Internal Enforcement

The last little while the girls have been pretty good about staying in their beds at night. Emma still stays up forever, but she doesn't come out until the other girls are asleep and sometimes not at all. Anyway, I was chalking it up to the fact that school started and they were more tired. Apparantly I was wrong.

Last night I was informed of a new program of internal enforcement being run by Kate. She said, " Mom I started something with the girls like my music teacher does at school. I have this bag with lots of my favorite toys and I give the girls 100 pts. at the beginning of the night and they lose them for being crazy and stuff. Whoever has the most points at the end of the night gets to pick something out of my bag and play with it all day the next day."

I guess whatever works. Emma was pretty excited today because she got to play with one of Kate's Bratz dolls. And they definitely have been better. Someday Kate will take over the house but as long as she cleans it I don't mind.

Tagged Twice

I've read both Amy's and Kaylynn's blogs and I'm all about worksheets.

Jobs I have held:
1. Deseret News papergirl-started at the age of 7
2. McDonalds-crew and manager (People can be mean)
3. EFY counselor(1st time east of Wyoming)
4. Daycare worker at Deer Valley (watched Cheech Marovich's kids)
5. BYU Writing, Reading, and Computer Center Tutor (Best job ever!)
6. BYU guest services grunt worker (I drove vans and told people to go home at dances if their shorts were too short) (met my best girl friend and she convinced me to move into her apartment and out of my parents' house, where I then met John, so life-changing)
7. 7th grade English and Science teacher at Centennial Middle School (Loved the kids, hated disciplining-pretty much the story of my life)
8. Slave to 5 Taskmasters (John said I should throw that one in)

Movies I can watch again and again:
1. Pride and Prejudice (A&E version) and again and again...I think John can quote parts of it whether he likes it or not but he did buy it for me.
2. Emma(Gwynneth Paltrow) Mr. Knightley-the model for the perfect man when I was single
3. What a Girl Wants-I like the music
4. While You Were Sleeping
5. You've Got Mail
6. Anne of Green Gables
7. Ella Enchanted
8. Any Jane Austen movie
9. Scarlet Pimpernel
10. The Quiet Man

Guilty Pleasures:
1. McDonalds Coke and Quarter cheeseburger
2. Going out to eat almost anywhere as long as it is good
3. Leaving my kids and going to the library or shopping for hours
4. John getting me a Coke Slurpee

Places I have lived
1. Orem
2. Provo
3. Buffalo (I'm counting my summer visits because it makes me feel not so pathetic)

Shows I enjoy:
1. Star Trek Voyager
2. Star Trek First Generation
3. Smallville
4. Amazing Race
5. Scarecrow and Mrs. King

Web sites I visit Daily (or whenever I make it to the computer):
1. John's blog--you never know what he's going to say
2. Everyone's blogs that he has linked on his website
3. Provo library website
4. Pliget.net(my friend kaylyn's website)
5. My email

Body parts I have injured:
1. My skull-I got a concussion in a bus accident
2. Nothing else--so opposites really do marry

Nick Names:
1. Big T
2. Mommy

Person who Tagged me:
Kay and Amy

People I tag:
Anyone who wants to bare all

Shoe shopping

I took the girls shopping for shoes yesterday--Emma, Kate, and Mary. I had promised Kate and Mary that I would buy them new sandals for the summer, and since the summer was half way over I thought it was high time to go shopping. I took them to Walmart where all their girls' sandals were on clearance so I gave them free rein to pick out their own (they were all in my price range). Anyway, I think they tried on shoes for about an hour. Kate especially had a hard time deciding. Mary found some super flip flops that were very chic and pretty much settled on them. Emma, who wasn't supposed to be getting shoes because I already bought her some, couldn't handle it after watching her sisters try on shoes for a half an hour. She joined in and found some that looked so cute that I couldn't help getting them (hey it was clearance!). Anyway I see in my future many hours spent in shoe store with 5 girls. I'm glad I like to read. Next time I'm bringing a book.

Leaning Tower of Emma

Emma's into sculpture too. Hers was considerably less messy, but as you can see, she was just as proud. (The older girls couldn't believe Emma had done this by herself, they thought I had done it.) The things that happen when you turn your back for a minute.

Payne Metropolitan Museum of Art

So maybe Ruth's problem is that she is very artistic. She sees art everywhere. Today her medium was yogurt and silverware. We like to call this sculpture, "How to make Mom crazy with only some forks and a thing of yogurt." I think the process was something like take all the silverware out of the drawer (and I do mean all, you can't see it but the silverware tray is sitting on the floor too, completely empty with a few dollups of yogurt for good measure). Then dip each in yogurt and then arrange them artistically in and around the yogurt container with a few swipes of yogurt surrounding it on the floor to frame the creation.

On the positive side, it was a relatively fast clean up. I picked up the yogurt container and the silverware, threw them in the sink, and wiped the little bit of yogurt up. It took only about 2 minutes after I had stopped hyperventilating.

Calvin and Hobbes over the years

When I was in high school and college I loved Calvin and Hobbes. I thought it was the funniest thing out there. Every day I would get the BYU newspaper just so I could read the latest C&H comic strip. The day Bill Waterston announced he wasn't doing the comic strip anymore was a very sad day in my life.

Anyway, I haven't really read Calvin and Hobbes in years. We have a couple of the books but I rarely pull them out and read them, although when I do I still think it is hilarious. But then a couple of weekends ago my ward had a little mini women's conference that I went to. One of the topics was about dealing with kids. She used a lot of Calvin and Hobbes strips to illustrate her points. She said she used to think Calvin was funny until she realized she had become his mom. Then some of the things were funny in a different way or not quite as funny at all. It's true. When you look at it from the perspective of the parents, it is a little different.

Kate recently decided she really likes Calvin and Hobbes so she's been reading all the books, and she thinks they are hilarious. She reads me her favorite ones sometimes and I couldn't believe how much they reminded me of people. So here is one of my favorites (I'd do more but I can't figure it out):

MY KIDS

I had this great one about little boys flying for Evan but I can't figure out how to get it from my scanner to here. Sorry!

Las Vegas

John and I went to Las Vegas for a vacation last week. John's sister Melissa was kind enough to come and watch all the girls for us, which they loved. John had a convention down there for work so it was a great opportunity for us to go on a trip together with little expense(BYU paid for the car to drive down in, the hotel, and $60/day for meals). We just had to pay for extra stuff.

Anyway it was really fun. I took a whole bunch of sewing and scrapbooking stuff and just basically sat in the air conditioned, kid-free hotel room and worked on my stuff. I had a whole bunch of snack food so I just munched until John would come back and then we would go and find something real to eat. John also left me his laptop so I could watch dvds. I watched all of the A&E Pride and Prejudice(probably my favorite show). I also listened to a whole book on tape while doing scrapbooking(it was easier because I didn't always have to be looking up to see a movie, I could just listen to the story and get more done.) It was very relaxing.

John and I also went to the wave pool/lazy river in the hotel one day, the shark reef exhibit, the Coke and M&M museum, and one night we went to ESPNzone for dinner and another night to Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville(that night was an HP party, lots of booze that we passed on but lots of great food too). So I did do a few things but I'm not really one to go walking around a strange city by myself so I was perfectly content in the hotel room.

The question I always get when I go on a trip like this with John is, "Didn't you miss your kids?" And I honestly have to say, "Not really." I hope that doesn't make me a terrible mother, but I knew my kids were having a great time too and that they were in good hands. They LOVE Missy and don't get to see her that often so it was fun for them too. They could barely stop having fun long enough to talk to John and I on the phone. I did have some nightmares that I was forgetting to feed Lily when I slept in in the morning, so maybe I missed them subconciously, but I'm glad we could all have fun. I was glad to see them when we got home, but I have to say, being able to get up in the morning and not immediately change 3 girls' diapers was pretty nice. Ah well, I have lots to look forward to in the future.

How my mind works, or what I think about in the shower

When I was a kid I had a small paper route. Now I liked the money and the exercise, but the monotony of it got to me sometimes. Everyday when I went out I would calculate as I went along how much I had left. It would go something like this, "I've delivered 3/21 papers. That reduces down to 1/7. I am 1/7th of the way done. I have 6/7th of the way to go." Each paper I would figure out the fraction of what I had done, and the fraction of what I had left. It kept me entertained while I did the route. But you can imagine that doing that almost every day of the year for almost 5 years made me really good at reducing fractions and finding common multiples and stuff like that.

So a couple of weeks ago, I was sitting in the shower thinking, "I wonder how old John will be this year on his birthday... oh yeah, 32. Let's see. 32 isn't a prime number. It reduces down to 2^5. It would be great if we had someone that was 2. Oh yeah, Ruth is turning 2. This is great! John is 2^5 and Ruth is 2^1. We've got to have an exponents party. John will love this. I'll throw a surprise party." I was actually laughing out loud. I know, I'm weird. But John loves me.

Well, after further considering, I decided I could never pull off a surprise party without John finding out so I told him my idea. He did love it. He's probably the only husband around who would think that was great. But that's why I love him. He loves math and I love math (to a point).

Anyway so we sent out these invitations and had a grand old time. We saw lots of people we hadn't seen in a long time and the girls got to play for a long time.

And that's an insight into my thinking patterns that you probably didn't need but there you are.

Kid's Music

The girls and I really enjoy listening to music. Fortunately, our public library has a great kids' music collection. There's a lot of great kids music out there but there is also a lot of bad kids music. So here are a few of our favorite artists. (By great I mean it doesn't annoy the heck out of you to listen to it with your kids, or that John will actually listen to it.)

Justin Roberts--we love all of his cd's that we've listened to so far. He has a great song called "Meltdown" where the kids meltdown and then the mom does too. I really related to this song. His music is a lot of rhythm, guitar and a little brass. But I have to say that I know most of the words to the songs we have and I don't mind when they go running through my head.

Laurie Berkner--Clever lyrics and great rhythm. Sometimes her music grows on you. At first I don't always love it, but after a few listens I always do.

Jessica Harper--Great rhythm and good lyrics. It is hard to listen to her music without tapping your feet.

Jon Lithgow--I know you're probably thinking, "Isn't he the Third Rock from the Sun guy?" And yes, he is. But he also has several children's cd's and they are hilarious. He redoes a lot of old big band songs and then has quite a few that he's written. His is big band style and he actually has a great voice. He is one of our favorites and even John likes his stuff. His voice always makes me want to laugh (in a good way).

VeggieTales--You gotta love these guys. We do. "We are the pirates who don't do anything", "Bald Bunny" and "Billy Joe McGuffrey"(otherwise known as John's life story) are our favorites. There's also a little ditty called "Steak and Shrimp" on the Jonah cd that John and the girls like to listen to over and over.

Anyway, there you have it, our kid's music picks. The girls also LOVE Disney's Cheetah Girls, but it is ultra girl power so if you don't have all girls in your house it might not go over as well. I actually had to give the girls the "boys are OK" talk after we had listened to this cd a little too much.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you my little secret. There a website called emusic.com that is kind of like a napster thing. Anyway, they don't really have anything normal (by my standards, sorry if I've offended anyone) but funny enough they have a lot of kids music. I think they work mostly with independent labels and that's where a lot of kid's music gets made. Anyway they have an introductory deal where you can download so many songs for free. I did that and got a lot for my ipod that we really like and then I canceled so they really didn't make any money. Oh well at least they got some free advertising right here.

The Emma-verse

I'm sure if you read John's blog you've encountered the Emma-verse. I'm here to say that it is all true. And some day I'll be telling this tale behind bars. Here's an example:

One day we were running around in the car and we were listening to a children's cd from the library by Ella Jenkins. She's a folk singer from the 60's and does a lot of folk music. We listened to the whole cd and it was all right. BUT one of the songs had like a third verse that went something like "Kiss me Mama, Don't beat me Mama, Not a bucket to sell." So what thing do you think Emma chose to learn and repeat out of all 13 songs and 60 minutes of music. Her and Mary start singing this song and I'm not really paying attention in the car. Then we go into the grocery store and they both start singing that line over and over, very heartfelt, and Emma at the top of her lungs. Emma even threw in a few, "Beat me Mama, Don't kiss me, Mama" improvisations just for fun. I tried to be calm and ask them if we couldn't please sing something else. After a while they complied but I could tell that Emma really wanted to keep singing. Needless to say I got a few weird looks and the cd went back to the library. (I would just like to point out that I don't beat my children, although sometimes I'm tempted.)