Success!

I just peeked into the living room to see what Bentley and Kendra were giggling about. They were sitting on the couch together, sipping apple juice and contemplating the jacket to a DVD. Bentley announced that they were having Book Club. Now they've got four books that they're sharing. They may have already learned as much as I can teach them.

I cannot even begin to say how pleased I am.

Musings (Ramblings) on Harry Potter

I had a lot of reading time over the weekend. (More on that later.) At one point I risked getting out of bed to find the novel I've been reading (Ceremony, by Leslie Marmon Silko), but when it wasn't in the usual places, Craig shooed me back to bed.

"But what am I supposed to read?" I wailed.

And right on cue, Craig answered, "Harry Potter. I'll go get you the next book."

I told he's good at knowing what I like.

When I was in labor with Kendra, one of the things that got me through it all was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. If I was going to be wide awake at two in the morning and in pain, at least I had a good book to get me through it. After it was all over and my in-laws arrived to clean up our apartment, they commented that it was slightly unnerving finding my book open to the page I'd been on, left on the bathroom counter, so close to the scene of the crime. After Kendra's birth, I finished the series and vowed that I wouldn't read them again until the next time I was pregnant. This sounds weird, I'm sure, but it was because whenever I read Harry Potter, I sort of want to just keep reading them over and over again. It's hard to go back to other books because they just aren't as awesome. (Magical, amazing, well-thought out, and cool are also words that come to mind.) So this was me making an effort to force myself to read other literature.

And I stuck to that pretty well. It wasn't until we were at least trying for Lucky that I kind of sort of slipped up and read the first three. Those ones are pretty short anyway, so they only kind of count, right?

When I found out that I was pregnant, I have to admit that it wasn't long before it occurred to me that I could now continue on with Goblet of Fire-- guilt-free!!! I was pretty excited.

But I also had a stack of other books that needed perusing before I could jump back into the world of wizards and muggles. So I dutifully made my way through Great Catherine, The Summer Knight, Ender in Exile, Endowed from on High, Night, The Lovely Bones, and was well into Ceremony* before it went missing. And then I finally indulged. I read Goblet of Fire in about four days. And enjoyed every lovely word of it. I two absolute favorite lines. One is when Harry is practicing the Summoning Charm during Divination: "He managed to make a fly zoom straight into his hand, though he wasn't entirely sure that was his prowess at Summoning Charms-- perhaps the fly was just stupid." And then later on when Hermione scares Malfoy by pretending that Professor "Mad-Eye" Moody is standing behind him and then spits out at him, "Twitchy little ferret, aren't you, Malfoy?" Brilliant.

Anyway, the purpose of all this is that I mostly just wanted to say how much I adore Goblet of Fire. It's definitely one of the top three H.P. books as far as I'm concerned, and I have a hard time narrowing it down beyond that. Prisoner of Azkaban has the happiest ending by far, and I love that, but it feels a little bogged down at the end (time travel can do that to a novel). I have a hard time with Order of the Phoenix because Harry seems like such an angsty teenager there (points for honesty, Rowling, but that doesn't mean I enjoy reading it as much). Half-Blood Prince has Harry really maturing into the person I love, but the ending is so sad; the first time I read it, I was sitting on the beach with Craig (we were engaged then), sobbing. Craig hadn't read it yet and thought I was weird. Meh. I really enjoyed Deathly Hallows, but I had a hard time getting used to the complete change in format, and (yes, I'm a dork here, but) I missed Hogwarts.

But Goblet of Fire... Yes, the ending is sad and scary. But it's also thrilling. Voldemort is BACK. There's so much energy in the action. And that plot. Wow. It blows me away every time I read it. (It also makes me think I shouldn't even try to ever write a novel; I could never be that genius.) I don't think any of the other books can compare with this one for having plot twists that just blow you away, but make absolutely perfect sense in hindsight. Brilliant beyond words.

It was this book, actually, that I insisted that Craig had to read before the movie came out. All the other books he'd read after seeing the movie, but for this one I put my foot down. "No movie could possibly do this book justice, but it will give away the plot so you won't appreciate how amazing it is. You have to read it first," I insisted. And he listened. The summer we were engaged, Craig worked while I went to school, and while I studied in the evenings, he plowed through this book. I still remember the last night of his reading, when he started on the third task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament.

"Oh, you'll have to finish it now," I told him. "You won't be able to put it down tonight."

"Are you sure?" Craig flipped to the back of the book, "There's over a hundred pages left still."

"Trust me."

Then he got to the part where Harry and Cedric grasp the Tri-Wizard cup, only to discover that it's a portkey. And he looked up at me and simply said, "Oh, no."

I sent him home. It was nearly midnight, and he would have to leave my apartment soon, anyway. Let him go and enjoy his book. We had a great time discussing it the next morning.

Anyway, I could go on and on. But now I need to get cracking. I have to finish Ceremony so I can move on to Order of the Phoenix!

But all this one-sided writing has made me curious: Which is your favorite Harry Potter book and why? I'd love to know.



*If you and I aren't already friends on Goodreads, then perhaps we ought to be?

Awesome.

Today, for your viewing pleasure, I bring you a combination of two of my favorite things: Seattle and Glee. Tons of thanks to Juliana for bringing this to my attention! Enjoy!

New Life

A few shots of spring. I'm not a photographer. Plenty of people I know would have done a much better job of this. But that doesn't mean I can't have fun with a camera anyway, right?

New leaves. So green and pretty!

Thanks again to the previous owners for planting so many flowers in my backyard!

Hostas poking up out of the ground.

And introducing: Lucky.
Nickname chosen by Bentley, and agreed upon unanimously by the family.
(And chosen before I had a chance to read this. Oops, Jen!)

I like spring. I like new life.

More on Craig

I can't believe I forgot this earlier-- it's one of my favorite things about Craig! So it turns out that Craig understands what I like. You can take that any number of ways, and it's probably true. Craig knows when he needs to make me laugh and he knows when I just need a hug. And he even knows when I'm (just occasionally) being a little bit ridiculous and probably need to be called out on it. But even then he manages to do so in such a way that I don't turn on him in rage. That takes skills.*

But he also knows what things I like. When we were engaged, Craig actually picked out the jewelry I wore for our wedding. He chose this necklace and the earrings (I chose the tiara before he'd arrived in Seattle):Perfect for my skinny, ballerina neck.

Of course, when he chose them, I tried them on, said, "Hmm, maybe..." in my most non-committal voice, tried on five hundred other necklaces, and then bought the one he'd originally suggested. He was so proud. I was pretty impressed, too, actually. And it made for a fun story.

Since then, he's managed to do this several other times. (It's not often I buy much of anything, so he hasn't had many opportunities to try.) The most obvious current example is my Easter dress for this year. I decided I needed a new dress, and dragged Craig and the kids to H & M to look for one. Unfortunately, none of their dresses quite worked: they were too short, or if I tried on a bigger size in hopes of it being longer, then they were too low-cut. And most of them were sleeveless. Craig suggested one dress that I tried on, and I quite liked it, except I couldn't really breathe.** So off Craig went to look for the next size up. Unfortunately, the next size up turned out to be five sizes up. So he brought back an entirely different dress.

It was fuchsia. It was sleeveless. It looked kind of big and clunky, somehow. I looked at it and said, "Um, no. Thanks for trying, but I don't like this dress." And tried on another one for the second time. Then I felt bad and decided I should at least try on the fuchsia dress. It was the least I could do. Did I think that it was big and clunky? Try swishy and fun! Hmm... Maybe it wasn't such a poor choice after all. But fuchsia on my skin color isn't really the best combination... I tried on a few more dresses. They looked all right standing up, but I could barely move in them. Not good for a human playground. Plus, they were all button-down dresses, which tend to do awkward things on me (is that something where you just have to be crazy skinny to pull off properly? I can never tell...). I looked at the swishy fuchsia dress once more. If I put a black shirt underneath it, maybe it wouldn't be so bad against my skin...

And suddenly I had a dress that I loved. A swishy, fun, bright Easter-y dress that I could wear even with kids.

Happy Easter to me!

Good work, Craig, once again.

One of these days I'll learn to trust his taste. Like I said, he knows what I'll like!



*I originally wrote "mad skills" but the pun was just too bad.

**This is something that might not have bothered me before having kids, but knowing they'd be climbing all over me at church the entire time I wore the dress, I decided this was an impracticality that I couldn't accept. Ah, how parenthood changes one!

Reasons Why I Love This Weather

This is Seattle weather at its best. I can't actually see any raindrops falling anywhere, but the surface of everything is wet. Under the car is still dry, though, and you know that you'll be able to run out to the car and back without doing any major damage to yourself or your clothing or probably even getting your shoes too muddy, provided you stay off the grass.

So here are the reasons I love it:

1. Because it's darker outside, the kids slept in (7:40, where they normally get up around 6:45!!).

2. Because the pollen count is down to a 7 now (as opposed to 11.3!!!), I'm opening the windows and enjoying some fresh, cool air.

3. The air that is wafting in through that open window smells delicious.

4. My backyard is so filled with green that I can no longer see the neighbor's houses behind us. Such delightful privacy! Thank the rain for all that green.

5. I'm already sunburned from spending three hours at the park yesterday. This will give my skin a chance to heal.

6. It's so relaxing on the eyes to not have the sun glaring into them for a bit.

7. Tomorrow when the sun comes back again, I will greet it like a long-lost friend. Absence truly makes the heart grow fonder.

8. It just makes my little Seattle heart happy. It always has, and I suppose it always will.

I think it's my lucky day. Hope it's yours, too!

And Two for Kendra

While I'm telling stories:

-Yesterday, Kendra managed to put her shoes on all by herself. She proudly announced, "Ta da, me!" Now she's saying it any time she manages to do anything on her own.

-Just now, she was sitting in her high chair eating a sandwich with her Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal tucked in beside her. Pooh Bear's chin was resting on her high chair tray. She began insisting that she needed a bowl for her sandwich (rather than the plate it was sitting on). When I asked her why, she said, "So Winnie the Pooh doesn't eat my sandwich." Can't argue with that logic.

Stories of Craig

Usually my stories about the kids. But I seem to have a bunch about Craig recently. And, after he told our Sunday School teacher that I'd come to class, as soon as I was "done gossiping in the hall," I don't feel quite so bad about sharing the embarrassing ones, too. (In my defense, I was not gossiping. My friend Sarah had just gotten back from spending three weeks in Hawaii, and like any good friend, I wanted to hear about her vacation. Sheesh!) So indulge me for a bit while I talk about Craig...

-A couple weeks ago, I came home to find Craig hard at work on the rec room. Craig is very patient with my obsessive need to listen to the same music (right now, Glee) over and over, but when I'm gone he's quick to change the playlist. This particular time, he claims he just put the whole library of his iTunes on random, but I'm not so sure. All I know is that when I walked in, Britney Spears was singing away. It was awesome.

-When I have enrichment, Craig will usually clean up the kitchen for me. One time he didn't, and I have to admit that I was a little annoyed to come home to such a mess. A few days later, I tried to complain about this to a friend. She looked at me, narrowed her eyes slightly, and said, "Alanna, I can count on one hand the number of times my husband has cleaned up the kitchen for me." Oh. I shut up really fast. I appreciate Craig more now.

-Craig and I always read scriptures together at night. Sometimes this goes better than other times. One night Craig was particularly sleepy, and in the middle of his verse, his head dropped and he mumbled something about "mountains" and "glorious." I'm still trying to figure that one out. Another time when he was sleepy, we were reading 2 Nephi 8. We'll each read five verses at a time. Every single set of Craig's verses had the phrase, "Awake!" repeated in them. It was almost spooky. I about died laughing.

-Last week we had BLTs for dinner, and then I had to rush out for a meeting. When I came home, Craig had placed the leftover bacon on a plate in the fridge. This was something one of his roommates did when we were dating. The roommate's bacon stayed like that for weeks. It was so gross. Craig did it to remind me of that incident. I was so relieved when I confirmed with him that it was a joke, and he didn't really think this was an acceptable way to put away food. Yes, he was joking, but he's still a nut. (SERIOUSLY-- who leaves bacon sitting on a plate in the fridge for weeks at a time?!?!?!?!)

-One of my many favorite moments from when Craig and I were dating was when we began talking about our mothers. "Just so you know," I informed Craig, "I think my Mom is perfect." "Well, so is mine!" Craig shot back. I knew he was a good guy then. (You raised him right, Donna!)

I'm sure I have more, but this is it for now.

Thanks for keeping me laughing and smiling, Craig! You have a gift for it...

The Joys of Home Improvement

A few weeks ago, the garbage disposal began making a dreadful noise when I turned it on. At first I thought I'd dropped a spoon down it (something that infuriates me every single time I manage to do it, which is approximately every other week). But fishing around inside the disposal led me to believe that there were no spoons there. So I told Craig to take a look at it.

This is what he found:
The most beat up penny you've ever seen. Poor thing. I shudder to think what it did to the blades of my garbage disposal.



And while we're on the topic, my dryer stopped working this week. Well, let's just say that it stopped actually drying clothes without needing to use two or three cycles to do it. I find this unacceptable in a dryer. I noticed it the first time a couple days ago but hoped it was simply a fluke. But when it happened two more times, I had to face up to the fact that we had a problem.

Minor home improvement projects tend to get a bit backed up when Craig is consumed with a major one (such as the entire downstairs). That's why I've had light fixtures sitting on my kitchen counter for several weeks now. But not having a dryer is a big enough deal that it got moved to the top of Craig's chore list. Poking around looking for ideas as to what could be wrong, Craig decided to take off the outdoor vent for the dryer.

And a bird flew out.

We think this may be the root of our problem.

Upon further investigation, this is what Craig found inside the vent:

Yes, that's a nest, complete with tiny eggs (3 or 4 of them, actually, although they're hard to see in this picture). I can't decide how much I should be horrified by all this and how much I should be fascinated. But I will say that if removing this doesn't fix my dryer, then I don't know what will.

I bet those birds hardly needed to sit on the eggs at all to keep them warm, though! I hope now that Craig has moved the nest to a tree that the mother bird will come back...

If I make you laugh, will you forgive me for not being original?

I have been feeling less than inspired these last few weeks. Perhaps you've been able to tell. For right now, I'm going to blame it on my allergies. I keep waking up in the night with my nose stuffed up, my throat dry because I've been breathing through my mouth, and my eyes so itchy I can't stop clawing at them. I finally broke down and took some claritin*, but last night, at least, even that didn't seem to help.

So I've had to stop wearing mascara, which makes me feel like I look like a rabbit. A very sad, just-finished-crying rabbit. Which, naturally, made me think of this video from the first episode of Flight of the Conchords:




So that's what I have to say for now. I'm not crying. It's just a little bit of pollen in my eyes.



*Funny thing about me. I love suggesting to other people that they take drugs. I will offer ibuprofen, Tylenol, anything if you even think you might have a headache. But for all my drug pushing tendencies, I really hate taking anything for myself. I'm not really sure why, although I suspect my inability to swallow pills has something to do with it...

Method

So, if I tell Bentley that Batman likes certain foods, thus inspiring him to eat said foods also, does that make me a bad parent?

Unexpected

I made another Sunday crock pot meal yesterday, but this one did not turn out well. I'm taking a page from my mother-in-law, and am blaming this on the recipe, not me. I suppose a better cook-- someone who really knows what they're doing in the kitchen, like my friend Anni-- could have looked at the recipe and foreseen that it wouldn't taste very good. But I'm not that good, and I was too intrigued by the use of Kielbasa sausage (yum) to realize that the cabbage (not so yum) would completely overpower it, leaving the entire dish in the "not-so-yum" range.*

So, yes, it wasn't very good. Craig and I both ate the contents of our bowls while quietly agreeing that even though it tasted better than it smelled, we couldn't think of a good reason to ever eat this again.

What was funny, though, was Bentley's reaction to it. Bentley pretty much never eats dinner. He doesn't eat much of anything, actually, despite my best efforts to cram food down his skinny little throat so that people won't wonder why I apparently only feed my daughter while starving my son. (They currently weigh within three pounds of each other!) Anyway. Bentley took a bite and yelled out, "I LIKE IT!" And for the rest of the meal, he kept shouting out, "IT'S YUMMY!" and "IT'S GOOD!"-- stuff like that. In all honesty, it got a little annoying. But he was nothing if not enthusiastic

He ate two bowls of it. It's the most I've ever seen him eat at dinner time.

Weird.




*Anni, however, is practically German, so maybe she would like this recipe because of the cabbage. Do Germans eat a lot more cabbage than Americans or am I just making that up?

Best Laid Plans

After I got out of the shower and dressed this morning, I felt energetic. So I decided to vacuum out my mini-van. It's been needing this ever since we used it to haul junk from the rec room to the dump. Splinters and pieces of carpet pad littered the back. That was really gross. And then with the drive to and from Hershey, the kids had added a layer of goldfish cracker & pretzel crumbs and fruit snacks. Yikes.

So I got everything all ready: I wove the extension cord through the window and carried out the shop vac. I even emptied the shop vac, which is really going above and beyond the call of duty, if you ask me. Before I could actually get started I noticed two things: I was ALREADY covered in dust. And Bentley was crying hysterically because bees kept flying near him. Hm.

I'd done too much to just scrap the whole project, so I let the kids run back inside to the refuge of our home, and proceeded to vacuum away and hope they wouldn't do any serious damage to each other. (I did have the front door open with just the screen door closed, so if there was any major screaming going on, the chances were good I would catch it any time the vacuum was switched off for a moment. I'm not completely neglectful.)

Vacuuming the car is hot and sweaty work, and when you begin covered with dust, it makes for me being a big mess by the time I'm through. Why I had showered before embarking on this chore is a mystery to me. But I finished eventually, and came inside to discover Kendra happily reading a book and Bentley nowhere to be found, but my bedroom door closed. The last time this happened, Bentley was standing on top of my toilet, playing with the sink and splashing water in his hair (at least it was sink water and not toilet water!). It ended with him slipping on all the water he'd spilled and hitting his head on the shower door right when I was going to see what he was up to. So seeing the closed door caused me to dash up the stairs in alarm. The first thing I noticed was that my bed (which I had actually made) was all messed up. No biggie. Where was Bentley, though?

Then my bed began wiggling and kicking. He was under my pillows. No damage done to him, or to my room. Phew.

And now I've showered again. And my car is clean (at least, on the inside; maybe I'll take it to a car wash today?). Now I'm just not sure I can bear to let the kids back in the car...

I think I've earned an afternoon of lazing about and reading for the rest of the day!

Observation

Last week on Tuesday, our weather was just barely in the 50 degree range, and the wind made it feel downright cold. Today, it got up to 95. And I had to turn on the air conditioning. On April 6th.

And people think I'm kidding when I say that spring on the east coast is about a week long!

It's a good thing I like summer, or I might find this upsetting.

Spring Break

I guess I took a vacation from blogging while Craig was out of school. Suffice it to say, I love spring break. And thanks to Arrested Development, I can't even say (or type) the words "spring break" without wanting to end the phrase with a screamed out "Woo woo!!!" (Unlike Kitty, I usually manage to not flash people, so it's not as bad as you might think.)

So now I'm going to be obnoxious, and cover the entire week in one post. Or in other words: BEWARE-- REALLY LONG BLOG POST TO FOLLOW. Consider yourself warned.

Anyway, we actually managed to strike a balance between fun and productivity, so that made me happy. Craig spent the first few days working on the rec room, and the main room now has all its drywall up, and some of it has even been spackled and taped, so that's good progress. Then starting on Thursday we moved onto the "fun" portion of the break by driving to Gettysburg and meeting up with my sister Natalie (who is the biggest Civil War buff I know). We toured the battlegrounds there and tried not to laugh at the irony as the CD tour praised the stoicism of the soldiers and we kept turning up the volume hoping to drown out the whining of our children. But despite all the whining, we managed to finish the tour and I learned a lot, so I'm glad we did it.

Here's Natalie with Robert E. Lee. When we happened to visit Arlington on General Lee's birthday a couple years ago, she sent me a text asking that I wish him a happy birthday from her. Because she just happened to know that it was his birthday. THAT'S the sort of Civil War buff she is. Lest you think I was simply exaggerating.

Holding my nephew Samuel at the top of the Pennsylvania monument. He took one look at his mommy standing below us and was not happy that I'd dragged him up there. Oops.

The family at Little Round Top. I love how Kendra's pants totally clash with Craig's shirt.

We spent Friday hanging out with Natalie and meeting up with some of her friends who also happened to be visiting Hershey. Then that night, we put the kids to bed, left them with Natalie and Cameron, and Craig and I headed out to Hershey Park for their "preview" night. It was so nice to wander around the park without strollers for a little bit! I was kind of a wimp and only went on some of the roller coasters. I am learning to accept the fact that I am afraid of falling from heights, so several of the roller coasters were off-limits to me because of that. I did manage this one, though:

"Great Bear" at Hershey Park

And I'm awarding myself three coolness points for that, at least. Interesting side note: Craig and I discovered that we have exact opposite views on roller coasters. If I can't see where I'm going, I can just enjoy the ride and I will love it. That's part of the reason I liked Disney World's Rock ' n ' Roller Coaster so much. But if I can see the big loops (and yes, the big drops) coming up, then I'm terrified. Craig is the opposite-- as long as he can see where he's going, nothing much bothers him. Not knowing what's coming will just make him sick. Weird, huh?

Anyway, we had fun, even if it was only for a couple hours. And many thanks to Natalie and Cameron, who had to put up with our kids who did NOT go right to sleep for them like they should have!!!

The next day we all went to Hershey Park.
The kids were a little nervous about the whole thing (and cold-- it warmed up eventually!). So Natalie and I took them on oodles of little kid rides while Cameron and Craig enjoyed all the roller coasters that I had been too afraid of. And we had a good time this way! Best of all was Natalie being willing to take all the kids home for nap time by herself. Saintly points for that one. It gave Craig and Cameron and me a nice break from pushing strollers around, and the kids were MUCH happier when they came back. Then they absolutely loved all the rides, rather than mostly putting up with them like they had in the morning!

Unfortunately, by this time, I was tired of lugging around the camera. So we only got shots from the morning when the three-and-under crowd was still a tad trepidatious. Here are a few of them, though:




e







I'll admit that we also enjoyed the yummy food at Hershey Park. We'd had grandiose ideas of packing lunches and buying a healthy dinner while we were there. But then we decided, "Eh-- it's HERSHEY Park! Let's enjoy it!" This involved Craig eating ice cream for dinner, and me devouring a chocolate-dipped Belgian waffle and a fabulous s'more, among other things. I did at least have a gyro sandwich for dinner, in addition to the chocolate. (Random note: do you pronounce it like "hero" or like it looks? I can never figure out what's correct!)

We went to bed that night exhausted, but pleased with how the day had gone. What is it about your kids having a really fun time that makes you feel like an awesome parent?

The next day we took our time packing up (and trying to clean up some of the mess we'd made of Natalie's apartment!) and eventually began our drive to Culpeper, where we had a lovely Easter dinner with Craig's parents. I'm always a big fan of Easter dinner, but after eating nothing but junk the day before, this one tasted absolutely WONDERFUL. Many congratulations to my Mother-in-law for her fabulous cooking! Seriously, even the carrots were to die for (and I don't usually even like cooked carrots). So we owe them lots of thanks and gratitude, especially since it meant I didn't have to cook as soon as we got home (something I seem to have forgotten how to do, lately)! Grandma and Grandpa had also planned plenty of fun for the kids: Easter eggs, blowing bubbles, and lots of chocolate:



After that we finally headed home. It was sad having Craig back at work on Monday, but it's awfully nice to be home again!

And now... I can hardly wait until summer vacation!