Dance Company

Ruby is Dance Company president this year, and she is loving it.  So by extension, the rest of us are loving it, too.  I got to be the first mom to host the Friday lunch.  Except this one was on a Wednesday because of an assembly.  Ruby and I planned to make Elmeda's to-die-for chicken roll-ups, but who am I kidding?  That's a two-day project and I had exactly one morning.  I called my mom and said, "I need you to talk me down from making chicken roll-ups for Dance Company."  She was successful, and helped me come up with Plan B.  It was lovely and the girls were thrilled.  The gasps of delight when they came in and the thank-yous when they left were proof of their satisfaction.

My mom is the best at jumping into the fray.  She is available for any type of help, anytime.  I could not do anything without her, from hosting lunch to raising 7 kids.  And by the way, this was all happening during a bout with cancer and major surgery.  Everything is fine.  But everything was not fine for a few weeks there.  Can you tell by this picture?  Of course not!  Coco looks glamorous and confident, at all times.

Unlike me!  I laugh so hard at this picture.  Look at my hair!  And I wasn't even facing cancer and surgery.  All I was facing was picking up a stack of David's Pizzas!  Rest assured, I was beautiful on the inside.  Tee hee.  And that's Kim King, the teacher we love, who mentors all these bright young dancers.

I love this group, especially Ruby, who is holding up Tizzy so she can be in the picture.  Ruby always, always sacrifices herself for others.  It's in her nature.  She has the beauty on the inside AND the outside.

Next up, the Homecoming parade.  It lasts for 20 minutes, but it's packed with excitement, from the drumline at the front to the last trailing stream of confetti at the end.  I took Ptolemy and he got an enormous amount of candy.  Freestone went with Frank.  It was a good intro to American high school life.

The next day, I cooked 40 pounds of pulled pork and set up the tailgating party for Dance Company.  It sounds like a lot, but it was super, super easy because all the other parents go above and beyond, and the girls plan the whole thing.  I just showed up with my assignment and my people.  Except for Ruby, who was at her "day date" for Homecoming.  It was funny and sad that she had to miss the tailgate.  It was the best one we've ever had!  Oh well.  She had fun, and went to the game afterward.  In fact, the whole family went to the game except Tizzy, Xanthe and me.  We went to Bennion Crafts and relaxed at home all night.  It was so nice to be able to go home and take off my shoes and not have a zillion people to drive around or put to bed.  A perfect end to one of those fall days that you wish would last forever.

Big eyeball face right here.

Celi and her friend Emily

My two boys.

Things don't slow down, do they?  The Davis High Performing Arts Spectacular was the next weekend.  I love this thing.  It's so fun to see all the high school kids do their thing.  Even the stage crew is made up of students.  The are impressive.  This year was especially fun for us, because Ruby choreographed one of the pieces that Dance Company did.  It was a jazz piece that was awesome.  I would have been happy sitting there watching it over and over.

Bruce and Marlene, our superfans!

Nana's 99.5th Birthday!

Coco and I met at the Villas with chocolate ice cream, as promised, for Nana's 99 and a half birthday.  OK, there's no smooth way to say that. How about just Nana's half birthday?  At any rate, we dished up ice cream for all of Nana's friends, who had just finished an early dinner.  Nana, in regards to the celebration, said, "We just have to take what comes."  She has all these sayings, and they get more frequent as she has more and more trouble remembering when and where she is, and what is going on.  Another one is, "Well, I don't have to worry about that."  OR, "I'll have to think about that one."  Or, "We just have to be grateful for everything."  Nana is cheerful, loving and positive, but she has zero interest in most of the activities the Villas offers.  They do games and puzzles and arts and crafts and socials and recitals.  I'll say, "Nana, it looks like they're making tissue paper flower arrangements at 1:30."  She'll say, "Well, they'll have to do it without me!"  Or the funniest, "I could CARE less!"  It's so funny to hear Nana say something like that!

Seeing Nana's loving and positive nature shine through makes me worried that, if I ever get to be 99 and a half, I'll be all fire and vinegar.  The best I can do is spend as much time with Nana as I can, so that her radiant spirit rubs off on me, at least a little bit.

Princess Whiney

Ever since February, when both the Dopp family and the King family had birthday parties for Tziporah, she thinks she needs gifts wherever she goes.  Last week at Coco and Bill's house, Tziporah came to me with her big eyes and plump, round cheeks and said, "I need my presents now!"  Rolayne jumped on the bandwagon and said, "Ya!  We need our presents!"

Coco asked them what they wanted and Tziporah ordered a "pink princess dress and a crown."  As the rest of us stood by in awe of Coco's magical gifting skills, everyone's favorite shopper led the girls downstairs.  They emerged each with a new, pink princess dress that Coco just happened to have.  I wish I could say that Tziporah was as overcome with gratitude as Rolayne, who was 100% delighted, but Tziporah's satisfaction only lasted a few minutes.  Then she said, "Where's my crown?"

Coco had a custom-made crown on the little princess's head immediately.  She knows that when Tziporah asks for something, you have two choices:  give it to her or listen to her whine steadily and with heart, until the next thing comes along that she wants.  She is a very dedicated whiner.  Tziporah is like one of those women in certain cultures that are hired to wail at funerals.  She can whine for hours.  "I wanted orange juice!  I wanted orange juice!  I wanted orange juice!"  That will go on unless and until a new thing presents itself.  "I wanted orange...that was MY coloring book, Tolly!  That was MY coloring book, Tolly!"

She just has a lot of crying in her.  Except when Coco produces a new pink princess dress, of course.  Forget discipline.  Give the kid a princess dress and a crown!  Just make sure you have orange juice on hand for after the novelty of the new dress wears off.

Coco's Big Birthday

 On Sunday, Scott's birthday, after we had made the most of the morning, Scott went home to have a big birthday dinner ready for the kids when they got home from church.  They were looking forward to celebrating with Dad!  He prepared a Chinese dinner with egg rolls, fried rice, chow mein and Chocolate cake.  It looked like fun!  As for me, I stayed in Park City and waited for my mom and sisters-in-law to arrive for the next party!  October is a big month for us where celebrations are concerned.  This is a landmark birthday for Coco, so Emily arranged this girls' sleepover.  Thanks, Em!  Coco chose Red Rock, where I had to take pictures of our meal for Scott.  At the same time, he was taking pictures of his dinner with the kids for me.  I love Whatsapp.  It's so easy to send pictures, texts and videos.

My mom's elegant hand.

Back at the Ranch after dinner, we talked yoga.  Some of us even did more than talk!  But mostly, we talked. To each other.  Via Whatsapp.  Sad commentary on society, I know, but we were also including the boys back home in the messages, so it was like we were multitasking.

And here are some of the incoming messages, along with Trajan's musings on what to be for Halloween and Araceli trying to talk to the family at large about the book she's reading.  Book club, holiday planning, relaxing, and yoga, all in one.

And macaroons.  Can you believe they waited until I was gone to savor the Laduree macaroons that Coco brought back from Paris?  And then they had the nerve to send pictures!  Well I never.  At any rate, happy birthday, Mom!

Bienvenue a Kaysville!

 She's baaaaa-aack!  Coco and friends have returned from Paris bearing gifts for everyone.  I'm telling you, it was like Christmas morning at Coco and Bill's when the non-stop Delta flight touched down on Utah soil.  Coco knows how to shop.  The girls are going to be so fashionable!  We're so glad to have Coco back.  We would have been glad even had she not brought presents on top of presents, but, well, it does make the homecoming even sweeter...literally, in the case of Lauduree macaroons!

 New dress!

 Here is Coco in her element.  When she dies and goes to heaven, I bet it will look like Rue Cler.

Juxtapo-chicken

 Yesterday while this refined, elegant table was being set and readied, and subsequently enjoyed by my Shelter girls, the below scenario was playing out in wild shrieks, boisterous pronouncements and urgent, terrified chirps.  "WEET! WEET! WEET!!!!"  Quite the juxtaposition of events!

What happened was, Coco.  I was going to finish that sentence, but I think just the word Coco explains it all.  I sauntered into her kitchen at 9:10 yesterday morning to retrieve Ptolemy, who had woken up concerned that somebody was going to eat his baby turkeys.  He had to go see them!  Coco said, "Doesn't Tolly have preschool right now?"  Why yes, he did.  I honestly don't know how I keep forgetting preschool.  It's been happening every Tuesday and Thursday since September.  This time, I had a pretty good excuse, which I explained to Miss Sharla upon showing up 15 minutes late:  "Sorry, I forgot because of the baby turkeys.  Also, he doesn't have his backpack, and that's just lipstick all over his legs.  So he doesn't have a rash."

Pretty sure my explanation prompted more questions than it answered, such as, "Baby turkeys?"  and, "Lipstick?"  Yeah.  Remember on the way home from the zoo when I turned around and Tizzy was sitting calmly in her seat looking like Robert Smith, lead singer of The Cure?  For some reason, the kids thought wiping all that lipstick on their legs would be a good way to clean it up, and it stained.  Why did they think legs were good substitutes for wipes?  Same reason Ptolemy said to me the other day, "I went in the laundry room because I had to get a sock to wipe my nose..."

One time!  ONE time, he sneezed in the car and there were no tissues, so I gave him a stray sock to contain the damage.  So now I have a kid that's going to grow up and one day say to a runny-nosed friend, "Oh, your family uses tissues to wipe their noses?  Huh.  We use socks.  We keep them in the laundry room with the chickens.

Ptolemy named the chicks Eight, Eight, Olaf and Sven.  

Not sure why two of them are named Eight.  

We're not allowed to question that.

Ptolemy is in love with his birds.  He croons, "They have sunflower eyes!"  And then he sighs.  Now that I look, they do have little brown eyes that are shaped like sunflower seeds.  Aaaaww!