An Unsuccessful Blog

Waco Gets the Blues

2012-01-11T10:33:00.000-08:00

Have you ever seen one of these?

I only ever saw one (OK, three) in this movie:

In the beginning of the movie, the title character retires from his job in a mine. He and the two others retiring at the same time each recieve one of those as a gift.

In this scene, after the man on the left turns his on, Schultze, center, says, "Schoen" (pretty). The man on the right then picks a flake off with his fingernail, tastes it, and says, "Salzig" (salty). That scene made me laugh so hard that I have always remembered it.

So imagine my surprise and delight when we entered the home of an old family friend of Kevin's in Waco, TX, and there on the entry way table, was a rock salt lamp, all lit up, schoen and salzig. I refrained from tasting it.

This wonderful widower was immensely generous, giving us pretty much free reign of his house, catching Kevin up on the lives of his children that Kevin knew, offering driving advice, and giving the children each their very own keychain from the university where he teaches.

By the time we said goodbye the next morning, the children had adopted him as another grandpa.

Thank you, thank you for reminding Kevin why he misses Texas hospitality and a for a first-hand glimpse at what is in my mind an icon of German cinema:

Shultze would be proud.

New Mexico?

2012-01-08T19:05:00.000-08:00

But not a white as New Mexico was. After leaving Utah, on the evening of the 22nd, we spent the night in Santa Fe. There was snow on the ground when we got there, and we woke up to more snow falling. Many of the highways, including the one we needed to take, were closed. So we took the road that was open, even though it wasn't going quite the right way. This is what the surrounding areal looked like:

We stayed on the interstate through Albuquerque and then the interstate was closed, too. We took the road that was open--winding through the middle of the state--and kept checking back on the road closure site to see what road we could take next. This way we finally made it from Santa Fe to Roswell--winding through the middle of the state. What should have taken us 3 1/2 hours took from 9 am to 5:00 pm. The snow was falling thick in Roswell and we skedaddled out of town after a quick dinner and kept driving, trying to get ahead of the storm, until we had to stop for a rest. The Lord surely blessed us to find a way to push through.

Proof of Our Trip

2012-01-08T16:19:00.000-08:00

Like I said, during the first part of our trip, I forgot to take many pictures. Here is the first proof that we are not at home that I have (though we had already been gone for a week and driven through Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Utah). This was the first state we were in on our trip to which I had never before been.

This was taken on December 22nd. Mostly the color was white.

Galavanting

2012-01-08T16:18:00.000-08:00

So, we're not home. (Don't come rob our house, though, I keep very vicious guard Goulds there while we are away.)

The initial impetus for our trip was Kevin's younger brother Michael's wedding on December 20th in Salt Lake City. We left for it on the 15th. We stayed with Kevin's sisters in Provo, as did his parents, Michael, and his older brother and his wife. It was a two bedroom house with a living room, dining room, and small kitchen. And one bathroom. Yeah. That was squishy. But also very fun.

While we were there, we found a little bit of time to visit with some of my family and some old college friends. I am not very good at remembering to take pictures to remind us of events, so I don't have any of my , but I did manage to whip out my iPod to capture this moment:

I call it "Chinese Peasant on a Horse"

You can't tell very well from the photo, but he is holding on to the reigns and squeezing his thighs together to hold the horse. He wouldn't hold still long enough to get a better picture

Stay tuned for further updates on our trip.

Window Art Wrecks

2012-01-08T16:12:00.000-08:00

I wish there were a Cake Wrecks-style website I could submit this to. I think her name is "Quasimodo-Bell."

(from a gas station probably in Idaho)

Christmas Decorating Magic

2011-12-25T17:21:00.002-08:00

Do you notice the magic in this photo?

I know the picture's kind of blurry, but if you look closely, you will see all of the hanging loops for the stockings are falling forward limply. this is because they are not holding them up. In fact, the stockings are not hanging from anything. They are fuzzy enough that if I pressed them up against the rough brickwork, they just stuck. Pretty cool, huh?

Non-Hypopregniatic Confessions (In other words, no pictures, but lots of typing)

2011-12-25T08:21:00.000-08:00

I don't think "guilty pleasure" is quite the right term but I can't think of a better one right now. But this is a confession: I'm hooked on Asian romantic dramas. Especially if they have subtitles. Subtitles make me feel high-brow and cultural, even if the content is ridiculous.

When I first started this post, it was going to be purely about anime series depicting High School romance. This was a double guilt, because not only is it frivolous, but I also disapprove of High School romances in general, and try to avoid them in English when I can. But somehow the subtitles seduce me into reasoning that they must be more mature. After all, they are speaking a foreign language!

Since initiating this post, I have also found myself sucked in to Korean dramas on Hulu. Oh, Hulu! You are my blessing and my curse! Somehow I think I rationalize that since they take place in a different country that speaks a different language, then indulging in them is actually a cultural experience, and I am learning about people from around the world. In all reality I am probably learning about as much as someone would learn about the realities of life in the US by watching daytime TV. One thing that I do like is that the culture that is portrayed is one that values morality. Though some of the shows I have seen have used a child born out of wedlock as a plot device, it is treated as the anomaly it should be. 9 times out of 10 the climax of a romantic moment is a hug, rather than a kiss, and quite often in a public place. I really appreciate the underlying assumption of a standard of morality that is more in line with my own. That is rarely if ever the case for modern American romances. Some of the plots, if you try to sum up all 50 episodes in a few paragraphs, come across sounding like a soap opera--children switched at birth, near fatal accidents, amnesia, faked deaths, secret biological relationships (an unknown father, brother, or child). I've since learned that they actually have a word in Korean that means just that--makjang--a dramatic plot device that seems contrived and absurd by the standards of reality. But the very absurdity is somehow comforting to me. Of course the ridiculously handsome, arrogant, spoiled rich boy has a friend who has to work hard to earn a living while trying to go to school and dodge the debt collectors who are after his gambling-addict father that he hasn't seen in two years. Wait, haven't I heard that be fore? No, that was the other gambling-addict father with debt collectors harassing his children who has been missing for 2 years who just happened to show up back at home just days before his daughter begins to suspect that she might have been switched with a rich girl at birth (she was--meaning she was actually supposed to be the rich girl).

One thing that they consistently do to me (by they I mean the Korean dramas I have seen and also the one Chinese romantic comedy-drama) is paint out characters in situations where you don't even know which of the guys you want the girl to end up with until the very end (it's usually one girl and a question of guys in my experience so far). They just give you such good reasons for each of them, and you just die to see how it resolves in the end to make everyone come out with a happy match. It's sort of Jane Austen like in that. Maybe that's also why I love them.

Maybe someday I'll loop back around to the Japanese High School Romance Anime that I was enamored with before and I can expound upon their beloved vices, but right now all my free watching time and so my self-evaluation and sophistry is consumed with Korean Drama. That's not such a bad indulgence, is it?

Quiet time

2011-12-24T02:10:00.000-08:00

I went to check on the kids having quiet time in their bedroom to find Rhys clad thusly:

He told me he had to take his shirt off so he could put that purple dress on. As it was made for a 9 month old Willow, it only fit around his neck. I might consider beginning to question our treatment of gender roles in our family if I wasn't absolutely certain that, if questioned, Rhys would say something like the flower headband "shoots guns out" and the plastic shoe "is for killing."

Advanced Family Yoga

2011-12-23T02:10:00.000-08:00

I tried to get Rhys to join the egg stack, but he was afraid of trying to balance on Willow's back. But they were still pretty darn cute.

Neoma's Cute Snack

2011-12-22T02:10:00.000-08:00

Neoma made these turkey sandwiches for November's DUP meeting. And she said she filled her cute-making quota for the year with Peter!

Our New Door

2011-12-21T02:10:00.000-08:00

It makes cool pictures.

Breakfast of Champions

2011-11-21T07:55:00.001-08:00

I sent a bunch of pictures to my blog and never got around to publishing them... until now. So here they come, a trickling...........

Yes, that is bacon on Nutella on a crepe. Courtesy of Rhys. And no, he didn't like it.

A Boing

2011-11-16T02:10:00.000-08:00

As Rhys only has a tentative grasp on his "Big Boy" status (i.e. always going potty in the potty), I have been calling him out whenever he does the peepee dance and insisting that he go to the bathroom. I try to point out to him that his body is telling him that it needs to go potty and it is very important to listen to his body so that he doesn't have an accident. He often tries to hide or deny the fact that he is quite clearly "dancy in his pants," as we call it. The other day we were at the table and he was kneeling on his chair. I saw him bouncing up and down on his knees with the characteristic rhythm of the need to go, so I told him, "Rhys, you are getting dancy in your pants. Your body is telling you that it needs to go potty." He emphatically stated, "No, I am boinging." As if this made a difference. I made him go any way.

A day or so later I saw him cross his legs and then hold his crotch. I told him that when he wants to hold his crotch it is because his body it telling him that he needs to go potty. He told me, "No. When I hold it, it feels like a boing." I think he was hearkening back to his recent most favorite explanation for why what he was doing didn't mean he needs to go potty. Never mind that it didn't work the first time, and it didn't work this time.

But the funniest was yesterday when he had wet his pants and I noticed as we were on our way to bed. I said, "Rhys, your pants are wet. You went peepee in your pants." To which he replied, "No! It is just a wet boing."

Maybe I need to start telling him, "Boings go in the Potty."

Don't You Know a Wild Animal When You See One?

2011-11-14T15:37:00.000-08:00

Rhys just came upstairs from quiet time. Downstairs somewhere, there is one naked little teddy bear. Suprised that he could have gotten the dress and bloomers off the bear and onto himself so well (albeit inside out and backward), I asked if he did it himself or if Willow helped him. I asked him a couple of times, trying to get him to admit that Willow helped, but finally he said, "I put it on me, Mommy, because I want to be a wild amimal." And then he did this soft, cougar-like "Aaaach" and lunged at me. I'm still laughing so hard I can hardly type.

Look! I did a Decorate!

2011-11-12T02:10:00.000-08:00

Sometime a couple of months ago, I finally got to painting the rest of the bunkbeds dark brown. When I purchased them at a garage sale for $15, they were red, blue, and yellow. I got a great idea to change that last Christmas and Kevin painted one of the beds that we then made into a castle in the kid's room. I also made them each a new blanket with stripes of blue, green and purple flannel on teh front and dark brown furriness on the back. The kids shared the one bed until just recently when they started getting too big and too annoying to eachother. Kevin kept being out of town so I finally just did it myself. I even went to the hardware store and got new bolts to replace the ones that were stripped so I could screw the side rails and the ladder in place, all by myself! (It only took 3 trips to get the right ones, but thankfully, Home Depot takes back open baggies of bolts.) I got the beds put together, and Neoma eventually bought a new mattress so we could have our second one back, and the kids got their own beds. It makes my heart melt of satisfaction (I hope it's not pride, because then I will have to try to give it up) to see their beds made with their matching blankets. They seem to like it, too.

Notice also the matching dark wood furniture. I even secured the shelves to the bed so they can't be knocked down (anymore). Ignore the askew ceiling panels. One of my favorite things about this bunk bed is that it is relatively short. I can see over the rail while standing on the floor and it fits on the step in the kids room (Half of their floor is raised about 1.5 feet) and still leaves Willow room to maneuver. Yay! I did it.

Tomatoes Galore

2011-11-10T22:39:00.001-08:00

I came home from the last cleanup day at the community garden with 5 boxes of tomatoes in varying stages of green. After putting it off for 2 weeks, I finally tackled the 5 boxes of tomatoes now in varying stages of decay. I milled the ripe ones and froze the puree to make into tomato sauce later. The quandry I had was how to store the still unripe ones so that they get sunlight so they will ripen. Neoma offered the garden window in her kitchen (if I cleaned out and cleaned up all the dead houseplants), but that still left the question of what to put them in that I could sort and keep track of what was how close. Then I remembered this gigantic vase that Kevin's mom gave us. That sent me on a hunt throughout the house for all the large glass vases and the result:

Voila!

Tomato Aranging

Yesterday's Lunch

2011-11-08T22:10:00.000-08:00

The kitchen has exploded. Neoma ran away upstairs because she couldn't handle it and I am trying to do the dishes (it is my day, after all). I'm trying to find where all the plates and silverware has hidden itself.

Today as I was setting the table for dinner the cupboard was bare of the dishes we normally use. I opened the dishwasher, and it, too, was bare. I peered around the kitchen, behind boxes of tomatoes in various stages of green and decay that I am trying desperately to sort so I can be done with, behind dirty mixing bowls and frying pans, and I come to the conclusion that they have been abducted. We eat on paper plates, with plastic forks and paper cups--I want no new dishes added to this mess tonight.

As I am now herding the various utensils and vessels out of their hiding places, seeking the ninety and nine (I wish it were only one who had strayed) I find, behind the stacked griddles and crusty pancake bowl of this mornings' breakfast, a small stack of plates, the top one overflowing with chips--delicious Tostito's baked scoops. A few are smeared with the sour cream, that, together with those chips, constituted my 2-year-old's entire meal, but most of them are crisp and clean.

My first thought is, "Yesterday's lunch! This is yesterday's lunch!" As I gather the chips and carry the plates to the sink, the back of my mind it contemplating: the chicken bowl, or my mouth? The front of my mind is still thinking, "How could I not have caught these dishes sooner? Yesterday's lunch?! Cummon, Carol, you Sloven!" As the back of my mind quickly determines that these clean chips are much too good for the chicken bowl in their entirety, the front of my mind suddenly realizes, "Oh, wait, I think this was actually today's lunch. Oh, yeah. We had taco salad today, I remember." And then I also realized that I was crunching away on chips without even knowing how many days they had been sitting on the counter bedaubed with sour cream.

Um, yeah.

Parental Discernment (i.e. tickling your gums)

2011-11-07T02:10:00.000-08:00

I am so grateful that Heavenly Father wants us to be good parents, and that he helps us.

For the last several months, Rhys has been complaining whenever I brushed his teeth, saying, "Ow, ow, ow," whenever the brush touched his gums. I usually promised to go softer and he would let me try again, but it got to the point that I was brushing so softly I don't think it was really having any effect. At one point when he was really complaining, I looked in his mouth and realized it was entirely covered in canker sores. I was fairly certain that this had not always been the case, but I did go really easy on him at that time.

This was driving me crazy. His gums should not hurt like this, especially with no visible sign of injury or inflammation or anything. At our last dental checkup, I asked the hygienist for advice. She recommended using baby Oragel on his gums before brushing. We had some adult, overnight Oragel (a topical medication for toothache relief), and, being the cheap-o that I am, I used a small portion of that. Rhys was generally OK with me brushing his teeth after putting that on, but I just could not accept this as a long-term solution, as it didn't give me an answer as to what was wrong or offer a physiological solution. What I was doing simply should not be hurting normal, healthy gums.

I was still frustrated with this predicament when, one evening during teeth brushing time, it hit me--maybe it doesn't actually hurt. Maybe the sensation of the brush on his gums is just triggering the idea of pain, for some reason. I decided the best I could do was try and see if it worked, trusting that my mother's intuition (i.e. special powers of discernment) were not leading me to lie to my child. So before I started brushing his teeth I said, "Rhys, you know the feeling of when I am brushing your teeth? That is not a hurting feeling. It is a tickle. So when I am brushing your teeth, don't say 'Ow.' Laugh. Can I try tickling your teeth now?" He let me, and he didn't make a single "Ow" the entire time. Since then I have asked him "May I tickle your teeth?" instead of "May I brush your teeth?" and he has let me without interruption (except to tell me all the different animals that are on his teeth that he needs me to tickle with the brush).

I am so grateful for the little whisper of an idea that led to the solution for Rhys and toothbrushing. I don't think anything but inspiration would have led me to seek a psychological rather than physiological cause to the problem. Heavenly Father surely loves parents.

Recycling Food--It's Not Just for Monkeys?

2011-11-06T13:24:00.001-08:00

Rhys is so close to being independently potty trained. Right now I would consider him semi-dependently potty trained. For the last couple of days he has been deciding on his own to go potty instead of only waiting for me to take him or having an accident. And he can take care of business in the bathroom pretty much by himself, except that when he decides himself that he needs to go, it's so close that I often follow him to hurry him along to avoid a puddle on the bathroom rug. I have taught him to take his pants all the way off and sit backwards on the potty (Thanks for the idea, Mom V!)--it's easier for him to keep himself from falling in and it's the only way I've found to make sure he gets #1 down in instead of on the back of his pants (he hasn't figured out holding it down yet). I also don't trust him to wipe himself after #2 yet.

This was just preface so you will know where we are at when today's poopisode occurred.

I had just left Rhys in the bathroom after wiping him so he could climb off, clean his hands, and get dressed by himself. After a few minutes, I hear distressed cries coming from the bathroom. I went back to where I could see him and he is still sitting on the potty, looking down into it, fussing something that I can't quite understand. I went in to him and finally deciphered what he was saying: "My food! I dropped it in there! I need my food! Get it out!" I looked in where he was looking (being backwards, he had a good view down into the bowl) and saw that some of the #2 had what was obviously poorly digested remnants of last nights dinner and this mornings breakfast in it. Thinking I must be missing something, I asked him again, and again he pointed toward the poo and cried (literally--tears running down his cheeks), "I need my food! I want to eat it!" I tried to explain to him. I tried really hard, but I could only get a few words into it before I started laughing so hard I had to cover my face and turn away--he was seriously in distress! Finally I told him that it wasn't food anymore. It was poopoo. I explained where poopoo came from, that sometimes it still looks like the food we ate, but it is not food any more, it is yuck, poo, garbage, and we flush it away. He said, "Oh," and "OK," but when I got him off the toilet and flushed it, he started crying again, mourning for his lost food and mortified that I had callously refused to rescue it for him and in stead savagely plunged it into the oblivion of the sewer pipes. I reassured him that as soon as he came upstairs he could finish the lunch that was interrupted by the potty break, so he would have plenty of food. Finally his tears stopped and he was able to get dressed again. He's now playing happily with the other kids, and I doubt he will ever remember the Poopisode of the Flushed Food, but I will. Oh, boy, will I.

No wonder gorillas eat their own poo. If my two-year-old thinks his looks like food, they're probably just thinking, "Hey! Who left all this food sitting here? Can't let it go to waste!"

Meaningless Dreams?

2011-11-05T22:30:00.000-07:00

I dreamt two nights ago that we got the children we have been desiring to foster. The person we've been working with to become licensed came to the door unexpectedly with all three children and told us, "You got them! Here they are!" I took the baby in my arms and I couldn't keep myself from crying. My already children and my new children started playing while I held the baby and cried, trying to listen to the rest of what the social worker was telling me.
I have had some crazy dreams at times. I have had dreams that we're undeniably messages--visions, if you will. I have had dreams from which I learned something or experienced something I could never have done in real life. And then I have had dreams that are very comforting and I wish I were dreaming truely, but I just cannot say that I am, because I don't know.
I have had meaningless dreams before. I have had dreams I really hope are meaningless ( no, I don't actually want to be Spiderman punching hybrid supervillians in the face). And then there are dreams like this one. I hope and I want so badly for it to be true. But is it meaningless? Does it really have no reflection in reality? If nothing else, I recognize the peace and comfort that came through it as the peace of faith and trust in the Lord. Whatever is or is not in store for the future of our family, I know that He is in charge of it, and in the end all will be right , whole, and perfect. (If it isn't, it isn't the end yet, right?)

Snow Man Snack

2011-11-05T02:10:00.000-07:00

Willow was so sad that Sam started going to preschool this year while she stayed home that I told her we could have home preschool. Part of this, twice a week, we have a special snack. Every once in a while I have a good idea. So I took pictures.
This is the example one I made:

Here is Willow and the ones she made:

The rounds are bananas, chocolate chips for the eyes and buttons, pretzel sticks for arms, and a strip of apple peel for the scarf. They are all stuck on a peanut-butter covered graham cracker. In future, I think I would use a full graham cracker. Other than that, I thought they turned out well and had lots of little learning benefits in the kids making them--fine motor skills in placing things, fractions in breaking the pretzels in half and trying to get them even, dividing in making sure they have the right number of chocolate chips for each of the two that they made. And they were fun, and they were yummy! What more could you want?

Pictures at the Temple

2011-11-03T02:10:00.000-07:00

Just before Kevin left this last time, we took the kids to walk around the temple grounds.

It had been raining, so we brought a towel to cover the bench before we sat down. If you notice--I'm sitting with the towel over my lap. That's because I preferred the bench's wet to Rhys'.

Bustin' out the Big Breads

2011-11-01T02:10:00.000-07:00

I let myself slack off in making bread. I used to do it every week and a half or so--8 loaves at a time, so I didn't have to make it more often than that. But I got out of the habit over the summer as I was inundated with vegetables from the garden and every spare moment in the kitchen went into preserving. Neoma would buy bread at Costco that we liked a lot, and always kept a couple of loaves in the freezer for back-up in case we ran out of bread and I couldn't make more for a couple of days. So, we ran out of bread and I didn't make more for a couple of months. So we started buying "emergency bread" at Costco 6 or 8 loaves at a time. But I volunteered to bring bread to FAT to force myself to make it again.

I was already making 8 loaves at a time for just our family. I didn't want to have to make bread again sooner because I was sharing it, so I decided to make a 12-loaf batch. See that bucket next to me? That's what I mixed it in. At least, that's what I started to mix it in. Then I had to do the rest by hand.

Good thing I have such skilled bread machines.

Lurkers Still Welcome

2011-10-31T22:58:00.000-07:00

For my official policy on Blog Lurking, please see this post. I just wanted to be clear for those unlookedfor lurkers who recently confessed themselves--you are very welcome here.

This Year's Theme:

2011-10-30T16:06:00.000-07:00

Can you Guess?

front row: Wendy, John, and Michael Darling, Peter Pan
back row: Nana, Captain Hook, Tinkerbell, and Tootles.
Sadly, Smee was at sea. (OK, he's really in Louisiana, but he will be going off shore tomorrow.)

We were dressed up for our ward's annual Harvest Party and Trunk-r-Treat. I think Jason's costume was the biggest hit of the night. I think mine was probably the most startling--no one else had their face fully painted.

Although Tinkerbell and Captain Hook seem like an impossible couple, I think I could see Nana and Smee actually working out. What do you think?

And I had to prove I had a tail because it make it into any of the other pictures:

Update: Because I'm sure you all wanted the details of how the fabulous costumes were made--
Tootles was a hand-me-down bear-eared white baby warm suit that I colored brown two years ago for a Fozzie Bear costume for Rhys.
Tinkerbell is wearing wings I made in college, a gold-threaded black cardigan and a green broomstick skirt folded up into it's own waistband to make it short and floofy both from my closet and a thrift-store find sleeveless tunic shirt with the bottom cut jaggedy. Also green tights borrowed from one of the sister missionaries.
Captain Hook has on a wig and hat from Value Village with Neoma's white feather boa piled on top. The mustache and eyebrows he made himself from black construction paper and stuck on with corn syrup. The jacket was Neoma's missionary trench-coat and the cravat is a small frilly half-apron from my costume closet all piled in on itself.
Nana is wearing a suede coat from my closet inside out with faux-fur from the fabric boxes covering the hood. The tail is the sleeve of an unwanted shirt sewed slightly narrower with more faux-fur on the bottom. It was stuffed with scraps and old clothes and safety pinned in place (like the faux-fur) The brown pants are from the maternity clothes box (I've got to get me some dark brown pants...). Hair is in pigtails with the tips tucked back up inside and the cap is another of the small frilly aprons folded over itself.
Peter Pan is wearing an over-sized green shirt from the thrift store that was cut and sewed down to size with a jagged bottom and sleeves, green thrift store leggings also cut and sewed down to size. The hat was triangles of felt from the craft store with a red feather yoinked from Captain Hook's hat (before the feather boa).
Wendy is wearing an XXL adult t-shirt from my closet with elastic threaded through the neck and sleeves and a ribbon from my hair notions around the waist.
John's shirt was fashioned from a brother-in-law's castoff white shirt with a toddler shirt laid on it for a pattern--cut down and sewed, but left super long. The glasses (with lenses popped out) and umbrella were from the same thrift store as Peter Pan's green leggings. The hat was from a neighbor cleaning out their kids old things.
And lastly, Michael is sporting pink footy PJ's from a consignment store with a bunny removed from the left breast and the flowery cuffs and collar tucked inside and sewn. The feet were cut out so he could wear it with shoes on, and he kept pulling them high up his legs. The backside was embellished with a line stitched around it and buttons salvaged from a baby shower invitation sewn at the corners to imitate a bum flap. He is carrying his own bear that he is actually extremely attached to.

Altogether we spent under $40 to outfit all 8 of us. $40 looks like so much when I type it, but it's only about $5 per person. That's really cheap, right?

Dishpan Man

2011-10-29T01:20:00.000-07:00

In the grand tradition of all Gould babies, Peter has discovered the dishwasher.

To My Mystery Follower

2011-10-23T22:47:00.000-07:00

Hi. This is me risking being really embarrassed because I don't think I know you, but there's always the slight chance that I might be supposed to. But I don't think I know you, and I was really excited by the idea that someone is following my blog that I don't even know. How cool is that! So, that being said, I actually did want to find out who you are, because as much as I welcome anonymous blog-stalkers, I like knowing people even more. And I tried to send you a message, but couldn't figure out how to make that work. (I even followed one rabbit hole down to becoming a follower on my own blog, but I still couldn't send you a message then, so you see how desperate I am.) So, maybe you could comment and tell me, "Hey, don't you remember, I was in your ward that one time," or, "Hi, yeah, I've never met you but I am friends with so and so and saw your blog on their blog," or, "I'm that stranger and I randomly came across your blog as I was clicking 'next' up in the corner and was so impressed with your wit and humility that I have been hooked ever since." Or don't, and just keep silently stalking me and drinking in my clever goodness and correct usage of apostrophes. 'Cause I'm sure that's why you're here. :)

Kindness and Blessings

2011-10-23T21:56:00.000-07:00

As I sat in church today, listening to my children sniff and snort and sneeze their way through Sacrament Meeting, I was regretting that I hadn't paid better attention to them sooner so that I might have had time to find someone to teach my primary class for me so I could take them home. I didn't want to send them to their respective classes to infect all the other children, but I didn't have anyone else to take them home, or to teach my lesson. Besides that, I wasn't feeling too great myself. I was silently despairing, when Rhysie told me he needed to go potty. With a tenuously toilet trained toddler, you don't tell them to just hold it. So I left Willow in our pew and took him to the restroom. I tried to encourage him to take off his shoes so that he could get his pants off and sit backwards on the potty, which is the only way we have found to make sure that he gets it all in. He insisted he wanted to leave his shoes and pants on (which we could never get him to do back when we were trying to get him to sit frontwards), and so sit facing forward. Since he had been practicing aiming, I agreed and started talking him through holding it down to aim it in, but before I knew it, he was going, straight out, onto me. I got him pointed down pretty quick, so I wasn't soaked, but I was definitely thoroughly sprayed. I have a change of clothes for him, but his were dry. I do not have a change of clothes for me. I turned to the other mom that happened to be in the bathroom at the same time with her little boy and spilled my sob story on her in the form of a "what do you do when" rhetorical question. I tried to be cool, but my eyes started dripping (might as well, my nose already was). When she offered her husband to teach my class for me, I finally made up my mind--we were going home. I'm so grateful for compassionate and observant people. I can do the compassion, but I'm generally not incredibly observant. I'm glad other people are, and are kind.

And I will end with a cute, although unrelated, picture (note the ride-on car in bed with them):

Hey, What's Dripping On Me?

2011-10-20T02:30:00.000-07:00

To My Medieval Compatriots

2011-10-18T02:30:00.000-07:00

Do you recognize these?

St. John's Urchin! Otherwise known as Sausage Hedgehogs. I actually made them for dinner the other night. The kids loved them (as did the grown ups). I actually slivered the almonds by hand. We only had whole ones, and I wanted them so bad. It was worth it.

My Sister's Son

2011-10-16T02:30:00.000-07:00

Because I don't have a cute baby of my own to post pictures of right now.

Maybe if his mom was downstairs she would have taken it off after the pictures. As it was, we left on for the whole meal.

Toilet Training in (More or) Less Than a Day

2011-10-14T17:32:00.000-07:00

If you will recall this post, you will know the entirety of my fickle nature. I pursued the gimmick-free potty training path with Rhys, and guess what? It worked! He could fully hold it between times being taken to the potty, even if I didn't remember to take him with great frequency. I felt so successful! And then he had a period of regression. At that point, I just didn't want to deal with multiple accidents every day, especially not on the go, which was difficult anyway because he needed someone to hold his little man down for him, but when I leave him in the child care center, they are not allowed to help him. Yeah, that was interesting, and unsuccessful, and wet.

So he went back into diapers indefinitely, though I had some thoughts of trying to potty train again when Daddy got home, or maybe after all of the summer traveling. And because I'd packed away all the cloth diapers and I was tired of laundry, and I'd had trouble there at the end of cloth diapering getting them stripped, we were even back in plain ol' disposables. Talk about regression. All my lovely, green progress, gone.

I have a friend at church who has 4 children. I think she has some magic child-rearing skills because her 4 year old was reading scriptures in her primary Sunday school class and her 2 year old is not in diapers anymore. And she said the same was true of all her children at the same ages. I had secret jealousy. In talking to her, she told me that she used the book Toilet Training in Less Than a Day. She offered to lend it to me, and I figured that it couldn't hurt to at least read it, even though I had completely eschewed gimmicks. It turns out, the method in this book is every single gimmick I have ever heard of rolled into one--dedicate a morning distraction free, focus only on your child, nothing else, teach a doll to go potty, give them lots to drink, give them rewards for success, make them practice 10 times when they have accidents--plus more I had never heard of. The thing was, though I had tried and failed with each of those tricks, it started making sense as I read the book that the reason for the failure was that I had used each on its own. It explained how they work together to actually teach your child how to toilet himself, not just throw him in and hope he swims, and then getting mad because you have to keep getting wet when you jump in to save him from drowning over and over and over (why doesn't he just swim?!). So I was converted. And I held on to the book and read it and planned to train him after the summer craziness was over.

In mid August, the day finally came. My angel of a sister took my daughter and her kids out of the house so I could focus on just my little boy and we started with the special drinks and teaching a dolly (we didn't use one that wets, we just used a regular doll and poured some water behind it). I don't know if it's because my son has such a great capacity to hold it, but he did not get enough practice in that single morning to actually figure out what he was supposed to do. I kept him up all afternoon and put him to bed early. We were both exhausted. He went once or twice in the potty, but could not take himself. He had, however, learned to pull up and down his own pants, carry the little pot and empty it without spilling, and get a wet wipe to clean his hands afterward (he can't reach the sink on his own).

The next day my sister again took all the kids and we returned to work with a little more success. He sometimes went on his own. I left it at that. We had accidents, but sometimes he went. After a few days of off-and-on, I decided he needed more practice, and not practice running to the potty when he had an accident--that didn't seem to be helping at all. So I set aside another morning, but with everyone at home this time, and I gave him lots of drinks and watched him so he would have lots of opportunities to practice. Success! He actually started taking himself to the bathroom without instruction. He usually told me he needed to go, but he was noticing and choosing and taking care of it on his own. So Exciting!

After a couple of weeks I decided that he needed to learn to go by himself in a big potty, and, using a tip from my wonderful mother-in-law, I taught him to take his pants all the way off and climb up to sit on the potty backwards. With his hands on the back of the toilet, his body is in a position such that the urine stream actually goes in. It has been wonderful. The last several weeks, somehow his ability to notice and go to the potty on his own has all but disappeared. I'm not sure what happened, but if we don't tell him and insist, he won't go. But he does hold it if I tell him to go regularly, and he can take himself and do the whole thing without me in the room. This is huge, and I call it success. We are, however, working on the staying dry and taking yourself thing, but I know it will come eventually. He currently gets a cookie just before teeth brushing time if he still has on his big boy underwear from the morning (he has to put on training pants if he has an accident). He likes it and looks forward to it, but it hasn't really modified his behavior (except that he doesn't complain as long when I ask him to go).

Official Book Review: It took about a week from when I started to when I would say my son was fully potty trained, but I still think the method was a success. Even though it wasn't as quick as promised, it still was a lot quicker than the year-and-a-half with my daughter. I don't think this method is for all parents. It's intense, and requires determination, effort, consistency, and faith. (OK, that sounds like if you don't want to do it, you must not have those things so you are a horrible person. No, you can have those things and just not have them for potty training, and still be a marvelous human being.) Some of the things they describe or advocate in the book are pure fantasy--a 2 year old wiping himself after he goes #2 and then dumping it all in the toilet without you knowing? SO not a good idea--and somethings are missing--they don't even mention hand washing, anywhere, ever--but overall the child psychology and pedagogy are sound and the method does produce success.

I am very happy to say that I have two potty trained kiddos. And no diapers. That's weird. I was planning to have at least one in diapers for the next 20 years. Oh, well. I'm not complaining (too loudly).

Making Music

2011-10-09T15:19:00.000-07:00

Learning to Crawl

2011-08-21T23:06:00.000-07:00

It's tough learning to crawl with so many big kids around. Or maybe so many big kids around while you're learning to crawl makes you tough.

Either way, he's getting it. (I like how his hind end overtook his fore end for a while there.) To see him really crawling, see this post on my sister's blog (it's her son) of a video that was taken a few days later.

Rhys' New Hobby

2011-08-21T21:38:00.000-07:00

Apparently Rhys has taken up cross country skiing at bedtime.

How can I make this cuteness go to sleep?

(Don't worry. I did it.)

Meanwhile, Willow made sunshines on the magnadoodle.

How Sam Wanted His Nails Clipped

2011-08-19T12:03:00.000-07:00

A Prayer for Priorities

2011-08-16T09:21:00.000-07:00

What wouldst Thou have me do today?
What wouldst Thou have me know?
Who wouldst Thou have me serve today?
Where wouldst Thou have me go?
I am willing and wanting to do Thy will,
I am eager Thy children to bless,
But sometimes in the rush of my busy day,
Thy service gets lost in the mess.
Help me to focus and help me to hear.
Help me to open my heart.
Help me to attend to, all the day through,
What I asked to know from the start.
What wouldst Thou have me do today?
From my Chaos I beg this request:
What part is paramount for me right now?
What needs my thought and my story right now?
What in my life is ignorable now?
How can I serve the best?

In My Own Back Yard

2011-08-14T17:23:00.000-07:00

OK, it was really my neighbor's back yard, but the picture was taken from mine. It's closer than it seems because the camera on my iPod isn't very good at distances.

P.S. It's a bald eagle, by the way, and maybe if my sister is so enamored with the photos her husband took of it, she'll should post some on her blog.

Chicken for Dinner

2011-07-05T11:08:00.000-07:00

Please read this post: One of these things is not like the others... on my sister's blog. Then you will know why Rhys just walked in the door from the back yard and said, "Please eat the new chickens?"

"No, we are going to keep them!"

"Nooooooooo!"*crumple on the ground in despair*

PS: we had Louie (formerly Lulu) for dinner last week, Tuesday, I think.

When Has Sharing Gone Too Far?

2011-07-03T14:05:00.000-07:00

I don't know how and I'm not sure when it started, but somehow Willow and Sam started the tradition that when quiet time starts, she goes and gets a stuffed animal from her room and brings it up to him where he has quiet time in the office. I finally interceded when she had to come ask me how many more she needed to be eight (she was carrying 3 stuffed animals). The best that I could piece it together, they had decided that every day she should bring him one more than the day before. There are two problems with this, OK, maybe 3--first, she is supposed to keep her toys in her own bedroom. Second, it had gotten to the point that they couldn't even do it by themselves. Third, which is sort of like the first, they didn't get put away afterward and so it was always 8 new toys--her entire bedroom was migrating upstairs.

I told her not to bring her stuffed animals to Sam during quiet time any more. She protested, but finally obeyed. I wanted to let her share, but it was getting ridiculous. Do any of you put limits on sharing? Today when she came upstairs to announce that she was bringing her stuffed Koala upstairs to Sam for quiet time, I let her, because it was only one toy and she could do it quickly all by her self. Does that make me an inconsistent parent? Maybe. Oh, well.

More (Concrete) Yogurt Insights

2011-06-20T08:13:00.001-07:00

For previous home-made crock pot yogurt exploits, see Crockpot Yogurt--More than you ever wanted to know and An Addendum on Yogurt

For the record:

I have successfully cultured wonderful yogurt from both stringy-gloopy underheated yogurt and from over-cooked cheesy yogurt. So apparently temperatures of up to 150 degrees will not "kill" or ruin yogurt cultures, they just mess with the quality of that batch. Similarly, cooler-cultured stringy yogurt cultures are the same as any other and can produce good quality yogurt from new milk.

The secret to well-cultured yogurt: 120 degrees. I have actually produced consistent fantastic results from that. Once I have cooled the heated milk down to that temperature and mixed in the starter I put it in the warming oven (the regular oven set to the lowest "keep warm" tempurature of 145 degrees) and don't turn off the heat until it is back at 120. Then I (manually) cycle the oven on and off to maintain as close to 120 degrees as possible (this isn't too intensive if you are spending an afternoon at home--it's just a matter of opening the oven door and quickly checking the temp with a probe thermometer. If you had one of those leave-in-the-oven-stuck-into-the-meat thermometers that could give a continuous reading, it would be even easier. This has consistently produced yogurt firmly cultured into one mass with a little bit of whey floating around it. This yogurt looks like real store-bought yogurt in that when you scoop it, it leaves a well behind and does not stick to itself. I served some of this straight (without draining) to my kids for breakfast one morning and they loved it. I had some myself and found it a little thin tasting when it was not drained, but the weirdest part of it was that it was still warm. It tastes much better chilled.

This quality of yogurt also drains much better than poorly-cultured yogurt and naturally drains out just about 2 quarts of whey if left to sit in a cheesecloth-lined colander. What you are left with is beautiful, thick, white yogurt that scoops and is not sticky (after you put the drained yogurt into a bowl and stir it all vigorously to even out the drier and wetter parts). It is also awesome for making frozen yogurt.

Thick, soft yogurt cheese is best made by culturing the yogurt as usual and then leaving the oven on at the end until it gets to about 140 degrees. Once it has reached this temperature, the yogurt has started to break down and as you ladle it into the cheesecloth, it will seem loose. This is desireable as it allows more whey to drain out. I usually let it drain until it slows down enough to be draining almost nothing more, then I gather the ends of the cheesecloth together to make a sort of purse. This puts gentle pressure on the sides of the yogurt in addition to gravity and it begins draining more again. I suspend it by the gathered corners and put a bottle or bowl under it. I try to drain out 3 quarts of whey from this, but it sort of drains however much it wants.

To determine the nutrition content of your yogurt cheese (which may be different from mine as different amounts of whey will drain out, and the resulting cheese may vary unexpectedly in volume), use these formulas:

a=cups of whey drained out of the cheese, b=cups of yogurt cheese remaining

Carbohydrate grams per cup=(16*13-a*13)/b

Protein grams per cup=(16*9-a*2)/b

This is for one gallon of fat-free milk. I haven't ever used anything else.

If using a different kind of milk, substitute the grams of carbs in the milk regularly for the first 13 and the grams of protein for the 9. Then for the fat, where grams of fat per cup of milk=c, use 16*c/b (as far as I know, all of the fat stays behind in the cheese--none of it goes into the whey).

If using less milk to start with, substitute the cups of milk initially for the number 16 in all cases.

To be sure to negate the nutritional effects of the starter, just remember to remove as much yogurt as you added before you drain it. (you can even take out the starter after you culture it but before you over-heat it)

For a finer texture of yogurt cheese, when initially heating the milk, bring it all the way up to scalding (over 200 degrees, but not boiling). This makes the resulting yogurt not as firm, and so also makes yogurt cheese (if that's what you make) with a smoother, more creamy texture.

Boy, Oh Boy.

2011-06-16T11:45:00.000-07:00

I was watching my boy play around (and occasionally behind) the TV stand where he has been forbidden to go because of all the wires and potential for things to fall. But he was so cute that I wanted to record it before I stopped him. I opened my blog and before I even got to the posting form he had tripped over the lamp cord and knocked it off the table. sigh.

But his cuteness that must be recorded was this: He has a plastic surfing baby Ronald McDonald in one hand and a wooden train in the other and he is making them talk to each other. I think the Ronald is the dad, but I'm not certain. This was their conversation, as near as I can remember:

. . . "No, you are brothers."

"Oh, I forgot. OK, Dad!"

"I need to do my work."

"I want to do work, too!"

"OK, it's time for work."

"Yes, we do work."

"Here is where we do our work!"

Remember, this is a train talking to a plastic McDonald's toy as they romp around the TV stand. I love my boy and his imagination.

Willow's First Talk

2011-06-06T03:08:00.001-07:00

Last week in primary, Willow about jumped from her seat when they called her up as they were passing out assignments for the next week's sharing time responsibilities. She was beaming from ear to ear as she sprang up to the front, had the note taped like a bracelet to her wrist (so it couldn't be missed by the parents on the way home) and proudly marched back to her seat. I made myself wait until after primary to see what it was (Willow is a Sunbeam--the 3 turning 4 year old class--and I teach the CTR 4's--4 turning 5 year olds--and I think I had as hard a time as she did staying with my own class instead of running over to her to read all about it). I was actually surprised to discover that, rather than being asked to give a prayer or a scripture--relatively short, limited word responsibilities--she had been asked to give a 2-3 minute talk on "The first principles and ordinances of the gospel make it possible for me to live with God again." This was great! She loves to speak in front of people, and she has memorized the 4th article of faith during April of the 2 previous years (we were working on a different scripture this year), so it shouldn't be too hard for her to refresh it in her memory and discuss it a little further.

Willow takes after me in that public speaking is no problem. In fact, I think we both seek the limelight a little too much. But it is always exciting when the humble waiting pays off and we get to be the center of attention for a little while. I may just be projecting my own feelings on my little girl here, but I'm pretty sure she craves it as much as I do, what with how she melts down when she realizes she forgot to get up and bear her testimony on fast Sunday.

I was surprised how much of a struggle it actually was to get Willow to focus on preparing for her talk this week. I remembered to start talking about it Sunday night, and then we had a lesson on the topic for Family night on Monday, and then I forgot about it until Saturday evening during dinner. Trying to get her to recite the 4th Article of Faith, which enumerates the first principles and ordinances of the gospel, was like pulling her teeth. I didn't know how to start the discussion about it with her if she wouldn't acknowledge what they were. Finally, Saturday night after Rhys was in bed, I got her to sit down and talk about it with me. We recited the Article of Faith a few times and then talked in one or two sentence explanations about how each thing is important in getting back to Heavenly Father. I am a big believer in children's talks, and particularly that they should come from the child's understanding and abilities. But it was really difficult given this topic that was so clunky to wrap a child's mind around. I couldn't just ask a 4 year old, "so how do the first principles and ordinances help you get back to Heavenly Father?" and get any answer other than, "I don't know," or "Huh?" So I was already in an undesirable place of telling her what she should think and then asking her what it was, trying to pretend that she was coming up with it herself. But we persevered.

I know that some children are so shy of being in front of a group or unpracticed with writing or pictorial representations that their personal best in a talk is for a parent to whisper in their ear what they should say and then repeat it aloud, but I knew Willow was capable of speaking unaided in front of a group. My only concern was how to help her stay on topic during the talk. So I drew pictures for her of the things she planned to say (to the best of my ability). She started out with reciting the 4th Article of Faith--We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are first, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, second, repentance, third, baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, fourth, the laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost--then offered a sentence or two about how each of them is important in getting back to Heavenly Father: Jesus is the path back to him, so we need faith in him. Repentance is how you get back on the path if you get off. Baptism is becoming a member of the church, which is God's kingdom. The Holy ghost helps us choose the right and become like Heavenly Father. Then I told her she got to bear her testimony of those things. This is something she is familiar with, so I was glad to encourage her to do it and not to write down anything in particular for her to say. I did remind her that it is important to pray for and listen to the Holy Ghost while bearing her testimony and say what it prompts her to say, and stop when it is finished. We also chose pictures to represent each of the 4 things she would discuss for her to hold up and show the primary as she talked about each one.

When it came time for her talk (they almost forgot to ask her to come up. That would have been a tragedy) she went up to the front with her pictures and her notes and I stood by her side for support and whisperings, if needed. Her Uncle Jason was there because he is the Primary Pianist, her Aunt Neoma came from Relief Society meeting, and Grandma Gould (Jason's Mom) came all the way from Bothell especially to hear Willow give her first talk. Willow made it through all of the things on her note page with minor stumbling over the pre-chosen words and a few preemptive reminders (like to say "repentance" instead of "turning away from the bad people" when she looked at the picture of a u-turn arrow that was supposed to represent that principle in her notes).

She got all the way to the testimony portion before she realized that we forgot to hold up the pictures we brought for everyone to see. At that point it was the time I had decided I would encourage her to go "off script" and bear her brief testimony that what she said is true before she closed. But with the pictures still needing to be displayed, she chose to go through each of the things again while holding up each picture. Oh, I wish you could have been there, because I will never remember exactly what she said, and I am sure that me writing it down and you reading it will never be as profound an experience as hearing her pure, simple, and sincere testimony coming from her own mouth. As she held each picture she repeated again the ideas that we had already discussed, the ideas that we had been talking about all week, but this time filtered through her own real understanding and in her own simple language rather than trying to remember and get right the exact words that I had told her before, including, "I know that I will get baptized someday," and "Jesus has the power to forgive us." (I didn't tell her that one.)

I am so grateful for my daughter. I am so grateful for the love she feels for and from her Savior. I know so much of her belief and understanding is wrapped up in what our home is filled with and has been from her birth. It is so reliant on what we teach, not her own proactive discovery. But that doesn't mean that her testimony isn't real. She feels deeply, and because Christ is actually real and the things we are teaching her are true, her feelings and her understanding are real. Sometimes she hears me pray that my children with gain a testimony of the gospel and come to love Jesus Christ and she tells me afterward, "Mommy, I do have a testimony! It is growing bigger and bigger!" We must be doing something right. And above all, I know that God is blessing us.

She is also a tremendously valuable example to her younger brother who loves to stand on things and bear his testimony (like his "Jesus Real"), and loves to show and express affection unashamedly. A funny note--as my kids are exploring having different names (incdentally, Willow is now Rose Red, not Sally anymore), and calling me a different name (Aunt Maude), they often come up and want to practice my new name, so they call out to me, "Aunt Maude?" without anything really in mind to say to me once the have my attention. Their default comment when I reply, "Yes?" is, "I love you." (Of course, the more frequent the occurrence, the more emphatic they feel they need to make the comment, to prove its sincerity, so it has most frequently been, "I really love you so much.")

Meet Sally, Aunt Maude, and Naddy

2011-05-31T07:16:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Willow decided to change her name to Sally. When she began insisting that I call her her new name, I insisted that she call me a new name, too. Hence, I am now Aunt Maude. Rhys wanted to get in on the game and decided that his name is Naddy. Willow actually remembered her new name this morning and that she wanted to be called by it, so here we are again today. Perhaps I shall have further exploits of Sally, Aunt Maude, and Naddy to share later today.

A Mother's Dilemma

2011-05-24T20:34:00.000-07:00

My little Rhysie is so adorable right now. His current adorableness is that he has started saying "yay-yeh" instead of "yeah." It's so cute I find myself asking him things just to get him to say it again. My problem is, I also love my Willow, but she is growing out of the "so cute I must eat you right now" phase. So recently every time I want to get on my blog and say something hilarious and adorable about my kids, it is almost always about Rhys.

I know Willow had her day, back when she was the only one I had to talk about, and even when Rhys was a baby and in spite of the specialness that that is, you can only say so much about it, but I still feel bad that my attention seems so lopsided.

At the core of the matter is that my little girl is not a baby any more. Her id is giving way to ego. And with this new self-awareness comes trying to be cute, or funny, or adorable, which just isn't as adorable as genuine un-self-awareness is. I have memories of myself at that stage. I know I thought I was cute and clever, but I look back at myself and wince at how annoying I must have been to my older siblings, on whom I forced most of my wit. Don't get me wrong--Willow is not currently annoying. Hopefully she doesn't ever get that far before social skills start to develop that can compensate (unlike her mother, who's showoff skills far outweighed her social skills well into Jr. High. Acutally, I think they probably still do. sigh).

But I think I mourn a little bit for the effortless cuteness of babyhood that inevitably succumbs to the self-awareness of childhood.

I think what I want to say, and to be on the record for the day when my blog becomes my personal history and Willow, while reading it, comes to the shocking era of her mother's life where she is overshadowed in anecdote by her younger brother, is:

Willow, you are growing up. You are maturing beautifully and just as you should be. This process is important, and often serious. That's why it doesn't lend itself so well to being laughed at as babyhood does. Know that not being mentioned as often is a compliment to how well you are developing the ability to pay attention to and interact comfortably with those around you. I don't share as many of your mistakes because you are coming into an age where you will learn what embarrassment is, and I don't want to be the source of that, if I can help it. And I won't laugh at you when it will hurt you.

Thinking over this post, I feel a little ridiculous that I am literally crying as I think about my daughter and how much she is not a baby anymore. She's only 4 years old. But, My Word! She's 4 years old! Thats practically a Kindergartener, and once they start school, their nearly grown up. Ohhh. My babies. Aren't babies. Won't be babies forever. Sigh. *sniff*

A Long Post About Rhys. Please Comfort and Reassure Me.

2011-05-21T10:33:00.000-07:00

Little boys who run around the house and yard incessantly pointing anything and everything they can find--sticks, necklaces, pillows, spoons, every toy, gold high-heeled shoes (from the dress-up box)--at other people and saying "pchew, pchew, pchew. I'm killing you," can still grow up to be normal, loving, righteous, well-adjusted non-violent non-criminals, right? I can't make him stop. It is his one consistent waking thought, "Shoot! Fight! Kill!!" Even when he is playing with toys (which he does adorably), he is almost invariably making them fight each other. It doesn't seem to matter what I say or how I react, it's just hardwired into his little brain. I'm glad we don't live in an era without guns, because then he would have to play that everything is a sword, and those require actual physical contact to kill, which means he would be hitting things all the time instead of simply pointing and making a sound.

I try to re-direct him (because I know just telling him to stop will have zero effect) by telling him to shoot chocolate love arrows, like we did with Sam and Willow, but, though he loves it when we pretend to catch and eat them, he will never admit that they are not real arrows for killing.

He seems to love us. He doesn't seem to be angry or really violent, he just has to "Kill!" all the time. I'm not quite sure what to do about this, or if I even need to try. I would really appreciate advice or wisdom from those of you who have been here before.

Some other notes on Rhys: He is continuing his dry streak. We had a day or two of two or three wet pants but mostly it was when we neglected to take him to the potty ever. And one accident always seemed to snowball into more. But if we took him and he went, we usually don't have to take him but every hour and a half or so. We even went to the Zoo yesterday and he was dry the whole time and went in the potty there. He was also dry during nap time. Yay!

This morning Rhys discovered a way to circumvent my blockading him downstairs by shutting the door. He can't open knobs yet, but this morning when I had shut the door to keep him from escaping upstairs while I was changing his clothes, he left the bathroom while I was finishing up and suddenly I hear Neoma from upstairs say, "What are you doing out there?" He had opened the sliding glass door and run around the the slider into the dining room upstairs and begged to be let in. He did it again later this morning, but let himself in upstairs because it was already unlocked. I needed him to be downstairs so I got him and brought him back down, but this time locked the sliding door. I set him down and shut the door to the upstairs and without hesitation he ran straight to the back door and tried to get out. When he found it locked he sat on the floor and wailed. I'll have to keep a better eye on him for now.

And a last funny: There is a big rock outside under a tree in the front yard. Rhys love to climb up and stand on this rock whenever we let him out of the car (which we park near it). As soon as he is there he starts calling out to everyone. And as you approach, he pauses he preaching to explain to you, "This is my 'Jesus Real.'" I assume he is referring to how Willow usually starts her testimony by saying, "I know that Jesus is real," because he then continues his dissertation, "I know Jesus real. Name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Then he climbs down and is on his way.

The Hand of the Lord in my Life: Kevin is gone. I'm a little sad, but mostly excited. How this is evidence of the Lord's hand: Kevin was able to be home for all of the vital things he needed to do to license to be foster parents and as soon as it was done, he had a job waiting for him. We got the application turned in, had all of the paperwork sent to us for him to sign, received our fingerprinting forms (for the background check), had our prints taken, took CPR and first aid classes, had TB tests done, and the day after our TB test was started, with our appointment already made to go back and have the TB spot interpreted the next day, he got a call to ask if he could come in the day after that. The Lord is arranging things and looking out for us. It is very important the Kevin be working right now not only because it has been a long time and our savings are being drained (which they are, but not so much that we are insolvent), but because we need to save up a little bit more for a down payment and have evidence of what his paychecks look like this year in order to successfully apply for pre-approval of a mortgage loan. After that, we can look for and buy a house. Hopefully sometime in the next two months. Whew!

An Addendum on Yogurt

2011-05-13T12:21:00.000-07:00

For the beginning of my yogurt journey, see Crockpot Yogurt--More than you ever wanted to know.

I think I have discovered in my yogurt making exploits, that the warmer it is as it cultures, the firmer the product and the more easily the whey drains off. However, if it gets too warm, it kills the cultures and you cannot use it again. Also, if it gets cooked, too much whey tends to drain out and you are left with something more cheesy. This is not necessarily bad. You can do cool things with it like make German-style cheese cake (what you are left with when you super-drain it is similar to the German soft cheese quark. Be careful not to overcook the cake, it makes the edges have a really cheesy texture. It is best after it has completely cooled in the fridge). I've also substituted it for ricotta in lasagna.

Lately the yogurt I have been getting if it cultures at a cooler temperature is almost stringy, but with thick, gloopy, gelatinous strings. If you scoop a spoonful and try to pull it out, it is just as likely to get pulled right off the spoon back into the rest of it by the stringiness. It tastes fine, but the texture is strange and it tends not to drain as well, sometimes seeping right through the cheesecloth. Leaving it to culture longer once it is in this state does not help. I'm not sure if this development is a result of culturing at too high a temperature previously, or if the result would have been the same if I cooler-cultured it from the beginning. I definitely don't like it as well. This may be why some yogurt making sites recommend periodically refreshing your starter with new store-bought yogurt.

For more accurate information and additional insight on these issues, see

I Must Shout My Excitement From the Top of Someplace Very High!

2011-05-13T11:59:00.001-07:00

This is about the highest place I could think of. Yesterday Rhys was dry all day long!!!!! (Granted, he did have one poopy pants, but not wet.) And so far this morning he has been dry, too. I'm so excited! It's like magic.

And now that I have shared my excitement, I have to work on not being too hung up on it, because in all likelihood it is not permanent, at least, it is likely he will have periods of regression in the future, and I have to not set myself up for frustration. He is still in the process of learning. I have to remember that. But it is encouraging that he was dry all day long and we didn't even use a timer to remind us to take him potty. In fact, we forgot a few times for an extended period and he was still dry. He is doing so well, my little man. Not even 2 1/2!

And on Rhys these days--I can't even stand how stinkin' cute he is. I love to hear his little voice from the other room when he's playing by himself or talking to the other kids. He takes any random toy and will just play around by himself making it talk and jump off of things. He's all boy, forever making things into guns and shooting people (no, we don't have guns or gunbattles at our house. I don't know where he gets it. I haven't watched the A Team for a long time. . . ). Mostly he shoots "bad men" whom he seems to see everywhere. He is very vigilant in defense of our house. He love sticks, the bigger the better, but he will also carry around puny little twigs. I try to get him to leave them outside, but I still find them in the house. Oh, how I love that boy.

And I will conlcude with a conversation I had the other day with Willow, who was in the seat behind me in the car, next to Rhys:

Willow: Mom, do you think I am asleep? (this is actually not an uncommon question)

Me: No. Do you know why?

Willow: Why?

Me: Because I hear your voice talking to me, and you can't do that when you are asleep.

Willow: No, it is Rhys talking to you!

Me: Rhys is asking me if he is asleep?

Willow: No, he is asking you if I am asleep!

Success on Many Levels

2011-04-13T10:26:00.000-07:00

Rhys is doing so well. We are having great success at training each other. His wet pants make it unpleasant enough that I remember to take him to the bathroom periodically (usually) and I have found the secret to make him go once he gets there. For some kids it is the promise of candy, or stickers, or a toy. For Rhys, it is Sesame Street.

We bring a laptop into the bathroom and let him watch a two minute clip of Sesame Street while he is sitting on the potty. It is like magic. I think the real secret is that he has to forget that he is on the potty and is supposed to do something.

The first time we started having any consistent success with Rhys was when we would refuse to let him get up if we were fairly certain that he had something to let out. We would physically hold him on the toilet and he would start to scream and wriggle and fight, and suddenly, relieve himself. Occasionally this led to very wet parents, but once we figured out the pattern and prepared for it, we usually got him off the toilet clean (us and him).

Then, some angel whispered in my ear to turn a show on the computer and, like magic, he stopped fighting and arguing. He still insists that he doesn't want to sit on the potty and that he doesn't care about Sesame Street right up until the point that we get his pants down and the computer sitting next to him, and then, quite often, he will go in the potty before the show even loads. And then he doesn't want to get off, so I pause the show and won't start it again until he is washing his hands. Then he can finish it.

The best part is that it really is helping, not just for when we can use the computer, but even in public places, if I take him to the bathroom, he knows what to do and he does it. Of course, when we are home he insists on having the computer before he will go, but it is progress. If we take him consistently, he will be dry all day long. We haven't actually achieved that yet, but we have gotten very close.

We are still working on #2, but I have been encouraged in this, too. Two days ago we were at a friend's house and I went to the bathroom to wash my hands. The door was shut so I knocked, and a little voice I recognized called out from within, "Come in!" It was Rhys, playing with the doors to the cupboard under the sink. I asked him what he was doing and he said, "I go poopoo." Yes, his pants were full, but just newly. I don't know whether he went before or after he went into the bathroom, but he was in the right place, all by himself.

Yesterday after lunch he stood up and said, "I need to go potty." When Daddy took him, he had a small smear of poo in his underwear, but sat right down on the potty and relieved himself of the rest. Yay! Yay! It didn't happen this morning. Instead there was an epic battle of wills to get him to go more after I caught him making a little bit in his pants and I am still waiting for the rest of the dirty pants to come later. But yay! It is real, good, self-directed progress, and I am glad for it.

The second level of success was funny and extremely joyful to me. Kevin and I were sitting at the table with all four kids--Sam and Benji as well as Rhys and Willow--and we had just put bibs on the two little ones. Sam and Willow insisted they needed bibs, too, I told them I thought they probably wouldn't spill. They said they would spill and started chanting, "We'll spill! We'll spill!"

I told them, "If you know that you will spill then you can be all done and get down from the table right now." They stopped chanting and Willow turned to Sam to say in awe, "Wow! She's a good Mom!"

I can't tell you how heart-melting and hilarious it is to have that level of good-mom-ness recognized by a four-year-old.

And I have a confession. All those "new me" improvements I rejoiced in a while back weren't so unalterably permanent and I wished they were. I still know I can do it, and it feels like that is the me I am trying to get back to, but I'm having a hard time making it work in everyday life. But I am starting to have success again--particularly with tracking what I am eating. I haven't been doing that, or able to get myself to do that for several months, but I have been with semi-consistency for about a week. I'm again working on consistent personal study--scriptures and journaling--everyday. So hopefully you will be hearing more from me soon.

And a mysterious way that the Lord works sometimes: This is an experience I had a long time ago, but was reminded of it today--how the Lord can work through seemingly entirely unrelated things to bring about a greater understanding and to show shadows of truth. Oh, back in elementary school, I think, when the X-men cartoon was on every afternoon, I watched an episode in which there was some virus killing people and no one survived it. If I remember correctly, there was also a time travel element, so when things were resolved in the end, they could go back and save people that we thought didn't make it. And the entire resolution was make possible by one character--Wolverine. I had always thought that Wolverine's mutant power had to do with that pointy hair and how he could shoot metal claws out of his knuckles. But, as my brother explained to me, that was only something that was done to him that his real power made his body capable to survive--his real power is that of near-instantaneous healing. So when he got infected with this virus, his body alone, of all the bodies in the world, was able to survive and produce antibodies to conquer it. From samples of his blood after he had defeated the infection doctors (probably some mutants, but I can't remember who) were able to create a cure that worked on everyone. Thus that he, the only one who could defeat the disease himself, not only survived, but made it possible for all mankind to survive, as well. I'm sure you see what I'm getting at. Somehow, this impossible fiction made the true and real Atonement of Jesus Christ seem a little more comprehensible to me. There was something fundamentally different about His body that made self-willed resurrection possible. And somehow, being half like us, He was able to use this occurrence to make possible a formerly impossible resurrection for all fully mortals. It doesn't really explain it any more than I already knew it at the time, but somehow it made more sense after watching Wolverine do it.

Does anyone else have a story like that to share--where something so entirely unworthy of being related made some gospel principle make more sense, or seem more comprehensible? I would love to hear them. Please share.

The Peace of God's Turbulence

2011-04-08T16:55:00.001-07:00

Today I am thinking about Disneyland. There are lots of rides there, many exciting, thrilling, unexpected experiences. That's half the fun, I think, the unexpectedness. I remember in particular the Indiana Jones ride. The vehicle we were riding in would bump and swerve and buck without warning. There were seemingly treacherous dangers everywhere, including dart guns and gigantic boulders headed straight for us. That doesn't sound fun to hear it, but it was. And the reason was, I knew that I was safe. Those who laid out this course and designed the equipment knew what they were doing. They would not allow real danger. That is, unless you left the car. Then there were no guarantees. Those excitingly alarming pseudo-dangers could become very real, actually life-threatening situations if you left the safety of the appointed course.

But, even though it fits my analogy (you didn't know this was an analogy, did you?), I digress. Let us return to the safe trip, that one that is fun because it is unexpected. That's where I am right now in my life.

As some of you know, we have been planning a long road trip for this Spring, to visit all our relatives that we don't see often across the country, including brothers in Idaho, Colorado, Texas, and West Virginia. We've been looking forward to this for more than a year and are very excited about taking the awesome-to-travel-in new minivan we got last December.

As many of you did not know, Kevin and I have been thinking of taking a long trip to Germany. I wanted to give the whole family (and most selfishly, me) an in-depth cultural experience while solidifying my own German skills enough to be able to raise my kids bi-lingually. We were hoping for a whole year, maybe Willow's kindergarten year (2012-2013). This should have given us enough time to save up a substantial amount and for Kevin to become established enough in his profession that he could work in Europe.

We also have a long-term goal of building a castle on a large plot of land and eventually converting it to a bed and breakfast. We thought timing would probably work out really well to look for that land to buy after we got back from Germany in about 2 years. We should have been able to save up enough by living as we do with my sister for that long for a substantial down payment, if not to buy the property outright.

We have tried to stay close to the Lord in all of our planning, wanting above all else to be where He wants us. Thus far lacking contrary direction, we have been pursuing our plans. I have even had periodic personal assurances that Heavenly Father is mindful of and approves of my desires.

And then this year a series of initially small promptings have led us to a course which does not seem to align with some of our already made plans. The most notable of which is the feeling that we should pursue becoming licensed foster parents. This seemed a little ridiculous in our circumstances--we have very little space, and no ultimate control over our surroundings (being in someone else's house). But, full of faith, we have taken the first steps--we just finished the 25 hour training classes. As some of you may also have heard, it is possible we may be needed in this capacity in a way we would be able to serve. Nothing is definite yet, but the whole prospect makes a long road trip in the next couple of weeks extremely non-feasible.

We have also today felt directed to begin the process of looking into buying a house of our own. This seems to shoot in the foot the idea of going to Germany. How could we buy a house just to leave it for a year with uncertain employment opportunities? And longer term even than that, we could do a much better job saving where we already are than anywhere else we could find. What are we thinking?

I'll tell you what: WAAAAAHOOOOO! Did you feel those blow darts whizzing around us? Do you see that boulder headed straight for us? Whoa! Here we go sideways! Hold on! I have absolutely no idea what is actually coming next in my life. There are obstacles I can't see a way around. I feel no certainty whatsoever. And I'm loving it. Because I know that I am safe. I am perfectly, absolutely certain that the Lord's hand is personally guiding my life's events right now, much more so than over the last few years where I have been able to comfortably imagine up my own ideal future and actually think that might be what is coming for me. The architect of this path has no interest in my calamity. In fact, he guarantee's my safety, as long as I stay in the car. I know that whatever may appear insurmountable opposition will, in time, be reduced to nothing of consequence as I travel toward the Lord's appointed destination (which, I must note, may be very different from the destination I see for myself right now).

And whatever of an awesome long-term life I can imagine for myself, I have complete confidence that what the Lord has imagined for us, that He is directing us toward, will be infinitely, unimaginably more exciting, satisfying, and lovely. (Though it would still be sort of nice if it included a castle, too.)

One Ticket to CrazyLand, Please

2011-03-11T07:22:00.001-08:00

I don't know who's side my mind is on or where all of the firm determination not to go down this path again went, but here I am, with a newly 2 year old, contemplating potty training. I decided after the year and a half of terror with Willow not to go there anymore, and wait until much later with my next one before bringing it up. yeah. right.

Reasons why it is different this time:

I have been cloth diapering which means 2 things--1)supposedly Rhys should have a better understanding of what it means to be wet because cloth diapers don't keep a baby quite as dry as disposables. 2)with Willow, my main potty training motivation was to stop paying for diapers. This is a moot point with cloth diapers, (though not having to wash them any more is a bonus. But I'll just be having to wash underwear and every horizontal surface in the house for the next year instead.)
Rhys actually has successfully made poopoo in the potty 2 times. It has never been the full amount he had inside, and was shortly followed by a dirty diaper both times, but it was success! And he has occasionally woken up from nap time with a dry diaper. This is much more than I can say for Willow.
I am done with gimmicks. No more sippy cup of juice and potty in the living room all day long. I just have to put underwear on him, watch, and take him to the potty. And clean up messes, of course.
Yesterday, independent of potty trianing contemplation, I decided to give myself permission not to go to walking group any more, just because feeling like it is a necessity is stressing me out when I feel like I have too many other things to do. So I just freed up all of my days from external commitments. I can do this.
My mom is here. She pottytrained 10 children (one was potty trained in 2 days by her father while he was visiting, so even she is in awe of her parent's potty training abilities), all before the age of 3. With her support, I can do anything. Which gives me 2 days. Because she's leaving soon.

Reasons why nothing is different (why I am crazy):

I am still lazy. The idea of watching my child every waking moment to try to "catch" him when he is about to relieve himself bores me to death. I have never been able to see or "tell" when my child is about to go, or even when he his going. This is going to be haphazard at best. And very, very, VERY messy.

Please, wish me luck. Actually pray for me. Hard. That would be good. Very, very good.

And a Little Child Shall Lead Them

2011-03-11T06:47:00.001-08:00

A couple of nights ago I put the kids were put to bed as usual. My mom, who is visiting, had put curlers in Willow's hair and Willow came up from her room about 20 minutes after being put to bed crying that Rhys had pulled one of her curlers out. I accepted that this was a legitimate frustration and I told her that she could sleep in my room on the floor or in my bed instead of in her room until Rhys was asleep so he couldn't bother her anymore. Apparently this wasn't the answer she was looking for because as I sent her back downstairs she was just crying and crying, and a minute later I looked down to where she was crumpled on the floor in the hallway between our bedrooms sobbing about how she didn't want to go in her room with Rhys there and she didn't want to go in my room, she wanted her own room. She just wanted to be by herself with no one else who could be there.

And my heart broke for her, because I remembered feeling that way as a kid--always trying to find somewhere that was all my own, where no one else could be, where I would be alone with no danger of anyone coming where I was because it was just mine. But at the same time, I also knew that having one's own bedroom is not always the answer. Sometimes people just have to share rooms, even for their whole life. I knew that she was not going to be getting her own room anytime soon, but I also couldn't simply say, "get over it. It's not a big deal. Just go to sleep." Because sometimes it is a big deal. Rhys was really bothering her. I couldn't think of any way to make it better.

I went down to her and picked her up and let her cry on my shoulder. Then I reminded her that Heavenly Father says we can pray when we are sad and he will help us feel better and help us to know what to do to help things be better. She looked up at me and said, "He also said we can read the scriptures." Oh. OK. Yes, this is a good thing, but where in the scriptures does it address wanting to be alone and having no place alone in the world? But she said it, so we acted on it.

We went upstairs and got the Book of Mormon of the shelf. I prayed, "Please, Father, let this work. She trusts. I am trusting. Bless her." I asked her where she wanted to read. She opened the book and I showed her how to flip through the pages. She stopped at a page in Alma 31. I told her to point to a verse. She did and I read it, verse 35:

"Behold, O Lord, their souls are precious, and many of them are our brethren; therefore, give unto us, O Lord, power and wisdom that we may bring these, our brethren, again unto thee."

I asked her how she thought Jesus felt about Rhys. She answered that He loves him. "What do you think Jesus would do if he was here?" "Tell Rhys to repent." "And how would he treat him? Do you think he would love him, even when he isn't kind?" "Yes." I don't remember all of what we said, but I do remember that Willow was comforted and happy to go back to her room. I even remember hearing them laughing together shortly after that before the fell asleep.

God does answer prayers. And He listens to the little children who trust in Him with their simple, sincere faith.

What Has Been Occupying My Mind

2011-03-08T09:39:00.001-08:00

Have you ever had something that consumed your thoughts and mental energy so that it was all you could think about when you wanted to tell someone what was going on in your life, but it was also something you weren't ready or able to share widely? It's horrible when you are used to blogging every level of your life, from the mundane to the highly significant.

That is what I have been struggling with for the last month or so. The central feature of it has been a search for an old friend of mine. I have only seen her once since high school and that was a chance meeting in a parking lot about 5 years ago. She had a really hard youth, both circumstantially and in the choices she made. I had no idea where she was at or what was happening to her. But a couple of months ago, out of the blue, I dreamt about her. In my dream, she showed up at my house unexpectedly. She was happy and said she was doing really well. That was all I remember. After I woke up, I promptly forgot about it for a couple of days. I don't remember what it was that brought the dream back to my mind, but when I did remember it, it came with the thought, "you should find her."

As I turned the thought over in my mind, I recognized the familiar flutter in my stomach that means the Lord is asking me to do something. So I told him I would, but I would need his help. I started by contacting the first person I could think of who might have kept in contact with her. When they got back to me they told me they hadn't, but reminded me of someone who might have. I contacted that person and they weren't in contact with her, but were with her younger brother (the only relative I think she has right now). I sent a message to her brother, and while I was waiting for a reply, I had the following experience (I typed it up to email to Kevin right afterward, but wasn't ready to share it more widely then):

I laid down on the floor for scripture study this afternoon after getting the kids down for naps. I got about 2 minutes into it when I started feeling the nagging nervousness in my stomach that means I need to do something. I wish I could say that I knew loud and clear what I was being asked to do, but I didn't. I only knew it was something. That tiny little nudge could easily have been brushed aside--wasn't I already doing what was spiritually pertinent--reading my scriptures? But I knew better than that. This is the feeling I have been trying to cultivate--to prove to the Lord that He can count on me to act on. So I closed my book, knelt up, and prayed--What is it? Here I am. What dost Thou need me to do?

I wish I could say that the answer came clearly all at once, but it didn't. The "answer" never really came at all until the end, and the course I pursued to get there came in fits and starts, a little at a time, hesitatingly. As a vague impression would come, I would snatch it, hold it up to the Lord and ask, "This?"

The first was to get in the car and go. OK. My kids are sleep, Neoma is here. I can do that. One possibility of where--the one group of trailer homes Kevin pointed out to me as possibly the place of the last address my friend had for the person I was looking for--a place I didn't even know how to get to, but thought I might be able to find.

I checked with Neoma, who was napping, 9 months pregnant. Yes, I could go and leave my kids (she may or may not remember this). As I headed to the car, my mind filled with possibilities--finding this person today, in a dire state. Piking her up and putting her in my car and driving away with her. Maybe she is starving. Maybe she needs cash. Maybe it's not her I'm acting for. Maybe someone else needs cash. Maybe it is that guy who has been panhandling near the grocery store recently. I ran back inside and grabbed our stash.

As I got in the car and drove, I thought maybe it is any number of total strangers that need me-- a ride, or money, or help. Maybe it is not anyone at all. Maybe the Lord just needs me to prove that I will act, even to the extent of driving aimlessly for an hour. If that is what He asks, I will do it. Maybe I just have to burn up enough gas so that I will have to refuel at a certain time and place at which point there will be something for me to do.

I saw a woman crossing the street--is it she that needs me? Does she need a ride? I listen. No. Peace. It is not she. I turned toward the grocery store where the panhandler had been. He was not there. I drove past the front of the store--does anyone there need me? do I need to run in and buy someone's groceries? No. As I drove past, the anxious feeling did not change--it is not here that the answer is. As I turned back on the main road I thought maybe there is something out here that I need--maybe at the consignment store. If I drive around for a while and don't feel anything, maybe I will stop there on the way home. I drove up to the area I thought the trailer park was supposed to be. I drove down the road I needed to be on, knowing it was somewhere up the hill to the left. All I passed were apartment complexes--not there. Then I came to a road to the left--I took it. Half a block up that road, there it was--a mobile home park. Maybe this is the one. I turned in and immediately to my right. I passed one home and saw a woman bringing in her garbage can at the next home on the left. I stopped and rolled down my window. I called to her, "Do you know if a woman name ______ lives here?" "What was that?" I repeated the question, and then just the name. She came over to talk to me. "A woman named _____ used to live here--right there (at the first trailer on the corner). They moved her out about a year ago."

We talk and the gist of the story is that it is undoubtedly my friend. She lived there and was doing pretty well. Then there were some changes and things started going south. Finally someone intervened and moved her out to a place where she could get help. The person was her brother, the one I was trying to contact.

Knowing this, when I received a reply from her brother a few days later and all he said was that he hadn't talked to her in a while and she was hard to get ahold of, I wrote again, pressing for more information. When he hadn't replied after a week and a half, I felt prompted to write again, and this time make it a matter of fervent prayer. I know I was inspired in what I wrote, because some of it I would not have written if it was just coming from me.

The next day after I wrote that message, I got a phone call. It was my friend. Her brother got in touch with her and she called me. I can't even begin to write me feelings. There is so much going on that I know the Lord has had a hand it bringing us together just now. There is a lot more to this story that has not been written yet. I am still trying to actually meet with her. True to what her brother said, she is hard to get ahold of, but I have her phone number, and I keep trying. Her circumstances are both much better and a little worse than I thought they might be. And I pray gratitude every day for the wondrous waves of light that wash through my life as I turn myself over to the Lord to use as an instrument to bless His children.

Happy Birthday, Willow!

2011-03-08T08:53:00.001-08:00

Yesterday was Willow's birthday and tomorrow is her party, so today is the tween day of celebrations. We are making a cardboard castle to play in at her party. It is mostly structurally intact, but I fear it may not last out the day with 4 kids playing on it hard already. And we will have 3 times that number of kids at the party.

How did I let this happen? I only wanted to let Willow have a small birthday party. So I came up with what I thought was a brilliant idea--she could only invite 4 friends, one for each year old. 5 kids, that's not bad. But we came up with the list (populated with my friends who just happen to have daughters roughly Willow's age) and also invited her cousin who lives upstairs. We wanted to invite him, but I still wanted Willow to be able to invite 4 other friends, that she doesn't see every day. And then Each of the kids invited also has a younger sibling (including Willow and Sam) so since I wanted the moms to come so I could visit with them, they got invited, too. So we have 12 children coming, plus one infant. I'll try to remember to post pictures after the fact.

Wish me luck!

A Biblical Refutation of a Christmas Carol

2011-02-12T07:38:00.001-08:00

Before I get started, let me just say I love Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. We plan to watch several versions of it every Christmas. I find it extremely entertaining and uplifting and full of hope for mankind. Unfortunately, though it doesn't change the enjoyment I will take in watching it in the future, I now know it is a crock.

I was just reading the allegory of the beggar named Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31. The summary is that there was a rich, unjust man and a righteous beggar named Lazarus. They both died and the rich man went to hell while Lazarus was "carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom" (v 22). The rich man begged Abraham to let Lazarus come down and relieve his suffering and Abraham said it was impossible. Then the rich man ask Abraham to let Lazarus go back to the Earth and warn his 5 brothers of the consequences of their lifestyle.

"Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets [the scriptures]; let them hear them. (v29)

"And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. (v30)

"And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead." (v31)

And I immediatly thought, "Sorry Scrooge. It's a nice thought, but it's not going to work. You should have read your scriptures."

Spilling the Beans

2011-02-12T06:19:00.001-08:00

Kevin left Monday morning to go to work. For some reason, I have been able to get up at 5ish every morning since he's been gone. I've also been able to go to bed earlier and get more done. I love having Kevin home, but I sure do have my schedule down better for when he's gone. I'm sure I also get special blessings to be capable when I'm on my own, too.

However, even though I've had this time every morning (and my kids have actually slept in 'til after 7 every day--I know I'm not responsible for that blessing), I haven't been blogging consistently because I now have to do all my own dishes and diapers. Kevin really takes care of me when he is here. Maybe that's why I get so soft and have a hard time even waking up, let alone getting things done. So my mornings are full of hot water and my hands are feeling it. Vasaline Total Moisture lotion--very good stuff. Also I've been emailing Kevin quite a bit, so most of what I would want to say gets typed anyway, just not posted for the world. I know I have interesting things to post kicking around inside my head, but every time I sit down to the computer I draw a blank and can only think of all the things I have to tell Kevin (but not necessarily the rest of the world). What I really need to do it sit down and go through all the comments to my recent posts and respond to them. There are several that I have been meaning to and just haven't gotten to it.

But mostly this morning I'm thinking about how Neoma and Jason are not here because they are at the hospital. Hopefully they will not be coming home without a new baby. And hopefully (for Neoma's sake) I will be able to take the kids to see them all sometime today (as opposed to the baby not coming til tomorrow).

So I'm a single mother of 4 for the day. Sigh. I hope they all sleep in 'til noon.

Since Kevin has been gone, we decided to keep up some sort of couple scripture study by emailing thoughts we have during our own personal study to each other each day. This has been amazing. I sit down to type after a normal study session thinking it hasn't been particularly insightful or important, wondering what in the world I will say, and then I remember one little thing I noticed or thought and start typing it just to say something. Then, as I am typing, more thoughts come, and more ideas open up, and I remember things that I thought in passing and promptly forgot, but now become more solidified and memorable for the review. I have noticed before that I tend to meditate on and mull over things best verbally, rather than mentally--my thoughts don't flow and progress until I am solidifying them into words--but I didn't realize just how great of an impact applying this to my regular scripture study could make. I see the Hand of the Lord bringing deeper insights to my mind every day, and I am loving it.

Testing, one, two, three

2011-02-09T05:56:00.001-08:00

I was recently turned on to previously-unknown-to-me feature of Blogger that I wanted to test out--emailing posts for publishing. So this was an email. We'll see how easily it becomes a post. This may just solve the problem I've been having with not being able to paste into the blogger composition box. (Editors note: It worked great! Except for the fact that I misspelled the title and had to immediately come in and edit it. Sigh. Will machines never become smart enough to eradicate user error?!)

There is one particular scripture in the 14th chapter of Isaiah (and so also in the 24th chapter of 2nd Nephi), verse 29: Rejoice not thou, whole Palestina, because the rod of him that smote thee is broken; for out of the serpent's root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent.

I had read the Book of Mormon several times as a youth, but had never really regarded this verse until we read The Book of the Dun Cow in my 10th grade English class. I'm certain that the author took this verse from Isaiah as an inspiration, but I don't know exactly what he was trying to say with his work. It involves a sort of human-less world of a chicken farm where a certain rooster's crowing may or may not be what makes the sun rise every day. Things happen in the story, weird, symbolic things and the other, old rooster ends up laying an egg, out of which hatches a cockatrice--a mythical half rooster, half snake. This cockatrice is the spawn of pure evil and its offspring with all of the hens on the farm are multitudes of basilisks--mythical poisonous flying serpents. They take over and generally reign havoc and eventually the earth splits in two creating a mighty pit, at the bottom of which is a snake (I believe they called it a worm or wyrm, or something like that, which can also mean dragon) the size of the world--so big not more than a coil or two is visible at any one point. This is the true sire and master of the cockatrice. Eventually everything is put right and Chanticleer, the main rooster, is able to crow again and Mundo Cainie Dog sacrifices himself by jumping into the pit to bite and scratch the snake and the pit closes up and the sun comes out and life is beautiful. (Please forgive any misspelling or misremembering of this book, it has been a long time since read it.)

So after reading this book, and then coming across that verse again, it began holding a new terror for me. The image of the serpent, the cockatrice and the fiery flying serpents were definite symbols of evil and I shivered every time I read about them. And then today, as I came across them in 2 Nephi during my study of all the footnotes, I noticed first that there was a footnote on "fiery flying serpent" that said, "TG Jesus Christ, types of, in anticipation." What? The fiery flying serpent a type of Christ? OK, I knew that the brass serpent was a type of Christ, but this one? That was way too much for me to take in at first because the emotional associations with that term were so negative. I looked up the other footnotes in the verse, which referenced specific scriptures. A footnote to "fruit" referenced a verse in 2 Kings about Hezekiah, a righteous king of Judah and the son of Ahaz who is referenced in the previous verse in Isaiah/2 Nephi "In the year that king Ahaz died was this burden [prophecy]" And a footnote on "smote" referenced a verse in 2 Chr. about King Uzziah, who thoroughly trounced the Philistines, and who also, I discovered after some digging, is the great-grandfather of Hezekiah. So the "rod that smote thee" is talking about a king of Judah that beat the Philistines (which is what "Palestina" means here, according to footnotes in Isaiah). And the serpent, cockatrice, and fiery flying serpent refer to him and subsequent kings, who are all still fierce warriors against the Philistines, as well as being a type of Christ.

It is talking about doom for the wicked who fight against the people of the Lord, not foretelling gross horrors of the last day when Satan and his minions shall reign terror on the innocents and righteous, which is the impression I always got after reading that silly book that grossly misinterpreted the symbols. I am so grateful for the Lord who is able to so quickly change misconceptions through so many innocuous means--like simple footnotes to the scriptures.

Back in the Saddle Again

2011-01-26T15:38:00.000-08:00

Today I finally went for my first bike ride since surgery. I've been wondering how it would go and wanting to do it, but putting it off out of fear of it not being good for my hands. I don't think it will turn out to be an issue at all. I found that I do a lot more pulling back with my fingers than I do pushing on my palms when I'm going hard, and when it's easy I can sit back and take the weight off my hands all together.

So, I have just given myself medical clearance to pursue my new goal of doing a triathlon. I don't want to do anything like an iron man. I don't even want (at this point) to do one that as a combined total of effort would be comparable to a marathon. But I do want to have to push myself from what I can do right now. I'm not sure exactly where that puts me. I have found a couple of people with triathlon experience/aspirations that I can call on, but I haven't done that yet. I need to figure out, especially if I'm not going to be pregnant for a while, when and where one is that I can try to do, so I have a little more concrete of a goal.

Yesterday at the gym I swam 20 laps--5/8 of a mile--and ran 3 miles with a little bit of walking interspersed totalling another 1/4 mile. I've never been a runner before, so this is the newest experience for me. I know I have frequently ridden 7 or 8 miles at a time easily. I just have to figure out how and where to push myself. And start running outside on real ground instead of an indoor track. And figure out how to swim in open water instead of a pool. Does anyone want to coach me?

The Hand of the Lord: I'm not pregnant. I'm fairly certain this is His doing. As much as I want to be pregnant, this gives me the opportunity to accomplish things that I could not do, or do as easily if I was--for example, have carpel tunnel surgery. The biggest one on my mind right now is that I am free physically to pursue my goal of doing a triathlon. I could not be in training if I was pregnant. I could maintain what I was already doing, but not be constantly pushing my body to do more than it had before, let alone to do the actual event when it comes up. I am actually very grateful that, however the cause or effect may have occur ed, the Lord has inspired me to make this goal at the same time that He also is arranging my life to allow me the physical ability to work for it.

Good Idea of the Week: Showering With Children in the Handicap Stall

2011-01-20T06:18:00.000-08:00

I should have applied my previous Good Idea. Kevin and I just got back from the temple and I had trouble staying awake. We're actually hiding out in the car after pulling up so I can finish my personal study while Neoma watches the kids. It's cool that the wi-fi reaches us out here.

Tuesday we took Willow swimming at the YMCA. Usually the after part of this--showering in one of the stalls--is a less than ideal process with the showerhead being fixed such that at about Willow height the stream of water has dispersed to a radius that fills the entire stall, so she can't get away from it unless I block it for her with my body and she can't look up at me so she wants to be held all the time. This, and her consuming desire to do everything she feels capable of by herself--notably rinsing out and hanging up swimsuits over the stall wall--mean a lot of lifting and catering to her, and overextended, exhausting showers. But this time we happened to choose the handicap access stall. It is a little bigger and it has a bench, and a hand rail, and an adjustable height shower head with detachable wand. This was perfect. Willow could wash out and hang up the suits on the hand rail without needing to be lifted. She could escape the water when she needed to, and she could stand on the bench and reach the shower head. Now if I can just work out a system for when she gets to hold the wand vs when it has to be on the peg so I can use it, it will be perfect. And I think it would work really well for when I have 2 kids, too, because I can stand Rhysie on the bench and not worry about him wandering off. Yay!

The Hand of the Lord: Today while in the temple I was reflecting on symbolism and how a particular place is designated to represent being in God's prensence. I thought about actually being in God's presence and what that might be like, and then Kevin walked in and I thought about being with him in His presence. and in that moment a little hole was punctured in the typical temporal perspective and in flooded feelings of joy and eternity. I can't make those feelings. They can't be faked. And when you feel them, you know that what you are working for is absolutely the best and most important that there possibly can be. And I am grateful for those small glimpses at what is in store. But I'm also glad right now I don't have to live every day in that quivering, life melting joy that is felt when the veil is removed from your heart and you feel the pure love and happiness of the presence of God and loved ones for eternity. It would be paralyzing in my current state. I'm glad we have the mental and emotional buffers of flesh while we are learning to have stronger Spirits.

Illegal Wakefulness

2011-01-18T05:30:00.001-08:00

My kids, both of them, woke up crying at 4:00 this morning. I don't know what started it, but Willow was crying that Rhys was sitting on her hair. This was entirely possible. They have lately been sleeping crammed together inside the cardboard castle we added to their bed for Christmas. It is only designed to hold two children sitting up, but they pile in there with pillows and blankets and sleep in a pile (though not without a lot of complaint on Willow's part usually. In her defense, it is often justified. Rhys only ever wants to sleep on top of her and her pillow).

Amazingly, Rhys didn't get mad at me and immediately demand Daddy as is most often the case when he is first waking up. He actually first came right to me and snuggled. And then he asked for food. Only after that did he ask for his Daddy. This was very exciting. I took Willow to the bathroom, with Rhys tagging along (hanging along is more like it--he wouldn't let go of my neck), and changed her clothes, which, not surprisingly, were wet. Then I gave in and brought the kids to our bed so Rhys could have his Daddy.

I secretly love sleeping with my children. So I don't mind too much. But tonight after Rhys finally found Daddy (it was really hard for him in the dark with so many people in the bed) and we all got snuggled in, he suddenly started talking. "A goat. A goat grass a movie. A goat movie. Goat says "Baaaa" a movie. A goat movie!" I can only assume he was describing a dream because we haven't seen a movie with a goat in it that I can think of. When Willow started chiming in to encourage him to "Baaaaaa," I told them that if they talked, they would have to go to their own room. Willow quieted right down, but Rhys kept jabbering away until I picked him up and carried him out of the room. He cried when I put him in his own bed, but I was undeterred.

Unfortunately, he still kept me awake for at least another half hour. I guess I had been too thoroughly aroused. I eventually did fall back asleep, just in time for my alarm to go off.

Kevin just came to sit next to me and confessed that he wishes I'd let Rhys lay there and talk. He wanted to hear the whole story. I told him he's perfectly welcome to join Rhys in his own bed next time. I'm sure Rhys would love it.

The Hand of the Lord: Last night I was reading to my children from the Friend magazine a message from President Uchtdorf. He was enumerating places we can listen for the voice of the Lord--in the scriptures, in nature--and one place he mentioned was in the laughter of a child. I had to pause as I read that one, because it struck a chord in my heart that I know only the Lord's Spirit can touch. I fought back tears as I finished reading to the two beautiful spirits sitting on my lap. How often I need reminders of the overwhelming beauty I have literally at my fingertips (especially when I'm tickling them) everyday in my children. And I am so grateful that He readily provides them.

Popular Blogs, and Probably Why I'm Not.

2011-01-17T07:01:00.000-08:00

Last night I was watching some of the profiles on mormon.org. I watched one about a mother who blogs and was reminded of another one about a mother who had a widely popular blog (I'd actually heard about her from 2 very disperate sources before she ever came into the more public news for an accident that she and her husband had). Then I thought, "How do these women get people to read their blog?" And I quickly reminded myself that I am blogging for unsuccess, so this is a forbidden topic in the first place.

But I secretly indulged (and then publically recorded). And I think the thought that most struck me was--I don't read random people's blogs. I really should not be at all suprized that they don't read mine. I have occasionally stumbled upon some unknown-to-me person's blog that I enjoyed (from another friend's friend list, usually) One even inspired me to start cloth diapering (which venture is having traumas of it's own right now). But have I been back to see it since then? No. I have appreciated other's blogs that answered questions I posed to the internet at large: How do you make crockpot yogurt, for example. But I think the only stranger's blog that I check regularly is cakewrecks. I have a hard enough time just getting to the blogs of people I know.

So if I ever want anyone like me who doesn't already know me to read my blog, I probably first have to become a different person. Because people like me don't follow random blogs. Good thing I'm not the kind of person who blogs for success. So I don't care. Really. Right?

Big Families

2011-01-14T06:44:00.000-08:00

Yesterday and today I am watching my sister's kids. At least, 6 of them. She has the baby with her. I'm glad that kids come one or two at a time. And that they start out small, with no extracurricular activities (or curricular activities, for that matter). The oldest is in Jr. High. The next 3 are in Elementary School, and one of the youngest goes to preschool once or twice a week.

For Christmas we gave my sister and her husband a night away at a resort in Downtown Seattle, and as part of that are watching their kids. She is spending one night away, and we are spending 3 nights at their house, so they could leave early and come home late. I'm not saying it's a piece of cake, but it hasn't detered me from wanting a big family. There is nothing like a big family that has been parented well to make you excited about having more kids.

Be that as it may, it is still difficult to try to meld your parenting style into another family's routines. For example, last night we tried to put 2 preschoolers and 2 toddlers (1 of each of mine, one of each of my sister's) to bed in the same room, and part of the time the 6 year old who insisted on sleeping there, too. Eventually he got kicked out to his own room. And I figured out why their dad usually lays with them until they (and he) are all asleep. Instead of sleeping with them, I made them go to other rooms by themselves. It was really distressing for the 2 year old who didn't understand, but he was the one who was jumping on the bed and hitting and kicking his brothers, and he did calm down eventually. And after a little while the 4 year old came out and told me he needed to go in a different room by himself. OK. It wasn't until after I had them all in bed initally that I realized I was doing this about an hour earlier than my sister's kids were used to going to bed. But I wasn't going to go through the whole thing again, so I toughed it out. It worked out for the night, but I don't know that it would be a long-term solution. I'm glad I only have it for one more night at this point.

And I've put off getting them up for too long. They have school today. Curse this responsibility thing!

For Good

2011-01-13T07:48:00.001-08:00

So, I don't know that I believe that every single happenstance or coincidence that turns out to be a good thing was decreed that it should be so by the Hand of the Lord, any more than I believe that every setback of seeming chance was not actually chance but either a punishment or a "learning opportunity" instituted by the same. Be that as it may, I am hard pressed when examining any single event or occurrence to say this or that one was definitely not. Perhaps it was. It makes it even harder to determine knowing that for those who are striving to follow Him, the Lord finds ways to work every existent circumstance for good, even those that came about through neutral, or even unrighteous means.

The impetus behind these thoughts was the events of this afternoon surrounding my boots and the garbage can. I noticed as I came home in the late morning that the garbage was not picked up this morning (due to snow) and the can had been knocked over and was spilling into the street. I tried to pick it up, but due to the mass of large and awkward pieces protruding from the top (we cleaned out the garage this weekend), it was too difficult to do alone without spilling more than half the contents. So I went inside for help instead.

Kevin was busy at the time, so I decided to wait until he was done. I didn't get to it before Neoma got home, also, and so I put on my boots and went out with her to clean it up. We decided that probably, since the garbage hadn't been picked up by then and it was usually done in the early morning, it probably wouldn't be gotten today. So we brought the garbage can, the extra garbage can, and the 3 more bags of trash inside the garage. I took my boots off just inside the door so I wouldn't track anything around the house. After I got upstairs I remembered I left my boots by the door instead of putting them away in the closet and I silently reminded myself that I needed to do that soon to be tidy. But I quickly forgot again.

Later that afternoon, I ignored some sound wafting in from the cul-de-sac until Neoma yelled, "The garbage truck is coming, right now! They passed us! It's in the cul-de-sac! Get the can out to the other side of the road (where they would pick it up as they came back past)!" I was covered in piles of laundry on the couch and didn't know that I could make it in time, but Kevin was just coming in from the garage and I yelled at him, "Go!" He ripped off his socks and headed back out. I got myself unburied and dashed toward the door to join him and saw, right there waiting for me, my boots! I was able to slip my feet into them in as much time as it took Kevin to get his socks off and we got all 5 containers of garbage across the street and they got picked up and taken away. It was wonderful and gloriously fortuitous.

I have often left my shoes out, and thought I need to put them away and then forgot and had to put them away later after there was a mess. But somehow I have a hard time saying that this particular time was not divinely appointed. It certainly worked out for good. And I know Who does that.

My Big Girl

2011-01-08T14:24:00.001-08:00

My daughter thinks that people get bigger by stretching. Whenever someone remarks, "You are getting so big," or, "Look how big you are!" she responds, "Yes, because I'm stretching!" I just passed her standing on a bench reaching her arms into the sky with gritted teeth saying, "Rrrrr, rrrrr, rrrruh!" Then she proudly exclaimed, "Look how big I am!"

Speaking of big girls, Willow has been having a little regressive week with regard to potty training. And I am working really hard on not going crazy, not because of the work, but with frustration that we've already been through this and I wanted to be all done. Why can't she just stay done? Today, though, I was blessed with a little insight--it is that way for me, too. Oh, not with using the bathroom. I'm pretty sure I have that one mastered for my forseeable future (perhaps some day I'll need diapers again, but I don't count that). But there are so many things in my life that I learn to do them and do them consistently and then I have a period where all that learning just flies out the window and I don't apply it at all. Case in point--all my new leaves. You, know, the ones I was oh, so modestly boasting about all those posts ago? I'm still pretty good, but I had some major regression over the month of December. I got through it, and I hope this next stint will be stronger, but I don't have any delusions that regression cannot happen to me, too. I'm just glad that my Heavenly Parent doesn't berate me the way I feel like laying into Willow sometimes. I hope that I can make my compassion for human frailty, or preschooler frailty as the case may be, mirror His. I love my daughter. It makes it easier to help her clean up the messes when I remember the mess of a life I would have without His contantly available help.

Good Idea of the Week: Napping at the Temple

2011-01-07T05:46:00.000-08:00

Yesterday afternoon, Kevin and I went to the temple. We knew as we were leaving the house at 1:40 that we would not be in time for the 2:00 session, but we decided to leave then anyway so that we would be out of the house and not scrambling to get out the door for the 3:00 session after dawdling too long. So we got to the temple with at least half an hour to spare before we needed to go in even to be early. I, as is my default state right now, was feeling sleepy, so Kevin insisted I spend the 30 minutes to take a nap. He did too, and we slept right there in the parking lot in our car. When his phone alarm went off, we got up, collected ourselves, and went inside with plenty of time to spare.

Asside from a few brief moments of wandering mind, I actually stayed awake and alert the entire time while in the temple. This is a major event. I have such a hard time keeping my eyes open there. I don't know what it is, maybe just the peaceful atmosphere, but it is like a drug to me. I usually can't fight the sleepiness. Actually, although it seem like it helped (and probably it did), I know that the nap was not the hinge point of my staying awake. I give all the credit to the Hand of the Lord. I know from long experience that it doesn't matter what I do or don't do to affect my sleepiness level, ultimately whether or not I stay awake is up to a power outside of me. I don't know why that is, but that is how it is for me. And I prayed really hard (not like this was the only time I ever have done that, either) and this time the answer was yes. I got to stay awake and pay attention to the whole thing. It was marvelous.

No, is too much. I sum up.

2010-12-29T22:16:00.001-08:00

Actually I'm not even summing up, just highlighting.

We spent the last 2 days in Oregon with cousins. It was great fun and we stayed up very late each night playing games. Yay!

Prior to that, I lost my voice again. Just in time to not be able to sing and record our Christmas poem/song to post on youtube. (if you haven't gotten our newsletter yet, don't despair. We're still getting to most of them. It may expedite the process if you email me your address. Otherwise I will try to find it. If you don't ever get one, assume I never found your address, rather than that I didn't think to send you one, please.

And lastly for today--a thought I had while again trying to parent with no voice: (and I think that sharing a spiritual insight automatically counts as a recognition of the Hand of the Lord in my life, because I know that is from whence they come) It is really hard to instruct children when you have no voice and sign language is not fluently spoken in you home. It wasn't so much that I couldn't get my voice to make any sound, it was just that I knew my voice would not heal until I stopped using it almost completely for a day or so. So there was a lot of the time when I wanted to say something to my children and just couldn't, or rather, didn't. I often tried to communicate in other ways, with expressions, clapping, and seldom understood hand motions. And when I finally did have something important enough either to me or to them that I was going to do what it took to communicate it explicitly, I had to go to the child (usually Willow) and put my mouth right up against her ear and whisper very softly.

Spending so much time actively not talking inspired more thinking, and some thoughts that I had revolved on how much more my parenting during this period looked to me like how I see Heavenly Father parenting us. Most of the time, he does not speak to us directly. He relies on other clues and cues--scriptures, the order of nature, prophets, to let us know what we should (and should not) be doing, and leaves us to do it. When something is important enough to explicitly communicate, it still comes by small, quiet whispers--ones we have to still ourselves and pay attention to to hear.

I don't think that the Lord lacks power to communicate with us directly, at any point, and with utter clarity, but I do think that the physical world is very, very loud and easily drowns out the voices to be heard by our spirits. Hopefully, these reflections will inspire me to seek stillness in my life more regularly, so I may listen and hear the whispers of my Heavenly Parent.

A Yuck Thing

2010-12-22T19:19:00.000-08:00

Tonight Kevin had a short meeting to go to at about 6:30. We had dinner about 6 and he said he should be home in time to help put the kids to bed. So at around 6:40 when we were finishing dinner I thought to myself, "What would be the easiest way for me to keep the kids occupied and out of the way so I can keep working on Christmas presents until Daddy comes home?" And I figured it out: a bath! My kids are always begging for a bath. And as long as I keep them within earshot and can hear two happy voices and not too much splashing, I figure I'm OK.

After Rhys' initial protests, I get them both in the tub and fill it while Rhys is periodically sticking his mouth in the water and coming up coughing. As long as he's coughing, I know he's breathing. So I go upstairs to catch up on my blogging for a few minutes before starting to sew again. Then I hear Willow say, "Yucky! Hee, hee, hee." I figure Rhys is sticking his mouth in the water again. Then a moment later, slightly more concerned, "Mommy! We found a yuck thing!" So, now a little concerned myself, but more for missing out on my child-free work time than for their safety or comfort, I hasten to the bathroom to find...Yuck.

Someone, I'm guessing Rhys, relieved himself with great fluidity in the tub. Yuck. Unplug the drain. No hope of scooping any out to contain it, So I just let it drain as I start to pull toys out and wipe them with disinfectant. The kids have to stand there in the water as I let it all drain because I don't want them dripping poo water all over. After the toys are out and the tub is drained (and rinsed, thanks to Willow's industrious efforts with the bathtub cup), I wipe down the tub then suds up the kids. Rinse the kids with the bathtub cup and let the water drain again. Refill the tub and call Kevin, "When are you supposed to be coming home again?" "Soon." I wait. He can take it from here.

14 ½ hours later

2010-12-21T20:25:00.000-08:00

The Hand of the Lord: Tonight Willow got in big trouble. She intentionally hurt her little brother for fun while simultaneously breaking rules and Christmas decorations. The particular decoration, I was not too upset that it was broken. I was really upset by how unphazed she seemed to be by what she had done. It was just a funny thing, “Oops, hee, hee, hee.” I collected myself enough to refrain from spouting whatever came into my head as a properly intense punishment and just told her that I would have to talk to Daddy before I knew what the consequence would be.

As I was discussing it with Kevin, I explained that I really don’t want her to just forget this ever happened. But I was utterly blocked as to how to accomplish this. I wanted her to remember how bad what she did was so she will never do it again. It was while I was explaining this to Kevin that I realized that I sounded to myself like I was reacting very emotionally—from my frustration rather than her improvement.. “I want her to remember how bad this is,” sounded vindictive, even though what I meant was that I wanted to create in her an emotional recognition of bad behavior. And at that point I stopped to re-evaluate my thought process.

I realized that what I really wanted was for Willow to have a soft heart that recognizes others’ feelings. As I saw this, my heart softened. I recognized that there was no way I could force that on Willow, no matter what I might do to her. This helped me to see that the consequence of this action did not have to be a life shaking event. It was only going to be one drop in a continual bucket of reinforcement throughout her life. It didn’t make it suddenly easy, but after that point I finally could start to see appropriate consequences in this case.

And that moment of pause and reflection that turned the focus of my deliberations to Willow right now and gave me a little better perspective on this moment in her life, I credit to the Lord’s intervention in my thoughts. I am grateful I took the moment to acknowledge it and let it guide my conclusions.

New Babies—Not Mine

2010-12-21T05:59:00.000-08:00

I made bread last night and I forgot to bag it and freeze it before I went to bed. Oops. I’ll have to do that after this.

Friends came into town last night. One of my old roommates (but a good friend before and after that, too) and her husband and 3 kids. They were about 3.5 hours later than they thought they would be, so my kids had to go to bed before they got here, which bummed them out. But they got here safely, after fixing a flat tire on the pass. They were coming from Salt Lake City, and frankly I’m amazed they made it as early as they did, even without a flat tire.

I just looked down to discover spit-up on my nightgown. I am up by choice right now so I can blog before the rest of my day starts. My friend is up by compulsion right now because her 6 month old is teething. I held the baby while she went out to the car to find the baby Tylenol. And the baby gave me that little momento I failed to notice until just now.

Admittedly, spit-up and milk-fed baby poo are not in and of themselves necessarily wonderful smells, but it is amazing how nostalgic they are for a mom who no longer has an exclusively breast-feeding baby and is already baby hungry anyway. I’d like one of those soon. In any case, we will have a baby in the house come February. It will be so strange for my sister to have a baby and me not. I don’t know how to handle it. But I guess I’ll get used to it soon enough.

Well, I have to get to scriptures, so I guess sharing the Hand of the Lord will have to wait (which it did anyway, at least until I thought of something to share).

This is NOT What Christmas is All About

2010-12-20T05:29:00.000-08:00

I've had such dreams this year. Mostly of gifts for my kids. I think most parents do this, but it's just beginning for me, so I'm a little unsteady in my handling of it. I'm waffle-y and grandiose in my visions of what we will give our kids. There are so many things I want to make for them, but there is not enough time for all of it, and besides that, I don't think it's good for them to have a glut of presents on Christmas. But where the issue really hinges is on the fact that in pursuit of these grandiose visions I have been staying up hours past my bed time and unable to get up on time in the morning every day. This leads almost inevitably to delayed if not entirely dismissed personal devotions because I lose my focused kid-free time in the morning.

I've been letting it slide because I actually have more time to work on things in the evening than I do in the morning because I always remember to put studies first in the morning and sometimes that leaves me with no time before the kids are up, whereas I know once the kids are down they won't be up for as long as I am working before I go to bed. But I also don't usually make myself have my studies before I start working in the evening and at least 2 different days over the past week I have put it off until I passed out and never did it at all. This is a problem. And finally yesterday morning I decided it has to change.

I determined sometime as a teenager that the way to give gifts to Christ was to make improvements in yourself. Since what He wants most is for us to live with Him and Heavenly Father again, then the most loving thing we can do for them is progress along that path. I think I can also agree with the idea that serving others is also a way to give gifts to Christ--the least of these, and all that--and I want to include that as an integral part of our Christmas celebrations, but that is a different topic. It still remains that letting good habits that I have been cultivating slide because of distractions by gifts during the Christmas season (even if it is about giving to others) is like and anti-gift for the very One whose birth we are celebrating. This should not be.

(An entirely side note. Willow is looking at a book with Rhys right now and said, "It's a zebra. It's like BRA. It has that word in it: ze-BRA.)

So I made a commitment yesterday. I will not let any planning or crafting or working keep me up past the appointed bed time and I will get up at my determined wake up time and start my day with the studies I know are most important to my personal improvement. The coolest thing about decisions like this are that even though I can trick myself into feeling selfless about it, at the same time it gives me access to promised blessings that make it entirely worth while, even if it wasn't done for a gift to Christ--I know that as I work to improve my habits and correctly order my priorities each day I will be blessed with abilities beyond that which I can know foresee. I know that I will still be able to accomplish all things that are important or requisite. I have faith that He will bless me, even as I am trying to bless Him.

I am very grateful for the gentle reminders from the Hand of the Lord that bring me to a place in which I can see the need and commit to change before it is too late for this Christmas time.

And now for reality--it's not even 6 am and my children are both awake and kicking. Why? Why do this to me on my first day of new determination? They were knocking on our door at the same time my alarm was first going off. Why? They surely have not had enough sleep. Sigh. Well, if I can pass this test, all should be well. I told them, even as I brought them upstairs with me, that Momma and Daddy have some things they need to do without children for a couple of hours in the morning, so they have to play by themselves until we are ready to play with them. It's worked alright so far--I got to blog--but then, Kevin is lying in the middle of the floor asleep with the kids climbing on top of him right now. We'll see what happens when I have to engage Kevin for couple study, too.

Nocturnal Habits of the Juvenile Vezzani

2010-12-15T13:34:00.000-08:00

This post was originally composed on November 12th, but I did not publish it because I could not get the video to upload. I've finally put the video on youtube, so here it is. Since this was put together, Rhys and Willow share a bed almost every night. And the kids will be getting a big bed for Christmas.

I almost quailed, but in the end I determined to risk it. Even at the risk of losing my solitude for the entire morning, I had to try to capture on film the potential adorableness of my chillun. Based on the data collected at the last observation, I had absolutely no idea what I would find.

Notice how I turn the video on before opening the door, and don't turn it off until after it is closed. It is great danger to enter my children's room in the morning unless I want them to be awake because they always seem to be in a lighter phase of sleep then, and even just the light from the open doorway is often enough to wake up Rhys. But, abandoning my better judgement, I forged on, what ever the cost might be.

Here is the raw footage:

Look at those two little bums in the air. Perfect examples of juvenile recumbent posture, or "Child's Pose."

A couple of nights ago Willow decided to sleep on the floor instead of in her bed and Rhys wanted to lay down with her. So I let him, and they both slept there on the floor. Last night, Rhys wanted to climb in Willow's bed instead of his crib, and she agreed, so I let him then, too. But Willow's bed is a lot narrower than the floor, so they were a lot cozier.

When I put the kids to bed I read stories and sing songs and then I leave the light on slightly dimmed and let Willow and Rhys look at books til they fall asleep. This has virtually eliminated all complaints about bed time and getting up when she should be in bed. Then I come in a couple of hours later when I go to bed when they are invariably fast asleep (except for once, and Willow and I had a discussion about that), put the books in a safe place, make sure their covers are on, and turn out the light.

Last night I went in to find Willow partially dangling off the side (thank goodness for the rails on toddler beds) with Rhys crowded up against her and almost half of the bed (which is as narrow as a crib) bare of children. As I bent over her to pull up her blankets, Willow's eye popped open, but I don't think she was really awake. I did take the opportunity to ask her if she wanted Rhys to go back in his own bed. It took a while to get my question through to her, but she said no, she wanted him there.

The whole time I was talking to Willow, Rhys had been wriggling like a sleeping puppy over the pillow and Willow's side. I don't think Rhys has REM sleep. I think he only has RLM sleep--Rapid Limb Movement. I covered them both with the blanket and went to sleep myself.

And as I was laying in my own big, empty bed all I could think about was how I wish I could fit on that toddler bed with them. I've been thinking for a while about moving Willow to a big bed, and if I did that, it made more sense to me to put Rhys in the same bed with her rather than a second bed in the room because she wouldn't even take up half of it. And I think I have become even more stuck on this idea because I am a snuggle sleeper and in the absence of my husband, my kids get elected to fill that need. I finally realized that it would be a lot easier to have a bed I fit in in the kids room than to try to make my room entirely unsupervised-kid-proof. So I think Willow will be getting a big bed for Christmas, and that means Rhys, too. And me, I will be getting a bed to snuggle my chillun in all night long.

Good Parenting

2010-12-15T12:12:00.000-08:00

Does anyone else parent by ignoring? I don't mean the active "you're trying to get my attention but I am not going to give it to you" kind of ignoring, but rather the passive "if I can let you do your thing while I do my thing then I'm OK, you're OK" kind of ignoring. Of course, not all day can be spent like this. Sometimes kids need attention, and I will give it to them, but largely encourage them to play on their own, even out of my line of sight (in another room, in the fenced backyard). Right now we have a friend visiting and I can hear that he, Willow, and Rhys are in an upstairs bedroom 2 half-stories above me. And I'm not worried. No one is crying, but they aren't silent either. And this is my measure of whether things are going fine--we're right in the middle. If it was absolute silence, I would get suspicious (after I noticed), and if they fussing got too severe (a little fussing/crying to work out on their own is pretty healthy, I think) I would intervene. But for now, I ignore them and do my own thing. I think this is good parenting. What do you think?

There is so much of our day that I do and must interact with the children--meal times, prayer times, family night, scripture study, bath times, church, running errands, transitions (getting up, going out, going to bed)--and then times when I play with them because I want to--they are incredibly cute after all--that I don't feel bad leaving them to themselves in the in between time. They demand attention often enough.

Maybe that's how God parents us, too. Not that he's ever truly ignoring us, but maybe not always actively engaged in our day-to-day life. When we're doing well, in the in between times, he just lets us take care of ourselves--but is always within earshot for when we find ourselves so distressed we need help. And he may not always come right away, even when we think we are stuck, because he knows our abilities better than we do and sometimes a little struggle is the best way for us to grow and learn. And the more capable and mature we become, the more he ignores us. He also knows that when he has heard absolutely nothing from us for a while, we're probably getting into trouble, and He will come look for us.

Not being actively engaged, however, does not mean a lack of perceptible presence. Even when my Daughter is in a different corner of the house she can see my influence in the nature of the home--the decoration, the toys and things she has to play with, the clothing she has to choose from, and even her own ideas of right and wrong, good and bad, have been largely developed in the image of mine (I do pray that mine are correct ones!). Thus she can see my hand every moment, if she just looks around, even when she does not see my direct physical presence.

On that note, I see the Hand of the Lord in the way even a seemingly flippant reflection can ultimately turn to a serious meditation on a spiritually enlightening level. I am grateful for His influence all over my life, even when He's ignoring me.

Instrumentality

2010-12-12T22:12:00.000-08:00

Today's notice of the Hand of the Lord is not directly in my life, but rather an instance of how I see the Lord use us as instruments in His Hands.

Kevin had a meeting this morning and received notice that it was canceled just as he was about to leave due to the fact that the basement of the man who was supposed to lead the meeting was flooding. (It's been raining quite a bit here.) Instead of taking it easy thanks to the unexpected free time he and my brother-in-law, who was also supposed to go to that meeting, headed right over to the man's house. They, along with some other brethren from church were there all afternoon and into the evening helping to get out the water and set up a way to keep it from flooding back in. That kind of immediate selfless service is nothing less than allowing yourself to be an instrument in the Lord's hands to bless the lives of others. I love my man.

Quote of the (Other) Day

2010-12-09T01:20:00.000-08:00

I have been watching episodes of "Get Smart" because I got them from the library. Because of the way you check them out, you have to watch an entire season in one week or else miss seeing some before you have to return it (and get back on the waiting list for it). So there has been a lot of smarting going on around here. There are a lot of guns and shooting, but no blood, so I let my kids watch it. But it makes for interesting scenarios to explain that make me re-think this decision sometimes.

Willow, while watching Maxwell Smart load a gun: He's putting batteries in it!

Me: Yep.

Freecycle Karma

2010-12-09T00:15:00.000-08:00

I like Freecycle, and those of you who are cheap and thrifty and hate to see good, useful things go out into the world without knowing that someone will love them (As much as we all love thrift stores, we all know that too many poor textilular souls pass through their doors unwanted and eventually leave, unloved, to languish forever, stubbornly refusing to biodegrade, in a un-environmentally friendly landfill.), should check out Freecycle, too. It mostly exists as individual Yahoo groups for different locations. I belong to 4--Freecycle Woodinville, King County, Central King County, and Snohomish County. It is a forum where people post things that they have to give away and people can respond and then come get them. I have received a couple of things and given a couple of things away so far.

Today I posted about 5 things that have been sitting in the garage forever hoping to clean some of them out without even having to leave the house. One listing was a set of 2 samurai-style swords. They are decorative pieces, and kind of cheap. They were given to us for free and they aren't really anything that I particularly want. I realized after I received 5 requests for them within the first 20 minutes, followed by 9 more over the next couple of hours before I finally posted that they were taken, that I probably could have sold them on ebay or craigslist and made enough money to have been worthwhile. I could have simply retracted my offer and said that they were taken (by me) and then sold them, but it just didn't feel like it would be worth the effort when I could just say "yes" to any one of these and they would come take them from me. And besides, I liked the idea of storing up some good Freecycle Karma.

I figure if I really show my commitment to generosity and sharing what I have, eventually I will be able to cosmically cash it in and someone will offer something very valuable that I really need or want. Right now I have a specific Christmas present in mind for Willow and am hoping I can get it for free. Though I think I may be using up some of the Karma already simply by the fact that multiple people have responded to my offer for every single item, potentially getting all of these things off my hands without lifting a finger higher than from keyboard to mouse. This is pretty exciting. I'm especially attracted to those who respond saying they would like what I have to give someone for a Christmas present--like that will help narrow down the scope of the Karma to the exact category I want it in--free Christmas presents.

I like the stage of life where time is not actually money because there's not really anything I could be doing instead of what I am doing at this point that I could be paid for, so I can take time to do things like hand-rinse and line-dry diapers, make meals from scratch and put them in the freezer, scour garage sales in July for gifts in December, and haunt internet posting sites for cool free stuff to give away instead of buy to give away. This is a nice life. And I credit the Hand of the Lord with bringing me a husband who does not ask me to work outside the home and is excited about the efforts I make to live thriftily.

Good night.

Rad-tastic Body Love

2010-12-09T00:01:00.000-08:00

This is a shout-out to my little brother (can you say, "back and forth"?). (By the way, how's that for punctuational overload? Don't often get to see "?). all in a row, do you?)

I fully agree (if you don't read the comments on previous posts, he is the one who there posited) that it is easier (often) to generate hilarity when two exchange words than only one in a monologue. So please feel free to exchange with me. I will try to better address your comments in future. Thank you to those who responded correctly to my self-depreciatingly named post with ego stroking affirmations of my awesomeness. (Special note to my slave-for-life: Your duty for life is to read my blog and make me feel good about myself with occasional murmurs of awe and wonder and love. P.S. I think you are awesome-rad, too and am way excited for your two baby boys, and also the fact of your whole family, even though I never told you before.) (And special note to my self-designated most favorite roommate ever--she might just be right--I'm so excited you found me and I need to seek out and catch up on your life sometime soon! I like you.)

And as a final note to my little brother--actually, as fun as it is that you can make my back pop, usually the "Aaaahhhhhh." is more like an "AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!" of "Oh, no. I know my brother loves to do that but I can already feel it starting to give me a headache." Unfortunately, my back doesn't like being vigorously popped any more now that I am an old lady. But feel free to give me a massage any time and then ease pressure onto my back and see if it wants to pop a little then--that is always welcome. And I love you.

15 Crafting Days Left Til Christmas!

2010-12-08T06:53:00.000-08:00

We went to the Temple last night. We didn't spend a long time there, but enough. Then Kevin and I did some Christmas shopping--just Dollar Store stuff, but it was fun. I like Kevin. I'm mostly done with Christmas shopping for my kids. But there are still the siblings we are giving gifts to this year and I don't feel satisfied with what I have for Kevin. But I have a whole load of Christmas present projects in the works (mentally at least). I'm pretty sure I won't get to them all, but I still cling to them and try to make a little progress every day. But it is a very little, because I have very little children. sigh. But I wouldn't trade them. I guess they're worth it.

The Hand of the Lord: He gave me a husband who is so gentle. While we were driving, Kevin brought up something. It was a concern he had had that I thought we had addressed. He was seeing a potential problem with the solution I thought we had come up with. My reaction was initially very hostile to the whole topic and instead of figuring out why I felt that way, I let it all vent onto him. My wonderful, gentle husband just let me for a minute, then explained that he was just wanting to have a discussion about it, not a "what are you thinking?!" explosion. And I was immediately disarmed, realizing what I had done. When I apologized, he didn't hold it over me, he just helped me over it. How sweet is he? I love him. I don't know why I have been blessed with this even tempered man, but I sure am glad.

Analog* Fail

2010-12-07T07:21:00.000-08:00

I hadn't recorded anything until it was bed time last night so I brought my journal to bed with me to jot a few lines before going to sleep. It didn't work very well. It ended up as one of those few words, random lines, blotches and unrelated thoughts kind of entries that didn't even have an end to the forst sentence before I gave up on trying to wake back up after I dozed off and I put it to the side.

So here I am back, and I hope you will forgive the everyday overload, because it helps me to actually finish my thoughts when I can be excited that someone out there in the ether may read them.

The Hand of the Lord: OK, here as really simple one--For the ward Christmas party the person in charge of decorating had different people each bring unique center pieces for the tables. There was some concern in the couple of days before that there would be more tables than centerpieces coming, so I put together about 6 possibilities from my Christmas decorations and brought them all with me. When I got there to help with the decorating on the day of, all of the tables were already set. So I had 3 boxes of decoration and no table to put them on. But over the course of setting up for the evening I discovered other places that needed decorating (like on top of the piano) that I simply had not thought of before, and it was super easy to re-arrange some of my decorations to fit there. Sometimes little blessings like that--mini-crisis averted quickly and smoothly--are easy to miss. But I know I would have remembered it if I didn't have anything there to fill the gaps. I am grateful for a Father that helps me be prepared, even if what I think I'm preparing for is not what I end up needing, it just made me also prepared for what actually ended up happening.

*I know that "analog" is not technically an accurate word to describe writing by hand, but I couldn't think of a better one, and I thought perhaps the pressure of pen on paper as recorded by the presence/absence and thickness of ink line left by the trailing ball point might satisfy the "mechanism that represents data by measurement of a continuous physical variable, as voltage or pressure" that the definition calls for the word to be "of or pertaining to."

In a Mysterious Way

2010-12-05T21:25:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it is very easy and obvious to see the Hand of the Lord at work directly in my life and it is only a matter of moments to capture it in words. Other times it takes forever of sitting and really thinking hard to figure out a specific and unique instance for the day. Sometimes what finally makes itself visible to me is such a twisting history of tenuously related events that I would never have seen it if I hadn't spent the time in intense meditation. So I guess those periods of reflection are good, because they expand my view of the Lord's Hand at work in my life.

Last week our ward Choir director was sick and emailed to cancel choir practice that day. I called and offered to lead the choir practice and so it was back on. My daughter has been coming with me to practice and loves the special with Mommy time. Because Kevin was also home, he kept Rhys with us at practice as well instead of sending him home with Neoma like I have usually done.

At practice I was up in the front and Kevin let the kids run around. Spurred on by Rhys (usually she would sit next to me most of the time) Willow joined him sneaking snacks from the table in the front and using the music stand for a Maypole. I mostly ignored them, and I thought everyone else was fine with it too, but a couple of days later I got a phone call. The caller was very kind and had no word of hostility or condemnation, but just wanted to sympathise with the difficulty of handling hungry little children who have just been at church for three hours, emphasize that both my and my husbands voices were needed in the choir, and suggest that perhaps we can find a way to occupy the kids elsewhere during rehearsals in the future.

A couple of days later this same Sister called again to tell me about the wonderful idea she just had--she would take our children to a different room and give them a snack, freeing up both my husband and me and if my sister and her husband would only come also, she could take their children as well and trade her one voice for all four of us.

I love this sweet woman. Neoma and Jason have not come to choir for quite a while specifically because it is just too difficult to take care of the kids at the same time. I was finding a way to work around it by sending my kids home with Neoma (except when Willow promised to be very well behaved she got to stay with me). It was (I think) just one week of misbehaviour because of me being unable to corral kids due to conducting and Daddy being distracted with music he was seeing for the first time. But because of that week and the stir it caused, a need was seen and acknowledged that applies to more than just me. And so now Neoma can come back to choir, which I know she enjoys, but not when it is filled with the stress of unwelcomely rampaging children. And that is a strange and mysterious working of the the Lord.

I'm glad I didn't feel inclined to be offended when someone told me (however nicely) that what I let my children do was not acceptable. In fact, the better I am coming to know this woman, the more I want to be like her when I grow up. She is a widow, I think, and I'm sure she is older than my mom, but I have no idea how much. She is still bright and witty and funny and helpful and lively. I want to be like that when I am a grandma or great grandma, or whatever she is. And I hope I find the opportunity to tell her how much she is my hero.

I Think I Must Be Boring

2010-12-05T21:08:00.000-08:00

A post of self-pity, and hypocrisy. But not too sincere, never fear.

I bluster and brag about how I don't care what people think of my blog, but I secretly do want to entertain, enlighten, and inform people I know and care about. And the only way I know it's working is through comments. So I always feel depressed when there are no new comments, even though I've put up 5 new posts. And I persist in stalwartly refusing to do anything specifically to generate popularity. I just want people to love me spontaneously for my show of not caring whether anyone cares. sigh. Why is that so hard to achieve?

But I guess, because I'm stubborn, I will continue to persist in not attempting to cater to my target audience or even admit I have a target audience. And privately wallow in illegal self-pity. Because self-pity would be stupid. Because I'm the only one imposing arbitrary rules on myself. If I want to change them, I can. But I won't. Because then I will have to change the name of my blog and that will basically negate all the coolness I have sought to establish in having it up to this point and that is not allowed, even though I negate it every time I make a metablogically ridiculous post like this.

The End

I'm a Free Woman Again! Let Christmas Begin!

2010-12-03T21:41:00.000-08:00

It's done! The ward Christmas party happened and was well received. I'm so happy.

This year we did a celebration of Christmas music. We started with Hors 'Devours then had the first half of the Program: secular Christmas music. Then we had Desserts and the second half: sacred Christmas music. I was a little worried that the program would be too long. I tried to be generous on my estimates of time and I figured we would end around 8:15 or 8:20 (we started at 6:30). We ended up finishing the program at 8:00. Yay! I'm always concerned about not going too long on programs. I hate making people sit, especially children, and I want ward parties to be very family-friendly. We had people sing and play the piano, violin, and guitars, even a banjo and bells. And one poem, and one dance. We had a few congregational (audience) numbers and for 3 of the songs we had a Mary and Baby Jesus come sit on the stage.

The numbers were all chosen by the individuals who performed them. I was initially planning to weave the songs together into a telling of the a story, but it didn't work out very well, so mostly people just performed them. The problem that I ran into in that department was that I wanted to have a progression through the songs through the Christmas story, but the songs that were chosen mostly had a sort of progression of their own and most of them repeated what others already said. And then there were some random ones that didn't really match with anything. So I gave up on telling a complete story with them and just let them bring the Spirit how they were.

At some future point I think it might be cool to work out the nativity story in song and have people dress up and stage the performing of them, but this time the way it worked out was just right. And I am grateful that it all went well and that it is now done because that means I can concentrate on my own family's celebrations and gift making and decorating (my decorations got torn apart to bring to decorate the church).

The Hand of the Lord: Not so much in my life specifically, but in the church, specifically the youth of the church. Tell me if this sounds like what you hear of most "young people these days": several times during the course of the evening I called to a group of teenagers that was chatting together halfway across the gymnasium and said, "could you do this for me?" Sometimes it was sweeping, or moving things, or carrying boxes to my car. I don't actually know these kids very well. Some I have interacted with more than others, some I've never actually seen before in my life that I know of. Every single time, every one of them dropped what they were doing and with smiling faces and helpful hearts jumped to what ever it was I asked them to do. Every time, every one, whatever it was. I never got a surly look or a "who do you think you are to ask me to do something?" scoff. We truly have wonderful youth in our church. And I know it is not happenstance or luck. It is because of the lifting and refining influence of the Spirit of the Lord--His hand stretched out over His children as they try their best to follow Him.

Skills I Lack

2010-12-02T07:18:00.000-08:00

Willow has been experimenting with locking the door to her room. For some reason the locks on the downstairs bedroom doors require keys. Unfortunately, there are no keys for them. Usually it has been when she is playing in the room and I always make her open it when I discover the door is locked and tell her she is not allowed to lock the door when she is playing in there. Yesterday she locked the door when I sent her down for her rest time, but apparently she didn't close it (you can't turn the handle from the inside when it is locked) until she came out a few minutes later. Rhys was still inside. Luckily, Rhys was sleeping soundly and never knew that for an hour we were frantically working on the door to his room.

I learned 2 things from this experience: (1) there are a million videos about how to pick locks on the internet and (2) they all make it look eaiser than it actually is. Some of the videos said you could do it with a bobby pin or a paper clip, but they all also required a "tension wrench," which I've never even heard of before and which, apparently, you get in a lockpicking kit, which if you have, I don't know why you would need a bobby pin or a paper clip in the first place. Since we didn't have a lock picking kit or a tension wrench, we tried using a screwdriver and a knife in place of the tension wrench. If you sear picking locks on youtube, you will see what a tension wrench is and why a screwdriver or a knife is much less effective in the roll.

I felt pretty calm about the whole thing, but I guess my even bloodpressure belied how upset I actually was because when Willow kept asking questions and getting in the middle of things, I sent her to time out. I know she didn't know she had done anything wrong so I tried to explain how serious what she did was, that Rhys was locked in the bedroom and we couldn't get to him, but she just kept asking why. Finally I told her that even when we don't do something on purpose, sometimes there are consequences, and her concequence was that she had to go sit in time out.

So I have come to the conclusion that lockpicking is a skill, and one that it takes more than 60 minutes to learn. The moral of the story is: Start picking locks now. By the time you need the skill, it will be too late.

And the Hand of the Lord is: I have a husband who knows how to remove a door frame and bypass the handle to get a door open without causing permanent damage.

Happy Family Birthday! and my very intelligent girl

2010-12-01T05:44:00.000-08:00

Kevin and I decided when we got married that we wanted to make our Anniversary a family celebration because it is not just when we got married, but it was the birth of our family. We decided it would be a good time to plan an annual fancy dinner out for the whole family. Although we dress up and practice our good manners, however, so far we've still gone to family restaurants. This year we went to Sheri's. The waitress took this picture for us.

Happy 7 years!

When we got home Neoma took some more pictures for us. I love my little family.

Willow took this picture for us.

And since I was finally dressed up in something flattering, I had Neoma take some skinny pictures of me, too. I haven't done that yet, and it was fun.
For the record, this was the dress I wore to my high school prom 10 years ago. It fits me better now than it did then.

My little Willow is learning to read. It's still shaky, but it's coming. We read scriptures as a family every morning, and usually for a verse or two I will say it to Willow and she will repeat it. The other morning I helped her sound out the first two words: And it. I had to work with her to string the sounds of the letters into a recognizable word. She can get every letter sound, but has trouble blending them together accurately. (It will often go, "/a/-/n/-/d/, nad!" or, "/i/-/t/, tit!") But after getting those two we went back over them and she said them, then I pointed to the next and without even saying a letter or a single sound she said, "came," which was correct, then "to" and "pass." She stumbled on "after" and guessed it said "Ammon" (whom we are reading about), but she is beginning to recognize patterns and some words by sight. I am very excited and a very pleased Momma.

The Hand of the Lord: OK, here's a roundabout blessing. On black Friday my brother-in-law and little brother went to Target for their super sale. I had seen some plush blankets on sale there the night before and my little brother knew I wanted them, so he called me to see if he wanted me to pick any up while they were there. I was in the shower while he called and so Kevin talked to him for me and couldn't think of why we would need them (I particularly wanted one to use in making Christmas presents) so he told my brother not to get any. Kevin thought, if I really wanted some, we could go later in the day ourselves. So we did go later in the day, in the afternoon, but by the time we got there they were entirely out of the size and color that I wanted for the sale, which saved about 30%. I picked 2 other blankets in colors that would work just as blankets to have and went to check out. They rang up as full price and when I mentioned the problem to the clerk and explained the sign she checked and told me that that was a "door buster" sale that was only on until 10:00. But while I was figuring out if I should just put them back and go home the manager came over and let us have them for the sale price and dispatched someone to go take down the faulty price sign. I realized as we were on the way home that at the point my little brother was there the sale had already ended, and it is very probable that since he was not the one who wanted them for that price he may very likely have either just put them back or bought them full price and they would have taken the sign down and I would not have been able to get them later. So even though I didn't get the color I wanted initially (Kevin found me some later at a different store), I did get the extremely good price. And it was a blessing.

12 Hours, Two Good Hands

2010-11-28T21:21:00.000-08:00

At least, that's how it goes in my mind. I know this time around that I will still have a bandage on my hand for the rest of the week even after I get my splint off tomorrow morning, but it will be a bendy bandage and I will be able to take it off to shower and re-dress it myself. I am looking forward to this. And on Friday I can even take that dressing off. I'm very excited.

As with everything, recovery of my second hand has seemed to go by quicker and more easily. I have felt less incapable and even feel slightly surprized that the time is up already. But I'm glad. I want it to come off.

I am continually amazed at the peace I feel from the Lord. I can look at some situations logically and think, "This should worry me," or, "I have so much to do that I haven't planned that I should be going crazy right now." And then reflect and say, "But actually I feel fine. I'm not anxious in the least. Weird." And I know that this peace of mind comes from the Lord, and is only available to me when I am doing what I should be doing and doing my best. It is not a feeling that I could create simply by wishing it, and I know because of the times in my life when I am not doing the things I should be doing and so am left to my own abilities. It's horrible. I feel anxious and upset all the time, even without knowing why. I acknowledge and express my gratitude to my Heavenly Father for peace. May you each know a measure of it in your lives also, every day.

And I appologize in advance if the posting gets a little terse for a few days, I'm going to channeling my creative reporting skills into a family newsletter we're determined to get sent this month! Wish me luck!

Thanksgiving Daze

2010-11-27T16:34:00.000-08:00

I have been barely able to supress my excitement for the Christmas season that I caught myself several times talking to others about Christmas plans as if I was already in December and had to do a quick reigning myself in and reminder that it wasn't after Thanksgiving yet. I've been so excited about Christmas that I was having a hard time giving Thanksgiving its due excitement. Even Thanksgiving morning I just sort of sat around doing other things instead of incessantly planning and figuring what needs to be made and when does it need to be started and what can we set up to be ready, etc, etc.

And then it passed, and, I think because I didn't experience the whole rollercoaster of emotion about it, it sort of feels like it never happened, so I'm still feeling guilty getting out the Christmas things. I feel like I'm forcing it, and that just doesn't seem right. I love Christmas decorating! But I'm not feeling it right now. Sigh. However, I will persevere. We will have decorations up this week! (OK, we actually already have half of them up. We will decorate our tree! That's not up all the way)

The Hand of the Lord: I have 3 older siblings who have all had carpel tunnel surgery before me. It is so comforting and helpful to have them to turn to and advise me as I am recovering from mine. My sister sat down and massaged my scar on Thanksgiving day. It was wonderful. I am grateful for the advice on resting enough and not resting too much, on desensitizing and strengthening. I love my family. And I love the the Lord put me right where I am in my family with so many older siblings to love, support, and guide me.

At Last! Book Review Time--Leven Thumps*

2010-11-25T08:59:00.001-08:00

*an additional comment was added to this post near the bottom. Also, just so you know, this review contains no sort of spoilers. So read in security.

So, as I have been asked and as I was intending to say all along (I just ran out of time), the books that I have been reading/listening to are the Leven Thumps series by Obert Skye.

There are 5 books in the series:

Leven Thumps and the Gateway of Foo
Leven Thumps and the Whispered Secret
Leven Thumps and the Eyes of the Want
Leven Thumps and the Wrath of Ezra
Leven Thumps and the Ruins of Alder.

and a companion book: Professor Winsnicker’s Book of Proper Etiquette for Well-mannered Sycophants

I'm reviewing them all together because it is really one continuous story. None but the first book really opens--they just start, and none but the last book really concludes--they just end. So expect to read them all sequentially in rapid succession. I'm glad I didn't start them until they were all published. They are pretty quick reading. I recommend reading the companion book after you have started but before you are about halfway through. Then you have a frame of reference for it but have not gotten so far that the fun surprises and hints have become largely irrelevant.

It is a really interesting series. It revolves around a boy named Leven Thumps and a realm called Foo. Foo is described as existing in the space between the folds of your mind--the place where dreams go to be enhanced and made beautiful. But it is nevertheless a real and substantial world with inhabitants of 3 sorts: those native to Foo, who's kind were created in the beginning and have a job in keeping Foo serving it's purpose, creatures born of dreams who don't really have their own grand purpose but are just sort of happenstance, and those who have been snatched from Reality into Foo (and their occasional descendants) who are expected to join the natives in maintaining the purposes of Foo.

The driving conflict of the book is that evil has been building in Foo in the form of beings of all sorts who are not contented with their lot of dream enhancement for the rest of their lives and so bend dreams to their own selfish and evil ends with the ultimate goal of finding a way out of Foo and into reality (which they think will make them the rulers of everything, but those loyal to Foo believe it will mean the end of dreams and therefore the end of all mankind).The entire series takes place over the course of a few weeks, but an interesting trait of Foo is that people there age by experience, rather than time, so in these few weeks Leven progresses from a 14-year-old boy to a 20-something-ish young man. Ditto for Winter, the 13-year-old girl who accompanies him to Foo.

The author is LDS, but it is not an LDS book. That being said, however, I was very, very happy to find that, unlike some other LDS authors I could name, Obert Skye keeps his writing incredibly non-offensive. On rare occasions he will say that a character (usually uncharacteristically) swore, but that is actually what he writes, not the word, or even a description of what the word is. For example, something along the lines of, "Tim always told his boys that use of foul language belied a lack of creativity or intelligence. Apparently the sight of X drained him of all intellect. 'Wow! That was a colorful word!' exclaims another, very naive character. 'What does it mean?'" Occasionally the author will use terms that the LDS reader will recognize as common, of not entirely exclusive LDS phrasology, but they are innocuous enough, and myself having run up against the difficulty of trying to use other wordings just for the sake of avoiding commonly LDS terms even though they would be easily understood by any audience, I can readily forgive that.

One thing that I unexpectedly enjoyed a whole lot was the life truths from an LDS perspective woven into this secular fantasy story--echoes of what resonates so deeply with what I know popping out of a story that is wrapped up in entirely other unreality. I wanted to use a quote from C. S. Lewis here, but I can't find it. And now I am beginning to wonder where I even heard it from in the first place. So this is an explanation of what I think is a C. S. Lewis Quote but I cannot definitely confirm (if someone can, please help me!): In fantasy we strip away every physical thing familiar in our comfortable reality--even the very laws of physics no longer apply. And in this way we highlight the things, non-physical, which must remain constant--the struggle between good and evil, the universality of morality and kindness. When what is unimportant to moral understanding is removed and replaced by something entirely different--an etirely different world--what remains consistent is brought to the forefront and more easily becomes a focus in a way that is difficult when the mundane trappings of reality cumber the way. Thus good fantasy re-affirms the deepest, most valuable truths of goodness and morality in a clear and beautiful way. I think this must be the big reason why I dislike immoral fantasy so much. I am actually disgusted when I come across fantasy that uses it's re-versioning of reality to negate moral laws--consequences of sexual immorality don't exist (magic amulets provide 100% birth control and STD's don't exist), wanton violence doesn't count if it is against things that don't look human and have green blood, things like that. But I digress.

What I was saying is that I really enjoyed seeing glimpses of not only rather universal moral truths, but some concepts and aspects of the plan of salvation that are uniquely LDS being woven into a different story--the salvation story of a different world. Things like a character who lived in a place and had the life experience of an adult agreeing to come to be transformed into an infant and have all memory of her former life erased, to grow up in a harsh and difficult world, but only with the promise that she could, in the end, return to her former home. The heavy reliance of the "good" characters on what they call "Fate" (what I would call faith) that basically means that all things will eventually be worked out for the ultimate good, so when you come to a place where you don't know what to do, after you have done all you can do, you can still have peace while waiting to see what happens next because it will all be alright in the end (even if it means sad things and pain come before the end). There were other things, too, but I can't think of them all right now. I really, really liked that aspect.

The only deficiencies in the story for me are 1) It does fall into a common trap of teen fantasy--(almost) every adult is either evil or powerless (which is why kids have to save the day in the first place). This is often accompanied by abysmal family relationships. I was able to get over it enough to enjoy the story, but I think it would have made the story a little stronger if it didn't seem so heavily kids vs. adults. 2) There are some possibly disturbing or frightening mental images presented. It is not heavy on gore and the occasional violence is not disgustingly detailed, but some occurances and images could be alarming or gross, depending on how you see them in your mind--an oozingly and festeringly infected ear, black skeletons being dashed to bits and continuing to bite, the guise of a kindly old man being blasted off of what is really an amorphously human-shaped ooze of blackness--things like that.

*additional comment*
Something I liked, but others might find annoying was the voice of the narrator. It often digressed into seemingly unrelated details or side tracks, but it kept the whole story funny and lighthearted. I really enjoyed it. It reminded me of the narrator in "A Series of Unfortunate Events," although the story in itself was not nearly so dismal.
*end additional comment*

I have heard this series compared to Harry Potter, but the similarities are more superficial than substantive--in both the protagonist is an orphan boy who is raised by unkind and unloving relatives and then in his young teens-ish years is caught up into a fantastical adventure to which he has unknowingly been destined his whole life. But lets face it, that's more a standard modern-world fantasy plot than a glaring duplication of storyline exclusive to these two series. The stories themselves are very different.

Overall, I would give this series a 4 out of 5 stars. I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone over 10. Possibly down to 8 for a mature child. For the most part I didn't have a problem playing it in the background with my 3 year old around, but I don't think she would have understood or enjoyed it a lot if I was trying to read it to her.

I would love to hear from anyone else who has read these books--what did you think?

Dreams and Other Things

2010-11-25T07:20:00.000-08:00

I didn't get to writing yesterday because my hands were over-worked. They are a little tired today, too, so I don't know how far I'll get. So we'll take care of the important stuff first: Monday night I got a huge headache. I've never had anything I've known as a migraine before, but occasionally I have gotten really splitting, don't-want-to-deal-with-the-world headaches--most notably before I learned how much water I need to drink and then again after my very minor car accident. I haven't really had a problem with them since then.

But on Monday night, wow. It was a doozy. I'm fairly certain that it was brought on by a prolonged period of time not drinking enough water. I have been really lax about it for the last several months and my body is starting to feel the effects--continually dry lips, um, actually that's mostly the only sign. Except this headache. And here is the Lord's care and mercy--the recurrence of dehydration-induced headaches, did not happen until after Kevin got home. Even though I was just as bad the entire time he was gone and even before, I wasn't laid low by headache even once (other things laid me low occasionally--like surgery--but either not as completely, or not without planning). As it was, I went to bed at about 7:00 and Kevin took care of Rhys (Willow was with Neoma). I didn't even have to find someone to watch the kids. I just told Kevin how I was feeling and went to bed. I love having 2 parents in my family.

Now for the dreams. I think I've always had really vivid dreams, and I know I've thought about them sometimes, but never as much as when I was roommates with Thora, who had to lay in bed every morning and tell me about what she just dreamed. I loved it, and I started telling her my dreams, too. And I found that when you tell a dream right away, you remember it better. I had some interesting dreams and thoughts about them recently that I wanted to share.

Sometimes dreams are so mundane it's hard to remember whether or not they really happened. I remember dreaming once that my sister announced she was pregnant. You'd think this would be memorable enough I would know the difference. Nope. And then a while later I finally asked someone about it. She actually was pregnant. But I still don't remember whether it had been announced yet. The point is, if it was a dream, it was so unremarkable that I didn't know it was a dream or just a faded memory. Then 2 nights ago I had an entirely unremarkable dream--I was using my sister's silicone pastry brush to brush something yummy, like, glaze or something. Afterward I was sucking off the yumminess and several of the silicone bristles came off in my mouth. I remembered that these bristles had been falling off for a while and I just said, "Oh, well, I guess this one's no good any more." and I threw it away. Then yesterday morning I was grinding wheat for pancakes and thought it would be good to get that brush that I always use to brush the flour down and my first reaction to that thought was, "Oh, yeah. I threw that away." And it was several minutes before I suddenly realized--no I didn't! That was a dream. And there it was in the drawer. Even the dream-remembrance I had that the bristles had been falling out for a while was false--it has maybe had one or two accidentally pulled off, but it was definitely not wearing out.

Dreams can be so weird. Last night in the middle of an otherwise really weird dream--there was fire in a corn field right outside the house and my super powers of fire suppression weren't working correctly--there was a movie on the TV where someone was putting out little bits of fire, and they missed one and as the camera angle shifted, it looked like that little missed bit of fire was coming toward the screen and as it got to the point where it disappeared off the bottom edge, but seemed like if it followed its trajectory it would now be coming into the middle of the room I turned and blew to put out the fire, like blowing out a candle, right on the spot like it seemed it should be before realizing that it was actually only on the TV. But the funny part about it was as I turned, I saw that my Aunt (one I have not thought of in a while) was there in the room on the other side of where it looked like the fire would have been and she turned and blew on it exactly the same as I did at the same time, and then we both looked at each other and laughed at our mutual silliness.

It wasn't until I started writing that paragraph about last night's dream that I realized how full of fire it was. But I guess that's not surprising since we moved the TV out of the fireplace for the first time since my Sophomore year of college--if I have had a fireplace, my TV named Kevin has been in it everywhere I lived--and put the gas fireplace guts back in it so we could have a fire and be a little warmer in our freezing weather conditions. Kevin and I even slept in front of the fire last night (our sheets were still in the dryer). But then, after the whole fire dreams, I know I went on to dream more, because I was in a different house and there was at least one movie that someone was watching in the background and suddenly I realized that 2 of the stars were people that I know. He was playing a recent convert to the LDS church who was going on a mission and she was playing the girl who wanted to wait for him while he was gone, even though they weren't actually dating or anything before he left. Neither of these people is a particularly close friend, but the guy is nearly 30 and has recently gone back to school while the girl I haven't seen in years but I know she got married and my sister recently told me she just had a baby. And then in that house there started to be a big storm like a hurricane or a tornado and we had an argument about whether or not we were supposed to open the windows. I think the strangest thing about dreams is how mundane they can feel, even when the things that are happening in them are not normal.

And then there are the inspiration dreams. I'm sure someone has dreamed a really good idea before. I dream ideas, and they seem really, really good at the time, and then I wake up and they make no sense. Or they make sense, they are just dumb. The other night I dreamt a song, or lines of poetry, or something. I think as I was formulating it the rhythm came out sounding more like a rap. I remember being so excited about it in my dream because it was sooooooooo good. And it all started with a single line of imagery, "you're brushing me off like a non-stick friend." I still like the way that sounds and I think the metaphor is sort of cool, but it seems a lot less accessible and readily comprehensible now than when I was dreaming it.

And then there are the epic dreams. These are a lot less frequent, and only one comes to mind. The strangest thing about this dream is that it actually ended. Most dreams I just wake up before there is any resolution. But this one was totally complete. I've told it several times, and gone over it in my mind innumerable more times, but I haven't written it down yet. It was just too long. I even wrote in my journal at the time (it was my senior year of high school) that I knew I needed to record it, and I would some day, but it was just too long to do it now. Maybe now is the time. It will probably be one of those posts I work on for a long time before it gets published, but rest assured--it is coming. It was like a cold war communist China movie. It was intense.

Small Blessings, Big Blessings, and Snow

2010-11-23T05:49:00.000-08:00

If you live here in the Seattle area, I don't even have to tell you about the snow. For those of you who don't live here, I will just give you a summary of how they explained it on the radio this morning--Don't leave your house. They said since the horrible snow-in power outage catastrophe of 2008 the city of Seattle was prepared with a new plan--attack the road with ice preventers and snow melters (read: salt) before they even start to get slick so roads can stay clear. Apparently they were a little late getting started because overnight, when most of the work was supposed to be happenning, they couldn't get out on the roads to clear them because they were too backed up with abandoned and cars and accidents.

I'm thankful that the only thing I had wanted to leave the house for today (besides sledding) was to visit my new niece. And as much as I want to do that, it is not necessary for today and we can stay bundled up at home cozy and content.

Yesterday, however, my mom flew in from Denver in order to stay and help with said new niece. My sister Neoma was elected to pick her up from the airport and bring her to our other sister's house. She was supposed to be at the airport for a 4:20 flight and she left here sometime around 3:00. She took the 2 3-year-olds with her because they like to ride in the car and see Grandma and it is easy to watch them when they are so contained. She didn't get to the airport until after 6 and didn't get home until after 10. Small blessing--there were no accidents in the car from the fragilely potty trianed children. This was due in part to her ingenious deployment of emergency diapers in the middle of the 3 mph creeping freeway. The big blessing--they made it home at all. We really didn't know if they were going to. I am so grateful for the safe care of the Lord that meant they did not have to spend the night in the car. There were people who did last night, and Neoma drove far enough on the roads to up her odds significantly of ending up as one of them.

As it is, the most immediate thing on my mind this morning is looking forward to playing with my kids in the snow!

Unsuccess Unsuccess

2010-11-22T07:53:00.000-08:00

So I got a bug to google my blogs and see if they come up (Thanks to my brother's dilema and facebook cry for help). Instead I found several articles with instructions of how to have an unsuccessful blog and guess what I discovered--I'm doing it wrong. I did get some things right--mile long posts, extended breaks, rambling--but apparently I don't swear enough, I'm not abusive enough to people who comment, and I shouldn't have said anything about my blog on facebook. Oh, well. I guess I can live with that.

I have a wonderful husband who makes breakfast for our family and does diapers and every thing without complaint while my hand is bandaged, and even when it is not. I know I marvel and thank the Hand of the Lord for guiding me to him a lot, but it's just so true. I'm a lucky, lucky girl.

It's Christmas!

2010-11-22T00:08:00.001-08:00

It snowed a bit today--nothing stuck, but when my sister noticed and pointed it out to the children, my daughter looked out the window then exclaimed to me, "Mom! It's Christmas!" I love my little girl.

Tonight we went to an interfaith Thanksgiving service. It was held in a Catholic church and was attended by members of the LDS church, a local Jewish temple, and about 7 other Christian denominations or non-denominations. One of the men signalling people where to park had long white hair and a long white beard. As we were pulling in Willow asked, inevitably, "Is that Santa Claus?" I answered that it was not, but he probably dressed up like Santa sometimes for fun for little kids. (I could just tell he was a Santa.) Apparently he heard our conversation and he goodnaturedly told Willow that he was one of Santa's helpers. We spoke with him several more times throughout the evening. I hope someday Kevin can grow a long white beard. I would love to be Mrs. Claus every December. I would refrain from dying my old lady hair just to do that. And make myself a red, fur trimmed dress with a white frilly apron and a mob cap. But I digress.

It is a sweet experience to join with other that you know don't share all your beliefs and yet are still able to rejoice with you in the beliefs that you do share--in a loving Heavenly Father who blesses us with an overabundance of all things we need, and even more, just to bring us joy. I see the Hand of the Lord in such gatherings. Even though they occur at least once a year, and usually more often in our community, this is the first one I have actually gotten myself and my family together to go to and I see in it the way God touches the lives of all His Children who seek Him, even if they do not have all the light of the restored gospel yet.

The Luxury of Washing my Hands

2010-11-20T23:35:00.000-08:00

I promise, I am working on that book review. I’m just not able to write a lot each day, so it’s coming incrementally.

So, I had my 2nd hand surgery yesterday. On Monday I had the splint and bandage removed and the stitches taken out from my right hand. There were still steri-strips over the incision and the doctor recommended that I encourage them to stay on until Friday (yesterday). To facilitate this he wrapped my wrist in a new bandage. The advantages were that the dressing was much smaller, being only one strip around my wrist and up over my hand between the thumb and first finger holding a gauze pad on the inside of my wrist; there was no splint so I could bend my wrist; and I was cleared to get it wet and change the dressing myself, so I could shower with relative normalcy.

This was great. I showered 3 days in a row! (I would ask you to be impressed except that I did it because I was instructed to shower with special soap for each of the 3 days leading up to my surgery yesterday.) Then, after showering early Friday morning to prepare for my 8:15 am surgery, I left the dressing off and removed the steri-strips. I was at the surgery center by 7:15 am for my surgery and it wasn’t too long before I was (un and re)dressed and just waiting for my name to be called. Kevin was able to come with me this time, which was wonderful. After quite a while of waiting I finally decided that it would be easier to go potty now than right after surgery so I excused myself to the bathroom.

It wasn’t until I stood in front of the sink and put my hands—plural—under the water that I realized that this was the first time in 2 weeks that I had been able to rub and wash both of my hands together. I had had a bandage on my right hand the entire time so it had always been either awkward solo left hand self-washing or awkward left hand and right fingertip washing. And I also realized it would be the last time for the next two weeks that I would have that opportunity. Within the next hour my left hand was going to be put in a splint. I savored the feeling of rubbing the skin of my two hands together and stepped out of the bathroom just in time to answer the questioning of the nurse who had come to find me to take me to the OR.

I am very grateful and recognize the Hand of the Lord in helping me find that one opportunity to experience what I didn’t know was such a missed simple pleasure.

Another Reason to Learn Baby Signs

2010-11-19T18:45:00.000-08:00

I lost my voice again. It seems to happen every year while I am trying to coordinate the ward Christmas party. Except last year. I don't think I lost my voice, but I did sprain my foot the day before the event and had to do all my set-up and event directing on crutches. But I know I lost my voice the year before that. So now I have to rest up really hard because bI am supposed to sing at the party, oh, and in the chior on Sunday for the Thanksgiving program. Shoot. Ah, well.

It is really hard for me to stop talking, because it is pretty much impossible for me to stop communicating, unless I lock myself in my room, and even then I would probably bring my computer and still blog which is communicating, too. (Sorry for any typos--I'm one-handed typing again.) I actually started thinling this time, seeing as laryngitis seem to be at least a semi-annual occurance for me, that it would be extremely benificial for my whole family to learn sign language. And then I realized that I already do know enough to communicate basic needs--I've been teaching my children since birth! Unfortunately, my kids have become verbal so early that the signing loses effectiveness before they are able to figure out more than a couple signs. But I know th,em! Unfortunately, I found the glaring flaw in this plan when I tried to sign "Rhys diaper change," to my husband: I'm the only one who knows a lot of these baby signs (that, and the signs came off a little half-cocked with one hand in a brand new splint. It even still smells like a hospital). My husband does have a limited ASL vocabulary--he got the finger spelling of Rhys' name--but he doesn't know the baby exclusives, like "diaper." I finally got my point accross by holding my nose then waving my hand in front of it and making a face. We do what works.

The Hand of the Lord: I married a man who mirrors my methods and mindframes on child discipline. We don't use violence, but see the value of occasional physical shock like being quickly snatched from a disobedient or dangerous situation. We both favor a gentle reminder, but know that it must be followed with swift and decisive enforcement to be effective. I am typing this as I watch my husband handling our 21 month old son who was at a distance, repeatedly disobeying. After a warning and a statement of expectation and consequence, he went and got him and put him in time out. Afterward he talked with him about why he was there. (Rhys knew exactly why--"I do ce-ing [ceiling] a dis [this]" and reached up a finger to demonstrate how he had been picking popcorn texture off the ceiling while standing at the top of the slide.) We both believe in strict and consequence driven discipline for things we feel are essential and a "don't start a direction you don't intend to follow through with" (similar to "pick your battles" but with a lot more emphasis on anticipating and not even giving children an opening to suggest a battle for you to decline) for pretty much everything else. Above all, we both agree implicitely that parenting disagreements (which we do still have) should be resolved privately, not in front of children. We have no problem disagreeing on other things in front of the kids--we both think it is very valuable for children to see how differences of opinion can be handled respectfully, if occasionally heatedly--but on matters reguarding thier upbringing, to the whole world, especially our children, we should be united.

I'm not bringing this up or detailing it to extoll the virtures of our parenting style, or to suggest that in all cases and for all people it is the only way that works, but only to explain the miracle of not having sustantive child-rearing disputes with my spouse. I feel so blessed. I have no qualms whatsoever about leaving our cjildren in his care for extended periods, even days at a time. I don't worry they will become spoiled because of him being too lax, or that they will become despirited because of crushingly harsh punishment. I love my husband. I love this blessing the Lord has given me.

Not Enough Time

2010-11-18T07:57:00.000-08:00

I started the book review I was going to post, but finishing it will have to wait for another day--I'm going to DUP!

The Hand of the Lord: We have a new car. Well, a 12-year-old new car. The Lord has provided for me so well. When Kevin and I got married, his parents had a car they didn't need any more and they were happy to let us buy it from them at a generous discount, and pay them only as we had money available. It has been a great car for us--it fits really well with cargo room to spare (which doesn't mean I don't use every inch when we go on trips, it just means that we could have leftover room if we really wanted to). It has decent gas mileage and has provided wonderful opportunities for Kevin to learn auto mechanics. But it's starting to have a few problems that make Kevin very leery of taking it on long trips and we hope that sometime in the next year our family will be growing a little, which would make our current vehicle no longer roomy for long trips. When just at this time that we are seriously considering the need of a new, larger car, my sister suddenly and seriously need a larger car too--with the pending birth of her 7th child, she needs to upgrade to a full-sized van from her current minivan. And she wanted to give her minivan to us. Just give. She doesn't want us to pay her for it. I love the way the Lord takes care of us.

I had the greatest dream last night

2010-11-17T21:43:00.000-08:00

I dreamt that Kevin came home without telling me his flight information and just suddenly showed up in the middle of the night. Mmm. I liked that dream.

And then I woke up...

And it wasn't a dream. Kevin got home last night! Yay! We have had a fun family day together, including walking to downtown Woodinville, having lunch at Pallino's--a fastish Italian food place, exceedingly fun and exceedingly yum, and we found out after we got there that Wednesday is Kids Eat Free day. Yay! It was a little more expensive than Fast Food, but not much, and the food was way, way, way, way better! Just stop by for a dish of gelato sometime. It really is worth it--and some window shopping at Target, or more accurately, some Kevin-walk-around-the-store-with-the-kids-while-I-scan-the-dollar-items-for-Christmas-presents. It was a lovely day.

Here is another example of little nudges by the Hand of the Lord that continually lead our lives in the best direction: Kevin came home with a full dufflebag of dirty laundry. He apologized and said that he had it all together in the morning to set outside his door on the ship to be taken by the laundry people who would wash it and return it. But for some reason he just never put it outside his door. He couldn't say why. He had every intention of doing it, he just didn't. But if he had, there is no way that it would have been returned in time for him to leave the ship to make it to the airport for the flight he was going to be scheduled on to come home. He did not know at the time when the flight would be and it was sheer luck--Providence?--that he was able to pick up and leave so quickly because his clothes weren't stuck in the ship's laundry.

First, the Spiritual Thought, then more if I have time.

2010-11-16T05:40:00.000-08:00

I decided I need limit my blogging time each day. This will help you so you don't have volumes to read, and also help me to do more things during the day. This will probably mean that some posts take longer to write than they already do, and probably more posts will be just spiritual as I still want to actually get those posted each day as I blog in place of journaling, even if I don't finish whatever other blog post I am working on. That is why I am starting with it first today.

I just finished reading/listening to a series of books (whereof the balance of this post in intended to be a review, however I do not yet know whether I will get to that completely today, so it might be in a later post). They ended with the not unfamiliar scenario of only seconds left to save the world from utter destruction and one person alone who could do it, facing seemingly insurmountable odds requiring the sacrifice of everything he had as well as snap judgements and hurry, hurry, hurry to make it in time. It makes for great and exciting reading, but as I was reflecting on it, and also some of the great spiritual overtones in the book in general, comparisons inevitably rose in my mind between this protagonist and the one and true Savior of the World, Jesus Christ.

I realized that as exciting as it is to read these stories of universal rescue from the brink of disaster with an immediate and literal deadline, they are fundamentally different from the true story of the saving of the world. The life of and atonement performed by the Lord Jesus Christ did not come at a time of immediate or impending global catastrophe. Although there were political struggles within the society into which He was born, it was a time, though oppressed, of relative peace. There was no looming deadline of disaster against which He was forced to hasten. He lived a normally-paced life and was able to grow from a child all the way to full manhood without being snatched up into a rollicking adventure of doom.

He lived quietly, and when notoriety did begin to come, it was still on a very small scale, considering the whole world. And when the moment of crisis arrived, it was faced alone, quietly, without the eyes of the world and without any outside time frame except a personal determination between Him and his Father. It is true that it was immediately followed by arrest and imprisonment, the coming of which was already set in motion before His prayer in the Garden, but the Intercession was not performed with Soldiers looming on the horizon, requiring hurry and haste. It was all done in order and solitude, without rush.

There was a time schedule to the rest of the events as well: arrest, crucifixion, Resurrection. But there is never any indication of fighting against that clock. There was no buzzer to beat.

As I reflected on these thoughts, I realized that the unfolding of the actual salvation of the world is much more relevant to my life than any nail-biter of impending, immediate disaster. For most of us, we will not be brought to face a moment of now or never on which the world will hang, or even our own entire, immortal life will hang. But each of us is asked to live fully, without hurry, making small choices daily and constantly, forever, that lead to the salvation of our own souls. When the moments of conversion and conviction do come, they are most often not moments outside crisis. They are moments of quiet, solitude, reflection with the world progressing steadily, normally, leading up to it and continuing on, outwardly unchanged following it.

How grateful I am for the example of our Savior who lived in the real world, a real and very human life with ups and downs, but above all, normalcy. That is an example I know I can follow, and it makes his supreme achievement all the more impressive, because the decision points were intentionally created, rather than fantastically forced upon him. I am so glad for a Savior I can relate to, with an accessible life. And I am grateful to see the Lord's Hand in my life, daily, quietly sharing insights that build my testimony and increase my devotion to His Plan.

A Half-Way Hand

2010-11-15T09:59:00.000-08:00

So, the splint is off, but I have a new bandage on. However, it is one that I can change myself and I am cleared to get it wet. I can also bend my wrist now, but I only have about 75% range of motion, and a lot of weakness. I'm confident it will slowly come back. I am supposed to still take it easy on my wrist and hand over the next week because the inscision site is still really tender and could possibly re-open if too agrivated. Also, too vigorous of activity could cause swelling of the tissue surrounding and even the nerve itself, and that could cause increased scar tissue which would crowd the nerve and basically negate the effects of the surgery. So, taking it easy. I know there are a lot of things I will have to ease into doing again, but one thing I am definitely starting today: Shower! I may still wear a rubber glove just so I don't soak the steri-strips I am supposed to leave on til Friday.

At the doctor's office, I was brought back to the exam room and the nurse removed the dressing. It was the first look I got at the incision site. There were 4 steri-strips running crossways over a small incision parallel to and a little under the creases of my wrist. I couldn't see much of the incision site through the steri-strips. It was slightly swollen and it looked like some faint black lines were running through it. And in a big square all around it the skin was still tainted orange-brown from the site-preparation iodine. But the weirdest part was about 1/2 inch from either end of the incision there was a bright blue thread sticking out of my skin about 1 1/2 inches. Soooooo Weeeiiiiird!

I had not brought a book to read, so I had nothing to do for the 10 minutes I waited for the doctor except stair at these blue antenae sticking out of my wrist. It was bizzare. I felt the end of one of the strings. It was suprizingly stiff. I don't know what I was expecting, but that wasn't it. When the doctor finally came in, he didn't even need to remove the steri-strips to take out the stitch. He just clipped one end and pulled it out by the other. It felt funny and there was a little twinge of pain, but it was over quickly.

I may be having my left hand done sooner than later--all dependant on if Kevin comes home sometime this week. I hope, I hope! He can be my hands. I love my Kevin. And I'm grateful to have my hand back, even if it is not 100%

And now I'm falling asleep as I try to think of an evidence of the Hand of the Lord in my life today. It's not that it's so boring, it's just that, while going to bed leaves me feeling refreshed and able to get up without too much difficulty at 5 am, it also makes me crash at about 10-11 and desperately want a nap. I see the Lord arranging for Kevin to work for a few more days before coming home without working for weeks longer. (The job he was on ended a couple of days ago and they sailed in, but at the last moment were inexplicably asked to stay on for a few more days. So there they sat as the boat travelled from in port in LA to Tampa, FL. Who knows what he will do from there.

I just fell asleep sitting here typing and I woke up to 1500 "e"s on the end of "there." (yes, I kept a rough count of them as I deleted them.) I realize now that I was also mentally asleep as I was formulating that sentence. I don't actually remember typing it, but it's not actually what I meant to say. I meant to say that he may well fly home from Tampa, or else fly home as soon as they get back to LA in a few days. I hope I hope. He will have had almost a week more of work after finishing the initial job but still be completed with an assignment instead of having an assignment that goes on through when I want him home to help me with surgery recovery. If I have the surgery this Friday, though, it does put me at the day after surgery traveling to eastern washington for a wedding. Oh, well. Better than surgery the same day of the ward Christmas party I am in charge of.

I think it's time for me to be done. Even though that brief naps seems to have weirdly refreshed me. Perhaps I can do some good around the house before Neoma gets back from the YMCA with the kids.

Crockpot Yogurt--More than you ever wanted to know

2010-11-14T21:03:00.000-08:00

It's my turn to join the chorus of blogs about making yogurt in your crockpot all referencing this blog. It was really funny. I started out to look up making yogurt in your crockpot because I heard about it somewhere and that was the top of the Google list. I checked it out and even tried it. Then I went back to the internet to find more information and the next 5 links I looked at were all someone else's blog pretty much directing you to the first one. I did finally find some helpful notes on how it actually worked for someone else on this blog, and then I found this non-blog article with some more technical information which really helped my yogurt making skills.

Some people are afraid of plain yogurt because it is not actually yummy all by itself. But just mix in a spoonful of your favorite jam, or some frozen berries and a little sugar, or just have it with fresh fruit and it is delicious. You can also use it as a substitute for sour cream or to give something you would normally put milk in a little zip. It is versitile and healthful. For my figuring of the nutrition information and cost comparison of home made yogurt, see the bottom of this post.

Without further ado, here are my chronicles (and ultimate triumph) of home made yogurt (and also I've been wanting to make bulleted lists on my blog for a while, so I am seizing the opportunity):

Attempt # 1:
I was so excited to try this when I finally got around to looking it up and it looked so simple that I was impatient and didn't want to wait til we went to the store and I could buy some plain yogurt. I tried to talk myself out of it, but I finally succumbed and decided to use what I could scrape off the top of the one last fruit-on-bottom Greek yogurt cup my sister had bought from Costco.

The Procedure:

2 quarts (Costco) non-fat milk, heated it in the crockpot on low for 2.5 hours.
Turned off the crock pot and let it sit, covered, for 3 hours.
Stirred 2 packets of Knox unflavored gelatin into cold yogurt scrapings.
Stirred 2 c. lukewarm milk into yogurt.
Stirred yogurt mixture into the rest of the lukewarm milk.
Wrapped the crock in a thick towel and let it sit overnight.

The Results:
It was minimally successful and I have since learned that my milk did not get hot enough to start with and didn't stay warm enough during the culture process and so it was very thin and sort of gloopy. After refrigerating, the gelatin congealed and it was a little bit disturbingly like goopy milk-jello (2 packets for 2 quarts is too much). This would have lead my sister to completely bag the idea of homemade yogurt, but I persevered. Attempt #2:
I looked up other blogs to see if I could find more tips. I decided to try full fat yogurt, as I was sure it would be easier to get it thick without added ingredients. I figured the cultures in the yogurt I made would still be good, even if the yogurt was gross, so I used it as starter for my next attempt.

The Procedure:

2 quarts whole (Costco) milk, heated in the crockpot for 2.5 hours
Turned off crockpot, cooled, covered, for 3 hours.
Stirred about 1.5 c. milk into about 3/4 c. funky homemade yogurt-jello-gloop.
Stirred back into milk.
Put into an oven heated at 145 deg. for 15 minutes then turned off.
Left the light on in the oven for a little added warmth during the night.
Left in the closed oven til morning.

The Results:

OK. It was thicker and richer, but still not incredibly thick. We ate it. The kids loved it, and I saved 1 c. for starter next time.

Attempt # 3

This was the point where I learned about the actual temperatures that the milk is supposed to get to. This made a huge difference. I used a meat-probe type thermometer, the kind you are supposed to jab deep into your roast, or turkey, or what-have-you. I dangled it in the milk covering as much of the shaft as I could to get the reading. I discovered that 2.5 hours on low was way not enough to get the milk up to the 180 degrees it is supposed to get to to begin with. Also that it can cold down to the 110 degrees it needs to be not to kill the yogurt cultures a lot faster than 3 hours. So I made some adjustments to the original method.

The Procedure:

2 quarts fat-free milk heated in crockpot on high for 4 hours to 180 degrees
Removed crock from cradle, cooled, uncovered, 1 hour to 110 degrees
Made the mistake of trying to mix the skin that had formed back in.
Forgot and mixed 1 c. starter yogurt directly into the milk without tempering it.
Heated the oven to the lowest setting of warm--145 degrees--for about 15 minutes.
Checked the temp. of the milk--about 100 degrees
Turned off the oven and put the crockpot, covered, in side
After 1 hour, checked the temp of culturing milk--less than 110 degrees
Turned on the oven to 145 again for 15 minutes (with the crock inside)
Turned off the oven, checked temp--about 120 degrees
Waited 1 hour, checked yogurt temp--I can't remember what it was.
Noticed that the yogurt definitely looked like it was congealing in the middle with clear-ish liquid around it. When I stuck the thermometer in, I was definitely sticking it into something--I couldn't swish it around easily.
Let it sit one more hour, checked temp.
Reheated oven for 15 minutes, then turned off
Let sit another 2 hours

The Results:

This was the most set up I had yet achieved. In my checking of the temperature I remember it being as low as 100 and as high as 135, mostly in the higher range. I decided to drain the yogurt through a coffee-filter lined wire mesh strainer (actually several strainers--you can't fill any of them too full or they don't drain completely). about 5 cups drained out in whey--a clear, thickish, yellowish liquid that is as sour as yogurt. 3 cups was left of thick, creamy, beautiful, delicious fat free yogurt. It was very sour and I realized that the yogurt was probably done at least 2 hours before I took it out. It cultured very quickly when it was kept warm enough. There were also small papery pieces throught it, I believed to be remnants of the skin formed while cooling that I tried to mix back in. I have not had this problem since I started removing the skin.

Attempt #4:

I wanted to see if, having successfully kept it warm in the oven, I could actually just leave the oven on warm and it would culture just as well.

The Proceedure:

1 quart fat free milk, heated in crockpot 4 hours to 180 degrees
Removed crock, cooled 1 hour, uncovered, to 110 degrees
Removed the skin from the top and discarded.
Mixed 1/2 c starter yogurt into the milk.
Preheated the oven to 145 degrees
Put in the crock, left the oven on
Periodically checked temp. It got to 145 degrees after maybe 45 minutes.
Cultured for 3 hours--the length of time it was actually done in last time
Removed from the yogurt from the oven, spooned it into coffee filters to drain
Noticed the yogurt was not smooth--sort of grainy.
Thought, "Oops. I think I cooked it."
Lots of whey drained off.
Transfered the "yogurt" to cheesecloth instead of coffee filter so I could press it out.

The Results:

What was left was sort of rubbery and squeaky, like new cheese. It was a little sour, but not as sour as yogurt usually is. But since it was not salted, it wasn't very tasty. It may be worth experimenting with in the future to make cheese on purpose. It was not good yogurt. Luckily, I still had some starter yogurt left.

Attempt #5:

I was fairly confident in my yogurt making skills by this point, even though the last time was a fail. I decided to go for mass production so I wouldn't have to make it so often.

The Procedure:

1 gallon fat free milk, heated in the crock pot for 4.5 hours
Cooled for about 1 hour
Mixed in about 1 c. yogurt
Heated oven for 15 minutes, turned off and put in crock
After 1 hour, turned on oven for 15 minutes.
Let culture for 2 more hours, then--done!
Drained the yogurt through coffee filters in strainers and collanders.

The Results:

After draining for a couple of hours, I was ultimately left with 10 c of whey and 6 c of Greek-style (thick) yogurt. It was perfect and wonderful and now I am a yogurt making master. Thank you.

Attempt # 6:

This was made exactly like #5 except that I ended up using cheese cloth to drain it instead of coffee filters and I was able to put it all in one strainer instead of lots of them and it drained just fine. I was tired of the counter full of bowls and strainers and all of the used up coffee filters that got thrown away. I tiny amount of yogurt was lost in being stuck in the cloth, but not much more than stuck to the filters. I rinced the cloth and it dried very quickly. It should be able to use it over and over again. I like this plan.

I found lots of advice on what to do with the whey. I haven't actually tried any of these except using it in a little bit of baking:

Use it to culture your next batch of yogurt instead of the yogurt itself.
Put in a little sugar and drink it (like lemondade).
Water your plants with it.
Feed it to your pets.
Use it in place of buttermilk in recipes (or in place of milk+vinegar in recipes, but not in place of fresh milk alone--it will make things sour).
Wash your face with it--like a yogurt scrub spa treatment.
Make bread with it (because of the sugars in it, you might be able to cut down on the sugar you add to feed the yeast).

For most of the suggestions that use it as a replacement for milk, I personally wouldn't want to because it is lower in protein than regular milk but has the same amount of carbohydrates. But that's just me. Others may not care.

Summary of tips:

In figuring out how to make it in your crock pot, go off of temperature, not time--your individual crock as well as the volume of milk will all make a difference in how long it takes.
If you don't have a thermometer, 180 degrees is when it starts to look frothy and like it is moving without being stirred, but not boiling. It has a distinct "cooked milk" smell that fresh milk does not have. 110 degrees feels like a hot tub--initially very hot, but you get used to it. You would not put a baby in it.
The starter yogurt does not actually need to be tempered by mixing a little hot milk into it before mixing it back into the whole body of milk. If it is hot enough to kill the yogurt it is too hot period. If it is not, tempering it won't make a difference. I don't temper any more.
The more starter you use the faster it will culture.
The warmer the better (faster) for culturing, as long as it does not exceed 140 degrees.
If you want a thinner, drink style yogurt, check periodically during the culture process and stop (refrigerate it) once the desired consistency is achieved. It is not necessary to culutre it completely if you don't want to.
There is no need to continue culturing it once it is gelled. It will only get more sour and not less watery.
The more fat in the milk, the thicker the yogurt will naturally be.
You can add thickeners to low or fat free yogurt if you don't want to drain it. Some suggestions are unflavored gelatin, powdered milk
The yogurt will thicken in the refrigerater, so don't despair if you don't want to drain it and it isn't quite thick enough for you to begin with.
I started taking out the starter before I drain it and putting it in a separate container in the fridge so it doesn't get used by accident--1 cup per gallon.
If draining off the whey with coffee filters, only do a thin layer at a time. Otherwise what is next to the filter thickens and creates a barrier so the whey on the top/in the middle is blocked in and won't drain out no matter how long you let it sit. This doesn't seem to be a problem when using cheesecloth.
If you still like the flavor variety available in commercial yogurt, try mixing commercial yogurt half and half with homemade plain yogurt. The commercial stuff is so extra sweet that I actually like it better once it is dilluted, and it makes the more expensive stuff last twice as long!

Funny story for those of you who persevered all the way to the end:

While this last batch I made was left to cool uncovered, my brother in law stopped by to look at it. "Um, Carol? Your milk is breathing." I came over to look and sure enough, it had formed a skin on top, but was still hot enough that the milk underneath was swirling and roiling and making the skin wave and pucker and shimmy. It was really facinating to watch.

And now the promised nutrition info:

Undrained: The nutrition info for 1 cup is the same as for 1 cup of whatever milk you used. This will vary with the fat content, but for fat free milk is 0 grams fat, 13 grams carbohydrates, 9 grams protein.

Drained (removing 2 quarts from 1 gallon): I read that the nutrition content of the whey is o grams fat, 13 grams carbs, and 2 grams protein. If draining off the whey you are losing the entire amount of carbohydrates for every cup of whey drained off, but only 2 of the 9 grams of protein, which means 7 grams of protein are left for each cup of whey drained off. This means each remaining cup of Greek-style thickened fat free yogurt has 13 grams carbohydrates and about 20 grams of protein.

Cost Comparison:

The other blogs I read all used expensive products for price comparisons. I buy cheap stuff (not organic milk or yo-baby), so that's what my price comparison reflects. About the absolute cheapest you can find yogurt is $1.50 for 1 quart--$0.375 per cup, when it is on super sale. One gallon of fat free milk regularly costs about $1.90 at Costco, which is what we always get. This works out to $0.119 per cup of undrained yogurt (disregarding the cost of starter, which fades out after the first couple batches and any thickener you may choose to put in it), or $0.473 per quart. Even when drained, it comes out to $0.317 per cup of Greek style yogurt. That's crazy savings, especially when you figure that greek style yogurt actually sells for at least $1 for 6 oz, even on sale.

So the moral of the story is: Everyone should make their own yogurt. It is easy and so, so cheap.

(For additional insight, some of which supercedes what I thought I knew at the time of this writing, please see An Addendum on Yogurt and More (Concrete) Yogurt Insights.)

I get my hand back tomorrow

2010-11-14T20:00:00.000-08:00

Yay! My appointment to get the bandage off and the sutures out is for 8:45 tomorrow morning. I have already regained much of the ability in my hand, I can type and hold a pen and drive a car, but I don't have a lot of gripping strength yet, nor can I hold heavy things out in front of me. If I can rest something on my forearm, then I can carry it, but if I have to hold my forearm parallel to the ground while something is hanging from my fingers, that is too much. I'm trying to take it easy, not overtax or strain my hand, but at the same time keep on top of what I can actually do so I know how far I am recovered. I will have to be especially careful with the brace off to make sure that I don't forget to take it easy on my wrist.

And I have kept my floor clear for an entire week, thankyouverymuch. There are one or two items on it right now, but I should be able to have everything picked up before my appointment tomorrow morning. I think back over this week and how easy it has been to keep it clean down here and realize all I have to do to easily maintain this always is just never have a project to do. I figured out that that has been the biggest difference since my hand has been out of commission. It's not that I haven't ever tried just picking up a few items every night like I have been doing this last week and has kept it clean, it's that I haven't been able to do any projects that make the room explode like usual. It's the explosion I have a hard time recovering from, so I just let it layer until I have a room that takes until 3 am to clean. Sigh. At least over this holiday season I should have gimpy hands the entire time that may put enough of a damper on projects that I can keep it clean around here until the new year. That would be cool.

I have such plans to move things around in my house and I pretend that it is the lack of a right hand that prevents me, but really I have had these plans for months with a good hand and still haven't done them. I have shelves to put on the wall and I want to move some drawers downstairs and shove the craft desk into the cubby area in our living room. And I tell myself that things like that will fix the problem of mess that I have. I think I finally figured out that I have a subconscious conviction that there is some magical perfect arrangement of furniture that will make my house be orderly and tidy. I work out exactly how it should be and get things there and for about 3 weeks it seems right, and then I start to think about how some thing could be tweaked to make it just a little better, and ruminate on it until I have a list of about 20 tweaks and suddenly do them all and the room is totally different, and now it is perfect...for about 3 weeks. And none of this ever gets rid of the clutter. I think the problem is we just have too much stuff for our space. Someday I dream of having a house with space for our stuff. But I think I should seriously work on keeping stuff in order where we are at right now.

Part of my complaint is legitimate--I only have one living area that is mine right now, and it is living room, rec room, play room, craft room, computer room, and home office. I can't entertain while I'm working on a project without competely cleaning up the project (or else using Neoma's house to entertain in, which is why her living room gets cleaned about 10 times more often than mine does). Ditto with the toys. And the papers. I have such dreams. Dreams of a house with a formal living room that gets used for all sorts of entertaining, and for sitting alone when I need to be in a room with no mess. And a family room that can stay a mess. And an office with doors that close and keep kids out of my craft project (but windows from it into the family room so I can watch my kids but they can't get to me. Isn't that lovely?). These are my dreams. I hope they aren't fantasies, because I really do want to live in that house some day. Some day before I am finished having children, because it also has a nursery with a door to the hall and a door to my bedroom, and a clawfooted tub with sides high enough children can't crawl into or out of it until I trust them, and deep enough that I can be completely covered in water and one end slanted like a slide and a curtain that goes all the way around it so I can close it and the kids (it will be able to bathe at least 4 at once) can have a splashing party while sliding down the end without getting the whole room wet. Oh, such dreams. Someday, someday. Good thing I plan to be having children for the next 20 years. I still have some time. :)

Hm. I didn't know that was where this post was going to go. What other dreams do I have to share? I dream of having a big family. Whenever I think about my kids, I see them all different ages, a lot of them. I can't think about having teenagers without thinking about having babies at the same time. Sometimes I get so excited to find out what the family is like that the Lord has in store for me. How many children are there? When are they coming? What are their names? And yet I am so very content right now leaving the family planning up to God that the peace far outweighs any anxiousness attendant on not knowing. I am so happy to let God decide when my children should come because I know if he is planning it, that means that he is obligated to make me capable of mothering them. And I'll take his promise over my best reasoning any day.

Like right now. It just seemed so much like it was the right time for me to be starting another baby already, but He said no. And again he said no. And now I can see what He could see all along, but I couldn't see before, that now is the right time to get my hands fixed, and that would be much more difficult if not impossible to do if I were pregnant. And I know another child will come at exactly the time that the Lord has planned for us as long as I keep listening to Him and doing my best to be obedient in all things. And I know that it will make our family exactly the most perfect it can be. Does that count as recording the Hand of the Lord in my life? I think so, because I do recognize that that is what it is.

Happy, happy, love, joy, peace. That is my life. (and some random trial stuff and occasional stress, but mostly don't remember that.)

Today's Other Post

2010-11-12T09:14:00.000-08:00

I started out writing a post all around a video I took of the kids this morning, but I couldn't get it to upload (is it supposed to take more than an hour?). So I'll save that one for later and give you this instead.

My little Willow loves to take pictures with the camera and since it doesn't cost anything like film, I often let her, under supervision of course. Every picture in this post, except for the one of Willow, was taken by Willow without any assistance.

Of the dozens of pictures she took of me, here is one that was in focus, and not too bad. It also shows off my bandage. I am seeming to find more space in my bandage for my wrist to move as my hand gets stronger. It doesn't feel quite as restricted now as it did on days 3-5.

Apparently, however, I don't always watch her as closely as I tell myself I do, as this next series of photos attests--apparently she took the camera with her up and down the slide.

(the view of the room from the top of the slide--note the still tidy floor--and then a picture of her feet very much in motion, halfway down the slide)

And what had me so engrossed that I neglected my duty to assure the safety of our family's audio/visual equipment? Oh, Willow got a picture of that, too:

You guessed it: Blogging.

And the budding photographer herself:

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I see the Hand of the Lord in how rapidly my hand seems to be healing. I can do more with it without weariness than I thought I would be able to at this point. I even was able to can some pumpkin yesterday--the biggest challenge of which was wielding the chef's knife. I was surprised how much I could do with a plastic glove on my hand to keep the bandage clean. A lot of the strength is back, though I still can't use my palm to press things or grip with any force. And I do get tired and have to rest it eventually, but not as much as I thought I would. It is good. And I'm sure Neoma is counting the days til I can change diapers again. :)

The Hand of the Lord and my Dentist

2010-11-09T15:31:00.001-08:00

I have a brand new mouth, or at least, that's how I feel. I had a crown seated and 4 fillings done yesterday. It was supposed to be a crown and 2 fillings, but things don't work that way with my mouth.

I like my Dentist pretty well (you could also consider this a review of Dr. Thomas Natale of Woodinville, WA, if anyone is looking for a new dentist). I started going to him because his office is the closest to my house, and at the time I was looking for a dentist I didn't have any more compelling reason than that to narrow down the infinity of options in my area. I have been very happy with him. He has his own little office and a bevy of assistants and hygienists. If I had any complaint it would probably be that sometimes he seems to admire his own work a little too much, but it only comes across as mildly childish, not entirely unprofessional. And I have had absolutely no complaint with the work so far.

I particularly like that he is just as willing to say that I have done well keeping my teeth clean, or my children's teeth, when I have brought them in to see him. I don't like it when a dentist never seems to think anyone does a good job with their teeth, no matter how hard they try. But he doesn't sugar coat it when they do need work. And when I can't afford doing it all at once, neither he nor his helpers give me a hard time, but they do lay out everything for me truthfully.

He is inclined to talk and joke during his work, which I like, but others may not. Waits are never terribly long and often I am the only patient in the office. I have never shopped around to compare prices, but I've also never been terribly shocked by what I have paid and the convenience of their location combined with the pleasant atmosphere--small and friendly--makes savings I may find elsewhere not appealing enough to seek out. They also give me a discount for paying upfront (the day of the work--not billed later or through insurance). So I have been very satisfied.

I know my sister went to him for some work and there was a misunderstanding about insurance that cost her more money. (I don't have dental insurance, so this hasn't been a problem for me.) It seems that they will bill your insurance no problem, but they are not contracted (at least not to Regence), so they will bill you for whatever is above the "allowed amount" your insurance pays. And that wasn't clearly communicated in the phrase "Yes, we take that insurance."

But now on to my story for the day. I was having my crown seated and they found that my teeth had shifted since the original mold was taken and the crown was too crowded on one side to sit down all the way. So they had to grind a little bit off one side and that left the other side with too big of a gap. Luckily, as Dr. Natale said, the tooth on that side had a filling facing the side of the crown (which he had put in previously), so he could drill it out a little bit, then build it up to meet where the crown would sit.

Just as he was finishing this procedure and polishing it up, he noticed that at just about the gumline on that tooth, on the face that would be hidden by the crown, right at the edge of the original filling, was a little hole. He was surprised to find it, surprised he hadn't seen it on the X-rays (I think the exclamation he used was, "Crappola!" I laughed.) He pulled the x-rays back up and was able to find it when he searched for it. I have very tricky teeth that do not like to give up their secrets, even under radiation.

It was not too much more work (though it did mean anesthetic) to get that drilled out and filled, but I was actually surprised by the number of times Dr. Natale just shook his head and said in wonder, "I think someone was looking out for us." If he hadn't caught that cavity exactly when he did, if he hadn't had to drill out and build up that filling to make him even look at that tooth, even 5 minutes later the cavity would have been blocked in by a crown, and getting at it would have meant drilling out either most of the whole tooth or the brand new crown that they were about to glue down. He even came out to the waiting room as I was settling up my account to wonder at it and repeat that "Someone was looking out for us."

I've never heard him say anything even vaguely religious before. I was very happy to afford him the opportunity to have a little taste of divine intervention in his day. It was a missionary moment without even any effort. And it definitely was the Hand of the Lord in my life.