Picky, Pickier, Pickiest

So I wrote how my kids were picky. Had another shining moment dealing with that this weekend.

We went up to Provo, Ut. for my husband's niece's wedding reception. When we arrived at my brother-in-laws house, they brought out the left over pizza for dinner. Yay! It was Papa John's. Every combination you could imagine. But combination pizza toppings are something I have yet to expose my kids to. We hardly ever buy Papa John's except if we have really good coupons. Mostly because it is Expensive. Not that I don't love it, cause I do. I really, really do! Little Caesers, on the other hand, is $5 a pizza and hot and ready to go. Plus, it is right behind my house. Literally. I look over my back wall and there is the back door of the Pizza place. I could probably safely slingshot myself there faster than I can walk.

Anyway.

Since we usually stick with Little Caesars, we usually stick with cheese or pepperoni. Since they weren't willing to try any of the pizzas, they were a little hungry going to bed that night.

Speaking of going to bed that night, our hotel reservations were totally screwed up. Instead of two queen beds, we got one king. Not really appropriate to be sleeping with out twelve year old boy and ten year old girl in bed with mom and dad. Esther slept over her cousins, Emmett ended up with the roll a way bed that you could litereally feel every spring (they had another one for Audrey, but it was totally "Ghetto". I'd hate to see how bad that was). So Audrey, Eve, me and Steve slept in the king bed. Rather unhappily, I might add.
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But the visit got better from there. I was able to visit my friend Katrina, who moved down to Vegas same time I did, but moved back to Utah since theng. I got to do a little shopping. I got yards and yards of deep purple satin ribbon from my niece's wedding gifts, since she had no use for yards and yards of purple ribbon. I can't say I have a use for it, either. Yet. But I will find a use for it!

I found out that deodorant is flammable. So if you have a solid stick of deodorant that you are particularly fond of the scent, stick in a wick and light it up! Obviously not while applying it to you underarm, since underarms can be flammable, too.

And, last, but not least, the nieces and nephews gave me great stories about dates, school and what life is like now at their age. I don't know if they understand how much I love hearing all of it.

Overall, it was a good visit.

Picky Picky Picky

My kids are picky eaters. When did this happen, I ask myself. They ate their vegetables when they were babies. They ate sweet potatoes and green beans and lasagna. Something happened between the puree and actually having to chew the food that things went downhill.

I don't completely blame myself.

It happened when they started feeding themselves. It happened when they actually had a choice and control over what was going in their mouths. It happened when more siblings came along and I was too busy trying to choo-choo a spoonful of mush into the babies mouth and wanted (and needed) the older ones to eat something (anything) on their own.

I don't get it. I love to eat. I love vegetables. I could be a vegetarian if I didn't love meat so much. Some food tastes so good I have a hard time not eating too much of it.

It must be my husband's genes. He hates vegetables. He used to throw his vegetables under his brother's chair at the dinner table to get out of eating them. I thought that was pretty ingenius. Unfortunately, that wouldn't have worked at my house, since there were only three kids. There were eight kids in his family, so it was easier to get away with that stunt.

I guess I should be grateful they don't have extravagent tastes, because when we go to a restaurant, they want the mac and cheese. The kicker is that it's Kraft, and for the price they're charging, I could buy a whole case of it myself!

Last night I fed the kids pulled chicken from Fresh n Easy. I knew they would complain, so I did them a favor. Instead of buying hamburger buns, I bought those teeny, tiny slider buns. The deal was they had to eat their tiny sandwich (meat included, not just the bun) and their rice pilaf. The older two, after initial hestitation, ate it and even admitted it wasn't too terrible. The younger two we had to resort to threats and sending them to bed to get them to eat some. Although, they did eat the rice pilaf without too much complaining.

There was an ad on t.v. for dog food on later. This dog was chowing down on this "treat" that looked like dried raw chicken jerky, or something stolen from the "Bodies" exhibit on the strip. And the dog loved it! I can't get my kids to eat real food, yummy food, and this dog is eating a nasty looking version of real food. Is it just cause it's a dog and they'll eat anything??

I guess I could count my blessings. Is picky eaters worse than overeaters? Is it harder to force my kids to eat than to stop them from eating? I don't know.

On the upside of this, my kids have learned an important life skill: foraging for food. They know how to go and find themselves something to eat.

But, since man, woman, and child can not live on Ramen Noodles alone, this obstacle will not be backed down from (sigh). Sometime in the next seven years before my sons leaves for his mission, we will get these kids to eat what is on their plate.

Wish me luck, I'm gonna need it. I better eat up to build up my energy.

Good News!

No, it's not about my book--yet.

But global warming is a big fraud. Apparently. My friend Amber posted this on Facebook. So we can all rest easy now. We could say that is a convienent truth.

So on to my other good news. I got out of jury duty! At ten o'clock they said the case for the day "went away" (whatever that means) and we all got to leave! Whoo hoo! All that stressing and craziness came to an early end. And I could be home for when my kids got home from school. The Lord did answer my prayers, just not the way I thought he should. Haven't I learned that yet???

That means today I am back to my normal routine of fighting with my kids to get them out the door to school so I can come home and play with my imaginary friends. Gotta go! I have books to write!

An Inconvienent Truth

No, I am not talking about Al gore's book, although global warming is inconvienent. But I am one Birkenstock pair away from being a tree hugger . . . no, actually I recycle enough for my whole neighborhood. But that's not what I'm talking about.

Jury Duty! Err! I am jury duty today and it is a huge inconvience! For the 14 years I've lived in Vegas, I have always managed to get out of it. Usually because I had young, nursing children. but not this time. When i got my summons, I called to try and get excused because I had three kids with dentist appointments on that day. But instead of being excused, I got rescheduled--to today!

It would be inconvienent anyway, but today of all days! My husband is supposed to be in Canada for a business trip, but is actually stuck in Newark, NJ because his flight got canceled due to weather. So, he's no help. I have four kids that have to go to school. I have made intricate plans to get them to school and make sure they're not locked out when they get home, but really, my head is spinning because this stresses me out.

On top of that, this jury duty reporting (at 8:30 am, downtown--yuck) is messing with my writing time. Don't they know that time is SACRED???? I know it's my civil duty and blah, blah, blah, but it is just coming at a really bad time. My plan is to be an extreme feminist--"all men are guilty" or "people are GUILTY until proven innocent." Okay, I'm joking about that, cause I don't really believe that, but I'm trying to avoid having to go back to the court house again tomorrow! I'm wondering if I show up with bad hair, or just weird hair (not hard for me to accomplish, read my last post) and they'll just assume that I'm a little "out there!"

Anyhow, I have to go. I have to run to the grocery store to buy lunchables so the kids will have something to eat at noontime. Cause I need one more thing to do this morning!

I'll let you know how the whole jury duty thing went!

Bad Hair Day

Early this morning, I had just gotten out of the shower and my hair was dripping wet when my phone started ringing. I took the call, meanwhile, my hair decided to dry on it's own.

Now to some of you, having hair that dries in, like, five minutes, might seem awesome. But to me, no, not so great. The resultant look I achieved was bedhead. I had just had bedhead, and that's why I showered in the first place. If I could somehow, creatively and unobviously, get rid of bedhead, I could probably get away with not showering everyday. But having tried everything short of just shaving my hair off and opting for a wig, I have not found a solution to my bedhead look other than just washing it and starting again.

I attempted to re-wet it and redry it with a blowdryer. But to no avail. (Huge, heavy sigh). So I tried to use some yummy-smelling, pretty-colored Kenra hair stuff. It's sticky stuff, so I figured it would do the trick and relieve me of my problematic flat spot at the back of my head. But, as mentioned before, I've been down this road, know better, and yet, still bother trying. With that said, it did not fix the problem. I had several options: wear a hat (but that would mean I would have to find my hat in the first place), create a t-shirt with a black sharpie that would read: my parents deprived me of tummy time when i was a baby, or I could just ignore it and hope the wind would blow it into a new style once I stepped foot outside. I opted for the third.

Truthfully, I wanted to just start over.

Realistically, It was 8:30 a.m. and I had my two youngest to get to school in 15 minutes. Both girls are notorious for creatively finding ways to not go to school: my tongue is licking the back of my throat (my 8 yr. olds allergy explanation), my foot is broken (my 5 yr. olds excuse for getting out of pre-k. I don't get it. What's not to love about pre-k?) . . . Obviously we don't have backward tongues and broken feet, so I forcefully tell my children to hurry up and get ready for school.

We still have to comb hair, fly away hairs to wet down, find shoes, and oh, yeah, socks, backpacks . . . the list goes on and on and meanwhile, no one is any closer to getting to school on time. The faster I get my kids to school, the faster I get to come home and play with my imaginary friends (a.k.a. writing. I'm not delusional).

Finally, they got to school, 5 minutes before the bell rang.

I wondered if maybe I tried rewashing my hair, started over completely, if my day would get better??

Bright Pink Gerber Daisy Miracle

Becca Wilhite wrote a book called Bright Blue Miracle. In it, the main character Leigh, has a cool grandma who assigns everything a color. Not just things that already have claim to color, but things that are intangible like feelings and emotions. The miracle in the story is obviously Bright Blue.
I'm going to take it a step further and assign my miracle my favorite color and flower. If I could wear it as one of those pretty trendy hair clippy things, I would. But really, I won't. I don't have enough hair to pull off that much accessory and it would not be pretty. More like distracting. But you can read about distracting hair problems on Becca's blog. But back to my miracle. I'm describing it as such because my miracle went above and beyond anything that I thought I would be blessed with. Let me explain.
I went to the LDStorymakers conference this weekend. I was very excited (I had never been, weekend away alone, discuss writing . . .), but also nervous. I had only been to one other LDS writing conference. I met a few people at the UVU Book Academy, but still didn't know many people. Going to classes, no big deal. It's like going to college classes on the first day--everyone is in the same boat, they are there for a purpose, and it's not really a situation where you have to socialize.
LUNCH, on the other hand, and DINNER . . . ugh! Aaagh!
If anything has the ability to make me feel like I'm back in high school, in the cafeteria, and having no one to sit with, it's meal time at a conference. I knew I could always sit with Becca . . . but what if I couldn't find her? Or what if, what if, what if . . .? I had a million what if's that I could worry about.
So I prayed. I prayed that I could make one friend. Just one friend that I could meet up with at meal times so I wouldn't have to be that lonely person inviting myself to eat at the only empty sit at a table full of people who already knew each other.
What happened I consider more than a blessing. I consider it my bright pink Gerber Daisy miracle (since I love those flowers and they make me smile and happy).
I was sitting at a table in the huge room, meeting the others sitting around me, realizing that I was not the only person at the conference that was in it alone, when I looked up and saw Tamara.
Tamara and I went to church together as Young Women. Our ward in Massachusetts was so spread out that we lived twenty minutes away and only saw each other at church or church activities. We always got along and were friends, but never really hung out because of the geographics. But still, I always counted her as a friend.
I went to BYU. Next year she went to BYU. We'd see each other in passing at times, but I lived off campus, she lived on campus, I was overwhelmed, had dysfunctional roommates, classes, blah, blah, blah. Life happened. Still friends, but still not hanging out much.
Tamara got married and I sort of lost track of where she went from there.
I have not seen Tamara in almost twenty years, and there she was, standing three feet away from me at a conference with hundreds of people attending.
I didn't know she would be there. She didn't know I would be there. But there she was. My friend from growing up. I didn't have to worry about making a friend, I already had a friend.
Again, that was an answer, a blessing, a miracle WAY above and beyond what I was expecting.
And the beauty of it? More so than now I had someone to eat with :) . . . I could reconnect with my friend after so many years. And it seemed like it hadn't been anytime at all that had passed. Things were as comfortable and fun as the last time I saw her, so long ago.
And, by the way, I met A LOT of really nice people there. Everyone was friendly and were happy to have you sit next to them, and were happy to talk about their writing and the classes they had been to. I really had nothing to worry about.
I guess lunch time in high school was just one of those traumatizing experiences that I never got over . . .

What Is He Doing???

Today Emmett and I were at a stoplight, and I looked over at the gas station on the corner, and saw this man getting paper towels at the gas pump. But what was weird, was he kept taking more and more. Like the whole 2-3 minutes I was stopped, he was pulling out paper towels continuously and bunching them up in his other arm. So my over-active imagination kicked in and made me wonder, "what is he doing?" Obviously I get that he is getting paper towels, but why would he need to clean out the whole container of them? He was getting gas, and had a back door open, so I came up with a few scenarios to explain his weird and obsessive behavior. 1. His kid threw up in the back seat of the car. 2. His pet had an accident. 3. He was mad at the gas station/and or gas prices in general, so he was going to get THEM back by taking all of their complimentary paper towels. 4. He just murdered someone and couldn't get enough towels to get the "blood off his hands." :) 5. He just maybe really likes paper towels. I wished I had turned in and asked him what was the source for the passionate taking of the paper towels. Any ideas? Suggestions? Scenarios?