Spiritual Thought for the Day

“Christ is the Creator, the Healer. What He made, He can fix. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the gospel of repentance and forgiveness... Each of us has a loving Father in Heaven. Through the Father's redeeming plan, those who may stumble and fall "are not cast off forever"’

---President Boyd K. Packer

You can tell it's almost my birthday...

...because the lilacs around here are in bloom! Which is great, because lilacs are one of my most favorite flowers! I could happily breathe the fragrance every day, all year long.

A couple of times David has candied lilacs (the flowers are edible!) and put them on my birthday cake. And did I mention that he makes some killer cakes? DELICIOUS!

His family has started referring to my birthday as “Seis de Mindy” since it directly follows Cinco de Mayo. (Did I spell seis right? I know Spanish is a phonetic language, but that’s not really helping me here....anyone? Anyone? Bueller?)

And, silly though it may seem to many, I love my birthday. Even if noone really acknowledges it or I don’t do much to celebrate it, I still love it. Partly because I know that warmer weather is HERE! Only once in my life has it snowed (where I’ve been) the week of my birthday. I am a springtime baby all the way through. I love spring and everything about it. Which is why I get so grumpy when living in Utah Valley corrupts “true” spring. In “true” (aka MY definition of) spring, rain is allowed, but NO SNOW!!!

musicals & cake decorating contests

This week I checked out "My Fair Lady" from the library, as David had never seen it. This fact came to light last week, and I was in disbelief. I know guys are typically NOT into musicals, but C'MON! Hasn't EVERYone seen "My Fair Lady?" Apparently not! We watched it, and he quite liked it. The humor is really clever, and Rex Harrison & Audrey Hepburn really are fabulous, so I was glad that he liked it, too.

Which reminds me...one of my "tests" for guys back when I was single & dating was whether or not they liked the movie "The Scarlet Pimpernel" (newest version with the actress who played Dr. Quinn whose real name I can't remember right now). David and I were quite serious before I had the chance to show it to him, we may have even been married, but LUCKILY he liked the movie so we didn't have to do anything drastic. That really is one of my all-time favorite movies. Before the movie, I loved the book. In 10th grade we read it for class (and I'd already read it a couple of times before that) and instead of writing a paper or doing another sort of project, my teacher divided us into groups and had us decorate a cake relevant to the themes/plot of the book. My group make a guillotine out of pretzel sticks and chocolate & a blade of aluminum foil, then used Lego people to act out a beheading scene. We used that red gel frosting from the tube to add a touch of realism. I don't remember if we won or not, so we probably didn't. I think some lame European map won, showing England and France with flags on the cake or something.

And THAT reminds me of another cake decorating contest that I lost. The summer I was 19 I worked in Jacob Lake, AZ at a little lodge there. We had activities every week, and one week it was decorating cakes. My group decided to illustrate the song "Particle Man" on our cake, complete with Universe Man, Particle Man, Triangle Man & Person Man. We didn't win. So, we started digging into the cake with our hands and made a big disgusting mess of it (and ourselves). At the end, we formed the rest of the cake into a triangle and shouted out "See! Triangle WINS!" to the rest of the teams. I'm pretty sure they just thought we were crazy poor losers at that point. Which was fine, because it fit into my reputation as just crazy anyways.

Here's a totally unrelated picture of Spud climbing up the front steps:

Just "being tend"

That's how Noodle says that she is just pretending. I love it so I haven't even tried to teach her the right way. I figure she will learn soon enough and I'll miss how we used to "be tend". Especially since she says the vast majority of her words correctly. When she was turning 2, we took her to the zoo and loved to have her say "Elfanet" for elephant. The mispronounced words are just so darn cute, you almost hate to see them learn the correct way. Her first word for piano was "pellum". Later when we tried to teach her the real word, she'd say "pe-pellum".

Spud has been learning new words recently, too. On Sunday at church we were looking at the pictures of Jesus on the walls and after I pointed and said "Jesus" a couple of times he started it with "Zhe-sus". He also learned "Mine" in the past few days, and has put together the phrase, "No. Mine!" I guess this is likely to be the case with any non-oldest child. And he's added "Ah done!" to his repertoire, complete with hand motions. I taught him the hand motions first so he could let me know if he wanted more (which he can sign for) or if he was all done. Sign language really does come in handy with toddlers.

Anyways, here is a pic I thought was fun of Noodle "being tend" she was a princess with her silk cape on. Or maybe she was a superhero. She was likely both in a span of fifteen minutes.

Happy 16 Month Day!

Spud is 16 months old today!! Whoo hoo! He celebrated by spraying sunblock all over his sweatshirt. Okay, maybe that wasn't a celebration, really. More just an opportunity that couldn't be passed up. Now he's bouncing his football all around the kitchen. Did I mention he learned to jump with two feet a couple of weeks ago? Now he does it all the time. I don't know that 16 month old kids are supposed to be able to do that.

(yes, these photos are from the Cloudy Day, but he really hasn't changed since then.)

Great Flick

We just watched an Australian movie called “Danny Deckchair”. Really great, funny movie. I highly recommend it. It stars Rhys Ifans, the crazy roommate character in the movie “Notting Hill”.

IT'S SPRING!!

And today actually felt like it. A friend and I went to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point. My camera worked great for the first while, then started acting up again. I was able to get some of the pictures off, though. Flowers must be the easiest things in the world to photograph--great color, and they don't blink or move!



I read a quote in a book I was skimming at the camera shop that was, essentially, that learning to see through a camera actually teaches you to see. I am finding that very true. I am much more aware of the world around me now that I've spent some time "training" my photographer's eye. I've always thought the world was a beautiful and amazing place, but now I notice so much more and appreciate it that much more deeply.

Spring Break!

David's younger sisters are on spring break this week, so I've been spending time with them and also just gallavanting about it the Box. ;o) (Which I still love!) Good news--it turns out my camera disk/chip/thing only needs to be totally reformatted, so it shouldn't cost anything as I think the wonderful folks at Allens Camera are willing to do it for us on their machine for free. Whoo hoo!

So, I don't have anything to say, really, but I thought I'd share this pic of Noodle when she was about 1 1/2. She and David were walking home from church, and she was having a lot of fun. This picture just captured some sort of poignant moment in her toddler life, I think, as the very next minute she was up at at 'em again, happy as a lark.

silly

I am what you could call redonkulously in love with our new car. It’s SO MUCH FUN to drive. And what a stereo system! It has three settings: Neutral, Hear, and FEEL! I feel like I’m sitting in a sound booth while I’m driving. Ahhhhh...it’s so fun. I had no idea I could be so in love with a car.

What??! I said it was silly.

New Car!

We got a new car! A 2006 Scion xB, in Polar White. Scion is a subsidiary of Toyota, and I'm very excited to have a reliable car with a great warranty. Plus, it's very cool and very comfortable to ride in. I'll post pix of ours after I get my camera repaired, but for now I'll just show the stock photo from the web:



They are a lot more compact than they look in pictures, actually shorter lengthwise than a Mazda Miata, but inside they are SO spacious and comfortable. You feel like you are in a very cool mini minivan. And they handle really well, with very minimal blindspots. The huge windshield makes you feel like you are in a bus. So, you get the fun perks of a big vehicle, with none of the drawbacks.

I think eventually we'll paint it green and call it "The Frog," but until then, it's "The Box". Or maybe "The Boxmobile."

::sniff::

Good kids, lucky pup.

Camera Troubles

I am having trouble with my memory card on my camera. Poop! I hope it isn’t anything too serious. I don’t think it is, but we may have to send the camera for repairs if it is a problem with the card reader thing.

First Talk

Noodle gave her first talk in Primary yesterday. We spent all of last week memorizing the scripture John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” She did great, and could say it with just one prompt in the middle. As we anticipated, though, once she was at the podium, she developed a bit of stage fright. She still did quite well, though, and I think it was a good experience for her. She didn’t hide her face or anything, just had a bit of trouble remembering her scripture. But she got through the talk pretty well. I was really impressed with her.

Cloudy Days...

..are great for taking pictures!

The kids

Easter Candy

I like candy. I’m what we call in this house a “sugarbob,” or, full name, “Sugarbob Funkypants.”
But, I do not like ALL candy, and all Easter candy is not created equal.

Good Easter Candy
1. Hershey’s Candy Coated Eggs (hard to find sometimes, in a light blue bag)
2. Peeps!
3. Chocolate covered marshmallow anything
4. Jelly Beans, especially fun ones like Jolly Rancher or Starburst, but plain ol’ jelly beans are good, too
5. Peanut Butter Eggs, by Reeses
6. Robin Eggs (the Easter Whopper)


Not So Good Easter Candy
1. Hollow chocolate bunnies.
2. Those cadbury mini eggs (not the filled ones) that are chocolate and have some chocolate outer covering
3. Spice jelly beans


For the record, I am not a big fan of “regular” candy that gets rewrapped for the holidays. I may make an exception for M&Ms, but little Butterfingers, PB cups, Snickers etc in pastel colors just don’t meet my cutoff for TRUE Easter Candy. I’m also disturbed at how Peeps have branched out to other holidays. I still only buy them at Easter. Which reminds me....I need to pull out my Peeps tee shirt!

Aaack! I suck & I'm sorry!

So, I really am not very blog literate, I guess. I turned on “Comment moderation” a couple of weeks ago, thinking that it allowed me to delete spam comments easily, but instead it requires me to APPROVE every comment. But I didn’t get email notifications, so I didn’t know that I had comments. Poop! I apologize to the 3 commenters! I’ve repented and hopefully fixed the situation. I’m also turning the word-verification off. I’ll turn it back on if I have spam problems again, but hopefully that won’t be a problem.

Independence

So on the Tales From the Crib blog, one of the mamas was wondering how long is too long to breastfeed your child. One reply said that the big problem was that the mama was still nursing her son to sleep, and that he is too dependent on her, and the replier continued to say that she values independence in children blah blah blah. Now, I didn’t call her opinion ridiculous, but I did think it was a rather narrow view of independence. I’ve read a LOT of research about human and non-human primates, and it quite clearly points to the fact that infants & toddlers need to feel securely attached to their caregiver in order to “blossom” into independent children/youngsters. The idea of infants and toddlers needing to be “independent” is a holdover from the Victorian age, and we all know how much good came from that period of time. Infant needs have been the same for millenia, long before humans were on the scene. Our philosophies about childrearing change at least every decade or so, but such changes usually don’t meet the needs of the children because their needs aren’t “informed” by our snazzy new theories. A baby born today needs the same things that a baby born 10,000 years ago needed. This is why I don’t think crying it out is a healthy approach for children. Guess what happened 10,000 years ago (you don’t really have to go this far back, but just for the sake of example) if a baby was left alone at night? It got eaten by a predator. Babies are biologically conditioned to want to be with their mother, or if not their mother another primary caregiver. I don’t think an infant’s mind is capable of reasoning, “Hey, I’m not in a cave in the wilderness, I’m in a safe house. No need to worry.” Rather, baby wakes up alone and panics.

I digress, I guess, but her comments really got to me. Noodle was a very dependent child who nursed until she was 18 months old, and I honestly don’t know very many kids as independent and confident as her. I think it’s just ridiculous to think that infants/toddlers, who are in every way dependent on us, should somehow be expected to be independent in their sleeping habits. Would I like Spud to sleep a little better? Yes. But at what cost? I’d no sooner make him get himself to sleep than I would expect him to fix his own lunch. The thing that I learned with Noodle, though, is that all these stages are temporary. By about age two she was sleeping through the night, and even now she rarely wakes up during the night. I can’t help but think that it is because she has had nearly 4 years of positive sleep associations. No lingering panics or fears of being left alone to wake her up in the middle of the night.

Why it's good to have more than one kid

This is from a year ago. Even with as much work as two kids are, I really love seeing them love each other and play together.

What's wrong with this picture?

I was going through pictures last night, and found this from a year ago. We'd given Noodle a carrot to snack on (yes, she likes carrots) and quite a while later we noticed the "scene". We couldn't stop laughing about it, and it seemed pretty inventive for 2 year old Noodle to do.

Bacon shake, revisited

So in a BIZARRO coincidence, I ran into Mr. Bacon Shake (whom I haven't seen in, I believe, NINE years!) at Home Depot on Saturday. The kids were playing in the door displays, and I glanced over at the employee at the station there to gauge how annoyed he was at my crazy hoodlums. I thought he looked familiar, and a glance at his namebadge confirmed it. He remembered me, but he said "Wendy?" first. Pretty close. I asked him if he remembered the bacon shake, and he denied it, but I'm pretty sure he just didn't feel like he could 'fess up to such juvenile behavior. *wink* It was fun to see him, even if it did seem to be a bit weird of the universe to set it up like that.

Lock the doors!

I think Spud took a cue from Noodle as he now insists quite vocally that we lock EVERY door in the car. This wouldn’t be a big deal, except that the old old car we’re driving right now (while we figure out what to do about the car situation) doesn’t have auto-lock, so we have to lock every door by hand. That, or listen to Spud’s insistent “Uh! Uh! Uh!” as he waves and points frantically at the unlocked door. Do you think he’s preparing to be the safety monitor when he gets a little older? If only I could instill this same concern for safety in the kitchen, where he has no problem picking up a forgotten knife or reaching up near the stove out of curiosity. Heck, I’d be satisfied if he gave up his fondness for “dumpster diving” in the kitchen trash.

Are we entitled to our opinions?

I had an individual comment to me (on a blog) yesterday that someone was “entitled to his opinion.” It made me smirk, not because it is a particularly dumb phrase or infrequently used one, but more that it seems like such a wussy “defense”. “Well, I’m entitled to my opinion!” she says, as she marches off in a huff. I hadn’t said that someone wasn’t entitled to their opinions, rather that I found that “opinion” to be ridiculous. I too often find that people close their minds to a further investigation of facts by using the cop out, “That’s my opinion.” MY opinion is that people should be more concerned about learning the reality of things than defending their precious opinions. Plus, these same people get in a huff when you have an opinion about their opinion. What? I’m not entitled to have an opinion about your opinion? That hardly seems equitable.

So there. (I wish I knew how to put a smiley face in here, because I’d like to put one here. I’m really not as disagreeable as I might come across....just opinionated! *wink*)

Bacon shake

Noodle is watching “Arthur” on PBS, and the dad just said something about how Arthur shouldn’t have tried to make a “bacon-flavored shake” with his good cooking equipment, and it took me back to my summer working at Jacob Lake, AZ. I was the only vegetarian in the group, so of course one of the guys feels the need to tell me how delicious he thinks meat is at every moment. We went out for shakes one time and I finally said to him, “Dave, you’d put bacon in your milk shake if you could.” He said, “Hey, that’s a good idea!” So he requested a bacon shake, which caused quite a stir as we were in Kanab Utah and they don’t get “weirdness” like that too often. It ended up like a vanilla milkshake with bacon bits in it (the blender had that effect on it) and those who tried it said it was fine, just weird when you got a bit of bacon in your mouth. I just had chocolate and banana.

I'm so blue

This car situation has me completely bummed out and frustrated. I don’t know what we should do. I wish there was some rule that if your car becomes unfunctional, you no longer have to pay for it. I’m very stressed about what we should do, and last night it was in my dreams, too. So I woke up and my first thought was, “Whew, it was just a dream, our car isn’t really broken,” but then I remembered that it was. I’m just sick about it.

Bad news

Our car (that broke down late Friday night) is going to cost a couple thousand (plus) to fix. This is especially discouraging because we have only paid a couple thousand on it so far, and still have $4000 to go. If we wanted to put it up for a trade-in, we could get $100. A hundred lousy bucks. Seriously, it’s so depressing. Sigh....the only upside is that at least it is happening now, when we actually do have some money, rather than a year ago, when we were flat broke. But even still, it sucks big time. Though I did just remember that we’ll be getting our tax refund this month, and with the “two kid credit” we’ll almost have enough to pay it off. But I really hoped that we’d be able to add that money to our house fund. Sigh...again.

April Fools

So, the first prank of the day was played on David and I at about 12:30 a.m. this morning. The prankster: our Mitsubishi Gallant. We were on our way back from SLC (where we had a very fun evening with friends) when David noticed that we were running quite hot. He gets off on the nearest exit (which was thankfully not too far from our destination) and on the off ramp, the car sputters, then dies and ALL the engine lights come on as our hood disappears in a cloud of steam. Unfortunately, I don’t think this is the kind of prank where the prankster will later say, “Ha ha, just kidding.” Rather I think it’s the kind that will run us at least a grand in repairs.

And, of course it had to happen the weekend that I actually had FUN things planned (including a couple more trips up to SLC). Poop.