Oooh that is scary

Phebe was laying on the floor saying " Suzanne. Suuuuzannnne. Ooooh that is scary. I just scared myself." It made me laugh.

She was quoting this-

Mom upside down is Wow

This kid is so funny. This video makes me smile so much.

I am grateful yet again for funny things.

I love people

OK, I don't always love people. I do love funny people though. I was looking for a recipe for peanut butter chicken. Yes, it is kind of a weird dish, but about once a year I think it is a good dinner. I found a recipe with really good reviews. When I look up a recipe I usually read the first few comments that like the recipe and then try to read one that didn't like it.

I found this awesome one star review.-
Wow. I'm not sure what else to say. I found this recipe earlier tonight, and thought I'd give it a try. After making it according to the directions, and serving it for dinner, I think I may be able to make some suggestions to help improve it. For instance, you could navigate away from this page to a good recipe, never to return here again...

She's ready for Christmas!

Right now Phebe is working hard on wrapping all the flyers from local grocery stores in lovely light blue snowman wrapping paper.

It is a Christmas present she tells me. I am not sure who the lucky recipient will be.

Makes me smile

This video makes me smile. Plus it makes my kids laugh hysterically, then again, you don't have to be a comic genius to get them to laugh. So here you go, "Carnival of the Animals" in Fantasia 2000.

I love the mischievous grin on his face.

Just stop please

Some day my dear Victor, age 9,  will realize that arguing with a 3 1/2 year old is not worth his time.

Victor : Those are grown up (toy) whales.
Phebe: No, they aren't. They are babies.

And then I could just copy and past that like 4 more times. Why are we arguing over this?

Than again, there are adults that try to engage her in disagreements too. Sorry, you aren't going to change her mind and she loves a challenge. Just don't do it near me please.

Oh yea

I also meant to share this with you.

This blog entry titled "Dear Parents, you need to control your kids. Sincerely non-parents."

Ok, So I have never heard of it before. I don't know that I would love the whole blog, but I did enjoy that particular article. I enjoyed it because-

A. It was so true. If you have ever been a parent you have been in these circumstances
B. The mom involved is like a super hero.
C. The guy stands up for her to a complete stranger.
D. The author is hysterical. I love his electronics rant. I can not express to you how hard I laughed about his non- existent technology policy.

So take a minute parent or not, and enjoy.

Updates

I know I haven't updated in a while. I know that bothers the um... 3 audience members I have.

Things are going well. Ethan still works where he does. Victor still leaves his legos everywhere. Naomi still hates school. Caleb still just grins shyly at people, but shares funny little insights with those closest to him.. Phebe continues makes everyone laugh by her nonstop chatter about completely random stuff. She even tried to tell the chiropractor how to do his job yesterday. I am trying to get my list of goals done before the baby comes. I probably have 4 more weeks if we go by history, but technically I am due in just two.

The primary program is coming up. Primary is the children's organization at church. One Sunday a year they are completely in charge of the big church meeting (sacrament meeting is what we call it.) They all get the opportunity to speak in front of everyone about what they learned that year. They share the songs they have worked so hard on. I love it. If you are in the area and want to come we gladly welcome you on October 20th. I am just hoping I either don't have a baby by then or have the baby this week so I can go. I love the primary program.

I also wanted to share this video that really touches me. It makes me so sad during part of it and makes me want to try harder, to pay attention to my choices, to be better. Ok, I admit it is specifically addressing pornography, but I really do think that it can apply to so many other bad decisions that can be made.

So watch your step.

Long term storage, Ha!

Today I am going to make fruit leather. It is pretty much just home made fruit roll ups. I was reading through some of the suggestions they have one line. My favorite lines include the phrase " for longer storage". Like fruit roll ups last long around here, right. There are people out there who make and store this stuff for a long time? Really?

Latest fashion trends

Phebe has a fuzzy little nylon shawl that she loves. It is made of material that looks very similar to this-

OK, so it is supposed to be a shawl anyway. She has declared it to be a skirt. A well loved skirt. A skirt that is worn at nearly every opportunity. And why not? It is purple. It is fuzzy and soft. Plus it is sparkly. Honestly, how could a piece of clothing like that lose?

The reason I mention it is because we have given it a special name. A name that makes me smile every time she puts it on. 

It is the Wookie Skirt. 

 I am pretty sure that you will be seeing them on fashion runways very soon. I highly recomend wearing your wookie skirt with sweatshirts that say things like "I Heart Hugs" on 80 degree days. 

I wonder....

I used to wonder how much money wound up in a landfill each year. Change that had just been forgotten somewhere and thrown out.

Now I wonder how many Lego pieces are disposed of annually. Pieces that little girls and boys carelessly left where their mothers and fathers were sweeping or vacuuming.

I bet it is a lot.

Cooling down

Yesterday Phebe found some empty ice cream buckets. While I sauced tomatoes she brought me nearly every toy we owned to see it was an acceptable bathtub toy. I stood there with a noisy machine running nodding or shaking my head to each toy. It was approved, it went into the bucket to take with her later.

Much later in the day, long after a very crowded bath, she put a baby doll in the bucket.

Then she put it in the refrigerator. I just smiled but let her go.

My favorite part of the day was when Ethan came home from work and got to witness Phebe go claim her baby in a bucket from the fridge.

She makes me laugh.

Not a failure after all

I was reading a magazine my church puts out each month called the Ensign. I found a quote about parenting that really touched my heart.


Elder Ballard said " Be of good cheer. God did not place you on earth to fail, and your efforts as parents will not be counted as failure unless you give up.”

Already huh?

Today is day 6 of our school year.

Naomi has a reading assignment and 3 worksheets. She is only in second grade.

She is busy dancing around the living room singing-
"I am done with school! I quit! I am never going back!
I am not doing any homework!
I won't do any school work!
No one is my boss!
I am an orphan, OK, no I'm not. I'm a ninja.
But that means I don't do any homework."

Hope your child is transitioning a bit better. I do think she has a bit too much homework though.

It's an April thing

It was an hour after I had put the children to bed. The boys were still very loud. Caleb emerged to ask me something.

Me: Caleb, why are you still awake?
Caleb: I am just too hyper.
Me: I didn't give you candy or anything. Why are you so hyper?
Caleb: I think it is because my birthday is in April.
Me: you are hyper because your birthday is in April.... Dad's birthday is in April, he doesn't seem hyper.
Caleb: Well he is.

In the spotlight

For those of you who don't know me very well I will now let you in on a secret.

I don't like being in the spotlight very much.

I would much rather be stage crew or the equivalent most of the time.

When I was in school I went out of my way to never attract attention to myself. I am not quite sure then how I wound up dating a young man who did things just to get reactions out of other people. His name was Randy and he was quite fun. He dressed as a goth and was quite well known at our school.

So we went to prom together. We showed up late to skip the big ostentatious parade of peers entering.

There was another young lady that we went to school with who fashion-wise and counter culture-wise was much more in line with Randy. Her name was Angela. She wore a spiked collar necklace, had dyed hair and extreme make up. She and Randy were a far more logical pair if you looked at it from a style perspective.

To this day I do not understand the point of home coming court or prom court or any other ridiculous popularity contests. However, despite my indifference, the school did have a prom court. So when it came time to present the popular kids, the court lined up to march onto the stage. There the local paper and school year book staff would take pictures.

I will also admit to you, that I find prom to be a very over rated dance. Seriously, it is just another dance. Much as I love dances, I don't see the big deal here. But that is why you go with someone like Randy who makes it far more memorable.

The court members happened to line up next to where we had been standing. Suddenly Randy and Angela came up with a fabulous plan.

They would be part of the court. Oh no, they weren't elected, or even on the ballot. But they found a place in the middle of the line where they simply inserted themselves.

If you are wondering about how I felt while my prom date walked off with another woman I can assure you I was simply laughing, hard.

So up onto the stage they marched as the MC announced the members of the court. And then those in charge started to panic as there were two people, dressed in black, one with lots of jewelry and make up,  standing there among all the beautiful well dressed popular kids, having their pictures taken who were not on the list. There was much agitated arm waving from the principal signaling to get off the stage.

They did comply. They weren't out for a fight, just a memory.

I stood and laughed. No, I had no desire to be the one standing in front of them all, but I really enjoyed the break of standard behavior.

That was my favorite part of senior prom. Sadly, I did not take a picture and the only one that I knew of its location appears to have been lost. That is one my memories. It makes me smile.

Cha cha cha

Phebe has an original composition she likes to sing.  The lyrics are " going to the beach, cha cha cha. We're going to the beach, cha cha cha. " So on and so forth with lots of hip swinging.

Today she switched it up to " going to the jungle, cha cha cha. We are going to the jungle, cha cha cha."

Each night after the kids are tucked into bed Ethan and I sing a song to them. Usually a church hymn. Phebe usually requests Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Tonight she requested " Going to the jungle beach".