Look What I Did Today

So, I was feeling like finishing some projects today. And I did!

First, a bag for my yoga mat. I usually just carry it and wanted something that I could just throw over my shoulder, mostly because I'm usually carrying a two year old as well.

Here are the pictures. On it's own and then modeled by the lovely Kaitybean (ignore the empty Dorito bag on the floor, will you please?).




I'm thinking of making more of these and selling them on etsy.

Then, I FINALLY finished the quilt tops for Mashuga and Coco's room. We redecorated their room a long time ago (years, I think) and it's taken me this long just to finish the quilt tops.

Here are the curtains they're meant to match:



And here are the two quilt tops:




I'm hoping to get them tied this weekend and finished by the end of next week.

Why I Love Kris Allen

Cold Blooded @ Yahoo! Video

Honestly, Adam can SING. He can put on a show. He's amazing.

Kris, on the other hand, is a musician. This (along with SO many of his other performances) was brilliant. Anybody who can get up on a stage with just his guitar and his voice and make me feel THAT... Can't wait to buy a Kris Allen album.

As for Danny, well... Despite looking like a dorkier version of my adorable little brother, I just don't think he's all that great. Wish Allison were still in it.

Less Than One Hundred Days

If you scroll to the bottom of this blog, you'll see that little baby Nacnud's due date is only 97 days away.

This is just an open note to let you all know that I am officially freaking out.

I'm gonna have 5 kids.

In about 97 days.

Letters Never Sent

Or blips from blog posts never posted...

I've been going through the drafts on my blogs, the ones I've begun writing and never finished. Or opted not to post.

There's some interesting stuff here.

From Reflecting on Ten Years, written 7/14/06 in anticipation of my ten year high school reunion:

"I've often said that I'm not sure I liked myself back then and I'm not so sure I want to see people who remember me that way.

So, I've spent my adult years far away. I have grown into myself quite nicely over the last ten years. I am a joyful mother of children. I am a fierce, loving friend. I am a nurturer, a lover, a mentor, a teacher, a poet. I am rather at peace with the woman I've become. But, there's still an 18 year old girl in there who is hurting. Deep inside there is a girl who feels grossly inadequate, thoroughly misunderstood and completely betrayed. Despite anything I've told myself about either excitement or apprehension over seeing all of the other people in my graduating class, it's really that 18 year old girl that I'm not sure I'm ready to face right now. Because, despite all of the growth and successes I've found over the last 10 years, I still have no idea how to make it all better for her."

From a post awaiting a clever title, that I started on 1/25/07:

"There's a reason that I buy into the "sacredness of motherhood" bit. I trust God. I trust that when He says that motherhood is noble, sacred work that it is not just lip-service. I have no doubt that He respects me for what I do each day and will follow through on His promises.

To the rest of the world, however, I've found myself casting an evil eye. Because motherhood, womanhoood, childbirth -- anything distinctly woman -- has received little more respect and appreciation than the lip-service paid around mother's day.

The work that defines my existence, both personally and professionally is just not important."

From Hungry, 8/31/07:

"I love other people so deeply that it hurts at times, and yet I am never quite sure how to bridge the vast chasm that exists between two human beings.

In ways, the internet helps. With the time to think before I speak, to remove the masks and mannerisms and trappings of social interaction, I can more easily speak my truth. I can listen more fully, express my love and concern more unabashedly.

But then, these cold words so often fall short of the warmth of true intimacy. So I long for a face to look at, to see the eyes of another brighten and darken as we speak together. But then I find again that aching insecurity, a feeling of not being enough. Even among those I know well and love, the words that flow so easily from my fingers dry and crackle in my throat, unwilling to take the forms I bid them take. I choke on ideas, expressions that I meant to serve as sumptuous dinners for others. The love I feel, the gifts I want to give refuse to sound through my unpracticed voice, never rising above my breast."

From We Don't Need No Education, 9/8/07:

"If you skip too much school, you end up stupid. Period. "Getting in trouble with the authorities" just doesn't seem like a logical consequence to me. In my mind it undervalues education when the establishment uses force and threats to coerce students to go to school and to show up on time."

From Let's Face It, 8/27/08:

"I'm a home-schooler at heart. It goes against every instinct in my body to take my children to school and leave the shaping of their minds and hearts to strangers.

At the beginning of each school year my inner landscape is a war-zone. One part of me is highly suspicious of the compulsory government-monopoly school system as an evil, Orwellian institution. The other part of me gets giddy mid-August at the mere idea of buying school supplies and skipping off to Mrs. Castagno's class."

From Why I Think Marriage Matters, 11/31/08:

"Just over eleven years ago, I looked into the eyes of the man I loved and promised before God and loved ones to cherish him, care for him and give myself to him forever. It was an indescribable mix of joy and terror -- an earnest and meaningful commitment.

It was not political, not a simple merging of two households and fortunes. It was very tender. It was a leap of faith.

This is why marriage matters."

Apparently I've had a lot to say over the last couple of years, just not enough time to really finish saying it all. I felt compelled today to share these bits with you. Perhaps I'll finish and polish up a few of these and post them in their full forms.

Oh and Did I Mention How Cool You All Are?

Thanks for playing along with my word verification obsession. I have laughed SO HARD over the last little while every time another gets posted.

And I've been getting an absurd amount of enjoyment out of reading them. It's like a whole new vocabulary.

Dentist, Drugs and Patriotism

I don't think I've told you yet. Last week we found out that Mashuga had an abscessed tooth. Not as much fun as you might think. He was in massive pain last Tuesday evening, so we gave him ibuprofen and put a warm rice pack on his cheek. Oh and the other side of his head hurt too because he's been recovering from an outer ear infection. Again, not so very fun.

So, one emergency trip to the dentist, a serious course of antibiotics and a week later, it was time to have the offending tooth removed. Eeek!

Yesterday morning I got Kaitybean off to school. Then I took Scud and Coco over to my neighbor and friend, Emma's house. And Mashuga and I were off to the dentist.

Now, Mashuga has spent A LOT of stinking time at the dentist. For some reason, neither his teeth nor Coco's teeth developed properly while in the womb. They both had teeth come in with cavities already in place and enamel that was less than desirable. I'm really not sure that Mashuga has a tooth that has not had or does not currently have a cavity. He's always been exceedingly good for the dentist, but last time was AWFUL! Did I blog about how he screamed the WHOLE TIME and my mama heart just broke?

So, this time we opted for a Versed sedation. And it worked WONDERS. Just minutes after taking the medicine, he was curled up on my lap smiling a goofy, out-of-it smile and reaching for things that weren't there. In a moment of clarity he turned to face me and said "Mom, I think something's messing with my mind." We waited in the waiting room for another 15 minutes or so. All the while, he lay happily on the couch next to me, mumbling incoherently and teetering between sleep and awake.

We took him back to have his teeth worked on and he was a dream. Actually, I think he may have been dreaming. I heard him snore a couple of times. The dentist was able to fix EVERYTHING on the right side of his mouth (two root canals, two crowns, one simple cavity, an extraction and the placing of a space maintainer) without a single hitch. I took him out to the waiting room and laid him carefully on the couch to watch Ice Age. He only fell off twice while I was paying the nice receptionist an obscene sum (one that sounds a lot like whine hundert dollhairs) and negotiating times for his next appointment and the time for Coco to go in for general anesthesia and an overhaul of his cute little mouth.

On the way home I bought him a strawberry milkshake because he hadn't eaten anything all day and could only have soft foods. After this we proceeded to pick the other boys up from the babysitter, deposit a paycheck at the bank and pick up the other two kindergarteners in Mashuga's carpool.

About this time, Mashuga started "waking up". He was not a happy camper and the amnesiac properties of the Versed were very apparent. He kept asking things like "Why did they give me a sword balloon when I wanted a motorcycle?" ("Because you weren't coherent enough to tell us what you wanted.") and "How did we get here?" and "Why are we picking kids up from the school when we're supposed to be at the dentist?" and "Why does my mouth hurt?" and "What's all this stuff in my mouth?"

After a few hours he was back to his normal self and satisfied with my answers to all his questions about the morning's goings-on.

Then, last evening we went to the Hope of America Student Showcase to support Kaitybean, who was in the chorus. A few years ago, Kaitybean and Scud had the chance to be in the floor show with others from their charter school. We knew it would be a fiasco and a late night. So JDub stayed home with Coco (who clearly wouldn't have enjoyed sitting still that long) and Scud (who just didn't want to go). Mashuga and I went together to watch the show.

As it was last time, it was a bit of a fiasco. Less so with only two of us searching frantically for seats and such, but still quite interesting.

Some highlights:

• Mashuga lost a shoe on our way across a VERY busy street. TWICE. And I had to brave the cars again to retrieve it. I'm so glad neither of us is dead.
• Mashuga took his shoes off while we were waiting for the show to start and managed to kick the guy in front of us in the head. He turned his highly pierced and tattooed and very angry face to glare at Mashuga. Then he left and never came back.
• At the end, we went to get Kaitybean from the designated spot and she wasn't there. Luckily, she and a friend just got a bit turned around and made it to the right place after a while.
• While there, Mashuga informed me that his mouth was hurting. So, I pulled the ibuprofen out of my purse and ignored the sideways glances from our neighbors as I poured some for him.
  
• I got to see my amazing friend Monica and her cute family while waiting for Kaitybean. I enjoyed talking to her for a minute. She always makes me feel very empowered, just because of who she is. Just her being Monica makes me happy and willing to keep trying to be a first-rate version of Heather.
• Kaitybean was hyper and happy after it was over. She enjoyed the experience very much. And I liked it, too. Though it wasn't much different from the last one we attended. Still, it was very touching and patriotic.
• Fighting traffic to get out was, as I expected, a fight. We took a side road and ended up in front of the Provo Temple. So, the three of us decided to stop there and enjoy the temple grounds and the fountains. It was wonderful to be there together and to talk to the children about the temple and to feel their excitement to go there and their love for that peaceful, beautiful place.

I returned home to find a very exhausted JDub, who clearly got the short end of the stick. It took him 2 1/2 hours to get Coco to sleep.

So we drugged and dentisted our 6 year old amd managed to survive another Hope of America with our 10 year old.

Next on our list of parenting to-dos: find solutions for Coco's sleep issues.

The Source of Swine Flu

It was this kid!

My mom emailed me this picture a couple of days ago and I just had to share it.

Another interesting bit of information from our family about the swine flu...

A few days ago, Kaitybean came home from school and said, "Mom, I think the world's going to end soon."

"Why do you think that, Kaitybean?" I said, trying to take her seriously because I remember how mad it made me when people didn't take me seriously as a kid when I said stuff like that.

She looked at me with a somber face and said simply, "The swine flu."

I had a hard time not laughing, but held it in because I could tell she was truly, truly worried.

I explained to her how viruses are spread and how they work, how swine flu is both different from and the same as the flu that comes around every year. I explained that the odds of anyone she knows dying from it are very, very small.

Hopefully I reassured her. I hope, at least, that she was no longer worried that the swine flu would be the end of the world.