Keepin' It Real Wednesday

The Day We Learned To Never Trust a One Year Old

Oooh, look at those pretty lights.

A little closer please



Do you see them mom? Can I touch them?

Fine then, I will just play with the frosting.



NOT!


Swift move of the hand by Daddy saves the day (phew!)

(Pictures are stills taken from the video I took yesterday - I spared you our singing)

For Grandma and Grandpa Coleman

The books were a big hit.....

And so were the puppets!

Thank you!

Here is a video for you to enjoy.

Oliver's Birthday Party

See the little one in yellow? The one with the grin from ear to ear?

This was all about him.

We all got together last Friday to celebrate Oliver's birthday . We knew everyone would be busy on his birthday (which is the first day of school again) so we thought it would be fun to have it a little early - one last family summer hurrah.


It was a very simple party


The pool provided all the entertainment we needed.

We had banana splits instead of cake, because Oliver screams for ice cream.

We opened presents and Granny and Grandpa had a huge hit with the sippy cup they gave him - one of those ones with the flip up straw.

He carried it around with him the rest of the party.

This is what he looked like the whole time! Just a huge smile, cruising around. I think it was the perfect party for our little boy.

(Tomorrow is his birthday and we will do a little celebration with a cake here at our house. I don't want to think about it too much- I might cry.)

My Wild Saturday Night

I couldn't take it any longer.

I don't know if it was the summer heat getting to me, or the kids breathing down my neck, but I need to live a little.

I felt old and wanted to feel young.
I had fought the urge for way too long.

It was a Saturday night and I just wanted to party like the old days.

The kids were in bed, and Chad was playing the Wii.

I needed to act quickly and quietly. If Chad caught me, he would definitely question me and try and talk me out of doing what I was about to do.

I grabbed what I needed and rushed upstairs, to somewhere I could be alone.

I couldn't think about this too long. I needed to act now.

Oh yeah, this was gonna be fun.

Smile for the camera!


Then clip clip clip.



Once you start, you can't stop.




There is no going back.

I woke up this Sabbath morning a little fuzzy-headed. Did I really do that?

Something like regret seeped into my heart. How could I go to church and face everyone? Would they judge me?

The regret fled, I put on a happy face, and walked tall into church.



This is me, take it or leave it.

(I really do think I am doomed to have short hair for the rest of my life.)

Book Week - Day 5

Yes, I missed a day. Sorry! You can dock my pay if you want to.

I first started to hear about There Is No Me Without You through the various adoption blogs and websites that I frequent, especially ones that are for Ethiopia. Since I am cheap and our library didn't have it at the time, I never read it.

One day my sister-in-law Audra (who I believe had just started the adoption process for Ethopia) mentioned that she was reading a great book and told me about it. I was so happy when I realized it was this one. I borrowed it after she finished, and it lived up to my expectations.

It is a little slow in the beginning when it talks about Ethiopia's history, but getting through that part really does set up a solid context for the rest of the story that the book tells - a story of one woman who changed the lives of thousands of AIDS orphans.

It is a story that is especially close to my heart now that Levi and Audra have three beautiful Ethiopian children.

When I finished it, I wanted to change the world, and believed that I could.

Have you ever read a book that inspired you that way?

Keepin' It Real Wednesday Meets Day 3 of Book Week

Let's be real here,

Chad and I haven't always had this perfect marriage ;o)

I would even say that for the first five years of our marriage, neither of us were completely happy with our relationship.

When it all came to a head, we read this book together,

and it completely changed our marriage and our lives.

I swear I don't use the term "life-changing" very often, but this book was exactly that.

If I weren't afraid of offending people, I would buy this book for every new couple as a wedding gift.

And even if you really don't "need it," it is downright interesting.

So here comes your own chance to keep it real -

Any self help books you have read that you can give an enthusiastic thumbs up to?

And let me just add, if you think, "Getting my husband to read a marriage book would be like pulling teeth"...yeah, that is pretty much what it was like, but I think Chad is happy with the results.

Book Week! Day 2

Growing up, we got to open one gift each on Christmas Eve. Since each of the eight children gave each other something, we had gifts aplenty, but most of them were purchased at Pic 'n Save for under a dollar each. One gift always stood out under the tree - the gift from my Nana and Papa, which was almost always exactly what you asked them for. When I was in third grade, my fervent wish from them was for the complete Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Book gifts were a very deal for a little girl in a little town with a little library. I am pretty sure the library didn't even have the complete series at this point.

When my wish was granted, I couldn't sleep for excitement. Do you know that feeling - the delightful anticipation of finally having the book you have craved in your hands? I couldn't fight the feeling - I stayed up late into the night, spread out with the books on my bottom bunk, reading with aching eyes by flashlight.

These books were my first literature loves. I made bookmarks for each one. I thought about naming my first son Almanzo. I rejected the show because it wasn't faithful enough to the books.

At that ripe old age of eight, I was sad for Laura when I read the last book, The First Four Years, but felt a little disappointed. It wasn't exactly the fairy tale ending I had been hoping for (nor was Almanzo and Laura's courtship in These Happy Golden Years been dripping with modern day romance - oh, but I see the romance now!).

Reading this book as an adult, it is devastating and beautiful. It wasn't completed or published before Laura Ingalls Wilder's death (it is basically just a manuscript), and it concise and relatively emotionless, which in a way, makes it all the more poignant for me. Read it, as a mother, and it is a much different book than what an eight year old sees.

All of the books are very different to me as an adult, and I still love them.

I made the mistake this year of reading The Long Winter in succession with The Diary of Anne Frank this past February. Either of those books can have you alternately depressed and bursting with gratitude, but if you read them together in February, you won't want to leave your bed for a few days.

Do you have any poignant memories one of the "Little House" books?

What was one of your first literature loves?

*Edited to add

Christie assures me that our library had the full set. Sorry, I didn't mean exaggerate how horrible our library was (but it was!)

Book Week! Day 1

Well, I am trying to limit my computer time this week (it is the week before school starts so I am trying to spend a lot of time with the kids, and I am not allowing any TV), but I can't go a whole week without blogging, so this week will be Book Week. I am going to try and feature some books that I read again and again - books that have appealed to me at different times of my life for different reasons. Hopefully they will be books that you have read too and are willing to comment on!

Day 1

Ender's Game

by Orson Scott Card

One summer when I was hanging out with my cousin Olivia (yes, my very cool Gnome Sweet Gnome cousin), she was reading this book. I think I was probably twelve or so at the time. It definitely didn't look like a book I was would like (I was already very into Anne and such), but she said it was interesting and offered to loan it to me, so I gave it a chance. I can't really remember sending it back, so Uncle Buck, if you have been missing your copy for 16 years, sorry!

I was immediately hooked. It was definitely unlike any of the previous books I had read. Smart, interesting, yes, even violent. Kids who weren't in babysitter clubs, but training as soilders. Satisfying yet heartbreaking ending.

I have to admit that though I have loved several Orson Scott Card books, his are the only science fiction I have ever really tried. I'm not sure why that is.

So, if you have read it...

How old were you when you first read it?

Did it turn you on to science fiction?

Have you read it again as an adult and gained a different perspective?

Did you like one of the sequels more?

Any other science fiction that I HAVE to try?

Summer night at the garden

During the summer, the garden stays open until 9 every Thursday (instead of it's normal closing time of 5). I completely forgot about this fact until last week when we went with my sister Lindsey. I have always wanted to go to the garden in the evening because the lighting is so much better for photography, so I decided to make a trip tonight without my kids (gasp).

It was even lovelier that usual in the evening - the scents were so strong and it was nice and cool. I was really enjoying myself and looking forward to a million un-rushed shots (though I wished I had brought my tripod). About a half an hour in though, my camera battery died. I had a nagging feeling all day that I should charge it, but I could have sworn that it was almost full, so I never did.

I spent the rest of my alone time just enjoying my stroll and taking paths I have never taken with the kids.

Speaking of kids, here are some pictures from our visit there last week with Lindsey, Lily, and Granny.

Keepin' It Real Wednesday

And you thought your husband's feet were ugly......

Chad got home from work last evening and Colin immediately requested that he get his big Styrofoam airplane down from on top of the neighbors porch. Chad retrieved his expandable ladder and soon had the toy down. As Chad went to slide the ladder back down, it slid more quickly than he expected and landed right on his foot. I was in the front yard and saw it happen. He couldn't budge an inch - just stood there hunched over the ladder, gasping. I walked over as he took his sock off and gasped myself. It was immediately swollen. It did not look good.

Dinner was eaten quickly and then we dropped Colin and Gabe off at Sabina's and made our way over to the express care. After a few X-rays, it was determined that there was no break (THANK GOODNESS! I WOULD HAVE MURDERED MY CHILDREN DURING THE SIX WEEK RECOVERY PERIOD THE DR. WAS PREDICTING AND CHAD WOULD HAVE GONE MAD FROM SITTING STILL), but it was declared a "severe contusion." He is supposed to stay off of it for a week or so and got a prescription for night time pain relief.

I think he was a little disappointed that it wasn't broken because he wanted some proof that he wasn't exaggerating his pain level.
And let me just state that I can't really can't talk about ugly feet -mine are pretty bad - and the Dr. and the nurse kept looking at Chad's x-ray and telling him how excellent his bone structure was. Weird. I think the nurse was just flirting with him. She even mentioned her age (41 and she was blond. Cougar!) and made a joke about how he should wear that apron thingie during the x-ray if he "wanted to keep having more of those boys".

Poor Chaddycakes. Get well soon loves - and thanks for giving me some blog material.

(I'm not sure how well this fit into the Keepin' it Real category, but it is Wednesday and it has a yucky picture of a foot, so why not?)

The Great Debate: Twizzlers or Red Vines?

Which do you prefer - Twizzlers or Red Vines?

I noted to Chad the other day that Red Vines are cheaper per ounce than Twizzlers, which surprised me because I consider Red Vines soooo much better. He said that although he likes both, he thought Twizzlers are considered more "high end." HUH?!

Does anyone out there actually prefer Twizzlers over Red Vines?

(and if you do, do you also happen to enjoy chewing on plastic swim toys?)

A Summertime Retreat

I know a place,

A magical place,

where all your troubles melt away...

the mountain home of my sister-in-law Audra's parents.

(No, we aren't technically related, but they let us invade their home anyway. I am pretty sure they invented gracious southern living.)

This is the place to go when it is hot and humid and your children are pestering each other simply because it is something to do.

I drove up with my sister Lindsey, her daughter Lily, my dad, and my three boys on Monday.

We met my brother Levi there with his seven kids (Audra is busy with Aloha Snow).

By midafternoon, we were piled into a Kubota touring the green fields

right past the stinky cows.....

and playing in an overflowing creek....

cold enough to immediately cool your whole body....

...but not too cold for babies of all sizes to frolic.

It's even more beautiful in person, believe it or not.

And this was just the first day.

Shaped

I got into my van the other day, and thought, "What is that smell?". It was sweet, mild, and a little earthy. Strangely, it smelt like there was a cantaloupe in my car.

Not until I reached my destination did I realize that there was a cantaloupe in my trunk. In my mad dash to bring in the groceries the previous day (Oliver was standing at the door screaming during the unloading), I had left it there, planning to come back for it later.

The smell of that warm cantaloupe was enough to flood my head with memories. That odor, for my family, is the smell of summer. My father was a high school teacher while I was growing up. When I was young his "summer vacation" was spent packing cantaloupes, grown in the irrigated green fields surrounding Blythe, into boxes. Coming home after a long day of work, his work gloves, with fingers made of old bicycle tubes, would be placed on the kitchen counter alongside the melons he brought home - cantaloupes and occasionally honeydew that were perfectly ripe (too ripe to be packed and shipped).

So summer meant fresh melons for breakfast every morning when you woke up from your sweaty sleep. Summer meant bringing fruit salad to potlucks at the church farm pool, swimming with the sun sinking over the vast desert. It meant cantaloupe milkshakes when Mom went away for Girl's Camp.

Along with that, summer meant driving home under a starry starry sky after a long day on the Colorado -the air musky with river water and sweet with alfalfa, your skin sunburned and your head sandy.

It meant sprinklers under the hot black mat of the trampoline, and trying to sleep outside but coming in because it was still 90 degrees after the sun went down.

Blythe is summer. It lasts for almost half of each year, from May through October.

Blythe is my childhood. From 18 months 'til 18 years.

How did that land shape me? I wonder that often.

Raising our children in Blythe has never been an option (or even a wish), but it still makes my heart ache a little to know that something that had such an influence on my life will leave no trace on theirs -especially since my parents just moved from there to here. I can't even imagine a visit back there.

I look around myself here in Charlotte, and force myself to remember that this land is the land that will be shaping my children and their childhoods. It is baffling to me that this tree-packed city with winding, claustrophobic roads will be their "norm." Greenery, growth everywhere, without canals providing water, and water so plentiful, even in times of drought. Months of rain each year instead of four of five days!

Will they appreciate trees if they grow up surrounded by them, locked in by them on all sides?

Will they still marvel at flowers that grow so easily?

Will the giggle every time they get to use an umbrella?

Someday, will they travel to Blythe and feel overwhelmed by the vast nothingness of the land and the way the sky goes on and on?

And will that open desert sky ever stop feeling like "home" to my senses?