What's Your Flavor?

Now this is random....

Have you ever consciously thought about the wonders of Jelly Bellies? They are an absolute wonderful & creative invention. I mean, what drug was someone on when they decided to create a little candy that could taste anywhere from peanut butter to jalapenos - and then you could eat both and have peanapenos? How great is that?

I've made the mistake from time to time of taking mixing lots of random flavors to the complete rejection of my tastebuds. Don't do this...it could be wonderful, or it could be horrible.

I have finally, with great deliberation decided that my favorite flavor is ...

Toasted Marshmallows Mmmmm mmmmm.

What About Cupcakes

After having a lengthy discussion with Kelly about cupcakes, I then came across this funny little post on Yahoo today.

Question:
I'm curious as to the appeal of cupcakes. I love them, but why? They taste great, are super-cute, and they come in single servings. Plus, I love the look on people's faces when they get a basket of home-made cupcakes, perfectly frosted. Why do you love cupcakes? Or do you have a reason not to like them? I'm really just curious!!

Best Answer Chosen by Asker:
I love cupcakes. They are so sexy!! I would rather get a batch of cupcakes than an actual cake. It is a matter of convenience for me. You can just pick it up peel it and stuff it in your mouth. No knives no forks just pure annihilation.

Response:
I love that you called them sexy! lol

Well, that just leaves me more mystified than before I read it. If a cupcake is sexy then then the world confuses me!

Dance Lessons

Today was a milestone in my little turkey's life. She started dance lessons - the only lessons I highly coveted all of my ever-so-lucky friends (the ones who got to dance). She has shown a lot, if not talent, then desire for dancing past the age that it naturally kicks in whenever music starts. Most 2 year old's butts automatically start groovin' when music starts and Natalie's still does and it's completely out of her control.

We bought all of her gear, leotart, tights, little tutu, tap shoes etc. I vicariously danced all through the kitchen the day she first put the get-up on. She was delighted by the sound the tap shoes made on the tiles.

However........first lesson was very different. It took me about 10 minutes to realize that moms do not sit & watch dance lessons. She would not do a thing the teacher said and she kept wanting to come & sit on my lap. She was very bashful & gnawed on her fingers while everyone skipped & hopped around the room. I gave up and went out to my car finally after snapping a few pictures of my not-so-enthusiastic ballerina. That's her in the waaaaay back pretending to be invisible.

Another Letdown

There should be a word in the dictionary dedicated to the feeling you get every single month when you find out you're not pregnant...again.

How is it that a person can get pregnant so easily the first time and then struggle so hard the next time. There should be a word for that too.

It's really not fair, you know? I have so much of this mothering thing figured out now that I've done it once.

I know what to expect from an infant;
I know what to do when a kid throws up;
I know what to do when a baby cries;
I know how to get a child to sleep through the night;
I know several coping skills for when a child is screaming in a grocery store;
I know the most effective ways to get through a meal with the least amount of mess from ages 6 months to 2 years;
I have learned all of the most effective bedtime lullabies;
I know what to look for in a good stroller;
I have figured out how to use the crazy baby bjorn;
I am even not scared about the first 3 months anymore and how to cope with no sleep; I also now know how to avoid swollen ankles during pregnancy!.

I am not scared or worried - how easy it would be to slip into #2!

I wish there were a pill.

Analyzing Your Dreams

A few months back, I was having some really weird dreams which was no surprise considering the weird and tumultuous things going on in my life at the time. At the time, I was working with a fellow occupational therapist and friend of mind named Sindy who is by nature, a really spiritual kind of person. She always seems to be so in touch with herself and the spiritual aspects of the world and I'm always in awe to the advice she gives me.

Anyway, she advised me to analyze my dreams using a method she found helpful and she even helped me through the first dream. This is her method:

She said that first, you list out all the parts of the dream that pop out in your head. Then, you go back to the top of your list, and write the first impression you get when you see the parts you wrote about. For example, one of my dreams had a cougar in it, and I took it to mean “something I fear, and an attacker” since the cougar did attack me several times. Then when you’ve gone through the whole list and you’ve got all the impressions down, you find a common thread and try to put it together into a meaningful story – something that makes sense about what might be going on in your life at the time.

An example of this is:

I had a dream about my old boss calling at 7am to find out why I wasn't at work yet. She discussed her job and pregnancy, mentioned that Brittany Spears was being admitted to our facility (a nursing home), meanwhile my house suddenly filled up with people and I couldn’t hear her so I went outside. She asked me why I hadn’t left for work yet. Somewhere in this dream I was given a cute little antique desk. Weird.

I listed out the parts of the dream that I could remember: boss calling me on the phone, early hour, talking about her job, pregnancy, Britney Spears being admitted to the hospital, people in my house, leavning the house so I could hear on the phone, antique desk.

Then I start writing out associated thoughts such as

boss = authority figure
calling me on phone = unusual
why was I late = none of her business

Then when all that is done, you start going back and looking at all of the associated thoughts until a little story starts to come out and you can put it all together. This dream actually ended up meaning to me that all sorts of people & things were pulling me in too many directions leaving me offended & confused; not meeting certain people's expectations even if I felt like I was in the right place. It came to me that having a safe place to go when I'm feeling bombarded is a very important thing for me.

Anyway, a friend thought this stuff might be interesting so I thought I'd post it. I hope it's helpful for anyone out there trying to figure out what crazy dreams mean!

Come Back Later

...i'm chin-deep in beadboard, caulk, paint & other related items. Remodeling a spare bedroom for company coming. See ya tomorrow!

Friends & Books

I used to have this idea that having a friend within walking distance that you could just show up on their porch and have a cup of coffee with was the epitome of friendship. I still think that. And tonight, I did show up on my good friend Kelly's porch (more to return her crock pots that I used in my mad-meal prep day than to drink coffee) with Natalie and her wagon behind me.

If she didn't want me there, she was gracious enough not to show and we discussed our days and she gave me a glass of water, and it was great. She also gave me a book.



Now, let me say this: I've always been a humongous reader and by that I mean, an avid reader :). But recently, within the past 6 months, I've discovered audio books that I can download to my iPod...and my horizons have expanded! I now actually ENJOY housework, weeding my garden, & other completely menial tasks around my house - all because I can listen to these books while I putter around. The other week when I drove to my sister's house, it was like a 5 hour drive which felt more like 1 hour because I got to listen to a book the entire way. I've "read" (term used loosely here) a ton of books this way and haven't actually cracked a single "real" book since I learned to download free library books to my computer and into my iPod. It's so amazing!



But...when Kelly handed me this book, first of all she was very excited. If you read her post, you'll get the feeling of what she was saying. I heard all she said and I have to say, I sort of have a unique affinity with her mind anyway so if she find something riveting (and it's not a cookbook) then chances are, I will too. However...she handed me a "real" book with "real" words to read with my actual eyes. She told me I'd be up all night reading it and honestly, for all my audiobook bliss...I'm excited to do just that. I am actually looking forward to feeling the pages, the satisfaction of turning another page and feeling the left get bigger as the right gets smaller, absorbing all of the black & white, holding its weight in my lap as it sucks me in (or not whatever the case may be) but enjoying the whole process of a real book. And I had forgotten, or taken for granted the whole process.



It reminds me of something though. I'm undertaking the Harry Potter series right now which I'll address in another post however I went looking for Book 7 on audiobook - and while it is available on CD's, the author, supposedly, has not consented to release it as an "audio book" in Audible format or whatever. Which means it can't be downloaded from Audible or iTunes yet. Her reasoning is really similar to what I was talking about before and when I read her reasoning, I thought it was total bunk. What gives her the right to say how she wants her books "experienced"? Well, perhaps she's right. A real book is a very different experience than an audiobook, not that one is better than another, but she has a valid point and it's hers to sell. I, for one, find value in both experiences.

I Have Created a Hurricane

I know I'm preaching to the choir here but I have to blow off some steam about this little monster I co-habitate with. How many messes can one child make in a few short hours - the answer: endless. And they're not just any messes, oh no! It's like she has a little devil inside her saying, "let's dump out all the puzzles, and to make it extra hard for mom, let's mix all the pieces and carry them to different rooms & hide them!", or "let's dump out the contents of every drawer in my room and mix them all up so she has to sort them", or "let's put the babies to sleep in the kitchen, feed them in the living room, read them stories in mom's room & get them dressed in her office...so she has even more messes to clean up!" Trust me, this is what I feel like! And just in case you're thinking that she's old enough to be cleaning up after herself, that's just another battle I'm working on. I took away her best baby this morning until she cleaned up her room and even then, I had to sit on her bed and be director (not that I mind) but it's TORTURE and would take 10x longer for her to clean up each & every mess herself. Those of you with more than 1, I applaud you. Your words of advice are needed...do not remain silent on this; I need your voice!

Just Checking In

I was under the impression that the waterpark at Cherry Hill closes next week on Tuesday so I wanted to make sure & go a few more times. You might remember my recent post about women who are un-responsive to my attempts at friendliness. Well, it was actually about a certain woman I met at Cherry Hill that day, and she was there again today with her little girl who is Natalie's age. I decided not to sit by her so as not to subject myself to her again, but our daughters gravitated together and so I was forced to talk with her a few times. As I was getting ready to leave, she came up to me and asked me if I always come on Wednesdays and was I going to be there again next week. We discussed closure and she told me it doesn't actually close for a couple of weeks...blah blah and so I said I'd come next week. I had to laugh because not only was she rude to me the other week but now she is using us for our playmate abilities for her child. That's alright...I'll use her right back. I can stoop low too.

This evening, I will deposit 24 completed freezer meals into my freezer as a result of my afternoon labors. I am so tired! I made everything from ravioli soup to chicken fried steak to sweet & sour chicken. I hate cooking...anyone who knows me is aware of that. I do love to bake but to be on the spot to have dinner made each night is the worst part of being the stay-at-home partner. I'm far too busy to worry about sustenance each and every day but I can't get Todd to realize that. Freezer meals are my only relief from that age-old adage of "what's for dinner?"

Continuing Saga

The City has begun it's work on our front yard. I came home from work today to the entire stretch of sidewalk & street torn out, including about 20' from each side of the circular driveway. They "relocated" several of my plants which can be loosely translated to "killed", and stomped their way through the rest of my neglected garden. Neglected primarily because I knew they the City would be uprooting much of my hard Spring work anyway so why bother? Too bad that the ones they likely killed were some of the very established perennial mums & not the annuals I planted this year. We're still able to park in the driveway but by next week, we'll be having to find alternative parking spaces as concrete will be drying on the sidewalk soon to be poured. I've seen too many cars crashed into while parked on Orchard Dr. so I might be parking up one of the sidestreets across the street which will make hauling bags or packages (like 3 year olds) an interesting predicament seeing as I'll have to cross the busy street with my arms loaded & a little tyke in towe. It will be interesting. My sister-in-law Jenny is coming to stay with us starting on Monday for about 2 weeks as she is doing in-vitro in Salt Lake and hates to drive 3 hours each way every other day for a 45 minute appointment to do whatever it is they'll be doing to her at those frequent appointments. So, at least I'll have a couple of commiserating companions.

Here's the Story

Some of you may know the whole story about me and country life. For those of you who don't, and are confused by my constant pinings I thought I'd fill you in so that as my dreams become more real around the edges, you understand the pull.

Get out some popcorn people; here's the long version:

When I was 18, I married a boy named Casey.

He, his younger brother Zach and his parents owned a horse ranch down south a ways.

Casey was also a jockey and we spent many, many weekends at poor-boy thoroughbred races all over Utah, Idaho & Wyoming.

Casey also bred & broke horses. He owned a beautiful Stallion named Bo Cephus who had won many awards for constitution & Casey charged $5,000 for one breed. $5,000 then was like $20,000 to me now owing to the fact that we made like $7/hr a piece and lived off of his parents.

Casey was very good with horses and and especially loved the babies which he called "bobodees". In fact, sometimes he called me that strangely enough.

For my 20th birthday, I received a beautiful bridle from Casey's mother and a promise that coming Spring, I would get a filly from Bo-cephus. When she was born, she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I couldn't ride her for 2 years as is customary but I spent much time walking her, brushing her & generally spending all available time getting her ready for training which would begin when she was about 18 months.



Casey and I spent all of our time at the farm. We only lived there for a few months prior to getting married and then eventually purchased our first home about 1/2 mile from there so we could be there all of the time.

At his parent's ranch, there was about 20 acres of land, a huge indoor arena & about 30 horse stalls where people could board horses. My mother-in-law gave riding lessons, both western, dressage & jumping. I took all lessons from her and eventually started giving a few to beginners. Casey even taught me trick riding one winter when we were bored. It was really fun although I landed on my head a lot.

We went camping a lot with the horses, just the two of us. We'd take two horses, and a pack mule and head into the hills. He'd fish and I'd read and we'd eat soup from a can heated over a fire. We'd sleep under the stars. That sort of camping is a lot of work but very enjoyable considering how close you can get to nature. I landed on my head a few times that way also as horses are very skittish of rodents & dead animals in the path. It was worth it.





When we decided to divorce after 4 years, I gave up my little filly, all of my riding gear, tack & traded in everything associated with country-life for the so-called sophistication of the city. I went through a period when I wanted to move to Manhatten and start fresh. I even applied to Syracuse University in New York in attempts to get away from Utah and it's rural association.

About a year after my divorce, I gave away all of my country decor, and anything tangible that would remotely associate me with farmlife. I swore it was beneath me, too hick-ish, and so un-cultured. I even did a really great job at influencing my new boyfriend, now DH, to shed his association with rural America too. He bought doc martens, lucky jeans, stopped wearing those farm caps, and sold his farm truck. I hated going anywhere rural and would stick up my nose at trailer homes, log-pole fences, farm machinery & everything else dusty.

It lasted about 8 years. I don't know why but country life started to look enticing again. I'd drive through the country and admire the beauty; feel the dust in my toes and enjoy it. I remembered how wholesome I felt working on the farm and how great it felt to be dirty with dust & smelling like a horse. I slowly started to remember how it felt to wear riding boots & a straw hat. I remembered how the bridle felt wound around my fingers and the way a horse paws at the ground when he's bored.

DH and I started looking around trying to figure out where we wanted to eventually live. He asked me one day if I wanted to live in a place with a view, or have some land. I pondered it so hard and finally realized I wanted to get back to the land; have a little "hobby farm" - get a horse and teach Nat how to care and ride it.

I finally came to the realization that I never hated rural life. My mind was just doing everything it could to get over the pain of my divorce which was very sharp indeed. Once the pain was over, and I realized that I could actually be Casey's friend should the occasion arise, I found what home really means to me and where we really belong.

DH agrees with me and we both want a farm more than anything. So many things get in our way; money, his job, Nat's education, etc. We're planning for retirement but will be prepared in case something arises earlier. I can only pray.

Are You a Blog Surfer?

I am. It's become a favorite pasttime of mine on late Friday & Saturday nights and Sundays when nothing else productive sounds fun at all. I've gotten pretty good at blog surfing and am usually able to find good blogs to read in a relatively short amount of time. I love finding blogs about people that are truly interesting and blogging about stuff that is going on in their head. It's so fascinating to realize the profundity of many people's mind-workings.

I've also found there's a lot of true weirdo's out there that we actually share the world with. I feel like I sort of veer off the course of normalcy when I'm reading their blogs, and am amazed that all of thise characters are also, unbeknownst to most of us, sharing our world, walking around on the same streets, buying cars just like ours, eating at the same restaurants, and partaking of similar life pleasures. But they also do many strange and odd things reflected in their blogs...beware.

Anyhow, I would like to share with you some of my favorite blogs that I have come across in my travels. I have lots of reasons why I have chosen them. When I'm surfing, I have no preconceived notions about what I'm looking for, or what will grab my attention. It just happens and I'm sucked in and return again and again. Other blog surfers likely do the same, as my friend & fellow blogsurfer, Kelly Sansom, can attest to.

Here are a few of my favorite blogs that have come to my attention in my late night prowlings of the other dimension:

Farmgirl Fare
The Kat House
Marytree
Book Nut
What Adrienne Thinks About That
Blue Sloth

BTW, there's another way to blogsurf, and that's to push the "next" button at the top of my blog page. Highly NOT recommended as about every other blog you hit will be pornographic and boobs staring at you from every age. If that's what you're looking for, well then go for it.

Happy Blogsurfing!

Serves Me Right

Last Saturday night after Todd's 20 year reunion, he talked me into going with him to his hometown's podunk bar. In my earnest attempts to meet him halfway, I comply. It was smoky, hot and very crowded but he was having a great time yucking it up with all his old friends so I didn't want to complain until I'd for sure had too much. Somewhere amid my efforts to make small-talk with people I have nothing in common with, and doing my best to stare down and/or impress his high school girlfriend ... I got locked in the girl's bathroom. Here's me: completely sober, very hot dressed in long sleeves locked in a grimy, half-lit potty for 1. While about 4 past-drunk girls yelled at me to "let go of the handle" and "well, that handle's been broken for 6 months and I'VE never gotten locked in", I yelled for someone to "go get my husband" to which I heard nothing but giggles. Finally my knight in shining armor comes charging up & threatens to kick the door in unless they get his wife out pronto. All I heard was, "I can't wait to see the dumbass who got herself locked in there!" This is where my husband is from. Is it just me or...

p.s. i'm sure my smoke "hangover" was by far worse than any other person in that bar that night. Serves me right.

Word in Use

I'm going to use my word of the week in a sentence...

After recently watching the movie The Exorcism of Emily Brown, the chimeras of my imagination were enough to cause sleepless nights for weeks.

Do you have a better sentence? Outdo me...

What Happened to Me?

I've been trying to so hard to figure out all the terminology of HTML, XML blah blah. I'm so confused! I just want a nice new blog that's not the same template everyone else has but for the life of me, I can't figure it out. I've literally spent hours! I used to be the girl everyone went to for tech-support. There was a time when I was the guru and knew all about all most frequently used programs and could trouble shoot nearly every problem. Now, I just stumble through most things and feel overwhelmed by small problems. I can't even figure out Photoshop.

So I'm sitting here spending even more time devoted to these complicated matters, I'm contemplating going to bed and listening to my Harry Potter books. That sounds far more interesting.

Anyone willing to help me? I'd be willing to barter zucchini & tomatoes! How sad am I?

Jack Mcclellan

I was watching Nancy Grace last week when she started talking about this guy named Jack Mcclellan. Evidently, this guy is a pedophile who has just barely been arrested but apparently never "did" anything. What's interesting about this creature is that he had a very extensive internet site with the sole purpose of educating child molestors on where they can find LG (little girls), how best to get close to them, how to photograph them and all sorts of other disgusting related topics. There are lots of anti-Jack Mcclellan sites out there too and I visited several of them in my search. JM's website has been shut down and is no longer available, however I found a website that has many snapshopts of what actually was on the site when it was running. Please visit it. Scroll down to

Links to the screen captures of McClellan’s archived blog:

http://fracas.wordpress.com/2007/08/01/jack-mcclellan-thy-name-is-mud/

Here you will find the links to the photos of the site.

I'm concerned about this and writing on my blog for these reasons:

1) this person's site may be shut down but lots more may crop in the meantime
2) by educating ourselves on what child molestor's are doing, looking for, etc., we are protecting our children.

I for one feel a false sense of security in many public places such as Chuck E Cheese, Cherry Hill, etc. Places that are supposed to be relatively safe places for children. But these are the places when we need to be on our guard even more; and since this newscast went out, I have raised my guard. It scares me to death that a child molestor is counting on me to feel safe.

Sometimes I Hate Being a Grownup

Today has been one of those blah grown-up days. My day started out with weeding my overgrown garden: NOT FUN!!! I got a singular break around noon to go to a little neighborhood picnic which was relaxing but as soon as I got home, it was back to my desk for more grown-up stuff. I wish I could say I'm getting paid for this crap but I'm not. I've just let the piles on my desk stack up with paperwork for so many weeks that they were threatening to topple onto the floor creating a fire hazard if I didn't sort through and resolve some issues. Not to mention my home & car would be repossessed if I didn't pay a few bills.

I haven't grocery shopped in 3 months (or whenver that last weird post about the checker was) and it's a good thing I am such a pack rat or we'd be eating old phone books. In fact, I scrounged bean & cheese burritos for dinner last night but at least they were homemade and not the frozen kind. They were actually pretty good I must say although I think it was the addition of fresh tomatoes of which I have ample supply. That and monster zucchini's are coming out of my ears. If anyone would like zucchinis or tomatoes, please feel free to stop by and pillage my garden. I swear no one including the DH will mind. We feel bad that so much is wasted.

So a good portion of my afternoon went toward figuring out what the heck I wanted to buy at the grocery store - making a list of meals and comparing it to the list of all the excess I have in my freezer outside. I could seriously go into business as a frozen food supplier...

In other news I got a bug in my bum to go looking for my favorite song of all time on iTunes today seeing as my CD was stolen some years ago out of my car and I got thinking of it today. It's Forever Young by Alphaville and I have always favorited (did I just make that word up?) the more upbeat dance remix. But to my tremendous pleasure, it has been remade several new ways and each one is just a more fun version of the dance mix so I bought them all and enjoyed an endless afternoon of my favorite song sung lots of different ways. There are advantages to being grown-up I suppose.

My Dream

I've been harboring this little dream inside of myself for quite awhile now. When I'm especially down, I go in search of branches for my dream. I close my eyes and envision my dream creating the offshoots as I go. Several months ago, I decided to find a picture that would be my starting point. I dream of my little farmhouse and the small piece of property I will have where I can have a few animals, a kitchen garden, trees, a broken down fence and a lane. This is the picture I start with...

Tidbit

FYI for those interested: if you click on most pictures on this blog, it will blow it up for better viewing. This tidbit is mostly for Ellen since she might want to see some of those sprinkler pics close-up. They're hilarious!

Jaunt to Ellen's House

Ellen is my little sister. She lives near Boise, ID with her husband Tony, and two kids Abby & Will. I went there because Will was being blessed. He's only 2 months old and one of the best babies I've ever seen. I'm sure Ellen never forgets about him, but since I'm not his mom it was very easy sometimes for me to forget he was even around!




Publish Post













Baby Will


Abby, her 2 year old on the other hand, is a very active little girl and so cute. Her little trademark was her "de do" which is "thank you" and chattered with the same intonation. So cute!

Natalie had a great time playing with Abby helping her acclimate to running in the sprinklers which started with them fully clothed and ended with neither having a stitch on (pictures withheld). Much fun had!














In the beginning...














Later that hour...














Two beeeeutiful faces

I had a great time catching up with Ellen. We did lots of talking, playing Pente (our favorite family game), ate Strawberry Milkshake Whoppers, worked on a puzzle, watched movies, highlighted her hair, and had a roll-making competition which she of course won.














Ellen & Amy - August 2007

On the way to Boise, Nat and I stopped off in Twin Falls to visit Shoshone Falls which was stunning, and quite interesting to Natalie who wanted to stay there all day. I got this picture of the rainbow in the waterfall and think it's one of the prettiest pictures of the whole trip.














Mom & Natalie - Shoshone Falls

Shoshone Falls, Twin Falls, Idaho

When I was a Kid

When I was little:

I hated lima beans...and I still hate them now.
I stapled my finger to a wall...the other day I nearly sewed my finger to some pajama bottoms.
I made forts to sit in by myself...now I make myself whole rooms where I hang out by myself.
I whistled loudly to anyone...now I whistle under my breath as I work & now Nat does it too.
I wanted a pottery wheel so much...now I plan to take a class someday soon.
I made up stories about fairies & goblins to tell my sister...now I write them down to someday publish.
I loved to read book after book...now I still do it just like that only with bigger books.
I followed my mom around the house...now I have someone following ME around the house.
I ate Doritos by the bag...now I eat Doritos by the bag in my closet where no one can see my sick vice.
I couldn't WAIT until I could drive...now I still love to drive as much as the first time I ever did.
I couldn't stand the white meat on the turkey...I still would rather eat my toe than white meat.
I loved getting new clothes (ask mom)...it's still one of my most favorite things.
I used to bite my fingernails clear off...now I just look at them and wish I could chew them off (old habits die hard).
I was extremely sentimental...I'm still so sentimental that I have to keep getting bigger houses to hold all my stuff!

For all the changes we make growing up, some things remain the same.

It's Happening!!!

The tree is coming down right this very second. In about an hour, they've nearly cut off all of the branches which litter my front yard. The tree is looking very forlorn with so few branches and all these stubby things poking out of the tree where branches used to be. My front room is suddenly much sunnier!