The "First Adolescence"

It
has
been
brought
to my attention
that my son, Caleb,
has been replaced with a

Hyde-ian
doppelganger.

This is evident
due to the
following behaviors:

• speaking in the negative
• selective deafness
• boredom
• irritability
• destructive to own and others’ possessions
• lashing out
• fair-weather affection
• excessive whining
• has become picky regarding his diet: loss of appetite in carrots, chicken nuggets, Mexican food, rice, zucchini pie, stroganoff, scrambled eggs, squash, celery, mashed potatoes, broccoli, salad…
  

has a taste for only pizza, French fries, string cheese, oatmeal, most fruits, vats of ketchup, spaghetti, PB sandwich, garlic bread, cereal, waffles and soup.

Yep, that covers it.

These behaviors are most common in teenagers not in 23 month olds;
therefore, something is

amiss.

The obvious conclusion

(Obviously)

is that my son has been swapped for a rather short adolescent who is holding me and my patience

hostage.

I urge any Caleb-sightings to be reported to this blog,
in hopes that I will soon be reunited with my sweet, sweet son.

Until then . . .

send reinforcements.

March 26th, you scoundrel!
I've been robbed! :(

The Status is not quo.

Those of you who have befriended me on Facebook know the status shenanigans I pull.

Or at least try to pull.

Like a couple weeks ago when my status read something along the lines of: Angela is going to write the Great American Novel. The first line will read: In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. And it will end: So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Wait for it.
Wait_______for_________it.

No one got the reference. Well, that is not entirely true. Two English majors “liked” the status, so it is safe to assume they found it amusing.
I apologize to anyone I have misled, it was joke. I have no yearning to write the Great American Novel, I can barely update this blog once a week! The lines I quoted in the status were from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. :)

I’m such a literature snob.

AnYwHoo,

here’s some of my status updates from this past week. They are pretty mild. Read on. Don’t be ashamed if you have to google. You know me and my random references. ; )

(And apparently, according to the FB feed, I need cupcakes....?
Didn't they get the memo about my diet?)

click image to enlarge

PS A lot of guys ignore the laugh, and that's about standards.

Don't lose your marbles.

Click here to learn how to make your own marble!


I read banned books. Right now I am re-reading one of my favorite banned books. A book that year after year continues to top the most challenged book list due to sexual content, offensive language, religious viewpoint, being unsuited to age group and violence.

And every year I re-read it.

There are no excuses, only justifications. :)

This time around I really appreciated the craft of the writer. After another year of junky novels, I was once again feasting on composition cuisine.

Without giving too much of the plot away, here’s a brief overview pertaining to my point (yes some of my posts do have points):

Amid a New England catholic high school for boys there is a student society that assigns their peers to perform pranks. In the hierarchy of the society there is the Assigner who contrives the tasks and appoints it to a student. Just like any reasonable society there is a mechanism to keep leaders in check. In order to keep the Assigner’s ideas moderated a box with six marbles (five white and one black) is used. After each assignment is given the Assigner draws a marble from the box, unknowing which marble he will select. If the black marble is extracted than the Assigner will have to perform the conceived prank.

Remember how reading in bed doesn’t leave crumbs in your linens, only morsels in your lucidity?

Here’s something I’ve been gnawing on: Wouldn’t it be great if all of us had a black marble to keep us conservative? With our opinions, favors, delegation, advise?

Sometimes I forget how easy I have it. I mean, I am a Mormon woman of higher education, my husband has a occupation that allows me to stay home with my child, his career also pays for him to seek a graduate degree at an ivy league institution. Yeah. Wouldn’t trade places with anyone.
But that doesn’t stop me from advising other people in different circumstances (not worse nor lesser, just different) then my own. Brings new meaning to the idiom:

Don’t lose your marbles.

I also considered the tasks we endure perform in this life. I came to the conclusion that there doesn’t need to be a black marble in play with the Plan. It’s already been done. Our Assigner has already been there, done that and is able to assist us due to His experience.

This morning I read an article by President Monson that rocked. Yes, rocked.

There I say, even rolled?

In the article he relates the journey of the glass that adorns the St. George Tabernacle* windows. It traveled from the eastern states to California on boat. But that was not the tricky part. The difficulty was paying for the glass from fragile pockets. Needless to say, through various sacrifices members were able to raise the money through exercising faith and trust in the Lord.
Now, for the humdinger, the quote that followed the tale:

“Tabernacles and temples are built with more than
stone and mortar, wood and glass.
Particularly is this true when we speak of the temple described by the Apostle Paul:
‘Know ye not that ye are the temple of God,and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?’
Such temples are built with faith and fasting.They are built with service and sacrifice.
They are built with trials and testimonies.”

Diverse is the tasks we are asked to perform on this earth.
We have joys. We have trials.

These are the stones and mortar.

People are undergoing major construction.

Let’s be kind.

Yes, then we have the token Caleb collage because
we know my mom doesn't read for my recorded epiphanies.

*I've been there, have you? Can't wait to see it again! How many more months 'til JULY?!

All You Need Is . . .

Happy Valentine's Day.





"- I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! - and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death."

-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

An Unlikely Love Letter

Disclaimer: This is a creative post; therefore, details have been exaggerated, understated and some of it is just plain true.



To my Husband’s other Love:

When I first met Michael I was sporting a faux-grass skirt. It was at the institute Welcome Back dance, Hawaiian style, what else. It was August and he had been back from the mission for just three months. Maybe that explains why he waited a month to ask me out on a date. And why he almost canceled that date when he couldn’t find another couple to double with.

For the date, he invited me to a soccer match, he remembered I liked soccer, and I smartly left the grass skirt at home. To this day, we aren’t sure which team was Northern Arizona University (the blue on white or the white on blue) yet alone who won.

He spent the time talking about his ensemble. How most of it was purchased while visiting

you.

On our second date I temporarily evicted my roommates to cook dinner for him and to enjoy a movie together. I was trying to make an impression, something like, Hey, bonehead, I like you, I don’t just want to play house- I want the real deal. Something like that. We watched Serendipity starring John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale, a romance. During the film he remarked how he had experienced it all with someone else.

See, you and him, it wasn’t a two-year fling. It was a companionship. I get that.

I am willing to accept that I can no longer watch some of my favorite movies (i.e. Sleepless in Seattle, Searching for Bobby Fischer, Big Daddy, Elf, You’ve Got Mail, It Could Happen to You, Newsies, One Fine Day, and many more ) without commentary about him and you.

I can accept it because I know his time with you, made him into the man that I adore.

Then my time came. The moment all wives think about, meeting the other woman, letting Michael’s past catch-up to our future together.

When I first met you, I was nervous, I kept my head down. You were intimidating. I was three months pregnant at the time, starting to show, regularly uncomfortable without adding the discomfort of meeting you. But quickly I warmed up to you and your appearance. I figured:

If millions of people love you,
why can’t I?

And I do.

Love you. By the way.

And I can’t wait to visit again. Let’s set a date soon.

Until then, sincerely,
Angela

PS I never expressed gratitude to you for setting Michael’s gastronomic expectations low. From what I understand you didn’t have many dinner dates with him there and that he mostly feasted on mac n’ cheese and Gray's Papaya. Thank you for lowering the bar to the point where I can trip over it in the kitchen. I appreciate it.

Acceptance

click the notecards to visit Simple Viewpoints and take a gander at Kristina's new header

Photo Finish

Thanks Random.org for doing all the hard work and selecting
our Give Away Winner:


(great photo, right? Swiped it off her family blog!
If you look in her specs you can see her daughter Taylee, who took this portrait)

Kristina is pretty lucky, besides the obvious (I mean she did win the Give Away), because she has TWO blogs, maybe I’ll make her TWO headers, if she wants.
Although I may be a “super-talented, multi-tasking, ....mormon” (as Kristina puts it), she does something I can never do: run two blogs. Well, that and thoroughly clean other people’s teeth. Yuck. A noble profession, but, just, yuck.
Anyways, congratulations Kristina. We’ll be in contact soon to discuss your “vision” for your headers. I’m thinking... potato-skinned.
And the rest of you keep your eyes peeled (yuck, where did that expression come from? Probably from Idaho with all their spud idioms) for Kristina’s new header. And don’t forget to pop over to her Simple Viewpoints Blog for some refreshing perspective. It’s pretty much the opposite of yuck.

It’s Kcuy.

COMMENTING:

• If you know Kristina, post a nice comment about her below, even share a memory is you’d like.
• If you don’t know Kristina, your comment can be about the contents of her blogs (really though, her kids are stinkin’ cute go look at them) or you can practice your creative writing with the following prompt: The day I met Kristina… And be as goofy as you like, like, three wolf moon proportions! Someone take the creative writing bait! TAKE IT!
• IF YOU ARE KRISTINA, we await your acceptance speech.
  

DISCLAIMER:
I deny any rigging of this Give Away. SO WHAT if she is my visiting teacher, FB friend, real-life friend, on my blog roll, fellow counselor in the Primary Presidency, and is really ridiculously good looking? Blame Random.org, not me!

Oh SNAP!

Aw, February, it’s been awhile, say, 11 months?
How
do
you
do?

This month is jam-packed. Primary Activity. February Sharing Time. Branch activity. The moose goes back to Ivy patch and is trying on some MITtens this semester. Valentine’s Day. President’s day. And a Give-Away? Whew.


Speaking of Valentines, I’m sure lucky to have mine.

Last week I had him document an infrequent exhibit at our house: me, dressed-head-to-sneaks, cover-girled, and hair flipped, BEFORE NOON, on a WEEK DAY.

I’ll let you catch your breath...

… alrighty, let’s resume this blog entry.
Michael gladly took this opportunity to be goofy inventive. The first picture of 110, really illustrates my annoyance as Mike did not give nor take any direction at the beginning of the impromptu photo shoot.

Then he started to hand me random “props" . . .

And kept repeatedly commanding
“Pose!” “Pose!”

“Pose!”
causing me to fall over in fits of laughter to the point of tears.

But his “method” worked. We got some pretty good shots.

On Saturday I went to the church building to tape up flyers for the upcoming branch activity. There was a YSA conference being held. I haven’t seen the halls of the church so busy with bodies, ever. There was lots of giggling, hugging, flirting, and nausea (exclusively on my part). I was wearing blue jeans (Old Navy Flirt, best 20-something I ever spent and probably the most I ever spent on a pair of jeans) and hanging up flyers for a branch activity, while everyone else was Sunday-dressed and scripture-toting. It was obvious I was out of place, but I bustled along trying to get in and out so my Saturday could continue on its leisure course. But every corner I turned, even in the mother’s room, a YSA tried to instigate a conversation with me. Argh.

Because of Stephanie Meyer, the “Twilight Zone” gives new meaning to the experience. Absurd and extremely hokey. Upon leaving the building I reestablished my gratitude to be married and managing to leave the “meet” market fairly unscaved.

For my single readers, I’d just like to say, you are my heroes, and I advise you to make the most of your super time. As a young single adult you have unlimited potential to do good. Visit the temple often. Serve often in various callings, in the community, and extend service to those around you. Enrich your lives. Ladies, continue your personal progress. While I was single I was persistent to crack open my personal progress book and do projects every other week. Heck, if you are a woman, no matter the stage of life, browse through a personal progress book and give an activity or experience a whirl.

In the words of Holden Caulfield, whatever you do just don’t be

“phoney.”

Be genuine. Be sincere. When the time does come and you meet your mate, no slide of hand has ever resulted in a good marriage. If you aren’t a social person, don’t force yourself to be. As I told a friend once, “I'm a pretty aloof person. It has always bugged me that I could never sit in RS alone-- someone always has to do the ‘right thing’ and sit next to the ‘lonely’ person. It creeps me out.” (Are you beginning to understand why I'm on the activities committee? :) )


Not every guy wants a multi-task and talented, mega-social Molly Mormon.
My husband married a

Cindy “I leave my towels on the floor” Convert.

He couldn’t be happier.

And neither could I.
(And now, I even have photographic evidence.)

Post script:
On my way to church yesterday I spotted some turkeys. No signs of Mr. Gobbles yet though.
Should I be concerned?