Random Bloggy Blogginess Again...

I am going to have to become very creative if I want to keep my unique random blog titles unique.

The sub-title for this post is

How my Kids Rocked Their Day At School.

1. Emily's teachers had a meeting yesterday after class to discuss their upcoming expedition that starts in January. Some of the topics in the running were 'Ghostowns of Utah', 'Water', and well the third one escapes me. Needless to say, Emily was NOT impressed with the possibilities. She suggested to her teacher that they might do an expedition on Food. While her teacher took that as somewhat a tongue in cheek suggestion, Emily set to work writing a persuasive essay for the cause. Yesterday her teacher read it to the school director (Principal) and all the other 6-8 grade teachers. She was informed this morning that while they may or may not use her idea (the kids won't know until January) that her paper received a 4 out 5 on the AP English scale of writing. Being only an 8th grader, this news DID make her day. Some of her supporting themes included the topics they could study might be nutrition, agriculture, manufacturing and distribution. I think Emily rocks because she even thought of getting her point across in this way. She may not get extra credit for her paper, but I giver her an A+ for her GoToITiveness.
2. Tim...well Tim is a great thinker but sometimes struggles getting his thoughts on paper. So I was very happy that Tim rocked his day by getting his 'From the perspective of an Oil Drop' essay, his poster and all other assignments in on time and complete. Hallelujah!
3. Sierra (the third grader) rocked her day by finding out that on her recent Math test in her (mostly 4th grader) class--she was the ONLY one to get a perfect score! You go girl! We do love math around here. :)
4. In a somewhat random form, I learned Savanna has a lazy eye from her Kindergarten teacher. Am I the only one that is clueless about their children's eye problems? Whoops. On a good note, it doesn't seem to be holding her back in the reading department and her teacher gave me a great report on her behavior too. Thank goodness.
5. Ethan...well he didn't rock school today, but he did participate in Library time with gusto and that in and of itself is rock worthy.
   

Just another fun family moment...

This is normal...isn't it?

Miss Photogenic...

I made sun-dried tomatoes...

With my left over Romas...In the oven...

Now what?

Blog Life meets Real Life

Mike and I walked in late to our stake volleyball night. As we took our place on opposing sides of the net the girl next to me asked,

'Are you Kat on Brenda's Blog?'

'Uh..yeah' *thwack* as the first ball came flying over.

I've never been recognized 'on the street' from blogging before. So just in case she visits...

'Hi Robin!'

Progress Report...

A few months ago I committed myself to becoming a better photographer and in the process learn how to post process pictures with Photoshop. This is a progress report.

The latest things I've learned:
*How to make eyes sparkle in post processing
*Popping Color
*Sharpening

Anyway here is my Straight out of the camera shot

And here is my edited shot.

What's your blood type?

That was the question Emily posed at the dinner table tonight. We were talking about Ethan's excursion to Primary Children's Medical Center Emergency Room Sunday night. It all started with Ethan complaining of a sore neck and having a mild fever on Thursday night. I was worried he was coming down with the FLU and watched him carefully but by Friday morning he was fever free and mostly pain free. The sore neck returned on Friday night and lingered through Saturday. A call to the doctor urged a visit if he didn't improve in 24 hours. Sunday night--same thing. Once again the doctor suggested a late night visit rather than waiting until morning. Our appointment at the local clinic finished at 10:00 pm but the night was still young. We trekked to Salt Lake City (45 minutes away) to make our first visit to a hospital emergency room.

Strangely, having 5 kids, we have never had to grace that part of the health care system. Tim did have an overnight visit when he was one for RSV but we sidestepped the emergency room. I am always a bit worried in situations like this if we are going to pick up something that might be worse than what we came in for. The jury is still out on that, ask me again in a couple of days.

Not surprisingly the admittance process at Primary's was all that I have been told it would be. Kind, upbeat, helpful and quick. We did settle down in our exam room for a good long stay though by emergency room standards I think our 3+ hour stay is probably nothing to complain about. Ethan was having trouble turning his head and had a huge swollen lymph node. The doctors were concerned even though the symptoms were somewhat inconclusive that a deeper infection might be present like Meningitis or an abscess so a CT Scan was ordered.

Ethan was a real trooper, he never shed a tear, nodded quietly and bravely everytime a nurse would explain a procedure. When they put in the IV in his hand, they initially missed his vein and had to dig awhile to find it, but he didn't even flinch. They drew a vial of blood and he watched it all. Then he had to hold very still for the CT scan, he was so good. Both doctors and nurses were surprised at how well he took everything for being only three.

Luckily all our worse fears were found negative, no deep infections, no abscesses, just an infected node. Thank goodness for antibiotics, doctors, our health care system and hospitals that specialize in children. I don't have a picture today of my brave little guy, but he was a super patient and I'm very thankful his adventure to the hospital did not turn more serious. We even made it to bed by 3:30 am.

Back to our dinner conversation...Emily asked what Ethan's blood type was and before anyone had a chance to say a thing, He piped up with:

RED!

Girls Night...

Friday night=girls night. The boys went camping we visited some adorable babies.

Baby Zuri is a cutie! Those of you that have known me for awhile know of my fascination, love and adoration for elephants and BABY elephants are all that and more.

She's an active little one. Playing with her toys

chasing birds...

She liked to sit on her ball.

Doesn't she look like Dumbo in this pic?

Ooops fell right over. (darn post).

She loves her Mommy!

And a couple of Zuri's friends...

Tank the Tiger? (Actually we don't know his name yet.)

And the giraffe getting a love from his Mom.

I can't wait to go back in a couple weeks!

My Hopes for Joyschool...

*The thrill of having 'school'
*Being Potty Trained ASAP
*Friends
*Trying new things
*Being Brave
*Being Kind
*Bonding Time
*Fun, Fun, FUN!

5..4..3..2..1..BLAST OFF!

Yet another family tradition. Around here we call Labor Day--Rocket Day. It is the magical day awaited for all year when we gather all the rockets of the extended family, patch them back together and try to launch them to space. We traditionally lose at least one in a tree and often another in the same farmer's field. He must wonder why once a year he has crumpled fuselage and burned out motors in front of his barn. We do this rain or shine but we prefer shine. One year it was raining so hard, Mike and jumped out of our car shot off our one rocket--watched it land in the farmer's mud then jumped back in the car and took off. we did take a year off to have a Zucchini boat derby but that's another story.

All the rockets and rocketeers lined up and ready to go. Not sure what all the hand waving is...perhaps they were doing some kind of ritual to ensure a good launch?

SETTING UP.


BLAST OFF!

RECOVERY--S-T-R-E-T-C-H!


AND ANOTHER.


MEGAN'S TRADITIONAL POP BOTTLE AND MENTOS LAUNCH.


CAUGHT IN THE TREE.


THE DOUBLE LAUNCH.

Yep...Another successful Rocket Day in the books.

150,000 Miles

THIS


(Please ignore the insane amount of dirt on the dash. I don't know who would show a picture like that?)

EQUALS
THIS



This is what we call TRADITION.

Growing up my Dad was big into ice cream. He found every reason known to man to find an excuse for an ice cream date. That explains why when our car turned over every 10,000 miles we splurged for a scoop of the good stuff. I haven't kept up the tradition for every 10,000 miles, but I do think 150,000 should count.
(P.S. I did plan to take a picture just as the car turned the magic number...even had my camera with me. Pulled off the road with Mike rolling his eyes and wouldn't you know it my batteries were dead.)

A Measly .03 Percent

POINT ZERO THREE PERCENT. That is the percentage of citizens of my 'great' city that voted in yesterday's primary election. Granted a goodly portion of our 35,000-37,000 residents (depending on where you look) are kids and not eligible to vote. BUT NOT THAT MANY. We had 1088 votes total for the mayoral candidates and assuming everyone that voted, voted for a mayor that is a measly .03% of our population making the choices for the other 99.97% of the people.

PATHETIC

and I better not hear any complaining around town.

Randomness

I finally have my pictures back to FULL working mode! Yeah. Thanks to my genius husband that simultaneously thrills and kills me. Why can he fix things in less than 5 minutes that I have spent the good (well minor part) of 3 days trying to fix. *Sigh*


The good news...I'll be able to update my promised blog posts.

The bad news...well NONE that I can think of...unless you don't like reading my blog...and if that's the case...why are you?

OK off to the randomness.

1. Proof that I can french braid and I DO 'sometimes' do cute hairdos on my girls. Keep in mind she'd been running already today.

2. Brenda, you and Emily need a heart to heart. She came home from her Young Women planning meeting tonight a bit down at the upcoming activities. Crafts, crafts and more crafts with a Friday night Corn Maze complete with idiots jumping out at you to scare you to break up the flow. I said, "Why don't you plan a trip to channel 5's studios. (I know they do it for boy scouts why not for the girls?) Because I really want to go. :D" Her reply. Mom, they already think I'm a geek. I mean imagine if I suggested having a math contest...it would be like that.

We need some GOOD (meaning non-geeky-non-crafty-fun-yet-educational) ideas to pass along.

3. Huh... you should always do things in three when writing... you know supporting your thesis and all that, but I've got nothing. So I guess off to the real posts.

Antelope Island Balloon Stampede...

The Davis County Tourism board has a had time winning. For the last few years they have hosted a balloon festival on Antelope Island and each time it has rained. They decided to bump the festival up this year a couple weeks to Labor Day weekend and while not a lot of rain, there was quite a bit of wind and clouds. The balloons were still beautiful to behold even if they didn't get to launch (at least while we were there.)

Tomorrow is another day...

Telemarketers Beware...

Just fair warning. I am NOT in the mood to talk to you today. I'm sure you are very kind and are only trying to feed your 2.5 kids and a dog but really...can't you find another job? Do you really like the abuse you are put through? Even my abuse (which is in the form of politeness). I don't get it. And I'm really sorry you have to have that job. Now just don't call me...ANYMORE!

Irritating salesperson from Q**** (The phone company that will remain mostly nameless): Hi, are you the person in charge of the Q**** phone account?
Me: We don't have a Q**** phone account. (We switched at least 5 years ago on the business phone)
Irritating salesperson from Q**** (The phone company that will remain mostly nameless): Do you know who you switched to?
Me: Yes (long pause)
Irritating salesperson from Q**** (The phone company that will remain mostly nameless):No I mean do you know the NAME of the company you switched to?
Me: Yes I know the name of the company we switched to. (long pause)
Irritating salesperson from Q**** (The phone company that will remain mostly nameless): *click*

Yep...she hung up on ME...can you believe it? Well in fairness, it was a wise move. I have told representatives of this fine company to remove me from their calling list MULTIPLE TIMES and once I even told the guy WHY we would not come back (all due to our personal phone account and the many hoops and crap they have put us through. Sucks when you have a monopoly on DSL.) Boy was he SORRY he asked. I think I may have convinced him to switch too.

Oh for having the Do Not Call list extended to business numbers.

Finally have some good stuff

to blog about and we just upgraded my computer so I have no access to my photo software yet. :(

Coming soon:

150,000 miles
Balloon Festival
Rocket Day

I'm dying here!

Really?

On Tuesday September 8, 2009, President Barack Obama will have a televised speech specifically for school aged children throughout the country. Reportedly the speech will "challenge students to work hard, set education goals, and take responsibility for their learning."

Many school districts in Utah will be notifying parents if their school decides to show it, and many will provide 'opt-out' activities for those children whose parents don't want their children exposed to such political rhetoric.

Really.

Have I gone down the rabbit hole? Do you remember the song in South Pacific called "You've Got to Be Carefully Taught"? Basically it is saying that fear, hate and prejudice must be taught. We aren't innately this way but grow that way from the influences around us that teach us.

I think as an American Society we are doing a HUGE disservice to our children. All the way from Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid down to inflammatory talk show hosts and conservative activists. We are carefully teaching our children that opposing ideas, no scratch that, opposing people are bad, evil, wrong. Is it so hard to believe that two people with opposing ideas can both love their country...so much that all they want is the best for it?

Apparently yes, and we see that example in our leaders, in Nancy Pelosi's thrilling autobiography she mentions a story about wanting to buy a house when her and her family first moved to California. Finding the perfect house with the perfect yard, in the perfect location, she asked the homeowner why they were moving. It turns out the family was moving to Washington D.C. to take a position in the Nixon administration. When she found out they were Republicans she decided she couldn't buy the house after all because there was no way she would live in a house a republican owned.

What were her children carefully taught? We have example after example on BOTH political extremes of hate being carefully taught.

Right wing author/columnist/commentator Ann Coulter has books out such as Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism or How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must): The World According to Ann Coulter.
Obviously she has the right to speak her mind, but the approach she uses along with countless others is inflammatory, degrading and counterproductive to her position.

My question...what are we going to do to stop it? I am so tired of the arguments on both sides and frankly, the common phrase on both sides--'well the other side did it first' is just plain crap.

Are we back in Kindergarten? How about civil discourse. How about not jumping to conclusions. How about respect, Real respect. How about listening for a change before spouting off. How about teaching our children carefully. Carefully that all people have value. All people are children of a loving Heavenly Father. Carefully teaching them important truths that will guide them in making good and right decisions. Carefully teaching them that if you disagree with someone it doesn't make the other person a BAD person, it merely means they have a different opinion. Funny that we have been endowed by our creator with individual personalities and minds that DO NOT think the same. Do you think it chance? I don't. We have seen time and time again that growth comes from opposition. If we all agreed on every issue there would be no opposition. Without opposition there is no reason to progress, grow and become better.

I will be the First to admit that I am not President Obama's biggest fan. But darn it, I will NOT teach my children to hate him, to be disrespectful of him, or to diminish the office he legally and lawfully holds. Much of this furor was fueled by a Farmington Elementary showing a video about service to the kids. I don't agree with everything in the 'I Pledge' video. There are probably 5 or 6 phrases in that video that make me cringe. But darn it...there are another 3 minutes of pledging to do things that are right and good.

I pledge to find the good in opposing views and respectfully and carefully teach my children to treat all people with respect.

More Random Bloggy Things to Blog About

*Emily had her first fieldwork of the new school year yesterday. They are learning about Utah and transportation starting with the Mormon Pioneers. So yesterday they hiked 4+ miles of the path the pioneers took to come into the Salt Lake Valley. The highlight of the trip? 2 dead Moose. Yeah...I'm shaking my head too.

*Tim's Math and Astronomy teacher met me by the car today when I picked up my kids from school. She started the conversation with,

"Are you Tim's Mom?"

Surely a phrase that makes a Mom's heart skip a beat. ;) But as it turns out she just wanted to 'say hi' and tell me he is 'doing great'. ~Mom's heart beats again and urges lips into a smile~

*I am so OVER allergies. Or at least I wish I was..."bwahhhaaaahhhaaa"

*Ethan on our way home from walking Savanna to school yesterday morning.

Me: You are getting to be a big boy.
Ethan: No, I'm a medium boy.

*Savanna upon finding out that she got to go to school YET AGAIN this morning.

"Oh Goody!!!"

*Sierra's constant refrain over the last couple of days.
"When does soccer start again?" Thanks goodness for tomorrow. I hope we can find some cleats that fit!

Therapy

Frustrated, irritated, tired and stressed?

Snip green beans on the porch. It is good therapy.