Elli's birthday

Elli turned 8 on Saturday. 8! I can't believe she's old enough to be baptized. She had a little movie party with all her friends. She was so excited to watch the movie Bolt with them.

A few days before, she drew her cake design. Here's how it turned out:

On the left is Elli's cousin Kadee. Do they look alike?

Here was Addie during the movie. She looked so uncomfortable stretched out like that but she wouldn't move any other way.

Little men

Nemo the cat, Domo the ?, and Benji the dog - oh yeah, and Ben the boy

When I was little, I thought that all boys were loud, dirty, mean and bad. Except for my brothers. But every other boy. Boy was I wrong. So wrong.

I now know that boys are soooo sweet and loving and kind.
They love their mommy and daddy.
They want to do the right thing.
They feel sad when others feel sad.
They feel proud and happy when they clean their room.
They love to make people laugh.
They are very creative with their imaginations and their Legos.
They love kitties and puppies.
They get nervous when they have to give a talk in primary.
They are smart.
And they love to sleep with their stuffed animals! So cute! Ben normally sleeps with just one stuffed animal at night. He switches them out so that they each get a turn. But this night he decided to have all three at once.


Okay, so maybe my little boy doesn't LOVE taking a bath (until he's in and then he doesn't want to get out). And he can't comprehend what the word "whisper" means... but I love my little guy to bits and pieces and I hope that I can help him grow up to be a good, kind person.

Weird dream

I know a lot of people don't like to hear about other people's dreams so I don't mind if you skip this post. I used to annoy my sister with my morning recounts of my nightly dream. I'm sure I went into way too many vague details. (And then we weren't at home anymore, but I don't know where we were... And someone else was there but I don't know who it was...) But the other night I had such a strange dream and it was so clear.

I was at a beach and I was up on a hill so I could see down into the water. A lot of people were swimming and I looked to the left in the water and I saw a shark. Right as I yelled, "SHARK!" the shark zoomed over right into the group of people. Everyone scrambled out as fast as they could but one man had his foot bitten off.

Afterward I was in a beach shack where I was staying with two other girls. We had the foot in with us. Don't ask me why. Maybe we were the beach doctors. There was no blood at all, it kind of looked like a mannequin foot. Another funny thing (funny as in strange) was that it was cut smoothly off a few inches above the ankle. The shark must have had a nice straight bite and also must not have swallowed. But I was holding the foot and as the other girls were talking I wondered what the foot would taste like. I took a bite right out of the heel. It was hard, kind of like styrofoam or rubber. So it sat in my mouth for half a second before I spit it out. Then I was nervous that the girls would see that I had taken a bite so I had to hide the foot and the piece of heel in my drawer and then try to figure out how I could get rid of them forever.

Yeah, that was my dream. Does it mean I am psychotic? Do I have a tendency for cannibalism? Will I regret posting this on the world wide web? I don't know what my crazy subconscious was thinking. I have always had such vivid dreams (except for when I didn't know where I was or who I was with). Last night I was dreaming about construction on Redwood Rd. Oooh. Don't wake me from that dream. Let it stretch on and on in dreamy happiness.

Oh no!

Just as I said goodbye to the kids as they got out of the car for school this morning, I realized that I didn't comb either of their hair. Yikes! They are going to look scary all day. This is the first time that has happened. (Of course their hair goes uncombed sometimes on Saturdays or days with no school.) Oh well. I guess their messy hair will now match their pants with holes in the knees that are getting slightly short. And it will match their faded school shirts that they wear every Friday. Little orphans. Oh, I'm so embarrassed.

My sister

clockwise from top left: Lisa, Michelle, Ari, Eric, Mom, Sinika, and Lindsey

Blurry, yes. But also very cute.

My sister Sinika is one of my most favorite people in the world. We grew up wearing our jelly shoes, playing with our My Little Ponies (Moon Dancer and Apple Jacks) and with our Cabbage Patch Dolls. On the news one year certain dolls we had were suspected of having asbestos in them. (I had the boy doll that time. :)) They were placed in a box high up in the garage so we couldn't get them while it was researched by the toy company. We would go out in the garage and cry because we wanted them down. It turned out ours weren't affected so we got them back. (I still have that little guy. I don't know why. It's really not a very cute doll. None of my 3 kids have ever pulled it out of the mass of toys in our house to play with it. Maybe I should sell it on ebay.)

We were forced to share EVERYTHING. Rooms, toys, clothes. And when we weren't forced, we did anyway. Everyone thought we were twins when we were little even though I am a year and a half older. Nobody could keep our names straight so we just learned to answer to the other's name as well as our own. We had our childhood spats but by the time we were in high school, we treated each other as friends. You know how you were a lot nicer to your friends than your family growing up? That's how we started treating each other. Super nicely. (Most of the time anyway.) She has been my best friend for 30 years now. She has been and is always there for me when I need her.

We always said that we wanted to live next door to each other when we grew up. We're not exactly that close but our houses are only about 5 minutes away from each other. And I LOVE it. I know we probably won't live this close forever so I'm soaking it in as much as I can right now.

Sinika is BEAUTIFUL, loving, accepting, helpful, friendly, pure, spiritual, sweet, fashionable, uplifting, and always generous. I love how much she loves her kids. And I love that she loves mine too. :)

Today is her birthday.

Sini and our mom

Happy birthday Sini! I love you!

How does it end?

I have a sickness. It's called, "I have to read the last page of a book before I get to the end of the book". I know, it's horrible. I try to stop but I just can't help myself. I always try to not think of it until I get to the middle of the book and I hold the two halves between my fingers and eyeball it to see if I'm at the middle of the book. But then I have to just see how many pages the book has so that I can see if I'm in the exact middle. (Who doesn't do that?) So I flip my way to the last page and I tell myself I'm not going to look at any of the words. Just the page number. So I find the last page, look at the number and then proceed to glance down at the words just a little. Then I continue to read all the while telling myself,
"Stop reading.
Stop reading.
Stop reading."
Until I reach the end of the page.
It usually let's me know, who the person is with, where they are, or who just died.
Sometimes it's relieving, sometimes shocking, and sometimes I'm just mad at myself. But it cannot be stopped. My mind has tricked myself too many times with this. I can't trust it. Maybe I should just stick to eyeballing it.

Usually after I have done this and I go back to the page that I am on, I look at the page number and realize the real reason for looking at the last page and I find that I forgot what the last page number was and so I have to look at the last page again to look at the number and divide it in half. Then I finally know if I'm in the middle. (I'm usually not quite to the middle yet.)

Getting the mail

Addie's favorite time of day is getting the mail. Maybe cause we're outside and she can run around as much as she wants. Until she starts going into the road and won't stay out and so we have to go back inside. (Seriously, what is it with babies and roads?) Lately she has to ride the scooter to get the mail. And by that, I mean I push her while she stands on the scooter and says, "Wheee!"

Oh, and she HAS to ring the bell each time right at the first and right at the end.

Apple rings

My kids love to eat their apples cut into rings. They must taste better or something cause they usually end up eating the whole apple. (The two older kids anyway.)

Trying to be like his daddy

Ben played basketball this year for the first time. Brian is 6' 5" and has always loved basketball so, naturally, we signed Ben up even though he is a little shorty. Since he only has one game left next week I thought I would highlight his amazing basketball skills. He ended up being the shortest person on the team except for one girl who was the same height. Even though he was lacking in the tallness category, he still picked up some top-notch skills that he will probably use the rest of his life.

Some of which are:

Crying in the corner. (This only happened on the first day.)

Seeing how long he could stretch his wrist band.

Spinning in circles.

Looking in the opposite direction than the rest of his team mates.

Standing far away while the coach was giving the team a final pep talk before the game.

Smiling for the camera when he should be watching the ball.
And again.

While he was off court he didn't sit idly by and stare off into space. (At least most of the time.) He set to work doing things like:

Inspecting the brickmanship of the walls.

Playing roly-ball.

And running up against the padded wall to see how high he could jump.

We are so proud of our little guy. The team could not have done it without him. I don't want to brag but he might just be the MVP of the entire season. We are going to invite our entire family to the last game to see the awarding of the trophy. I'll film it so you all can see.

(Sorry for the dark pictures. They were taken far away and in a low-light building. I realize that when you are in a dark building you are supposed to put your camera on manual and open the shutter up or something like that but I haven't ever read up on how to actually do that with this camera. Or maybe I just have a crappy camera. Just kidding, I love my camera. Maybe just like. I like my camera.)

A tribute

Hello fruity fruit snacks.
I do love you so.
I know you are supposed to be just for kids,
but what is a grown woman supposed to do when she craves a mega-punch of sugar rushing through her veins?
I know what:
Turn to you and your colorful, sticky, sweetness.
That's what.
You've never let me down.
My husband wonders how our kids go through a box so fast.
Hmmm... I don't know. (gulp)

Postscript: that was a nervous gulp and not an I-just-ate-a-fruit-snack gulp.

Favorite books

1. To Kill A Mockingbird - I know a lot of people have this in their favorites too. I first read it in 10th grade. I think it was just the first amazing piece of literature that I had ever read and I liked it so much then and still love it now, so it will always remain one of my favorites. I love books written from a child's point of view. I laugh so much as I read about how they view the world.

2. The Princess Bride - I read this in 11th grade the first time. I had seen the movie several times and the book is just as good and a little better. Very cleverly written.

3. The Good Earth - This book just took me right out of my little world and put me in China in the early 1900's. It was so shocking to find out how people lived on the other side of the world in at that time. And when I read it I crave Chinese food! I like how it shows what can happen when someone grows up poor versus when someone grows up rich with everything at their fingertips. It's interesting to see what people do with the lives they are dealt.

4. Huckleberry Finn - Child's point of view. Mark Twain is soooo funny and can even be funny while writing about serious things. Huck Finn has just about the saddest life you can imagine and yet he is still so innocent and I find myself laughing throughout the book.

5. Dandelion Wine - When I first read this in a book club I was in, I didn't quite understand what the point was. It seemed like it was just jumping around to different characters and different stories. But after we talked about it in our club, and discussed what we thought the theme was, I found that the moments I liked the most were about no matter how old someone is they all feel a lot younger than they actually are. It made me look at people from different generations differently. I used to think that people who were older than me were just in a different mind set than me but it makes sense now, since I always feel younger than I am, that everyone still remembers what it's like to be a young and that I can even relate to and be friends with someone who is the same age as my mother or even my grandmother. I loved what the book made me think about afterward and I definitely want to read it again.

If a book changes my perception of real life (for the better) and if it makes me think even after I'm done reading then I will love that book. I have read each of these several times (except Dandelion Wine - I'm planning on reading it again soon) and still absolutely love them more and more each time I read them. I love a lot of other books too but these are my top 5.

What are some of your favorite books?

I FINALLY saw it

Lars and the Real Girl. I don't know what took me so long. And I loved it. It was such a sweet little movie. Ryan Gosling was amazing. -ly good looking. Just kidding. Okay, he was both. He was a good actor and he was pretty easy on the eyes. Mustache and all. hehe. It was just definitely my kind of film. A little quirkiness and a lot of originality. I just loved it.

He still looks 5, but he really is 6

A few weeks ago we had a birthday party for Ben. We had a couple of boys over. Not loud at all. Mine wasn't the loudest of them either. Okay, he was. The very loudest of them all. Now I'm all for boys to have fun at a birthday party and be loud and crazy, but it is nice to have a small moment of quietness to gather your wits about you and be ready for the next wave of loudness. I found out how to do that. We played "Ben 10 hide and seek". What's that you say? Well, it's VERY different than regular hide and seek because you pretend to be a Ben 10 alien while you are hiding and seeking. The rest is the same as regular hide and seek.

Let me tell you though, it was very nice to have everyone be so quiet while they were waiting to be found, even if it was only for a minute or two. I was able to breathe a little, which is not possible when they are all noisy. I could look around and see what needed to be cleaned up and get the next thing ready. Then I was ready for some more noisiness. (That is the correct spelling of noisiness even if it doesn't look like it is. I looked it up.)

I'm just saying, next time you have lots of kids over at your house and you just need some quiet time for your ears: hide and seek is your answer. Your welcome.


Ben had a lot of fun though and he had his most favorite friends in the whole world there so he was in heaven.

No, Ben isn't praying in this picture. He just blew out his candles. I just had to use this one because he was making a face in this one:

Little Ollie hiding. I thought it was a very clever hiding spot but he was found right away. Maybe it was because someone was taking a picture of him. We'll never know.

Not the plague

I'm FINALLY getting better from that horrible cold. I am so glad. Elli always gets the sicknesses first in our family. She gets them from school. I asked her over the weekend,
"Does your class wash hands before lunch?" and she said,
"No."
"Does your class use hand sanitizer?"
"No."
She had a small bottle of hand sanitizer hooked onto her backpack but if she forgot to use it before she left her class room then it was too late. So I told her that now we have to clip it onto the belt loop on her pants so that if she is in line for lunch or even sitting down to eat then she can still have it with her to use it if she forgets until the last minute. How mean am I? Making my daughter WEAR a bottle of hand sanitizer!! She's fine with it though. She even remembers if I forget. She'll grab it and clip it on. It's crazy that they don't make kids wash hands before lunch. Maybe they do in other classrooms that have sinks but Elli is in the portable classroom and there is no running water. I know that they talk about germs and ways to prevent them. I have gotten papers that they (Elli and Ben) have gotten about the subject. So you'd think that they'd really force the hand washing.

So to all the people that I have, or my kids have, spread this to:
1- I am sooo sorry. And
2- It takes about 10 days to go through your system. But it feels like longer.

I'm sorry, could you speak into my good ear?

I am so thankful for my hearing. And my voice. Right now I don't have either. I currently have the worst cold of my life. I don't even know if I could call it a "cold". I think it's actual term is "the plague". Late Friday night I started getting a sore throat and achy all over. The next day, the achyness was gone but the sore throat was still there.

Sunday, my left ear was hurting and all of a sudden it went all muffled with a nice clear ring in it. I decided that in the morning I would go to the doctor. I thought for sure a sore throat this bad was strep.

Monday, I went to the doctor. Not strep. Good. But now I have to live through the pain. (Okay, I can take pain medicine.) No ear infection, and it wasn't excess ear wax. He said it was probably just my eustatian tube plugged up in connection with my sinuses being plugged up. I'm supposed to take Mucinex to clear all that up and I didn't have a cough before (just a little hard to breathe) but when I started the Mucinex it sure loosened things up. Now I have a major cough. He said if things don't clear up in a week then to come back.

Tuesday, when I got home from Ben's basketball game, I noticed my eye was all red. Pink eye. Luckily we had some unexpired medicine from the kids left over to clear that right up.

Wednesday - everything the same.

Then today, Thursday, I woke up and had no voice. Laryngitis. Now, I've never had laryngitis before. I thought people that had it were kind of whiny. They could whisper as loud as they wanted. I thought, well, if they have this much control of their voice then they're probably faking it. Now I know. It hurts to talk normally and it sounds all froggy/squeaky. But whispering doesn't hurt at all. No matter how loud. The only bad thing is that you just sound silly to kids. (And to people who have never had it.) My baby has been whispering back to me when I talk to her all day today.

To top it all off, I have a boil on my chin so that when I talk everyone stares at it. There is no other word to describe it. It's a huge boil. I guess it could also be described as a giant zit. But it sounds more plague-y to call it a boil. Yeah, I DO have the plague.

So I've only had half my hearing since Sunday and I can't sleep very well because of the coughing. I can't wear my contacts for a week so I am looking real lovely with my outdated glasses. I have a giant red dot on my face and I sound like a frog. I'm tired of the monotonous 'eeeeeeeeeeeeeee' in my head that I'm hearing. Come on, learn a new tune, ear! And my throat still hurts.

Tomorrow, it will be a week since it started. I don't know if I'm supposed to go back then or a week since I went to the doctor, which was on Monday. He probably meant from Monday.

My visiting teachers have been so amazing though. They were supposed to come over Monday but I canceled and so they brought me dinner. Then today, one called to see how I was feeling and she heard my voice and knew that I wasn't any better. So they brought me dinner again today! So nice! I told them that this 'cold' doesn't affect my arms but they just insisted. They have offered to do anything for me from doing my laundry (I wouldn't let them) to taking my kids to school. They are too good at their jobs. It makes me want to be a better visiting teacher. I'm not off to a good start though since I couldn't go on Wednesday with my partner.

Anyway, I thought that by this time that things would be nearing the end, but now I'm not sure when this sickness will be ending. It definitely makes me realize how thankful I should be when I'm healthy.