Confessions of a Blog Stalker

Yes, I am a blog stalker. I don't mean to be and I most certainly don't have time for it, but there are a few blogs which have captivated me. Since I have been mainly stuck on the couch with a bum knee all week, I've had plenty of time to stalk and stalk and stalk.

This morning, I happened on a blog which is linked to from another friend's blog and encountered this awesome quote:

"The cheese in the mousetrap never is free"

That will now be my answer every time my children ask me why they can't do/have/try something. I can see it getting lots and lots of use.

Nate's NaNoWriMO

Once upon a time I raked the leaves and one turned into a dragon and I hit him with A rake!!!! Bye Bye .

Tagged - the remainder

#2- Not a big secret, but I hate to iron. In fact, I pretty much only iron twice a year, and those at conferences where I am supposed to look like a business professional and not like I live in my PJ's.

#3- I have helped make and detonate several incendiary devices. For fear my FBI agent friend reads this, I promise this was long long ago and all statutes of limitations are up.

#4- I do not mind cooking for 30-40 people, unless it all has to be hot at once. Then, I am a disaster. Dave hates it when I cook for loads of people. He's the one that cleans the kitchen after me. I am quite possibly the world's messiest cook.

#5- I have a house key for some friends of ours so that Ellie can watch their dog over Thanksgiving. I am now putting all of my mental energy into a prank that will be funny, but not annoying when they return home tired from travel. Feel free to chime in with ideas.

Jenne, KA, Christina, Naomi, Emily and Cari R- Consider yourself tagged. And I will be checking. . .

Tagged #1- Milli Vanilli and Primus (aka weird musical taste)

This will come as no surprise to Lore, who drove around Logan listening to this album with me in highschool, but I was and am a closet Milli Vanilli fan. What a travesty that they were all a fraud and no longer made such quality music:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwrL9MV6jSk&feature=related

And if you venture to the "Girl You Know it's True" video, check out those wicked awesome shoulder pads. I mean, it was a fashion that just would not die. And yes, I wore shoulder pads and leggings and fluffy hair. Yes I did.

No Rebi, there are no existing pictures. I have burned them all. For your sake, I have burned them so that Dad can't show them to your first date, thereby ensuring he will never date you again. . .

I also am a HUGE fan of Primus:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lyy6JDw_zUE

I have seen them live several times- a total blast even in the pouring sleet of Oct 1996- and was also able to Les Claypool perform with a different band at an Intel party a couple of years ago. He is totally amazing on the guitar.

I've been tagged

And now I have to come up with 5 things most people don't know about me:

Hmmmm. . .

(30 minutes later)

I've still got nothing. My life is an open book. Either that or my muse is still tired.

Hey Fearless Leader. . .This is for you!

The girls did an excellent job on their displays, their talks, and on the singing. The evening was- of course- beautiful!

These pictures are just more proof that God is a God of miracles and those miracles extend to modern day. A silly thing to pray for maybe, but we are proud of ourselves for taking our complete lack of expertise and making something nice. . .

Prayers to Marnie- the Patron Saint of Decorating

Our church has an active youth group, which I am fortunate to work with on a weekly basis. On Tuesday, we are staging our end of year event which highlights specific things the girls have learned and projects they have completed. It's a big deal.

The current president of this organization is an incredible woman who can do everything from baking her own bread to sewing beautifully without a pattern, and everything both crafty and practical in between. At one point in her life, she decorated and arranged flowers for weddings. So, when we made our plans to have bouquets for the girls and various tablecloths, drapings and arrangements, we were really excited at how fabulous it would all be. Then, Cathy had to leave town for an unexpected emergency. Imagine my surprise when I ended up on the hook for 23 bouquets. By tomorrow. Wait! I've never once in my life arranged flowers. And, the flowers aren't supposed to be here until 10:30 am tomorrow. So, in full panic mode, about 7pm I went to Costco and purchased a variety of things in order to make as many bouquets as it took to get them right.

I have never missed my sister Marnie more than I missed her as I walked out of Costco with all of the supplies and zero clue as to what I was going to do with them. Marnie can take anything and make it beautiful. She did all of the flowers for my wedding, all of the centerpieces, baked and decorated the cake, and on and on and on. She whips up displays and centerpieces the way I whip up brownies and cupcakes (which could explain the clothing size differences, but I will leave that for another blog). I learned two things tonight.

1) Prayers are answered. The above picture is my first attempt at the flowers and I am fully convinced I was channeling Marnie in order to do that, so thanks sis!

2) I never thanked Marnie enough for the awesome job she did. I had no idea what it really takes to make beautiful things appear like magic. So, THANK YOU!

(P.S. If those flowers look hideous, that is in no way Marnie's fault and someone needs to call and tell me ASAP!)

Sally Ride Science Festival

The girls and I spent yesterday in downtown San Diego, on the beautiful (and very steep) USD campus for the annual Sally Ride Science Festival.
I wasn't really sure what we were going to get out of it, but I hoped for something to spark some interest in the girls. Rebi has had an especially hard time finding anything to dive into as far as continued learning goes.

Imagine my surprise at how excited she was after her computer game programming class. I mean, there is a certain programmer who lives in the house. How is it possible that she never knew how quickly one can program simple games? It makes one wonder.

At any rate, if you have girls and there is a Sally Ride Science festival coming to your area, I highly recommend it. We learned about molecular biology, earthquakes and geology, how to find the density of chocolate, computer programming, a little oceanography, heard from a veterinarian and made 2 different types of rockets. It was great. The girls are already begging for next year.