Who Do You Think You Are?

WARNING: This post is long and full of psychological rumination. Avoid if you are not in the mood. Or simply skim, if you feel like humoring me. Also, no pictures. Sorry.

So the title for this blog post is interesting because it describes my psychological state over the past few days, and it's also the actual title of a story I wrote about a high school girl who stalks her English teacher (it's not as creepy as it sounds). I found out yesterday that the story just won first place--and 500 smackeroonies!--in a fiction contest sponsored by a SLC Lit Mag called Salt Flats Annual. Because I'm not too hip to the Salt Lake writing scene, I wasn't familiar with the magazine before I submitted, but I noticed an item about the contest in the SL Trib right next to the Irreantum Fiction contest call for submissions waaaaaay back in May and thought I'd give it a shot.

And I won! I couldn't (and still can't, quite) believe it.

This will be my first official publication in a non-Mormon magazine. I've sent out a few stories to other mainstream lit mags here and there, but no luck until yesterday. And now the editor has asked me to send in a few paragraphs detailing the writing process--basically the genesis of the story--and this story has a much more interesting, and potentially volatile, genesis than a lot of my other work. Here's my rough attempt so far at describing the experience (I'm still not quite ready to send it off, because I need to mull and fiddle a bit more):

===

Throughout my life, I’ve had a number of small crushes on favorite teachers. Although I never resorted to stalking any of them, like Beth does in this story, a word of praise or encouragement from a teacher (particularly a teacher of the intense and intellectually passionate sort) could keep me buoyed up for days. When I eventually became a high school English teacher, I never forgot the kind of power a teacher can have in shaping the way a student sees herself.

After teaching high school for five years (and no, no one ever stalked me), I quit my job and moved with my husband and two small kids from Utah to Minnesota. For the first time in my life, I didn’t have school to look forward to in September. I started to feel a bit frantic. Who was I without school? So I decided to take a community ed creative writing class. Although I’d puttered around writing fiction here and there, I’d never considered myself a serious writer. But my creative writing teacher felt I had potential (see what teachers can do?) and referred me to an MFA program at Hamline University in St. Paul.

I loved everything about Hamline. The students were smart and creative. The faculty was stellar. I wanted more than anything to impress all of them—to feel as if I belonged. But the truth of it was that I was a Mormon from Utah who lived in a split-level in the suburbs, drove a minivan, and spent most of her day sweeping up goldfish crackers and rewinding Blue’s Clues videos. I imagined my classmates and professors heading home to artistically decrepit Minneapolis lofts, gazing out the window at the snowdrifts and contemplating the great philosophical conundrums of our time while I boiled macaroni noodles. Although almost all of the people in my MFA program were unfailingly kind and generous to me, I often struggled with feeling like a bit of an impostor. Could a person with my biography ever be taken seriously?

“Who Do You Think You Are?” was inspired by a day when my perceived otherness became starkly real to me. I was sitting in class listening to a lecture by a professor I didn’t know well, but I liked her and admired her. The topic somehow turned to Mormonism. She related a story about a negative encounter with Mormonism that some of her Native American friends had experienced and said, “I just don’t see how anyone can be involved with that church.” Although this professor had no idea I was LDS, many of the students in class did, and it seemed like every gaze in the room turned toward me. My heart pounding, I raised my hand and told the professor that I was in fact a Mormon and proceeded to stumble all over myself explaining why the experience she recounted wasn’t indicative of the way most Mormons behaved, and certainly didn’t represent my own beliefs. Of course, the professor apologized profusely (with so few Mormons in Minnesota, who would think that one would wind up in an MFA program??), but I spent the rest of the day with feelings of embarrassment, guilt, indignation and sorrow roiling around in my gut.

“Who Do You Think You Are?” arose out of my desire to explore this experience. The year before, I’d started a story about a high school girl who stalks her teacher, but it didn’t take off until I coupled it with the idea of being rejected by someone you respect because of who you are. Or who he thinks you are. Then, of course, there’s the ultimate loneliness that comes when a person discovers how hard it is to really know anyone—even someone you think you love. Even yourself. It’s a sad lesson, but I hope it makes a good story.

===

So that's my rundown. Reading it again I realize it needs a little work--first drafts and all.

At any rate, I said at the beginning of this post that I've been struggling with the whole idea of who I am--or who I think I am--all weekend. Julie Beck's talk in Sunday conference gave me a lot to think about. So I went to bed Sunday night, my mind spinning about how I spend too much time writing and reading and teaching and not enough time preparing healthy meals and cleaning the house and reading my scriptures. (Yeah, yeah, I know my house is in fine shape and I try and make sure that my kids at least get some canned peaches with their potato chips and hot dogs at lunch and even though I haven't quite made it through the Gospels yet--and I started in January--at least I'm trying, yada yada yada). But the truth of it is, I was telling Forrest just last week how I think we women in the church need a good butt kickin' every once in a while--that maybe folks should stop being so scared of hurting our feelings. So I felt like a bit of a hypocrite when the butt-kicking started and my initial reaction to Beck's talk was, "True, yes . . . but that doesn't apply to me, really, because I'm trying and I'm doing my best and I'm not a natural homemaker," and on and on with the same little januty tune I hum to myself when I start feeling guilty.

I have an amazing ability to do a little mental jig and dance my way straight through guilt to justification. It's true!

So I decided Sunday night that a little priority rearranging might be in order. The problem was, the idea of the priority rearranging made me sad. But I wasn't sure if I was feeling sad because I truly didn't want to give up what I was doing because it was important to me, or because I was simply being rebellious and didn't want to change.

Then . . . I open up my email inbox Monday morning and there's the email from Salt Flat's editor and a nice note from the contest judge and the scaffolding of reason I'd so carefully constructed the night before came down and landed with a poof at my feet.

Sigh.

Here's what I really believe. I think. We juggle a lot of balls as moms and every once in a while we drop one. It's important not to drop the children (ouch!), or the husband, or the gospel, or the little fragile ball made of glass that contains our own spirit. Sometimes we bobble these balls, but dropping them is very messy and involves a lot of time and energy in clean-up. Some of the balls I'm juggling are extraneous balls and can make it even more complicated to keep the important ones safely off the ground. (These balls could be called, say, "Oprah," or "Spending lots of time reading the blogs of people I've never met and never will," or "Wasting precious psychological energy worrying about the twenty pounds I want to lose.") But here's the rub! What if I decide to do a switcheroo add a "dusting the baseboards" ball and delete the "working on my writing" ball? My writing ball is very pretty and light and relatively easy to catch. The baseboards ball is very heavy and liable to crash into other balls. It might even fall to the ground and stub my toe. Therefore, perhaps it's wise--for me--if the baseboards ball only come out very rarely. If at all. :-). For some people, the baseboards ball is very important because if they're not juggling it, they feel icky and dirty and unworthy and can't live with themselves. But then there are other people (like me) who didn't even KNOW there was a ball dedicated solely to baseboard dusting until a year or so ago. (Yes, this means I never dusted a single baseboard in my life until 2006.)

So enough with the metaphor. The point is, even though I think I'm a mature 35 year old woman with a mind of her own and a little bit of confidence and experience in her pocket, sometimes I feel just like I did in high school, where I spent part of my day with the drama crowd, part of my day with the Seminary/Madrigal kids, and part of my day with the cheerleaders. (I'll never forget the dirty looks some of those drama kids game me on the first day of acting class when I showed up in my cheerleading skirt. They came to put up with me eventually, though). I still don't know who I am sometimes, or who I want to be, or how I want other people to see me. Today I worked on the piece about my story (the drama kid part of me), went to a Relief Society Presidency meeting and helped put up the chairs in our new building (Madrigal/Seminary part of me . . . you see where this is going), and dropped Wyatt of in the childcare at Lifetime Fitness so I could lift weights in the barbell strength class with a bunch of smooth skinned chicky babes (cheerleader).

But we're all complicated. We all are. Just not everybody blogs about it. :-) I was hoping to tie this rambling post up with a nice little bow, or at least with a final thought about identity and purpose and choices and obedience . . . but I've written so much that it's now 11:30. I will sign off with this:

The t.v. is on and Jennifer Lopez is a guest on David Letterman. I think she's pregnant. She's trying to hide it, but her dress is waaaaay to billowy. Good for J-Lo! Now she can start juggling, too.

School Pics

The kids came home with their school pictures today, and they're so cute I thought I'd share:





I went against my innate desire for control and let them pick their own background colors. I think the pictures turned out well, though. Ethan looks so studious and mature, Elise looks loverly with her looooong pretty hair, and Jonas is the picture of first grade with that missing front tooth.

So, two other short items. First, if you haven't read it already, the cover story for this week's Newsweek is "A Mormon Journey: The Making of Mitt Romney." Give it a read--it's interesting. There's a practicing Mormon on the Newsweek staff--Elise Soukup--and she's noted as one of the contributors to the story. As a result, they get most of the facts straight, imo. Don't know about the interpretation of the facts, but that's an individual thing.

Also, as some of you know I'm no longer working with Irreantum, primarily because I've been soooo busy lately and needed to let something go. I've loved my time with the magazine, but after about three years it seemed a good time for me to move on. But, because I can't leave well enough alone, I've joined the editorial board of another LDS magazine called Segullah. You can take a look at the Segullah website and link to the blog here. I won't have nearly the workload I did with Irreatum, and the three women in my writers' group, Darlene, Sharlee, and Kathy, are already involved--so I'll be able to associate with some really cool chickies. It should be fun.

And now it's conference weekend. Hooray! I'm even kind of glad that it's rainy and cold. I'm looking forward to holing up in my house and listening to the talks and eating soup. Mmmmmm . . . Fall.

Jonas Leo

Jonas Leo Hallstrom, 4 months old, Topsail Island, North Carolina


Today Jonas was the V.I.P. in his 1st grade classroom, and his dad and I got to come to class for 30 minutes and tell everybody what's so cool about him. And there's plenty cool about him! It was fun to spend some time with him at school and listen to him talk about what he likes, what he thinks, what he's good at, and what makes him happy.

Here's a shot of Jonas waxing philosophical about karate (or how one of his favorite animals is the Phoenix--didn't know that; or how his best friend is his brother, his sister, and his cat; or how his favorite fruit is the grape):



Notice how he's holding his hand and there's a band aid on his finger? This was the best story of the day: Forrest and I pull up in front of the school and start walking toward the front door when who comes screaming around the corner, crying, holding his hand, and missing one shoe, but Jonas! It was almost surreal. We were 10 minutes early for the VIP presentation, and apparently Jonas was playing at recess and got stung on the finger by a bee. (One of his biggest fears has now come true!) He was so freaked out that he just started running for the front doors of the school (and ran right out of one shoe) and ran straight into us. Pretty amazing timing, I'd say. So we took him into the office and they put a paste of baking soda and water on the sting--I cure I hadn't heard about, but that seemed to work great. Then he calmed down and was able to use the story as an excellent opener for his VIP presentation. (I think the kids liked the closer better, though, because he passed around one of his favorite candy bars--Kit Kats.)

One of the other highlights of the presentation was during the Q & A period, when one of the kids asked Jonas, "Do you like Jesus?"

Another kid in the class: "He does like Jesus! Everybody likes Jesus!"

Jonas's friend Kyle: "I don't. I HATE Jesus!"

Entire class: Collective gasp.

I do think that Jonas likes Jesus, but he never officially answered the question . . . :-)

Jonas is such a good kid--smart, confident, great at math and making stuff with legos and snow skiing and Nintendo. Most of all, he's kind. He cares about his family and his friends, and even though he can be silly at home--and still won't eat more than his repertoire of 12 things, no matter how hard we try to break him--he's been such a joy to parent and it's been so fun to watch him grow up. We were proud last week that he got the "Student of the Month" award in his class for the month of September. They give out Student of the Month awards according to a theme, and the theme that month was "Respect." Jonas's teacher wrote on his award that Jonas is thoughtful and kind and treats his teacher and all his classmates very well. We're proud of you, Joe!

BANG!

The other day, I was driving down the street at the same moment Forrest was driving up it (he was just coming home from the airport after being out of town), and as we passed each other and waved, in that split second I could tell he'd shaved off his goatee. Only rarely in the last ten years or so has my beloved been clean shaven, and the sight of his vulnerable upper lip remains a shock. He looks, oh, 19 to me now :-). Although I do like my hubby's face, hairless or not, I'm a big fan of the goatee myself, as it gives him just a little bit of edginess. I'm one of those girls who likes guys who are mostly nice but not so nice as to make me feel guilty for my own lack of constant niceness.

(Sidenote: Forrest was ruminating the other day as we were out on a walk with Wyatt and passed the house of the nicest, Molliest-Mormon couple in our ward, that we should start a website called MormonFlanders.com, after the Simpson's character, where folks can post humorous and anonymous stories of Flanders-like characters in their own wards and neighborhoods. Our own Mormon Flanders recently declared the following two gems: "I frequently visit Providentliving.org for up-to-date food storage tips. It's the best website ever!" and "My children love going to the cannery! It's fun for the whole family!")

So aaaannnnyyyywaaaayy, I was starting to feel like Forrest had turned back the clock a bit, walking around looking like his early-90's self, so I thought I'd join him and give myself some early-90s bangs, making the two of us a matched pair. Here they are, in all their glory:



Now all I need to do is whip out my acid washed denim jacket and I'm good to go.

(Sidenote #2: I tend to look better in pictures I take of myself at arms length. I think it's because I point the camera down and it minimizes the Sweat Chin. And if any of you are from Bangladesh and accidentally happened upon this blog, no, I do not have sweat on my chin. Sweat is the family from which I hail, a family with with many members who sport what my sister-in-law calls a "sloping esophagus," or, in other words, a double chin.)

So here are some random updates:

1. Over the last five minutes, the phone has rung 4 times. It is the cell phone of Elise's friend, Tayler (yes, she's 9 and has a cell phone)and all I hear are children screaming and shrieking. Either they are on the bus and messing around with the phone, or there is some kind of horrifying hostage situation going on at the elementary school. I should know in, oh, 4 minutes.

2. I had my Super Saturday on, you guessed it, Saturday. Went swimmingly. (For my Bangladeshi reader: Super Saturday is a church sponsored event where women get together and make handcrafted knick knacks.) Was supposed to end at 12:00 and ended at 2:30. Dried flowers and blobs of paint and sawdust EVERYWHERE. Bought fruit and sweet rolls and muffins and, at the last minute, chocolate chocolate donuts, and the chocolate chocolate donuts were the first to go. We say we're calorie conscious, but when faced with a chocolate chocolate donut we simply cut it in half and demurely eat the first half, then fifteen minutes later demurely eat the other. I made myself a magnet board (cute and hard to explain) and I have walked around my house with it and can't find a single, solitary place to hang it.

3. Still no bus.

4. Wyatt is getting cuter by the day. He loves to crawl and is much happier when he's mobile. He's working on tooth #6. We have installed a remote control gate at the top of the steps to the basement and the kids love to press the remote button and open and close the gate repeatedly. Yes, they are 6, 9, and 11.

5. Still no bus.

6. Things are going well with my online class. I kind of like it. It's funny how different it is to "lecture" in a chat, typing as fast as my fingers will let me, and there are some things that are harder to teach. But overall, it's going well.

7. Bus. But no Elise. Turns out she and Tayler got off at the stop before ours because they wanted to walk a little bit. And Elise thinks the phone is broken. Hmmm. But all are home, safe and sound.

So here are some pictures of Wyatt to prove how cute he is. Note the teeth:





Now I must go rifle through the kids' backpacks and assess what kind of homework we have going on tonight . . .

Chuga Chuga

Yes, I have finally gotten around to updating my blog after the trip Forrest and I took with the Wilkey family to Colorado last weekend. Here's a play by play:

Thursday:

Woke up and cleaned. I am grateful with all my heart for the wonderful folks who took care of my kids while we were gone . . . and I had to make sure there wasn't any ring around the toilet and whatnot while they were here. So I cleaned and prepped and wrote my little "Mom's List of Instructions" until noon, when I dropped Wyatt off at my friend Karen's place. (She has four boys and her youngest just went to Kindergarten . . . and she actually said "Thank You" to ME for asking her to watch Wyatt. She says she's baby hungry, but I say she's just really, really nice.)

So Forrest and Darrin and Katie and I settled into the Tahoe and took off for Colorado. We had an excellent time yapping and snacking and spotting UFOs on the seven hour drive to Durango.



See that shiny white speck in the sky? We couldn't figure out what it was, either. UFO, we figured. I took four pictures of it, by the way, and three of the four mysteriously disappeared from my iPhoto application on my computer after I deleted them from the camera. Mysterious, mysterious.

Also, on the way there we got a call from my Mom and Dad--who had taken over from Karen later on that afternoon, thanks guys!--letting me know that (of course) WYATT WAS SICK! So I moped for about an hour, feeling sorry for myself and my little guy that he can be perfectly healthy for months on end, and on the very day I leave him for the first time, he comes down with a fever.

He has recovered, however, and all is well.

We also received a call from a very conscientious older Wilkey brother who checked on our reservations and discovered that we, in fact, did NOT have a reservation at the General Palmer hotel that night. (Long story, but we'd asked them to cancel Friday, and they canceled Thursday instead.) After many attempts to call other hotels and finding them all booked (and getting continually disconnected from the ever-patient hotel personnel, because every time we would go up or down a hill our call would drop, even with three different wireless providers represented in the car) we finally finagled a way to get two rooms for the same price we'd been paying at the initial hotel, even though one of them was a suite. Sweet! we said. Well, Forrest and I said, because Darrin and Katie let us have the suite. Nice guys.

We pulled into Durango, which is kind of like Park City on Cowboy Steroids. Cool town. We had an excellent dinner with 20 other Wilkey family members and I enjoyed one of the best chicken dishes I have ever eaten. Plus I was really hungry. We stayed that night at the General Palmer--a 120 year old hotel--but it was a really nicely kept-up, modernized 120 year old hotel. Unlike the Friday night hotel. But I'll get to that in a minute.

Friday:

That morning we woke up to a tooting steam engine and little flecks of coal dust in the air. Here's a shot of Katie and me that a.m., if only because 1. we liked posing under a sign that said "Quiet Ladies" and 2. Forrest says I have Jennifer Aniston hair. (Circa 1999, maybe.)



And here's a shot of Forrest and me in front of the rail car that the Wilkey clan (and two other unrelated, and probably a little frightened, women) occupied. It was the last car on the train, which was great because we could step out on a little platform on the back and take excellent photos and enjoy the gorgeous air. And when we were near any roads, everyone would wave at us like we were celebrities.



Here's a shot of Darrin and Katie from the interior of the train. Not only is it a delightful photo, but it also shows off some of the woodworking and craftsmanship inside the car, which was built in the late 1800s.



The train ride to Silverton was gorgeous. Gorgeous! Here are some pictures to prove it:





Here's my favorite picture from the ride. Since we were in the end of the train, we could see the front of the train as it turned. I think it looks like a toy train on a track, or a Disney ride, don't you??



When we got to Silverton, we moseyed around town for a bit. It's a very small town, and probably would have disappeared by now if not for the tourist trade. Silverton actually closes down completely in the winter months. The train ride back to Durango from Silverton wasn't quite as exhilarating as on the way up--we humans are so easily bored, aren't we?--but it was fun to listen to assorted Wilkey family members sing morbid songs about the Titanic at the tops of their voices. (I wish I remembered what the song was called, but one of the lyrics I recall is "glug glug.")

We'd decided to stay Friday night in Silverton instead of Durango (which caused the initial hotel reservation confusion in the first place) -- and once we got to Silverton we immediately began second guessing our decision. The Silverton hotel was also a 19th century "classic" hotel like the Durango hotel, but it had slipped a couple of notches from rustic and charming to creaky and haunted. And I mean it when I say haunted. The lady at the front desk told us that she had seen the ghost herself--a Dr. Luigi, an unfortunate M.D. who had killed himself in the hotel over a hundred years before. "He's a nice ghost, though," she told us. Apparently he goes around healing people of their ailments. (Darrin's usually very reserved oldest sister mused that she might wake up with bigger breasts, then. Hilarious.) She also informed us that there had been a number of murders in the hotel, and that the most recent had taken place "a couple months ago." Hmmmm . . .

The floorboards creaked with every step, but Forrest and I lucked out once more and got one of the nicer rooms. (Darrin and Katie were bummed that they didn't get rod iron canopy beds.) Here's Forrest looking spooked in our haunted room, and a shot outside our haunted window:




Saturday:

We woke up in the morning refreshed and unharmed, although I was disappointed to find that I hadn't been healed of my stretch marks. Dang!

We took off that morning for home. The drive out of Silverton was one of the most gorgeous (and scary) drives I've ever taken. Apparently Coloradoans don't think guard rails are necessary, and we snaked our way through one of the most beautiful canyons I've ever seen. I kept telling Forrest to stop looking at the scenery and keep his eyes on the road, though. Here's a picture of Katie and me against some of the only fall color we saw on the trip (too early), and a cool shot of an old, run down mill up against the mountain:




We also saw three young bucks (literal young bucks!!) crossing a river. (We also saw antelope and wild elk actually frolicking, but didn't have the camera ready in time):



The final great story of the trip is how I ran into my old elementary school friend, Stephanie Reiva. Quick background: Stephanie and I were best friends in 3rd, 4th and 5th grades. Her dad was in the military, though, and they moved to Denver when I was 10. It was one of the saddest days of my life. I went and visited her when I was in sixth grade, but we haven't seen each other since. Amazingly, we've stayed in touch all these years by sending Christmas cards, even though Stephanie lived in Boston (working as an engineer on the "Big Dig") and Puerto Rico. She got married about five years ago, and she and her husband finally decided the wanted to settle down and picked a small town in CO called Montrose and bought a business that builds cedar homes. So, as we were driving through random small Colorado towns, we passed a cedar home builder on the outskirts of one town and it reminded me of Stephanie. "Will we be passing through Montrose?" I asked Forrest. "Sounds familiar," he said. Well, a few minutes later I had to go to the bathroom, so we pulled over at a gas station. While at the gas station, we discovered we were in Montrose at that very moment. Darrin pulled out his Mio, a very handy/annoying GPS tracking gadget, and punched in Stephanie's address. Lo and behold, the cedar home business we'd passed was hers! So we flipped back around and walked in, their secretary called Stephanie on her cell phone (she was taking her son to the pediatrician to check for an ear infection) and fifteen minutes later, there was Stephanie Reiva! In the flesh! It was so fun to see her and meet her husband and her two little boys. Fifteen years is a long time, but I would have recognized her anywhere. Here's a picture of the two of us (even though I look TERRIBLE and blame it on the haunted hotel because it didn't have a hair dryer, so I couldn't wash my hair and I was all greasy and limp, but I must get over my pride):



We pulled into home at about 6:00. I was more than ready to see the kids, and I'm sure that Forrest's Mom and Mindy and Pete (thanks, guys!) were more than ready to see us. We had a ball, and we're so grateful to the Wilkeys for inviting us and for our marvelous babysitters for allowing us some badly needed Mom and Dad time.

And if you've read this whole thing until the end, congrats! (And I mean you, Dave. I know how you hang on every word I write :-).

**Addendum: I am a lot older than I think I am. It has actually been TWENTY FIVE years since I have seen Stephanie, not fifteen. Sigh. Why am I not 25 still????**

Fall is in the air . . .

which is nice since our air conditioner is broken . . . again. We've been patient w/ the Dick's Heating and Air Conditioning people, but after about seven or eight freeze-ups since we moved in, we think it's time to get a new one. (Especially since it's been broken since Wed. and they still haven't returned our calls). The heat is supposed to be back later this week, so hopefully they'll get sick of us calling everyday and fix/replace it sometime soon.

The other reason I say fall is in the air is because it's time for the kids to get back on the school/extracurricular activities bandwagon (and Mom and Dad, too). Jonas is playing soccer again, Jonas and Ethan have gone back to karate, piano is starting up, and Elise is going to do a Children's Community Theater this year--I think she'll like it. They're doing a "Pirates of the Caribbean meets the Little Mermaid" play. She has her first class tonight. She's also participating in the Monte Vista school choir and has to go to school 1 hour early on Tues and Thurs, which shows how much my girl who loves to sleep in wanted to do it. This morning, after dragging her out of bed and watching her droopy, grumpy face stare back at me in the mirror while I was doing her hair, she demanded to know why, exactly, they start school so early? "It doesn't make any sense!" she said. When I told her that junior high and high school were even earlier, she groaned and said, "Well that's not good news." I agree, sister.

Ethan also just graduated from Cub Scouts and got his Arrow of Light. Here's photographic proof:




The first shot is of Ethan and obviously me--with a loverly spit-up stain on my chestal region--holding the really cool plaque a nice woman in the ward makes for all the boys who receive their Arrow of Light. (For those of you without Scouts, it's an award you can work toward once you graduate from Cubs and move on to Boy Scouts.) The second shot is of Ethan walking across the "bridge" from Cub to Boy Scouts--a highly symbolic and emotionally weighty moment that, as you can tell from Ethan's stance, he wasn't taking quite as seriously as his mother and the Scout Master would have liked. But what are you going to do? I suppose the line between stand-up and somber symbolic moments can get fuzzy at times?? We discussed it and hopefully it is now clearer :-). I was still proud of him for getting the award. He worked hard in Cubs and did a lot of cool things. And now he's an official Boy Scout, and next year he'll be in the Young Men's program with his Dad, now that Forrest is the secretary. Hard to believe.

To conclude, I should probably say something about Jonas, since I've touched on Ethan and Elise (and I touch on Wyatt all the time--who by the way is having a rapturous love affair with remotes, shoes, and keys). He's doing great in 1st grade and his reading is really taking off. He's reading stuff all the time now. He had his first soccer practice on Sat. and did great. The more he plays, the more aggressive he gets about going after the ball -- but he still hates it when other kids take it away. I think he's spent too many years being the youngest and having a Mom who tells the older kids "just give him what he wants!" or "Maybe let him win!" in order to keep the peace. Bad parenting, yes. But I don't do it all the time. Just when I want some peace.

So that's it for now. As of yesterday, I have collected $1,779 dollars for our upcoming Super Saturday. Even though it's in check form, it's making me very nervous and I can't wait to hand it off to the woman who's buying all the supplies. Now that's really it for now.

Why do we hate Hillary Clinton again?

Good Hillary:



Bad Hillary:




I'm asking this question in all seriousness. I saw her on Ellen yesterday and she seemed quite nice. Although I can understand not liking her politics, or not liking her personality, I know there are quite a few people out there who don't find her simply unlikable. They think she's evil. And my question is . . . . why? I read the paper every day (almost), I read Newsweek every week, I watch the news, I read a lot of online stuff, I even listen to the occasional right wing radio program, and I'm wracking my brain to come up with why she's the fourth horseman of the apocalypse. I can't seem to put my finger on anything specific.

And you can't say it's because she's calculating (ambitious) or a flip-flopper (a politician) if you plan on supporting Mitt Romney, since he's both of these things.

I'm not on a pro-Hillary bandwagon or anything. I don't know if I'd ever vote for her. But it was a bit unsettling to me yesterday when I realized I'd dismissed the possibility of voting for her right out of the gate (when I haven't done the same with Barak Obama or John Edwards). When it comes right down to it, the reason I'm so skittish about the possibility of voting for her is I'm afraid some of my friends and family members will think I'm voting for a minion of Satan. Vote for Edwards or Obama and I'm simply a silly Democrat (like James E. Faust :-). Vote for Hillary, and I'm contributing to the constitution of this great nation hanging by a thread.

I don't think it's because she's a woman. Is it because she's a woman? If it is because she's a woman, would we even be aware that it's because she's a woman?

So . . . . lemme know. I won't jump on anyone's case or anything. I'm just curious, truly.

Kinky Neck

Yesterday we went on our final boat trip of the season with the Wilkeys and their five kids and Forrest's sister Mindy and her family. Lots of fun but supercrowded (and I mean super--it took us over an hour waiting in line to get our boat out. Should we have reminded ourselves not to go to Pineview on a holiday?? Hello.) I also had a pretty wicked wipeout on the waterskis and woke up with a sore neck for my trouble. My spell checker is underlining both "wipeout" and "waterskis". Are these not compound words? Hmmm.

Here's a cute picture of Wyatt and the Wilkey's little boy Isaac. They were both eating crackers at the time, so excuse the food remnants on the face. Our kids match up so well with the Wilkeys'--it's a lot of fun. They have FOUR boys and one girl, though. Thank heaven our two girls have each other to hang out with:



Right now I'm listening to Wyatt upstairs in his crib as he babbles and yells. He's supposed to be going down for his nap but instead he's saying "Bap, Bap, Bap" very loudly. But at least he's not crying, right? We've gotten to the stage where we can hand him a bottle at night. Very bad habit, but oooh, so nice to get right back in bed. Don't tell my pediatric dentist. My kids also rarely floss. Aren't I bad?

So a few quick updates. First, Forrest and I both got new callings at church. He was released as the ward mission leader and put in as the Young Men's secretary. I think he'll really like being in the young men's--he's never done it before. And I was released as the Enrichment Leader and put in as the second counselor in the Relief Society presidency. I think it will be fun, too. I'm happy to be a counselor in a presidency any day. It's being El Presidente that makes me feel woozy. So these changes should be fun.

Next, I have decided to drastically reduce my Diet Coke intake for a little weight loss experiment. To my dismay, I find that even though I stopped nursing (which always makes me lose a little weight--or at least, it did with Jonas) and I'm exercising regularly and trying to watch what I eat, I still weight exactly the same as I did at my 6 week postpartum doctor's appointment. My pants do fit better, but the weight itself is still so discouraging. I hate my dumb metabolism. So a friend of mine said she gave up Diet Coke and lost 5 pounds. We'll see. So far it's mainly making me grumpier and martyrish (I realize that is not a word.)

Ooh, also just finished reading a really good book, A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaleed Hosseini (probalby didnt' spell that right), the author of The Kite Runner. I think I liked this one better than The Kite Runner, which I liked quite a bit. It's so interesting to learn about Afghanistan--the things the women went through under the Taliban are breathtaking. Like they were taken out of a horrifying post-apocalyptic sci-fi novel. I remember reading A Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood ten years ago or so and not believing that such things could happen to women--and they were happening to women in Afghanistan and we didn't even know it. Anyway, the book is a page turner and fascinating and well written, and you'll learn something, too. Recommended highly.

Speaking of reading, a story of mine, "Accusation," just came out in the most recent issue of Dialogue. I'm sure that very few of my regular blog readers actually subscribe to Dialogue . . . but the story will be in my book when it comes out, so you can read it there. (Because you're all going to buy my book, right? :-).

So that's it for now. Wyatt has stopped "Bap Bap Bapp"ing, so hopefully he's decided to go to sleep. Now I gotta get to work!

These things I get myself into . . .

I remember before I had Wyatt, I'd decided that having a baby was going to be a new opportunity for me to simplify and stop overscheduling myself. Turns out, though, that I continue to overschedule myself and simply truck around with a baby on my hip doing everything I was trying to do before. I'm not saying this to whine, though. More an observation about my personality and why I must have a lot of stuff going on in order to, I don't know . . . distract myself from the housework, maybe?

The last week has been jam packed. I agreed to be in charge of this book publishing program at Monte Vista Elementary (I've been having PTA guilt--last year I wasn't incredibly involved beyond going to my kids' classes.) So I met with the principal a couple of times and got that all going. Relief Society Super Saturday is also coming up, so I had to meet w/ the Enrichment committee and get our craft projects decided. After a hilariously awful attempt to make a stepping stone with little glass marbles and grout, I was relieved to find that one of the committee members knows a lady who does Super Saturdays and she has super cute crafts that she supplies and teaches . . . and so we're using her. Relief! I also had various loose ends w/ the Irreantum fiction contest, and tried to find time to work on my book.

But those were the little things. The big things over the last few days have been:

1. Starting up my SLCC online English class. Long story (which I will make short) but it took the SLCC people a loooooonnnng time to get the template for my class posted, so essentially I wasn't able to work on anything for my class until Thursday. So I met with the teacher over online courses on Friday (with Wyatt--he crawled around and licked our shoes while we talked :-) and tried to overhaul my syllabus and get assignments figured out and learn the tricks of the Vista (online teaching) program all before Forrest got home from being out of town Friday night and the family left for our neighborhood Yuba trip. (Which will be #2. But I'll finish the teaching story first.) Last night was the first online "chat"--and I posted the syllabus about 20 minutes before the chat began. Whew! This was my first time chatting, and lemme tell ya, it's definitely different "lecturing" to a class that way. I'm thankful that I'm a relatively quick typist. How do the hunt and peck typists do it? I don't think it would be possible. But the class should be an interesting experience. Stay tuned.

2. Neighborhood Yuba trip. About 10 families from our neighborhood headed down to Yuba for camping and boating on Friday and Saturday. Forrest got home from a trip to MN at 5:00, and I had the boat all ready and he hitched it up and pulled out at about 5:15, with three of our four kids and Cameron (son of District Attorney Lora Miller) inside. Since we had to leave so late, I decided to stay home w/ Wyatt instead of tenting it--good decision--and I drove three other moms with babies there on Saturday morning.

Here's a cute pic of Wyatt doing his favorite beachy pastime, eating sand:



We really had a great time. It will probably be an annual event. I, however, am growing a touch weary of boat trips. I'm officially ready for fall. But I am looking forward to next year when Wyatt can play in the sand without eating it and splash in the water.

So we got home Saturday night, sunburned and tired and full of sandy particles, just in time for . . .

3. Ethan's birthday! We had the family over for ice cream and cake on Sunday night to celebrate. It was fun to get the Hallstroms and the Sweats together. Here's a video of Ethan's expert candle blowout (all eleven of them):


Then yesterday (Monday) we loaded eight of his friends, plus our four kids, into the van and the Tahoe and headed out to Classic Fun Center for skating, laser tag, and gigantic-inflatable-jumpything bouncing. Here's a picture of a bunch of sweaty boys:



Ethan had a ball and I think his friends did too. We got home just in time, though, for me to quickly scan chapter 7 and think up some discussion questions and start my online chat. So I went to bed happily last night.

Today I've been having a well deserved stay-at-home day. Wyatt and I have just been chillin. I even took a little nap. Heavenly. So for a final piece of cuteness (and an example of what really is fun about life, even with all the business), here's Wyatt:

The Promised Pineview Trip Blog Entry

Sorry this post is so tardy, but I used up all my blogging time with the previous first-day-of-school/existential rant . . . but now I can at least post some photos and video of our amazingly fun Pineview trip.

To whet your appetite, we'll start off the post with a video of Ethan's awesome kneeboard 360, his first completed attempt:




My Mom had the great idea to book a condo for the family at Pineview, and the digs were incredible. It was brand new and the furnishings looked like they came right out of a magazine--and the bed that Forrest and I scored (we got the biggest room because of Mr. Wyatt) had an obscenely huge bed with a cushy mattress and about 27 pillows. Well, not quite 27, but it seemed like it.

Everybody had a great time out on the boat on Thursday and Friday. The kids got a lot of skiing and kneeboarding practice, and Wyatt had a fun time playing in the sand and zooming around on the boat. Lucky for me, he loves being outside, and even seems to like the boat, too--which a lot of babies don't. It was so nice, though, to have an air conditioned condo to take him to for his naps. Made a huge difference. So here are some pics of the kids and their cousins out on the lake.







You might be able to tell from the pictures how much greener and prettier Pineview is than Yuba. Yuba still has its charms (can't beat the beaches, and the water is so clear), but as far as scenic beauty goes, Ogden canyon can't be beat. We did get caught in a HUGE storm that came barreling down said canyon on Friday afternoon, though. We could see the black clouds coming and before we knew it WHAMO! The kids were trying valiantly to make it up the hill to our condos and got stuck in a major sandstorm, all the while the men tried to wrestle our chairs and awnings into their bags (one awning didn't make it and ended up tossed 20 feet in the air and mangled like a giant spider corpse on the beach) and hold on to the boat for dear life. It was all very exciting.

Luckily we were able to retire to the condo and shower and recover . . . just in time to watch the premiere of High School Musical II. The kids were so excited, and it was a lot more fun for them to watch it all together (and stay up late--the movie didn't start until 9:00). Grandma even bought the girls matching pjs to enhance the experience. (And yes, Elise does have an "I Love Troy" shirt she picked out for school. There's something about that Zac Effron that appeals mightily to 9 year old girls. I think Scott Baio had the same innocent/not-so-innocent quality when I was 9. I had a poster.)



Notice Wyatt in the background crawling around. He perfected his crawling technique on the travertine tile and kept trying to crack his head on the stone fireplace mantle. Ah--the joys of mobility! I think I had the pleasure of a baby who would sit still and play with toys for a grand total of two weeks. While I type this, he has worked his way completely under my desk and is trying to suck on my toes. **Digression--We have been trying the "cry it out" method at night and he's doing better. Hopefully by next week, if we have the parental fortitude, he'll be trained!**

Finally, we also got to go and see the annual balloon festival held in the canyon. Although it was a little scaled down due to the storm, it was still a beautiful sight:




A wonderful time was had by all. It was so much fun to spend time with family and end our official summer vacation with a bang. Thanks Mom and Dad!

First Day of School

Even though it doesn't feel like summer is quite over yet, my kids ventured out for their first day of school today. Actually, since they're on D track, they are the last group of kids at their school to start (all the others started the last week of July). But I do like year round school, especially with D track: 7 weeks is the perfect amount of summer, if you ask me. The kids and I were all ready for school to begin :-).

So here are some cute first-day-of-school pictures that I love to do every year:



All the kids, even Wyatt Dean (who had been up since 5:30. Are all of you as sick of me complaining about my lack of sleep as I am of not sleeping?)



Sixth grader Ethan. Whenever I see pictures of him he looks like such a Hallstrom to me. I can see elements of so many Hallstrom relatives in his face. (His cute face). It's hard for me to believe he's in sixth grade, though. Only one more precious year until Junior High . . . and then all bets are off. But he's such a good kid, I have a hard time believing he'll be transformed into anything but a good teenager. He's definitely handy to have around, especially when your first grader is going to school and you don't want to worry about him. I know he's got Jonas taken care of. Ethan had been worried about his teacher because he'd heard a rumor that she was reaaalllly mean . . . but she told them all today that she'd told last year's sixth graders to start the rumor so they'd all be scared on the first day and behave, but that really she's nice. So he was relieved. He also lost his lunch box--a confession he made during family home evening, so I'd be less likely to be mad :-)--but he vows he will find it, as it is probably in the 4th grade pile of lunch boxes because that is accidentally where he left it. He reads this blog and will kill me for this revelation. Sorry, Ethan. I love you even if you are a teensy bit absentminded at times. (But aren't all future professors absentminded?)



And my pretty Lou. Fourth grade girl. She's always so nervous before the first day of school, and every year without fail cries on the last day of school because she loved it so much. I'm sure she'll be the same with 4th grade. She's wearing a new shirt that has glitter on it, and she ended up with glitter in her hair and on her forehead and cheeks. I'm sure all her friends thought it was some kind of fashion statement :-).



And big kid Joe. First grader. This is always a transition that kind of kicks me in the gut as a mom. My buddy's gone all day! But it's a good thing, too, especially for Jonas. He missed Ethan and Elise so much last year when he would come home from kindergarten, and I think he's ready to take off and learn in 1st grade. And tomorrow's a big day: hot lunch! They're having chicken nuggets, which is one of about four hot lunches I think Jonas will actually eat. Exciting!

And there you go. The three big kids in school. If I didn't have my kissy little Wyatt, I'm not sure what I'd be doing with myself. (Okay, so I do know what I'd be doing with myself . . . but it sounds kind of luxurious so I don't want to think about it too much :-). I've gotta say that Wyatt is such a little lover and a blessing and I wouldn't trade him for the world, but man, he's been kicking my can lately. It's nice that he's crawling, but now he's into everything, and his sleeping is still so erratic, and he's so, well, ACTIVE all the time that some days I'm exhausted just from holding him while he bounces. He even punches me while I'm feeding him, no kidding (or kicks me, or wriggles and squirms). Oh, the squirminess. I think I'm feeling a little extra exhausted today from all the excitement of the first day of school. When the kids came home, it took me literally TWO HOURS to read through all the papers they brought back and fill everything out and sign it and organize it and attempt to commit a dozen or so mucho importante parental responsibilities to my sleep deprived brain--all while Wyatt was wiggling and bouncing and trying to grab my pen and eat it and crumple the papers and drool on them. Oh, I'll stop now. No one likes a whiny blogger. I'm just tired. There's just . .. . so . . . much . . . to . . . do. All the time. And I keep trying to do other things--things that I like, like Irreantum, and my novel, and teach online for SLCC, and plan our Enrichment Super Saturday--and I wonder why I feel so frantic most of the time. And/or grumpy. Like today I came home from grocery shopping and bought a pork roast to make BBQ pork sandwiches and put it in the pot at 1:00--which is waaaay on the ball for me--so it could simmer and get extra juicy. Then when it came time for dinner, neither Jonas nor Elise would even touch it. They literally gagged when I tried to make them eat it. And I was so tired and so spent that instead of making me mad it made me feel like crying at the futility of it all.

This is really getting depressing. And this was supposed to be a fun first day of school post! Sorry.

I'm really not depressed, though. Just tired and overwhelmed and sick of cooking dinner and sorting socks and signing permission slips ad infinitum, all with a teething wiggly baby on my hip. And bad hair. And pants that still don't fit right, even seven months postpartum. And no food storage except brownie mixes and canned peaches. And a broken printer that leaves green streaks on everything I try and print in color. And a patch of stiff carpet where Elise spilled her milk and didn't clean it all up. You know the list. Waaah, waah. Yes, I must get over myself.
If you're worried about me, just go back a couple of posts and read my one about blessings. I'll feel better in the morning :-).

Oh, and I still have to post about my super fun family trip this last weekend, and I promise this one will be much more upbeat. Because it was super fun. Now I'm going to bed to degrumpify. Say a little prayer for me that Wyatt will sleep till at least 6:30. If he does, degrumpifying is much more likely. Stay tuned.

Tagged . . . and crawler baby.

I was tagged by my sister-in-law Andi, (**correction--I was tagged by my actual sister Amy! But they were both doing this list so I got confused. Sorry Amix!**) but before I answer her questions, I'm going to post some incontrovertible proof that Wyatt is now crawling (at 6 1/2 months--I told you he was a goer.)



So here's my list:


Four Jobs I've Had:

1. Hardee's Gal. I got the job before I turned 16 and my friends and I had waaaaay too much fun hardly working.
2. Receptionist/Assistant at my Grandpa Ranquist's law firm. I specialized in deciphering my Grandpa's handwriting and rewinding the little dictaphone tapes over and over and over to try and deduce what it was my Grandpa had mumbled :-). It was a great job, though, summers and Christmases my first two years of college.
3. Undergraduate Research Trainee in the Education Dept. at BYU. The professor I worked with gave me a ride on his motorcycle. He was about 65.
4. Various teacherly positions. Starting in the fall, I'm going to teach an online English 1010 course for Salt Lake Community College. I'll let you know how that goes with Mr. Wyatt pulling on my leg the whole time.

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over:

1. Say Anything. I think I've already explained on this blog how it is inextricably connected to meeting and (ooooh, so mushy) falling in love with Forrest and that I have a thing for John Cusak because he's so smart and so funny.

2. When Harry Met Sally. I just saw this movie again one day when I was up early w/ Wyatt and it's one of those that I love watching, if only because the dialogue is so great. Such good writing. It was heartening because I've been a bit nervous about my book because it's not very blurb-worthy ("What is your book about?" "Well, it's about this family, and it goes through time, and each character has a chapter," blah blah blah. So hard to explain.) Well try encapsulating "When Harry Met Sally." (Actually, the scene at the end after they're married does this: "When we met, we hated each other, then we didn't know each other, then we were friends, then we fell in love.") And look how popular this movie has been? And can you believe it's almost 20 years old???? How's that for staying power.

3. Good Will Hunting. It's a little melodramatic in places, but so am I. (Which places? I'm sure you're wondering.) Also good writing and great characters. I love Minnie Driver as the girlfriend. (I also love her as the girlfriend in Gross Point Blank.) But if I'm flipping through the channels and this one is on TNT, I always stop.

4. Best in Show. So funny. Period.

Places I've Lived:

1. West Valley City. The good times of my childhood on Cilma Drive. Lilac bushes, basketball hoop over the garage, walking to 7-11 on 4100 W. with Stephanie Reiva to get Tangy Taffy.

2. The Kearns (or, as I preferred to call it, "Unincorporated Salt Lake County") house, the starter home that Forrest and I built just off of 5600 West. According to a codified West Side Pecking Order, it's embarrassing to live in West Valley City, but not quite as embarrassing as living in Kearns or Magna. West Valleyites who lived in Taylorsville were obviously superior, however, and I often wondered what it would feel like to be cool enough to live east of 2700 West. I still don't know that feeling . . . :-)

3. Miiiiinnneeeessota! Land of 10,000 lakes and four homes over seven years (Edina apartment, Woodbury rental house, White Bear 11th Street house, White Bear Pintail Lane house.)

4. Jolly Old England. Okay, so we only lived in Altringham, a suburb of Manchester, for three months, but I'll count it since we were there long enough for me to learn to drive on the other side of the road and count out English change.

Favorite TV Shows:

1. So You Think You Can Dance. Best summer show. Well, only summer show. But it does make me happy. Finale this week! I'm rooting for Sabra. Did you know she lived in Roy, Utah for 10 years? Not rooting for Lacy, the sister of last year's winner Benji (my altime SYTYCD fave). She always seems fakey fakey, like she's pretending to be humble. And she shakes her tooshie at the camera too much.

2. Project Runway. Another great reality show about talented people doing things well. And a little snarkiness thrown in for entertainment value. I just saw a clip of season two and Santino doing his impression of Tim Gunn (the host), pretending that he had a crush on another contestant named Andre and that they were all going to Red Lobster. Truly hilarious.

3. The Office/30 Rock. I lump these together because they're both on Thurs nights and both laugh out loud funny. Those of you who aren't as morally corrupted as I am should not watch 30 Rock. But if you are already corrupt and haven't started watching it yet, please do. SOOO funny.

4. Lost. Nuff said.

Favorite Foods:

1. Foods derived from marshmallows. Peeps, circus peanuts, chocolate covered marshmallow Santas, Chicks & Rabbits. I've already explained this on the blog so you know of my marshmallow issues. I also like a good plain marshmallow from the bag.

2. Diet Coke. Also explained.

3. Really good red salmon smoked by Forrest. Yum.

4. Cheesecake with raspberry sauce.

I will have to finish this later because I have gone on way too long and must move along to other things . . . I'll update soon!

UPDATE:

It is now Wednesday morningish and Wyatt is sleeping and I swept the floor and put in a load of laundry and loaded the dishwasher and sat down at the computer to work on my novel, but I am weak and checked blogs instead and got sucked into updating this list. Don't tell my editor. Here's the rest:

Four Websites I Visit:

1. rottentomatoes.com This website is a must for anybody who likes movies. It takes movie reviews from around the country and averages them out for a score ("fresh" or "rotten"). Sometimes I purposefully DON'T go to Rotten Tomatoes before I see a movie and come up with my own little critique and then read the reviews to see how many reviewers agree with my sage observations. A little lame? Maybe. But fun.

2. Babycenter.com. I signed up for a little email newsletter on this site when I was pregnant w/ Wyatt and I've enjoyed the little articles and calculators and calendars and whatnots. Every once in a while I visit the "Birth Club" message board for January 2007 babies, but I never post. But it's fun to read other people's posts, and every once in a while somebody has some good baby rearing advice.

3. Segullah and other "Bloggernacle" (the Mormon blogosphere) blogs like A Motley Vision and Times and Seasons. My friend and fellow writers' group member, Kathy, is the editor of Segullah, and lots of other cool people I (kinda) know post on these other blogs. Fun reading.

4. Slate magazine. My homepage is MSN, and Slate is connected w/ MSN. It seems like whenever they have a "teaser" article on my homepage that looks interesting, it's always a Slate article. The article I linked above is my favorite Slate column, "The Human Guinea Pig." It's a woman who goes and does crazy things like competing in the Mrs. America competition or trying her hand as a street performer. Pretty funny.

Four Places I'd Rather Be:

1. In the really cool Hilton Hotel that Forrest and I stayed in when we visited NYC a couple of years ago. Best bed ever. And awesome views.

2. At the movies.

3. Out to lunch with someone fun.

4. Somewhere quiet. :-) (SCHOOL STARTS MONDAY!! HOORAYY! :-)

People I tag:

1. My friend Delise.
2. My friend Darlene.
3. My sister in law Mindy.

Blessings

Life is good.

Last night I was able to have a fabulous evening with a bunch of extraordinarily cool and smart people discussing the Irreantum fiction contest. We had over 130 entries, and I've spent a good portion of my summer as Irreantum's fiction editor reading these entries, culling them down to a top 25, and organizing the fiction contest committee, whose responsibility it was to come up with the winners.

Last night the committee met and I had a ball discussing the merits of each story and basically watching the gears turn in all these smart people's brains. It's still something of a mystery to me how I fell into my involvement with Irreantum, but I consider it one of my life's real blessings to be a part of something that I care about so much and that gives me so much pleasure. Although my work with the magazine is unpaid (people often ask me if I'm paid--which I'm not since a lit mag runs on a shoestring budget--and they seem genuinely perplexed why I would be involved with something like this without a paycheck attached. I tell them it's like me asking them if they're paid to play on their summer softball leauge :-), and has occasionally been a source of stress, the vast majority of the time I feel nothing but honored to be in a position to help champion quality Mormon literature. I like nothing better than watching talented people do things well, and last night was a prime example of it. Talented writers, talented committee members, smart smart, cool cool people, and I get to hang out with them. And make them cookies and yummy little tortilla wraps and have them over at my house. And have a husband who will take the kids and entertain them for hours and then hustle them upstairs (Wyatt included) with nary a peep to be heard and get them all in bed so my meeting can progress as smoothly as if I were the sterotypical single, urban writer chick living in a loft with nothing in my fridge but ketchup and takeout containers. (Actually it's full of ketchup and Sunny Delight containers.) So I'm blessed.

Then today I got to head out with my good friend Elise--who also happens to be my daughter--and have our annual Mom/Daughter day.


(Elise in her tennis getup, earlier this year).

Mom/Daughter day started a couple of years ago when the boys went on the fathers and sons outing, and now it's a day that Elise and I both look forward to every year. We went and saw Harispray (a wonderfully fun, joyful movie, and it stars the heartthrobby Zac Effron, so Elise was thrilled), went to eat at Red Robin (she had spaghetti and a chocolate shake--interesting combination, but it's her day--and we were both stuffed), and did a little school shopping. She's getting so old. She seems so much older to me than when we did this last year, and it's fun to think that she's growing up into a person I genuinely like being with. Seems like she was just barely my 15 month old who wouldn't walk unless she was holding on to my pinkie. Now she's my 9 year old, Heelying around J.C. Penney and chattering about how Zac Effron looks totally different than he did when he was Troy in High School Musical and she prefers his hair shaggy instead of slick.

So it's been a good couple of days. And tonight we're going to a BBQ (don't have to cook!). And Monday we're going to Lagoon. (I can ride the rides! And I couldn't last year because I was preggo.) And Thurs-Sat we're going to a condo by a lake with my family. And then the kids go back to school and Wyatt and I get to hang out. Did I tell you he's *this* close to crawling? Crazy 6 1/2 month old baby.

Life is good.

Why I don't go to the mall

I don't go to the mall very often, mainly because it's big and noisy and I buy most everything my family needs (wears, eats, watches, reads, drinks, plays with, etc etc) at Target. But the kids needed new shoes for school and Mervyn's was having a sale so I thought I'd check it out. While I was there, though, I:

1. Spent way too much money on shoes. The kids talked me in to getting them "Heelies" ("They're really comfortable, Mom, and we'll wear them without the wheels for our regular school shoes--promise!") which were on sale for $25 less than they usually cost, but still. Spending money on shoes and clothes gives me a very slight momentary thrill but then I end up feeling sick to my stomach. I wish this were the case for some of my other vices, though, as it usually keeps me from spending a whole lot of money on shoes and clothes. We'll see how practical the Heelies decision ends up being. I already told them that if they lose the wheels, they're dead meat. All three of them.

2. Decided to take Wyatt in to Kiddie Kandids for his 6 month pictures since he's almost not six months old anymore and Kiddie Kandids was virtually empty, so I could walk right up and get the pictures done.

3. But first I had to do to the Gymboree down the way and buy Wyatt an outfit for said pictures--but it was on sale for 14.99. Ethan said he looked like a giant tomato but I thought he was cute.

4. I had the smoothest, most enjoyable Kiddie Kandids photo shoot ever, considering it was spur of the moment and I had all the other kids with me going "NOOOOOO! Not Kiddie Kandids! That takes FOREVER!" I got right in, Wyatt was smiley and cooperative (except for trying to crawl off of the portrait platform.) Here are the proofs from the photo shoot. Sorry if they're small, but you know the Kiddie Kandids people want you to shell out the cold hard cash for the good ones:







Too cute, right? I ended up wanting to get most of them, but I didn't succumb and only bought the first (w/ the black background) and the last (on his tummy). It still ended up costing me . . . well . . . more than I'd hoped. I swear Kiddie Kandids used to be cheaper. Didn't it??? Oh, but he's so dang good lookin I couldn't help it.

And this is why I don't go to the mall.

Dr. Weissbluth is up in the night . . .

or at least he should be, with me, suffering the consequences of his sweeping pronouncements. Like, oh, babies should go to bed at 7:00, and if they do, then they will magically sleep even better because they are getting MORE sleep and sleep begets sleep and blah blah blah. Lemme tell ya, there was precious little sleep begetting last night. Here's proof: Wyatt Dean at 5:25 a.m.



I think the only thing being begotten there is his brother's light saber. And a mischievous look of satisfaction.

Yesterday I went to the zoo w/ the kids--lots of fun, but a story for another time--and, as a result, Wyatt's naps were all messed up. I tried to get him down for a late afternoon nap and he wouldn't go, so we decided to push him until 7:30 and then just put him down for good (according to the good Dr. Weissbluth's pontifications in Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, this should be Wyatt's regular bedtime anyway. And if you miss a nap, you're supposed to push it until the next regular naptime or bedtime.) But then Wyatt woke up at 10:30--which wasn't too bad, because we weren't asleep ourselves yet, but then he woke up again and 2:00 and then again at 4:15. At the 4:15 wakeup, I went in to feed him (again) and of course he promptly peed through his diaper, which is the kiss of death if your baby is lightly on the edge of wakefulness. (I recommend Dr. Weissbluth add a new chapter to his book called "Peeing Through.") So I changed the Wy-Man, rocked him vigorously and patted his bum, and once again achieved a light state of sleepiness so put him back down in his crib and tiptoed away. I allowed myself to hope (which is the biggest mistake of all) and drifted back to sleep myself when I didn't hear anything by about 5:00. But then at 5:25 he started crying and we came downstairs and I took the cute picture with the lightsaber and started blogging.

Now he is getting fussy on the floor. He has moved from playing with the boys' lightsaber to playing with the electric blue hair piece Elise received as a party favor after attending a birthday celebration at "Sweet and Sassy," a beauty parlor for little girls where they dress them up in leopard print evening gowns and do their hair with electric blue hair pieces and cover all exposed skin with multicolored glitter and send them down a runway. Also a story for another day.

I do think that Dr. Weissbluth has some important advice to impart. Wyatt has been sleeping better when his naps are better and Forrest, ever the optimist, believes that last night was simply an anomaly because Wyatt's naps were so disrupted during the day. Perhaps so, my dear. Perhaps so. But I'm not buying the 7:00 bedtime, Mister Doctor with the sweeping generalizations and the horrifyingly disorganized sleep advice book that has sold millions. (Really, for a book that has gone through a multitude of reprints, could this guy get an editor??? There book has no internal sense of structure and he skips from thought to thought as if he were a self-important dinner guest giving no thought for anyone else's time. Maybe that's why I don't entirely respect this guy: not only am I up at 5:00 a.m., but he doesn't know how to write.)

And now a smell has wafted my way and I think it's time for a diaper change. Oh, Wyatt Dean. I love you. Now can I please get some sleep????

Update: Wyatt did fall asleep again at 6:30 and I was able to get back into bed myself, since the kids still don't have school. We both slept until 8:30. Hooray! It is now 9:07 and the other three kids are still sawing logs . . . .