Really, There's Been Nothing Much to Blog About, But You Know I'll Write Forever About Something

Wow, nearly 10 days since my last post.  What's been going on? Hmmm. Let's see... I've been working on a big crafty project that fit my goal of using stuff I already have instead of shopping. It's gone very well and I'm pleased with the results. It involves some surprises and gifts, so I can't say anything more here. Eventually I'll have photos.  I've been planning out my kitchen cabinet painting plans, and I've been counting my calories and trying to work out every day.  I'm madly decluttering and getting rid of things, and through it all I've been rediscovering the Harry Potter series by listening to the British audiobook, read by Stephen Fry. I am fond of the Jim Dale version that Scholastic published in the US, but I have really enjoyed the Bloomsbury version, with its British words and cultural references and a subtler, slightly more wry feel to the narration. I couldn't actually find it in the US, so I used a whole pile of Christmas money to order it from Amazon.uk. Anyway, these really are good books. I do think they will become true classics.  Even without the media hype and the anticipation of the next installment, they are witty, well-written and just tons of fun. Yay for J.K. Rowling. She can truly be proud of her literary legacy.

I've also been spending lots of time with my Grandma who is here for an extended visit. She's 87. Isn't she adorable?  I love having her next door at my mom's so we can visit anytime we want. She likes to watch TV, so I've been getting reacquainted with the TV series "24."  We've been watching from the beginning. While we watch, I knit or she helps me fold laundry or we just talk and it is very cozy and companionable.  I expect this will be her last visit to the East Coast since my folks have bought a house in Arizona and will be moving there before the end of the year, probably this summer. Tomorrow is my mom's birthday and so we're all going to lunch. It will be memorable, not least because it will likely be the last time in a long time that I'll get to take my mom out for lunch for her birthday.  Next year, she'll be with my sister and brothers nearby in Arizona.

When I was young, I had no ambition whatever to live near my parents. My first career plan was to be a cetologist (she who studies cetaceans: dolphins, whales, and the like) and live on a ship like Jacques Cousteau. I went and lived in Costa Rica all by myself as a 16-year old. I couldn't wait to go away for college.  I've always been really independent. But, of all my siblings, I am the only one who has spent all but about 3 years of my adult life in the same area where I grew up, with my parents less than half-hour's drive away. In spite of the occasional bout of itchy-foot, it's been blissful-such an incredible blessing. My parents are very nice, very amiable folks who have always let us live our own life completely, but have always been there when we've needed them. I hope they can say the same for us. Fortunately, I don't have to stuff a whole bunch of relationship and memory building into our last months as neighbors. I feel like we've done a pretty good job of really appreciating each other. I'm also not afraid of them leaving, because in many ways, my daily life won't change all that much, and I have awesome friends here who are almost like family, so I know I'll be fine. It's more just an awareness of that our relationship will shift a bit. My mom is the hub around which our family rotates, and we siblings don't talk all that much. I know what's going on with them because I talk to my mom so much. So, maybe her moving will give me an opportunity to build different and better relationships with my sibs and in-laws.  That will be a good thing.

Anyway, I know that lots of people live without their parents nearby (including all of my brothers and sisters) and that I'm very lucky, so I'm not going to complain even one bit about them moving. I'm happy for them and I really like thinking about them in their cute new place under the blue skies and nearly eternal sunshine of the West.

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My Day in Poorly Constructed Sentence Fragments

Today I:

1. Got up at 6:49 am
2. Did not go running
3. Worked with Hubby to clean the house and make breakfast for 25 youth group kids and leaders who came to my house for a meeting.
4. Enjoyed chatting with a friend who came to the meeting and appreciated her helping me to cook the sausage and bacon even though I think a grease spatter burned her hand and even though the meat didn't burn, the house got all smoky because we were trying to cook it quickly.
   
5. Cleaned up after said breakfast meeting, and after recently reading a book about Japan and all their beautifully simple traditions, enjoyed the process of giving my kitchen a really good clean, which was a weird feeling...the enjoying part, not the clean part.
6. Invited my mom to come over and eat leftover waffles, which she did while we had a nice chat. 
   
7. Went upstair to knit a bit and listen to an audiobook.
   
8. Fell asleep after 5 minutes.
9. Woke up an hour later and helped E with his big history project which is driving us both crazy
10. Sent kids to local bookstores to help E look for books on the history of gunpowder because the library doesn't have anything useful and the books on Amazon that might be useful are textbooks and therefore cost more than taking everyone to a movie, and I imagine that no amount of popcorn would make them entertaining.
    
11. Invited my grandma over to eat leftover waffles, which she did, and we had a nice chat, then a walk around the block and I introduced her to my mom's pet rabbit. 
12. Spent a good hour figuring out how to stick a Lego spaceship to a display board without damaging the Lego pieces because we only have 5000 in the house and we can't possibly spare the 15 that were used to build this "3 dimensional artifact" for E's other project, also due tomorrow!!!
    
13. Continued E's research of the history of gunpowder online and found one useful resource through the library at a national park site, of all places.
14. Gave multiple pep talks to E explaining that his teacher's comments actually were intended to be helpful and he, E, will be glad that he worked so hard on this project even though I myself am ready to go have a conference because his, the teacher's, comments actually aren't helpful and are full of  abstruse, contradictory instructions in handwriting so illegible as to require both E and I to pore over it and decipher it as if it were a secret code. ARGHHH!
15. Got E through the process of finishing what he needed to do while simultaneously eating leftover homemade chocolate pudding (yes, it helped with that arghhh thing) and skillfully using the microwave to warm up mugs of leftover chicken soup for dinner, of which I did have a serving, after I finished my pudding of course.
16. Infused a cozy, warm feeling into our dinnertime by lecturing three teenagers on the rudeness of wearing headphones constantly and forcing adults to become grumpy when they don't really want to. 
17. Prolonged the happy mood by trying to figure out how two teenagers are allegedly so completely prepared for tomorrow's midterm when I had yet to witness anything resembling studying.
18. Decided to remember what I was like as a teenager and reminded myself that they will be okay, then ate more pudding.
    
19. Made hot cocoa for me and E, and yes I know-that is a lot of chocolate-flavored dairy products for one day but remember, I live with three teenagers AND a lawyer.
    
20. Watched the second half of Return to Cranford recorded from Masterpiece Classic. 
21. Got very excited to find out that a new version of Jane Austen's Emma is the next thing coming up on Masterpiece. 
22. Made more hot cocoa for S.
23. Thought about rousing myself and doing a video workout but then thought better of it and instead, with a large spoon, ate all the leftover whipped cream that I had made for the pudding and hot cocoa, and enjoyed every bit of it, and just so you know,  it was organic cream from local, happy cows, so it was like eating health food, I'm sure.
24. Watched a couple of episodes of Good Eats with Alton Brown (I really want to try his cupcake and frosting recipes!), fell asleep again, woke up and turned the tv off. 
25. Gathered the kids for our family prayer and scriptures and went over the calendar for the week.
26. Gave the kitchen another once over after the last of the cocoa and pudding, and actually enjoyed it again, I think because it, the kitchen, was not wearing headphones, asking me for help with a project, or swearing that it was ready for its midterm tomorrow. 
27. Ran my dishwasher for the 4th time today-not kidding. 
    
28. Wrote this. 

Now I'm going to bed to wait for Hubby to come home. He was supposed to have the day off, but got called in to meet a pressing deadline. He worked till midnight on Friday and tonight is shaping up the same way. I can't sleep till everyone's home, so maybe now I'll get some knitting done.

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The Post about the Polyp

So, if I were to say the words "garden-variety polyp," what image would come to your mind?  Well, a few weeks ago when my doctor said those words to me to set my mind at ease about the state of a recently discovered growth in a place that's not supposed to be growing things of any variety, I immediately pictured a tiny stalk of cauliflower growing out of the side of this particular organ. I know, I know. What if it had been me in the final scene of Ghostbusters-can you imagine? Anyway, five minutes later, when my doctor actually said that, had the polyp had a smaller stalk, she could have just snipped it off right there in the office, the image grew even stronger. Because mine had a "nice, sturdy stalk," she had to wait to harvest it until I was under anesthesia.  Is there a class in Med School about how to describe things so creatively? Add to the scene the fact that my doctor is a 50ish Indian woman with a fairly thick accent drawing a picture and talking enthusiastically about my polyp the way I might talk about knitting yarn and hopefully you get the picture. Okay, she never said the word "harvest," but nonetheless,  it was a memorable moment for me.  On Monday, when I reported for harvesting, even the nurses at the surgery center giggled when I told them and one said she would never be able to see that doctor again without imagining her snipping off tiny cauliflowers every time someone comes in for a polypectomy.  So I'm not completely weird, or at least not the only one afflicted with this type of weirdness (the garden-variety type). Luckily, it was just a garden-variety polyp, and the surgery was pretty uneventful other than feeling a bit off for the following 24 hours and now having a lovely bruise on the hand that had the IV. Even luckier, I'm not bothered by hospitals or needles or anesthesia, so the whole thing was blessedly easy. In the end,  I napped most of the day, was chauffeured around by wonderful friends and family, someone else cooked dinner, the kids didn't whine when I asked them to fetch things, AND  Eric made the kids' lunches the next morning.  Not bad for a plain old garden-variety polyp.

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A Very Pretty Little Snowfall

This morning's snowy scene was just perfect-only  a little snow, enough for a bit of a sleep-in rather than a full day off, and so fluffy and light that shoveling and cleaning off the cars was a simple matter. I took my point and shoot out to play with and got a few nice images of the sunrise over the sugary landscape. I also took some shots of my latest personal knitting for my knitting blog. This is a hat pattern from Sweden, so I thought a snowy backdrop suited it.  It is already my favorite hat.

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More About the New Year

It's been fun to read my way around my personal blogosphere and see how people celebrate and mark the new year. I've enjoyed reading about the decision to make resolutions or to consciously avoid them. I've read about ten-year plans and lovely traditions. I've been inspired by simple goals and ambitious desires for real change. I liked this idea over at Simple Mom a lot-the concept of monitoring personal satisfaction with life appeals to me. I especially love the idea of NOT making resolutions just because the date has changed. Several of my pals expressed similar thoughts about the new year, and I think it is smart.

The other thing that resonated for me about the post from Simple Mom is that January is not a time of big action for me. Here in the temperate area where I live, it is a time of darkness and cold. Because of that (and I recognize that this will be different depending on where folks do live) it tends to be a time of quiet, of rest after the holidays, of waiting and gathering strength. Spring and fall are definitely the times of doing new stuff.  

So, while I do have a new personal blog for myself about my relationship with money and material things, and I have made some necessary new plans in that area, I'm pretty happy with my life. My relationships are sound, I have things that bring me joy, and I have things that challenge me.  Of course I'm always irked about being "obese" on the BMI scale (Really, who came UP with that?), and I always want my house to be a little cuter and cleaner, but those thoughts are not new for this year, and neither of them is critical enough for me to completely change direction about. I already spend as much energy on those things as I'm willing to right now. That may change in the future.  For the most part,  I'm just trying to stay the course. I work to recognize the good in my life and maintain a kind of equilibrium between feeling satisfaction with myself and the world while still living with a sense of curiosity and engagement. I call that doing my best.

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Back to Life, Back to Reality

Winter Morning Over the Back Yard, 01.04.2010


In spite of wind chills in the single digits, two weeks of late nights, last minute homework and me being in the developmental stages of a bad cold, it was actually a pretty good morning. Everyone got up and made it to seminary and school. I remembered to make the lunches last night, then proceeded to be unable to get to sleep till 4 am due to an inability to breathe.  In the hour and a half that remained till my alarm went off, I had a vivid, weird dream that made me ever so glad to wake up and realize it was only a dream. Whew. Now, I'm off to go blow my nose for about 15 minutes, write the missionary son, and take a nap.

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