The Men in My Life

I've spent probably too much time singing the praises of my fantastic husband Craig on this blog, and while I am grateful for all that he brings to this most wonderful of unions, today, I'd like to take a moment to extol the virtues of another man I know:

My garbage man.

He loves me. I just know it.

It's Craig's job to take the trash can out to the end of our driveway each and every Tuesday morning, even the day after a holiday. Now. The man works hard. He recently took on another job so that we can pay off the loan we took out to purchase our business and while it's difficult to be without him 6 days a week not counting Sundays, the numbers don't lie and within the year, we will have enough financial freedom to shackle ourselves to some more debt when we build a new office. But I don't even make him mow the grass -- especially when the neighbor kid is willing, even happy, to tame our 3/4 acre for a mere $15 a pop.

So pretty much every Tuesday when I hear the garbage truck pull up our street, I glance out the window to make sure the trash has been taken up, and then, in a panic, race outside to do my husband's only outside job. Usually, I am tailed by a cadre of small children in various states of undress, all covered in peanut butter, or maybe poop. I lug the trash bin up the driveway and then try to manhandle my children away from the gigantic stinking monster truck that has, of course, become the ONE TRUE object of their considerable affections and, as such, the Everest to their Sir Edmund Hilary.

The garbage man, who, admittedly, has a nice smile under all the grime, grins at my boys, tells them to stay on the grass, and bids me a good day with a little tip of his hat and a wink. Which I think means he'll see me the same time next week.

This week, after our day at the lake on Monday, I really just forgot it was Tuesday. But last night, Craig took the trash out to the bin and came back inside scratching his head. "I forgot to take the trash up to the curb, but the can is still empty."

I just smiled to myself. Now, that, my friends, is service!

PS The use of his real name is intentional. I've decided it's time for our family to become Real People with Real Names. Introductions to come.

An Embarrassment of Riches. And An Embarrassment.

Late at night, when I check on my sleeping children, I always experience a little heart-squeeze. Do you know what I mean? I look at their sweet slumbering faces, completely relaxed, safe in the cocoon of home. I love those moments. And I must admit that, sadly, they don't happen too often when the yahoos are awake. Somehow, I think quiet is required for those tender moments and that is a true rarity in this house full of loud, raucous, rowdy boys.

Because these moments are so rare, I take note when they happen, and lately, I've been taking note more often than usual. I'll share some of them . . . but first, something to ground even the highest of fliers.

Ahem. I have a mouse in my car. Or, I did. Which, I guess, is better than the petrified dog poop found by a certain old friend of mine in the back of her car. But still. Last Saturday, we piled into the van to go out for breakfast. As I put on my makeup (which lives in the car, and no, I never put it on while driving, but the light in my driveway is great, and my kids, so far, patiently stay strapped in while I apply the little bit of cosmetics it takes to get me from "she's a man" to "she's not half-bad" . . . but I digress), I found myself in need of a tissue. Those are stored in the glove box. Oh, how I wish I had taken a picture of what I found when I opened it. All 50 million of those shop-lifted fast food restaurant napkins had been chewed and torn to bits, creating the happiest little rodent nest I have ever had the pleasure to encounter.

Last Saturday was CPod's first day off in weeks. He had plans. In that moment, they all changed. He cleaned that van so well you'd think he's trying to hide something from CSI. The good news is CPod saw Little Mousie in the garage, so at lease he's moved out of our vehicle. I'm not all that okay with vermin in my garage, but somehow, it's better than my van.

So, in the midst of all that car-cleaning, intermingled with General Conference sessions and other general Saturday tasks, CPod managed to take each of our big boys on an individual date: errand plus ice cream equals confidence boost and behavior upgrade. GDog's date involved the purchase of mouse traps at the Big Blue Home Improvement Store. During the course of his conversations with CPod, GDog realized that mouse traps do a bit more than just snap off little mousie tails -- and he was distraught.

So his solution was to warn off Mr. Mouse. "Mommy, I told him that he has two days to vacate the premises. After that, we'll have to put out the traps." He was serious. And somehow, it worked. Oh, I love that boy. Heart squeeze number one -- my tender-hearted, big-mouthed, bossy-just-like-me GDog.

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We took the boys to see How to Train Your Dragon (highly recommended by our entire family). The movie started at 4:20, so CPod met us there after his last patient. He was a few minutes late, and those first few minutes contain key plot elements and some serious excitement. He joined us in the dark theater, and the boys just jumped on him. They could not get the words out fast enough. Their sentences tumbled over one another as they raced to convey with abject adoration and uninhibited enthusiasm their total excitement about what they were seeing. They love their daddy. Heart squeeze number two.

 ConMan, GDog, MayDay -- and I can't even remember how he got that black eye!

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Last week, I spent a day at MommyJ's house. We cooked and boned four whole chickens! We filled her freezer with enough food for her husband to be able to take care of dinner for several weeks after her baby is born. Our kids played so well together, and if you know how much I love my sister, you know how happy this makes me.

We ate lunch outside on MommyJ's front porch. MayDay and Henry, who are just 6 months apart in age, shared a chair and some cantaloupe. My little MayDay looked over at his cousin and said, "Henwy, you're my favorite one to pway wiff." Heart squeeze number three -- my train-playing, thumb-sucking, baby boy MayDay.

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The other day, the boys clustered around the Lego bin. "Mommy", GDog said, "I need a human for my car. Will you help me find one?"

I'm a singer. And he said "Human". So I dug through the Legos and began to sing, "Are we human? Or are we dancer?" And ConMan totally picked it up. "My sign is vital, my hands are cold . . ." He kept going, so I turned on the CD: The Killers -- Live from Royal Albert Hall (also highly recommended), and ConMan sang his little heart out. Heart squeeze number four -- my Lego-building, Killers-singing, ladies-favorite, ConMan.

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And let's not forget Miscellany. She's growing so quickly . . . too quickly. She's beautiful. She recognizes her name. She reaches for me. She's so, so happy, and she smiles like a Muppet -- as though some puppet master opens her mouth as wide as it will go every time she grins at her brothers. GDog plays a little rough, and I spend a lot of time warning him off of the baby, but her reaction to him does not exactly reinforce my position. I have a little heart squeeze just about every time I pick her up and smell her lovely auburn head.

Oh, it's fun, isn't it? Even though it's peppered with moments like this one (look away if you're squeamish):

 The ones like this never fail to make up for the unpleasant patches:

I love watching my children . . . become.

Obsess, much?

My husband doesn't have a lot of free time. When he has some, he loves to hike and backpack and camp, with our family or with his buddies. He loves to travel, and to spend time at the lake water skiing when it's warm. There are plenty of things he enjoys. But when he only has a few minutes to spend at a time on diversions? He only has one hobby: Obsession.

He chooses a topic (usually, something he wants to buy), and then exhausts every resource he can get his hands on to educate himself about it, until he knows "enough" to make an informed purchase.

Examples? Sure. I've got plenty. Projector and 96" screen in the basement? That took three years. Jeep, and all the associated accessories? Two years. Vacuum cleaners? I'm still waiting for that one to resolve. His obsession with washing machines was accelerated by necessity, but no less intense than his serious interest in treadmills, lawn mowers, digital cameras, laptops, under-cabinet task lighting for our kitchen, garage floor sealants, minivans (also borne out of necessity), hardwood mulch, and reproductively-beneficial nutritional supplements (IVF, remember?).

He reads "Consumer Reports" more than his scriptures. (Kidding.) (Sort of.)

He does not have a monopoly on idiosyncratic behavior. I counted yesterday, after reading Steph's post, and I have 99 books (including library books) stacked up next to my bed. (I am completely willing to post that list on this blog if anyone is interested. Any takers? No? I didn't think so. But it is a REALLY interesting list.) They are not on a shelf (although, they are separated into fiction and non-fiction, then alphabetized), just stacked next to the wall. I gaze at them fondly with greater regularity than I would freely admit, because I. Love. Books. I cannot stop. My name is InkMom and I am a Biblioholic.

I also cannot sleep if my sheets are not tucked tightly at the bottom. (This caused problems early in our marriage. CPod -- all 6'5" of him -- adapted nicely.) In the shower, I always start with my hair and make my way down, and if I forget a step, it pains me if I don't have time to start over.

When I'm trying on clothes, the outfit never looks quite right until I've tilted my head to the right. (MommyJ shares this quirk. When we were growing up, the full-length mirror in our room cut off your head, and if you wanted to get an idea of the whole package, you had to tilt.)

My love for words is near-pathological. I collect them like trinkets and try them on for size often, until they become a permanent part of my repertoire. This has spawned a need to correct any and all improper usage I encounter in a way that is, I'm sure, terribly annoying to all who have experienced my supercilious oldest-child compulsion to make everything RIGHT.

Admittedly, I have let a lot of things go since having children: the towels don't have to be folded a certain way, though I'm happier if they are (after all, they must fit in the cabinet), and while my cleaning regimen might seem a little over-the-top to some (MommyJ), I'm much more flexible than I used to be, and it works for me.

I could go on. There is a certain member of my family who, for a period of time in his early childhood, would not wear pants that touched his legs. Thank goodness for the eighties God-sent trend of parachute pants. He also wouldn't wear socks with lumps, or shirts with tags, and the milk in his cereal bowl had to come to RIGHT HERE or he wouldn't eat it. We all have our little tics.

And that is why I am not surprised to already note idiosyncrasies in my children. ConMan's handwashing needs have become so intense that we have trained him add lotion to the regimen; otherwise, his little fair-and-delightsome hands become so dry it's painful -- but still not painful enough to curb his conviction that there are germs on his hands. (I think I blame this one on his germophobe preschool. Seriously.)

G-Dog, like his mama, can't sleep if his covers aren't tucked in tightly next to the wall. And, he, like his daddy, exhausts us with a machine-gunfire barrage of questions on topics ranging from the nature of God to what kind of sticks birds use to build nests to how kaleidoscopes work. (I know, Mom. I'm getting what I deserved, after famously asking questions like, "Do mosquitoes have blood?")

Last week, Miscellany visited our beloved pediatrician for her 4-month check-up. As Dr. H. examined Little Girl, MayDay kept scaling the exam table like a climbing wall. Once atop the table, he made his way across, behind the baby, towards the counter holding the baby scale, a sink, and a wall-mounted sharps container.

He was persistent, but so was I. Each time he climbed up, I put him back on the floor. Finally, as he climbed once again toward the scale, I took his little face in my hands and asked him, "MayDay, what are you trying to do?" He glanced significantly at the infant scale on the counter next to him. I followed his gaze and suddenly, clarifyingly, knew exactly what had fueled his compulsion.

I pushed the weights on the scale back over the zero-point, and my little, chip-off-the-old block control freak sighed, and said, "Oooohh, thank you, Mommy!"

Sadly, I completely understood. And I am now, more than ever, convinced that the reason more people haven't been officially diagnosed with one psychiatric disorder or another is, quite simply, because we haven't asked.

Delusions of Grandeur

Last night as CPod and I went to bed, I briefly stepped into the little boys' bathroom to tidy up. The toilet, of course, needed flushing, but other than that it really wasn't too bad. CPod cleans the toilets in our house. Thank goodness. Usually, five minutes after he finishes scrubbing, some little person takes it upon himself to turn it back into the truckstop toilet we all know it deserves to be. We spend a lot of time and effort remediating their aiming skills. And it seems to be working.

So I said to CPod, "Hey, your terlet in there is still pretty clean!" And then I started laughing because that was funny, right? (Intentionally mispronounced word, in case you were wondering.) CPod just glanced up from his Backpacker magazine and smirked at me through stylish wire-rimmed glasses. (Somehow, the smirk stings more when he just looks so good doing it, right?)

"You really crack yourself up, don't you?" he said. No laughing. Not funny.

Yes, apparently, I do. I spend waaaaay too much time laughing at my own jokes, fantasizing about being on Glee as I vocalize in the car, and wondering why they don't have more short, tree-trunk legged, curvy, busty supermodels. I suffer from a different kind of delusion: when I look in the mirror, what I see is much thinner than reality, with hair worthy of a Suave commercial, a sharp wit funny enough for Night at the Improv, and book ideas the big publishing houses would fight over could they just see into my brilliant mind.

And then I realized that I am just like those people on American Idol. You know the ones. Even the most tone deaf AI viewers can recognize a talent blackhole when they see it. Don't we all just shake our heads and wonder how on earth no one has told them that they can't sing?

I am always amazed at their confidence -- one girl's utter conviction that no matter how much Simon Cowell knows about the music business, he must be wrong about her. "Those judges don't know nothin'!" she screams at the camera as she angrily makes her way out of the venue. No, of course not. Their extensive experience and proven track record of choosing and grooming multi-platinum artists pale in comparison to your one semester of high school show choir and a lifetime of shower singing. How could belting it out in the opera house-like acoustics of your bathroom not prepare you to be the next American Idol? Honestly, I'm amazed you don't have a record deal already.

Is it a worse friend/sister/mother/significant other who fosters this delusion, or pops the bubble? I'm still not sure. But really. A little bit of, "Honey, why don't you try something else?" goes a long way.

When I was eight years old, I filled pages of my journal with a looooong list of my possible future careers. This list was, of course, based on some serious soul searching and a realistic inventory of my strengths and weaknesses. Well, not weaknesses, because, of course, I wasn't aware I had any at the ripe old age of 8. American Idol wasn't around then, but, rest assured, had such a phenomenon existed, there would have been an entry on my list of "What I Have to Offer the World" going something like this: "48. American Idol pop star, because I have a GREAT voice and I don't really get nervous in front of people, and because I have such an amazing sense of fashion and could totally set the trend for modesty." This from the girl who regularly wore red tights with turquoise shorts. Turquoise corduroy shorts. (There is photographic evidence. Wince.)

Part of me has to admire the . . . chutzpah of those American Idol contestants. It takes guts to believe in yourself way more than reality should permit. After all, if YOU don't believe in you, no one will. But, seriously. At some point, we all have to take the gauze off the camera lens and see things as they really are. Except not me. Because I AM the next American Idol . . . Mother Teresa . . . Albert Einstein . . . Jane Austen . . . Margaret Thatcher . . .

Stream of Consciousness

I'm breaking you back in slowly, my friends. It's been so long since I've posted anything on a regular basis that I've got to remind myself a little what this here blog thingy is all about. Without further ado, a list of random crap:

1. You should really be careful about how you pronounce the word "pianist." Do I need to explain why? Last Sunday, as our esteemed Stake President announced from the pulpit that a new person had been called as the stake Priesthood pianist, I had a premonition of what was about to happen as little ConMan turned to me and said, loudly, "Hey! That guy said (insert the word you're all hoping he didn't say)!" Well, at least now I know he was listening. Some of you early InkMom adopters will remember this is not the first time ConMan has spoken of verboten body parts during church. But really. pee-ann-ist. Three syllables. PLEASE!

2. I've been reveling in the soundtrack to Glee. I love it. My kids love it. I think I'm raising a bunch of musical theater nerds, and I'm totally okay with that. I turned it on this week and when the boys heard it for the first time, it's like their feet started dancing of their own accord. GDog's eyes got big, and ConMan made me play their version of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" over and over again. But guess which one GDog decided to sing in public the other day? "I'll bust the windows out your car." Yeah.

They may be monsters, but at least they're cute . . .

. . . and creative with their vast powers of destruction. (Dresser drawers as beds? No, my children have not been watching Seinfeld, thank you very much.)

3. One thing I'm thankful for right now: hot water. I think God gave us natural hot springs so that we would be inspired to want to bathe warmly. I say a little prayer of thanks every single time I step under the scalding stream of my shower, and another one each time I slip into the relaxing, eucalyptus and peppemint scented waters of my tub. (Origins Peace of Mind Vapor Bath, in case you're wondering. It's awesome.)

4. Chocolate is NOT all created equal. Please don't hate me for hating Hershey's Kisses. Chocolate should not be grainy like that. Chocolate should be smooth and intense and complex. It should make you swoon. My preferred delivery methods form a triad: liquid, semi-solid, and encased in pastry. Caotina (imported hot chocolate mix from Switzerland, bought every Christmas and rationed through the cold months. We finally found an importer in the US so now the shipping doesn't cost more than the product.). Chocolate lava cake (if you're lucky, I'll share the recipe one of these days). Williams-Sonoma chocolate croissants (also, our Christmas indulgence). And I have had the hedonistic gall to experience all three this weekend. And a bubble bath. Hold on, I think I'm about to have a reality check headache.

5. While we're talking about food, I think the food guide pyramid needs some revamping. My four basic food groups: Fruit. Bread. Cheese. Chocolate. With periodic supplements of a bacon.

6. While we're talking about bacon, I will share with you my greatest culinary discovery of 2009: bacon baked in the oven. Here's how you do it: Line a big rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Take care to make sure that the parchment paper goes up the sides a little bit of it's kind of pointless. Fill it with a single layer of bacon. It's okay if they overlap, because they shrink a lot when you cook 'em. Bake at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes, or until it's as crispy as you like it. It will all be uniformly cooked, and your cooktop will not have grease splatters and, voila! It will be done at the same time as your French toast. Which is what CPod made for breakfast yesterday. On our snow day. Which brings me to . . .

7. Generally, in this neck of the woods, you can hope for one good snow of 6 or 7 inches per winter. You can hope, but you probably won't get it. Our snowfall total so far this year? Nearly 2 feet. I'm serious. And I've discovered something about myself. When I'm an old woman, I will be A. living as a recluse back in the woods with no neighbors, or B. the one with a sign in the yard that says in very large letters, "DON'T PLAY IN MY SNOW." Because I have been totally bugged by the neighbor kids ruining the snow in our yard. I don't care if my kids mess it up, but for some reason, I don't want anyone else to do it. It's strange, because I don't care if the neighbor kids play on the grass. But the snow? It's all I can do to keep myself from yelling at them off the front porch. Luckily, CPod's been around all weekend to restrain me.

 

(This snow was so old and crusted over that when they were sledding, I was a little worried we might have an incident out of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.)

8. More on the snow. My lovely husband bought an old Jeep Cherokee early last year. He installed a lift kit and new shocks and some other stuff that caused him to put in long hours staring at the undercarriage. He loves that thing. I mean, there are more pictures of the Jeep on his phone than any of the people in his life. (Except for Miscellany. Because he is smitten.) But this fall, he had begun to question the utility of his project, and let me tell you, he is all about "utility". He's the one who told me that quilting was a great hobby because the finished product is so "useful". Well, we've got all kinds of utility going on now because in the snow, that Jeep is UNSTOPPABLE. And the crisis of finding a new project car has been averted. What a man I've got! Photographic evidence:

 

My baby-holding, vacuum-running, iPod-listening better half. No, that is not a new vacuum. Instead, we had to buy a new washer & dryer.

9. My baby is beautiful. And she sleeps -- get this -- 8 hours a night! At 3 months old! (Don't hate me. I already had twins who, for a very long while, did not sleep at the same time. Ever. I EARNED THIS ONE!) Do you need proof? Here you go:

 

Bliss.

  

(I just realized this looks like she's about to pick her cute little turned-up nose. It was bound to happen.)

Blessing day.

She laughs! She smiles! She's a person!

That's all I've got, folks. Bedtime calls, and so does the treadmill.

Gift-Giving 101, or Why I Don't Want a Vacuum Cleaner for Christmas

At some point, things just die.

That's what happens twelve years into a marriage. Almost all of the things we bought when we got married have now fulfilled the measure of their creation and are desperately gasping out their last great, heaving breaths -- washing machine, clothes drier, television, and, alas, the vacuum cleaner.

My kids are into Raisinets lately. And they're also really big on molesting the Christmas tree. I swear, it's a good thing we do real trees because an artificial tree would not make it to see another season with my children beating on it. Yet another thing that will breathe a sigh of relief when I finally take it out of my house.

So I was vacuuming the other day. I noticed some chocolate-covered raisins on the floor, and sucked them up, then made my way over to the tree to get rid of the many, many needles sacrificed on the altar of toddler tree redecoration efforts. As I went over (and over and over . . . 12 years is a long time for a cheap vacuum) the area surrounding the tree, my vacuum cleaner pooped on the carpet.

Or, that's what it looked like. It took me a minute to realize the Raisinet had been rejected by my Hoover -- spit right back on the rug like a little mouse turd, pooped out in midstream just like MayDay, who can (and does, frequently) clear the room with a foul stench while simultaneously putting together a train track and telling an entertaining story about his imaginary accomplices.

Sigh.

I need a new vacuum cleaner.

But it's December. It's Christmas. It's my birthday. It's CPod's birthday. I'm not spending my money on a vacuum cleaner.

And (are you listening?) CPod better not be either.

When it comes to gift giving, I'm complicated. I love to be surprised, but I also like to be happy. At the beginning of our marriage, those two things were mutually exclusive. Now, thankfully, my dear CPod has mastered the art of selecting the perfect gift for me to open on Christmas morning. One year, he bought me a print (genuine, official, signed, numbered and smacked on the butt as it went out the door) of the Greg Olsen painting, "Mother's Love". Not the close up, but the real one. The big one. Now it hangs over our bed. A few years later, he bought me a print of a painting that hangs in the BYU Museum of Art that he knows I love; it hangs over our fireplace. Another year, he gave me an entire box of Godiva key lime truffles. Mmmmm. He has developed a knack for choosing jewelry I will love, fine kitchen tools I will appreciate, and delicious-smelling things that will make me swoon.

But a vacuum cleaner? No way. I just don't think the sight of a new Dyson under the tree would have quite the same effect as, say, a beautifully wrapped bottle of L'Eau d'Issey. (Oh, yes, ladies. He even does gift wrap!) There's just something about vacuum cleaner that says, "In case you weren't sure about your place, little woman." And maybe there will be high heels and an apron in the next package. Now, don't get me wrong, without the vacuum cleaner in the picture, I'd be all over those stilettos, and the apron, too. But gifts are supposed to be something that I wouldn't be able to justify buying for myself, or that I wouldn't think of, or that make me remember fondly the person who gave them. Lucky for me, CPod does not subscribe to the Homer Simpson school of gift giving: I don't have to use the bowling ball engraved with his name to remember that he loved me enough to give me something I love on Christmas morning.

Speaking of things that I love -- check out my new signature! My awesomely fantastic brother-in-law used my own handwriting to design that cool little sign-off. Isn't he great?

Miracles, Large and Small

In the spirit of the season, I've been counting my blessings. Admittedly, I have special reason to be thankful this year since we have welcomed little Miscellany, a particularly delightful addition to our family. (A note to some of you out there: Miscellany is not her real name, in case you were wondering. We use aliases around here, remember?) We are blessed to have her at all, and that, my friends, is a story of miracles.

I'm grateful that I wasn't born 100 years ago. 100 years ago, I would have never had children at all because in vitro fertilization was not even a germ of an idea in the mind of the most brilliant scientist. I would have been childless and sad.

One hundred years ago, if, by some miracle, I had conceived, I would probably have miscarried. Have any of you had a Rhogam shot? If you have, you've been blessed by a modern medical miracle, too, as you were prevented from having an immunological rejection of your fetus.

One hundred years ago, little Miscellany would not have survived her delivery. When my water was broken, the amniotic fluid rushed out of the sac and suddenly we all heard the scary sounds of a fetal heart deceleration. As her heart rate plummeted to the 50s, suddenly my hospital room filled with nurses. They all knew their jobs, and did what had to be done as my doctor attached a monitor to the baby's head, reinfused amniotic fluid into my uterus and then manipulated my numb body into multiple positions in an attempt to find a place that didn't stress the little one any further. My mom and my sister stood in the corner and sent up prayers on our behalf, and watched my doctor do the same as she donned her surgical scrubs. My husband held my hands and my eyes as he helped me grasp the oxygen mask covering my face. The anesthesiologist stood behind me ready to dose my epidural as another nurse shaved my abdomen in preparation for an emergency caesarean section.

And then . . . and then, I experienced a tender mercy: an overwhelming sense of calm, and a certain knowledge that all would be well. I knew the baby would be fine, regardless of her doorway. I breathed deeply, and I felt the baby settle. And then the fetal heart tones began to regulate, and steadily increased to a normal level. It was the scariest 15 minutes of my life. We delivered her, with great joy, the old fashioned way, and without further complication even though the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck.

I am grateful for the miracles discovered and applied and perfected in hospitals and laboratories all over the world every day. I am thankful to the practitioners, doctors and nurses alike, who know their stuff, and risk their lives, names and reputations every single time they engage in patient care.

I am grateful for the miracle of a kind, caring, and devoted husband. I'm not exactly sure where I'd be (probably institutionalized) if it weren't for the efforts of my dearest one. He is the greatest. What's that scripture? I cannot say the least part of what I feel. And I love him.

I am grateful for the miracle of the Magic Grandma. Every time my mom walks through my front door, she saves my life. Miscellany is three weeks old now, and for her first two weeks of life, my mom came over every day.. She walked into piles and piles of laundry, dishes gathered and untouched since she had last done them, an emotionally fragile and sleep-deprived mommy, and three very stir-crazy, energetic and rambunctious boys. She built forts, channeled energy, straightened messes, and soothed frayed nerves. And she did it with style, managing to juggle all of that plus running a business and a stake Relief Society program without missing a beat.

I am grateful for my dad. His quiet, selfless service and sensitivity to the Spirit are miracles unto themselves. Since the baby was born, he has several times just shown up to take my boys with him somewhere – anywhere. And the hour of quiet that entered the house as they left was golden and peaceful. He is also the one who, while my mom mitigates and tries to make my husband feel better by saying some little feature on Miscellany's face looks like Daddy, instead says, “Nah, this baby looks just like InkMom.” And I know he means it because when he looks at her, he looks like he is remembering.

I am grateful for the miracle of sisters who are best friends, and best friends who may as well be sisters. I have experienced an outpouring of love and support from friends whose lives are at least as busy as mine. They have cooked and cleaned for me. They have made me laugh. They have taken care of my children and increased their own burdens as they have lightened mine. One has taken beautiful pictures of my baby. (You must go see them. Here and here.) My dear Heather left her own five children with family and came to visit from Idaho with her husband. While he went to continuing education classes at a professional conference, she scrubbed my hardwood floor and played games with my crazy boys. She mopped pee off of the tile in the little boys' bathroom and changed poopy diapers. She sword-fought with them and let them creep down the stairs early in the morning to wake her up in the basement That is friendship!

I am grateful for the miracle of my three boys, who love their sister so much. I am surprised by this. MayDay has been the baby for three years, and I worried he would regard his sister with hostility. Instead, the first thing he did when we brought her home was get his beloved blanket and spread it lovingly over her little body. I expected G-Dog to maul her to death, but I did not expect him to say, every morning, “I think she's a little bit bigger today, Mommy.” He gives her so many hugs and kisses that I'm certain she'll grow tired of them before she's a few months old. When MayDay was born, ConMan just ignored him – as in, if I don't look at him, maybe he's not really here. He is not as effusive as his twin, but he is still enamored of his baby sister. He approaches shyly, and looks up at me with big blue eyes. “Mommy, she's so pretty!” And she is.

My life is blessed by miracles. Isn't yours?

Loose Ends

Tying up loose ends, that's what I've been doing here the past couple of days. My due date is Wednesday, and while I don't expect to make any frantic midnight trips to the hospital or anything before then, I'm trying to be prepared in the unlikely event I actually go into labor unassisted. So . . . blogging loose ends, mostly about pregnancy, neatly tied up. You probably won't hear from me again until baby girl has finally made her entrance into this world.

1. I put the down comforter on our bed weeks ago. And then it got warm again. But now . . . now, I sink into the pillows and relish the weight of winter time. It is a singular pleasure to hear the rustle of a down comforter, and feel cozy, snug, safe in your warm bed. I've been waiting for this since May!

2. I believe people shorter than 5'4" should only be required to gestate for 38 weeks. Anyone with me? Because, seriously, there is NO WHERE for this baby to go . . . but out. And my body does not seem to be willing to comply. Did you know I've never gone into labor (and neither has my sister, nor did my mother or my grandmother)? With the twins, I was induced because amniotic fluid was low on baby A, and it was a necessity. With MayDay, I was induced with  foley ball (e-mail me if you want to know what that means) because after a long and painful induction with the twins, I was a little pitocin-shy. Now, at 39+ weeks, I am, to quote my doctor, "High, tight, and thick." Nice. In other words, I'm still going to be pregnant at Christmas.

3. I had forgotten that pregnancy lowers all kinds of boundaries for people. For example, I find myself talking about the state of my cervix with people who don't normally have an interest in how my reproductive organs are functioning. Even strangers ask me questions that would be totally inappropriate were it not for my obviously pregnant state. Yes, thank you, I do know where babies come from. Yes, I am also aware of what . . . action may be taken at home to possibly bring on labor. Same thing that gets you knocked up in the first place, right? No, we weren't trying to have a baby, but we just couldn't keep our hands off of each other. Too much information? Well, you're the one that brought it up! I mean, do people realize when they ask these questions that they, strangers, are really asking to know some of the most intimate details of my life? It's as though the only reason anyone would have more than two children is a lack of self control. Which brings me to . . .

4. Last week, we stopped by Verizon on the way home to take care of a cell phone problem. The boys had been cooped up all day, it was near bedtime, and we were right in the middle of what we affectionately refer to as "sleep throes" so instead of leaving CPod in the car with them, we all came inside. They ran around the store, and maybe they were a little noisy, but they did not mess with any of the display phones or destroy property.

As I neared the front of the line, CPod corralled them back to the car while I finished up our business. The woman in front of me, who five minutes before had asked me when I was due and if I knew what I was having, began to make small talk with the agent assisting her. "Don't you just love it when people bring their kids in here and just let them run wild?" she said to him. He just nodded, and she kept going. "And she's pregnant again!"

Really? Really? Oh, how I wanted to say something to her. It would have been easy to engage her in a brief but scathing conversation about parenting styles, kindness to strangers, Verizon's lack of posted policy regarding the presence of children in their store, and -- egad -- passing snap judgments on people you do not know based solely on 5 minutes of observation without interaction, and what types of judgments people might make of her based on her southern-redneck accent, smoker's voice, mullet haircut, and the Sam's Club employee ID hanging around her neck. Did I make any of those judgments? No. I know too many good, intelligent southern rednecks to assume they're all stupid, and I can't disrespect anyone who has a job -- of any legal type -- in this economy. I'm much more likely to judge her based on the duplicity I witnessed in the brief minutes of our encounter. People make me crazy.

5. We had our Trunk or Treat last night at church. It was . . . a bit much for me, I think. If we had that many people at church every Sunday, our ward would split. And they never plan for as many people as we actually get, which makes it just plain chaotic. My children, however, were adorable. (Photos to follow after real trick or treating tonight.) ConMan & GDog dressed up as Mario and Luigi, and MayDay was Toad -- all from Super Mario Bros. They've been planning this since August, and, I'm proud to say, since they gave me so much advance notice, and because Grandma so graciously crafted an adorable little vest for our little Toad, their costumes did not come pre-assembled in a bag from Target, thank you very much.

6. CPod came up with an awesome last-minute costume: The Edge. (Awesomely fantastic U2 lead guitarist, for you cave-dwellers.) He put on one of the boys' little beanie caps, drew on a goatee, and hooked a little kid rock star guitar in the carpenter loop of his jeans. Only three people at church got it. In case we weren't sure before, we now know for certain who are the three coolest people in our ward.

7.  I wore an orange t-shirt and taped jack-o-lantern face parts to my belly. Really, it was my only fitting option. And that, my friends, is the main reason why . . .

8. I'm done going to church until after the baby is born. Seriously. Because I just can't bring myself to wear my uniform of yoga pants and oversized hoodie to Sacrament meeting. It's not that I'm that huge, really -- I've only gained about 12 pounds (because the secret to healthy pregnancy weight gain is to just be fat before you get pregnant), but at this point, nothing feels good, fits right, stays where it should, or, most importantly, flatters the shape of anyone who looks like Humpty Dumpy. Who was probably a pregnant woman anyway.

Signing off until baby gets here!

The Terror of Chipman Hall, or Why My Husband Makes Me Fear Our Children

Disclaimer: I'm sure that somewhere out there in the gigantic blogosphere, someone is married to, or knows, or is, one of the BYU freshmen that my husband tortured so mercilessly his first year at that august university. To you, I sincerely apologize. Please don't hate me because I married him. I can assure you that he eventually matured into quite a civilized adult who has been threatened with his life if he shares any of the stories of his wayward youth with our children. Hopefully, this will ensure that the cycle will not continue should our kids all end up at some university together in the future. And I only share this stuff now because I figure the statute of limitations has long run out.

Do you remember the kids in your freshman ward at BYU who were always up to something? They were fun to be around, but you were never sure you wanted to stay too long because someone was bound to come up with a "great idea" that led to yet another encounter with Officer Wayne of Campus Police. Before the internet, what else would a group of rambunctious non-drinking or drug using college freshmen do with their time?

My husband knew Officer Wayne so well that if it looked like Campus Police was going to show up, he and his buddies would hightail it away from the scene of the crime faster than you could say, "One day they'll all be RMs."

It all started with his dorm assignment. See, CPod is a smart guy, but the whole honors thing? Not really his . . . milieu. Somehow, though, he was assigned to Chipman Hall, first floor: the honors dorm. Luckily (unluckily?), he found a few other guys who shared his love of a good time as well as his healthy disrespect for all things Dungeons & Dragons and/or a capella singing related. CPod, Dale, Nathan and Matt made it their mission to make their mark on the honors dorm by alienating as many groups of people as possible. RAs were not off limits; girls were, but only because these boys admired them so much. But the biggest pranks were reserved for the guys across the hall: The Freaksters. The disrespect was mutual, and pranks were volleyed in both directions. CPod claims they differed philosophically on a fundamental level -- they were destined to never see eye to eye, and I fear that if we still lived across the street, the pranks would still be ongoing.

The Freaksters were a group of like-minded individuals who spent most of their free time playing Dungeons & Dragons and singing together in the shower. (I so wish I was kidding.) During Thursday night visiting hours, they would host a big Dungeon-fest in their room; people would crawl out of their respective caves, decked out head-to-toe in dragon-master, elf and wizard regalia, and congregate in the room across the hall from CPod's. They sat three-deep on the skinny beds and rolled their million-sided dice as they obsessed about their cards and hit points and whatnot.

One night, early in fall semester, CPod and his buddies knocked on the Freaksters' door armed with an industrial carpet dryer. As the door opened, they turned on the dryer and watched the players scramble in their cumbersome costumes as all of their important papers, cards, and dice were plastered to the window by the impressive wind tunnel generated by a commercial-grade fan.

This was only topped by the time they filled a huge trash can with water, propped it against the Freaksters' door, and knocked again. This time when the door opened, an enormous wall of water flowed through the room and back again, soaking Freakster costumes and gamepieces aplenty. Those industrial carpet dryers came in pretty handy then.

Not exactly an auspicious beginning.

The Freaksters, though, were by no means innocent. They reciprocated swiftly as the prank war escalated: a giant snowball was left to melt in CPod's bed. CPod's room was ransacked, drawers dumped, closet emptied, bed overturned, and pictures torn off of walls. They tried to outsmart the non-honors occupants of the honors dorm by leaving threatening notes quoting Star Trek, or written in Old English quatrains.

But CPod and his boys would not be put down.

One night, one of the Freaksters left his door open as he visited another dorm mate down the hall. CPod and his homies snuck in and stole all his underwear. I could stop there, right? But no, it gets worse. They scrounged together enough change to completely buy out one of the refrigerated vending machines: put in your money, open the little door, and enjoy your yogurt, or egg salad sandwich, or whatever. But behind each door, they replaced the yogurt or sandwich with one pair of underwear. Every time the kid needed a clean pair of underoos, he had to find $1.25 to buy it out of the machine. It took about two days for that vending machine to be removed from their hall for good.

CPod is a South Carolina boy. What does that have to do with anything? I'll tell you: it's the state of legal fireworks. And in the pre-September 11 libertine era of air travel, he could not resist the temptation to smuggle some contraband from the motherland when he came back after Christmas break.

The Freaksters had a strange bathing ritual that took place several evenings a week: four of them gathered in the communal shower and sang harmoniously together as they simultaneously took care of their personal hygeine. Let me be clear: they met on purpose so they could sing together, naked, in the shower. CPod and his friends thought this was a little beyond strange. And since the war was ongoing, they came up with an ingenius use for CPod's M-80s. They put the fireworks on a board (to protect the tile, of course -- they weren't about destroying property, just egos and self-respect), lit the carefully-timed fuses (to give them more time for escape, lest they should look guilty), and slid the wooden block underneath the bench where people could sit to wait their turn for the shower. The four singing Freaksters harmonized away, until the fireworks exploded and, in their panic and self-preserving, adrenaline-induced haste, all rushed for the same exit from the shower, resulting in the unmistakable smack of naked people crashing haphazardly into each other.

This one was investigated as a bombing. CPod and the gang escaped to his sister's off-campus apartment and stayed there overnight until things died down back on campus.

There are more of these stories. If I had had my wits about me, I would have made CPod sign a prenuptial agreement regarding the possibilities of future mis-education of our children. He claims he has since seen the error of his ways, but I've heard him eagerly tell these stories too many times to believe that one. The truth is, I'm a little worried it's in the genes, and our kids won't need to hear the stories to repeat history. Let's hope you don't have a reason to know my boys too well should they go to BYU in about 14 years.

A Little Heartbreak

On Sunday after church, we had a potluck lunch. While I staked out a table with MayDay, CPod wrangled the twins, keeping our place in line. G-Dog and ConMan held his hands, but after sitting through three hours of meetings (and truly being on their best behavior), they were more than a little rambunctious. They held on tightly to CPod's hands while swinging to and fro across the front of Daddy, the human jungle gym. They played peek-a-boo behind his back and laughed and carried on while they waited for their spaghetti. None of this behavior was abnormal, and it certainly wasn't inappropriate for the setting.

A couple stood behind them. CPod overheard the wife say to her husband, glancing significantly at my two wonderful boys, "ConMan is the good twin," as though trying to explain away their behavior by casting one child as the bad influence.

We're not sure if the boys heard her, but regardless, CPod turned around and said, "Actually, Sister So-and-so, these are two very good boys." He gave her a very pointed look that made it clear to her that her comparison of the twins, and her subsequent judgment based on limited knowledge, was absolutely inappropriate and could be damaging to the tender psyche of a young and sensitive boy were he to hear her say it.

Here's the thing. G-Dog is an enigma. Though he and ConMan are twins, he takes his 97 minute headstart seriously -- never have I met a more assertive child. He is the oldest. I'm convinced that if it hadn't been for the extraordinary measures required for us to conceive in the first place, G-Dog would have been born not just first, but alone. He is opinionated and headstrong and persistent, extremely logical and inquisitive. But he is also very energetic and BOSSY and is constantly seeking for new ways to control his environment. (Don't say it, Mom. I already know he's just like me.) Add to that a very delicate and sensitive emotional side and a deep and sincere love for all things little and helpless, and you get a kid that to many, is too much work to handle and not worth the required effort.

I'll be honest here -- I have moments with all of my children that require way more effort than I have to give sometimes. Eighteen months ago, the child that required the most effort was almost always G-Dog. Because we have worked hard at developing communication skills with him, and begun a continuous dialogue about his feelings and how they relate to his behavior, his temperament has stabilized immeasurably and life in our house has been a lot easier. We have learned how to take each child's individual characteristics and use them to our advantage when tailoring consequences and rewards. We delight in their differences, even though, sometimes, those unique things that make them tick also make our parenting lives more difficult.

I am afraid that I can almost guarantee that the people G-Dog meets through his life, especially those who teach him in school, will not all be willing to see his "difficult" behaviors from a different perspective. This will be further complicated by his twin-ness: ConMan's unique characteristics are simply easier to take for many, and the comparison is, I fear, inevitable. Inevitable -- and unfair to both kids.

Sigh. I don't know how to protect them from labels, from people who don't realize how much their words can be prophecies. I hope G-Dog and ConMan will be able to hear my voice above all the other ones, reinforcing them, holding them up, helping them know who they really are and how much potential they each have by divine right. I see God in both of them. Please, may He help me help them to see it in themselves.

The Marriage of True Minds

I can't believe I'm going to be this sappy in front of so many people. Oh, well. It is what it is.

I had this theory when I was young (and thinking about love) that for a marriage to succeed, those who entered into it had to be opposites: that on a big continuum of qualities and characteristics, each partner needed to be equidistant from the center line. This was largely based on observations of my parents, a definite marital success story, but by no means the only type. My mom is intense and expressive and passionate and (don't get mad, Mom) a bit of a reactionary and full of bluster. My dad only raises his voice to call the dog in, takes everything in stride, never gets ruffled, and, if I'm being honest, has a lot less to say than my mom does. This also means my dad is a bit oblivious to many of the little things that go on in a marriage, but never misses when it comes to the really big, really important parts. They were, individually and together, excellent examples for me as I was growing up, observing, and formulating my own ideas about what a truly committed partnership should be like.

When I was a teenager, I vividly remember watching some sappy, sad tv movie with my mom and my sister. They both cried through all the appropriate parts of the show, and while I could understand why they were moved, and I could have told you that it was sad, I did not react with the same level of emotion. It was always like this. I thought I was missing something, like part of my girl-genes were not plugged in the way they should be. It wasn't that I didn't feel things intensely -- I have always felt personal feelings and experiences with great intensity and passion -- but when it came to other people, or depictions of other people designed to evoke emotion, I still, somehow, remained detached, with rare exception. This makes me sound cold. Maybe I was -- engaged in my own life, but standing apart from everyone else's. Then, I could have waxed poetic for hours about a Dvorak symphony, and was frequently reduced to tears by a musical experience; I dove head-first into literature and identified acutely with the works and characters of the masters; but I was, to say the least, intense, more than a little self-centered and seriously lacking in the empathy/sympathy departments.

I don't honestly know how my family tolerated me.

I've already written The True Story of CPod and InkMom. Go read it if you haven't yet. It was fun to write, because I got to remember all the fun parts of dating and courtship. And while all the fun parts are an important part of the story, probably the best part, they barely scratch the surface of the changes that I underwent when I met this man.

Suddenly, I cried. At stuff I wouldn't have cried over before. I remember coming home for Christmas that year, getting teary-eyed over a vacuum commercial, and wondering what was wrong with me.

It's taken me a while to realize what happened, what strange power CPod held over my emotional self. But I think I've finally figured it out. For the first time in my life, I was thinking more about someone else than I was about myself. And it opened this door into . . . reality. I walked through it into a place where everyone, not just me, was experiencing heartache and happiness and shame and love and disappointment and joy and pain, and it was a world full of colors that I hadn't noticed before because I had been so focused on myself. He literally held the key to my heart, and with it, he flipped the switch on my ability to empathize, to see things from another perspective, to love.

We celebrated our 12th anniversary a week or so ago, and as I've reflected on our experiences together, I have marvelled at the Lord's visible hand in our lives. What if I had, actually, married another narcissistic musician? I shudder to think what a trial like, oh, I don't know, 7 years of infertility would have done to a marriage like that one. But for us, that trial solidified our commitment to one another, to live the Gospel, to be satisfied with the incredible blessings we already had just because we had each other.

I would argue that ours is one of the greatest love matches of all time. I hope everyone feels that way about their marriage. But I know it about mine. We are supremely, divinely, perfectly compatible. My heart still skips to feel the delicate touch of his hand on my arm, to meet his eyes across a room full of people and know that he is mine, to catch a glimpse of his tall and lanky figure in the audience from the stage during a concert, to see him chase around our clutch of rambunctious boys who all, contrary to genetic probability, look just like him.

William Shakespeare wrote many sonnets about love. My favorite is Number 116:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose Worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

This is what we have -- the marriage of true minds: that mellows and intensifies its flavors with age; that lasts through tempests (don't think we don't have them!) and stands constant while our ships, though moored together, float independently on the water; that inspires in its participants a desire to be better, and as a whole, accomplishes more than ever could be done individually. My successes are his successes, his triumphs, mine, and our sorrows are ours together. He humors my intellectual excesses, tempers my emotional instabilities, strengthens my spiritual frailties, encourages my outside endeavors, and keeps me laughing through all of it. And while I have been known to fail here and there, and my efforts sometimes fall short, I know that my presence in his life is just as essential to his happiness as his is to mine: equally yoked in more ways than one. Blessed. Lucky. Loved. Forever.

Happy anniversary to us.

I'm boycotting my kitchen

Until CPod finishes what he started.

Our house was new when we bought it 6 years ago. We loved it then. We love it still, but the bedrooms are small and our only options are to cram three little boys into one room, or let MayDay share with the baby. Both are viable, but only for so long.

We own some land -- just a couple of acres, but it's lovely and close by and as soon as CPod's student loans are paid off (soon!) we'll be building something that suits our needs a little more fully: a big bunk room for all the boys, large enough for all of them to have personal space, and close enough quarters to let them keep tabs on each other; a better spot for a good garden (the property overlooks farm land, after all -- we'll have to follow suit); a studio for all of the musical instruments and accompanying accessories, so I'll be ready when the time comes to begin teaching again; a capacious and accessible pantry for food storage.

In the mean time, we're DIY-ing some minor upgrades and updates to make this house a bit more marketable.

I say minor. But how can anything be minor when it consumes every available (read: when children are sleeping) hour and turns your kitchen into something out of one of those disaster shows on HGTV.

CPod is actually quite capable. He worked his way through undergraduate doing electrical contracting work during the summers, so he installed hard-wired under-cabinet lighting all the way around the kitchen. It's wonderful.

We also installed a smaller cabinet above our stove to make room for an above-the-range microwave. This will free up the counterspace currently occupied by the behemoth dinosaur we've had since we got married 12 years ago, increasing the available work area a ton. (It smells like burnt popcorn anyway. Every single time we use it.)

Once all of the other stuff is done, we'll have someone else install moulding on top of our cabinets. Some things, CPod just isn't willing to do, and complicated use of the miter saw tops that list.

He has self-educated himself into tiling expertise. Our new subway tile backsplash will look wonderful -- as soon as it's finished. Therein lies the problem.

Our time is so limited that you can only make so much progress in an evening, and still get enough sleep to function the next day. So, in 4 nights, he's finished about a third of the kitchen. But all of his materials stay out -- except for the tile saw, which spends its days on the deck. Everything that ordinarily inhabits the counters (basket of sweet potatoes and Vidalia onions, knife block, paper towel dispenser, etc.) has been crammed onto the only available bit of counterspace left. Which means I have no place to work.

It's not that I mind. Really, I don't. I've been folding laundry in the living room the past couple of nights, and since CPod is otherwise occupied, I've been able to indulge in one of my small obsessions: TiVoed episodes of Miss Marple, on Masterpiece Mystery. CPod hates this show. No exaggeration. It's so dry and British that he just can't take it. He doesn't get Are You Being Served? either, but I could crack myself up right now just thinking about Mr. Humphries picking up the phone and saying, "Menswear."

I should just pause it every time he uses the tile saw, but somehow, it makes me feel smarter to know that I've unraveled the mystery too, even though I'm missing 30 seconds of essential puzzle-piece dialogue every five minutes or so.

It WILL be done soon. Otherwise, we're going to have to seriously increase our food budget to compensate for all the take-out. And it will be wonderful when it's finished. But then we'll move on to another project, and before too long, we'll be working on sweat equity projects in the house we'll build. It's just like laundry: never done, unless you're naked. Or dead.

Why I Love My New Tweezers, Except When I Hate Them

A few weeks ago, right after we found out our little pooper is a girl, I went to Target -- ostensibly to pick up some things on my non-grocery list, but really and truly, so I could buy some little dresses. CPod called me and as I meandered through the small female section of the store, I rattled off my list to him and asked if he could think of anything else he needed. Shaving cream? Batteries? Root beer? No, he said, but don't buy tweezers. I can get you some really good ones. Apparently, in the medical field, they have fancy and expensive tools for ordinary jobs. And the job of plucking small hairs is reserved for $40 "cilia forceps" engraved with a name other than "Revlon" or "Sally Hansen", with manufacturing information printed in German on the handy carrying case.

So I didn't buy tweezers. And I REALLY needed by buy tweezers. I am, thankfully, not one of those unlucky ladies who have to pluck whiskers from places women should not have hair. Instead, I have to deforest the Amazonian jungle of my eyebrows periodically in order to not be mistaken for Cro-Magnon man, Groucho Marx, Anoop Desai, Victor Krum, or, I don't know, Frankenstein (who's bride even had well-groomed eyebrows). I lost my other good tweezers (which I bought at Target for $7), and I'm so lazy about walking from my bathroom to my kitchen to write the need down on my list, and so incapable of remembering to buy things that aren't on said list, that I haven't plucked my eyebrows since . . . um, my brother's wedding reception last August. (See my profile picture.)

For nearly two weeks, every day we had this conversation:

Me: CPod, did you order my tweezers?
CPod: You mean the cilia forceps? Yep, and they came in, I just forgot to bring them home.

EVERY DAY! I'm trying to recreate all of equatorial Africa in 3-D on my forehead, man! Just bring home the tweezers!

So he did. And they're fantastic. In fact, they're the best tweezers I've ever used. I have pruned the rain forest to an acceptable perimeter. But in the process of staring at myself in the mirror for an extended period of time, I discovered some gray hairs.

If you have ever seen me in person, you know that I have A LOT of hair. It's dark, it's thick, it's curly (not like corkscrew curly, but still . . . curly), it kind of looks a little cavewomanish because it's so unruly sometimes, but it's me and I love it. In fact, my lovely mother said to me just the other day, "Wow, InkMom, it wouldn't take you very long to have dreadlocks, would it?" Um, thanks, Mom.

I have a few gray hairs right in the front that I usually pluck because they don't deserve to live if they have the audacity to poke up front and center and stare at me every time I put on make-up. So I yanked them out and then looked a little closer.

I was absolutely appalled by the gray hair that I saw . . . and saw again, over and over and over. I was compelled to pull them out. There were really long ones that must have been growing since I was 6 years old and really short ones that are brand new. There were ones that were dark brown on the bottom and white at the root, and there were wiry, curly ones, and wispy, thin ones. And I just kept plucking, urged on by some perverse curiosity to see how many I could find. By the time I was finished, I had counted 51 hairs and my sink looked like some old woman had shaved her head into it. At this rate, I'll be plucking white hairs from my eyebrows before I'm 33!

It seems I have aged a lot in the past year. And for some reason that I cannot identify, this bothers me. I wouldn't consider myself vain. I'm not overly concerned about my appearance (as is evidenced by the awesome outfit and leftover hair I'm currently sporting) and I certainly don't think I'm supermodel material (although if this baby ends up with CPod's legs and my curves, she's got a pretty good shot no matter what her face looks like). So what's the big deal?

My mom has black hair -- or did, until she went mostly gray and quit dyeing it. Her silver hair, though premature, is beautiful. My curls come from her, too. She started to go gray in high school, and by the time she had children, she had a striking silver streak down her part that was very distinctive and, somehow, didn't age her. My brother, two years younger than me, has hair the most like my mom's, and accordingly, has some gray -- more than me, I'd thought, but I'm beginning to think you can just see it more in his short hair. MommyJ claims she has NONE. I'll be sneaking soon into her house (or her tent later this summer when we're all camping together) in the middle of the night with a flashlight and my fantastic tweezers to prove her wrong. And baby brother is so far from gray hair I don't think he would even admit that it's in his future. But I come by this naturally. I should not be surprised, but I am.

I think I am bothered by looking older than I feel, almost as though it's proof that no matter how well I take care of myself, regardless of how hard I work to stay healthy, there are some things that are just going to quit working. I don't really want that proof. I just want to keep feeling good and then kick the bucket one day from over-exertion when I'm about 95.

Oh, well. I guess there are some things you just can't fight. CPod and I have come to an agreement, though. You see, he's red-headed and fair and already has a few more wrinkles than he should. That harsh Australian sun really did him in on his mission. I always tell him he'll age like Robert Redford: the wrinkles will just keep on coming, but that fair hair will never go anywhere. Too bad he can't carry a lighting crew around with him every where he goes to capitalize on the "natural" light a la The Horse Whisperer.

Well, if he's going to get all of the wrinkles, I guess it's the least I can do to get all of the gray hair.

The Joys

Today, G-Dog almost burned down our house. I blame it all on CPod. He was, after all, the only person older than 4 years old on the same floor as G-Dog when our little angel decided to pop his own bag of microwave popcorn. I was in the basement, herding our other two munchkins up from the garage after a morning outing, and CPod was so thoroughly engrossed in a very engaging phone conversation with his brother that he didn't notice when the popcorn smell went from warm and buttery to scorched and OMIGOSH! CPOD WHY IS THERE SMOKE COMING OUT OF THE MICROWAVE!!!!!!!!!!

Men. Multitasking. Not compatible.

Our house was so infused by burnt popcorn stench that I packed up the boys with some reliable sources of entertainment and headed over to my mom's house for the rest of the day. We opened all the windows and turned on all the ceiling fans and turned off the air conditioner, so when we came back home for bed tonight, we were happy to find a significantly less stinky house. Of course, it was 80 degrees, and terribly humid. But at least I don't have to wash every article of clothing in our closets.

In other news, I have begun experiencing more fully the joys of pregnancy. And by joys, I mean little annoyances. And by little annoyances, I mean a whole bunch of small things that add up to PURE HELL.

When I was pregnant with the twins, and again with MayDay, I endured about one bad symptom per trimester. Not so bad, right? First trimester, nausea. Second trimester, acne. Third trimester, heartburn.

This time around, I have had the distinct pleasure of experiencing all three symptoms since day one. Throw in a little restless leg and extreme exhaustion and you begin to understand why, when I told my husband that this pregnancy seemed to be flying by, he said, "Um, not so much."

I have the skin of a 15 year old boy. I never (I'm serious!) had zits when I was in high school, but I am more than making up for that now. I get heartburn from folding laundry. I could sleep 14 hours every day (although that's better than it was at the beginning). From about 8PM on I have comically uncontrollable restless leg.

Poor CPod. I guess I'll have to let the housefire go.

We've also been thinking a lot about names for the baby, now that we know what we're having. I tend to go for more old fashioned names, but what do you think about Satan? I know, not exactly a very feminine name for our one and only little girl, but it's the one suggestion that my boys keep coming back to.

See, we had a spontaneous lesson about the plan of salvation a few weeks ago. G-Dog is obsessed with why Satan doesn't have a body. He bombards me constantly with questions along the lines of, "Does Satan have a brain? How about bones? Does he have bones? Does he have a skull to protect his brain? Will he ever get a body? Will he get to live with his family? Will he get to live with Heavenly Father? I feel bad for him, Mommy, because he doesn't get to do all the things we do with our bodies."

While I appreciate G-Dog's concern for, oh, you know, the author of all evil, and I am amazed at both his and ConMan's grasp of the concept of agency, their choice of names for our baby is just a little disturbing. Beezlebub? Or Voldemort? Sauron, or Lex Luthor, or Freddy Kruger? How about Swiper? After all, this sneaky baby will always try to steal their stuff.

Either way, I'm strangely comforted that my children have no real frame of reference for the existence of evil in the world. Satan doesn't sound so bad to them because they've never really seen anything terrible. The villains they see on Scooby-Doo are just misguided humans dressed up in scary costumes; on Dora, the bad guy is a lonely fox (Swiper, for the NickJr novices) who just wants to make friends. Eventually, they'll be faced with honest-to-goodness temptations with the power to affect their lives profoundly. Until then, I'm just fine using their innocent fascination as a tool to teach them a little about reality.

The Nose

I cleaned my bathroom today. It was in need. I dropped my sports bra on the floor after I ran last on March 1 (I'm not kidding. It's the pregnancy, cut me some slack.) and it was still there, in the same spot, gathering dust bunnies until I picked it up and put it in the laundry today. Don't judge me. My husband does the toilets.

Anyway. As I rearranged stuff around so I could clean the counter, I noticed, for the first time in a while, my big, fat bottle of expensive perfume. And this brings me to The Nose.

After CPod graduated from . . . the long, long schooling that he attended in Memphis after graduating from BYU, we had a 6 week lag before he received his professional licensure and could do what he was trained to do. (This anonymity thing is hard sometimes!) I had a great job, and we'd been living on my earnings for a long time, so it was no biggie -- but CPod does not do bored. He cannot be idle.

So. He playied around on a few travel websites, all without my knowledge. He formulated a little secret plan, and one day made the announcement: honey, we're going to Paris! Well, flying in and out of Paris. What we did with the remaining three weeks was entirely up to us.

I was absolutely shocked. And ecstatic. But mostly shocked. I thought he was kidding, but he wasn't. What better way to burn through the last remnants of his student loan money? The surprise was an advantage -- my boss couldn't say no to three weeks of leave when CPod had already bought the non-refundable tickets and I had had no part in the planning.

We organized our trip, bought Eurail passes ahead of time, and test-filled our backpacks to make sure we weren't taking too much gear. I cut my hair super short so I wouldn't have to worry about it on the trip.

The trip was fantastic. I spent the summer after I graduated from high school travelling through Europe with an orchestra, so we went to all the places I could see again and again and again . . . the Louvre & Orsay museums in Paris, Santa Croce in Florence, the Jungfrau and Trummelbach Falls (I will write about this place again, I promise) in Switzerland. We ate fantastic food (after black truffles, how could anyone ever be the same again?), and explored amazing places. We slept on the train, and we slept in a 700 year old hotel in Venice. In Florence, we had gelato 14 times in 3 days. We made a big loop through France, Switzerland, Italy and Germany and it was all fantastic. All of it.

We have little handmade pottery salt & pepper shakers and a handpainted refrigerator magnet from Orvieto. We have a couple of small watercolors from some artist in Montmartre. We have a mechanically perfect hand-carved peppermill from Germany, and Christmas ornaments from Katya Wohlfahrt's in Rothenburg. CPod saved all his souvenir money so he could buy tools and Jack Wolfskin gear in Germany. And I spent most of mine in Sephora.

Have you been to Sephora? I don't mean the one in your mall, the one that smells like a flower shop on steroids. I mean a huge Sephora. A Sephora with a Nose. At the flagship Sephora on the Champs Elyssees in Paris, the first thing you see when you walk in the door is a small kiosk: nothing fancy, just a wooden circle filled with plain labelled brown bottles and a little man with a really big nose.

The Nose's job is to divine your scent: you tell him what you like, and he finds the fragrance for you. But it's more like magic. All of the bottles look the same, and they are arranged by major ingredient: citrus, floral, marine, musk . . . you get the picture. I thought I might like citrus, knew I didn't want musk, and that was all I said. He looked me over, and said, "Marine." He waved a few little wands under my nose, and voila! "L'Eau d'Issey, by Issey Miyake" was his proclamation, and darned if he wasn't right.

By the way, who is this Issey Miyake character? And where can I get whatever that is you're waving in front of my face, because I have GOT to get me some of that. It's divine: light, airy, clean, cool, and plus, when someone asks me about my perfume, if I say it fast enough, they have no idea what I'm saying. Because if you know me in real life, you are not allowed to share my signature scent.

So there's my memory. I have a newer, bigger bottle of Issey Miyake now. I don't wear it often enough. But every time I put it on, three wonderful weeks of my life flash before my eyes.

Quizzies and . . . what?

CPod took a religion course at BYU with a professor who surprised them from time to time with what he called "quizzies": brutal pop quizzes of 10 questions each. The class was small, and so the students developed a level of familiarity with one another and the professor, and all felt comfortable joking around to a certain degree.

One day, the professor, of course, sprung a "quizzie" on the class. After it was over, and they had traded papers to grade them, one young, innocent freshman girl said to the professor and class at large, "Boy! If these are your quizzies, I'd hate to see your testies!"

Oh, yes. She did. CPod says it took a minute for the awkward silence to finally degenerate into honest-to-goodness laughter, but that poor girl was never quite the same again.

Mortification, times three

My friend Lew just posted about an embarrassing moment she recently experienced. Her moment of mortification got me thinking about a few of mine. Just to break the ice, though, I'll tell you one about CPod first.

When CPod was in graduate school, he received an administrative appointment to be a "student ambassador." This post included, among other things, giving tours to prospective students, participating in applicant interviews, orientation of the incoming class of first year students, and recruiting. (I know, he's a bit of a brown noser. Well, not really. He's just incredibly good at putting any and all people at ease. Seriously. It's nearly impossible for tension to exist in a room where CPod resides.)

We lived in Memphis, and so, as far as I was concerned, it meant that just about every weekend we were taking some new crop of interviewing students out to get barbecue. Don't get me wrong, Memphis has some good 'cue, but there's only so much of it you can take. Back to the story.

During one icebreaking session, interviewees paired up, shared vital statistics, and then "presented" each other to the rest of the group. CPod noticed that one quiet girl was still sitting by herself, so he volunteered to be her partner. He was stymied after the first question: Where do you currently attend undergrad?

You see, CPod is not from Canada. He had never before heard of the University of Regina. And so when Quiet Girl mumbled it under her breath, what he heard was "University of Vagina." Say it fast. Yeah. Easy mistake.

He kept asking her to verify what he'd heard . . . over, and over. I'm sure she thought he was crazy, or just really slow. He was really sweating by the time it was his turn to introduce her to the group, so he avoided the issue altogether by just skipping the part about her undergraduate education. But the other students wouldn't have it. Finally, when pressed, he mumbled it under his breath exactly the same way Quiet Girl had. I nearly die laughing every single time I think about this.

My most embarrassing moment happened when I was in high school. My senior year, the drama department put on a production of South Pacific. I had several costume changes, including one from a swimsuit to something else, under which I could not wear said swimsuit. Which means that, yes, at some point, I was comlpletely naked. I was very concerned about this, but there was no way around it. Luckily, I was the only one there to see it, but still. There were randy teenage boys about.

Turns out, I had reason to be concerned. I asked my best friend to stand guard while I changed (Andrea, do you even remember this?!?), and proceeded to remove my swimsuit. Just as I reached up, facing the door, to hang one costume on the hook and get down the other one, this little pervert freshman kid barged in and got a full frontal shot of me in all my glory. Talk about mortification.

I could hardly look at that kid for the rest of the year. Every time I passed him in the hall, he gave me what he thought was a sly wink and a nod, like he was imagining what I looked like without any clothes on. Somehow, the creep got a hold of my yearbook and memorialized my embarrassing moment for all time by writing, "You have a nice body," and his name. I have not responded to his friend request on Facebook.

And another one on CPod -- back to high school for him, too. Freshman year, gym was his last class of the day. He showered, toweled off, and wrapped the towel around his waist as usual. This other guy was already dressed, and on his way out of the locker room, he took the opportunity to pop CPod in the back with a towel, then took off running.

CPod is not one to let provocation go without retaliation, so he ripped off his towel and ran down the hall after him -- you know, the locker room maze hall. As he ran, he twisted that towel up tight so he could pop him. And pop him he did, really good right behind the ear (CPod claims he collapsed, screaming in pain) but CPod had misjudged the distance to the end of the hallway, and before he knew it, he was buck naked, in the common hallway behind the gym, surrounded by cheerleaders painting pep rally signs.

This man is white, let me tell you, but I bet he was blushing in all different kinds of places as he sprinted back to the locker room.

I begged him to tell this story and let me video it, because it's so much better to hear it from him. But he had to draw the line somewhere.

How about you all? Any embarrassing moments you'd like to share? Nudity makes it funnier, but it's by no means required. And you're welcome to comment anonymously, if that makes it a little easier for you. Let's hear 'em!

Baby Geniuses

Or at least super-smart cookies. Here's the set-up. As we were eating dinner tonight, G-Dog informed us all that he had invented something.

And then, this:

Yes, yes, I know -- we've been compromised. Now you know my kids' first names. Bonus points if you caught all three of them.

In other news, this is what I woke up to on our snow day:



And this is how ConMan (old habits die hard -- I'll still be using the aliases) looked the entire 15 minutes he spent outside in the "snow":



And I love my boys. And I love their Daddy. You can't really see it in this picture, so let me explain: little boys are following the big one around the yard. He's just moved the Christmas tree into the burn pile, and they are connected to him as if tied to an invisible tether. I love it.



And this is from a quiet moment we had a few nights ago when the big boys fell asleep on the way home, but since MayDay had had a 3 hour nap earlier in the day, he did not. So he got to be the only kid for about 45 minutes and he chose to snuggle with Daddy for all of it.



A picture is worth a thousand words, right? HA! Try five: The Bane of My Existence! This is what I've been doing instead of blogging for the past four days:

The other day, ConMan said a blessing on our lunch. In it, he made sure to be thankful for flying carpets.

My couch smells like peanut butter. I'm a little concerned.

Thats all.

PS It has been a thoroughly unpleasant experience waiting for that second stupid video to upload to Blogger. MommyJ told me to use PhotoBucket because Blogger would take so long . . . I thought she meant, like, 45 minutes. But no. Try FOUR HOURS! On the bright side, I've folded almost all of the laundry. And did you know The Golden Girls comes on at 1AM? Who watches The Golden Girls at 1AM? I mean, most old people have been in bed for 6 hours or so, and won't wake up for another 3, and what other audience is there? Besides myself, of course. Those ladies were SASSY!

Man, I hope someone thinks that video is funny other than those people required to by a blood relationship. At least now I've figured out how to do it the fast(er) and easy way.