Falling Beauty

My newest favorite thing is to watch the leaves falling. It's so beautiful, the way they just sort of flutter to the ground, and when there's a decent breeze so lots of them all fall together it's pure magic. I watched a neighbor outside raking his leaves as more descended all around him. I couldn't decide if I should be impressed with his work ethic or if I should laugh at that exercise in futility, but either way I sat there mesmerized by it all. (We still haven't touched our leaves. Craig is still waiting for me to cave in and give him my blessing on buying a leaf blower...)

On my mission, one of the major Japanese holidays is the Cherry Blossom Festival. I was lucky enough to be in Hirosaki for it, which has the most famous cherry trees in all of Japan. Apparently they're six hundred years old or something, making them both the oldest and the biggest trees you can find. (Trust me, they put these ones in DC to shame!) All you really do for the festival is pack a picnic lunch and sit under the trees eating while the petals fall all around you and on you. And it's absolutely wonderful. It was also probably the only break we missionaries got, now that I'm thinking about it... Anyway, watching the leaves here makes me think that this is just a clunky, more colorful, autumn version of the cherry blossoms. And it's awfully fun, too, in it's own harvesty sort of way.

How I never noticed the leaves before was sort of a mystery to me, until I realized that I grew up where all the trees are evergreens (yay, Seattle), so not much happened with the leaves changing, then lived in Provo, which has no trees, and then the apartment we had here backed to mostly evergreen trees. No wonder I was so out of the loop! I guess I probably should have been paying more attention last fall, but it was a really busy time for us, between moving and working on Savior of the World. So I'm grateful both to have more time this year around, and to have finally noticed those leaves. They are awfully fun, aren't they?

Costumes

I'll be the first to admit that I am not terribly creative when it comes to Halloween costumes. And while I absolutely love what I ended up doing with Bentley and Kendra's costumes this year, there's a tiny, inside part of me that is cringing because I totally stole the idea from my friend Liza. (Fortunately for me, her blog is private, so I'm assuming that most of you haven't seen it. Why I'm even confessing this is sort of a mystery to me, actually. I guess I just felt like I needed to apologize to Liza somehow. Sorry, Liza!!!)

So, yeah, I'm unoriginal. But do I still get points for executing it well?

For some reason we couldn't get them to smile. Oh, well...

Is it just me, or do they both look like they're ready to bust out some seriously cool dance moves?

Another side note-- Bentley broke his fireman's hat WAY before Halloween. We were going to just buy him a new one on the day of the ward trunk-or-treat, but by then the dollar store already had their Christmas decorations up! Oh, well. He's still pretty cute, I think. Mostly I just like that Kendra, as a dalmatian, goes with the fireman theme (did you notice?). I thought about burning some of my clothes and being a woman who Bentley had rescued (my friend Sarah does awesome make-up, and I think burns are one of her specialties), but in the end I just got too lazy. I did like the smudges I put on Bentley's cheeks-- a nice touch, I thought.

Happy Halloween, everyone!

Casualties

Yesterday I was vacuuming underneath high chairs, and since there were big, monster crumbs to be picked up I had taken the attachment off the shop vac, leaving me with a huge gaping hose to attack the mess. And I accidentally vacuumed up a bib.

So now I can't decide if I* should open up the vacuum and try to save that bib, or just count it as a loss.




*And by "I," what I really mean is "Craig."

Sharing

I frequently wake up in the night because I'm cold. I suspect that this is why:

Yes, Craig is buried beneath all those blankets. He claims that I put them on top of him and am making him get too hot. Hmmm...

Content

Does it get much better than eating crisp, sweet apples spread with peanut butter and slices of cheese for lunch on a beautiful fall day?



That's what I was doing a few days ago. Today it's pouring rain, and I have to admit, I'm enjoying this, too, probably because it's a really warm rain and it started out just misting before it turned into a full-blown shower. It always makes my little Seattle heart happy-- especially since I don't have anywhere to go right now! It's humid and stormy and we have the windows open enjoying the delicious wet air and looking forward to dressing the kids up for the ward Halloween party tonight.

Good times.

A Time for Silliness

One of the many points that I really liked in Dennis Prager's Happiness Is a Serious Problem was when he talked about making work fun. In his case, he said that he found the writing process very tedious, and so he would play around with different fonts and colored pens and whatnot to make it more enjoyable.* I'd heard of this before, but not since I had children. Reading it this time around, it really struck me that if anyone is in a position to have fun in their career, it's stay-at-home Moms. Especially when your kids are toddlers.

So I've been on a mission to find and enjoy the silliness in life, rather than focusing on the drudgery of diapers, runny noses, etc. And it turns out that Prager is right! Breakfast time is way more fun when it involves songs and little jigs and my children giving me strange looks. We have a lot more tickling going on now, too, and building forts, and interruptions for story time. And hugs, whether my children like it or not.

Lucky for me, I'm pretty good at being silly.




*Too bad for him he doesn't just get to keep a blog where no one edits your work or even suggests how to make it better-- writing isn't tedious at all when there are no standards to hold yourself to! Of course, that's probably also why I don't get paid to do it... Hmmm...

Romance

Two weeks ago on Friday we went to the dump.

Last week, we went to IKEA on Friday night.

I guess Craig didn't know how to top those hot dates, so today, he looked out the window and suggested, "You want to go outside and watch my grass grow?"

Ah, love!



I should explain a bit, though: first of all, Craig is NOT growing marijuana. He really is growing normal, old boring grass. He actually has spent a lot of time fertilizing, leveling, liming, and now re-planting our front yard and our neighbors even commented that this is the most grass this yard has ever had.

BUT WATCHING IT GROW?!?! REALLY?!?!

So Close, and yet...

*Sorry for all these short little posts all on one day, but I guess I have a lot on my mind. (But not much about any one topic, huh?)

A couple weeks ago, Craig and I finally made that trip out to the dump and got rid of the blue toilet, blue sink, and shower floor pan that had been decorating our backyard. No more looking like trailer trash!

And then.

Some big fat frog decided to die right behind where we park our car. And you guessed it-- I ran over its dead body and now we have flattened, oozing, completely disgusting dead frog all over the road right behind our driveway. So much for getting away from our white trash image. (Sigh.)

Quote for the Weekend

It's a bit sacrilegious, but I can't help but love this quote by Edgar Allen Poe:

"My whole nature utterly revolts at the idea that there is any Being in the Universe superior to myself!"

Okay, so it's really sacrilegious. But fun, huh?

The Science Behind My Rant

Elizabeth very kindly sent me a link to show what I was talking about earlier about using all of our brains. (And what a relief-- it's always nice to find out I'm right when I go off on these rants!) Check it out!

http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/tenper.html

Thanks so much, Elizabeth!

Vocabulary

The other day after pushing Bentley on the swings for fifteen minutes, I began to get silly. Rather than pushing him normally, I started pushing his feet or giving him quick pats on his fanny. He finally got annoyed with me and began yelling, "No! You has to push me on my back tummy!"

"Back tummy," huh? I guess that's as good a phrase as any to describe the small of your back. And since growing up as a kid, we were absolutely forbidden to use the word "butt," (actually, I think my Mom still considers that word verboten), this seemed like a good substitute. At least, Craig and I got a kick out of it.

Imagine

I had to drive to Falls Church and back today, and during that time, I heard the song "Imagine" by John Lennon not once but twice. Can I just say that I absolutely loathe that song? It's really catchy and I like the piano that goes with it, but the lyrics drive me bonkers. A few of them include:


Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too


When I try to imagine these things, I pretty much end up picturing us all going back to being cave men. Living life for today? So John is suggesting here that we all quit our jobs and go to the beach? But then who would be growing the food? Who would be building houses? It may sound like a good idea if you're wealthy beyond normal people's wildest dreams and you have no concept of how the world (and the economy) works, but realistically, that's about the worst idea ever.

No religion? What is the meaning of life if you take religion out of it? No countries and no possessions? What's wrong with having different countries? I like that different places have different rules, so hopefully if you don't like the rules of the land where you live, you might be able to go some place better (although usually it doesn't work that way, I realize). Which country's rules are we going to follow if we do away with all boundaries? And no possessions? Who honestly wants to give up all their possessions? I'm not saying that material things are going to bring you happiness, but honestly-- everyone has at least a few things that they cherish and I think that's just fine, whether it's your teddy, your journal, or your car. And now that I'm thinking about it, I don't recall John Lennon ever giving away all his worldly possessions... Did he do that and I just missed it? Maybe Yoko Ono gave away all of Lennon's things after his death as a way of "keeping his dream alive"?

But the line that really kills me is, "Nothing to kill or die for." If there's nothing worth dying for, then there's nothing worth living for, either. I can think of lots of things I would kill or die for-- my family, for starters (and I'm including everyone there: husband, children, parents, sisters, in-laws; all of you out there); my beliefs; freedom for myself and for others. (I'm not actually out fighting for these freedoms but I'm grateful that we have a military that is.) If you took all these things away from me, I wouldn't want to go on living any more. There would be no point.

Anyway. I hope I didn't just ruin this song for you by overthinking it, but it doesn't take a whole lot of thought to really destroy it.

And John? You may not be the only one, but I hope there aren't too many other dreamers like you. I can't imagine a much worse world than what you've cooked up for us.

Rivalry

It's just been recently that my children have begun to flex their muscles in the art of sibling rivalry, a skill which I am sure will serve them for the rest of their lives.

Bentley, with his advanced language and motor skills, takes great joy in pointing out things that he can do that Kendra cannot because, "she's just a little baby still." Kendra actually has a pretty good little vocabulary for her age, but even she can't manage to counter this long argument yet. Give her time.

Both children, however, have discovered the phrase, "ME FIRST!" and they yell this whenever I need to do anything for both of them at the same time. This includes story time before naps, giving them their lunches, cleaning them up after said lunches have been consumed, etc.

But the thing they really get competitive over is praying. They are both frantic to get to bless the food. So we've been saying two prayers before each meal. I'd love to say that we're just so darn righteous and spiritual and whatnot, but in all honesty I'm usually pretty hungry by the time I've cooked dinner, and I hate eating food that has cooled down, so I'm all for digging in pretty quickly. Doesn't two prayers before each meal seems just a tad excessive? And now, sometimes those two prayers aren't even enough, and both children will continuing "praying" while we're eating. By this time my mouth is full and I'm done helping out, so they get to say their own prayers without any help from Mommy (or Daddy, who feels the same way). This usually consists of, "Father, Jesus, Amen." Which they repeat, yelling, with the most smug smiles on their faces.

I guess it's a start, but I doubt God is too impressed by it all.

A Myth Debunked

How many of you out there have been told that humans only use 10% (or possibly less) of their brains?

It's not true.

It seems like every now and then I hear that lie and it drives me crazy.

Here are the actual facts in my incredibly non-scientific, no citations whatsoever way, which I think I got from my friend Elizabeth, who is a PhD and studies brains. (If I'm wrong, please correct me, Elizabeth!!!) Some guy forever ago studied rats and they only used a small part of their brains. Then he studied humans and only saw them using a small portion of their brains, too, so he concluded that this was a universal trait. Recently, however, scientists have looked more closely, and it turns out that at any given time we're only using a portion of our brains, but throughout the course of a day, most people use their entire brain. Which makes sense, really-- I don't usually use both hands and feet at the same time. I, personally, cannot talk and listen both at the same time. We're using different parts of our brains to do all the things we do, but the entire organ is being put to good use.

Anyway, I'm tired of people spouting that lie as if the entire human population needs to stop being so lazy and start using this amazing organ that we possess. We ARE, for crying out loud.

Okay, I'm stepping off my soapbox now. Thank you, thank you.

Manic Monday, in a good way

Do you ever have one of those days where the sun is shining just enough to warm things up without making it hot, and the leaves are beginning to turn golden and red and it's absolutely beautiful with a deep blue sky background, and you just had a wonderful Sunday with your family where you didn't need to go anywhere or get dressed for anything but could just enjoy being together (while listening to General Conference, of course), and you even manage to come in under budget with your grocery shopping, and those jeans that haven't fit in years are suddenly comfortable (despite the cookie bars your husband baked during Conference) and life just seems perfect?

Yes, I am having that day. And I'm trying my best to just enjoy it and not worry about what dreadful thing might happen next to bring me down.

And I truly hope you are having an equally wonderful Monday as well.

Sneaky Sister

Guess who has a lot of fun with Bentley's new toys while he's busy napping?