That Folk Singing Sci-Fi Geek Was Pretty Cool

It may come as a surprise to you that I. LOVE. MUSIC. Okay, maybe not. When I was a young mom I was going through a slight postpartum cuckoo phase. I was conflicted, what kind of mom was I that I didn't want to listen to Raffi or Barney sing in my car whilst towing little ones about. But I felt my life was no longer my own and music was the only thing I could still control. The only thing that was still all mine. And in all seriousness, I don't think your kids care what kind of music it is and it won't stunt them cerebrally if they don't sing The Wheels on the Bus while driving about suburban Utah. So I had my music to sooth my troubled soul. Well that and Phil Hartman making me laugh on News Radio. (Laughter is right up there with music too.) I seriously mourned that guy's death a little when his wife tragically shot him.

Not to say I didn't give the kids a good dose of kiddie songs. Isabella had a Barney dinosaur that was about two feet tall with arms that moved as he sang. The three of us (me, Isabella and Barney) could belt out a medley of top 40 toddler hits like no one else. There was also my own medley to all three of my kids when they were babies of You are My Sunshine, Carpenters, Close to You and Beetles, Obladi Oblada. I could so rock that medley. So clearly, my kids were in good hands musically speaking.

Now it is so cool to see my girls enjoying their instruments. Zoe makes a great tormented pianist. She reminds me sometimes of that Muppet pianist on Sesame Street who always freaked out and banged his head against the piano when he couldn't get it right. (I kind of loved that guy.) But eventually she does get it and she is really enjoying it. Isabella gave up piano and moved on to guitar. I can't tell you how proud I was to hear her tell me after class the other day that her teacher said she was the winner of the best chord playing for Smells Like Teen Spirit. (Or how thrilled I was to find a teacher who teaches songs from musicians like Nirvana, Green Day and Bob Dylan.) Okay, she's only been in this class for a month but a mom can still be proud. I am more than a little jealous she is taking this class. Someday I'll make time to get back to learning the guitar.


So I love music, all around my house, in my car; I wonder when the day will come that my kids shame me enough into getting me to stop singing along. It was easier when they couldn't sit in the front seat. Now I'm getting a little self conscious, and I feel I should share the radio every once in a while. Not a fan of hip hop and the other music they play on that station but I can share (a little). I love seeing my favorite artists play in person too. I'd go to a concert every month if I could but that's not really practical. Last weekend Brent and I went to see They Might Be Giants again. They are just so much fun. Not quite the musical genius Ben Folds is but tons of fun and lyrics that are like goofy, profound poetry. I asked Brent if he minds me dragging him to these things. His reply was, I don't want to go out when I'm at home, then I get there and have a good time, then after about an hour I'm done and tired of standing. Well at least there is room for compromise in there somewhere. He was pleasantly surprised last week because Jonathon Coulton was the opening act. I said, who is Jonathon Coulton? Oh, he played some songs on John Hodgman's book on tape, he replies. Aaaa-hah! Now it makes sense. Well, no it doesn't really because a book on tape doesn't usually have a musical guest. Anyway, he turned out to be sort of a folk singing sci-fi geek sort of performer. How can that not be entertaining?





Funny how a song can sound beautiful, disturbing and funny all at once.

Halloween 2011

The Zombie

The Mime

The Rock Star

Something Reeeeally Important To Blog About

I don't like cake pops. To put it frankly, they are disgusting and they creep me out. The thought of eating a piece of cake that has been rolled around in someone's hands into a circle and then covered in fondant is not appealing to me in the least. (Fondant is a whole 'nother disgusting ball of wax all by itself.) It reminds me of how little kids like to take the crust off a piece of Wonder bread and roll it in a ball and eat it. Yes, I did this as a kid. It's not the only questionable thing I did as a child. Then I saw some cake pops in my current issue of Martha Stewart Everyday Food. They used a circular cookie cutter, then covered it with chocolate. I can get behind that cake pop. I don't judge you for enjoying a cake pop or enjoying making cake pops. That is your decision and yours alone to make.

I'm not really into the whole fancy cake/cupcake thing anyway. Cupcakes are so 2008 anyway. Pie is the new cupcake, I hear. I'm not sure what the new pie is. For me a cake isn't about being pretty or exotic or being motorized in some crazy fashion. It's about finding a way to get frosting into your body so you don't have to sit there with a tub of Betty Crocker Supreme. I watch some of those cake shows on TV occasionally . But I wouldn't eat anything they make. Take Ace of Cakes, for instance. Do you really want to eat a cake decorated by a graphic artist who thinks he or she is making an edible work of art? I have my doubts about the cleanliness of those places. Way too many power tools involved and wood and cardboard...and rice crispy treats masquerading as cake under that fondant. Not right at all.

Twenty Years Ago Today

Twenty years ago today Brent and I started dating. Ah, so young! So bright eyed and hopeful. Well, I would be if my eyes weren't closed.

Those Who Can....

....paint or draw or something like that. Those who can't get a Charley Harper art book and cut out a bunch of pictures, mod podge it onto poster board and frame it. This allowed me to finally finish this family room of ours. Well this and discovering after the kids rearranged the furniture to make a movie theater one day that I still had room to exercise at the far end of the room. This and that and some strategically placed sock monkeys placed at the far end to balance out the other wall since I couldn't put anything big on the wall over there since Brent and Noah discovered that empty space I will now use for exercising is also good for a fun game of hand ball with a red rubber ball too.

A Brief Summary of Summer

Summer was here! And now it's almost gone. It was a good summer.Thank you summer, we really needed (well wanted) a good summer. What did we do? We...

Had a week of cold and rain. Had swim lessons, with beautiful weather (not too hot, not too cold) I might add. We took lots of bike rides to the other side of town. Stopped for a few icees at the gas station along the way.

The kids ran the Run for Congo 5K run at Wheeler farm, half of it anyway. I helped out with kids activities (heel spur came back, no running for me.) Brent cheered us on. Followed it with a ride on Trax, exploring the SLC Library and visiting a park from my teen years.

We had girl's camp for Isabella (she had fun!); 11 year old scout day camp with Brent as leader; cub scout day camp, a first for Noah (and me as a parent volunteer).

Next up was a week off for Brent with some local fun. (We WILL NOT call this a staycation.) We rode the Heber Valley Railroad- got robbed by some train robbers, it was terrifying! We went to Lagoon. It ended up being the worst Lagoon trip in years. I got a small purse stolen. It didn't have anything in it but $25 but it was a cute little handy purse and I'd had it since 1990-something. I yelled at a girl running a ride. I think the purse theft was karma for my bad behavior. Then we got our stuff locked in the Lagoona Beach lockers and had to get a security guard to break our stuff free. The kids had fun though! Then the drive in of course, you have to hit the drive in once a summer.

Then there was the actual real vacation. We went to Lake Tahoe! Ah, beautiful Lake Tahoe! There was kayaking and playing in the water and on the beach, a sailboat ride, and horseback riding. The girls LOVED that. They'd never been on horses before so it was pretty great. My horse kept getting sassy and had to be separated from Zoe's horse.We stayed in a condo and did not eat at or from a restaurant once! Well, except for sundaes at the McDonald's drive up, but I don't think that counts.



Next I went on my own little adventure. I went to Seattle to visit and old, old, old, old friend. Okay, not old, because we're not old dangit (regardless of what my foot and back try to tell me). I spent three days there. It was great hanging out and seeing the sights. Did I ever tell you how much I love Seattle? Well I do. I belong in the Northwest somewhere. My friend Becky lives in a suburban forest. Huge trees everywhere. Paths that literally take you through the woods. I felt like Little Red Riding Hood. It was magical, I tell ya.


While I was off enjoying the cool weather and the water and the trees Brent took the kids camping with Grandma Cathy at a lake. I hear they had fun, not as much fun as I had, but fun still.


Then summer was almost over and it was time to get ready for school again. I signed up for a new program at a different school which I will talk about more later, I'm excited. I had to get four shots though. I wasn't sure which was worse, enduring the pain of the shots or realizing how much it must have hurt my kids to get all of those shots when they were little. Okay, my own pain was probably a little worse than my empathy for the kids. Back to school shopping with the kids went really well and I didn't even want to shoot myself in the head numerous times. A small miracle.


So there you have it. Summer 2011 in a nutshell. You were good to us summer. Thank you.

First Day of School 2011

School is back again! Summer went by so fast. My kids are growing up so fast. Isabella is in 8th grade, Zoe is in 6th and Noah is in 3rd.

Oh Yeah, That Birthday

Oh, blog. What will it take to get me to post more on you?

I'm wondering what I should do. Whenever I answer the phone people think I'm a teenager. Now they think I am my daughter. Should I start smoking? That ought to give me a nice husky voice. Like Natalie Merchant in her later albums. I don't care for those later albums. Smoking is so 1980s though.

I never even blogged about my fortieth birthday spectacular. (I finally got it in my head, just in time, that there is no "U" in forty. I still reject the spelling on a certain level, but I'm slowly accepting it.) What did I do? After telling 39 it could "suck it" and 39 saying to me, "Right back at ya, babe!" I decided I better show 40 a good time. It's been so long I've nearly forgotten. The original plan was to hike to the top of a nearby mountain. It sounded like a good plan for turning forty but then I discovered, especially in a year as wet as this one, that I would likely be hiking through waste deep snow halfway up the mountain. First, our weekend getaway plans (for Brent and me) got postponed. So on Sunday, my birthday, we just drove up Big Cottonwood Canyon and watched the rushing creek and hiked around a bit. It was a beautiful day, I remember. Brent volunteered to make me a gluten free cheesecake which was delicious. The kids made me birthday videos on the ipad! I wish they were on you tube so I could post them here. The next weekend we had our getaway to the city (it was also our anniversary weekend-16 years!- so that worked out great.) We wandered around, saw some art, saw a movie, ate a reeeaally good hamburger and just had fun being together.

But the best part of the birthday extravaganza was the Tuesday after my birthday. This wasn't planned for months or a year or more like some had planned for this. Two weeks before my birthday I thought, nothing exciting is going on the weekend of my birthday, so why not buy myself some tickets to U2, dang it! And so I did. Invited Isabella to come along with me. I can't say I'm a U2 superfan but of course I like U2. And being the music lover I am I think I know more of their songs than the average non U2 superfan. All I can say is it was one amazing concert! The best show I've ever seen, maybe even! I think I knew all but maybe two of the songs and I think I love that Bono and his humanitarian loving ways just a little bit.

So it was a great birthday extravaganza, I have to say. And it's not even done yet. I'm feeling pretty good. I'm on month 3 of Chalean Extreme (a three month workout program). Lifting heavy weights. My muscles are huge! You should see them! I kid guys, but my arms are looking decent and I've lost the beginnings of armulite. You know, cellulite on the upper arms. So, there's that too. And in July the fun continues when I go to Seattle (oh Seattle, how I've missed you!) to celebrate with a dear old friend who will also turn forty. So we will be having a great time celebrating our forty year old awesomeness together.

Isabella had a great time at the concert playing videographer:

Happy Birthday To Me!

A Brief Religious Interlude (or what I learned from Jon Huntsman)

Over in primary land I am able to feel the spirit and never hear religion mixed with politics. It is a blessing. To be honest though, my ward is pretty good about steering clear of that. From what I remember anyway. The internets are a different story however. I know, don't go seeking it out if you don't want to read that. You don't have to go there. So true, so true. But I'm a glutton for punishment, among other things, occasionally. Today I went to a blog and there was a little fundraising for Mitt going on. Dear old Mitt. The fundraising was going on so "America can get it's dignity back". Uggg. I hate that. "We have a president I don't agree with, he's not my guy, so of course our country has lost it's dignity." (Not an actual quote, just my guessing what is going on in these heads.) Why so vitriolic? I still say there is good in everyone. Why does it always have to turn so hateful? I'm being a little sensitive today, I know. Nursing an annoying, sinus bothering cold.

Anyway, That's not even what I was going to write about. Mormons are in a bit of an uproar because potential presidential candidate and former Utah governor, Jon Huntsman, is unable to clearly define his Mormonism. I really don't care about Jon Huntsman's Mormonism. I liked him as a governor. Solidly moderate he seemed. He seemed friendly on the environment. I liked that. But as far as his religion goes, a lot of Mormons aren't happy he didn't boldly bear his testimony. Or at least renounce the church. "You're either in or you're out!" they say. Now I understand people who like to comment on newspaper articles and threads and facebook statuses (stati?) on the internet are often more opinionated that the average person. So there's bound to be a lot of "You're either in or you're out!" "There is no such thing as gray! It's all black and white!" I don't believe that. I hate black and white. You should see the walls in my house, nothing black and white there. The ceilings are white though.

I don't mind that Jon Huntsman, for whatever reason, can't be completely black or white or straight with a reporter (he has time to do that anyway, why bother getting too personal on a subject that is very personal to some people before you've even thrown your hat into the ring officially). And I don't believe "you're either in or you're out". Is that what stake missionaries say? Do they go talk to the inactive family down the street, develop a report, get them interested in coming back to church and then, BAMM! "You know, Brother and Sister Jones, we really would love to see you at church (even though you haven't been in ten years). Please come this Sunday at 11. But remember, once you get there, you are either in the church, OR YOU'RE OUT! NO EXCUSES! If you ever have a question or doubt, don't bother coming back until it's gone. So we'll see ya Sunday, k?" And I don't believe the church feels this black and white about things either. They know we are all on our own path in our spirituality. If such a black and white stance was the case I would not be in the primary presidency. I was married in a church. I haven't been through the temple. My own spirituality is very personal so I don't get into it much. But if it was that black and white I don't think they would have called me to the primary presidency. This isn't about me. The whole black and white thing has long bugged me. The world is a beautiful place for all it's colors and shades of each color. I believe in God and Jesus Christ and I believe they know that too.

Frustration

I'm frustrated. Hence the title. Isabella had a six months post diagnosis of celiac disease check up and she has gained weight and is feeling healthier, she isn't anemic anymore, but she's still getting unacceptable levels of gluten. So what do I do? Should I only buy whole foods and products from gluten free companies? I thought I was getting things down. I read labels but there is so much cross contamination that can be done in a food manufacturing plant. She wants to go to girls camp and youth conference for church this summer and I intend to let her go, but how much of a pain is this going to be? How risky is it going to be?

The other day we ate lunch at the only exclusively gluten free establishment I know of, Eleanor's Bakery. It was good, albeit expensive. We had these sandwiches on this cornmeal bread called arepas. We also had chips: Cheetos for Isabella and Doritos for me and Brent. These chips do not have gluten in them (I am becoming increasingly wary of food additives like MSG, however. Not because they contain gluten but because I think we should get away from artificial ingredients. We have a long way to go though.) These chips have also recently been changed  on the Frito Lay website. They are produced in facilities that produce other products that contain gluten (like Sun Chips). They aren't on the much smaller list of products that have been tested to have less than 20 part per million (the acceptable level of gluten). I buy quite a few products that say gluten free on the label or have no gluten in the ingredients but also say they are produced in a facility that makes wheat containing ingredients or just says "may contain wheat". Like Heartland Gluten Free Pasta or Reese's Puffs cereal. I do that because it makes life easier and Isabella can have more options. But I guess I can't do that anymore. I realize I sound very whiny here. But this is my blog and I need to complain about how this is a pain in the butt once in a while. Especially when I have confirmation that while we are making progress, it's not good enough.

Trampolining and such

One kid got baptized, one designed her own t-shirt, and one stuffed her face in a cake.

On the new trampoline:

Zoe made a cake at a party and decided the best use of it would be sticking her face in it:

Isabella went to Brent's work to job shadow him. She got to design and print her own t-shirt:

Noah was baptized by Uncle Matt:

What a handsome boy.

Twenty

Internet, I've been sick most of the month of March. I'm just now beginning to emerge from an ibuprofen popping, oozing, aching, constantly feeling like a two year old is squeezing my tonsils in his or her strong, tiny fist stupor. So I've been in bed as much as humanly possible learning how to redo my neighbor's bathroom with fabulous glass tile and carrara marble flooring courtesy of the kind givers of knowledge over at the DIY network. I'll have to do my neighbors bathroom because I simply don't care enough to do my own. Bathrooms aren't my top priority. It could use a coat of paint though. So my neighbors have really lucked out this time. Kudos to them.

Prior to being stricken with walking pneumonia/the plague/throat, lung and bone cancer (strangely not the flu though, I went to the doctor and got a couple of swabs stuffed up my nose that was all at once invasive and cleansing but came back with negative results) I was getting in shape. Working out like a mad woman. I spent the whole month of January successfully achieving results with my new years resolution: workout at least five days a week and eat good 5 out of 7 days each week. I even broke the birthday cake curse: When you make a resolution to eat healthy FROM NOW ON! at the beginning of January but you forget that two of your kids have birthdays in the first two weeks of the year and you're a big sucker for a good birthday cake.

So, now I'm on the road to recovery (fingers crossed). I need to get back with it. I'm taking it to the internets. Which means this here blog. I want to lose twenty pounds. My only goal is to eat all the healthy/whole foods I can and workout as much as I can (which will probably translate into about 4-6 times per week). I don't do calorie counting, that's for schmucks (unless you count calories, I would never call you a schmuck). Today I have begun my journey with my own Power Breakfast (plain yogurt, blueberries, sliced oranges, ground flax seed, oats, stir it all together and enjoy) and a good stretch (never underestimate the importance of stretching) followed by a walk to the elementary school to volunteer and back. I'm still kind of sick, so let's not get too crazy.

Here is my before picture, which I really don't like much, but in my defense it was the day I really started getting sick and wound up with a 102 fever that night. You try looking good doing yoga with a fever of 102.

The Dumbest of The Smart

If I ever write a memoir it will be called The Dumbest of The Smart....a Memoir. It's almost as cool as the name of Brent's future memoir, In The Shadow of The Squeegee. Very mysterious I know. These names are copyrighted of course. Sorry, you can't have them. I've always felt that way, dumbest of the smart. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. There's always room for improvement. If I were smartest of the dumb, well then I would have peaked. I'd have to say, this is as good as it gets. In high school I was in honors classes...just barely. I should write a memoir just to save all the timeless tales of my childhood for my children and my children's children to read someday. I think about it then I think, could I ever really put my most embarrassing moment on paper? Or on the internet? Or even in microsoft word? I've had the same most embarrassing moment of my life since I was 19 years old. So for twenty years. It was so embarrassing it has been difficult if not impossible to surpass. There I was, waiting for my date to pick me up in the afternoon. We were going over to the community college to play raquetball. There was a knock and Chuck (my step dad) told him to come in... Nope. That's as far as I can get. I've only told this story to two, maybe three people. Maybe it's not that bad, I just embarrass easily. Still. Some things are better left unsaid.

I could just start my memoir by telling how I got my name. Why did my parents name me Cindy? I'm not a Cindy in the '70's sense of the name. Cindy was always a dumb blond with a big chest on TV when I was growing up. I guess that is sort of appropriate. I am blond but anatomically I don't fit the bill. My dad had what I would guess was a small crush on a coworker. Why did he have a crush on this woman? Well, she'd had surgical augmentation, if you know what I mean. So yes, there you have it. My parents named me after a woman named Cindy who had a boob job. So glad I got that off my chest. Pun intended? I think my slight white trash upbringing streak is showing through. So back to my most embarrassing story. Could it really be worse than the story of how I got my name? I'm afraid so. It's funny if delivered properly. Funny and horrifying all at once. No, not yet. We'll save horrifying for later.

Quotes

"I brought food to the hungry and people called me a saint. I asked why people were hungry and people called me a communist."-Dom Helder Camara

"The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers." -M. Scott Peck
 
A couple of quotes I've read recently that I really love.

How's It?

You're wondering how the gluten free cooking is going aren't you? Not bad, not bad at all. Isabella is up about ten pounds since she cut out the gluten four months ago. I'm such a proud momma! I still worry there is too much cross contamination going on and hidden gluten in foods that are supposed to be gluten free. But you can't argue with results. And she hasn't gotten sick since then either. I've got the cooking down pretty good. I've learned to cook some new things too. I dare say I make some pretty good stir fry and fried rice. And my chicken enchiladas are quite tasty. Have you ever tried rice crispy treats with rice chex instead of rice crispies? (Rice crispies have malt which contains gluten. You'd think RICE crispies would be safe.) They are better than the rice crispy kind.

I'm finding all sorts of places that sell gluten free stuff. Unfortunately they are all in the city on the other side of the mountain. But I get out there frequently enough. I walked into a Harmon's grocery store and nearly cried from happiness last week. They have a huge natural foods section with tons of gluten free stuff. It even has it's own freezer section. And every gluten free item in the store (many that are throughout the store too) has a label on the shelf that says gluten free. So convenient. It's all expensive of course, but that's just the way the gluten free stuff rolls. Maybe someday it will all come down in price. Hopefully by the time Isabella is an adult. Really, more and more people are discovering they have celiac disease. Bad for them but good for the consumer.

So what else have we been making? I found this awesome gluten free baking mix called Pamela's that is so handy for baked goods. We've made mint brownies, chocolate chip cookies, banana nut bread, muffins, it even worked well for our Christmas sugar cookies. It's so much easier than trying to work with a million weird ingredients and has taken out a lot of trial and error. And the price is about the same as mixing a bunch of stuff together so I may as well save myself some stress. I sound like an advertisement here now, don't I?

Still making homemade bread too. I found a simplified recipe off the Gluten Free Goddess blog that I'm liking a lot. I usually change out some ingredients to find a combination Isabella likes (and Brent, he likes to eat the bread too). She complains about a lot of it that it has "that weird taste". I've narrowed down "that weird taste" to either sorghum or rice flour or tapioca starch. Someday I'll figure out which one bugs her but until then we've found teff, millet, amaranth and potato and corn starch make up a pretty good bread.

Yesterday I made up some gluten free energy bars. Kind of like granola bars. They were so good! You should try them. Your kids will like them. Well, mine all did anyway.

Gluten Free Energy Bars

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup peanut butter
• 3/4 cup honey
• 3/4 c almond pieces (or other nuts you like)
• 1 cup dried fruit (I used dried cherries and cherry flavored craisins)
• 4 cups GF brown rice crispie cereal
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation:

Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper

Mix dry ingredients

In a large saucepan melt peanut butter with honey over medium low heat. Stir and watch carefully to prevent scorching. When the mixture is smooth and bubbling cook for about 1 minute. Remove from heat. Add salt and vanilla and stir to combine. Use a large spatula to stir in nuts, dried fruit and cereal. Stir until all ingredients are coated with nut butter mixture. Spread out on parchment paper. Let cool and cut.

I also added mini M&Ms. Next time I might add some ground flax seed to make it healthier. If you wanted to try them and didn't need gluten free you could use regular rice crispy cereal instead of the gf brown rice variety.

Birthday Party Year Is Over!

Every other year the kids have birthday parties, starting with Zoe's birthday in September. Isabella and Noah both have birthdays in January so it usually goes: birthday, birthday, party, party. It makes for a LONG, busy month. Don't ask me why I didn't stagger the birthday parties every other year. I'm just not that smart I guess. Anyhow, I think they each had a good birthday and some fun parties. Isabella turned thirteen! I can't believe I have a teenager. It was a good group of girls, they were all loud and crazy but they all behaved well. No drama! I guess we didn't get many pictures. Got more video footage.

Noah had a lego themed party. It turned out fun, Noah said it was as good as the bowling/laser tag party he went to the week before. That is saying something. It helps that he was the birthday boy. There were lego games, lego prizes, lego candy party favors! I even tried to make lego pizzas and lego cakes. Ten 7 and 8 year old boys running around! I swear you burn off about a thousand calories hosting one of these things.

Belated Christmas Post

I never got around to blogging about Christmas. Well, it was a good one. We had fun with family, Brent's mom was in town and stayed with us on Christmas Eve again. Noah got this telescope which turned out to be larger than him. This wasn't planned. Santa was supposed to bring a simple telescope that would be fun for him. He's wanted one for a while-mostly to spy on people out in the soccer field across the street. Hopefully we can make good use of it this summer when the clouds finally go away and at the star parties at the local observatory. The girls got digital cameras and have been having fun with them. They have a video mode so Zoe has been having fun making videos of herself pretending she is having a tantrum. (The things that entertain an 11 year old.)

Brent was sick on Christmas, my poor man, and I was exhausted. I had some minor outpatient surgery a couple of weeks before and between that and all the Christmas prep I was so worn out by the time Christmas day came. So it was a pretty low key day at home with just a short trip over to see my dad and step-mom.

New Years Eve I decided to be nice and volunteered to take the girls and their friends to the ice skating rink that is about 30 minutes away. I misread the weather again and while they all carried on having a good time in the car, I was white knuckling it down the freeway in an ugly storm. But all ended well and the storm had let up by the time we headed home. Luckily, we no longer have suicide tires on the van. New years day we headed over to the sledding hill. I love that we have a big hill that is perfect for sledding just down the street. So that about wraps it up, plus a boat load of pics:

I guess this last one will work in the Christmas post. It was over Christmas break I believe. Zoe and her friend Ellie were messing around with legos and decided to make a lego bathroom. From left to right you've got the tub, sink (with a storm trooper washing up), toilet with a toilet paper holder (yes someone is sitting on it, is this appropriate for my G/PG blog?), and a shower. It was too funny not to immortalize it with the camera.

Thanks For The Assistance

Thanks, my friends, for helping me out with your comments on who is reading this here blog. Actually, I knew you all were readers (thank you sight meter, and a "Hello!" to you all.) Unfortunately, I still haven't been able to out the mystery visitor. And I don't have a problem with mystery readers, just with ones that engage in suspicious behavior. In that case I need to know I know who you are. Hopefully I won't have to make the old blog private. I hate private blogs. Such a pain with the signing in every time and all. Anyway, for the time being, we shall carry on as we are.

My Little Cub Scout

Noah started cub scouts last week. He's so excited and is already memorizing cub scout pledge type stuff (I really don't know what I'm talking about here). I'm still a little skeptical and I won't make him do it if he doesn't want to, but I'm excited that he is excited to be involved with it.

Letting Go

I wrote this some time ago and never published it:

Letting go. I need to work on that. I think I've improved over the years as a mom but it is still a weakness for me. Letting go of what exactly? Control. I've always had the hardest time giving up control when it comes to my kids. One of the areas it has been the hardest is in the kitchen. One of my excuses is I don't have a huge kitchen so it's just easier to do it myself. And it really is a bad excuse because I hosted two cooking classes last year with Isabella and her friends and I had five extra people in the kitchen with me and we managed to make it work.

Sunday the girls found this recipe in a magazine and wanted to try it out since we just happened to have all the ingredients on hand. It was for banana split ice cream sandwiches. We were making to cookie part and I told the kids to put spoonfuls of the dough evenly spaced on the cookie sheet. All of a sudden I'm feeling very tense and I'm having a flashback to this episode of the PBS cartoon Arthur that I saw with the kids when they were little. If you haven't watched Arthur (and maybe they do it differently now, I don't even know if they still are making new episodes of that show, my kids never watch it anymore-stupid satellite discouraging my kids from watching PBS) they had this thing between cartoons where they would show real kids doing things. This particular episode showed kids at a blind school making cookies. I remember watching that and as they were tapping the dough off of their spoons onto the cookie sheet the best they could- but of course it wasn't that neat because they couldn't see what they were doing- I felt very tense just watching them do that and that is the feeling I had watching the kids put the dough on the cookie sheet, especially Noah. I know it's wrong, a bit of a sickness even. What will happen if the cookies don't turn out perfect? Nothing, that's what. And I'm not anywhere close to being the worlds greatest baker and I'm too impatient to make things really pretty so I don't know why I care how the kids do it.

I do things on my own timeline. When the girls were younger I picked the next days clothes out for them every night before they went to bed. This went on later into the elementary years than it really needed to. They could have been doing it themselves. But they do just fine now (and learned how to match their clothes, you never saw my kids wearing ridiculous mismatched combinations, not that that really matters in the scheme of things). I'm lightening up a little as they get older. As I get older. I think it was all a defense mechanism since you often feel like you have very little control over your life when you have young kids. That's also why they almost ALWAYS listened to my music in the car, not preschooler music. But they are growing up. They are capable of much and it's my job to help them discover what they can do. This year I will work on that.

Hello Friends

Friends, I need your help. I have a mystery blog visitor who needs to be identified. I know it's probably a friend or relative and I don't mind strangers popping in. I'm just curious about the identity of a particular regular visitor. So if my regular visitors wouldn't mind, could you leave me a comment? You don't have to register with blogger to comment. Just leave it under anonymous and leave your name. Thanks for the help!