New Niece

Check out what Schmath and Ryan got today...

I'm Dreaming of a...

Good news! My family is spending Christmas in Utah this year, and it looks like there's a good chance that my mom will have her very first white Christmas ever.

First Christmas Miracle of the Year

Check out what I just found in the bowl of leftover Halloween candy:


It's the dream package of Runts. No bananas! That conversation I normally have in my head about the starving kids in Africa who don't get to go trick-or-treating won't be happening tonight, because not a single piece of candy will be wasted.

30

Yesterday Ben turned 30, so we made some food...



...and then invited Liam's friends over.

Decision Time

In the words of my wise friend, Tricia, it's time for me to just buy curtains already!

Now can I get a little assistance, please? I'm trying to decide between a more casual look in a more colorful color and a fancier look in a more neutral color.


Just so you know, if I end up keeping green I'll put them in the dryer with a damp towel to get the wrinkles out, like the directions say to do.

Here's what the rest of the room looks like:


So, what do you think?

Goo for Dinner

Ben’s dad is visiting this week, which means I feel a little bit of pressure to make dinner every other day or so. Today I was roaming around Costco looking for ideas when I spotted a giant chicken pot pie. It looked really gourmet, with a nice lattice pie crust on top, so I bought it. Then I took it home and baked it. It looked really beautiful when I checked on it after a while, until it came sliding off the rack and onto the oven door. Now it looks like this:


And the worst part is that some of the goo got inside the world’s tiniest hole at the top of the door, so now it’s hanging out between the inner glass and outer glass, just staring at me like, “Oh yeah? What are you going to do about it?”

It's a Girl!

Liam is pretty excited about getting a baby sister, but he's even more excited about the horse I accidentally promised him since he won't be getting a brother to play with.

Movie Star

We got our new Signing Time! DVDs in the mail this week, and it turns out that Liam the non-smiler actually made the cut.

Blogging

Dragon Tales

This morning in my daily attempt at putting clothes on Liam (the boy loves his jammies), I decided to try reasoning with him. I said, “Liam, I have a baby in my belly. I can’t be dragging you around trying to get your clothes on every day.” (I use that baby in the belly excuse for everything these days.)

He answered, “You’re a dragon? But you’re not even wearing a Halloween costume.”

Twinners

Guess what happens when you marry someone who kind of looks like you?


Your niece from one side of the family and nephew from the other side of the family kind of look alike too.

Great Big Sea

Ben and I went to see my favorite Celtic band, Great Big Sea, about a week ago. It was Ben’s first experience with the band, and I embarrassingly admitted to him that I used to think the long-haired bouzouki player [left] was the hottest member of the band. Ben’s response was something like, “Really? But now you know the guitar player [middle] is the hot one, right?”

Superdell

I'm not normally one to wax political, but seriously...

Is this guy for real?

Mad Bread Skillz

I'm taking a really fun bread-making class with my cousin, Sarah, on Tuesday nights this month. Check out the sweet stash of bread I made tonight:


Now that I can make bread and rolls, it's probably time to open a bakery.

In Which Devin Becomes a Big Guy

My little brother, Devin, comes home from his mission on November 19, so we’re planning a trip to California to visit him this Thanksgiving.

Yesterday I told Liam that we would go to Grandma and Grandpa’s house next month when Devin gets home. Liam asked, “Devin? Is it the big guy?” No one really describes Devin as a “big guy,” so I thought maybe Liam was thinking of my other brother, Toby.


I wasn’t confused for long, though, because Liam’s next question was, “Or is it the little girl?” I had totally forgotten about his girlfriend, Devan.

Eleven

The other day Liam told me he loved me SO much, so I asked him, “How much?” He answered, “Eleven.” Ever since then, everything he says is about the number eleven. He asks if he should eat eleven more bites of spaghetti, or if he can sleep with eleven cars, or if he can have eleven pieces of licorice.

This morning he told me he loved his daddy SO much, so I asked him, “How much?” He answered, “Three.” I asked, “Only three? Why not eleven?” He answered, “That’s too much.”

Haircut Remorse

It looks like I'm not the only one who regrets taking Liam to get his most recent haircut.

Before:

After:

High Maintenance Fetus

I’ve gone three full days without throwing up, and I don’t want to jinx anything here, but I think I might be getting over my pregnancy sickness. I’m no longer convinced that an alien has moved into my belly; it might actually be a human fetus.

The funny thing is that I actually considered becoming a surrogate mother when I was pregnant with Liam. It was just that easy. I never called in sick to work, never threw up, never had cravings. This time I’ve had all of those things plus killer headaches every day that make the nausea seem like a walk in the park.

My hopes for my future family have been to have Liam and two girls, but if this is the difference between being pregnant with a boy vs. a girl, I think one girl will be plenty.

Expanding

ETA: 3-24-09

Aloha!

I'm in Hawaii with the nine adult members of Ben's family (parents, kids, and spouses) for the next 10 days, and we rented a 12-passenger monster van to drive around Honolulu. After some heated discussion on the drive from the airport to our hotel yesterday afternoon, Ben's mom came up with the first rule of the trip.

Rule #1: We're not going to be mean about other people's operating systems.

Professional Craigslist Shoppers

We got an offer on our house this week, so we’re finally going to start moving to the new house this weekend. In preparation for the big move, I listed a bunch of stuff we don’t need anymore on Craigslist. You might remember my last experience with selling something on Craigslist…the one where I blogged about the suckers who bought my couches and then Karma came and locked Liam in the delivery truck.

The first Craigslist response I got was from a couple who was interested in this rug:



We set up a meeting time, and when they showed up at my door I thought I was getting Punk'd. It was the same couple who had bought our couches. I'm not sure what Karma was trying to tell us this time, but I think I'll play it safe and stay away from Craigslist from now on.

Breaking Dawn

I finished the last vampire book yesterday, and now I kind of wish I had stopped after number three. Is it just me, or was that one a little more ridiculous than the rest?

My Favorite Locksmith

About a year ago, one of my students hopped in her car to go home and couldn’t get it to start. In order to reach her battery with my battery, I had to park halfway in my neighbor’s driveway and halfway in the middle of the street. I figured it would be okay since it would only take a second. That’s when I locked my keys in the car.

By the time the locksmith arrived, my student had called her brother, gotten her car jumped, and left, leaving my car in the middle of the road for no apparent reason.

A few months later, Ben borrowed a truck from work so we could deliver our couches to the people who bought them off Craigslist. Liam locked himself in the car, and we called the first locksmith who could be at our house in 15 minutes. It just happened to be the same guy who came the last time, and you better believe he remembered my crazy parking job.

Since it had been several months and we knew that locksmith was good, fast, and cheap, I called him this week to see if he could re-key the locks on our new house. When he showed up, I pretended I had never seen him before. (No need to bring up past transgressions, right?) Everything went really well until he finished and I handed him a check. He saw my address and a light bulb turned on above his head. “Oh, yeah!” he said. “You’re the one who locked your kid in the truck, right?”

On Becoming a Permanent Utahn

I found my new favorite grocery store yesterday. It’s called Sunflower Farmers Market, and contrary to how it might sound, it’s neither outside nor temporary. It’s a real live grocery store with tons of cheap, yummy produce and bread and fresh salmon.

But here’s the best part. Remember my favorite kind of candy, which I have to buy online in bulk because it doesn’t exist in the state of Utah? The Sunflower Farmers Market sells sour strawberry belts! Now I can live in Utah for the rest of my life.

Fortunately

We spent last week in Yosemite with my family, hiking, riding bikes, river rafting, and checking out all of the cool wild animals.


One afternoon as we were strolling around the park, a squirrel came up to check us out. My five-year-old nephew, Jacob, threw a piece of bark at the little guy and hit him right in the belly. His mom reprimanded him for trying to hurt the squirrel, but finished her lecture with, “Fortunately the bark was soft, so you didn’t hurt him.” Jacob answered, “Fortunately I GOT that guy!”

Closing #2

We closed on the newer, cuter house yesterday. I'm really excited about this kitchen:


It makes me think I'll have to start making dinner more than once a month, though. Anybody know any good recipes for beginners?

Now we just have to wait and see if it actually records this time. Wish me luck!

Easy Breezy

Ben and I celebrated our six year wedding anniversary this weekend. And when I say celebrated, I actually mean observed. We decided not to give each other presents this year because no matter how cool the present I receive is, it’s not worth picking out and spending money on the present I give. I’m selfish and Ben is indifferent, so it works out perfectly.

In honor of our easy anniversary, I’ve decided to tell the Internet the secret to our easy marriage. The feminist in me is a little embarrassed, but my mom is the one who shared it with me and she has more feminism in her than I have, so here goes…

When I found out I was pregnant with Liam, I was pretty stressed about how my easy life and perfect marriage were going to change. Ben and I were pretty independent—not the type to ask each other for help. One night on the phone with my mom I voiced my concerns about how stay-at-home moms and working dads scheduled evening diaper changes, baths, meals, etc. Were we supposed to take turns? Make a job chart? How would we make sure we’re each doing our share of the work without having to ask each other for help? (Did I mention that I’m selfish?)

My mom’s response was this: Instead of planning on doing 50% of the work when Ben’s home, plan on doing 100%. Then, when Ben helps out, you’ll always be grateful.

This advice has made my marriage so easy. I plan on doing everything myself, which means I never have to ask for help, and I’m always pleasantly surprised when Ben steps in to help. I plan on doing 100% of the work, and I only end up doing 60%.

See? Piece of cake. I dare you to try it.

Dance of the Stay-at-Home Mom

Now I know why Tabitha and Napoleon brought a camcorder last time they came over before Ben left for work in the morning. They were stealing our moves to use on So You Think You Can Dance.

The Difference Between a Violin and a Fiddle

I used to dread playing in violin recitals. Every year I would dress in my Sunday best, sit around in a stuffy church for hours waiting for my turn to play, and then butcher my piece in front of hundreds of people.

Now that I’m in charge, recitals are held outside, in casual clothes, and they take no longer than 45 minutes.




And when the recital is over, we move to the trampoline.

The Bright Side

Are you getting tired of my house drama? Here’s the latest:

The bank doesn’t want to sell us our house because it turns out that Mr. Bankruptcy had a second mortgage of $66,000 on it that he promised to pay back before he filed for bankruptcy. They no longer have that deal, so the bank wants to try to sell it for more.

We could probably get a real estate lawyer to push the deal through for us, but we decided to see what’s on the market these days in case there’s something better. We looked at a bunch of houses on Saturday, and after the 11th one I felt like we had just wasted an entire day. We decided to go see one more…

AND TOTALLY FELL IN LOVE WITH IT! Here’s the difference:

House we’ve been fighting for:


New house:


They’re both older homes in similar neighborhoods with great schools, and Mapquest says they’re both exactly 17 minutes from Ben’s work and 30 minutes from Schmath’s goats. We put an offer on the new one Saturday night and got a verbal acceptance a few hours later. I’m trying not to get my hopes up just yet, but let's be honest. This could turn out to be the greatest of all blessings in disguise.

In Limbo

I packed up my car earlier this week with the intention of moving some clutter from our old house to our new house. The new house hadn’t recorded yet (we had no keys), but it was sure to happen by Tuesday so I wasn’t worried.

I took one of the twin beds out of the guest room, shoving the box springs under the other twin and the mattress into the newly emptied closet, the contents of which were sitting in my car.

Now it’s Friday and my car is still packed up, and the house isn’t going to record anytime soon. Our realtor is even more frustrated than we are. He spends hours on the phone with different people from the bank, not making any progress. Because of our weird bankruptcy situation, nobody knows how to process our paperwork. Apparently there’s still a possibility of us not getting the house, even though we already closed on it and we’re paying $30/day in interest.

Now I need to go to Costco, but there’s no room for food in my car and no room for clutter in my house. I’m afraid I’m going to have to set up that second bed again, just for the closet space.

Shiloh's Lonely World

The latest issue of Life & Style Weekly was on display as I was checking out at the grocery store tonight, and cute little Shiloh was staring back at me with this caption: “She’s surrounded by so many siblings—and there are even more to come. Why does Shiloh feel so left out?”


What the…? First of all, how do they know she’s feeling left out? I would love to see a copy of that interview. And secondly, isn’t she like two? Who cares if she feels left out? Two-year-olds don’t have real feelings. Get a real story, Life & Style.

Mike Crowley Is My New Best Friend

Several years ago, my band had a gig in Las Vegas. We spent one of our nights there at a jam session while our husbands went to the strip and gambled. Mike Crowley taught Ben how to play a fun little game called Roulette.

Fast forward to last month, when Ben’s boss, Craig, took us to Vegas. I loaned Craig $30 so he could tip the limo driver, and he paid me back with a $5 bill and a $25 chip. Ben and I promptly took our chip to the Roulette table and set it on black. Five seconds later we had two $25 chips, which we immediately cashed out.

But that's not the only reason that Mike Crowley is my new best friend. We closed on our house today! The house we thought we could no longer have! The house that prompted this post, where Mike Crowley left a comment and taught us how to work the system!

Mike, because of you we are not just $25 richer. We also have the house we really wanted and we only had to wait four extra weeks. Thank you!

So You Think You Can Clog

Whoa. Did you guys just see Maria Tucker on So You Think You Can Dance?


I hope she clogs her way to Vegas. Go Maria!

Signing Time!

A couple months ago I got an e-mail from Rebecca, saying Signing Time! was auditioning for some new episodes. We sent in our audition tape and found out that even with all of the nose wiping, they wanted Liam.

Last week they started filming, so we spent a couple days in front of the camera where some dude would say, “Now can you smile at the camera, Liam? Can you smile while you sign ‘play’?” Obviously that dude hadn’t watched the audition tape.

This morning we got to meet the Signing Time! cast: Rachel, Alex, Leah, and Hopkins. Just for fun, I asked Liam to smile for the camera. Instead he gave me this look:

Real Estate Riot

Here’s a little update on our housing situation:

After we found out that our seller went bankrupt, I called our realtor to see if there was anything we could do to fight the system. This is his first experience with a short sale turned foreclosure, so he wasn’t sure. He said he would get back to me. A few hours later, he called to say there was some paperwork that would need to be filled out saying the seller was not making a profit from the sale of our house so it didn’t affect his bankruptcy, and that it would take up to 30 days to get the paperwork processed, but that there was a 70% to 80% chance we would still get the house. Hooray!

Then, a few days later, the realtor called again. It turns out that Bankruptcy Guy was the one who would be filling out the paperwork, costing him time and money, and he was sick of it all. He decided he wasn’t going to help us out. Now we had only a 5% to 10% chance of getting the house. Bummer.

Then someone named Mike (Is that you, Mike Crowley?) left a comment on this post, saying we could probably work out a sales agreement with the seller's lending agency. Ben called our realtor to see if this was a possibility, and the realtor said it was possible but not really legal. This got Ben thinking about other possibilities, though, like suing Bankruptcy Guy to force him to fill out the paperwork or going over Bankruptcy Guy’s head to have someone else process the paperwork.

Turns out that Ben is kind of a genius, and now there’s a 90% chance that we’ll still get the house. We’re not sure what any of these percentages mean, since they fluctuate 80% from one day to the next, so we’re not getting our hopes up just yet. But we’re also not giving up yet. So thanks, Mike, whoever you are!

Weed Hound

Bucket of weeds, anyone?


You might remember that last year I absolutely detested dandelions. I picked those stupid yellow flowers every single day and never got any satisfaction from it. This year, things have changed.

I found this handy little tool called the Weed Hound at Home Depot.


This thing reaches down and grabs my dandelions by the roots without even making me bend over. I'm not much of a gardener, but this thing is SO gratifying. I think I'm in love.

Huh?

Our realtor called yesterday to tell us that the seller of our new house filed for bankruptcy without telling anyone. It was going to be a short sale, but now it will go up for review sometime in June and then become a foreclosure. Long story short: it’s no longer ours.

Did I mention we were going to close on it tomorrow?

Weekend in Review

Ben’s boss took us, along with six other employees and their spouses, on a quick trip to Las Vegas this weekend.

We flew in Friday morning and took a giant Hummer limo to the Venetian, where we checked in and then hung out in a private cabana by the pool for a couple hours. I really liked the cabana because I could lie in the sun (with my SPF 45 sunscreen, of course) and sip my drink without having millions of people around. Ben really liked the cabana because he could watch TV in the shade while eating nachos and wings.

Next we had dinner at The Palm and then went to see Phantom of the Opera. I hadn’t seen Phantom in 10 or 15 years, so I didn’t remember how awesome it was. Totally awesome. Afterward we went up to Ben’s boss’s giant hotel room and ate cheesecake while watching the end of the Jazz game.

The next morning we had breakfast at the Venetian and then went to the bodies exhibit at the Tropicana. Again, totally awesome. Then we moseyed on back to our hotel by way of the New York, New York roller coaster. Have you noticed that everything is better when someone else is paying?

Back at the Venetian, we had a quick lunch at the Wolfgang Puck restaurant out by the pool, then grabbed our stuff and got back in the Hummer limo. We were back at the airport after only about 28 hours. So that’s what I call a really fun really quick trip.

For Sale

Anybody want to buy my house?

Hypothetically Speaking

In case you ever have a baby with three holes in his heart, and you have to watch him scream his 4-day-old head off while doctors do all kinds of tests on him, you should know that it gets better. By the time he’s 2 ½ he’ll probably kind of enjoy watching the doctor experiment on him, and he’ll really only care about whether he gets a sucker after it's over.

Alert!

We’re moving! And we haven’t finished our taxes! And I have skin cancer!

Don’t worry, it’s just a little piece of basal cell carcinoma on my back. Tons of people get those, right? I think it just means I’ll turn into one of those people who says, “Did you remember sunscreen?” every time we go outside.

Apparently we filed for an extension on our taxes, and apparently it’s totally legal.

And we’re moving! The house is not very far from where we live now, but it has a dishwasher! And a master bathroom! And big closets!

I can’t wait to see what other news we get on Tax Day 2008. Anybody have anything?

Dungeons and Dragons, Anyone?

My brother, Toby, just returned from nine months in Afghanistan, where he was serving in the Navy. I e-mailed him when he got back and asked if his time in Afghanistan made him a real live veteran. Here is his response:

Yes, I'm a veteran. Now to avoid further confusion, I will list the warrior levels.

1. Veteran
2. Mongrel
3. Dark Knight
4. Wizard Apprentice
5. Master Wizard
6. Beast Master
7. Warlord

How lucky that going to war didn't take the dorkiness out of him.

Signing Trickster

Liam took a break from Signing Time for a few months, but now he’s back with a vengeance. We have five or six episodes saved on the DVR, and he would probably watch all of them in a row every day if he could.

Since I don’t sit down and watch it with him, Liam knows all kinds of signs now that I don’t know. Sometimes he asks me, “How do you sign blue?” And I say, “I don’t know, how do you sign blue?” And he shows me, while saying, “You make a B for blue, and then twist it.” And for a second I think he knows that blue starts with B, before I realize that he’s just repeating what the Signing Time lady says.

Yesterday we were going through one of these signing lessons when I got the feeling Liam was making up his own signs. It all became very clear when he asked me, “How do you sign Lisa?” Instead of spelling out L-I-S-A, I said, “I don’t know. How do you sign Lisa?” And Liam stuck his fist up by his nose and wiggled it all around.

I know I haven’t seen all of the episodes, but come on. This kid is totally taking me for a ride.

Got a Light?

A couple weeks ago, my neighbor brought over some junk he was getting rid of from a house he remodeled. He said if I sold the junk on Craigslist, we could split the money 50/50. One of the things he brought was this chandelier:


I secretly hoped that everything else would be snatched up, but that no one would want the chandelier. Guess what. My secret hope came true! So I painted the chandelier in hopes of putting it in my next house, and now it looks like this:

April Fools

How much do you want to bet that my brother is going to call today and say something like, “Can you believe Dad had an allergic reaction to his insulin and now he has to get his left leg amputated?”

Runs In the Family

Apparently my brother, Jeff, could carry a tune at age 18 months. My parents have a recording of him singing You Are My Sunshine, perfectly in tune with all of the words memorized, at Liam's age.

Liam? Not so much. Here is his rendition of the ABC Song:



Luckily, his monotone voice serves as a bit of a distraction from the fact that he has the lyrics totally wrong.
A B C F G
H L N M O P
L N M O
Q R S 2 and V
W X Y and Z
Now ABCs
Next time won’t sing with me?

On Becoming a Trace Adkins Fan

Am I the only one who watches The Celebrity Apprentice? I just watched Trace Adkins talk trash about the Backstreet Boys and I think that 20-second clip made the entire season worth watching.

Blue's Clues

I found some pants in my drawer yesterday that I don’t remember buying or owning. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, but I can’t tell if these pants are black or blue so I don’t know which shoes I can wear with them.

I did some detective work today, and I think my clues are telling me that the pants are blue. First of all, I found them in this drawer:


And not this drawer:


Apparently when I was deciding which pants should go in which drawer (back before I lost my memory), only black, gray, and denim were allowed in the dark pants drawer. Blue non-jeans were sent to the brown, green, and white drawer.

Next I did an Internet search to see if I could find my pants online. I don’t think Dickies makes this exact style anymore, but these are very similar:


You’ll notice that while the blue pants (left) are confusingly dark (dare I say almost black?), the black pants (right) are obviously not blue.

Now that I’m convinced that the pants are blue, a tiny shred of a memory is forming in my mind. I think I can actually remember buying them. I think I’ve even worn them before. Or maybe I’m just making up memories to compensate for the fact that I’m losing my mind at age 28.