My Favorite Magazine

Lately I've been drowning in magazines.

My mom cashed in all her frequent flier miles for a bunch of new magazines to try (mainly ones that include anything about Robert Pattinson), including some that she thought I might like. She was pretty right on in some cases. This Old House and Health are two that I enjoy that I had not read before.

The Martha Stewart Living magazine? So not my favorite. Martha makes things too complicated. She also stresses doing things "the right way", which I have neither time nor money (not to mention the lack of patience) for. I also think I'm a little too casual at this point in my life to be a Martha fan.

In the real world, Martha and I would not be friends.

Anyway, the other one that mom got right was this one, Coastal Living.

I had already been getting Coastal Living, so for a few months I was getting duplicates, a concept that my mom didn't quite grasp.

Anyway, I like Cottage Living for the cottagey-beachy style of houses they show. I am a huge fan of beadboard, which shows up in abundance in Cottage Living and will hopefully show up in a few places in our new house. I also kind of like the semi-rustic cabin style, though not too rustic. I'll have to post some examples to show what I mean.


We'll be re-doing our new kitchen soon, hopefully within the next year. We (Hal) decided that we need to live with it a while and see if we want to change more than the superficial things like counter tops and hardware. It is a good idea, so I agreed. (And our nice, though a little outdated, medium-oak kitchen table already matches the nice, though a little outdated, medium-oak cabinetry. Right now a new kitchen table just isn't in the budget.)

Now I don't feel as guilty spending so much money on all the new bedding and towels I've been collecting.

Ahhhh, don't you just love new towels? I do!

Now you won't need to be scared to use our new guest bathroom when you all come and stay with us.

Though not at the same time, of course.

Martha might not approve of how I would handle things if I had too many guests at once.

One Thing I Know For Sure

Having the flu is not very fun.

Taking care of people who have the flu is no picnic either. (Especially cleaning up the aftermath.)

Doing both at the same time is pretty much physically impossible.

(And that has been our week so far - at least for the last couple of days.)

The End.

We Now Interrupt Our Regularly Scheduled Chaos.......

I've been feeling like I've neglected Austin with all this house buying/selling nonsense that has been going on. I don't think he knows it, but I know it.

Actually, I think he rather enjoys it. I've let him have a friend over EVERY SINGLE DAY, except for Friday last week (when we got to go see some other friends), and most days so far this week. In fact he had three little friends over yesterday and it was fine, as long as they stayed outside. The big windstorm and rain put a stop to it though.

Anyway, I found this today while wasting time on the internet (which hopefully I won't do so much of in two weeks, when I can start to slowly move into our new house).

It made me feel rather guilty in a good way, the way that makes you turn off the computer and play a board game with your child, even though you hate board games because they are tedious, take too long and have a million tiny little pieces, which you know the kid won't help you pick up later.

I am going to go play Life, which he has been begging for for quite some time. For some reason, I really dislike this game.

Today I'm going to do my best to pretend to enjoy it.

Or I'll just let him win. Either way, he's happy.



(Later: So we played Life, which was interesting because Austin refused to pay any taxes or responsibilities. I may have a future Ted Kaczynski on my hands. After the game was over, I asked if he wanted to play again. He begged me to invite a friend over instead. I'm fun, aren't I? I'm starting to get an inferiority complex. And there are still a million tiny little game pieces all over my bedroom floor.)

Things Are Not Always As They Seem

Here are two quick examples:

A couple weeks ago I drove the girls to Ogden to go shopping for new bedspreads. On the way through Brigham City, Morgan and I were having a philosophical discussion about why someone famous (allegedly) beat his girlfriend. It got to the point where we were being silly about it so as I was driving I gave her a little pretend punch to the side of her head.

Well, I didn't really think about how it would look to anyone else until the truck behind me started swerving and honking. I was horrified when I realized that he thought I had really hit her.

I couldn't think of any way to let him know we were just kidding, so we did the only thing I could think of: I had her pretend to hit me back. Once. (Just once, so we were even. He couldn't have a problem with that, I figured.)

This was right about the time that we decided that our family needed our own reality show.

(Or maybe a reality check is more what we need.)


And....

Last Saturday Ally had a soccer game. She wasn't quite dressed when we needed to leave so I told her to hurry and get ready and then I would drive Austin's friend home and come back and get her. I also told her to be watching for me when I pulled up (or else).

Well, I dropped off the friend and talked to his mom for a few minutes. I pulled around the corner and was about a half a block away from our house when I saw Ally trotting up the street in her soccer uniform. I thought, "Good, she really was listening and is trying to make things a little easier on me."

And then I saw her go to get into a car that was parked up the street about 100 yards ahead of me. She got all the way up to it and grabbed the door handle. I could not figure out what in the world was going on. I wondered if she thought I wasn't coming back and she had called someone else for a ride or something like that. And I have to admit, I wasn't thrilled.

But, as quickly as she went to get into the car, she got away from the car and started running toward me with a funny look on her face. (Luckily she saw me or she would have had to run clear home.)

It was then that I noticed that the car in front of me was identical to ours.

Now really, what are the odds? In the year and a half we've had this new Pilot, I've only seen one other that is this same dark gray color. Anywhere, even on vacation. Now one just happens to be parked a half a block away from our house? Crazy.

So she jumped into our car, looking more than a little freaked out and as I drove past the other Pilot the guy got out and started taking a little girl out of the back, probably to look at the horses in the pasture they were parked in front of.

I realized then that I was heading the wrong direction for the game, so I turned the car around in the driveway directly across the street from them and rolled my window down to make some comment like "Nice car." but Ally told me to put it back up and just get out of there. I have no idea what that guy thought was going on with us.

It wasn't very funny to Ally at the time, but now it's hilariously funny to me.

I thought I was the only person stuff like this happened to.

I wonder if it's hereditary.

Favorite Photo Friday

Okay, I know, this is not a photo, but it is a new favorite of mine. It's a portrait of my father-in-law, who passed away last August. I just love it, it really captures his "essence", right down to his left eye squinting a little more than the right one.

It was created by Elspeth Young, the illustrator from my sister-in-law's book on Women of the Old Testament. She is a very gifted artist and I am so thankful to be able to have a copy of this work. I feel melancholy and happy at the same time when I look at it.

Morgan: A Young Girl With Attitude

When Morgan was young, she was very, um, lively. Well, that's not exactly it. Precocious? No, that kind of sounds bad. Let me give you two examples of her behavior and you can decide for yourself.

When Morgan was three we were at my parents' house. My dad had just come in from doing chores. (Or maybe not. Sometimes he doesn't change right after doing chores, which drives my mom bananas.) He was bouncing Morgan on his knee when all of a sudden she wrinkled up her nose and said, "Ewww Grandpa, you stink. You need to change your pants."

I was quite shocked and just looked at her for a second and then she started carrying on again. "Grandpa, you really smell bad. You stink. You need to change your pants!"

I was embarrassed, so I said "Morgan, that isn't very nice. Don't talk to Grandpa like that. You need to be polite."

She looked at me, somewhat surprised, so I reiterated my stance. "Morgan, you need to be polite."

Again she looked at me and then back to my dad and without missing a beat she said, "Grandpa you stink. You need to change your pants, PLEASE!"




She was not quite three when this next incident happened. I know this for sure because I was pregnant with Ally and she was born before Morgan was three.

Somewhere Morgan, unfortunately, got the idea that anyone without a flat stomach (which is most people) have a "baby in their tummy".

I took her with me to Schreibers one day to pick up my check. A bunch of people, most of whom were men that I didn't know very well, were standing around in a semi-circle chatting. Morgan walked up to each of them and poked them in the stomach one by one and said, "You have a baby in your tummy. And you have a baby in your tummy. And you have a baby in your tummy." etc.

It was very embarrassing, but I really hoped that since she was so little they might not really know what she was saying.

Well, I really should have found a way to nip that in the bud because the next week I was at my parents' house again because my aunt and her new husband were there visiting, along with my grandma and my other uncle and aunt. They were all sitting in a big row across the couch and chair.

Morgan started right into her same routine of "You've got a baby in your tummy, and you've got a baby in your tummy....", until she came to my Aunt Shirley, who I need to mention has quite a large chest, and Morgan's eyes got really big and she said, "And you've got TWO babies in your tummy!"

I have never been more grateful for the fact that Aunt Shirley has a good sense of humor.

My "Aha" Moment in Church Today

Somebody in church was saying that we should get to a point where we want to do what's right.

Well, I do. I really do.

So, I started thinking about why I don't always do everything I should.


I finally figured it out.

(Are you ready for it? It's big.)


If I could just stay away from other people, I could keep all 10 of the 10 Commandments and, quite possibly, any other commandments that are sent my way.


(Not that I'm making excuses and blaming other people for my short comings, I really do think this possibly could work. Think about it.)

A Morning Conversation:

Austin (on the toilet, after being in the bathroom quite a while): "Blistering blue barnacles!" (He has been reading a lot of Tintin with Hal lately.)

Me: "Austin, you need to eat better food. Are you having trouble going potty?"

Austin: "No."

Austin, a minute later, still in the bathroom: "Can I have some fruit?"


(A few weeks ago he said, "No, I'm not constipated. It's just that my poop is a little sleepy.)


Disclaimer: I never, ever said the word "poop" without visibly cringing until after my third child was born. Now it seems to be an everyday occurrence, which begs the question; Do our lives really get better or worse after having children?

It's Spring Break!

How do I know this?

Because the kids have already eaten about 100 granola bars - each!

Also, we have about a foot of new snow.

We've (actually the kids) decided that we should just stay home this whole week and relax. It's only the second day and already I'm wondering if that was such a great idea.

And in other news....

Austin loves to decorate for each holiday. The only way I can get him to let me take down decorations from one holiday is to tell him which holiday comes next that we will decorate for.

Today he asked me which holiday is coming up next. I said, "Well, let's see. I guess it is Mother's Day."

He said, "Okay."

Then a few minutes later he came back and said, "What is Mother's Day about?"

Apparently I have not been pouring on the guilt early enough for him to know. We'll have to remedy that this week.

Favorite Photo Friday

I love, love, love this photo!

It was taken by my fabulous young friend, Katie, when Ally was four.

I think Ally and I have both grown up quite a bit since then!