Yellow Wallpaper

It's been almost a month since I last wrote a post on here. I keep thinking "I should write a post; I have stuff to say." And then I don't end up writing anything after all. Stuff has happened--it's been a mostly good month I guess. I might write a better post about the last month at some point later this week. Here, however, is a quick glance into a typical evening around here.  5:30--Get home from work and talk to the babysitter a bit before she leaves. Put away my things and figure out dinner. I actually made a menu plan and bought supplies for meals this week, but no one is feeling excited about breakfast for dinner (too many pancakes at their dad's house over the weekend).  5:45--Decide to make some veggie soup and biscuits for dinner. It's a bit ambitious, but uses up food I have on hand and sounds tasty. P. Bibby "helps", which mostly means getting in my way while I try to quickly make dinner. At least we get to spend some time togethe...

I was going to post this on the kids' blog, but I figure that I need a post for today. It also made me realize that I don't spend enough time just laughing and enjoying myself. I used to do it a lot and now I have a hard time relaxing. Little Dude has been particularly difficult lately, but thankfully he made us laugh at least two times. I still laugh thinking about the one from lunch. Lunchtime: LD: "Daddy, can I watch Mission to Mars after lunch?" [it's a Backyardigans DVD that he loves] Daddy: "Sorry, but I took it back to the library." Mr. Fob to me: "Featuring the voice of Alicia Keys" [quoting the annoying preview we've seen a billion times] LD: " What ! I don't even like Alicia Keys! I don't like broccoli, or carrots, or tomatoes either. Or salad!" Dinnertime: LD: "Knock, knock" Me: "Who's there?" LD: "Children with glue in their eyes" Me: "Children with glue in their eyes, who...

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 ...

Shortly after we moved in to this house my parents brought up my cedar chest that I've had since high school. We've never lived in a place that's really been big enough for it, and we've moved around a lot, so they've been storing it in their house. Obviously I haven't put anything in it or even looked in it for a number of years. I had a lot of fun when I opened it up and started going through it. I found a few wonderful gems that just have to be shared. The first one comes from a journal I kept for a while when I was eleven and twelve. I've never considered myself an artist but for some reason I felt a need to add illustrations to my entries. I think they are the best part:

Happy seven years sweetie!

November is NaBloPoMo, which stands for "National Blog Post Month". The challenge is to write one post a day for the entire month. Despite the fact that this is a very busy month for me, I've been toying with the idea. I always like a good challenge, plus it might be nice to get my writing groove back. They don't have to be very long or meaty posts either. So tonight I leave you with a very funny moment in toddler linguistics. Little Dude pronounces the word "corn" with a "p" sound at the beginning for some reason. So you can imagine how funny it was when he saw the giant display of clearance candy at Target today and shouted excitedly: "candy corn!" PS--This month I will be guest posting on Wednesdays over at Segullah .

Cicada's post about the squeamish ultrasound tech reminded me of the fact that Little Dude's new favorite word is "penis". He pretty much only talks about it when his diaper is off, but since I have a juvenile sense of humor I still find it hilarious. A few examples: Last month when we were at my family reunion I had to change a very dirty diaper. I took Little Dude into the small bathroom right next to the room where a solemn gathering was taking place in honor of my grandmother. He realized that his voice echoed in the bathroom and suddenly started yelling "penis" as loud as he could. I was laughing so hard I couldn't even breathe, let alone stop him. Thankfully no one could hear us in the next room. Another favorite phrase of Little Dude's is "big, heavy"--said in a very strained voice like he's picking up something enormous. He'll sit in the bathtub and say "big, heavy penis" over and over again. When we were moving Mr...

Question: If you sing along with Celine Dion and no one is around to hear it, are you still a dork? Also, I think Titanic was one of the worst movies to win Best Picture (and all the other awards). I think the music video for My Heart Will Go On is better than the movie.

Since the blog world is buzzing with morning routine competitiveness , I thought I'd share mine with everyone to see if you all could top it. I have some better post ideas in my head (including birthday thank yous to all those fabulous people who have commented, sent cards, called, given me stuff, etc.) but I'll get to them tomorrow. Here's what my morning routine looks like lately: 6:00 Stirred to consciousness by a small person in pink pajamas asking if the sun is awake yet. Groan that it is not and scare her back to bed. Realize that the other person in blue pajamas is awake and quacking. 6:10 Retrieve smaller child from crib. 6:12 Make bottle with one hand while balancing child on hip with the other. 6:13 Power up lap top and start checking email, reading blogs, checking the weather, and other important parts of morning computer routine with one hand while feeding baby with the other. 6:35 Realize that baby has finished bottle. Substitute pacifier for bottle and pray f...

This morning we were watching The Tigger Movie and S-Boogie suddenly asked "Where are Pooh's pants?" I replied, "I don't know", and she looked troubled for a moment before replying "Probably he left them at home." Also, yesterday I was trying to get her to stop doing something, and I asked her several times to stop. Finally I got exasperated and asked "Are you listening to me?" She looked up and replied, "Mama, I don't want to listen right now."

Today at lunchtime S-Boogie picked up a section of her orange, wrapped it in a napkin, and told me that it was baby Jesus. Then she placed it on the table, arranged a few oranges around it to be Mary and Joseph, and added a few noodles to serve as angels. She also moved her cup of milk over to see baby Jesus as well. Then she picked up the napkin, took it off the orange segment and informed me "I eat baby Jesus." And she did.

Last night I was putting S-Boogie in the car so we could go to Queen Zippergut's wedding reception. I explained to her that we were going to a special party because QZ had gotten married. S-Boogie repeated "got married" (at least it sounded like she did), and then she looked up and asked me "Got Joseph too?"

I'm really going to hate myself tomorrow for blogging instead of going to bed, but I needed two share two random stories precipitated by posts on other people's blogs. First, Miss Hass posted a story involving giant spiders in her apartment. Recently we had an encounter with a spider in our kitchen. I was cooking and I turned around to see S-Boogie crouched on the floor next to a very large spider. She was very excited about it and even started singing " itsy bitsy spider" to it. It was all very cute and I thought it was neat that she didn't seem to have any fear of spiders. But then I realized that it looked kind of like a hobo spider, and I should probably get rid of it. I tried to get it onto a piece of paper, but it wouldn't cooperate. So I squished it. I probably also squished a lot of S-Boogie's wonderful love of spiders too; I felt horrible about killing something right in front of my daughter. And then she spent the rest of the evening saying ...

Actually this is just Master Fob honing his fathering skills with our new nephew. According to one website I found, our baby right now is the size of a sesame seed and looks like a tadpole.

One of my favorite things about Conference is the really lame commercials they play right before and after sessions. Some of my current favorites include: " FHE on DVD"--Now you don't have to spend any effort to have family time. Hey, you don't even have to talk to each other at all! "You've waited two long years for it. You've waited long enough"--"It" is Richard Paul Evans' new book. Yeah, since two years is such a long, long time for writing and publishing a new book, especially one of such obvious quality. " LDS Realtors.Com"--Making it even easier to avoid getting to know people of other faiths, no matter where you go. Oh, and I love the fact that just after hearing talks about staying out of debt and living moderately we get all the commercials for things like the "collectors' editions" of books like Lectures on Faith that cost 4 times as much as a simple paperback would...