Fifteen

Fifteen things I love about my birthday girl:

1) I can't make her do anything--except last week I did make her take a walk with me because I wouldn't log on the computer until after she did.  Over the years this trait of Emma's has made me a little crazy at times but ultimately I'm happy that she is her own person (whether I like it or not).

2) I love hearing Emma make music.  Whether she is playing the piano, singing, or playing the guitar, her music delights me.

3) Her courage astounds me.  She'll do something that seems completely out of character, she'll sing a solo at a concert or the Star Spangled Banner at a football game, she'll join a group of strangers if they are involved in an activity she wants to participate in...all this from a girl that isn't completely comfortable ordering in a restaurant.

4) Most nights she gets up from the dinner table while the rest of us are still chatting and she'll start doing the dishes.  No one asks her to do it, she just does.  Also, she's super strong.

5) She is a talented artist and writer.  She is also able to understand when I forget a word for a person, place or thing.  I say, "Will you go get whatsit?" or "You'll have to ask whatsit..." and she almost always knows what I mean.

6) We are both introverts and love nothing better than being home together...separately.

7) Emma is very funny.  Her specialty is clever plays on words.  She is also good at laughing at herself.



8) She is a generous and loyal and non-competitive friend.



9) Her heart is tender and her eyes leak when she is touched by something.



10) Grammar matters to her.

11) Her handwriting reminds me of my sister Olivia's.

12) She is a conscientious and hard-working student.



13) Her morality barometer is very keen and she isn't afraid to stand up for truth.



14) She is not materialistic.

15) Recently she has started making her bed.  Usually not until after school, but this is progress, people. (see number 1)

 Happy birthday Emma Jayne!  I'm glad you're my girl.

A valentine to Adam

A few nights ago, Braeden was regaling us with arguments in favor of his latest scheme (a friend has invited him along on a family trip to Hawaii this summer).  I've told him that the jury is definitely still out.  He keeps scheming and bringing it up and haranguing us in a way that only Braeden can harangue.

He said, getting up from the table, "I'm not going to bother you about it.  I'm not going to pester you."

Adam and I looked at each other and laughed.  We laughed and laughed.  Without saying a word, we both knew why.  It was funny to us that 1) Braeden didn't think he had already been bothering us and 2) he really expected us to believe he wasn't going to in the future.

Later we were watching the Olympics and NBC had effectively manipulated our heartstrings into pulling for a certain Swiss skier.  Then she won gold and called her grandparents on her cell phone to tell them she won.  Adam and I both looked at each other with tears in our eyes.  The Olympics gets us every time.

That's one of the great things about a long marriage.  You laugh and cry at the same predictable intervals and no explanation is needed.

I also love that Adam orders food he knows I'll want to eat off his plate, he plans ahead for my tiredness or hunger on road trips, and he usually knows what I want before I do.  In the history of Adam I don't think there's been a time when he couldn't make me feel better.  He's had enough on the job training of handling a stressed out wife that I think he could be a successful 9-1-1 operator.  He stays calm.  And he gets me.

Except when he doesn't and I love that too.

I love the ways that we surprise each other and show each other parts of the world that we wouldn't have otherwise known about.

I know more about sports and politics and critical thinking than I would otherwise because of Adam and I like to give myself credit for introducing Adam to Jane Austen.

The longer we're married the more I feel like we're a team.  We each have our strengths and weaknesses.  We need each other.  Life with him is pretty grand.

I love you, Adam.

Happy Valentine's Day.

A valentine to my children

Last weekend Braeden and Emma and I watched some family movies from when they were babies.  It always makes me happy.  It makes them happy too.  I look over at them and they have huge smiles on their faces.

After, Braeden asked me if there were things about them now that I never would have guessed back then.

I thought about it and oddly, there aren't.  The only one I could come up with is that I had no idea I would enjoy them as teenagers as much as I do.  I think I believed the stereotype that teenagers are rotten and to be endured when in reality, I really like teenagers.

In their essence though, my children are the same as their cherubic toddler counterparts.

There are videos of Braeden being Braeden.  He doesn't just sing (everything from Broadway show tunes to songs he learned on Barney) but he also dances and gestures elaborately.  His face is expressive and he makes jokes.  Also, I loved the way it was clear that he adored his dad.  He still does.

Braeden was the ringleader of the action in the videos.  Even when the camera was focused elsewhere, you could hear him singing or chatting.

I also loved seeing the way he interacted with his sister.



About a week ago during choir--which he and Emma have together--Braeden texted me, "I wish you could hear Emma right now."  He thought she was singing beautifully.  Also, last night he told me of his genius move of having his sister proofread his paper.  He thinks she's wonderful.

I think he is wonderful.

I love you, Braeden.

Emma was quieter in the family movies.  She had a smile that, like now, could melt ice.  When Adam, who usually was doing the camera work, would ask her a question, she listened carefully.  Before she had any words, Adam would talk to her and it was plain to see she knew exactly what he was talking about.  She'd watch Braeden from a bemused distance.  Sometimes she'd join in his game and other times she'd do her own thing.  Like now, she was her own little person.

When Emma was small she named everything.  Her all time favorite stuffed cat was immediately named Sally.  She also had Inca and Chinta who were beloved.

Last night I was downstairs, writing on my laptop and she was upstairs in the school room, writing on a desktop computer.  I kept texting her to give me names for my characters. 

I could have walked upstairs and been in the same room as her but as I've said before, texting Emma is a highlight of my life.  Her gift with words extends into her text messages.

The older Emma gets, the more I like her (and I started from a place of liking her a whole lot).

I love you, Emma.

Mark wasn't in the videos we were watching but the same holds true for him.

When he was a baby, he was hot or cold.  Happy or...not.  He still is that way.  There is never anyone as miserable as Mark when he is miserable and when Mark is enthusiastic about something, it's best to just get out of his way.

He was a tenacious baby who moved at full speed and experimented.  He'd put a dishtowel over his head and crawl at full speed until he had terrific crashes.  He spun in circles in the dark until he banged into his bed (he lost a tooth over that one).  Now his experiments are thankfully safer for him but maybe not for our electronics...

When Mark was cranky as a toddler, the best thing to do was get on the floor and wrestle with him for awhile.  He still loves to be physical whether he is tearing through the house with a nerf gun or snuggling.  When Mark was a baby, I was homeschooling his older siblings and he'd do things like fill the toilet with Lego bricks.  He still likes to work magic with Legos--and he is still not a huge fan of school.

I am looking forward to Mark as a teenager.  (And bracing myself just a little bit.)

I love you, Mark.

Do I love my first born, my only daughter, or my ginger baby best?

Yes.

Misunderstandings

They cause a lot of wha???

They can cause embarrassment and hurt feelings or waste time and energy.

Sometimes misunderstandings just delight me though.

Mark and I are reading a book for school called What Ever Happened to Penny Candy?  It is about economics.  Mark, being Mark, loves the book.  He is fascinated with economics.  I am not fascinated with economics but I have learned from the book.

I was telling Geri about a part of the book and Emma said, "Oh!  I thought Penny Candy was a person!"

She had seen the book lying around.  She thought we were reading a mystery...

An organization that benefits blind people called and asked if I had any donations.  Since I'm on the getting-rid-of-things rampage, why yes, I did have things to donate.  I was having Mark help me move stuff to the front porch for pick up.  I was supposed to put a sign on it that read 'Blind' so they would know it was for them.

One of the items I was donating was a mirror.  Mark was amiably hauling things for me but the mirror gave him pause.  "Mom?" he said, in his best diplomatic-I-don't-mean-to-offend voice, "I'm not sure you should donate the mirror.  Why does a blind person need a mirror?"

I explained that the items would be sold and the money would go to benefit blind people.  Ohhhhhh.

One of my favorite misunderstandings happened awhile ago but it still makes me happy.  Emma asked one of her friends at school (who is also a Mormon) if he'd watched General Conference (it's a televised church meeting twice a year that we love--it means church in pajamas and listening to our prophet).  Anyway. This boy said, "No," in a way to indicate Emma was off her rocker.

Then he said, "Wait, what did you say?"

Emma repeated her question.

He said, "Ohhhh, I thought you asked me if I went to a dental conference."

I've never met that boy but I think I love him.  

My noble little sister told me about a misunderstanding of her own the other day.  It is more serious than these others--it cost her money--but it also delighted me just a tiny bit.  It's because Olivia, all the way down to her core, is a good good person.  She was trying to do something really nice for someone she hardly knew and it ended up costing her way more money than she thought.  Not fun but I love that girl.  She has a heart of gold.

Of late

We were driving home one night and Silver Lake was full of floating lanterns:

Every once in awhile, for no explained reason, the world is just a little bit magical.

Also, I have officially Thelma-proofed by computer.  

Braeden and some of his friends skipped school last week to go to the Seahawks parade in Seattle.   Emma wanted to go too but I didn't think that could be true.  She admitted she didn't really want to go to Seattle, she just didn't want to go to school.

I insisted she stay home with me then.

Let the other kids catch up.  (This is what happens when your mom is a recovering home schooler.)  I am happiest when my kids are home.

Or at Alfy's for lunch with me.

Just look at those virtuous plates of salad.  Despite the occasional truancy, I'm not a 100% terrible mother.

Mark and I went on a date while the rest of our people went on a youth temple trip.  Mark is a good date.  He is funny and pleasant and...organized.  He mapped out the agenda.  (Also he didn't mind when I got lost temporarily.  In Snohomish.  I don't want to talk about it except I'm really not the type of person that should go a different way that I think may be faster...) Essentially we just ran errands which is pretty much normal life but some of the errands were for sheer pleasure so that elevates it all to date status I think.

Mark was patient enough to accompany me to a few of my favorite stores in Snohomish.

We found some statements we could get behind:

We walked through the antique mall that is sort of a glorified garage sale.  It is always fun to look.  I found this cookie jar:

It reminded me of one my parents have/used to have?  (Do you still have it?)  My parents' is cuter and it sometimes had wheat in it (my dad--he likes wheat) or peanuts.  I don't remember cookies being in it that often.  I don't think cookies last long enough to make it to a cookie jar.  (My mom makes good cookies.)

We were going to have dinner at one of our favorite hamburger places, The Blazing Onion, but the line was huge.  I promised Mark we'd go another day, at lunch time.

Because really, Mark and I sort of have a date every day.

We went to the Arby's drive thru instead.  He gave me one of his curly fries.  (Usually one fry is plenty for me...unless it's sweet potato fries.  I love those guys.)

I guess this is all just to say:

“Sometimes, the simple things are more fun and meaningful than all the banquets in the world ...”

E.A. Bucchianeri

I have more issues than Vogue*

On Friday night we watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics.  I love the Olympics and the opening ceremonies is one of my favorite parts.  I started to get uncomfortable though.  In the cultural presentation portion, when they were celebrating Russia's history, I started feeling uneasy during the part about the Soviets.    Our kids thought my reaction was odd so I told them about Mrs. Callahan.

Mrs. Callahan was my fifth grade teacher.  She reminds me of a character from a Roald Dahl book.  She was mean and tyrannical and gave a lot of homework (way more than I had in high school).  It seems like maybe she could be the type of strict teacher that once you got through her crusty exterior she had a heart of gold and loved children and teaching, but I never felt that way.  I was afraid of her.  And also I didn't like all the homework.

She smoked like a train and was overweight and really unhealthy.  She had a blood clot in her leg and missed a good portion of the school year when I was in 5th grade.  I felt like it was the best thing that could have happened to me.  Mrs. Dalton was our substitute.  Mrs. Dalton was benevolent and kind.  She read us novels (Mrs. Callahan actually got mad when she found out) and she didn't give us all the homework Mrs. Callahan wanted us to have.  The principal would come into the room and solemnly tell us how Mrs. Callahan was doing and that she'd still be gone for awhile and I tried to feign concern but I felt like I'd been given a stay of execution.  Mrs. Callahan's illness made me happy.

My clearest memory of 5th grade is the day Mrs. Callahan decided to tell us about the Cold War.  I don't know why she felt compelled to do so.  I don't know if it was somehow related to our curriculum?  I remember her sitting at her podium and telling us about the Russians.  They were coming for us.  They had nuclear weapons and we had nuclear weapons and they were pointed at each other.  She told us that the president had a button in his office and that he could push it at any time and essentially, the world would end.

She also told us that Seattle was a big city and that Russia would certainly target Seattle.  She told us we got our weather from Seattle so we would get the nuclear fallout.

(Now that I live in Seattle, it is plain to see not all the weather here makes it to the desert of northeastern Nevada...)

I started having nightmares about Russians landing at our school.  They'd chase us down and torture us with ice picks.  (Mrs. Callahan didn't supply the ice picks, my imagination did.)

I remember practicing the piano one afternoon and crying from the sheer terror of it all.

I eventually made it out of 5th grade.  The Cold War ended and we've reached a somewhat strained peace with Russia.  The world's not going to end with Russians landing in the playground and chasing me.  Friday night I had scary dreams though, they were vague but the Bad Guys in the dreams all had Russian accents.

Intellectually, I'm not afraid of Russians anymore but there may be a scared 5th grader in me that is still a little terrorized.

Thank you Mrs. Callahan.


*I can't take credit for this title.  I saw it on pinterest and it tickled my fancy.

Books I read in January 2014

Wildflower by Mark Seal***

Wildflower is a biography about Joan Root.  She was of English descent and was born and raised in Kenya.  She was a wonderfully capable woman and lived a full life as a safari leader and filmmaker and naturalist.  Towards the end of her life she worked hard to preserve a lake she loved and to protect the habitat from poachers and pollution.  It ended up getting her brutally murdered which was very sad.  This book was fascinating and made me mad at the same time.  Her husband was a cad and didn't deserve her undying love but he had it.

Eric Liddell by Janet and Geoff Benge***

I don't record all the books Mark and I read together but I liked this one.  It was an interesting story about an impressive and good man.  All I knew about Eric Liddell before I read this was that he was the Chariots of Fire guy.  There's good history in the book too...stuff I didn't know about China's history.  (I could write volumes about what I don't know about China's history.)

House of Sixty Fathers by Meindert DeJong ****

I read this book to Mark too.  I LOVED it.  It was a very sweet story about a little boy--and his pig--who were separated from his family and his resourcefulness and the kindness of strangers.  It made me cry.

Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel **

I liked and didn't like The Life of Pi (also by Yann Martel).  It was well written and fascinating and I love a good twist but it was also violent and I don't like that.

I was hesitant to read this book for that reason.  I know Braeden LOVED The Life of Pi and I thought maybe I didn't give it enough of a chance so I should give this book a chance.

It was well written and interesting.  And violent.  I don't think I'd recommend it for that reason.  Too much.  Just seeing the cover makes me uneasy now (I spook easily).

The Magic of Ordinary Days by Ann Howard Creel ****

I loved this book.  It was such a pleasant relief after Beatrice and Virgil.  I'm 90% sure I'd read the book before but I didn't remember it enough that it detracted from the story.  I don't remember books I've read which is why I've started recording them here.  I'd blame it on my encroaching dotage but I've been that way my whole life.

It's a sweet love story set during World War II.  There's more to it than that of course...I don't have the attention span for proper summaries of books...

I've Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella ****

Sophie Kinsella is incredibly entertaining.  I have enjoyed every book I've read by her.  I love her hapless characters and her wit.  This is a perfect romantic comedy.  You should be warned that there's language in this book that made me cringe and wince but the book was so good, I overlooked it.  Maybe I shouldn't be admitting that?