create. Even those who don't do a lot of baking/creating will love it. You really have to hold the book in your hands to see how lovely it is. It is beautiful inside and out. Just like you. That's why I think everyone should have one. I have spent hours and hours looking at it and reading all the quotes about chocolate and little stories about the creation of each recipe. Plus the recipes themselves. I am a reader of recipes (ingredients, instructions, all of it).

I love it. You should own one.

Here's how the fudge recipe goes (in my own words):

Quick and Easy (I'd call it Fabulous) Fudge
4 tbsp butter
1 can sweetened condensed milk (or one recipe of this)
2 cups of two different kinds of chocolate chips (or whatever you have on hand)
1 tsp vanilla or 1/2 tsp almond or mint extract (or orange)
1 c chopped nuts (I don't like them and left them out)

Butter an 8x8. Melt butter, stir in SCM. Stir in chips (or chopped bars), let them sit a minute and stir again until they are melted. Stir in extract and nuts. Mix well and pour into pan. Refrigerate for an hour (or two) until set. Cut and try not to eat the entire pan yourself. Seriously. Ugh. Do you think seven minutes of non-strenuous exercise works off an 8x8 pan of fudge?

Smooth and delicious. You should seriously make it. (And I should make it again with better ingredients and see if it turns out worse. It couldn't turn out better.)
*Quick and Easy Fudge
Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies
Chocolate Muffins
Chocoholic Lemon Bars
French Silk Pie
**Classic Chocolate Buttercream Icing
Sinful Chocolate Cupcakes
Perfect Chocolate Brownies

More Ways In Which I'm Awesome

By the time I finished reading Evie's copy of Ella Enchanted I quite liked it, but while I was reading it I reflected to her:

"Reading this book I realize that I don't really read books for the story. This book is interesting and it has a good story but. . . all I ever find out about is what is happening." (there was a pause and we both started laughing)

Incidentally a few days later I went to a book store and the book I decided to buy was Moby Dick.

************

Me: (eyes watering) Do you want the rest of my chicken wrap? It's so hot (spicy) I can't stand it.

Greg: Sure, thanks.

Me: (after he's taken a couple of bites) So, how hot would you say that is?

Greg: Like, on a scale of 1-10 where 1 isn't hot at all and 10 is extremely hot?

Me: Yeah. (getting out a tissue)

Greg: Point three.

Me: Blows nose.

Randomness and My Weed Addiction

• I'm considering taking Spencer off solids. Just until he's potty trained.
• It seems the kids' excuses for not doing what I ask are getting better all the time. Yesterday I asked Ev to come sit by Spencer on the couch so I could go do something else and she said (from her place at the computer), "Um, my patient is kinda gonna die. . . " Well, by all means! Who am I. .?
• The ringtone on my phone is still set at the soothing harp tone I changed it to when I was in the hospital when Spencer was born. That's going on seven months. I don't really need a soothing ringtone anymore.
• Two words that I find to be more welcome than most others when having my teeth filled are, "almost done" (I don't usually prefer to be numbed). Oh man, I love when my dentist says those words.
• When you keep your house at 63 degrees throughout the winter and learn to really like it, it is that much harder to live in the 77 degrees it stays at most of the summer.
• I am developing a bad habit. Nothing I need to repent of yet, but it's becoming an addiction. This morning I woke up and nursed the baby, did my exercise and went to take the trash out to the curb. I was very glad the other kids were asleep so I could take the baby outside with me and indulge myself. It involves weed. I have a hard time knowing it is there and not going to it.
  

The weed in question is clover. Our poor grass is overrun by it in places. I have started weeding it out and I find it to be EXTREMELY enjoyable. Our grass is long right now so you have to grab a little stalk by the leaves, follow it down to the base and grab the branch its coming off of. Then you pull on that and follow it, tearing up the little places it has taken root, until you come to the actual root base to pull up. You have to comb through the grass to keep it from getting stuck as you go. Oh my gosh I love it.

Of course it is actually a good type of weed addiction except for when you go out to do it when you should be doing things like making breakfast and writing articles.

If you have clover in your grass I seriously recommend you try it. It's totally therapeutic and better than dish washing for think time. And probably this is all making me sound weirder than usual. Maybe I am weirder than usual. Yes, I think I am.

Enough About You

I wish I had anything to say. I'd like to blog more regularly, but I just don't have anything floating around in my head wanting to come out on my blog. There's no room in there for floating. It's a high traffic area.

But then Heidi left a comment in my last post that reminded me of something. Her comment is a few lines long about reflections she has had similar to those I posted about. Reading her comment I was very interested in her thoughts and then she suddenly said, " Um, anyway, I'm talking an awful lot about me." and I thought, Oh! But please go ahead! Keep "talking"! (she didn't, maybe because she couldn't read my thoughts, partly because she'd already written the comment by the time I had them)

So I was a little surprised about that and then I remembered something. I feel like that regularly! I read someones blog post with interest and by the time I get to the comment form all I say about the post is, "that's so neat!" or "I love it when that happens!" or something before I start in on a 3-12 paragraph comment about me and my experiences. Then I sometimes feel dumb and either edit it or delete it and go back and respond more to the post.

This urge to edit is unusual for me because usually I really do just say what I want. I don't try to come up with something to say in the comments, so sometimes I just don't respond. I enjoyed the post, but am taking it with me without leaving anything behind (sorry to those who think that's rude. Putting the way I just did sort of makes it sound like stealing. Hmmm.). I don't worry about coming up with something clever or thoughtful. I just say what I want. And sometimes it's a lot. About me. Then I feel bad.

I think what I learned from Heidi's comment is that a) maybe I'm not the only one who feels like that sometimes, and b) maybe other people don't mind long comments about the person commenting.

After all, people blog because they want to share their thoughts. People read blogs because they want to read those thoughts. Comments are an extension of that, so really it's best to say what you want (within reason) in a comment. And at least for me, I love reading anything someone has to say. Even (especially) if it's a long story or string of thoughts. It helps me feel the blogging connection. Whatever I said made you think of that, and whatever you said made me remember that 12 paragraph long story (for which I still apologize). It should mostly be okay to just type it out and hit "comment". (or whatever the button says. Weird that I comment several times every day and I don't remember what the button says. The human mind is so weird*.)

*note to self: there are other words that mean the same thing as "weird". Using the same such word twice in as many sentences is wrong. Strange, odd, bizarre, unusual, uncanny. . .
Weird is my favorite.

Made Over

I've been thinking a lot lately about making myself over. I want to lose another ten pounds (or fifteen. Twenty would be okay, too) I desperately need a haircut (see previous post). I haven't bought clothes in a thousand years and never feel well dressed etc.

The last time I made myself over I got a haircut and new glasses on the same day (this was two years ago). I was quite excited. Until I came home looking like this.

Now, I'm not saying it's the worst look in the history of all looks, I'm just saying that I absolutely hated the haircut and felt like a total dork in the glasses. I would give that makeover an F.

I won't be buying new clothes until I lose the weight (and we strike it rich. Both things will likely happen around the same time) and a haircut can only do so much for you, so that makeover will have to wait.

~~*****~~

Listening to General Conference made me feel like it was time for a different kind of makeover. I got a huge amount of inspiration and am excitedly making changes that will likely soon have me translated (maybe I won't have to worry about the new wardrobe after all, since I think they give you your white robes in Heaven gratis)

~~*****~~

Now, the other part of me, my blog, has been in need of a makeover for ages upon ages, ever since all the graphics and borders mysteriously stopped appearing about a year ago. This has been The Year In Which Lisa Didn't Care, but now I'm starting to care again.

I had just been scouring the Internet for a new template when a friend of mine made an offer that was positively providential (are you hearing Mrs. Spencer's voice? I am.)

There are a number of reasons I am grateful I read Melissa Bastow's blog. First of all, she is Fu-nny. Silly and funny and fun to read. She has excellent phobias and four very small and sweet-cheeked kids as well as a fabulous imagination (hence the phobias, I believe).

The imagination also contributes to her artisticness. She draws, and has a website, Green Jello with Carrots, that offers some awesome clipart and games, and handouts and posters and other paraphernalia for use at church (primary, RS, YW etc.) or home (FHE, Conference, etc.)

She's also branching out into photography, but even more applicable to you all, she makes buttons. Not the kind that keep your pants up or your shirt on, the kind you stick in your sidebar. You know, for advertisement and also to look cute. If you want a button, Melissa is the girl for you.

BUT the real reason I'm glad I read Melissa is because she offered to make my blog over. How happy was I!?! Very. Until it came time to tell her what I wanted. Hmmmm. I gave her an extremely vague idea, and LOOK WHAT SHE DID TO MY BLOG!!!

I really love this new look. It's perfect for spring. It's awesome, and I'm SO thankful to her. She can really do anything. She made her own blog and I'm pretty sure she put together the other sites, too.

Now this makeover I would give an A.

Check her out if you want a button, or a makeover!! (or clipart or a photoshoot)

*Please love my punctuation and capitalization in this post

Lookin' Good

I just finished my English lesson, said good bye to my students and went to the bathroom. On looking in the mirror I noticed that my collar had been sticking up at the corner. Oops. I pressed it down and looked for another second in the mirror, mentally replacing the vision of me sitting in front of my students with my collar looking retarded for the past hour with one of it behaving the whole time.

I do this sort of often. I'll come back from shopping or church or doing anything in public, really, and catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and see that one of my curls is flipped the wrong way or that I forgot to wipe off the bit of mascara that got brushed on my eyelid.

And always I wipe off the mascara, or flip the hair down or whatever, look for a second at the fixed me and convince myself that that's what I actually looked like. Or maybe it's more of a "that's what I meant to look like". Or something. And then I'm fine with the fact that dozens of people just saw me looking the wrong way. Almost as if turning down my collar after the fact has some sort of retro-active power, making it so that it really WAS the right way the whole time.

And I wonder, do other people do this?

An Unfortunate Sequence of Events

The night before the wedding there was a rehearsal dinner at the Napa Rose, a restaurant in a Disneyland hotel (NEAT). Before we ate, Micah and Heather ran through with us what they'd practiced at the rehearsal at the chapel a few nights before.

For the bridesmaid's part, we were to walk down the aisle and line up on the left side of the altar. I was to go first. So much for being able to go without glasses and just follow the person in front of me. We ran through it once or twice, were told about the little yellow triangles on the floor to guide our positioning etc. Then we ate a very delicious dinner.

In talking to Heather a little at the dinner she expressed how nervous she was, and that she was scared something would go wrong or that she'd mess up what she was supposed to say etc. She had the perfect, bridely jitters.

The next morning the wedding was at ten o'clock. We were told that we could practice from nine to nine-thirty. I was glad, as I had never been in this type of wedding, hadn't seen the chapel's layout yet, was wearing those heels (I haven't worn heels since I got married since Greg, um, doesn't like them on me.) and have pregnancy wobbliness on top of my normal spastic tendencies.

We arrived a little after nine and rushed to dress so we could practice. But the bride wasn't there yet. So we didn't actually practice and I just peeked in the chapel once but was mostly wandering the grounds with family.

At five or ten 'til 10 the photographer was taking pictures of my family on the lawn and I was feeling as though it was very late. I ran to the dressing room to ask the other bridesmaids if we should be with them. They said yes.

I ran back to get my sisters and we got our bouquets and all six of us ran around the chapel to the back where we would enter from.

While we were running we started getting in order, me in front. At the back of the church I stood first. There were loud whispers from the wedding planner (I think that was her title) for us to hurry up! Get in order! Etc. I just stood ready and let her take care of the girls behind me.

Sooner than I expected I heard her voice in my ear, "Okay, you can go in now." I was starting to turn my head for confirmation and felt a light nudge on my back. Oh! Better go!

I walked as gracefully as I could down the aisle and turned left at the altar and took my place.

But Anne wasn't behind me. She was supposed to start walking when I was half way down the aisle. She should have been right behind me!!

Whatever. Once I was standing where I thought I was supposed to be (totally forgot to look for yellow triangles) I tried to sneakily remove my glasses and held them with my bouquet. Anne kept not coming. I smiled into the audience and reflected more than I had before on how very empty the front of the chapel was. How very, very empty.

I had no idea what was going on but I tried to smile as if I had been sent there to smile for everyone. To give them a hint of what was to come, or something. I was just hoping that there were more bridesmaids to come. And SOON!

I did not see the wedding planner at all. I kept looking for a sign from her (that I had done something wrong or to sit down or come back or anything). Granted I had my glasses off, but I could see her talking to the harpist (beautiful music!!) but never motioning to me or even looking in my direction. But I saw Anne standing there waiting. (FOR WHAT!!?)

Both my mom and dad kept giving me sympathetic smiles, which I appreciated. I wondered if I should sit down (I was standing right by a pew) until the other girls came but decided against it.

Finally Anne started walking. Hooray! Oh, wait. Then she went back . I noticed movement from the other side of the front of the chapel.

The groom and groomsmen came out of a door in the front and started lining up. So it was them, and me. Cute.

For the record, my level of embarrassment through this whole thing was a zero. I felt pretty confident that something had happened after I started walking so they had to change plans or something. But my level of feeling bad for being the one who sort of ruined the effect was well above a zero. Especially when Heather's words from the night before came back to me of her fears about something going wrong.

Once the groomsmen were nicely lined up the music changed (I think) and Anne started coming. And she looked great. All the girls did as they came in behind her. And I finally felt relief. We arranged ourselves:

See me smiling my relief to all my new-made friends in the audience?

Then Heather and Micah were married. It was a lovely ceremony.

Afterward I tried to find the lady in charge (to apologize/find out what had happened), but I never did. However, from talking to a few different people I learned that some guests had come in behind us while we lined up and were hesitant to go sit down so the lady told them, "Okay, you can go in now." Yeah. Right in my ear. (I swear!)

It wasn't until even later that I found out that the push I got on the small of my back was not from her but from Anne who also heard her and also thought she was talking to me.

Here's what I assumed we were lined up like when I started going in:

Here's what it actually looked like: (notice in the picture above it's Anne at the front of the line and not me. I'm at the front of the chapel). And that's my actual first step of doom. (I was seriously so shocked when I saw this picture, just today. I had NO IDEA we weren't all lined up.)

So there's my story. I already mentioned a couple of posts back that the wedding was wonderful. I never felt like anyone blamed me or really even cared about my big blunder. It was completely lost in the awesomeness of the day. And I got lost in it, too!

Here's another shot of my family, this time with our newest sister!

The S Diet and a Medical Condition

I'm sure most, if not all, of you have been very concerned for me.  I told you I was on a lose-seven-pounds-in-two-weeks diet many weeks ago, and then never told you how it went.  I'm sure you had images of me in your mind having lost the 73 pounds (because you calculated how much it would be by now) the passing weeks would have dropped off me instead of the 7-10 lb. MAX that I wanted to lose.  Cadaverous Lisa, wasting away in her living room.  Mummy-obsessed David watching it all in wonder.  

But, no.  

I found that the S Diet works differently under different circumstances.  While home alone for two weeks with only a nursing 4 month old, The Amazing Race and Survivor marathons running all day and no one to cook for, it's easy.  In a busy home with three kids and a husband, when things like taco salad and lasagne are on the menu it's not so easy to eat very little.  

Another thing that makes the S Diet difficult to follow is when you find, two days in, that you have a Medical Condition that makes it impossible NOT to gain weight.  

So I tried following the diet for a few days and then stopped.  I haven't gained any of the anticipated weight yet, but I know it's unavoidable.  My mom even fattened up my size 4 bridesmaid's dress for me.

At least I can surely expect to drop most of the weight right around December 10th or so.  

(and don't you love the label I'm putting this post under?)

I Like Nike

I'm sorry for the problems!  The picture should be up now.

(Of course the "Nike" in the title is meant to be read the way I pronounced it as a girl, with the silent "e".  Also, I don't actually like Nike (or at least not the ones I'll be writing about) so pretty much every single thing about that title is wrong, except for that you can take out the "N" out of it and have a rhyming political catch phrase from the 50's, which  I'm assuming you already knew.  And if you didn't then everything about the title is wrong)

There was a time in my life when I did more than just sit on my lazy rear all day.  I ran cross country and track in tenth grade (yes, only tenth grade).  Since then I have loved running off and on.  Mostly off, though.  

My second year at Ricks College I started to notice that my pants weren't fitting me right (or at all) and also that I hadn't eaten a single vegetable in months.  I was getting up to clean the library every morning at 4am and my health wasn't the best anyway.  I decided to get it in gear.  

I started eating things like a bowlful of canned green beans (I used to believe that those were vegetables)  for a snack or meal.  I also decided to start exercising in the mornings after my shift at the library instead of going home and going back to sleep.

First I tried weight lifting.  With free weights.  Free weights are no good for people with spastic tendencies so I decided to try running.  It was winter (and you don't know winter till you've experienced one in Rexburg Idaho) so I had to use the indoor track, which was eight laps to the mile. 

Running around a tiny little circle in a dark room at seven in the morning after vacuuming and mopping floors and removing gum from carpets for three hours.  I was dedicated.

So much so, in fact that over the Christmas break while I was back home I decided to buy some new running shoes.  My old Saucony's that I just LOVED were dying and needed replacing.  I went shopping with Erin, my best friend from high school, who also attended Ricks and with whom I regularly swapped stories about the guys we had crushes on.

It came down to some UGLY-but-perfect-in-every-other-way Saucony's, or some cutest-shoes-on-planet-earth-but-much-more-like-not-very-comfortable-cross-trainers-than-running-shoes Nike's.  I ran laps in the mall a few times with each pair, and there was no question which pair I should get.  I already loved Saucony's as my runni

ng shoe of choice, and these ones felt GREAT.  But why did they have to be ugly and gray and bright orange (or what is yellow)?  (the Nike's were mostly white with a little bit of turquoise and dark purple.  Remember 1995?)

I hemmed and hawed over this forEVER, and finally Erin told me I should just go with the Nike's.  Her logic was too much for me to resist when she said, "What if you meet the man of your dreams while you're running?"  I'm not kidding when I say that that is why I bought the Nike's.  I'm also not kidding when I say "What on earth was I thinking?" and "Was I really ever that lame?"

So I wore those Nike's running early mornings on the indoor track.  I was looking awesome but running was seriously about 10% as enjoyable in my new shoes as it had been in my old Saucony's or would have been in my new ones, had I bought them.

I ran and I ran.  And I consistently didn't meet the man of my dreams.  In fact, the only person I do remember meeting was President Bennion, the President of Ricks College, who ran laps the same time I did every day, and who I wasn't particularly interested in making a good impression on with my footwear.

So you could say that the story has a sad ending, but I did end up running a lot with friends at BYU, one of whom  was the man of my dreams.  I just wasn't wearing those shoes when I met him.  And he is the last person that would ever care about what I had on my feet.

And here I am 14 years later having done so little exercise that I still have ONLY those same Nike's as my shoes to be active in (although even when walking across town I just wear my every day shoes and in the summer I only wear sandals or flip flops).  They're pretty worn, but WOW.  And they're even less comfortable today than they were then, as my feet have "grown".  

I still think they look pretty awesome, though.  

I'm not a fan of pictures of old shoes, but I had an afterthought to include one anyway, so here it is.

You can tell it was an afterthought because I would never say "I... think they look... awesome" if I knew I'd be including a picture, but I'm leaving it anyway.   And sorry they're lar

ger than life.