Cops and Robbers

At the risk of exposing myself as addicted to blogging and really having nothing else to do and at the greater risk of fanning the neighborhood, "let's move" fire I thought I'd fill you in on a robbery in the hood yesterday. I was taking Gage to school yesterday when I passed a Sheriff coming down our street. I thought, "Finally these guys are doing something about our drug problem!" He was very intently looking at my neighbor's house. We were late so I kept going. When I got home there were 5 police cars and a crime unit at the top of my street. Thankfully Joe the mailman, you all know him...best mailman ever...knows everyone and everything that goes on in this hood was walking by. I asked him what was going on and he told me my neighbors house had been robbed but that he thought the cops caught him in the act. Needless to say I was a bit freaked because it seems a bit brazen to rob someone at 12:30 in the afternoon not to mention earlier I had my door open to let in the great weather. Anyway, the cops were there for quiet a while but while I was bringing in my garbage cans later I heard the Sheriff talking to another neighbor, since I have good hearing, I gathered that he was the hero of the day for noticing someone who didn't belong in their backyard and calling the cops immediately so they could catch the guy. Yet later in the day I went on a walk...unusually brave for me I know, but I figure they caught that guy, and I saw an undercover cop sitting on 8th which I think is encouraging that the police haven't totally abandoned us! I think the moral of the story is to be alert of what is going on and not to be afraid to call the cops right away. As great as I think it is that the neighborhood ladies ride around the neighborhood in their cars even staring me down (someone they see everyday!) the real help comes from just watching out for your neighbors!

It's A Hair Thing

I got a hair cut today. I know for normal people this is no biggie. For me it is always a big event which usually ends with me crying at my sister's house for an hour. I've got two problems. First my sister lives in Oregon so crying at her house won't really be an option today...although I've been checking on flights. :) The second problem is that both kids needed naps so I guess I'm stuck. Maybe I can come cry at one of your houses. I think my sister always thought it was funny. I cut it all off. My hair that is. The floor of the salon looked like the site of a dog murder. While I'm sure my neck muscles will love the break I on the other hand am wondering how when I brought a picture of what I wanted how I ended up looking like I do.

Per an earlier post you all know that I've been bugged with my mom image and this hair cut was phase one of revamp. I think I'm going to need a whole new syllabus. I ordered all these shirts off the internet last week and between one of them being defective (one sleeve was noticeably bigger than the other...it looked like on one arm I had granny flab and the other a normal arm) one not being in stock and being sent something totally different and the others totally unflattering I think the stars are not aligned at this moment for a new look. Bring on the mu mu.
Which by the way while I was pregnant Gage used to tell perfect strangers that I needed a mu mu because I was so, "fat." My ego will never survive that kid. When I picked him up today the first thing he said was, "I don't like your hair." I asked why and he said, "Because it isn't cute." See why I need to cry. I'll just cry here alone. (how's that for a pitiful picture?) No, I'll call my sister. I can't even fit it in a pony tail to hide the ugliness thereof.

Tiny Talks

Gage is a Sunbeam and he gave his first talk in Primary on Sunday. He did really well. I was wondering if he would freeze up when he got to the microphone or if he would talk loud enough, but he was really excited and spoke pretty well. They assigned the Sunbeam class the Doctrine and Covenants which was little over his head and difficult for all of them to say but all in all he did good. I just can't believe he is old enough to be doing it. Heck, I can't believe I'm old enough to be helping him. Sometimes I still feel about 14 years old, and then I remind myself that I'm a mom!

So, I started out with the positive stuff from church. Now if you'll indulge me for just a sec (you know with me it won't be just a sec and it will be this really long post. Every time I sit down to post I think, "I'm going to make this short" Ha. like that has ever happened...see there I go again) I'll move onto some more negative feelings from yesterday. Gage has been really excited about going to primary and yesterday seemed no different until we got to the door of his classroom and he had a melt down to end all melt downs. I sat there like an idiot in indecision. I really had no idea what to do. My mom always seemed to know what to do. Maybe she is better at pretending like she knows what to do. He really isn't one for melt downs. Sure he cries when he gets hurt or frightened but this is the first time he has been hysterical for no apparent reason. All he kept saying is, "I want to go home and play." We tried just forcing him and I have never seen him defy an adult before but he was digging in his heels and yelling, "NO!" when the teacher tried to take him to class.

It was truly bizarre and just accentuated my own feelings about church yesterday. If I could've dug in my heels and yelled, "NO!" without looking like a big freak I would have. Afternoon church with kids is such a struggle for me. Actually church with kids is a struggle sometimes. Between keeping them quiet and trying to listen myself I feel exhausted at the end. I just feel pulled in a million different directions on Sunday. I don't feel like I'm doing one thing really well...just a lot of things crappy. Is that too lame? Tim is wonderful to take care of Luke but he has so much on his plate at church too. Although some people treat him like he is a slacker which further riles me. I think our family is just having growing pains and I just long for the feeling of being excited to go to church!

I am determined to end this on a good note. I know that church is where I'm supposed to be on Sunday and even when I feel the spirit for like a split second it makes all the trauma worth it.






Thanks to Gage the neighborhood is now safe from dragons again. The drug dealers...still not so much!

Nerd Fest 2008

I married a nerd. I've always known that but it hasn't been until recently that the level of Tim's nerdyness has really sunk in. Tim built his own computer last week. Nerds don't just buy their computer already put together from say like Dell or Hewlett Packard. You build it with tools and everything and you invite other nerds to help. He has done this before several times but this is the first time I've watched. I knew it was serious nerd activity when he passed up a piece of chocolate mousse pie in favor of putting it together. There was a hushed reverence in the air when the parts were taken out of the plastic and I swear he sniffed the air as he circled the parts like a shaman circles the fire chanting for more rain. Apparently computers can't be built on the carpet unless you have a special potion of Snuggle and water in a water bottle, to combat static electricity, which we didn't have and the other nerd left at home. So it had to be built on the hard-wood. I was threatened with divorce at one point and I inadvertently almost dropped my fork (I had the pie anyway) right next to the holy computing parts which sent Nerd no. 1 and Nerd no. 2 into convulsions. Anyway, it is from this new fangled machine that I write this post and reflect on this nerd exhibition.

Gage is exactly like Tim. They look the same and act the same and Gage seems to have the same affinity for computers. What I'm trying to say is we are raising a nerd. And I'm really no help because I suspect I may be a nerd too and since I lack all coordination of my limbs I can't teach him a sport. Although Tim is an annoying nerd who also has physical abilities in most sports except Basketball. Gage plays video games already (which I vowed I would never do but what do you do when your husband is so giddy to show the lad how to play?) Gage and I were playing Lego Star Wars on our Game Cube and in an impatient voice and reaching onto my controller Gage says to me, "Here mom let me show you how to do it." That made me feel pretty dumb...even a 3 year-old is better than I am. We got Gage a ClickStart computer for Christmas and he had it pretty much mastered in about 2 sittings and can totally control the mouse on his own. I'll never forget the first mouse I saw on my friend's Apple, remember those? I thought that I would never figure out how to move one. There are worse things than being nerdy so I guess I'll keep them both!

Then there is Luke. It is too early to measure the nerd factor but what I can measure is that he doesn't have Tim's easy going attitude. The kid has a temper and a strong will like nobody's business. Which sadly I think he can thank me for. He has taken to full body temper tantrums that get my own temper flaring in a way I never did with Gage. Doesn't he seem too young to be doing stuff just to bug me? I swear though he is a teenager trapped in a 1 year old body. He's pretty cute too though. Just as I'm about to publish this post Luke has gotten a hold of our cordless phone and turned it on and now it is making that annoying off the hook sound and judging by the delight on his face as he utters, "Ohhh" I fear I do in fact have another nerd on my hands only this nerd has a terrible temper.

P.S. This is a an "ahhh" moment. The above pic of Gage holding Luke has a story. I was dressing Gage in the living room and Luke was standing next to the couch, and Gage wouldn't come over. He was hovering by Luke and I was getting exasperated with him and he finally said, "Mom I don't want Luke to fall again!" Luke had just hit his head a few minutes before. So I told Gage I would watch Luke really carefully if he would get dressed. Gage dressed in record time and went over to Luke and said, "You can fall on me Luke!" A great mom moment!

Identity Theft

To my male readers I suggest reading the following post only if you wish to congratulate yourself on being male and knowing that the shirt, jeans, and sneakers you wear today will still be in fashion into the next millennium.

I'm a woman with an identity crisis. And not because I'm called, Queen Amidala, Princess Leah, and Jaba the Hut as much as I'm called mom. What it really boils down to is I have no idea what I'm supposed to look like. I look exactly, and I mean exactly, like I did my senior year in High School. Granted my hair was a bit longer, had more highlights, and more layers but I could walk into my high school and say, "Hey, you guys want to skip 7th period and go to McDonald's?" I did that a lot by the way and I barely passed seminary (with make-up work) and then was asked to speak at seminary graduation in the assembly hall (my penance). From my place on the stand I could see people saying to each other, "She took seminary?" and then someone answered, "Yeah, I had a class with her once and she came a few times." I loved seminary but it was easy to skip so I did.

I'm sorry I always tell another story betwixt the one I'm trying to tell. Where was I? Oh yeah, I look the same. I don't know how to change this. I look at the clothes in my closet and think, "ick." Maybe the reason I'm having a hard time changing my image is I'm not so sure about some of the fashions I see around. I never was a fashionista but it looks like everyone raided Luke's touch and feel book and ripped the fake fur off and glued it to the hoods of their coats and around their boots and then they dipped cotton balls in dye and glued those to the shoe laces. I would feel ridiculous if I stepped out of the house like that. But does that mean I'm ready for the mom jeans? I vow now to never wear them.

Being a stay-at-home mom has messed with my inner fashion sense. I have known others this has happened to. My cute sister for example. She had really cute fashion...she still does actually, but when she was pregnant the first time she came to show me this truly hideous sweater (picture the PTA president) she had just bought and I could tell that the battle of mom fashion was raging insider her. And I laughed at her...rude I know...and now the battle rages inside me. I've been drawn to velor track suits (they seem comfy and I won't care when a cracker is smashed to oblivion into my pant leg) and every time I've gone shopping with my friend Andrea, she has literally physically restrained me from buying one. She just had a baby though and she called to tell me that she thought I could buy one, clearly she has been corrupted in just a matter of a few weeks. I knew she couldn't be trusted anymore when she suggested I accent my pink and yellow bathroom with baby blue? If you could see my face right now you'd see I have one eyebrow raised. It must be the estrogen. Here's the thing though. My sister and Andrea still look cute while I on the other hand am paralyzed by my lack of fashion prowess and I think I've worn the same pair of jeans 2 or 3 times this week.

Adding to my anxiety is Tim. He doesn't like any change in my appearance. A new beret in my hair sends him over the edge and earns me comments like, "I'll have to get used to it." Before I had kids I paid no attention. I was in college and worked full time so I knew, by looking at others, that I looked good, and people even complimented me from time to time! Tim compliments me too but only when I'm wearing what I call a "safe outfit." Amongst those safe outfits are my Banana Republic business casual wardrobe from my working days. Seriously don't have reason to wear those to playgroup or grocery shopping.

So that's it. My crisis I'm sure will rage on. My identity stolen and I'm still looking for it.

Spring at Last and Curls Part Duex

I know it may be a bit premature but I felt the first hint of spring in the air this weekend! It has been really sunny today and I know I shouldn't get too excited because there are some more storms on the horizon. I think I truly and honestly suffer from the winter blues and just the slight indication that winter won't last forever is making me happier. I thought I would share my joy.

The story goes in my family that I had wonderful and beautiful curls at the back of my head when I was a baby. My dad loved said curls and my mom, while she thought they were OK, she thought that my hair wasn't going to grow because of them. Seriously...it was the 70's and my mom drank a lot of Pepsi. So my mom kept telling my dad that she was going to cut my hair and my dad threatened divorce if she did. (not really but you know how idle threats go) So poor dad went off to work one day and when he came home my mom and a neighbor had cut my curls! I was too young to know how severe my dad's reaction was but given the fact that my dad, to this day, has an envelope that contains my curls and that he never fails to lament, "when you were little you had the cutest curls and your mother cut them off and they never grew back." I'm thinking he was pretty upset. I try explaining to him that my hair looks so straight because I use a flat iron and that I have annoyingly wavy hair that drives me nuts if I don't iron it but it is lost on him. He is a guy after all and he doesn't have much hair of his own so maybe that is why he worries about mine?

Here inlays my problem. Luke has the curls. They have just shown up in the last couple of weeks as the hair at the base of his neck has gotten longer. They are really only curly after he gets out of the tub and when his head is sweaty from his nap. Boys are gross...they sweat when they sleep. Anyway, so my dad is in love with them. He holds Luke and pets his head like Luke were a dog. I have to say it has given me and my disappointing straight hair a break. The problem is that Luke needs a hair cut. My two options are: leave the kid with a mullet circa 1984 and dad will be happy or for the rest of my life have added to my own curl murder Luke's as well. My dad has held this grudge against my mom for what, 28 years? I'm sure it will be a new family controversy.

I thought that just because Gage has straight hair he shouldn't be left out of this post. Although he did have the weirdest hair I have ever seen as a baby. He had this one part in the back that grew up and he looked like a rooster until I finally cut his hair at 5 months old. He was born with a mullet that was cut when he was 2 weeks old. No, I don't have an envelope. Lately he has been telling me he is so smart because he eats Smarties. One of my all time favorite candies. Earlier today he was yelling from his bedroom in a very distraught voice, "Darth Sidious (that's Tim today) I need help!" I really thought he was in trouble but I was fixing dinner and Tim totally unfazed said, "What's the matter Anakin?" Gage yelled back fake crying, "I'm in the lava come fix me!" For those of you who are lucky enough to have never seen Star Wars or you have normal children who like Diego I'll explain. Darth Vader, who's real name is Anakin, became such because he fell into lava and Darth Sidious fetched him out and saved him so they could be mean together.

Bad Luck

Do you ever feel like everything that can go wrong does? We've felt that way this whole year with this and that. Yesterday morning T-Dawg woke up to take care of L-Dawg (I love that guy...what a great husband) and noticed that our heater wasn't blowing and that it was 62 degrees inside. Since we don't have a basement that means, yup you guessed it, our heater is in the crawl space. This is not a normal house. I don't even have a closet tall enough for our vacuum. So T-Dawg gets his winter outfit on and braved the cold at 2 am to crawl into the crawl space and try and fix it. He wasn't victorious and by morning it was 56 degrees. So we called this guy, Tony, our handyman. I love saying that...we have a handyman. It makes me think we are genteel and I just said, "summon the manservant!" Tony is awesome. He has great rates, can fix anything, and he shows up when he says he's going to. If you'll remember our water heater was on the fritz a couple of months ago and Tony came to the rescue then too. Well, we found out that we have the Rolls Royce of furnaces which isn't such a good thing because the part that was broken had a freakin' computer in it and didn't come cheap to fix and the only store that sells the part doesn't sell to civilians. But Tony, bless him, went and set up an account with them yesterday just for us to get the part and I am pleased to announce that I'm writing this post in a warm house today! Anyway, the whole point of this post is I told Tony that I would pass on his info to generate business for him. He probably didn't' know I was going to do a post on my blog but that's the wave of the future Tony! We were ticked about the furnace because T-Dawg's aunt, who we bought this house from, put in the new furnace and water heater in 2001 and we have had problems with both despite the fact that she paid Rolls Royce prices for the stupid furnace that is way too big for this house and explains why our heating bills are $160 in the winter to heat 972 sq feet. I know that was a run on sentence. She was blind, T-Dawg's aunt, and people took advantage of her and it makes me so mad. But I digress if you ever need something fixed I recommend Tony.

Farrer Better Handyman
897-8879


Also, here's a shout out to my Bro and his family for letting us sleep at their house while the heater was out. G-Dawg got his wish to have a sleep-over with their kids after all. Between the food and the new sheets we felt like we stayed at a hotel! Love you guys.

Passing of a Prophet

Since President Hinckley passed away last week I thought I'd do an unusually serious post. I've been watching a lot of the coverage of his life and it never fails to strike me of what an extraordinary person he was and how we have all been blessed at having known him. I'm also so thankful that the church is a church of order and that we aren't thrown into a tizzy that our leader has passed away and that we know there are a line of wonderful men who can take his place. With that said I don't know that anyone will ever replace him. I think I have selective ADD and it seems it always kicks in when I watch conference. Seriously I feel like I'm five years old and the paint on the walls suddenly has my interest. However I never felt that way when President Hinckley spoke. I honestly sit a little straighter when I hear his voice. He had a way of talking about the gospel that anyone could understand and inspired me to be better. He often closed conference by saying that he felt he could be better or kinder and I always said to myself, "If President Hinckley thinks he can do better than so can I." I'm going to miss hearing him and seeing his smile but like everyone I'm so happy that he gets to be with his wife again. One quote from him that actually came from Pres. Hinckley's father when he was struggling on his mission is, "forget yourself and go to work." It is obvious that President Hinckley adopted that fully and lived every last day with that in mind. He also was a optimist to the extreme and would that I could live to be half as optimistic as he is. He makes me proud to be a Latter-Day Saint, not that I needed a reason but you know what I mean!

Music To My Ears

Thought I would share this clip of L-Dawg laughing. Might be the cutest noise on earth. Our digital camera takes small video clips and I've never used it before. It is pretty low quality so sorry you can practically count the pixels. I've been against getting a video camera but this has me thinking one might not be too bad.