Look at My Thumb. Gee, I'm Dumb!

I am sympathetic to friends of mine who suffer from chronic illnesses of the mental or physical variety, because pain is a game-changer.  It is a thief.  I go about my life with enthusiasm, and just enough energy to get by.  I tout a positive attitude as my muse and attribute my happiness to a just-keep-swimming mentality.

And then my thumb starts hurting.  I yelp in sudden pain when I grab a Sharpie to jot down yet another conflict on the calendar.  Everything seems just impossible.  My positive attitude seems to be deflated, possibly sleeping somewhere under the pile of homework papers that I don't give a rat's patootie about.  I want to be productive and organized, but...I can't even think of a way to finish that sentence, because OUCH!

Is this all because my thumb hurts?  How pathetic am I?  On a scale of one to ten, like...a ten.  I really think I should do one of those cleanses, like the paleo thing that people are talking about.  My body feels like it needs a tune-up.  It feels broken, like it hasn't recovered from the last pregnancy.  And it keeps gaining weight, too.  My body is acting like a stranger.  I would love to diet or exercise, but I simply do not have the will.  I do NOT have the will.  I am mentally there, I'm happy and stable, emotionally in check, but physically, I feel like I'm dragging around dead weight.  All I want to do is sit in my car and study my calendar, trying to make sense of it.

I have to cut myself some slack.  Technically, I don't have the mental space to be tackling my health right now.  If you have a bunch of kids in school, you know that April and May are months you're lucky to survive intact.  There is not one single big event coming up that isn't at the exact same time as another big event.  (Dance Company spring show and Ari's monster concert tomorrow, same time, different places.  Freestone's big ballroom show, during Golda's band concert next week.  Ogden, Kaysville, same time.  Next Tuesday, Ari's youth symphony audition, a very special Young Women's night, and play practice.  All at 7:00.  Tomorrow, state solo and ensemble in Draper, right before dance company performance in Kaysville.  Look for me driving 80 mph along I-15.  Also look for Ari, walking to ballet.  Because it goes without saying that there is always a ballet class during each of these events.)

Scott and I want our kids to be involved in all of these things.  In fact, we love that they are involved in these things, and we wouldn't have it any other way.  But something has to give, and that something is, evidently, my thumb.  It just does not want to write one more thing on my calendar.  It is in rebellion.  It sees a Sharpie and seizes up.  And then it sends shooting pains up my arm and into my hand, just for good measure.

Come on, thumb.  The word is opposable, not oppositional.  Now toe the line!

"The Internet" Is Coming!

There was this funny memo from 1994 that NPR had sent out to all its employees, announcing that the internet would be coming to NPR!  It explained what "EMAIL" was going to be like, and how it worked.  I read the memo to Freestone and he thought it was hilarious.  Every time I used the words "The Internet" or "EMAIL," I did air quotation marks, because it was so much funnier that way.  I don't know if these kids can fully appreciate what it was like just 20 years ago, without the ubiquitous high-speed internet that we all enjoy now, let alone what it was like when the only computers I knew about were in the computer lab at the high school!  My kids can't believe I didn't take keyboarding, or "typing," as it was known back then, until 9th grade.  And then there were grumbles from students of, "When will I ever use this?  I'm not planning on being a secretary!"

I told Freestone, amid his gales of laughter, how when Golda was a baby, I would put her down for a nap, and then log onto the internet through dial-up.  It would make that high-pitched squealing noise, and I would try to muffle it with a blanket so it wouldn't wake up the baby.  Soon, if I was lucky enough to get a connection, the computer would tell me enthusiastically, "You've got mail!"  Or...not.  It was such a letdown when the voice didn't say I had mail, since I was paying by the minute for that precious internet connection.

Or how about in high school, when computers were the next big thing and my parents signed up Trajan, Josh and I for a computer class?  We would go to the school and try to play games on the computer.  Lemonade Stand was as far as I ever got, because although Trajan and Josh seemed to have no problem setting up their digital lemonade stands, all I ever got was "Syntax error!  Syntax error!"  I sighed and vowed to wait until computers got smarter before I used them again.  

I dreamed of a day when you could type in a question that wasn't worded exactly right, and the computer would know what you were talking about.  None of this "http/:" business! My dreams have come true!  I can ask my computer, which is at my house now, instead of the high school, any question I can think of.  I can even ask my phone!  To Freestone, that is normal, but the older generation (me!!) laughs when we think about how we used to use card catalogs.  Remember the Dewey Decimal System, and how it was such a big deal when you went to the library?  Now, I search for a book on the library's website, from my phone, and it's waiting for me when I go to the library to pick it up.  Or, better yet, I buy it on my Kindle app (on the trusty phone again), with one click, and it downloads in seconds.  That one-click feature is extremely dangerous for a bibliophile like myself.

Speaking of downloading, back in the day, a picture would take hours to download, and the phone line would be busy the whole time!  Remember this phrase:  "Ugh!  Their line is still busy!  They must be on the internet!"  Yeah, that was when whole families shared a phone line, and it was tethered to their house.  I was infamous at my house for tangling up the phone cord, pacing and twirling around the kitchen as I talked on the phone.  I can twirl all I want now, but it might be difficult to text if I were doing that!

All of this technology seems so commonplace now, it's hard to remember that it has all happened very quickly.  I depend on wifi so much that it's hard to function the same way without it.  For example, I was just driving Golda to play practice and we were discussing how she is going to get from band state solo and ensemble, to her dance company performance Friday.  While I was driving, Golda said to the microphone icon on the phone, "Corner Canyon High School."  Within seconds, we the GPS had given us a map and told us how long it would take to get there in light traffic.  Problem solved.  Our time frame was clear.  I can't fathom having to what, go to the library, to look in some school district binder, to find the address for this other high school, then estimate how long it would take to get there by buggy...just kidding, but do you see how much we have come to expect knowledge and information?  I love it!  

I went to the used book store to find a copy of Don Quixote today, and they didn't have one.  So now I'm going to get it for free on my Kindle and read it...if I can tear myself away from The Internet!!

Friday Adventures

 I just love having days free with these kidlets.  That's why I try not to volunteer at the school and all that other stuff that can so quickly fill up the days.  I'm busy!  I have two little kids to hang out with!  It's harder than you would think to escape with them.  I have to make a concerted effort to plan outings with them, and I feel like I'm a big slacker in other areas when I do, but dangit, these are my last babies!

Friday, we ran away early in the morning.  First stop, the Discovery Museum, where, after managing to get away from home, I had a bunch of stuff to address via text, while the kids played in the toddler area.  If anyone asked why my four-year-old was in the baby area, I was prepared to say he was a two-year-old with giantism.  I needed Tizzy contained in there so she didn't bolt while I sold a cello over the phone! :)  I only had the employees bring her back twice, so that's progress.

Next stop, the Planetarium.  It's free, so it makes sense to swing by there whenever we're at the discovery.  Plus, I was hoping that the pendulum would lull them to sleep!  Not the case.  In a flash, Tizzy was in the gift shop trying to buy up all the "You Can Be a Woman Astronomer" kits.

 It was such a nice day to be downtown, I took the kids to the Church History Museum.  This is the building they disappeared into, right next to our secret downtown parking spot, while I was on the phone telling Scott how adorable they are.  Notice how it says "restricted access?"  I have no idea how they punched in the right keypad code.

 The flowers were still spectacular, and so was the museum.  Ptolemy was wary going in.  He asked, "Is it JUST art??"  It wasn't JUST art, and I love how the art is right there with the children area, so that it seems like a normal, accessible, necessary part of life.  This exhibit was about women and their various roles in life.  A couple of the paintings really spoke to me.  I felt inspired, being there with my little ones, seeing them play so happily, surrounded by the spirit that is so present in the museum.

 I love this.

 Isn't it chillingly wonderful that there is a free place to go, that is full of beauty and art, where kids can create and see and be inspired?

 That painting behind Tziporah was my favorite.  It depicts a mother, with an angel reaching down to adjust her halo, while a host of angels looks on with concern and love from the sky.  It is a representation of what I feel must certainly be the case, as each of us needs - and receives - inspiration and divine guidance on a daily basis.

 And then we went home, completely inspired.

Thursday

 It was Ptolemy's unbirthday at school, and he brought these gift bags for his friends, with cotton candy, Play-Doh and a pencil.  At the end of class, I brought the baby chicks for all the kids to hold.  some kids loved it.  Some were terrified.  Overall, it was a big success, and Ptolemy came away wearing a crown, which he kept on for ballet class, and for the rest of the day.  Later, he came to me and asked quietly, "So, am I FIVE now!?"  I explained the concept of an "unbirthday," but after thinking about it, he decided that he would still be five.

Freestone and Sam, aka "Einstein"

 Freestone's Marionette show was next on the program.  He stressed about writing the script with his partner, but it turned out funny and cute.  HERE IT IS.

Freestone and Ben, fellow Whovies

 Freestone was mad about Thomas Jefferson's clothing.  He claims I gave him dumb fabric and then left for Paris.  Which is true.

 Later, Golda's Dance Company performance at Moonlight Seranade.  The band does a pretty amazing job of pulling off this 5-course dinner.  They prepare it all at the school, and the band kids are the servers and performers, along with Dance Company and the choirs.  It's all big band stuff.  They serve 400 people a night for 4 nights.  It's the main fundraiser for the band, which has a bigger budget than a lot of high schools in the state, just by itself.  So it's a huge undertaking.  Scott and I were on cleanup duty, starting at 10:30 pm.  It went quickly; the band kids pitched in without being assigned.

 Golda's dance was the cha-cha and her partner was Logan.  They were both great.  It was fun to watch. HERE IT IS. As soon as I started filming, a group of people decided to leave.  I was standing next to the railing and one of the women was on crutches, so I had to help her down the stairs.  So...not the best beginning, but at least I was in a good spot to see Golda.  Golda said she's glad she's not an only child, or Scott and I would completely smother her.  It's true, we were on the front lines watching and recording the dance, and also in the hall taking pictures.  Annoying!  I guess we won't be seeing the performance the next two nights.  We'll stay home until our clean-up gig at 10:30.  I'm sure we have other offspring we need to annoy anyway!  ;)

Time Travel

 Pinewood Derby car blanks come as a square piece of wood and four wheels.  Dads and sons then (theoretically) transform them into sleek, James-Bond-worthy speed machines through the use of power tools, paint and stickers.  Except that this year, Scott began his Pinewood Derby project with the question, "What would be easy?"  Let's see, what could you turn the block of wood into that most closely resembles...a block of wood, yet still has the cool factor?  The perfect solution was a Tardis!  You know, Dr. Who's time machine?  It's essentially a British police call box, if I have my Dr. Who facts straight.  My wise and creative husband googled "Dr. Who Pinewood Derby" and, wouldn't you know it, a ton of people had already thought of the idea, and they had shared their knowledge on the web.  Bingo!  Templates, stickers, instructions, paint color names, everything was right there.  They just had to execute the design.

The finished product was, indeed, very cool.  Freestone, the biggest Whovie out there, was thrilled.  We warned him that it wasn't too aerodynamic, but that winning the speed race wasn't that important.  Still, it would have been nice not to come in last every time.  Some of the cars didn't even cross the finish line.  Why didn't the Tardis ever get to race those cars?  Considering its bulk, it didn't do too badly, but it has to be said that the Tardis is faster at time travel than space travel.

 This scout uniform is solid proof that Scott and I are the worst scouting parents ever.  Ever!  Free has earned more than just the one gold arrow thing, but the rest of his meager collection has come off.  I blame it on the scouts.  Can't they make a stickier back?  Those patches are so hard to stick a needle through!  And also, let me phrase it this way:  Scott got his Eagle at the first possible opportunity because his parents told him he didn't have to go to scouts anymore after he earned his Eagle.  And I...well...I will say that we have awesome scout leaders, and we love them, which is why Freestone sometimes goes to scouts, even though some of the other boys keep "calling him a brownie and trying to eat his hair."  Hey, Freestone isn't exactly not-weird either!  It sounds like the perfect environment for him.  Perhaps the other boys just don't talk about Dr. Who enough to appeal to Freestone?

 Ptolemy is an inventive little boy.  When he heard we were going to race cars, he went in Freestone's room and got last year's car off the award block it was velcroed to, and brought it with.  He was determined to race.

 When the boys were instructed to write their names on the bottom of the car, he wrote a collection of letters that added up to "PTOLEMY."

 The baseball bat had the cool factor AND the speed!

 Scott whispered to me, only half-joking, "See?  I'm the only dad that even BOTHERED to match my sweater and socks to the car."  He claimed it was coincidence, but we all know it was intentional.  Scott was proud of their car.  Not so proud that we didn't have room to mock Tyler White, though, who was seen testing and lubing between races, getting the maximum speed out of his - I mean Eli's car.  We had to give him a hard time, of course.  Eli's car did win every race it was in, though, so...:)

 After the real races, there were "fun" races, and Ptolemy, speaking of racing, races from the finish line to the start line quick enough to take part in almost every single race.  He LOVED it!  Scott had better be coming up with more creative designs for Ptolemy's official Pinewood years.  They'll be here before you know it!

 Freestone and Brother Williams both had Tardis cars!  They form quite an awesome club!

The Fort

Question: What do rusty, protruding nails, precipitous heights, standing water, weathered boards, polygamist land and reclaimed garbage all have in common? Answer: my children. It sounds dangerous, right? Why yes, it is dangerous. In fact, when I went out there to rescue Tizzy, at Ptolemy's insistence, (She refused to be rescued, BTW) I slipped in the fresh mud. "Don't do that, Mom, or you'll be at the BOTTOM of the gully," cautioned Tolly.

 Grown-ups have to be careful out there. It's a kid's world, which is why I hadn't been there since Ari, Freestone and some of the DeBry cousins had turned it into a veritable wonderland of repurposed garbage, courtesy of "the bottom of the gully."

 To be honest, I didn't remember about "The Fort" until I was shooing Tolly and Tizzy out the door to eat candy while I finished a violin repair.  (This, despite the glowing blue light that emanates from it at night.  Evidently, it is rigged with solar lights.)

 "We're going to eat these Mentos in The Fort!"

 "OK great, yes, do that, and then stay there! Fun!" (Door closes as I mumble, "Whatever THAT is!")

 When I went out a little while later with Ptolemy for the big rescue, I found Tizzy happily perched on a rickety sheet of plywood overhanging a steep 50-foot slide into the ravine. She was dipping shards of broken plastic in the fetid water of a bin that Ptolemy referred to as "The Beach."  And just like at the real beach, there is a comfy chair to sit in, except this one is infested with fire bugs, a feature the kids seem oblivious to.  Another hair-raising feature of The Fort is the dead tree, whose branches you can climb, almost straight out, to a crow's nest where you feel like you're in the rainforest.  It was from this outpost that I noticed the narrow 2x4 with the protruding nails, which the kids use to access the treetops.  I told Ptolemy and Tziporah the cautionary tale of the time I got a rusty nail stuck in the bottom of my foot.  When the doctor yanked it out, I told them solemnly, people could hear me screaming from the parking lot.

There was a pause, and then Tizzy squealed, "Can I do that!?"  So much for cautionary tales.  I didn't get the nail in my foot in the gully, anyway.  In all the time I spent as a kid trying to claw my way out of the steep, muddy - or snowy, or dusty - ravine, I never once got hurt.  I never had to be rescued, either.  I never even got shot at by the polygamists who own the land, and it's not because they're real nice.  The reality is, nothing we were doing was that dangerous, and the same goes for this new batch of daredevil babies.  Technically, a kid could get hurt falling over the edge of a soggy piece of leftover building material from the 1970's, but the fact is, they probably won't.  Ditto for the slide that is anchored to nothing and shoots the rider straight down the hill through dense foliage.  Big deal.  The poison ivy isn't even close to the slide.

The delicious irony is that, when Tziporah was good and ready, she came out of The Fort herself.  I don't know how, because I was in the house.  I do know that she came in and immediately and inexplicably tried to open the oven door, losing her balance and hitting her head on the floor, right there in front of me.  And this after she came away unscathed from the "dangers" of the dead-wooded, nail-studded, mud-coated, garbage-strewn, bug-infested, perilously steep gully.

Go figure.

How fortuitous that this slab of concrete was already there to serve as a foundation for The Fort!

The ladder.  It's how you get in and out.

I have to admit, Ptolemy did get an unwelcome shock when one leg went in that bucket at the bottom of the slide, and the other leg didn't.  Owie!  He was just going down there to pick me a purple flower, too.  He probably felt sorry for me because I'm a grown-up.

Easter Love

 Here is the Magnificent Seven, all lined up to see what the Easter Bunny brought.

 I still marvel that this little ray of (aggressive, loud, daredevilish) sunshine made it to our family.  I shouldn't be surprised.  With her extremely courageous and pushy personality, she wouldn't have taken no for an answer!

 This is such a snapshot moment from our lives right now.  I love Don Carlos.

 This little girl is growing up!  Junior high next year!  She is ready in every way.

 This one, I feel like I can't take in all of his wonderfulness.  There is too much of it.  I look at him, on the very brink of growing into a completely different creature, and I know that I will miss this phase of his life desperately when he is a gangly teen.  In fact, I can't soak up this phase of life enough, no matter which kid we're talking about.  When I go to bed at night, knowing that all seven kids are under our roof, safe, I know in the back of my mind that those days are numbered.  It's not OK.  Not yet, but it will be.  I do want them out in the world, yet it's so comforting to have them all gathered around us, safe and sound.  "Safe and Sound" was the song that was the soundtrack of our travels last summer.  Driving all those miles, we listened to that song many times.  I remember listening to it in the dark or the rain, or with the midwestern corn fields spread out on all sides of us, the lush grasses and mile markers whizzing by.  I thought of the day when we would all come together safely after our travels.  It was my goal to get home safely, yet I wouldn't wish away any of our time apart.

When the kids leave home, I guess it will be the same thing.  For now, let's not think about that!

 Easter brunch at Bill and Coco's was a delightful event.  Quiche and cake.  Mmmmm!

 Yep.

 Scaling the railing.

 Murdering tulips.  These next pictures were my Instagram contribution to the hashtag #BecauseofHim.  Here's what I said:

 Because of Him, Light.

 Because of Him, Families.  All kinds.

Because of Him, Knowledge.

Because of Him, Love.  Without conditions, endless, unchangeable, infinite, for each of us, no matter what.  I truly believe that part of our mission here on earth is to cultivate love in all its different forms.  Could we experience that love if we were all perfect, or if we didn't get to play the different roles we play in families and as friends and neighbors?  Too often, we waste our time her on earth shaking our heads at others' choices, instead of getting to work on our mission:  to love them anyway.  You would think love would be easy, but it has to be grown and understood and felt.  It's one of those things that can't ever really be mastered, because there are so many opportunities in our lives to feel it, and so many times when we don't want to do the work of getting past the feelings that can hold us back from our true purpose, which is to love as God loves.  We'll never get there in this life, I don't suppose, but it's nice that we have been given this time to grow and learn and love.

Those are my Easter thoughts, 2014.