Construction Update

Remember my ceiling problem in my kitchen? I thought you might like a little update.

So my sweetie started digging into the disgusting mess that used to be boards beneath our shower. After he slowly and carefully chipped out a huge square, he repaired the liner pan with this special rubber stuff that looks like the thera-bands I got from my physical therapist last year only bigger. He had to carefully glue everything in place with this horrible stinky glue that sent us all to the great outdoors while we aired out the house.

Then after several more layers and some Gorilla glue and some wood, he sent the Drama Queen to Home Depot for the drywall. It was my assignment to clean up the area with the vacuum and remove the incredibly awesome letters Teach had installed as a gift for me. (I'm hoping she has a little more vinyl so we can replace them after everything is repainted.)


After I got down from the ladder and tossed the crumpled pile of vinyl into the wastebasket, I pulled out the shop vac and started vacuuming the floor. This project had created quite a mess! My sweetie had thought to cover the couch that was down a step in the family room, but since our hardwood floors are in need of refinishing next month, he didn't bother to use a drop-cloth.

I found several little splotches of glue on the floor right below where the light used to be. They were difficult to clean up, until I thought to rub a little Vaseline into them. The trouble is, I didn't quite get all of them, because the next time I crossed the room to turn off the shop vac, my feet tried to stick to the floor.

I took a paper towel and wiped off the sticky mess and assumed problem solved. Then I spread out the drop cloth and moved on to other things.My sweetie spent a couple more hours up on the ladder before he finally quit for the night. Since I had already put up my post, I followed him upstairs.

As I got ready for bed, I suddenly remembered those dirty sticky socks and I grabbed a clean pair. The first sock pulled off easily, but not the second one. It was stuck to my foot in three places!

My sweetie was watching Smokey and the Bandit that is until he heard my whines of frustration. He rolled over to my side of the bed. "What's wrong?" I carefully started picking at the first splotch of glue. "My socks are glued to my feet!" I was remembering that "I Love Lucy" episode where she accidentally glued a fake beard to her face. She had to have a special remover.

After examining my foot, my sweetie recommended acetone, then left me to my own devices.

It took me about 15 minutes to finally scrape off the sock and another 15 to calm down. Other than a small piece of skin, there was no permanent damage except to my psyche...maybe it's because I'm a bit claustrophobic, but I like to be able to take things off whenever I want to...without a chisel.

So Did We Win?

OK, I want to confess up front that if you were hoping for pictures of me playing basketball, it's just not going to happen. Nobody but the teams actually attend the women's games. All those kids would be too distracting for the moms on the floor.

Instead I'm sharing pics of my Jr. Jazz team. Crafty is on the bottom right in the pink shirt. The second pic is Scout's cute little team. She is #5.

I know you are just dying to find out about the tournament, right? So half my team got lost on the way to the church. The woman in charge actually called me when we were about 3 minutes away and asked me if we were coming...

I assured her that we should probably stay home, but we would definitely be there before 8:00. And we were...we walked in the door at 7:58. They nicely gave us a couple of extra minutes to put together our roster and warm up. Six of us were there. The only one missing was Bossy. She and I have been sharing the point guard position this year, so that was not a good thing.

We got out on the floor and the Daybreak team took the toss. Things were not looking good. By the end of the 1st quarter we had only thrown three shots and none of them went in. The score was 10 - 0. That's about the time Bossy walked in.

We decided to play the second quarter with both of us on the floor. The first shot she put up missed the mark but I got the rebound and tossed it in. The next two possessions were the same. Then she threw in an awesome three-pointer from about six feet outside the line! I think that shook them up a bit. Suddenly they were only up by three at the half.

Bossy and I met up quickly in the restroom during the break. We might actually be able to win this game, but then we would have to forfeit tomorrow night's game for sure. Teach had to work and I had a Tupperware party at 6:00. That left only five players and that was assuming every one else would be able to come.

The rest of the team didn't realize the dilemma we were in. We played the third quarter with the same intensity except for "yours truly" was the one to throw in the amazing three-pointer! (I think I was more surprised than anyone else...I've never made a three-pointer in a real game before.)

We finished up the third quarter still down by 3. I took a quick breather and Teach racked up a total of six points. With three minutes to go, the game was still close. I called for a time-out and subbed myself back in. That's when Bossy pulled us all into a close huddle and explained the situation...that a win would likely mean a forfeit Friday night.

Always loyal, my team dropped it down a notch and we lost 31 - 22. But the game was so fun! If you remember my whining from yesterday, I expected us to take a beating and it wasn't like that at all. And these ladies were good sports too. The only dose of humble pie for me was when I was fouled on the shot and totally missed both foul shots.

I'll let you know how things work out tomorrow. I may even think to ask Bossy to snap a pic on her cell phone...but I probably won't, that's what I love about basketball, when I'm playing the game, I don't have enough brain cells to think about anything else.

DARE Graduation

In our school district they have a program called DARE that helps the kids make a decision early on to avoid drugs and alcohol. Crafty graduated from that program yesterday. Curly was so excited to see the DARE car when we were walking in to the school! Nobody is EVER allowed to park that close to the front doors!

The fifth-graders filed into the gym and took up the three front rows. Crafty ended up on the opposite side from us so we could hardly see her.

After all the proper introductions and thank yous, they introduced the six essay contest winners. One boy and one girl from each of the three classes read their essays. I already knew Crafty didn't win, but after I heard the essay by the girl in her class, I was not a bit surprised. I don't think anyone could have written a more touching essay. This little girl's mom died of an accidental prescription drug overdose several years ago. She had gone to the dentist and she was in pain and she mixed a couple of painkillers that shouldn't have been and she just didn't wake up.

I remember when that happened. She was in Crafty's class then too. The kids were devastated to think that a young mom of one of their own just died when she wasn't even sick!
DARE is such a good program for these kids. Most of them are so sweet and naive at this age they have no idea what can happen to them.

I am so proud of Crafty for making a pledge to stay drug-free. Now if I can just figure out a way to get them all a ride in that awesome car!

Scout's New Game

I'm pretty sure I've told you before that we are not big into TV or video games. I like the kids to use their imaginations and come up with their own games and activities. I also want them to be active, not just sitting around all the time.

So Scout and Curly were giggling as they came down the stairs after the shower. They were dressed in clean jammies and big t-shirts, but I didn't think anything of it. Several minutes later, I understood why...

Scout had made up a new game and I think she called it "Bop." They each tucked a large playground ball under their shirts. At first I thought they were pretending to be pregnant, until the first Bop.

They banged their huge "bellies" into each other and laughed and giggled as they continued bouncing off each other until one of them (usually Curly) landed on the ground.

I'm not sure I love this new game...it kind of feels like Sumo wrestling with a twist. I guess I should be happy...at least they are active.

Another Very Long Day

 I almost don't remember what it feels like to not be tired. I sewed flags last night until 5:30 this morning when my sewing machine suddenly gave out! I think a belt or something broke. Then the Dog Walker and I ran across town to give them back to the lady in charge. I felt bad about it, but what could I do?! 

At 6:30 I finally crawled into bed for an hour or so. Sport had to be at the football field at 8:00 and his game started at 9:00. They played a good game and soundly trounced the Riverton team. We came home and started on the five boxes of peaches.

We finished them up around 2:00 and then we started on the five boxes of pears. By the time we were finished we had nearly 100 quarts of fruit. We also had the kids pick another round of beans and I just turned off the canner. That added 13 1/2 quarts to our tally for the day.

Not a bad day's work for a conference Saturday. We enjoyed the talks and the music in between the plop and hiss from the canners. Remember, if you want to do peaches, they are just like pears except they take a little longer to blanch. I hope you all had a happy and productive day too. Sorry about the short post, I'll make it up to you, I promise, but right now I really need some  zzzzzz.

My Tupperware Obsession - part last (I promise!)

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I know you all thought my Tupperware saga was over, but it couldn’t be, because Tupperware has a lifetime warranty and I couldn’t possibly throw anything away that might be worth something (no wait, that’s my sweetie…). Every time I broke a bowl, or the numbers wore off my measuring cup, or the kids took one of my good tumblers out to the sandpile and smashed it with a shovel, I stashed the pieces in a cupboard in my kitchen. Then every couple of years I would host a party, drag out all the broken stuff, and get a huge new pile of Tupperware for free.

Now even though I love Tupperware, I can only use so much of it…but I figured out that it makes a fantastic wedding gift! (Sorry to all my neighbors, now you know that I get all of the gifts for your kids for free…) When we moved onto our street, nearly everyone was in the same stage of life, in our mid to early 30s with elementary-age kids. Now everyone is pushing 50 (except me, I’m only 46), and our kids are getting married and moving on. That makes for at least a dozen wedding gifts a year.

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When Bossy first got out of school, she was looking for a little part-time job and I persuaded her to become a Tupperware lady so I could buy all my stuff at a discount. That worked for about six months until she got tired of it. Then for about the last seven or eight years I have called the same Tupperware lady and she has come over and taken all my broken stuff and we have scheduled a party and we both come away happy, because you know my super-overachiever self can never do anything halfway.

Last summer I made my biannual call to her and I was stunned to hear that she was no longer selling Tupperware, but that she had started her own business selling bags and purses (the traitor!). So I shut my Tupperware cupboard and let the broken pieces accumulate for another year. Sadly though, my gift box was dwindling and I’m afraid my last couple of weddings got pretty lousy gifts. I also had so much broken stuff it was falling out of the cupboard. This prompted a visit on the Internet to find a new Tupperware lady. I was surprised to see some names I recognized from the old days (which if you are counting, are about 20 years ago).

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The first name I called was Bossy’s old manager, but I was not impressed with her people skills…her leave-my-$150.00-worth-of-broken-stuff-on-her-porch-and-she-might-get- back-to-me attitude, that is if somebody didn’t steal it first. So I headed back to the Internet to look for more names. This time I spotted another name I remembered from the early days…my nemesis! She and I were always in the running for the top sales and recruiting honors. Did I dare call her? Would she remember me? After a couple of days brooding over these questions, I finally sent her an e-mail and she agreed to come to my house. I mentioned that I had sold Tupperware in the past and left her my name.

When she rang the bell, my heart began to beat wildly…which is so stupid! I wasn’t afraid of her. I opened the door to her friendly smile and she introduced herself. Like an idiot, I said, “I’m pretty sure we already know each other.” Then she said, “I wondered if that was you!” and that was the end of it. Like two old friends, we sorted through my stuff and I got tons of new things to fill my gift box. Then she asked me to host a party, and what could I say? We booked a date a couple of weeks from now and then she asked me that hard question…Tupperware at my own discount? Where do I sign?

The Tangled Web

Last night I was ready for bed at 11:30 which is kind of a record for me, but I hadn’t been feeling well the night before so I was a bit sleep-deprived. I promised my sweetie that I would finish my blog and head to bed as quickly as possible. Besides, this thing with Sport’s arm had me really stressed and worried (I took him to the doc, btw and she put him on oral antibiotics. The swelling is now 10 inches long and 6 ½ inches wide. If the swelling isn’t down by tomorrow it will be another trip to Primary’s). I had just finished reading my last bloggy friend post, gathered the baby, and turned to head upstairs. That’s when the Prima Donna showed up. But she didn’t look much like a Prima Donna. She looked like something from an 80s monster flick. "Mom," she whined. "Can you help me with this?" She had wrapped the entire front part of her hair around a curling iron brush! The handle and the cord swung loosely toward the floor, but most of the bristles were totally wrapped in her long brown locks.

"What did you do?" My voice raised a little too high for the late hour, but I was exhausted and my patience was wearing thin. "I just wanted to see how this curling iron worked," she stated matter-of-factly. I reached for the rod. It was cold. "Did you even plug it in?" I asked. "No, I was going to figure out how to wrap it first," she said. I rolled my eyes and began tugging at her hair. The hair barely moved. This was not going to be an easy task. I handed the baby off to the Dog Walker and began tugging with a vengeance. This was so not fair! It was my night to get to bed before midnight.

Fifteen minutes later the hair had budged very little. "How did this get so bad?" I wanted to scream in frustration. "Well," she said, "When I couldn’t get it right out, I tried to brush it out…I think that made it worse," she trailed off. "Ya’ think?!" I was ready to get out the scissors, so I sent her over to have the Drama Queen give it a try. Less than five minutes later she was back. The Drama Queen suggested baby oil and some scissors.

Good riddance!

The Prima Donna had an even sillier suggestion, "Do you think if we plug it in it might help?" "Yeah," I answered sarcastically, "Then I’ll burn my fingers trying to do an impossible task." After another 20 minutes, I reached for the scissors. I know I’m the meanest mom on earth, but I started snipping. "You’re cutting my hair?" she wailed. I didn’t answer right away, because I thought she deserved to suffer a little. I was actually snipping all the little black balls from the ends of the curling iron brush. I was thinking that without them I might be able to slide the hair down and off the end.

"Do you think maybe a bobby pin would help?" questioned the Prima Donna hopefully. The Drama Queen was watching and offered, "Yeah, then you’d just have a bobby pin stuck too!" I snipped a few more balls. "You aren’t cutting my hair, are you?" Prima Donna asked accusingly. "How do you know?" I snipped some more. "’Cause little black balls are falling all over me," she said. I tugged harder. After a total of 72 minutes, I finally slid the last of the hair from the end of the devastated curling iron. As I dangled its sad and broken body over the garbage can, I bid it a grateful farewell.

It took the Prima Donna another 20 minutes to comb out the rat’s nest (littered with little black balls) that it left in her hair. She sent me a picture text just before I turned off my light. I glanced at the clock…1:00 AM. My sweetie would be unhappy. Oh the tangled web we weave…well, somebody did something with a tangled web...I'm just too tired to know who!

Pageant and Palisade

As you all know, I grew up in a small town in central Utah. When I was 2 years old, somebody decided that we needed to present a pageant (not a beauty pageant, but a large live play) that explained our Mormon faith. My parents were excited about this opportunity and promptly signed up our family to participate. The girls all got bonnets and long dresses and we walked at the appropriate time across the fairgrounds to represent the trek of the pioneers. I don’t actually remember any of this, but my mom told me about it many times and showed me the bonnets that she kept as remembrances. The pageant had about 2000 people attend the first year and it grew and grew and grew. For two weeks every July, the Mormon Miracle pageant brought thousands of visitors into our tiny towns.

When I was about 12, I had a second opportunity to be part of this production. By then they had moved it to the grounds of the Manti Temple. I was part of the heavenly choir along with the rest of our Young Women group. We wore white dresses with tinsel (no wings because we don’t believe in wings). I can still perform the actions for that song. After my second year as an angel, I graduated to the ranks of a Nephite. These dances were much harder and required weekly practices that began after auditions the first week of May. The costumes were fun and elaborate and reused every year.

Christ among the Nephites

The year I was 15 I was chosen to be a Lamanite, but not a dancer. I stood on the platform. Since Lamanites are the ancestors of today’s American Indians, I was required to be covered in a coppery shade of body paint and have my hair dyed temporarily black each night. This paint was messy and stained the shower. Several years earlier, my older brother wore his hair mostly black all summer when the dye they used wouldn’t wash out of his blonde curls. Our part in the pageant was during the first half, so we were allowed to leave the staging area on a school bus and return to the high school to change.

The years I was an angel or a Nephite, we would walk the couple of blocks to where the crowds were gathered to watch the pageant and chase boys. When I was a Lamanite, we had to find a place to wash off. We were not allowed to mingle with the masses in our war paint. So we would all pile into the back of somebody’s pickup and head to one of the nearby lakes. Gunnison Reservoir was a favorite swimming hole because it was dirty and loaded with catfish. No one minded if we had our cleaning party there. (Remember, this was thirty + years ago. The Water Quality people would be all over us now…I don’t know what they currently do.) The other spot we liked to go to wash off was Palisade Lake in Sterling.

One night a bunch of us headed up there. It had been a difficult performance. The guy who was playing Samuel the Lamanite was supposed to stand on a wall and preach to the people. But he had worked an 18-hour shift the night before and when his cue came, he was snoozing on the ground behind the wall. The spotlights hit the wall, but nothing roused him. The Nephites threw their rocks and chased nobody…He was in our group and rather upset as you can imagine. So when we got to Palisade, he wanted to do something idiotic. He wanted to swim across the lake and back.

The lake is 66 acres with an average depth of 18 feet.

He was about 18 and cute, and I was the only taker. I had been on a swim team as a child and thought I could do anything. Looking back, it’s amazing I even survived. This guy was a trained lifeguard and a much stronger swimmer than I was so I guess that was some consolation, maybe he could have saved me. I was in the pageant all through my teenage years until I was married. I even auditioned for the lead role, but was disqualified because I was only 17 and they required an 18-year-old. The pageant now plays for over a hundred thousand people each year. I looked up the dates for you just in case you are driving through Manti and you want to stop. This year it is June 16 – 18 and 21 – 25. It’s all free and if you’re interested, it’s a great place to pick up guys…but don’t let them take you to the lake. You might just have to swim for it.

*Editor's Note: If you decide to put this on your Summer list and attend the pageant please leave us a comment about your experience.  We'd love to hear what you enjoyed.*

The Interview

Last Thursday my sweetie, Baby Doll, Grandpa, and I took off for Cedar City around noon. It’s a four-hour drive and we had a deadline. The Drama Queen was directing her first one-act play and she really wanted us to be there. We got stuck in traffic in Utah County, but the rest of the trip was pretty smooth sailing. I rode in the back with my Baby Doll since this was her first long road trip and it wasn’t long before my legs were totally cramped and aching. Did I mention that I have Achilles Tendonitis in my right foot? I’ll tell you all about that and my torture (therapy) sessions next week…but for now just keep in mind that an 8-hour car ride was not pleasant. 

 

 Yeah, we drove down, spent a couple of hours in Cedar including the play (which was amazing by the way) and turned around and drove home. Normally we would have spent the night, but Bossy’s graduation was at 10:30 the following morning so we had to get back. About two hours into our ride home, I got a phone call from Bossy. "Guess what, Mom?" she shouted excitedly into my ear. It was already pushing 11:00 pm, so maybe I wasn’t as excited as I should have been. "What?" I asked. "Brooke Adams from the Salt Lake Tribune has requested an interview!" I sat up. Suddenly I was listening. "You’re kidding," I responded. "Nope! You’ve  finally arrived!" (That’s about the 5^th time she has told me I’ve arrived…). 

 **Editor's Note: This  doesn't make sense to anyone else, Mom.  For the first month she kept asking me, "When do you know your blog has "arrived?"  Like there was a magical pop-up that would greet her one day.  "Congrats!  Twelve Makes a Dozen is now a real blog."  So I started teasing her at every blogging milestone.**

I don't remember the rest of our conversation, but when I snapped my phone closed, I was unable to slip back into that dozy place. An interview! Nothing like that had ever happened to us before. Brooke wanted to talk to me about twelvemakesadozen and why I blog. When we got home I sent her an e-mail agreeing to the interview and she sent me a bunch of questions. Bossy’s graduation ate up most of Friday and we spent Saturday cleaning the house and preparing for her graduation party on Sunday. 

We fed and entertained 48 people at our house who all came to express their congrats to Bossy. When they were finally all gone, the house was under semi-control again, and the kids were all in bed, I sat down with the list of questions. It took me over an hour to answer them all. Some things I had never given much thought to, like WHY I blog. I sent them off to her and headed to bed. 

 She responded first thing Monday morning…the answers were just what she wanted. They were planning a huge spread on mom bloggers in the Mother’s Day Feature section. They also wanted to send over a photographer on Wednesday to get some pictures! That meant another day of cleaning the house while trying to settle my racing heart. 

My sweetie stayed home from work on Wednesday morning and took all the kids to school so I could sleep in. When I finally dragged myself out, he was touch-up painting in the kitchen! I was thinking mopping the floor would be a good idea, but painting!? We spent the morning together with me scrubbing and trying to avoid fresh paint while he crawled on the floor one minute, then stood on a chair the next. We took the youngest three (who are still home during the day) to McDonald’s for lunch. We didn’t want to chance making a mess. 

The paint was dry when we got home…that’s when my sweetie discovered he’d grabbed the wrong can and all the sand-colored paint he’d touched up on the walls was the wrong color! We had little lighter patches of paint everywhere…so much for impressing the photographer! She showed up that night just a little early. I was surprised how uncomfortable I was in front of the camera. Teach said, "Don’t worry so much, Mom, she can’t make us look any skinnier!" But maybe she can make my walls all look the same color. 

Pick up a copy of Sunday’s Salt Lake Tribune or read it on line. Let me know what you think. I'll even give everyone who leaves a comment about the article an additional entry in our new contest that starts on Monday. Have a fabulous weekend and Happy Birthday, Gamer!

Rains Came Down and the Floods Came Up

Some nights I stay up late just writing this blog for you. It drives my sweetie crazy because when I don’t get enough sleep I get ornery. But if I don’t spend time forcing a particular story from my brain, I don’t get any sleep anyway because it rattles around in there until I spit it out. So Friday night was one of those nights. The Autism stuff is such a huge part of our lives that its story was itching to be told. I finally forced myself off the computer and up to my nice soft bed around 2:30 a.m.


The baby fussed a few times and demanded her middle of the night snack…she’s getting really chubby, by the way…but by 9:00 a.m. I was still snoozing soundly when the door slammed open. Ten-year-old Crafty was responsible, "Mom! Get up and bring some towels! We have a flood in the bathroom!" She grabbed an empty laundry basket and headed back down the stairs. In my dazed and confused nightmare, I reached for my bifocals and knocked them to the floor. It took me a minute or two to locate them and clear my head. We do not live in a floodplain!

I pulled on my clothes from last night, grabbed a pile of towels and headed down the stairs. I nearly crashed into the Dog Walker as he brought the shop vac in from the garage. "Dad’s downstairs," he said before I asked. "It’s raining in the storage room." Crafty was busy trying to soak up the water on the bathroom floor with towels that were already more than saturated. "Toss that wet rug in the basket," I suggested. "I’ll go start the washer." That was dumb! Laundry baskets have holes and I totally underestimated the amount of water one rug could hold. When I picked up the basket, water ran all down the front of my shirt and shorts. Did I mention that it was the toilet flooding? Yeah. Not clean water…

After I got the washer running I grabbed a few more towels from the laundry mountain and made my way back to the flooded area. We spread them out on the carpet all around the bathroom door. Then we did a new kind of potty dance by stomping all over them to help pick up the excess water. My sweetie, Teach, and the Dog Walker were dragging heavy Christmas boxes out of the storage room. Cardboard was soaked and so was the carpet in the downstairs family room. We only finished that area this past summer so my sweetie was more than a little stressed.

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"Get the fans!" he hollered. The kids set them all up in various spots on the wet carpet. We danced some more. As it turned out, the little fans weren’t enough to do the job. My sweetie headed to Home Depot and rented a couple of their industrial strength fans to blow away the rest of the water. They were loud and noisy, even for my house, but they seemed to do the trick. I rounded up the kids and headed them all to the van to get them out of the house. I didn't want to take any chances by leaving them stranded in a floodplain!

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 Time for details on the new contest! We thought it would be fun to give away some cute kids stuff for Easter. We have one box for boys and one for girls. If you are the winner, you get to choose. Prizes retail for about $25.00 and include things like Barbies and Hot Wheels sets. It will definitely arrive in time to assist the Easter Bunny. Now, there are three ways to get your name entered into this random drawing. First, everyone on the followers’ list will automatically get one entry. Then, if you leave a new comment on any post you will receive a second entry (limit one entry from commenting). And, if you link your blog to mine (leave a comment directing me to your blog so I can visit), I will enter you again! The contest begins at this very moment and ends on March 25, 2011 at midnight MST. Remember to leave me your contact information so I can find you if you win. Good luck!

Falling in Love: First Date

So we met the first week in June of 1982. I survived the Survey Chem class with the firm intention of never taking another chemistry class in my life! But my job required me to correct homework and tests for the various chemistry classes, so chemistry became part of my routine. 

I was an English Major, so sometimes correcting homework was a bit beyond my abilities especially for the Organic Chem class. This nice lab assistant was the perfect person to ask for help! Not only was he in the Organic Chem class, but he could get paid for his efforts in my behalf. So we started spending many afternoons together, laughing, working, and getting to know each other a little better. 

 
I must confess that I was a big flirt and it never occurred to me to be anything different around him. It was obvious that he didn’t have much experience with girls and most of my flirting just seemed to frustrate him. After several months of working together I finally ran into him one night at the library. I was with my little sister and he was just hanging out and doing homework. We started teasing him and eventually I stole his class ring. That was really the first time I looked at him as being a romantic conquest. 

Several evenings later I was working in the chemistry office. The Organic class was having a test and I had several guy friends in there sweating it out. After a couple of hours, they were finally dismissed. What a ragged bunch! They had clearly used every bit of brain power they collectively possessed. These were some of the smartest guys in the school and they all congregated in the chemistry office. I was the only girl among them. 

My lab assistant sprawled in the professor’s chair, "I could sure use a steak!" he complained to no one in particular. Then, when he got no response, he said, "Anyone want to come?" "I’ll come," I said. We looked around at the rest of the guys. Each had his own silly little smirk on his face. "I have some stuff I need to do," said one. "Have fun!" commented another. Somehow I thought I had been set up, but I wasn’t going to walk away without a good steak dinner. Besides, this was probably the only way I was ever going to get this super-shy guy to ask me out. "OK, let’s go," I said. 

He didn’t have a car, so naturally I had to drive. We headed to the only steakhouse in town, a tiny café I had never been to before. I made up my mind then and there that this was a date and we were both going to act like it. When I pulled into the parking lot, he got out and headed to the door. I just sat there and waited. It took him a few minutes to realize that I was still in the car. I’m pretty sure that’s when he figured out that we were not just two friends grabbing a bite to eat together. 

 He came back and opened my door. We enjoyed our meal and talked about things that were a little more personal than homework and test scores.  Then I took him to my favorite place in the whole world…my grandparents’ house. 

They were a little nervous about me bringing a new guy around, but they took it in stride. Although my grandma took me in the other room and said loudly enough for him to hear, "Now don’t go getting serious with this one!" I was only 17 and college boys were definitely trouble. I can’t remember who suggested that we attend the dance that night, but somehow we ended up there. Several slow dances later and we were both convinced that our first date wouldn’t be our last…come back tomorrow and I’ll tell you about our first kiss.

Yard-sales

First let me say that I have always hated yard sales. I hope that doesn’t alienate anybody, but I would rather go to a store and find a good deal on something that is new and most importantly, not used. Only once in all the 27 years I’ve been married have I broken down and agreed to let someone sort through all of our old junk and give us pennies on the dollar for things we don’t want and they don’t need. I would much rather donate my stuff to Deseret Industries or some other charity than be subjected to that kind of humiliation. 

That said, my kids (and unfortunately my husband) love a good yard sale! They drive around in the summer without me just so they can stop at one if they have the intense desire to dig through boxes of old shoes and faded camping equipment. It was just such a sunny summer day about ten years ago that they happened upon a huge yard sale and an amazingly good deal. The Gym Rat was about 13 years old and he burst into the house yelling, "They’re having a yard sale!" When he saw me he quickly amended it to, "The neighbors are having a moving sale!" That started a chain reaction with the kids. They were practically bubbling over with excitement. Me? Not so much. So Dad came to the rescue…"OK. I’ll walk them over for a few minutes." I’m not sure which was worse, taking them myself or actually letting my sweetie loose at a close neighbor’s yard sale. But before I could think of a reasonable objection, they were out the door and down the street. 

Within fifteen minutes they were back with a few miscellaneous treasures including some rather sad-looking stuffed animals and the proverbial frame backpack. I breathed a sigh of relief. That couldn’t have caused TOO much damage to my checking account. Then my sweetie came in. From his hang-dog look, I knew he wanted to talk. "OK, what do you want to buy?" I asked cautiously. He laughed. "You know me pretty well…" "How much?" I prompted. "Well," he began, "It’s worth about $2500.00." This couldn’t be good. "…and they want $700.00 for it." I choked on nothing. "What is it?" I asked, trying to sound normal. "A go-cart!" There was nothing I wanted less than a go-cart at that very minute, well, maybe a root canal…but I could tell from the look in his eye that he really wanted to claim his prize. So what could I do? I handed him the checkbook. It didn’t take him long to drag his treasure back to the house and then, of course, they had to drive it. None of them had a driver’s license, but it was only a little go-cart, so how much damage could it do? 

Bossy and Teach climbed on and drove it carefully down the street. Until they were out of sight, that is. The next thing I knew, they were trudging back up the sidewalk. "Mom, we dinged up the go-cart," Bossy admitted. "Were you hurt?" I asked frantically. "No, but we put a little dent in Mr. Jones’ truck." I grabbed my sweetie and we walked the long walk to the Jones’s house. The little dent turned out to be not so little, but it was in an old beater truck that he didn’t use much. Three hundred dollars later that great yard sale find wasn’t such a good deal any more. It’s no wonder I hate yard sales.

Church Pews

If you drive past my house in the light of day, you will notice that I have a church pew on my front porch. But that’s only half of it. I also have one in my living room! We joke about trying to teach the kids to be reverent at church by practicing at home, but really we have a church pew in our living room because it is an easy way to seat lots of people and we have lots of people! 



We found the church pews by chance or maybe by Providence. I was driving along 1300 West one bright summer morning and as I drove past the church, I noticed several dozen church pews spread out in the parking lot. Then I saw a large cardboard sign that said FREE. I picked up my cell phone and quickly called my teenage daughter. "Grab your brother, get in the truck, and get up here right away!" They thought I was crazy (as usual), but like the good, obedient children they were, they climbed in our broken down pickup and headed for the church. "Get two small (about 16 feet long) ones," I commanded into the phone. Of course I was on my way to an important appointment so I couldn’t stay and help.

*Editors Note*  Mom did not know these pews were 16 feet long.  She thought they were 9 to 12 feet long.  We had a '70 Chevy to haul the pews home in and the pews hung 8 feet out of the bed.  It was terrifying even with my big red flag I knew I was going to get pulled over. I could already see the disbelief in the cop's eyes when I tried to explain that I did not rob a church and that my mother really did want these pews for our house.

About half an hour later they showed up at the house with two dirty, smoke-filled pews. Apparently they had a fire at the church. The pews weren’t damaged, but they were covered in soot and they reeked of smoke. The pews were too long to fit in the truck bed, so they were hanging out the back with a nice red flag. We quickly unloaded them and set to work with soap and water. I had already envisioned one on our long covered front porch and I assumed the other would go on our back patio. 

When my sweetie got home, he had other ideas. It took them about an hour to angle the pew just right to get it into our living room. I believe I might have to chop it up to get it out again. But I don’t think we’ll get rid of it any time soon. It might not be working for the reverence thing, but at least we have places for everyone to sit.

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to me! I’m older than a tree! Fewer brain cells for me! …What day did you say it was again?! Not to belabor the birthday thing, but I am one year older. I’ve been thinking a lot about birthdays this past week. My older brother celebrated his on the 22^nd. I’m comforted by the fact that no matter how old I get, he’ll always be two years older than me! My oldest sister turned 51 a couple of weeks ago and celebrated it by becoming a grandma for the first time. ‘Grats on the birth of the twins!

My sweetie wanted to take me out to dinner last Friday to celebrate my birthday. We had a giftcard to Outback Steakhouse. I’d never been there before so I thought it would be fun. We drove across town, discussing the menu he had pulled from the internet. I was excited about the prospects of a big, juicy steak until we turned into the parking lot. There was not an empty space to be found. Vehicles were even parked on the street. I wanted a steak, but not that bad. My sweetie offered to take me to another place, but I didn’t want to spend that kind of money so we pulled out the Happenings book.

After flipping through a few pages, we found a coupon for a Chinese restaurant that shall remain nameless since I don’t want to be sued. The salad was OK, but that’s the nicest thing I can say about the food. The company was fantastic (it always is when I’m with my sweetie) and the fish tank was cool. Other than that the only good thing about it was that it wasn’t busy. I guess that should have been a clue, but as I already mentioned, more birthdays for me means fewer brain cells