Yellow Wallpaper

Right now in the refrigerator we have: string cheese, shredded cheese, cream cheese, feta cheese, sour cream, plain yogurt, Gogurt tubes for lunches, Activia yogurt, milk, and ice cream (in the freezer). Maybe we should try other food groups?

I've been looking forward to tonight's Relief Society broadcast all week, partly for the spiritual uplift and partly for the opportunity to have a nice meal and get out of the house for a little while by myself. Our stake was planning a dinner at 5:00 and then we would watch the broadcast together. I was a little late getting out the door, but still surprised by how full the stake center cultural hall was when I got there. I noticed a sign announcing the event and noting that dinner started at 4:30, so I felt embarrassed and slunk around the back to grab a plate at the buffet. There was a nice spread of pasta and salad, so I filled up my plate and took my seat at a table with an empty spot. There I nodded at the other women seated near me and tried to concentrate on my food while surreptitiously looking around to see if I recognized anyone. I found it odd that I didn't see anyone I recognized at all; I've only been in my ward for a few months but I have started to make ...

Right now I think fall is my favorite season. Of course if you ask me next year I'll probably tell you that spring is my new favorite, but I really like the fall. Where I spent most of my growing up years we didn't see a lot of change in the seasons and it wasn't until we moved to Maryland before my senior year of high school that I understood what kinds of colors the leaves could turn. I love the the colorful trees, the yummy fall foods, and that clear, cold sharpness that shows up in the air one day to signal that fall is here. After spending so many years in school fall also feels like a new beginning to me. I keep remembering my first fall in Utah, settling into my new apartment, learning to live on my own, buying books, making new friends, going to bed with aching legs from walking all over campus. Before coming to BYU I had not spent much time in Utah, especially not in Provo. Each fall that I live here I seem to remember the first time I saw all these places that ar...

A few weeks ago I read an interesting article about parents who forget and leave their children in the car. It was a horrible article to read, but fascinating at the same time. Several things stood out to me from it. First of all, a demographic survey reveals no common link between any of the parents that do this. They are all over the map, and even include parents that have gone through great time and expense to adopt children. It's certainly not a case of neglect or an absence of love. The article pointed out that these parents are often vilified in the media or by law enforcement (in many cases they are arrested and charged with neglect or even manslaughter). The writer theorized that the reason for our visceral reaction to this phenomena is the fact that in our subconscious we are afraid that we could be that normal parent who just forgets, and to escape that fear we must demonize them and turn them into the 'Other', some kind of non-human monster. Another, related poin...

We had our 'big' twenty-week ultrasound today, and to be honest it was sort of anti-climatic. I guess that's part of having three kids; with each one the newness wears off a little. The baby also wasn't moving around very much and insisted on being face-down the entire time so we also didn't get a very good look at much that was cute. We did get to measure all the important things and everything looks great. First of all, we are definitely having another girl. Mr. Fob and I both pretty excited about this; I'd been mentally preparing myself for another boy just so I wouldn't get my hopes up, and was therefore excited to realize that I'm getting what I want after all. Everything looks nice and healthy, and the placenta is at least towards the top and back of my uterus, which is a better place for it than other spots could be. Hopefully the next twenty weeks will just go smoothly and we will have a more calm and peaceful delivery this time around.

To be honest, the biggest reason why I haven't shopped at WalMart for a few years is because it is not close to my house. I'm lazy and would rather drive to a closer store that only takes two minutes rather than ten. Today my mother-in-law asked me to pick something up for her at WalMart, and since I needed some groceries anyway I was happy to oblige. When I hit the produce section I started to question my laziness, because many of the produce prices were lower than my usual store and the produce was just as fresh. But then I tried to find some spinach in the frozen foods section and they were completely out. I had a similar experience trying to find hair detangler for S-Boogie and they only had one set of the curtains my mother-in-law wanted me to buy. Then when I got to the cash register I had to wait several minutes while the cashier chatted with another one who was apparently replacing her. No one looked at me or said anything to me like "sorry, we're changing shif...

David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism by Gregory Prince and W. Robert Wright I liked this book quite a lot more than I thought I would; it is long and has extensive footnotes, but the writing is very readable and most of the chapters were very interesting. The book is organized by themes rather than chronologically, so it was occasionally confusing, but other than that it seemed well-written and carefully researched. I learned a lot more about President McKay and the history of the Church during the mid-twentieth century than I had known before, and many issues and ideas that come up now make a lot more sense to me after reading some of the historical precedents for them. I also realized that I am much more interested in recent Church history than in early history; I must be a modernist after all. Gone for Good by Harlan Coben This was another quick, fun read that definitely sucked me in until I finished it. I didn't like it as much as the last Coben book I read ( Tell...