Getting in the Spirit

For the past day or so, I've been listening to as audio book on my MP3 player.  I had heard it was a good book...in fact, several friends rated it well on a book-sharing website.  While I listened, I was putting together a scripture-based Nativity advent calendar for my Young Women.  And when the feelings that should be invoked by celebrating Jesus Christ's birth were far overshadowed by the sadness and despair of the story I was listening to, I decided that there is enough garbage in the world.  I turned off my player and left it alone for the rest of the day.  This morning, when I had a chance to plug it in again, I deleted the book.  Without finishing it.

You see, I've been teaching my beautiful Young Women for about two months now.  Last week, our lesson was on creating an uplifting environment.  I urged (strongly) my girls to eliminate the things in their lives that weren't uplifting--things that didn't allow the Holy Ghost into their lives.  As I looked at the lesson for this Sunday, I realized that I will be teaching all three Young Women's classes about "Return[ing] to Virtue."  Here I am, merely a few days later, listening to a book that didn't make me feel light or virtuous, but made me feel like the heavy, dark rainclouds that so often descend on the city where I live.  Hippocrite.  That's what I was.  I couldn't teach these things if I myself couldn't stand up for my own standards in such a small way.  And that's why I turned it off.  I don't regret it one bit.  I feel light again.  Bring on the housework!  I need an excuse to listen to the hours and hours of Christmas stories I downloaded to my player this morning.

Music to My Ears

This morning, I attended my first ever parent-teacher conference.  I consider this as much of a rite of passage for me as Kallie's first day of school was for her.  I can finally consider myself a real mom.  (Does anyone else have vague memories of Pinnochio associated with that phrase?)  I know that someday, it may become a mundane annoyance.  But I was actually looking forward to this event.

To preface this, I will say that I know Kallie is a good kid.  And while I think that she is incredibly smart and darling, I am her mother.  Every mother--especially one charting untested waters in parenthood--thinks her child is the smartest, most brilliant child on the face of the planet.  However, knowing this maternal tendency, I have come to realize that my opinion of my child may not be viewed as valid in some circles. 

In the past 2(ish) months since Kallie has started school, I have had my concerns about her social and educational development.  As talkative and expressive as my child is, she is somehow nearly mute on the details of her educational experience so far.  So, I have been left wondering what kind of person she is at school, among her friends, while I'm not there.

I'm happy to report that, according to her teacher, Mrs. R, Kallie is "every teacher's dream."  She is excelling well beyond grade level in every subject.  Mrs. R has been impressed with Kallie's very well-adjusted social skills, as well as Kallie's ability to show initiative, responsibility, and always being on task.  (Whose kid is she?  I always got in trouble for talking too much!)  I could not have asked for a better initiatory parent-teacher conference. 

Oh, as for me?  My real mom world will start unfolding a little more in January.  That's when I get to start helping in the classroom!

Letters

A friend recently did this on her blog--and I thought I'd follow suit.


Dear Alarm Clock,
We have been frienemies for so long that I hope you'll understand why I am making this request.  As things stand, you scream until I hit you--and then you pipe down for a while.  Once I've hit you three times, you finally give up and let me sleep.  And while it seems you're being kind, you're not helping as much as you might think you are.  I would prefer that you not give up, no matter how many times I hit you.  Could you make that possible?

Thanks,
Better-rested, but running-late-in-the-morning mom
--------------------------------
Dear Sparkpeople.com,
I know you're interesting in rekindling our relationship.  The sprinklings of e-mails you have sent in the past few months have piqued my interest more than once.  I just can't make any long-term commitments at this point in time.  I hope you will understand.

Someday yours,
My Pre-Pregnancy Body
--------------------------------
Dear Self-Control,
I miss you.  I certainly feel better when you come around, but that doesn't seem enough motivation these days to do anything about it.  Your return will make it possible for me to enjoy Sparkpeople.com's company again.  Please come back soon!

Sincerely,
Desperately Seeking
--------------------------------
Dear Seattle Weather,
I have really enjoyed the warm(ish) sunny afternoons we've had lately.  Although it's not much of a change from summer, it certainly feels like fall around here.  One thing--could you please stop faking me out in the mornings?  Or at least decide what you're going to do before I dress myself and my children?  Your assistance would be much appreciated.

Thank you,
Consistently Over (or Under) Dressed
--------------------------------
Dear MP3 Player,

Thank you for making my work so much more enjoyable lately!  With your assistance, I am able to eliminate mountains of laundry, piles of dishes, and bacteria-infested toilets.  The stories you provide keep my mind off the drudgery that has a tendency to creep into these (and other) tasks.  Oh, and my family thanks you, too!  You're a lifesaver!

Many thanks,
Audio Bookworm

In the mean time...

I have so much I want to post about...our trip to Utah, my sister's wedding, Kallie's first day of school, the projects I've been working on, painting (and repainting) our house...but I have (obviously) been busy.  By the time I get a few minutes, my brain doesn't want to focus on writing.  It wants to relax, too.  So, instead of blogging, I've been reading.  Lots of reading.  And one of my favorite reads lately is from Julie B. Beck--a talk she gave at BYU's Women's Conference.  I will admit, I couldn't just let my brain relax with that one.  In fact, I wanted to turn myself into a sponge and just soak it all in--make it part of me.  So, while you're waiting for my riveting blog posts, feel free to delve into Sis. Beck's talk!  (And, let me know if you master the whole "turning yourself into a sponge" thing.)

The Stench -or- Why We May Never EVER Have a Dog

Ryan woke up a few Saturdays ago and said, "We're ripping out the living room carpet today."  I thought we were going to do yard work.  But work is work.  And I wasn't getting out of it either way.  That's the problem with being the right-hand woman. 

Why, you might ask, did we decide to rip out 168 square feet of carpet on a random Saturday morning whim?  Well, it all had to do with what I called "Scratch n' Sniff" carpet.  When we moved into the house, we put couches in the living room.  No problem.  When I slid the couches into a more acceptable furniture arrangement about a week later, a horrible odor wafted up from the carpet.  It wasn't something we had ever smelled before--not when we were looking to buy the house, not when we had the carpets cleaned, not when we moved in and simply placed furniture in the room.  It was only after the carpet got a deep massage from a couple of couches that it gave up it's scent.  We discussed new carpet, but the carpet looked fine.  And there are 1000 other projects needing our money and attention.  And, after all, The Stench started to dissipate after a few days.  However, we started avoiding our living room at all costs.  We didn't want to accidentally release more of The Stench.

A few weeks later, Ryan commented that he hoped the couches weren't just absorbing horrible odor.  We're hoping to sell the couches (someday soon) and figured no one wanted to take The Stench home along with the couches.  So, once again, I moved the couches.  Slid them across the entry into the dining room.  The Scratch n' Sniff carpet once more did its thing.  And this time, The Stench didn't dissipate.  As embarrassed as we were to have people come to our home while The Stench was on the run, those who did come said they couldn't smell a thing.  And, even if they could, it was very faint.  We were convinced that they were just being polite.  And so, on that Saturday morning, Ryan decided enough was enough. 

When we walked into the living room, I said, "You know, on all those HGTV shows I watch, they always cut the carpet into strips and pull it out one strip at a time."  Nope.  The plan was to rip it out in ONE BIG PIECE.  So, I went along with it.  We tugged and rolled.  And I almost lost my breakfast.  If you think The Stench was bad after moving furniture across the top, just think how much worse it would be when you actually opened the source of The Stench.  On the far wall of the room, there was a HUGE stained area.  The carpet tacks along several feet of the wall were rusted.  Another small corner on the other side had the same issue.  I couldn't understand why we didn't smell this before and how the carpet looked so normal from the top.

It took us a good 10 or 15 minutes to lug, shimmy, and shove the carpet out the front door.  (We later learned it was 280 lbs. of carpet, although it seemed at least twice that as we manuvered the thing.)  Once it was on the lawn, we went back in and ripped up the pad, tack strips, and staples.  We didn't want to leave even ONE speck of something The Stench was clinging to.

The Stench was so bad that when we went back out to take care of the carpet, we noticed a random cat wandering over to our lawn.  It could smell the carpet all the way from who-knows-where and came to investigate.  We had talked about trying to cut up the carpet and put it into our trash bin.  But, everyone knows that 168 sq. ft. of carpet doesn't all fit into a trash bin.  That meant we would have had to store The Stench somewhere in the mean time.  And, I wasn't thrilled about attracting the rest of the animals in the neighborhood.  Instead, we cut the carpet into strips, (which is a story in itself), rolled it all up, and packed it into the back of our car.  (At this point, I told Ryan that next time we ripped out carpet, we were cutting it into strips BEFORE taking it out.  And he said, "Next time?")

We had some other errands to run, so we packed the kids into the car, rolled down all the windows and set out for the "transfer station"--which is just a nice way of saying The Dump.  It was at this point we started laughing.  Air whipping around our hair, kids complaining they were cold, and we couldn't roll up the windows because of The Stench.  But it was no longer in our house!

We're still working on fully eradicating The Stench.  It's greatly reduced now and the smell is generally contained to the living room.  We've put pet odor remover on the plywood floorboards, (the stain went all the way into the wood), and we're painting it with Kilz this weekend.  The good news is that while I'm in Utah, Ryan is going to paint the entire living room--as long as I can decide on a color by the time I leave.  A few weeks later, we will have carpet.  And, I'll bet we spend a lot more time in that room.

Window Worm

A couple of weeks ago, the Young Women in our ward held a fund raiser.  For a certain amount, a group of them would come to your home and complete 2 tasks in a 20 minute time frame.  Knowing that I don't have time to do everything and wanting to help their fundraising efforts, I signed them on to wash my windows.

In the few months we've lived here, we have determined (thanks to neighbors) that our home was unoccupied for about 16 months by the time we finally moved in.  And before that, it was a rental for a while.  Needless to say, my windows certainly needed the bath.  I won't describe in detail the state of the window tracks/sills, but suffice it to say they were living entities of their own--possibly toxic (at least in my mind).  Not wanting to allow the Young Women anywhere near the science experiments growing beneath our windows, I decided to tackle the project before the girls came.

I started upstairs--and really, it wasn't too bad.  I thought it was going to be a lot worse!  And when I headed downstairs, I realized how much worse it was going to get.  When I went to clean the family room windows, I found this curled up in the corner of the window:

I was convinced it somehow wormed its way onto the house from the overgrown plants that used to be right outside the window.  (We removed them over a month ago.)  I immediately texted Ryan and said, "There's a huge WORM THING in the corner of the window!" and then I discreetly asked what he planned to accomplish when he got home that night.  His reply? "Lots on the agenda.  You can do it!"  Right.  I cleaned all of the other window tracks downstairs before returning to this particular family room window.  The creature was clearly dead, but I was well-armed with rubber gloves, an old mechanical pencil (for removal), and a Ziploc bag (to prove to Ryan how GROSS it was--and what I trooper I was for removing it myself).

I psyched myself up and started the removal process.  I wondered if it would just crumble when the pencil touched it.  But, when I actually pushed the pencil between the folds of worm, it was much softer than I thought it would be.  I almost freaked out and quit the whole process.  But ever so slowly, with my eyes closed, I lifted the worm up and out of the corner.

It was about then I saw this worm for what it really was: a brown hairband.  All of that worry for nothing.  I started laughing and texted my husband, "Turns out the worm was a hairband! Still laughing."  I popped it into the Ziploc, (still wearing gloves--you never know where that thing has been!), for proof--along with the pics--that it really DID look like a worm!

Fabulous Fourth

It all began on Friday afternoon...after joining the masses in holiday weekend travel, we finally arrived at the Cottage just before dinner time on Friday.  (Good thing, since we were bringing part of dinner.)  We hung out for a bit and ate dinner and then left the kids with Nana and Papa while we headed out on a date.  After a short drive, we ended up on the beach to watch the sunset.  It was quite windy and cold, (typical of the Pacific Northwest coast), but it was wonderful to snuggle with my hubby and enjoy an uninterrupted conversation with rolling ocean scenery.

Saturday, we took the kids to the community 4th of July celebration.  Our kids bounced themselves crazy in several inflatable bounce houses.  I asked if I could join them, but I wasn't allowed.  (Bummer.)  After they rode the kiddy train, we headed home for lunch and naps.  Once the kids were asleep, we left the kids with Nana and Papa again, (They were lifesavers this weekend!  I SO needed the break!).  My brother-in-law and his girlfriend introduced us to geocaching.  What a BLAST!  I'm totally hooked. 

That evening, we roasted hot dogs in the fire pit and then headed to the beach for fireworks.  It was still cold and windy.  While conditions have been comparable in past years, this year was much windier than ever before.  The kids, (especially Clayton), weren't too impressed with the blowing sand.  The girls spent their evening with pillows and blankets in the back of Papa's car.  I love that we can (legally) let off our own fireworks here.  And, this year didn't disappoint.  By the time we left, every inch of me was covered in a fine, dusty grit.  Thank goodness for hot showers.

Sunday, we enjoyed the local ward.  And, I enjoyed connecting with my college friend.  Seems like 4th of July is our once-a-year time to catch up.  Last year, (we hadn't seen each other for about 10 years), I was pregnant--and Clayton was born about 5 weeks later.  This year, she is pregnant and due in about 6 weeks.  Who knows what next year will bring?

My ever-gracious in-laws offered to stay with our children again that evening so Ryan and I could head back to the beach to watch the 4th of July celebrations.  Although I LOVE fireworks, by the time that evening rolled around, I didn't feel like changing back into 100 layers of clothes and/or freezing my buns off.  So, we decided to stay home--out of the wind and out of the cold.  Instead, we watched fireworks on TV.  Not quite the same, but I still felt patriotic.  And I still thought a lot about the freedoms we enjoy in our country.  After living in a post-communist part of the world for a year and a half, I feel very strongly about the need to preserve our freedoms.  And very grateful for the sacrifices that have been made for us to remain free.

This morning, we got up, packed up, and headed out.  We anticipated a bit of holiday traffic--but ended up not encountering any.  (Although there was an Kallie-induced emergency pit stop at a Rest Stop about 20 minutes from home.)  Throughout the remainder of the day, I finished reading a great book (The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig--slow at first, but loved it!), found out I have been cast as Maude Dunlop in our stake production of The Music Man, and ripped out a few rhododendron bushes in our front yard.  And our holiday weekend is over.  Can't we have another one next week?

Out of the Blue

I have had a rough couple of days.  You know how it is when you feel like everyone is telling you that you need to improve at this or that...or that you're just not doing this or that well enough?  Well, that's how the last few days have felt for me.  I know I don't have to be perfect, but feel like I should be able to be successful at something.  It has certainly been a challenge.

But, today has been better.  Maybe it's because the sun was out?  Maybe it because I spent the day exploring the movement of the sun and learning about clouds with my kids?  Maybe it's because I drank enough water?  Maybe it's because I actually felt productive?  Maybe it's because my kids all napped?  (Although not at the same time...)  Maybe it's because I'm just tired of feeling blah?

While I'm not a fan of those blue moments, I am grateful that I have them.  They expand me...push me to refresh my perspective...and remind me to enjoy the good days. 

Memorial Day Weekend

I find it quite interesting that we spend this day to honor those who have sacrificed for our freedoms by enjoying the freedoms that we have.  Whether it's a working weekend or play, we are so blessed to have the freedom to choose to do those things. 
This weekend, we tackled several projects--some we finished, some we didn't.  But, most importantly, we made progress!  I'll just say here that I can't believe we've only been in the house for three weeks.  It feels like it's been MUCH longer--so I have had to convince myself to be patient with everything I want to do here.  One day at a time, we are transforming this place!

OK--since Friday night, we have completely painted the family room, mounted the TV, trimmed the bottoms of a few doors, made a couple of trips to Home Depot, ripped out an area of landscaping, rebunked the girls' bed, got drywall in the kitchen ceiling, and spent time together as a family.  (And, I use the term "we" here loosely.  Except for the painting and yard work, I was the lovely assistant in the projects. I know--I have the tough part.)

So, are you ready for some before and after shots? 

I'll start with the yard.  We have only scratched the surface of our yard.  We still have SO much work to do out there.  Since we were painting the family room, I wanted to rip out the plants that were blocking the light from coming in the family room windows.  But, it poured all weekend.  Until about 5 p.m. today when the sun finally made an appearance.  Once the kids were in bed, Ryan and I rushed out--and we finished just as it got dark.

BEFORE

AFTER

(This is a little hard to see because I took it in the dark.  But, you get the idea.)

OK--now for the family room.  Please note that we still have a TON of work to do in here.  We are going to put up chair rail and crown moulding...and still need to paint the existing trim and fireplace, which will all be white.  I forgot to take TRUE before pics.  (The first one was taken from our house listing.)  So, these were taken once we had moved everything into the middle of the floor.  And, I was impatient in taking the after pics, so things are still out of place in those--but I'm mainly including these so you can see the color difference. 

BEFORE

AFTER

Life as a Facebook Status

My life today has been a series of status updates.  And, since I'm not one to update my status multiple times per day, here they all are for your enjoyment.

I finally met my goal of getting up, dressed, showered, and ready before the girls were up!  I got up early and they slept in a little.  I could get used to this.

Oh no.  The car won't start.  I should probably turn the interior lights off so my 3 yr. old doesn't leave one on again.

Thank goodness I've already met my neighbor.  And she was home.

I could spend hours in the paint department of Home Depot.

Walls are (partially) primed and ready for action!

Hmm..Not sure I like the look of Scottish Isle and Feldspar in my family room.

The more I look at Hawaiian Sky, the more I'm convinced that's definitely the color for my bedroom.  Now, if I could just get a new bedroom set and change the bedding...

I think I put a little too much basil on my Black Bean Pizza Burger.  I really love basil, but the balance was off.  (These will soon be posted on My Little Red Kitchen.)

I can actually hear the rain.  Ryan took the girls to run errands.

Baby sleeping...second coat on the walls...time to empty my brain onto the blog.