Word of the Week: Otiose

otiose /adj./  lazy or indolent.  of no use.   ineffective or futile.  idle.  laggard.  slothful.  pointless.  profitless.  worthless.  hollow.  superfluous.

otiose /adj./  1.  I'm making myself write this post.  David, for one, wishes I would have written it yesterday.  (I had a rough night, all too terribly aware of my otiose homemaking efforts in the face of stupid and constant entropy.)  So here goes.  First the word itself.  Talk about otiose.  The "t" right in the middle of this word serves as a case in point, as it is pronounced "oh-shee-ohs."  That "t" seems equally lazy, ineffective, pointless, and superfluous.

otiose /adj./  2.  Ethan had three days off school this week and we had such an enjoyable time together, it made me wonder (yet again) if pre-K isn't a completely otiose endeavor.  But then I went to his parent-teacher conference and they showed me how week by week his ability to write his name has improved.  I got a little teary at his progress and even a little proud, despite myself.

otiose /adj./  3.  Caleb had his first official boy scout camp-out this week and David was good enough to go with him.  The camporee was held next to part of the Mormon Battalion trail and as part of the camp they did a 6 or 7 mile hike along the trail (through the middle of the desert) with stops and challenges along the way.  They came back hot and sunburned.  (I packed Caleb an otiose sweatshirt and long pants, instead of sunscreen.  Sounds about right.) 

 

otiose /adj./  4.  Thursday this week was "National Boss's Day."  (Which is quite an otiose minor holiday when you really think about it.)  But they celebrated it at the hospital.  When David came home with a balloon and goodies, Olivia asked incredulously, "You're the boss?"  When David smiled and said he was, Olivia commented that she had no idea. 

otiose /adj./  5.  Caleb is still working on his aerospace project, and I spent about eight otiose hours this weekend helping him with it.  I think I am quite possibly the most otiose "parent coach" ever (ineffective and worthless, not idle or lazy), and am just trying to figure out what we can come up with in 6 more weeks that will be worth standing up in front of a half dozen NASA scientists for.  We are still in the "life-support" stage (do you know how much water and oxygen 100 people use in 2 years time!), though we did make some progress yesterday as a group on the social/cultural/political aspects of the project.  Meanwhile, I am spending my "free time" reading articles about humanure...which is exactly what you think it is.

otiose /adj./  6.  On Saturday morning, while David and Caleb were at the scout camporee, the other kids and I helped out on an Eagle scout project, painting fire hydrants.  The kids were hesitant, at first, to spend their "play day" out in the hot sun doing "scouts" (Olivia says the word with particular revulsion), but all their protestations became otiose once they saw they got to wield their very own paintbrushes.  We had a great time, and even managed to keep most of the bright yellow, enamel-based paint on the actual hydrants...though there are a few obvious bits in David's car.  (David had the camera so you will just have to imagine our sweaty, paint-spotted faces grinning at you from behind a fire hydrant right here.)

This and That and an Appearance by CIM

Not much to say, but need to talk.  Be forewarned, this is mostly CIM at work.  I'm afraid RIM has flown north for the winter.

This:

This week Ethan only had to go to school on Monday and Tuesday and so we had an outing yesterday, to Target, then to Sweetcakes (our secret lunch spot), then to the museum, the library (of course), and finally the grocery store.  Ethan told me he wasn't bored the whole day. 

We're at my favorite part of the Book of Mormon in family scripture study.  Ether, chapter 2.  Though I'm crazy about chapters 3 and 6 as well.  After we had read the chapter, I tried to explain to the kids why I liked it so much.  I said it was like a metaphor for our lives, and asked them if they knew what a metaphor was.  Olivia raised her hand and said, "It doesn't use 'like' or 'as.'"  Correct darling.  (She's been doing metaphors and similes all week at school.)  And then I explained the metaphor and bore my testimony.  A pause for impact.  And then Olivia raised her hand again.  She asked, "Mom do you want to hear the simile I wrote?  The koala is as fluffy as a pillow."  I looked at David who was discretely grinning behind his book.  This is because he finds it charming that I would try to explain my metaphor to the children, and he finds it even more charming that the whole time I was talking, Olivia was thinking about koala bears.

Olivia had an impromptu tea party with her friends yesterday.  She dressed up, of course.  Complete with a hat.  But her bike had a flat.  Miraculously, I had a tube on the shelf and offered to change it for her.  She was skeptical, but agreed.  Halfway through the project I sent her on Savannah's bike because I am not nearly as handy as I thought I was.  An hour later (well-spent, no?) I had the tube changed and pumped up and Savannah took it on a test drive to the mailbox.  I congratulated myself on my brilliance and proceeded to clean up the tools and popped tube.  By the time I did that and went back to park Olivia's bike, could hear a soft hissing and found this:

Apparently I put a hole in the tube as I was putting the new one on her bike.  Which is a real shame.

That:

Savannah came home from school yesterday and said, "Hi, Mom.  You look pretty."  That made my day.

And David came home at 6:30.  That made me over the moon.  How's that for a metaphor? 

Last night was the final presidential debate. (Thank heavens.)  I cannot bear another word from either candidate.  David had it on while we were finishing dinner and I started answering the questions for the candidates.  They would uncanniliy say the exact same thing a few moments later.  Savannah's eyes got bigger and bigger.  She asked me how I knew what they were going to say.  That, my dear, is because I have heard it all too many times.  I can recite their speeches for them.  And that is why I cannot wait for election day.

An Appearance by CIM:

Last night there was nothing on TV (including the debate), and so David and I went to bed early and talked, which turned out not to be early after all and was, in fact, rather late once we finally went to sleep.  I started the discussion by unleashing CIM from her carefully controlled enclosure and telling David that I was desperately failing at everything, and I was pretty sure I never choose "best" when given a choice between good, better, and best, and by the way I was going to shut down my blog as well.  He tried to reasonably talk me through my crisis of confidence and eventually we ended up on safer ground talking about his life at the hospital.  And eventually CIM settled down and went to sleep.  And this is why I love that man.

Word of the Week: Fealty

fealty  /n./  faithfulness or devotion to a person, a cause, obligations, or duties.  allegiance.  loyalty.  fidelity.  constancy. 

fealty  /n./  1.  I loved thinking about this word this week, and after a rough couple of disconcerting weeks, this word reaffirmed my fealty to spotlighting a word-of-the-week.  For the record, fidelity is one of my favorite words of all time, and so perhaps it was natural that this week I developed a little crush on his velvety cousin.

fealty  /n./  2.  In our family scripture study, we are steadily making our way through the Book of Mormon, with big plans to finish before the end of the year.  This week as we were reading in Mormon, deep in the winding up scenes of the Nephite nation, Olivia suddenly caught on to what was going to happen.  Though we have read this book many times before, this is apparently the first time the story has really made sense for her.  Questioning my fealty to her security and happiness, on Wednesday morning she interruped our reading, outraged, "Wait a minute!  This book is not going to have a happy ending, is it?  Why would you have us read a book that doesn't have a happy ending?"  I smiled despite myself.  I confess I had never really thought about it that way.

fealty  /n./  3.  David had a rough week at the hospital, and because I am his loyal wife, this made a for a few rough moments of my own.  This is the price of fealty.  Occassionally there are moments, especially smack dab in the middle of budget season, where sincere fealty is the only thing helping him get up and head back to the hospital, particularly on days when he only just left his office five short hours before.  I kind of like the idea that fealty has a price, but the actual paying it is much less romantic.

fealty  /n./  4.  At the General Relief Society Meeting, a week or so ago, Sister Allred spoke about the temple.  As I sat in that meeting, I realized how long it had been since I had been to the temple, and I firmly recommitted to go more regularly.  (And in a stunning realization I also figured out that, for the first time in my life, I could go while my kids were at school and not even worry about a babysitter!  What in the world?)  So on Wednesday morning I went.  The overpowering feeling I had as I entered the House of the Lord was welcome.  Not rebuke.  Not disappointment.  Just love and welcome and joy.  And as I sat in His holy house, I was astounded by His fealty.  Despite my inconsistency and my wandering, his love and devotion are constant.

fealty  /n./  5.  Caleb swims with fealty for over an hour, four days a week, no matter the season or temperature.  Last year he swam these practices all year without going to one swim meet.  I promised him this year we would try to make it to a few swim meets.  He had his first one on Saturday between conference sessions and swam the 50 Butterfly and the 50 Free and a couple of relays.  He improved his freestyle time by over 9 seconds.  And it was such nice weather (cloudy and not even 90 degrees) and such a joy to watch him swimming, I wondered why I had been so hesistant to do more of these.

fealty  /n./  6.  We thoroughly enjoyed General Conference this past weekend.  It was, in every way, exactly what I needed.  I am so grateful for a living prophet and apostles who serve the Lord with absolute fealty and do all they can to lead and guide me and my family.   I would like to have their words and faith every single week, but instead I have decided to really hearken (listen and obey) to this conference.  At the end of conference we went around and told one thing we were going to try to do better.  Olivia said, "I thought I just had to listen.  I didn't know I had to think too."  She finally said that she was going to try to say her prayers every night.  To this, Caleb replied, "I pray every night.  I can't sleep unless I pray."  I didn't know whether to be happy or heartbroken about this revelation.  The truth is my family and I are deep in the wilderness, really and truly, and I am so glad for the light of the prophets that show us the way in the dark.  The word is so sweet to me.

The Opposite of Disconcerting is Concerting

All's well that ends well.

After a disconcerting beginning, the week ended well.  Here are a few of the highlights, in no particular order.  This is going to be quick and dirty because my house is, well...dirty.

1.  David took the girls to our ward's daddy-daughter camp-out on Friday night.    This is one of those things that only adds to my love affair with him.  He takes them every year, without fail and really spends time with them.  My girls love it.  They didn't get back until about 2 on Saturday afternoon and only then because Olivia was so excited to open her birthday presents.  I wish I had a picture of them, but I can easily imagine them in my mind, beaming all the way to the mountains.

They got a late start this year because David had a late budget meeting at the hospital, so they pumped up the air mattress and laid it in the back of the car instead of setting up the tent.  On Saturday morning the men in charge of the whole thing had brought BB guns and cups for the girls to shoot.  I know...I wouldn't have thought of that either.  But David just grinned when he was telling me about it and said that we really need to get some BB guns...apparently all of our kids are great shots.  He said we could hang cups and bottles from the trees in our backyard and let the kids shoot to their hearts content.  Of all the "wholesome recreational activities" out there, this is honestly one I have never considered.  Color me surprised.

2.  On Saturday night I met my mom at her stake center to watch the Relief Society General Broadcast from Salt Lake.  I just loved Elder Uchtdorf's talk.  It was exactly what I need to hear and, I thought, absolutely inspired in the way he talked about finding happiness through creation and compassion.  It seemed to raise most of the "ordinary" activities of my life into something much more exalted, and gave me a vision of what I'm really doing.  And I keep repeating the line, "Happiness is your heritage" to myself over and over.  It was a beautiful talk and I'm so happy to have heard it.

3.  A picture from my Saturday morning:

In addition to these three, I also made two lemon pies for Olivia.  Of all the pies, lemon is the most labor and time intensive.  But Olivia's effusive gratitude, makes the effort worth it every time.  There are two slices of the lemon left, and she and Caleb have plans to enjoy them as soon as they get home from school today.

4.  David and I had a long and lachrymose discussion with Caleb on Sunday afternoon.  The last month has been a bit emotional and difficult for him, and this has made living with him a bit more difficult as well.  We had a good talk on Sunday and he confessed that he has much more than he can handle on his plate right now and his stress level is very high.  David reminded all of us that Caleb is only in 5th grade, which made it easier to eliminate some of his heavy burdens in exchange for more play time.  This means that he is probably going to give up the aerospace project for this year (a hard one for him to let go of).  I went to bed feeling better about our relationship, but again wondering if I really have the skills to be a mother. 

5.  David brilliantly bought Olivia the first season of the Little House of the Prairie television show for her birthday and it has been running here ever since.  Can I say how fabulous it is?  I never saw this show growing up and was unfamiliar with it, but have been amazed at the wholesomeness and goodness of it, and absolutely astounded that it once played on national television.  So far we have seen the Ingalls family kneel in family prayer, go to church two times, learn lessons about keeping your word and the golden rule and charity.  When I compare this to what was offered from the networks on television this week, I am shocked, flummoxed, and disgusted by the changes that have occurred in my lifetime, and deeply saddened by the world my children face.  (see the last sentence of #4)  Give me strength.

Okay...admittedly those last two were a bit disconcerting, but for the most part we are determinedly moving on to "fealty."  Onward, ever onward...

A Decade of *Love* and *Happyness*

Olivia's had her birthday this weekend.  10 years old.  On her "wish list" she listed a number of things and then, at the bottom in big letters she listed:

Love!

Happyness!!

This is just so Olivia.  From the sentiments to the misspelling to the exclamation points.  This is my girl.

This week we saw an overdue expectant mother from our church congregation walking through our neighborhood, walking through her contractions and trying to get something going.  It reminded me so much of Olivia's entrance into the world.  We were living in San Diego at the time, near a golf course.  And I was so uncomfortably miserable near the end, David would take me out and make me walk that golf course.  We walked for miles and miles.  I told Olivia this week that it didn't work, it only made me tired.  The day she was born I awoke to contractions about 4 and tried to lay quietly so I didn't wake David.  At about 5:30 or 6, I woke David and told him my water broke.  He said, "Are you sure?"  I don't know why he always asks me that.  I'm always sure.  Olivia arrived a couple of hours later.

And she brought love and happyness with her.

Here is a top ten list of some of my favorite things about this darling girl:

1.  She has a great sense of humor.  Really great.  Around our dinner table, she is nothing short of hilarious.  David and I just sit and grin at each other over our water glasses.  The other day she did this impression of a chicken talking to a chicken salad that had us busting.

2.  Olivia is (without question) the most empathetic person I know.  The day I got released from my young women's calling she sobbed all through sacrament meeting for me.

3.  She is desperately in love with Laura Ingalls Wilder.  I find this absolutely charming.  And I can't wait to introduce her to Anne.

4.  Olivia loves to watch David and I kiss.  She starts hanging around when she knows David is about to arrive home, just so she can catch us.  She takes pretend pictures while we kiss and then closes her eyes and says, "Ahhhh."  This makes David and I both quite nervous about her dating years.

5.  She makes pretend quote marks in the air for everything and anything.  I find this hilarious and terribly endearing. 

6.  Of all my children, Olivia gets in trouble the most at school, usually for talking.  Last year she sat next to a boy named Willy and she would regularly "have her card pulled" for talking to him.  When I would ask her about it, she would say something like, "Oh Mom, I had to tell him how nice his handwriting looked.  He was doing such a good job."  This always took the wind out of whatever I was going to say.  I once suggested that she wait until recess to encourage Willy, but she told me that he needed it right then.  (see #2)

7.  Olivia was born to be a mother.  She mothers everything.  She mothers all her friends and all her "enemies."  I'm often sorry that I'm the mom when she is so clearly the natural at it. 

8.  Olivia loves anything lemon.  Her birthday request is always lemon pie, and I took lemon muffins to school on Friday for her birthday celebration. 

9.  Olivia has only recently started liking chocolate.  For years she would pull the chocolate chips out of her cookies until I started making a plain batch just for her.  At kids quilt retreat this year she said seriously, "Chocolate changes people."  (see #1)

10.  Olivia loves seafood.  Tonight we had Garlic Shrimp Linguine and candles and toasted the birthday girl.  We went around the table and told all the reasons we love her and reminisced her birth.  Olivia did all the funny lines.  She's heard it before.  And then she had two pieces of lemon pie. 

Happy birthday, Livy.

I hope it was full of love and happyness.

Word of (Two) Weeks: Disconcerting

disconcerting  /adj./  upsetting the composure of.  frustrating.  causing a person to be self-consciously distressed.  embarrassing or confusing.  mortifying.  bewildering.  being thrown for a loop.

disconcerting  /adj./  1.  For whatever reason, this has always been one of my favorite words.  I love a word that is (all by itself) a little revelation of its definition.  You can feel it's mortifying unease as the syllables break apart and switch directions on the way out of your mouth.  So I was excited to spotlight it, but forgot about the uncanny and disconcerting way the word-of-the-week determines my destiny.  As Amy commented: "last week when I saw "disconcerting" I knew it didn't bode well."  I wish I had had the same sense.

disconcerting  /adj./  2.  As I type this, it is disconcerting to realize that I can hardly remember back two weeks.  I remember I was going to comment on the disconcerting economy, the disconcerting lack of sagacious national leaders, the disconcerting speed that entropy takes over in my house, and the disconcerting bad grades my children continue to bring home in math and spelling.  I am starting to get the disconcerting feeling that I have very little "real control" over anything.

disconcerting  /adj./  3.  Last Saturday I volunteered myself and David (he was briefly disconcerted by this) for the Prop 102 campaign.  Here in Arizona there is a proposition on the November ballot to change the Arizona constitution to say that "only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state."  So we went and worked at a phone bank for about three hours on Saturday afternoon to poll registered voters about how they were voting and encourage those in support of the proposition to be sure to vote.  Admittedly this was a bit scary calling people I didn't know, and there were a few disconcerting calls, but for the most part I felt good about doing what we could to hold the moral fabric of our state together.  Plus, I thought that being a "political activist" might make me that much more attractive to David.  He now reports that I'm irresistible.

disconcerting  /adj./  4.  Caleb decided to enter an aerospace contest with some of his friends from school, in which they have to make a model of a space station for 100 people to live on for 2 years.  He asked me to be the "parent coach."  It has been a bit disconcerting to discover all the variables he has to address in the project:  food, water, power, oxygen, waste removal including carbon dioxide, the effects of weightlessness, docking, communication, radiation protection, and the list goes on.  This week we worked on air supply (that seemed like the most critical first step).  We made some progress, but quite frankly, I'm a bit overwhelmed with the magnitude of the project and secretly think Caleb would find it disconcerting to discover that I got a C in my organic chemistry class.  I'm seriously considering flying him out to his grandpa's house for a crash chemistry course.

disconcerting  /adj./  5.  Caleb and Olivia performed their musical number (Olivia singing, Caleb on the violin) in sacrament meeting at church this last Sunday.  It went well until the disconcerting moment when Olivia stopped singing.  She just stood there as Caleb finished the song and later said through her tears that she "just went blank."  I hugged her and assured her that it was beautiful and no one could tell that that wasn't how it was supposed to be.  So many people came up afterwards and told her how well she did that she was on cloud nine before we left church.  On the way home she told us that the bad part was forgetting the words, but the good part was all the compliments.  She kept track.  And counted 37.

disconcerting  /adj./  6.  The end of my canning season came this week.  Last week I made what I thought would be a year's supply of raspberry jam, but then made the disconcerting discovery that this wouldn't be near enough, when my family finished off an entire bottle at dinner that night.  And I was also a bit disconcerted when, after kissing David hello and after having him admire my jamming, he said offhandedly, "So what did you do today?"  Um.  Do you want to rethink that question?

And in a wholly brave move, I tried canning spaghetti sauce this year.  (I usually just do the tomatoes halved, but I had 60extra pounds of romas and decided to try something new.)  I find the process of box to sauce to jar nothing short of miraculous.  The only disconcerting thing about it was that these babies turned out to be about $5 a jar.  (Don't ask me how Prego does it, but I'm suspecting it might not all be real tomatoes in there?  How's that for disconcerting?)  My only consolation was that I added real sausage to the sauce as well, so it's ready to go as is.  I was admittedly proud of the endeavor, despite the disconcerting price tag. 

  

disconcerting  /adj./  7.  I got a UTI this weekend and if you don't know what that is, then you have been blessed and you can blissfully skip this definition, because the rest of this won't make sense.  All Sunday I kept having that disconcerting feeling that it was coming and then by evening I was completely miserable and David ran to the pharmacy for antibiotics.  I didn't feel like myself until Wednesday and then had to face my house, which nearly took the wind out of my sails again.  It was a disconcerting combination of the regular weekly mess plus two serious days of neglect, not to mention the laundry, some of which I had to wash twice, because people had just walked over it rather than wearing it or (heaven forbid) folding it after I washed it the first time.  It is nice to know I'm needed, but a bit disconcerting to think about how these darlings would survive without me.

Word of the Week: Sagaciously

sagaciously  /adv./  with acute mental discernment or keen practical sense.  shrewdly.  wisely.  sagely.  intelligently or keenly.  perceptively.  prudently.  judiciously.  cleverly. 

[torridly:  /adv./  with intense heat, subjecting something to scorching heat.  with so much heat as to be parching.  very passionately.  ardently.  zealously.] 

sagaciously  /adv./  1.  Last week when I posted the new word of the week on my sidebar, I had every intention of spotlighting the word "torridly," but when I went to type in the definition I started having second thoughts and ended up with the word "sagaciously," which is ironic since this was not a wise choice in any way.  I lived my entire week "torridly" and not a bit "sagaciously."  So in the most sagacious move of the week,  I'm going to sneak "torridly" in here as well.  This is also ironic since the passionate little "torridly" has never snuck anywhere before.

sagaciously  /adv./  2.  I spent lots of hours this week in my kitchen "putting up peaches for winter." (This is how Caleb refers to my canning and I LOVE it.)  The big question is always how many boxes to buy.  This year I sagaciously bought three for canning and one for eating.  This seemed to be about right, as I only really enjoy canning for about three boxes, any more than that and it starts to feel like a chore.  My favorite part is the eating though.  We've had peaches at every meal since I picked these up.  They are so good, and I've been torridly filling bowl after bowl of them for me and my darlings.  Yesterday we had them with whipped cream on top of our pancakes.  The kids asked what holiday it was.  It's peach season, lovelies.

sagaciously  /adv./  3.  The lady who sells me Utah peaches also has an in with the tomato farmers up there.  She had a couple of  boxes of gorgeous beefsteak tomatoes for sale and even though I'm getting three boxes of romas this week, I just couldn't help myself.  When I wasn't eating peaches this week, I was torridly eating tomatoes on crusty bread.  (September is quickly replacing November as my favorite month.)  I canned all the ones we didn't eat and sagaciously decided to make spaghetti sauce with the romas.     

sagaciously  /adv./  4.  Olivia finished her latest Laura Ingalls Wilder book a couple of weeks ago and has been positively destitute without something to read.  I sagaciously pointed out that she has shelves full of books she hasn't read yet, but she is madly in love with Laura and couldn't bear to start something new.  I finally took her to the bookstore on Thursday afternoon after her viola lesson and she has been torridly reading ever since.  She almost wouldn't let go of the book long enough for the man to ring it up.  Every night as I tuck her in she gives me the update.  (Mary's on her way to college and Laura's working in town, by the way.  They had to sell the calf for Mary to go.  I thought Olivia was going to swoon when she told me they were going to buy Mary a trunk.  "A trunk, Mom, a trunk!  Oh, can you imagine having a trunk?") 

sagaciously  /adv./  5.  I found out (through sagacious deduction) that our water softener hasn't been working since we moved into the house.  We've been here nearly three years, but I'm just discovering this.  Anyway, on Saturday I asked David to replace the salt in the softener so that we could turn it on.  He did and we ran the cycle and felt quite proud of ourselves.  Then the water pressure in the kitchen faucet and the shower went to practically nothing and the water softener, which hadn't run for three years, started leaking all over the garage.  I decided I was perfectly fine with "hard water."  We spent part of Sunday trying to stop the leaks and fix the pressure, but didn't get it all solved until last night.  This is how home improvement projects go at our house.  I not-so sagaciously think something will be easy, and it's always a hundred times more work and complication than it's worth.  It is only an indication of how torridly David loves me that he agrees to any of these projects in the first place.

sagaciously  /adv./  6.  David and I went out to dinner on Saturday night at our favorite restaurant.  (I sagaciously ordered the Oscar medallion with blue crab on top, oh my.)  And then we stopped by the grocery store on our way home.  A good date night always includes a torrid stop for bread and milk.  I find David loading the car with groceries among the most romantic of gestures.

sagaciously  /adv./  7.  You do not want to know how my gospel doctrine lesson went on Sunday.  I stand up there dying a little death with every word that comes out of my mouth.  But I have sagaciously formulated a new plan.  I told David I need him to get a substitute next time I teach so he can come and hear it.  I need his gorgeous, blue eyes looking at me, torridly telling me that no matter what I'm saying he thinks I'm H.O.T. Hot.  He said he'd see what he could do. 

Word of the Week: Burgeon

burgeon  /vt./  to grow or develop quickly, flourish.  to bloom or blossom.  effloresce.  expand.  thrive.  flower.  snowball.  sprout. 

burgeon  /vt./  1.  I need to get this post written, as this word's life and influence is quickly burgeoning into my current week.  And may I just say that I love a word that can be defined by both a snowball and a flower.  Clever word.  You can feel it's anxious, growing, proud self in the first syllable.

burgeon  /vt./  2.  David's love of politics has burgeoned from a sweet little crush to an all-out obsession.  I have felt a bit like a "football wife" for the past, oh, ten months or so, but it has been particularly bad this last week.  He has Fox News on his Blackberry 24/7 these days and he was cheering and clapping and yelling so loudly during Sarah Palin's speech this week that the kids got out of bed to see what all the excitement was about.  (In his defense, she is quite fabulous.)  He's even given up sleeping-in on Sunday mornings (gasp!) to watch the political shows.  That election cannot come soon enough. 

burgeon  /vt./  3.  My sister, Rachel, and I taught another of our body image classes last week and we have another one tonight and two more scheduled in the coming weeks.  I cannot explain the burgeoning popularity of the class, but we are so happy to teach it whenever we can to get the message out.  Though the more we give it, the more we see what amateurs we really are.  Really, you'd think our confidence would burgeon the more times we give it, but I think both of us are just more and more aware of our flaws.  I told her this last week that the one really great thing about it is that we get to spend more time together.  That part is admittedly delightful.

burgeon  /vt./  4.  Savannah was baptized this week and Olivia was unaccountably emotional about it.  As I was blow-drying Olivia's hair on Saturday afternoon the tears burgeoned to overflowing.  She finally threw her arms around Savannah's neck and sobbed, "I'm just so proud of you Savannah.  You make me so happy."  I cannot believe my luck in catching this moment on film.  Savannah's look so perfectly captures her bafflement at her sister's emotional (and decidedly lachrymose) moment.

burgeon  /vt./  5.  Much to my delight, Caleb and Olivia performed a musical number at Savannah's baptism, "When I Am Baptized."  Caleb played his violin and Olivia sang.  I accompanied them on the piano.  They did so well, despite the sheer terror (as Rachel described it) that Olivia experienced just before she opened her mouth.  I love to see my children's talents burgeon and flourish.  They have been asked to do the number in sacrament meeting in a few weeks.  Olivia has been quite conflicted about this invitation, vacillating between burgeoning fear and happy pride. 

I didn't have a picture of their musical number, but David sent me an email earlier today letting me know that I had neglected to include his favorite picture in the baptism post...I'm including it here, for him.

burgeon  /vt./  6.  Olivia had her first viola lesson this week and was bursting and burgeoning with uncontainable excitement.  Her teacher is a woman named Marie with a charming eastern European accent.  When I picked Olivia up she said, nodding at Olivia's joy-infused face, "Oh, she's just vonderful."  And so the practicing has begun in earnest, and I am aware of a burgeoning acknowledgement (again) that I should listen to my children...apparently they do know what they want.

*Boy Howdy* Revisted

As a follow up to yesterday's post...here are a few more things I don't know:

This morning at scripture study we were reading 3rd Nephi, chapter 11...when Jesus visits the Nephites.

Savannah asked (about resurrection), "But how does that work?  I mean, I don't get it.  How exactly does our body actually come back to life?"

And then Olivia, "And how old are we going to be?  I hope I'm nine.  I want to be nine forever.  Can I be nine when I'm resurrected?"

And among these imponderables, there was also this.  Do you remember this quote by Sister Hinckley?

"...the only way to get through life is to laugh your way through it.  You either have to laugh or cry.  I prefer to laugh.  Crying gives me a headache."

This morning my head and cheekbones and swollen eyelids wonder why (especially given my lifetime of experience) I still haven't learned this.

V is for Viola and V5

Yesterday I went downtown with Olivia to rent a viola.  I know.  (Rest assured that RIM has already given me the lecture about good money after bad and all that.) But the girl would not be deterred.  We got her a viola and signed her up with a teacher for lessons, because as long as I'm throwing away money renting the instrument, I might as well throw away some more helping her actually learn how to play it. 

She was over the moon...hugging and polishing it the rest of the night.  And then this morning as Caleb was practicing the violin, she pulled out her viola and started "fiddling" away on random strings.  And we could hear her asking Caleb and Savannah, "Does that sound good?"  and then "How about this?  Doesn't that sound good at all?"  (I think the viola actually does have a very lovely, dark, chocolatey sound.)  She can't wait to get started.  Of course it's the "boring middle" and the "excruciating end" that I'm worried about.

And then this morning, a friend from our ward called and said they would sell us their daughter's viola for $35.  Sold!  They got it off Ebay.  I was complete astonishment.  I would never be brave enough to buy an instrument off Ebay...that is a world I neither understand nor trust, but there you go.

In other "V" news, squarespace recently changed their website version from V4 to V5, and while I appreciate their efforts to make my life easier, this has not actually resulted in making my life easier.   I had to reformat my blog (which you may have noticed) and David told me that it no longer all appears on his computer screen at once, that he has to scroll over to see it all...is this universal? In addition, my personal computer is having memory issues and is running slower than usual and so my pages are loading slowly...again, I'm wondering if this is universal.  I'd love some feedback...is my blog loading slower for you and can you see it all on one screen?  And I think I've finally re-figured out how to load pictures, but David also said that they sometimes load excruciatingly slow on his computer as well...and, as an aside, he said he also misses the pink typewriter.  I reminded him (in my sweetest voice) that it is my blog.  He said he was just saying.  Anyway, I'm wondering how V5 is for the rest of you.

Well, I've now used "excruciating" two times in a post written on normal, uneventful Wednesday morning.  I think my work here is done.