The Diversity Dinner

A couple of weeks ago, the Dog Walker's Psychology teacher posted an opportunity for extra credit on her web page. Apparently the Salt Lake County mayor started a new program several years ago called the Diversity Dinner. I had never heard of it before... but I guess I was in the minority...

The event was free and I had the evening open so we added it to the calendar. We showed up right before 6:00, but we easily could have waited until 6:30. Obviously no one here was in a hurry. Except for the couple at our table who finished their meal and immediately bolted. But they were quickly replaced with others until our table was 8 again.

We had 3 questions we were each supposed to talk about for 3 minutes. The first one was easy. Why were we diverse? The Dog Walker pulled the Autism card and I gabbed on about the benefits of large families. Then we had to give a personal experience about how we dealt with diversity. This one was harder! I mumbled something about being from a small town where everyone was the same color from the same background.

The Dog Walker talked about merit badges and scouts and hard work. I was a bit surprised how well he handled the group. He really has improved so much in his public speaking! The third and final question wanted to know how we were going to connect with someone who is different from us.

So here I am connecting with all of you. Isn't it nice that we can all be friends? I think it would be so fun to get in a room with you guys, one table full of eight at a time and really talk. But since that's not possible I'm glad you pull me up once a day to see how I'm doing. Even though we are different, we are still a lot the same.


Now pass the baklava and start talking. The bell just rang and my three minutes are up!

The Most Random Pics Possible

I had a huge nasty headache last night, so I begged Teach to drop some pictures into a post so I could write something for you this morning. Boy, does she pick some weird things! But just for fun we will go with it anyway. This first picture is Drama Queen's birthday I would guess about 5 years ago. I am picking that random year based on the size of Crafty in the background. She looks about the same size as Scout does now and that is 6. The other clue is the fact that there is no cake topper. We do fun toppers and candles until the kids are adults so Drama Queen must be 18. We were also in the process of repainting the family room. What do you think of those blue walls?

This is a picture of Prima Donna. Wow! I forgot our living room looked like that once. We had the peach-colored walls for a long time but as you know, they are green now. And that faux leather couch bit the dust years ago.

These next two are both scout-related. The first one was a picture of a snake we had to visit at the zoo for about 8 weeks in a row. This snake actually liked to hide so some weeks we ended up with a picture of what looked like an empty cage. This was NOT my favorite merit badge. But driving up to the zoo once a week was certainly preferable to owning our own snake!  The second one is the Dog Walker working on either the Auto Maintenance badge or the Auto Mechanics badge.

I have absolutely no idea why this picture was taken or who that leg belongs to! My best guess would be Teach since she likes taking random photos of things.

Don't you love this fun picture of Princess getting ready to head out for 80s day?

And last but not least, the kids on our whitewater rafting trip to Denver a couple of years ago. This was certainly the most money we put into helping the Dog Walker earn a merit badge and probably the most fun for the kids.

Thanks, Teach for the fun walk down memory lane!

A Can of Water

There is this long-standing discussion that my sweetie likes to bug me about. Once when Bossy was still living at home (I'm guessing it was about 10 years ago), she was making dinner. I was distracted, doing something with the Dog Walker when I gave her the instructions for the chicken pot pie she was making for the family.

Anyway, as she pulled it out of the oven, the crust was beautiful, but everything was really sloshy and runny. I began interrogating her on the instructions. All was well until she got to the part about adding Cream of Chicken soup. Instead of adding a can of milk, she added a can of water!

And the worst part is that my sweetie confirmed that he had indeed overheard me say to add a can of water for each can of soup. (Although this has been a source of discussion for quite some time now.) We tried to eat the food, but really it was ruined and all Bossy's hard work was wasted because of a simple mistake.

Flash forward to today...

Teach and I were busy with various things so the Dog Walker offered to cook lunch. Since there were only five of us, me, Teach, Dog Walker, Curly, and Baby Doll, I suggested that he open a couple of cans of stew and warm them in the microwave. He also insisted on making instant mashed potatoes (which I can't stand!) in a somewhat sad attempt at shepherd's pie.

Eventually he called us in for lunch. I was still working on the computer when Teach called out, "You'll never believe this!" She paused. "The Dog Walker put cans of water in with the stew!" I immediately recommended that she pour off the excess water to see if the stew could be saved. She did and then added a little flour to thicken it up.

But it was no use. I took one bite of the pale watery concoction and immediately spit it out. Even the mashed potatoes on top couldn't convince the little kids to try it. When confronted with his mistake, the Dog Walker replied, "When I opened the cans, they looked funny." So don't come to my house looking funny... you might just get hit with a can of water.

The Dog Walker's Corn Maze

By now you know that the Dog Walker is in charge of all outdoor holiday decorations at our house. This year he started putting stuff up mid-September. Usually my sweetie has a fit about stuff like that, but for some reason this year he let it slide. (Maybe it's because he's never home so he didn't notice!)

So the last Saturday in September the Dog Walker dragged out all the boxes and began his Halloween display. It took him all day! but by nightfall, we had it looking pretty much like this. I bought him the new spider lights and he used his own money to buy the icicle lights on the roof.

We barely had enough corn to make the maze this year and some of it is pretty short. He did manage to sacrifice one bundle to give Bossy for her new house. Her house looks good too! Hey, Bossy, put up a couple of your pictures too. We are just so festive around here...