Nephi in Translation

I feel bad for even admitting this, but Nephi has never been one of my favorite Book of Mormon prophets. Something about the way he writes tends to rub me the wrong way. So it's been interesting as I've been reading him again this last month, but in Japanese. Before you even think about being impressed with this, I should explain that my Japanese is all but non-existent these days. I haven't had much chance to speak it in the last few years, and consequently I've forgotten most of it. I realized recently what a sad waste that was, and so I decided to try reading the Book of Mormon in Japanese in the hopes that it would jog my foreign language memory a bit. Basically, I read a verse in English, and then I read it out loud in Japanese. This is only possible because the Japanese BofM has all the phonetic pronunciations next to the Chinese characters. If I didn't have those to help me out, I would probably never even try doing this in the first place. As it is, it's mostly a lot of sounds with a few words that I actually know thrown in the middle-- faith! Plan of Salvation! Holy Ghost!-- words that only a missionary would know (and words that I'd sometimes forgotten, but am relieved when I recognize).

Anyway, it's very slow going, to say the least. And now that I'm in the Isaiah chapters I'm getting even less out of my reading than before.

But. Reading in Japanese has helped me appreciate Nephi a little more, so here's the story.

It's interesting because the translation is very direct, and this can be problematic with the cultural differences between Japan and America. The most obvious example is just the fact that Nephi is always beginning his sentences with, "I, Nephi..." And here's where it gets tricky because in Japanese, it's considered very rude to use the word "I." It's self-centered to talk about yourself so much, so in most sentences, Japanese people will just leave out the "I" and assume you know who they're talking about. So when Nephi keeps saying, "Watashi Nifai wa..." I keep wondering if this seems as rude to the Japanese people reading the Book of Mormon as it seems to me. And I wonder if that could have been translated better (less directly) so that it wouldn't seem quite so self-centered. And then, when Nephi mentions that he is "large in stature," I just about die. You NEVER brag about yourself in Japan!

So this was on my mind as I read the other day, when I came across 1 Nephi 17:19, "And now it came to pass that I, Nephi, was exceedingly sorrowful because of the hardness of their hearts; and now when they saw that I began to be sorrowful they were glad in their hearts, insomuch that they did rejoice over me, saying: We knew that ye could not construct a ship, for we knew that ye were lacking in judgment; wherefore, thou canst not accomplish so great a work."

The word used in Japanese for sorrowful was "kanashii" which for whatever reason struck me as being much sadder than the English "sorrowful." And the Japanese word for "rejoice" was the verb form of the word "yorokobi" which means "joy," which, again, seemed much happier than I'd given it credit for in English. Such strong emotions between Nephi and his brothers surprised me. I mean, what sort of brothers tease their little brother until he is truly depressed-- kanashii-- and then, seeing the affect they've had on him, have joy? We all know that Laman and Lemuel are punks, but this somehow made it feel so much more personal to me. I realized just how sad it made Nephi that he could never manage to get through to them.

And this, of course, got me thinking some more. I think we can agree that prophets very rarely have easy lives. The scriptures are full of prophets being ignored, rejected, ridiculed, and/or killed. It seems that only the very lucky prophets manage to actually convert people and bring them to repentance. And Nephi fits in with this generalization pretty well.

But there's one way in which Nephi is very different from other prophets, and that's who his audience was. Most prophets preach to huge groups of people, many of whom are probably strangers. But Nephi only ever preached to his family-- his brothers and sisters and their spouses and children. And still he was rejected by more than half of them! That had to have been a lot more personal, and therefore hurt a lot more, than being rejected by strangers. It would certainly hurt my feelings a lot more if my own sisters were slamming their doors in my face than it did when the Japanese people did it.

Anyway, it occurred to me that Nephi had a much more difficult time of things than I probably have been giving him credit for. And if he feels the need to mention how strong he is or to talk about himself a bit much, maybe I can cut him some slack because he had a truly difficult mission in life.

Insights from reading the Book of Mormon in Japanese.

Criticism and Concern

Since getting our piano, Bentley has been very concerned about the men who helped move it in. He wants them all to come back and hang out with us. This led to a very suspicious-sounding conversation, as he recently asked me, "Where's the guys?" Craig gave me one of those eyebrows-raised looks that effectively said, "Busted!" Trying not to appear guilty, I asked Bentley which guys he meant, and he answered, "The Piano Guys." Phew!

Anyway, yesterday during breakfast, we had this conversation again (the joys of being two and having Alzheimer's-- repeated conversations), but this time it took a slightly different turn. It went something like this:

Bentley: Where's the piano guys?
Me: Hmm... I guess they're at work
Bentley: Like Daddy!
Me: That's right, Daddy's at work, too.
Bentley: And Mommy, too!
Me: Yup, I'm working, too. My job is to feed Kendra and keep you guys happy.
Bentley: And keep Daddy happy, too.
Me: Yeah, I guess I keep Daddy happy, too, huh?
Bentley: Sometimes.

Ouch! Apparently I need to do better in the Wife Department of my life. Didn't think it would take my two-year-old to tell me, though!

A Great Idea

My friend Mary said something the other day which I find incredibly wise. She said something to the effect of, "Sometimes I wish we took videos of everyone running around trying to get ready in the morning before church. Because all we ever see are these perfect little families sitting in the pews as if they were made that way. No one ever sees the frantic-ness that goes on to make that happen!"

This statement came right after I'd been telling her about getting dressed for church and discovering that chapstick had been left in a pants pocket and run through the wash, resulting in a dime-sized grease stain in about THE worst place possible on the shirt I was going to wear. (I'll leave that one to your imagination. Trust me, it was bad.) That coupled with getting a bad night's sleep had left me in a foul mood all morning, so, of course, the best remedy was to whine to my friends.

Since then (and also since I managed to get the stain out-- let me just sing the praises of Shout's advanced stain formula!!!), I've decided that there was even more depth to Mary's idea than I at first thought. As I get to know people better, it often amazes me to realize that we all have trials that we're dealing with, 95% of which are not apparent on the surface. It's too easy to assume that we're the only ones who occasionally wake up tired and cranky and while we are desperately trying to look our best for everyone else, we feel like inside we're still frantic and our shirts have embarrassing chapstick stains on them. (Or something like that.)

Anyway, it made more sense when I was thinking about it late last night. Hopefully you're at least getting the idea.

Bad Sign...

It's never a good thing when you've completely run out of tupperware. And it's even worse when you realize that's because it's all in the refrigerator, holding food which is now too old to be eaten. Gross!

(I guess after my last post I should explain-- the ants can't get inside the fridge, so it's not something I clean as regularly as I should. Oops. The good news is that the garbage men hadn't come by when I noticed this problem, so it's all cleaned out and miles away from me now!)

Motivation

I finally realized the main reason why I clean my kitchen.

I probably do dishes at least twice a day, and I try very hard to keep the counters clear of crumbs. And certainly a big reason for this is because it's just plain nice having a clean kitchen!

But after the kids are in bed, I have to get everything spotless. Dishes washed, table and high chairs scrubbed down, floor vacuumed. The works. (And when I say "I," I really mean "we." Craig always pitches right in so we get the job done fairly quickly.) I remember my mission president's wife explaining that it was much more restful going to bed with a clean house, and I wholeheartedly believe this.

But the real reason I try to keep things so clean is because I'm afraid of ants. There is no greater siren song to ants than crumbs left all over your counter or food sitting on the table. Trust me, I lived in Africa. I know about ants. Any food left out would be covered in ants within the hour. I live in fear of the day that I will come downstairs in the morning and discover a kitchen turned black with ants. (Really, I've had nightmares.)

So I clean. And so far it hasn't happened. We did get some ants in the bay window of our apartment shortly before I moved, but there was no food there, just a lot of paint chips that the ants were convinced must be hiding food. But even then, I had to not look at the bay window or else I would lose my appetite. I was so relieved once I had finally cleaned it out and sprayed Raid all over it... The only other incident that even comes close to this nightmare of mine was the time I left brownies in my backpack while I was in California. That was a big mistake! After emptying the backpack of all food items, I just left it outside by the garbage cans for a week, hoping the ants would realize the food was gone. (Fortunately for me, my aunt didn't get mad that I'd gotten ants on her bed while my backpack was resting there-- she assured me that ants in Southern California were pretty much a way of life. Poor Californians!) And I'm sure I have many stories involving the ants in Africa, but none of them are coming to mind right now. Perhaps I've blocked them out? You're probably happier not hearing them, anyway, so I won't try to remember.

Anyway, that's my weird paranoia. Or at least one of them. What's yours?

Projects

There's been a lot of stuff going on here these last few days, which is why I haven't been writing much. But it's time I started telling you about it!

The oldest thing is probably that we finished working on our downstairs bathroom (for now). It's still a very small and claustrophobic little bathroom, but at least it is no longer scary and dirty and claustrophobic! Now it feels very clean and functional. I'll put up the before and after pictures to prove my point...


So this is the original ugliness:

Why, why, why in a bathroom this small would you use such busy wallpaper? It's just awful! And it looks like a Subway restaurant. I like Subway, but it's not how I want my bathroom to look...

(It's hard to see, but trust me, that shower was disgusting. But nice of them to leave their shampoo and soap behind for us, don't you think?)

Anyway, Craig ripped out the wallpaper, replaced the toilet with a slightly smaller one, replaced the broken tile in the shower, cleaned the shower like crazy, and painted the bathroom white. I helped with the painting a little, when the kids were napping, and also cleaned the sink and the inside of the medicine cabinet (which was really gross-- why would there be little tiny hairs inside a medicine cabinet? Was someone trimming their mustache inside it??? Ew, ew, ew!). And then Craig put up new towel racks and stuff like that.

So here it is now:

Oops-- forgot to use the flash for this picture... It isn't really this yellow.

Whew! Doesn't that just feel better somehow?

Anyway, so that's one project done. For now. Some day we need to bump out one of the walls, and possibly move the toilet closer to the wall, but that requires a whole lot more work than what we wanted to bother with right now. We just wanted it functional.

The other project was a bit unexpected: our oven died on Saturday, so we suddenly had a rather more urgent project to take on. (Thank goodness for my crockpot, since we were having company on Sunday!!!) But Craig was able to find a new oven on Craig's List (gotta love it) for less than half the price of what one would have cost at Home Depot or Lowe's. We picked it up yesterday (which, thanks to DC traffic took three hours, but that's a different story), and then after the kids were in bed, Craig installed it. I did help hold it up while Craig was connecting all the wiring, but it was pretty much his show. And I think the entire operation of taking out the old unit, carrying the new one into the house, and installing it took less than twenty minutes.

Who does that? I would have had to hire someone!

Anyway, I was impressed with Craig. And it's nice having a new oven, even if it is just as small as the previous one (that's the problem with wall units-- you can't sporadically change sizes, it turns out!). If you'd seen what the previous owners had done to the oven, you'd be glad, too. When my mother-in-law cleaned it out, she found old chicken bones inside it! And I'm not even going to tell you what was climbing around inside the control panel. (Shudder.) That's probably why it stopped working, though...!

But no more! We have a lovely new oven, and I made bread in it just now, so it works wonderfully!

So check those two projects off the list.

FreeCycle Miracle

So, we have a new addition to our family. And this is it:




Isn't she beautiful?

Okay, if I'm going to be completely honest with you, I should admit that there are some scratch marks that you can't really see in this lighting, and it's way out of tune. But considering the fact that this piano was free, I think it was still a good deal. Right?

Anyway, the story here actually begins a couple weeks ago when I was hanging out with several of my friends. They were talking about how someone was giving away a piano on freecycle, this community board that they subscribe to. I'd heard about freecycle, but it mostly sounded like people trying to get rid of their junk, so I hadn't bothered joining yet. But when I heard that they were occasionally giving away free pianos, I decided maybe it was worth investigating. My friends, for the record, didn't want the piano for various reasons-- not nice enough, not enough space in their apartments, etc.

So the next week (last week) I actually got around to signing up for freecycle. The local version is run by a woman in the ward, so that was easy to do. And (I kid you not) the very next day, someone posted that they had a piano to give away. I was in hysterics I was so excited. I emailed him right away and asked if I could come see it and then I told Craig that maybe we were going to get a piano.

Now this is where things suddenly got weird. Because Craig was totally apprehensive about taking it! He pointed out that it was probably in pretty bad shape, and it would be really hard to move, and since when did I want a piano, anyway??? I told him that I had to at least look at it, that it couldn't be that hard to move because people did it all the time, and of course I wanted a piano. I may not play much, but I love to sing, and it really helps if you have a piano to plunk out the tunes and make sure you're doing it right. And hello-- you NEED a piano for warming up!

Craig wasn't convinced. I think he thought this was an Impulse Buy, which, according to Craig, is always wrong. (Although if it's free, does it still count as an impulse buy?) I finally had to explain that I'd always wanted a piano, but didn't see much point in talking or even thinking about it, because they were so expensive. When would we ever get around to buying one? But every house should have one. Sort of like a computer. When I told my Dad this theory, he laughed out loud and told me that I didn't get this notion from him. Yes, we have my Mom to thank for that one. (Thanks, Mom. Really.)

But all of this arguing didn't really matter, because I waited all day and never heard back from the guy. I figured someone else had already gotten it.

Fortunately, I checked my email one last time before going to bed. They still had it. They said I could come and look at it. Tomorrow.

I was too excited to sleep that night.

The next day I went to see the piano, and it was beautiful. Not perfect, no, but still beautiful. And then my mind was made up.

Craig said I had to do all the work, so I did. I called people and got lots of men from the ward to help out. I reserved a van from U-Haul and even drove it to Haymarket (I did let Craig drive it back). And I watched and smiled a whole lot while the men struggled and heaved to get the piano from there to here.

And now it's done and I couldn't be happier about it. And Craig has already been playing the piano, and I think he's pretty darn pleased with the whole thing, too, even though he won't quite admit it. (I was right! I was right! I was right!)

Sometimes my life goes so well for me. Free piano, who would have ever guessed?

Three

That's right, everybody! Kendra finally has THREE TEETH. She got her first two at the same time when she was ten months old (a little late, yes, but Bentley was the same). And then nothing else happened! NOTHING! Only two teeth! As my father-in-law pointed out, "What can you do with only two teeth? It's like trying to clap with one hand!"

But after gnawing on a dill pickle for twenty minutes (gross, huh? what baby likes dill pickles?), she finally popped out one on the top of her gums! Yaaaaay! And #4 is visible beneath the gums, so it's just a matter of time for that one, too.

Now if only we could convince her to try walking...

Pictures

It's a rainy, dreary Monday morning, so what better way to spend my time than posting pictures of sunny days? Hope you enjoy them! (I should explain-- Kendra gets in more of the pictures because she doesn't move fast enough to get out of them, unlike, say, a certain older brother of hers... So please don't think I'm playing favorites!)


One of the dresses Kendra got for her birthday


Bentley and Kendra looking very Eastery (although I think I put Kendra in a different dress on the actual day...)




I love the flower behind Kendra's ear


Before the weather warmed up...


Spring break gave us a great chance to finally go to the National Zoo!


You can see the Asian leopard-y thing in the background. Bentley and I, however, are mesmerized by the goldfish.


Bentley's favorite exhibit: a construction site. Why am I not surprised?


Me looking spacey in front of the elephants. In my defense, I didn't know when Craig was going to take the picture...


Craig looking much better in front of the elephant-- I guess I'm a better photographer! ;)

Xcite!

That's what our new toilet seat says. "Xcite!" Close to the hinge, on the inside of the lid-- basically, really close to where your derriere goes. Do you know of anyone who thinks/says/mutters that when they're using a toilet? Because I don't.

Other than that, I really like the toilet seat. It's wooden and heavy in a substantial, this-won't-break-underneath-me way, and it's nicely rounded out so it's comfortable to sit on. I'd been meaning to replace the original seat as soon as it was set up and I realized what a cheap, plastic seat it was (and it probably goes without saying, but it was angled all wrong, too). Who would have guessed that I had such strong opinions about toilet seats??? Anyway, "meaning" to replace something and actually getting around to doing it are two very different things in my world. And then convincing Craig that it's worth the money is a whole 'nother ball of salami, so I didn't think it would happen any time soon. But THEN we bought a new toilet for our downstairs bathroom and it didn't come with a seat at all! So I suddenly had a golden opportunity to buy the toilet seat of my dreams. And yes, I'd already picked one out. What a dork!

Anyway, I like our new toilet seat. I think the only reason that the word "Xcite!" bothers me so much is simply because I already was excited! I didn't need orders from my toilet seat!

Who's up for a poll...?

I've been resisting the Facebook craze for a while now, mostly because without internet there didn't seem to be any point in bothering with it. Now that I have internet, I'm not sure what to do... I like the idea of keeping in touch with my friends better, and especially of seeing the pictures that they post. But I really hate the idea of having to befriend the people from high school who I never really cared about much and still don't care about. I know, I know-- I can always ignore them or whatever. But that seems a bit harsh, don't you think? I don't actively dislike them, I'm just completely indifferent to them. But I certainly wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings.

Having said that, I'll be the first to admit that if none of them tried to "friend" me, I'd be totally offended. And I hate myself for feeling that way. Maybe it's for that reason alone that I'm afraid to join? Hmmm... Chomp on that for a moment, Freud!

Anyway, it's been on my mind. And then this morning, I was reading the Weekly Standard and there was this whole long rant about how stupid and boring facebook is, complete with an example about the guy's wife, Alana (!!!), who was a complete facebook junkie and then suddenly quit because the thrill was gone and she realized it was a big waste of time. What are the odds? It was spooky. But, on the same day, I also got two emails from friends telling me I should join. Who's opinion do I go with? I'm stuck!

So that's why I put up the nifty little survey. Feel free to express your opinion (or just put it in a comment, or send me an email, I don't care how you do it!). And if you don't care enough to respond at all, then that's completely understandable, too!

Hallelujah!

Driving home from Craig's parent's house on Sunday, they started playing Handel's Messiah on the radio. Can I just say that I love, love, LOVE Messiah. It is some of my favorite music. And the recording they happened to be playing was a really good one, from the little bit that I heard. I was a little surprised at first that they were playing it at this time of the year, but then I remembered that in England, this is considered Easter music, and it's only in America that we sing it at Christmas time, so then it all made a little more sense. (Maybe the D.J. is British?)

Anyway, listening to it and feeling slightly drowsy from eating too much at my in-law's, I began reminiscing about the experience I've had with this amazing music. So I may as well share it with you, right?

I only knew a few of the songs-- the Hallelujah Chorus, "For Unto Us a Son is Born," just the obvious stuff, really-- until my mission. My first Christmas in the mission field, the ONLY Christmas music we had was the Mormon Tabernacle Choir performing Messiah, so as you can imagine, we listened to it a LOT. And it was fun. Sister Howard and I spent many a night riding around on our bikes singing "All We Like Sheep" to our heart's content. We got some weird looks, but we were already foreigners (gaijin!) riding around on bikes in dresses in the snow and wearing helmets to boot, so we were pretty much going to be freaks no matter what we did. May as well have fun doing it, right?

My favorite songs, along with the two I just mentioned, are "And He Shall Purify," which just builds and builds and becomes more and more beautiful and intense as it goes along, and the Overture. I love how the very first bars are very slow and sad and even a bit melodramatic, until suddenly this one violin starts playing this cheerful little tune and the whole orchestra takes it up until it becomes more and more joyous. I could listen to that one little violin for hours, it just makes me so happy. I would want to learn to play the violin just for that one song, I think.

Anyway, since my mission, I've had some wonderful opportunities to continue my love affair with this music. My first Christmas home, my good friend from high school, Elizabeth, told me that her family had an extra ticket to a performance of it at Benaroya Hall and would I like to go. Would I??? Can you get much luckier than that? And then Craig and I got tickets to the National Cathedral performance last year, which was amazing. But I think my absolute favorite performance was the free sing-along that they hold at the Kennedy Center, which Craig and I were able to attend this last year.

To get these free tickets, all you have to do is stand in line for a really long time. (You used to have to camp out, but they changed that this year-- what luck! Camping on December 22nd in D.C. sounds like a very cold version of hell to me... And the wait now is inside, so it's not too bad at all!) So we enlisted my ever-helpful in-law's aid, and were able to score some seats in the fifth row! (And, extra-bonus, our friends the Fords were able to join us, so that made it even better!)

And now that I've done the sing-along, I have say that the whole thing was just incredible. It probably would have even been worth camping out for. And I hope to be able to do it many more years to come!

The main conductor (they had three throughout the course of the performance) not only conducted the orchestra and the audience, but also added his own advice and his own reading of the songs in order to help you get the right feeling for some of the pieces. So, for example, he began by asking us to turn to our neighbors, smile at them, and then remember that we would never see these people again. So if we messed up, who cared? "Sing your heart out! This is the most joyous message of all time!" he advised us. And I took it to heart! I don't think you can really fully appreciate the joy of the Hallelujah Chorus until you've actually sung it all the way through yourself. It truly is amazing. I can't remember the last time Craig and I had such huge smiles on our faces!

And speaking of joyful messages, in one of my classes at BYU, we talked about Messiah, and my professor explained that it was first performed in Dublin, and then as it became a hit in England, the proceeds from the show would go towards helping people get out of debtor's prison in Ireland. My professor commented that he thought it was highly symbolic that music about our Savior helped people pay the debts that they themselves couldn't pay.

Layer upon layer of why I love this music. I couldn't have asked for a better treat Easter night.

Disappointing Dye

I absolutely LOVE dying Easter eggs. As a kid, my Mom decided one year that eggs were cheap and it was something we all liked, so she started buying a dozen eggs for each of us. How cool is my mom? We loved it. And probably because of her attitude, I have so many happy memories wrapped around this tradition. Like the time when my oldest sister Leah, in High School, announced that she was too old to dye eggs any more. We accepted this. It wasn't a very big deal. So then when Leah's friends came over and saw the rest of us dying eggs, they all got excited because their parents wouldn't let them dye eggs any more (what kind of parents are these?) and asked if they could join in on the fun. We were actually a bit annoyed, because that meant less eggs for us, but it was worth it to watch Leah eat her words as she and her friends joined us!

When I was a grad student I decided to throw my own Easter egg dying party, and my Mom once again came to the rescue by offering to pay for the candy I wanted to buy for it. (Thanks, Mom!) So I invited a bunch of friends over, and we had a nice time. But the highlight of the party was afterwards, when Craig was leaving. No one else was ready to go yet, but Craig and I were going on my ward's temple trip to Manti the next morning, so he wanted to get to bed. Rather than kiss him good-night in front of everyone, we opted to sit in his car and chat for a few minutes before he took off. We'd been dating for about four months by then, and as we sat talking away, Craig suddenly got quiet. I finally asked him what was on his mind, and he turned it around and asked me what I was thinking about. Being way too up-front, I told him I was just wondering where our relationship was going, to which he responded, "Yeah... It just keeps getting better and better, doesn't it?"

Then he paused (probably gathered his courage a bit) and said, "So I'm thinking, maybe get engaged next month and then get married this summer?"

It was one of the happiest nights of my life.

And since then, dying Easter eggs has taken on a whole 'nother joyous aspect.

I did have Easter egg parties the next couple years, but then when I should have had the 4th one it was so soon after Kendra was born that I just couldn't pull my act together in time, and this last year seemed too soon after having Kendra's Birthday party (go figure), so it just hasn't happened. But I'm determined to do one next year! Consider yourself warned!

Anyway, we did, of course, dye eggs as a family. Unfortunately, they were all out of the Paas brand at Target. The only egg dye kits they had left were either the weird ones (who really wants to bother with marble and tie-dye?) and then some other brand called Dudley's. Well, the Dudley one had nine colors, which is my only real requirement, so I went ahead and bought it. Bad idea. I should have looked more closely at the kit.

Let me just ask you: who really wants to dye their eggs brown??? And even if you did want to, you could just dip the egg in all the other colors! You don't need a cup of brown dye! And then there were colors listed on the box that weren't even there-- no purple, and if there was both a red and a strawberry, then I certainly couldn't tell them apart! But there were two greens, which was not mentioned. (Was one of the greens meant to be something else?) And some of the colors were just plain wussy. I like my colors to be as vibrant as possible-- my favorite thing is to leave an egg in each dye for as long as possible so they get as much as they can out of it. They're so pretty that way! But that wasn't going to be worth it with this dye.

Anyway, I was disappointed. But the kids didn't really know or care, so I guess it doesn't matter. Next year I'm getting the good stuff. For my totally awesome party, which you can consider yourself invited to. Till then!

Easter Surprise

Craig was outside with Bentley yesterday and guess what he found in our backyard??? A little nest of baby bunnies! How amazing is that? When I was really little I wanted a pet bunny so badly. I loved bunnies. (Later on whales became my favorite animal, and it turned out that my parents wouldn't let me get a pet orca either. I had a rough childhood. But that story should probably be a different post...)

Anyway, I feel that these are my pets now, even if Craig says we can't keep them. They're so tiny and cute! And their ears are so big and folded back and perfect! I love them. It's all I can do not to run out and check on them every fifteen minutes, but I'm worried I'll just scare their mommy away, so that wouldn't do anyone any good... (Although maybe if he thought they were dying, Craig would let me keep them?)

We took a picture. You can't see them very well, but trust me, they're in there. And speaking of the wildlife in our backyard, we had four deer wandering around all day in the woods behind our house. I've also seen a fox (he better not come near my baby bunnies), and a groundhog, not to mention a ton of birds. I love our backyard and all our wildlife! Manassas is so much fun!

Anyway, happy, happy Easter! If you want a pet bunny, just let me know!

Guess Who's Finally On-line

WE HAVE INTERNET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hallelujah. As my sister Leah said, "Welcome to the world of the living." For all of you who I haven't kept in touch with at all-- hopefully all that will change now! I look forward to actually keeping up with my friends again! And looking up stuff-- addresses, recipes, history, WHATEVER I FEEL LIKE! Yay, yay, yay!

Inheritance

So it’s becoming more and more obvious to me that Kendra has inherited things from each of my sisters. Genetically, I realize that's probably not likely. You have to see it to believe it, but it's definitely there. It would probably border on being spooky if I didn’t like my sisters so much. So here’s a list of what I’ve noticed recently.

From Favorite Aunt Leah: Personality. If Kendra’s birth hadn’t already tipped us off that this girl does things her own way and on her time table, you can prove it really fast just by trying to take her toy away. She has an amazing grip and a very loud squeal of rage when she thinks it’s necessary to use it (and growing up with Bentley means that it’s used about twenty times a day). Kendra doesn’t put up with any crap. And in this day and age, I think that’s a great thing for a girl. I like that about her. Thanks, Leah!

From Favorite Aunt Tracy: Skin. I am capable of tanning, eventually, but it takes months, and usually several sunburns and I don’t really even try for it any more (No need to lecture me about the evils of tanning, Leah!). But even coming right off of winter, Kendra has the most beautiful olive-toned skin ever. I’m so jealous. I first noticed this last summer when I realized that she had a diaper tan line from the two times we’d gone to the pool! And it’s not like we hadn’t slathered sunscreen all over her! Tracy has this same easy-to-tan skin that I’m pretty sure skipped all the other Bentley sisters, but somehow popped up in Kendra. No fair. But very pretty. Thanks, Tracy!

From Favorite Aunt Natalie: Early-riser. Kendra didn’t sleep through the night until she was about eleven months old and I was finally too exhausted to wake up to her cries any more. She did finally give up on the night-time feedings, but got me back by changing her wake up time to 6:30am. I’ve gotten her to back down to 7:00, but she’s been stubborn about this time. Natalie is the same way. Her favorite thing to do in middle school was to practice the violin at 7:00am on a Saturday morning right under my bedroom. It was a source of contention, at the time, if I recall correctly. To this day, I think the latest Natalie’s ever slept is, what, 7:30? (Correct me if I’m wrong about this, Natalie!) Anyway, Kendra certainly didn’t inherit this trait from me or from Craig! Um, thanks, Natalie, I guess…! ;)

From Favorite Aunt Rachael: Fashion. I make it a point to try to time my clothes shopping with when Rachael is in town and can go with me because I trust her fashion advice implicitly. It’s a little early to tell if Kendra actually has any fashion sense (I still get to choose her outfits for her), but any time I put a bow or (heaven forbid!) a hat on her head, the only way to get her to leave it on is to show her her reflection in the mirror and tell her how pretty she looks. This will actually amuse her long enough for me to even get ready for church! Again, I should stress that this is not what Rachael does (at least, to the best of my knowledge… hmmm…), but if Kendra got any fashion sense whatsoever, you can bet that she didn’t get it from me. Thanks, Rachael!

From Favorite Aunt Jeni: Loving. I’ve seen Jeni take care of her girls, and she is a very kind and caring mother. (I like my kids a lot, but I certainly wouldn’t claim to be a particularly patient mother. Especially after my last post…!) Kendra is like that, too. She loves to snuggle with her mommy and daddy. One of her favorite games is to hug her stuffed animal doggy and then pass it around so everyone else can take turns giving him hugs, too. She’s a very loving little girl. Thanks, Jeni!

This is by no means an exhaustive list of Kendra’s aunt’s good traits—- they have many other wonderful qualities that are hard to spot in a one-year-old (like, say, punctuality). But so far she seems to have gotten more than her fair share of good things from her aunts. What a lucky girl!

Good Advice

The other day as I was trying to get out the door, Bentley somehow slipped into ultra-slow toddler mode. I will hazard a guess that those of you who have had children understand this state, but for those of you who have somehow never experienced the aggravation, let me just clue you in: it’s really, really annoying. How can it possibly take anyone (even a two-year-old) five minutes just to climb into the car, climb up into his car seat and then SIT DOWN??? That’s all I was asking him to do, but to hear me trying to nag him into actually doing it, you would have thought I was Craig trying to get me to write my master’s thesis! I was practically begging, and since I was trying to reach over from Kendra’s side of the car to help him out, I was literally on my knees for this, so it looked AND sounded like begging. In the midst of my despair of ever actually getting him buckled in and going anywhere, Bentley suddenly held his hand up against me and in his very authoritative voice commanded, “Don’t cry, Mommy.”

Sound advice if I ever heard it. I could only laugh in response. Did my two-year-old really just say that to me?

Knowledge

Bentley suddenly started singing the tail end to the alphabet song today. I've never sung it for him, so I don't know where he learned it. But the best part is that he sings it, "Now I know my a-b-b-c's!" I guess, since he doesn't know his abc's yet, it isn't false advertising if he messes it up while claiming he can do it. Right?

Bellydance Superstars

It occurs to me that I should probably explain my fascination with bellydancing. If you already know or if you simply don’t care, then just skip this post!

Anyway, it all started when I was in Spain with Paula (and some other girls, but they don’t really play into this story, so I’m going to leave them out of it all together since that will make for an easier read. If you ever want to know about them, then that’s a whole ‘nother post!). Paula and I saw a bunch of posters for a show called “Bellydance Superstars” all over Barcelona, and when we found out that it wasn’t very expensive, we decided to go.

It turned out to be one of the best nights I had in Spain. Not only was the bellydancing super fun and awesome, but then that night was some sort of festival (I think for St. John, although I don’t remember very well any more), so the entire walk back to our hostel was accompanied with oodles of fireworks. And not the kind you see at a professional show, these were the neighborhood, little kids in the streets setting them off variety of fireworks. A little scary at times since you never know where the next explosion would come from, a lot loud, and lot of fun, too. I think the subways were closing down, also, so it took us forever to make our way back home and we enjoyed every minute of it! (A few days later my purse (with my passport in it) would get stolen and Spain would take on some darker memories for me, but that night in Barcelona was pure magic.)

Just for the record, bellydancing, at least the kind that I saw, is not erotic or gross or bad or anything. It’s just really cool. Those women shake their bodies in some amazing ways, and it was just a lot of fun to see. I enjoyed it as much as I’ve enjoyed ballet and hula and a lot of other dancing. I just want to emphasize that there was nothing weird going on here, lest you get the wrong idea about me.

And the group, Bellydance Superstars, is actually an American group that just happened to be on tour in Spain. So later, when I was back at BYU working on my master’s degree, I happened to look them up online and found out that they were coming to Salt Lake! Well, I couldn’t miss a chance to see them again, so I decided to take my boyfriend to the show. As the date drew nearer, it turned out that my Mom and little sister were going to be flying into Salt Lake that same night, so I figured we’d just go straight from the bellydancing to the airport.

Poor Craig. I’m pretty sure it was the weirdest date he’s ever been on. Because it turns out that the people who follow bellydancing in America are very different from the people who follow it in Spain. In Spain, the performance was just in some big auditorium and everyone attending looked pretty normal to me. In Salt Lake, the show was put on in a Masonic temple. Yeah, right there the “weird” flag starts waving a bit. And the people who go to a bellydance show in Utah, besides Craig and me, are really weird. Women with strange dreadlocks sporting feathers, beads and who knows what else stuck in their hair, and who also bring their two-year-old daughters with matching crazy hair and sad skanky outfits that I would NEVER put on my sweet innocent little girl… Yeah, it was enough to make me feel slightly uncomfortable, and enough to make Craig (good old EFY counselor Craig, who still likes to say things like, “Modest is hottest” and “Hazards of the horizontal”) wonder about the girl he was dating. In my defense, though, the bellydancing itself was still really cool. So I don’t think you can blame Bellydance Superstars for a bunch of wacko Utahns.

And then after that we headed straight to the airport where Craig got to meet my mother for the first time! But no pressure or anything! (At least Craig had already met Rachael, so she shouldn’t have been too scary. I hope.)

Before all this I’d told my humanities class about my Friday plans for me and my boyfriend. As I recall, there was a pause and then one of boys simply said, “He must like you a lot.” That turned out to be true. And we did get married, so I guess I didn’t scare Craig too badly.

Anyway, shortly after Bentley was born, Paula came to visit me. She brought me a bellydance skirt telling me it might help me lose weight, which I thought was about the coolest thing ever. We talked about going to see Bellydance Superstars again, since they were coming to DC, but I was feeling too poor (and too overwhelmed by being a new mother!) to manage it. But now that I’ve been practicing my bicycle hips and my crescents, I’m thinking I should start saving up for the next time they come…

Deep

So I’ve begun exercising. Don’t be impressed—- if I manage to do it twice a week I count it as a success; three times a week and I get so proud of myself that I eat ice cream to celebrate. So naturally, I haven’t lost any weight at all. But even if my weight doesn’t change, I still think it’s good to be moving a bit, right?

Anyway, so you’re not allowed to think that I’m completely insane, but the workout video that I bought for myself is a bellydance DVD. And I think it’s really cool. Notice that I don’t say I’m any good at it, because I’m not, but I do have fun trying. I figured there was a better chance that I’d actually work out if I thought it was fun. (I like doing aerobic dance, too, but I wasn’t sure there was enough room in the basement for that!) The funny thing about this DVD is that I really like the instructor—- Dolphina, if you’re up on your bellydancers—- but I only like her when she messes stuff up. For example, she teaches one move and says, “Let’s practice that once!” and then, after you’ve done it once, she laughs at herself and says, “Okay, just kidding, let’s do that four more times.” And I love that—- it just makes me laugh. There’s another time when you’re practicing tucks and pops and she’s telling you to imagine that you’ve got a precious ruby tucked into your navel, but then you realize that it’s flawed, so you’re going to pop it out. After doing that eight times, it’s time to tuck the ruby back into your abdomen, at which point Dolphina announces, “You realized that it wasn’t flawed after all!” but she’s laughing as she says it, so you know that she knows it all sounds ridiculous too, and it’s just hilarious to me.

So I like that.

But what I hate is when Dolphina tries to be DEEP. Every so often she needs to throw in these really stupid remarks that I just know are aimed at being deep. The worst is the very end after you’re done cooling down. Clasping her hands in front of her in what I can only imagine is meant to be a ponderous yoga stance, she announces, “When you awaken the goddess within you, magical things will happen. Peace.” This last word is spoken as she slowly closes her eyes, in case you hadn’t already figured out that this was a deep moment. Yeah, thanks, Dolphina. I’m sure magic is just around the corner. (If I’m going to believe in any sort of magic, it’s going to be the Harry Potter variety of magic, not the peace and yoga fitness variety!) On a similar note, during the warm-up, as she’s talking about sucking in your abdominal muscles, she announces that these are your core muscles. “They’re also,” she says, “your chi energy.” Now, I do not claim to know much about yoga, or chi, or even feng shui, but I’m pretty sure that the concept of chi is a lot more complicated than just your abdominal muscles. Anyone out there who can back me up on this? It just makes me want to yell, “Stop trying to be deep and just teach me some cool bellydance moves! You’re not my spiritual adviser, you’re just some chick with an exercise video!”

Anyway, I wonder if people with no religion take this more seriously. I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry for them if they do.

But I will also admit that few things give me greater joy than when I can do the “bicycle hips” move really well!