A Musing Mother 6

Flat Stanley is traveling this weekend. He came with my sisters and I to Arizona for my nephew's school project. Here's what he has been doing so far: This is Stanley watching my sister's shoes and purse.  He is now radioactive. Stanley doesn't know which gate he should take. He went to a picture of Arches.  Stanley gets around. Captain America posing with his new best friend, Stanley.  Don't you feel confident with a captain that looks like this?  Surprisingly, his singing over the intercom system did not have the same effect. Stanley did not get a first class seat. Stanley and I were disturbed by the state of my sister's Barbie house.  First of all, all them were clothed.  Secondly, none of them had been decapitated.   It's just wrong.  Fortunately, Barbie on the right is an amputee. Stanley got a little too comfortable here. So we went downstairs to see Ken.  Ken had a party last night and fell asleep partially clothed and hadn't picked ...

  Cody Brown has left the state of Utah.  Law enforcement began investigations regarding his possible practice of Bigamy.  Well, duh.   In case you missed it, TLC has been filming Cody and his four wives for a season.  Truthfully, he isn't legally practicing polygamy.  It's more like, in the eyes of the law, he has a wife who has accepted three of his girlfriends into her life and agreed that it's okay for him to have children with them and live in their house, albeit somewhat separated.  They are spiritually wed and living in relative harmony.  No child brides.  The children attend public school along with the polygamist school in a nearby town.  That part is all legal.  And fascinating to non-Mormons. HBO airs a show called "Big Love."  One fictional man living in Salt Lake City, practicing polygamy and belonging to a church that shot off the mainstream Mormon a few generations ago.  Again, another big winner for those w...

You know how I'm kind of high strung and a little on the neurotic side?  Well, for the past few years I've been carrying all my stress in my shoulders and thoracic back muscles.  I've started doing a little yoga when I can or dance in my kitchen.  When I am really pressed for time, I just turn up my van radio and dance with my upper body. You know you're guilty of it too so wipe that judgmental smirk off your face. Last night I caved and took a muscle relaxant.  The end of the world could have come and I'd have slept through it.  Unfortunately, morning does come and 5 people moving around flipping lights on and off tend to irritate the mother bear in hibernation.  So does a certain cub that keeps kicking her.  So I sit up and blink a few times, swing my feet over the side and plod to the kitchen to take inventory. First of all, I've got carpool in 15 minutes.  I'm supposed to be driving to work in 20 minutes, and suddenly, the boy whose school day...

We were hit with a blustery, gusty storm. It blew all day then started to snow while I was driving home from work at 7:30 at night.  I opened the garage door and drove the van in.  The power went out as the garage door was midway closing.  This was a definite improvement from a couple of weeks ago when the power flicker occurred when I was on the other side of the garage and without a remote.  The first hour was fun.  We lit candles and hunted down flashlights, replacing batteries where needed.  The second hour was cozy.  There was no noise from the television, computer, refrigerator, dryer, washing machine or any appliance.  The beginning of the third hour was boring.  Everybody wandered off to sleep.  Being neurotic, I felt it was my duty to stand sentry until the power came on.  When would the power come on?  I considered calling... who?  First off, the cordless phones don't work.  We have cells but all city offic...

I love reading.  I make no excuses that I am a nerd and a book whore.  I'm sorry.  I had to get it out.  It stuns me when people don't understand this addiction.  Like my husband.  He's a well educated, intelligent, accomplished man.  He reads the paper, his scriptures, lesson manuals, and an occasional book.  Novels?  Rarely.  But I don't get why he doesn't read books more.  More than 4 books a year.  I'm not being critical of him.  I just don't get it. I am an educator.  I am surrounded by people who loved learning and reading so much they decided to make it their profession.  Right?  Well, not so much.  Last graduation I packed a book in my purse and sat through the welcome, the talks, the song, the announcing of the names (okay, I stood up on the stage for that part and shook hands) and yada, yada.  The graduates march outside where there is much hugging and Kodak moments and eventually they re...

A benefit of being a blogger is becoming part of a community and meeting people I'd never known existed.  Some of these new relationships have developed into cherished friendships.  Blogging has become more than just a hobby.  I now have friends that I am actively seeking ways to meet.  If you know what I mean, stand up and holler! One of my friends showed up on my radar about a year ago.  I don't know when or how but it feels like she and I have been friends for years.  She is simply one of those women that is genuine and someone I want to tell all my secrets to because she is so accepting and and Christ-like. Turns out Amy lives her beliefs.  She and her husband have six children.  That, in and of itself, is service personified.  But a few years ago both of these people felt a pull to travel to Zambia.  How they found Zambia on the globe, let alone on a map is a mystery to me, but they felt spiritually led.  Long story short, they...

The flu has been making its way through our family.  The first to be hit was the 15 year old.  She was very, very angry.  At me.  She had been begging for the flu shot for the past three months.  I kept forgetting.  She got better but it's one more thing to discuss on her future therapist's couch. Today I picked up my 5 year old from school.  He told me about making valentine's for his friends and how he gave his valentine to his best friend, Chase.  Chase is the little boy who grabbed my scarf on my way to my car today, looked at me earnestly and yelled his telephone number to me so fast I couldn't process it then ran away. "Today I felt so sick." "Why didn't you call me to pick you up?" "I told Teacher but she didn't call you." "What did you say?" "I told her my head hurt and I felt dizzy." "What did she say?" "She told me I wasn't sick." I took mental note to talk to his teacher about c...

The dreaded science fair arrives every 5th grade year and parents are responsible for coming up with some kind of scientific experiment for their children to conduct and completely wow the judges.  Wowing is not my specialty and I deferred this one to Scott.  Between the two men, an experiment was concocted.  They were to test the electrical conductivity of coins.  Pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters were quickly tested and all were equal.  A little anticlimactic. I grabbed a small cedar chest I knew still held European currency from my single days as a girl without a mortgage payment or thought for retirement planning and proceeded to dump out the contents.  Turns out I had more in the box than German Marks or English pounds. With my 10 year old son beside me, I picked up a strip of photo booth pictures of myself and my sister.  At the same time, my son picked up another batch of photo booth pics.  His jaw dropped and he let out a loud gasp....

Except, of course, words fail me.

I've always been my dad's favorite child.  Although he denied for years, the evidence was obvious to my sibs and me.  He took me on outings, he gave me small gifts, he let me accompany him to his office where he saw patients and I cleaned the office all day, walked downtown to Trolley Square, and he took me out to lunch - things like that.  I have accepted it and occasionally rub it in a sister's face.  Because I'm mature like that.  My dad often picks up my son from school and brings him home because I'm his favorite daughter and all.  Last week he came inside and talked.  I told him we joined the city rec center.  "How much did it cost you?" "$328." "That's about what I pay." "For you and Mom?" He looked guilty.  "No." "Oh."  He was on a grandparent plan and paying for my older sister's family, too. He told me I could use his car while my van was getting fixed since my customization last month. ...

In every Primary/Sunday School class, there is always at least one little boy (sometimes a girl) the teacher dreads.  The one who can't sit in his chair, sits backwards, hides behind the door, talks out of turn, is a smart a(**)leck, lifts her dress above her head to announce she got new panties and so forth.  When teaching gospel doctrine, a teacher typically understands that children are not going to pay attention the whole time anyway and there will be random comments that are slightly disrupting, at best, shocking at worst. One boy in a 5 year old class I taught 12 years ago gave me a play by play of his parents most recent argument and how his dad slept on the couch two nights.  I was not stunned when they later divorced. Little Savannah had new panties on nearly every week, sporting a different Disney character. During one sacrament meeting the Primary children did their singing program.  The darling 3 year old girl with the beautiful red hair and flowing dress...