Thursday, November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving

While perusing the Internet, I found this creepy picture and a few million quotes about gratitude. These are a few that stood out to me.
"You cannot do a kindness too soon because you never know how soon it will be too late."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Some people are always grumbling because roses have thorns; I am thankful that thorns have roses."
-Alphonese Karr
"He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has."
-Epictetus
I really am so very grateful and appreciative for all that I have. Just thought I should share that again. Happy Thanksgiving!

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

She's a real comedian

I was out running errands with my kids today. Avery, Tyler & Cameron were all in the back seat telling each other jokes. There were the usual poop and pee jokes and other kid fare. They were having a rip snorting good time. Then Avery said, "Hey! What do you call a table with a stop sign on it? (Dramatic pause.) A stop table! Ha, ha, ha, ha!"

Crickets, crickets, crickets..........

Avery: "You know, because it's a stop sign.....on a table. So, it's a stop table."

Crickets, crickets, crickets..........

Avery: "It's funny. Right?"

Cameron: "Duh."

Tyler: "Duh."

Avery: "Well, I thought it was funny."

Apparently, stop sign jokes just aren't that funny.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Tell me something I don't know

Yesterday afternoon I attended Avery's parent teacher conference. We first discussed where she is academically. She can identify sounds of letters, knows several sight words, writes her name correctly, can sort objects in a variety of ways, can complete patterns, can write numbers and can make comparisons. She's doing everything a kindergartner should be able to do and is doing it very well.

Next, we discussed her citizenship. Students are given a number to rank where they stand in several areas. They mainly involve good manners. The scale is 1-5, with 1 meaning they "need support", 3 meaning "developing", and 5 meaning they are "achieving". A 2 or a 4 means they're somewhere in between, depending on what end of the scale they're on.

Her teacher began the citizenship portion of our discussion by saying, "Hmmm.....well, let's see. How should I say this?.....Avery is really very good at....ignoring. You can call her name over and over when we are on the playground and it's time to come in from recess. But she can completely ignore you and will only come if she wants to come. She's very passive aggressive. I see it in many other areas as well. The other kindergarten teacher has even noticed it. So, I know it's not just me." Consequently, she gave her a "2" for "follows directions and procedures". She said she will eventually do things, but with a lot of prodding. She wrote in the comment section "Avery loves to do things her way." She then said, I'm sure to try and make me feel better, "She is making progress in learning to be a good listener."

Well, that wasn't a terribly wonderful thing to hear. No parent wants to be told that their child is kind of one of the pills of the class. I tried to see the positive after that by noting she received a "5" in "uses materials correctly". At least I know that she's coloring with her crayons and not sticking them up her nose.

Sadly, I had to tell her teacher, and admit to myself, I wasn't the least bit surprised to hear this. I experience Avery's desire to do things her way on a daily basis. I apologized for her behavior and suggested that the goal we set for her for the new term should be improving following directions and procedures. She agreed. She then asked Avery to look directly at her while she told her what we thought her goal should be. She said, "Avery, look at me, do you think, look at me, you can listen and, stay looking at me, and follow directions, Avery you're not looking at me, (she finally stayed focused because I jabbed her in the ribs) and do this as soon as you hear them. If I say sit in your chair, what do you do?" Avery said "Sit". "If I say it's time to color, what do you do?" Avery said "color". And so on and so forth. Her teacher wrote down the goal with a sigh and a slightly weary look on her face. I know she could sense the difficult journey ahead. So, I committed that I would diligently work on the goal with Avery at home. Even if it kills me. It just might.

I really have no idea where she would have learned behavior like this. Her dad isn't really like this. Although, now that I think about it, he really kind of is. I know I'm certainly not. I'm always so flexible and accommodating. I never insist on doing and having things my way and I am most certainly never passive aggressive. That's my passive aggressive way of trying to elicit comments telling me I am absolutely not passive aggressive and that Avery most likely does get this from Ryan.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Don't tell me to shut up

I'm going to say something that I know will annoy, irritate and quite possibly enrage some individuals. I love the snow and am so happy we had such a good storm here yesterday. Don't tell me to shut up. I live in Utah, I'm not a skier (never have been) and I still love the snow.

I love how quiet and peaceful it makes the world. It makes me feel like I'm in a cocoon. I love to watch it falling from the sky. I love the way it looks clinging to the branches of leafless trees. I love how smooth and even it makes the ground seem. I love that it makes the world seem and feel clean. (At least until people start driving around and kicking up the wet and muddy stuff.) Most of all, I love it because it makes it feel like Christmas. I'm ready to start decking the halls now.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Little Things & Friday tunes Nov.20th edition



  1. Hard Habit to Break - Chicago
  2. Thank You - Dido
  3. Better Together - Jack Johnson
  4. Black Dog - Led Zeppelin
  5. I Wish - Stevie Wonder
  6. The Unforgiven - Metallica
  7. Come Away With Me - Norah Jones
  8. If I Ever Lose My Faith in You - Sting
  9. You Oughta Know - Alanis Morissette
  10. Let's Hear it for the Boy - Deniece Williams

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I am so grateful for everything I have. I'm grateful for big things like my faith, my husband, my kids, my extended family and friends. Then there's all the comfort things that make my life easier. My husband's job, our house, our car, clothes, dishwasher, washing machine & dryer, etc. This list could go on an on and is pretty much the same as most any body's. We all love these things.

Over the past couple of days, I've written down all of the little things that I'm grateful for. Things that make me happy, make my life easier and I take for granted. I'm thankful for:

  • tweezers
  • Burt's Bees lip balm
  • pens & notebooks to make lists like this with
  • pictures and being able to browse through them and relive memories
  • scarves to warm my neck
  • makeup (I really need it)
  • computers
  • word searches that help pass the time while I wait at a school for kids to get out
  • that I'm able to be a SAHM so I can be the one to wait at the school to pick up kids
  • a TV & DVD player in my car, they keep me sane
  • clean bedrooms
  • clean bathrooms
  • freshly vacuumed carpet and the lines left in it by the vacuum
  • freshly dusted and polished furniture
  • a little boy who's learning to talk
  • children who have a desire to learn
  • being able to provide service to others
  • sunglasses
  • medicine of all sorts
  • disposable diapers and diaper wipes
  • paper shredders
  • iPods
  • email
  • telephones
  • comfy blankets
  • good books
  • and many, many, many more things

Computer

Ryan has built me a new computer. My old one was "okay", but was slowly dying. (The machine itself had problems in addition to the modem problems, which by the way, is now working fantastically. I never have trouble viewing pages anymore. I have the Internet back in the way it was meant to be.) It kept shutting off at random times and would say that it had recovered from a "serious system error" when I would turn it back on. The processor just didn't want to process anymore. I guess computers get old too.

I'm now using Windows 7. Ryan tells me it's basically the same as XP and it's different. Great. Different is bad because I don't handle change all that well. Keeping things the same is a comfort to me. He tells me I need to just play around with it to figure it out and I'll eventually get it. I told him I would, but I have a secret. I never really played around with, or figured out XP all that well. I still don't have a very clear idea of what drive I was supposed to be storing my pictures on after they were downloaded. (Ryan knows this. How he thinks I'll be able to figure out Windows 7 is a mystery to me.) I have/had too many choices of where to put them. We have a server computer in our basement that I think is supposed to be the "media" server and where pictures are supposed to go. We also have our bedroom computer that has a purpose all it's own. What that is, I have no idea. It's so confusing to me. I just want to plug in my camera and download my pictures without having to figure out where I'm downloading them too. I want to click "yes" and have the magic little elves inside the computer take care of the rest for me. After transferring all the files from the old computer to the new last night, Ryan told me that I had pictures in 4 different places. I'm not surprised.


Monday, November 16, 2009

Maybe not

Avery got one of those plastic frogs with a tab on the butt from her teacher today. The kind where you flick the tab and the frog jumps up in the air. You know what kind I mean? She was really proud of it and quite excited that she got it. She started trying to think of names for it as soon as she got in the car after school. Finally, she said "I know! I'll call her Glitter. Yes, Glitter.....or, maybe Sh*tter. Sh*tter, Sh*tter (she repeated it a few more times to test it out and in my defense, I couldn't tell until about the 3rd time just what she was saying). Is Sh*tter a better name than Glitter Mom?" I stifled a laugh and then said, "I don't think that's the best name for her. Why don't you just go with Glitter?"

She ended up calling her Froggie.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Wanna be startin somethin

I decided on Monday that there was no time like the present and got started on my goal for the week. There was no point in putting it off until the next day. Or the next, or the next because I would just keep putting it off and it would never get done. After all, what is today, but yesterday's tomorrow. Yes, I am extremely profound.

I've tackled one corner so far. One corner doesn't sound like much, but it was a corner that had 3, 58 Qt. plastic storage bins in it. Bins that were filled to the brim with my kids old school papers and papers needing to be filed. I had started piling the papers on the top of the stack because I couldn't fit anymore into the bins. It was such a sloppy mess and the one that had been making me the most anxious because it was in my direct line of sight when I walked into the room.

It took me about 4 hours, but I went through all of them and was able to totally empty 2. So far. The third is filled with the needing to be filed things that don't really need to be filed and can instead be shredded. Once that's gone, the corner will be totally empty. Hooray!

I had to be really, really brutal when going through the bins. I've never been able to throw away my kids school papers because I didn't want to feel like I had thrown away something precious and irretrievable. However, I finally came to the realization that if I didn't start whittling them down, they would take over my house. So, I kept a few worksheets and art projects from each grade they have been in. I hope I kept a good representation of each grade and if I didn't, it's too late to do anything about it now. I took the rest out to the recycle can and threw them in before I could change my mind. The garbage man has already picked up the recycle stuff and so I really can't do anything about it now.

I've decided that for the rest of this school year, I'll save one worksheet every few weeks and then throw away the rest. I'll keep some of the art projects too, but I can't keep everything. If I do, it will build up way too quickly and take over my bedroom again.

I feel so much better about my room already. The most major monster of a mess has been tackled. The rest of the work to be done is simple tidying, dusting and vacuuming. Phew.

Monday, November 9, 2009

I didn't set a goal for myself last week, but I will for this one

I didn't set a FJ1W goal for myself last week because I just couldn't think of anything good. Plus, I kind of felt like I deserved a break after the last one. Being easy going and trying to not care about the little messes and such really took a lot out of me. ☺ It was so totally against my nature.

I think I have a noble and worthwhile goal for this week. I'm going to get my bedroom really good and clean. It's cluttered right now. Not Hoarders type cluttered (which is one of the more disturbing shows I've seen in a long time), but it's still bad enough that it's beginning to make me anxious. I'm going to give myself until Friday of this week to get it done. I need a shorter window because I know I'm going to push getting it done until the last possible second. The smaller the window of opportunity, the sooner I'll get my butt into gear and get it done. I'm experiencing a weird sense of excited anticipation and dread over this one. I'm excited to see the end result, I just don't want to have to do the work to get there. I've been a little, shall we say, on the lazy side lately. This goal is going to help be get out this funk.

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What's on the menu today: I can't remember and I'm feeling too lazy to go find my menu. I'm pretty sure it's a beef brisket crock pot recipe. I haven't posted it on my cooking blog. I'll try to get to that today and will maybe link to it tomorrow because I know people are just dying to to what my family is eating.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Twitchy & Friday Tunes Nov. 6 edition

  1. Makin' Whoopee - Dr. John & Rickie Lee Jones / Sleepless in Seattle
  2. Stickshifts & Safetybelts - Cake
  3. Silly Putty - Stanley Clarke
  4. Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' - Michael Jackson
  5. Gettin Jiggy Wit It - Will Smith
  6. Georgiana - Pride & Prejudice (2005)
  7. Best Imitation of Myself - Ben Folds
  8. Space Between - Dave Matthews Band
  9. Tonight, Tonight - The Smashing Pumpkins
  10. Overjoyed - Stevie Wonder

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My eye has been twitching, on average, every 5 minutes since Sunday. WHY? It's getting seriously irritating and makes me look ridiculous. I had to tell the checker at the food court in Costco the other night that I wasn't winking at him and really didn't want more than a slice of pepperoni pizza. I finally had to cover my eye while I finished my order because it just wouldn't stop.

I did a little Google search and some of the causes of a twitching eye are stress or fatigue. I'm always anxious, it's just my nature, and being tired is part of being a mom. So, I have no idea what's causing this. I really need it to stop. It's done it 3 times since I started typing. That's way more often than every 5 minutes. STOP NOW!

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Cameron locked himself in the bathroom on three separate occasions this morning. It's his latest way of throwing a fit. He storms off, screaming and yelling something like "I hate you! You're the worst mother ever!" Then he sits in there waiting for me to come and pound on the door and yell at him to come out. He delights in seeing me freak out. Most of the time, I try to ignore it and let him sit and stew. I couldn't do that this morning because he had to leave for school in about 3 minutes and he was still in pajamas. I may have lost my temper just a little bit while telling him to get his butt out of the bathroom. Like, there was a little swearing involved and me saying to him it would be a "joy" to send him to school and that I couldn't wait for it. Not my finest moment.

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What's on the menu today: Southwestern Bean Medley.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Surprise!

Happy 60th Birthday to my Dad! Although we won't be having the surprise party of your dreams tonight, we'll all live it up on Saturday. There might even be some dreaded black decorations involved. You just try and stop us. ☺

I love you dad and appreciate you so very much. Thanks for being such a great dad to me. And I guess those other two, but I still contend that I was the only necessary one. You could have stopped at me and been just fine.

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I was moderately successful with my FJ1W goal for last week. I got a little stressed a couple of times, but no major freak outs. My kids took full advantage of the fact that I was trying to not sweat stuff like messes. They wanted me to take it "easy" and ignore them and more importantly, not make them clean at all. Well, I'm sorry, but it's hard to ignore an entire Malt 'O Meal bag of Captain Crunch that has been dumped onto the family room floor. That's something that kind of needs to be cleaned up. It's also not right leaving dirty underwear, socks, pants, shirts and shoes on the floor of the bathroom. It has to go to the laundry room, otherwise the pile would reach the ceiling by the end of the week. So, a little cleaning up had to take place. Tyler tried to convince me on Monday of this week that I said I was going to be easy going for the rest of my life and not just for one week. Nice try buddy. We're mostly back to our regularly scheduled programming. I'm just going to try to be less shrew like from now on. Not more slob like.

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What's on the menu today: Golden Mushroom Pork & Apples.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

There's nothing worse

I have a go to comfort food when I'm feeling a little blah. French fries. There's just something about them that, for me, chases the blah away.

I've had a cold threatening for the past couple of days. It's nothing terrible and I'm fine, just a little tired is all. So, after I finished my grocery shopping this morning, I went to a drive thru and ordered some hot, salty, starchy, fattening comfort. I pulled one out, popped it in my mouth and it was the opposite of what it should have been. It was NOT hot and crispy and comforting. It was limp and cold and annoying. Not cold because it was old and had been sitting out too long. Cold because it wasn't cooked all the way through. How does that even happen? There is just nothing worse then wanting some hot fries and ending up with disgusting, skunky ones instead. Nothing worse at all. I may have cried over it I was so upset. Don't try to tell me that it could have been worse, or point out the bright side. Like, I saved myself from eating empty, fattening calories. I don't care. I needed a french fry hug and I didn't get it. Feel sorry for me.

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What's on the menu today: Some sort of cheesy, broccoli, chicken and rice casserole that I'm going to make up as I go along.