Bethanyology

This morning I’m having a broken filling replaced. I don’t remember ever being nervous about going to the dentist before, but I’m a little nervous this time. Something about “we’ll have to be really careful with this one” from my dentist on my last visit has stuck with me. So, wish me luck and pray for my dentist to do his job with skill.

I painted my nails last night with Maggie.  She chose a color called Black Berry and I chose my new Queen of Everything (sterling gold color).  We both feel pretty.

I need a haircut, which means I need to call Nancy.  Nancy, if you read this, I need a hair cut!

Interrupted mid-post with a stinky diaper to change, I’ve lost my train of thought…

Today might be the anniversary of my knee spraining incident last year. I was very pregnant and fell in a parking lot chasing my kids. No one noticed.

I celebrated the auspicious occasion by falling again. Only this time I fell down the stairs. Not pregnant, in my house. And this time I was chasing mail. Sonja tossed a letter down to me, and instead of letting it float to the floor and picking it up on my way down, I underestimated my position on the stairway and lunged for the letter. My arms were full of books and other mail at the time. So, I ungracefully tumbled in front of a surprised family audience.

Several beautiful bruises and scratches, and a very, very sore goose-egg forearm are my only injuries this time around. No crutches. Woo-hoo!

I folded and put away two loads of laundry today and washed another two. I still have a couple more to wash tomorrow. My reaction would be appropriately enthusiastic if some laundry elves were to make the dirty laundry magically appear good as new, folded neatly in their correct places in our drawers. I’m just saying…

Colin was listening to the radio on the way home and heard that the President of Indonesia is being sworn in for a second term. His name is Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Awesome.

Yesterday was C R A Z Y. I’d been playing with my sister since Friday, so my rhythm and schedule was off and laundry running out and…yeah.  But it was a good day.

At church, Colin gave a 25-minute talk in Sacrament Meeting on temples, springboarded from this talk by Elder Richard G. Scott.  Much of Colin’s talk was spent reminding us that we have to really decide to go, and on a schedule, or so many unanticipated obstacles will spontaneously appear that we’ll never get around to it.  And don’t wear a watch when you go.  I was blessed to have a sister, a friend, a sister-in-law, and Colin’s parents there to help compensate for my lack of husband who normally keeps our little crew under control.  Degen hurt his leg on Saturday, and asked to sit in a stroller all during church.  Then, it turns out that Colin had agreed to substitute teach Degen’s Sunbeams class at the same time as I taught my CTR 7 class.  Ruthie and Hillary signed up to join him in teaching about Being Kind to Animals, and Sonja agreed to watch little Heidi. Sonja has been willing to babysit a lot this week–thank you!!! Colin had an EQ Presidency meeting after church, so the kids and I listened to music in the car for a while before heading home for lunch.  I’m grateful to have a husband who serves others so willingly.

Sonja served us a yummy lunch and we all got to visit for a while before it was time to load up the cars and head to the airport by way of the beach.  Ruthie and Hillary both wanted to see the beach, and I’m so glad they did!  Kim recommended we go to Crissy Field since it was on the way to the airport.  Neither Colin nor I had ever been there before, but it was a pleasure to go.  I can’t believe how close it is, and with grass and beach and grills and free parking, I’m putting it on the list of places to go on a date.

We put our toes in the water, Degen carefully staying at the water’s edge and Maggie venturing in farther and farther despite my warnings and getting pulled under by a wave.  Colin and I both jumped in and saved her, all three of us getting soaked. Lucky, my Mommy brain had thought to bring an extra change of clothes for the kids though I’d had no intention of any of us getting wet.

Colin stitched together this neat 360 degree panorama  of where we were.  We mostly enjoyed the scenery and took pictures and let our toes enjoy the sand.  There was a little boy who’d wandered away from his family who adopted us for a little while, playing enthusiastically with Maggie and Degen.  It took us a while to find his family who were picnicking nearby with a large group and hadn’t noticed yet that he was gone (boy, do I sympathize with that!), but we enjoyed having a little friend to play with.

After a little while at the beach, it was time to take Ruthie and Hillary to the airport.  I had such a fun time during their visit!  Aside from the joy having my sister around, it’s just fun to have visitors to motivate me to enjoy the beautiful place where we live.  I hope they both had as much fun as I did.

I’m so lucky to have seen two sisters in one month!  I enjoyed visiting with and getting to spend time with both Liza and Ruthie.  They are both great young ladies and I can’t wait to see them at Thanksgiving.

Last night we went to San Francisco for our date. We actually went a-touristing with my sister Ruthie and friend Hillary. Yay for visitors!

We actually started with dinner at Ping’s Chinese Restaurant in San Rafael, which is consistently lovely and affordable at the same time. If you ever get to go, order mu shu pork for a starter, and do whatever it takes to get an order of the honey pecan prawns. Mmmmm…heaven. And the asparagus chicken and combination fried rice is pleasant too. It’s all served family-style, and at $10-15 a plate it’s a good deal (and we had a coupon!). And they have tablecloths and a quiet atmosphere perfect for a date. It looks a little strip-mall-dive from the outside, so it’s a place mostly only the locals know about. Try it if you’re in the neighborhood.

Then we headed south to the City, across the Golden Gate Bridge and over to the Palace of Fine Arts. We took pictures with what we collectively decided was neo-classical architecture. Swans in the pond. Very romantic. And free.

Then to Fisherman’s Wharf where Colin found the perfect parking place at Ghiradelli Square. We shared sundaes

and explored the rainbow of chocolate packaging and manufactory.

Then down the street to see the Cannery, look at the marina, and stare out the car window at the Coit Tower (which apparently wasn’t built to look like a fire hose nozzel, according to a random internet site I read that may or may not be a reputable source). A drive down the twisty Lombard Street and we were all too exhausted to go on.

Tags: dates, Family, Marriage, restaurants, Reviews, touring

At six o’clock this morning I’ve already got things waiting for me…

• A stinky diaper
• 3 kids to dress
• 3 loads of laundry to fold
• Breakfast to make
• Toys to pick up

It’s kinda like my school days when I’d wake up and realize I had put off my homework till morning.  But different, since I can put these tasks off further by putting kids in front of a TV.  And I couldn’t have changed the diaper in advance.

Maggie had her 3rd birthday a couple weeks back. It was a transition of a few days for her.

She had a family party (she got her requested mac&cheese, olives, and broccoli) two days in advance,

then spent the day of in her car seat on our roadtrip to Utah,

and proceeded to spend several days insisting that she was still two. I’d say “You’re three now, you already had your birthday.” She’d reply “NO! Nuhnuhnuhnuh no. Not yet. I had a party and SOON I’ll be three.” We tried to sing Happy Birthday to her and she screamed “Not YET!” We had cupcakes for her and she said “just a little longer.” My parents called on the evening of her birthday and she cried and screamed and wouldn’t be consoled when they started to sing to her.

Finally, about a week later, we got a second set of cupcakes and she consented to finally let us sing to her and she blew out the candles and reconciled herself (mostly) to the idea of being three. Now she agrees that she’s three most days.

I love Maggie.  I’m grateful for her every day.

Tags: birthday, maggie

Yesterday afternoon and through the night our power was out. I love temporary power outages because they force us to abandon the TV and internet for more social stress-busters. And it’s a little like camping, with the flashlights and/or candles!

I had a feeling the power would be out for more than a few minutes, considering the sheets of rain washing our world at the time, and since the outage conveniently occurred during daylight hours I had a little bit of time to prepare for the darkness with three little ones.  You see, with three little kids darkness unprepared doesn’t just mean “I can’t find my blue shirt.”  It’s more of a “I tripped over the toy fire engine and landed on and irreparably broke a toddler bed and is the baby crawling under the table or into the bathroom and I know you are afraid of the dark but that’s what happens at

night without electricity” situation.

So, the kids and I found the flashlights and entertained ourselves with making sure they worked and that we had extra batteries around.  We found backup candles and located the matches with which to light them in case our flashlights and batteries ran out.  Then we zipped around the house folding and hanging the last of the laundry (finding a blue shirt can still be a problem, even with a flashlight and three kids)  and putting toys and other things in their correct places.  My little ones weren’t really fans of this more-thorough-than-usual approach because they wanted to play with the toys rather than put them away, but I persevered.   We discovered some food that didn’t require cooking, which was a little harder than I’d anticipated (more on that in a minute), then called Colin at work and suggested that dinner might be best handled with a pizza delivered by himself on his way home. In a move that may have been overkill, I made sure we had water bottles filled and easily accessible in case the power outage might eventually effect our taps.

When Colin got home it was still light, so we ate our pizza and opened the birthday package for Maggie that my sisters mailed (thanks girls!).  Since Colin has class on Monday nights now, we’ve been having FHE on Tuesdays, and our lesson last night on Safety and Preparedness was particularly appropriate.  We drove the familia over to a local sporting goods store that still had power and picked up some hand warmers for our 72 hour kits, then dropped by the dollar store and got more flashlights and batteries (bringing our family flashlight count up to 4!).  On the way we talked about how the police and firefighters keep us safe, where our meeting place is if there’s a fire, and other relevant topics.  In the stores, Colin showed the kids how things like helmets, fishing poles, compasses, orange hunting vests, and lanterns can help us to be safe in different situations.  Way to go, creative husband!  The family home evening was a grand success.

Colin had thought ahead, and when we got home to a dark neighborhood and house we were greeted by glowing light stick fun that extended through the bedtime routine.  Between the new flashlights and light sticks, our kids are sure to enjoy power outages as much as I.  Ironically, even a lack of power company juice didn’t keep Colin from finding a way to de-stress via computer, and he relied on battery power to impress me with his Plants vs. Zombies PC game prowess.  The plants took the day on each level, assuring me that should any zombies attack our home we would most certainly be safe because of Colin’s extensive practice.

I’m concerned about one thing.  How do we cook without electricity?  Microwaves, stove, ovens…all electric.  I’ve learned how to make a simple solar oven, but that really wouldn’t help in the rain.  We have a fireplace, so I guess I could learn to cook on it in a pinch, but we didn’t have more than a little stack of firewood in the garage and that wouldn’t have lasted long.  We don’t have a grill or anything like that ’round here.  What do you have around your place to cook on in a longer power outage?  What do you recommend?

Another plug for my favorite eye-products vendor, zennioptical.com. We broke a couple of pairs of glasses on our vacation, me snapping an arm off one of my $8 pairs while putting the baby in a car seat and Maggie losing a nose pad while she patiently sat in a car seat. I went to order new ones and discovered that they will send you replacement frames for 50% of the cost of the full pair, and that they’ll send replacement hardware and nose pads for free! AND they send the tools to fix them, too. So, for $4.00 (plus $3 shipping) I get repaired glasses for me and I save myself a trip to Costco to get my daughter’s nose pads replaced. Good deal.