BYU sleep stories

I was reading BYUMagazine and they had a section where you could send in sleep stories. Unfortunately, about par for the course, I was reading it about 6 months too late so it was too late to submit any but I have some good ones.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love to sleep. My roommates used to make fun of me because I could fall asleep anywhere, anytime. And I don't think there was a class in high school or college that I didn't sleep in at least once. And you probably don't want to hear my driving stories, they'd scare you. But here are two of my best school related stories.

First, when I was a junior in high school I had Pre-calculus last period. My teacher was a nice guy and everything but he tended to drone a little. He made me want to go to sleep after about 5 minutes of listening to him. Unfortunately, he seated people alphabetically and for some reason that put me front row on the last row by the door for the whole year. This was unfortunate because that was exactly where his podium was that he stood behind to lecture. I could not have been closer to him if I had tried. Now, being the polite person I am, I tried my darndest to stay awake. He wasn't a bad teacher, just monotone. But in spite of all my efforts, the only thing I remember about that class was sleeping every day all while he talked and waking up just in time to do my homework when he sent us to work.

I know, this isn't all that funny but here's the kicker, I was going through my high school stuff a few weeks ago looking for something and I found a certificate for Student of the Month from that same Pre-Calculus teacher. I laughed for about 10 minutes. I'm not sure what he was using for his selection criteria but it definitely wasn't "# of minutes in class with your eyes open", maybe it was more like, "ability to still get good grades even though you haven't heard a word I've said". Who knows?

Second, about my third year at BYU, I had an upper level French grammar class. Now this was when I was still considering French as a minor and had delusions about my ability with the language. Anyway, it turned out not so good in a number of ways. First of all it was right after lunch, my #1 hardest time to stay awake. Second, it was taught by a native French speaker who talked about a mile a minute. I think I understood about 10% of what he was saying. Third, it was full of returned French-speaking missionaries who also all spoke fluently. Now in my own defense, I could read French really well and knew my grammar 100% better than most of the missionaries but I just didn't have their experience with spoken French.

Anyway, all of these things added up to a whole lot of sleeping in that class. My brain would spend about 5 minutes trying to understand and then shut down and I would fall asleep. So one day I was 90% asleep, sprawled in my desk, and my brain caught a word I knew. The teacher was asking for a translation of a particular word (and had been waiting for a few minutes with no answer) and none of the missionaries knew it because it was something used mostly in written French. I had learned the word the semester before in a French literary class. I perked up, raised my hand and gave the English translation as soon as I was called on. Without missing a beat my French professor purred, "Ahhhhh, I knew it. Madamoiselle White dreams in French."

You can't argue with that

You Are Cheesecake

Rich, sweet, and simply perfect. You're not boring - you're just the best!

What Dessert Are You Most Like?

Too Subtle for Me

Ok, a little background is required to fully appreciate this story. I periodically bug John to put in writing what he likes about me. This is extremely difficult for him. He is very, very, very good at showing me he loves me by doing things for me so I'm not really complaining, I just happen to be a very verbal person and so every once in a while this pops up. This year around our anniversary and my birthday was one of those times. Anyway, so John gave me two books for my birthday. Now I love to receive books for presents, but sometimes when I get them it demotivates me in reading them because, hey, I own them and could read them anytime. (You know in case I was snowed into my house for a week and couldn't get to the library, I would definitely need something to read.) Anyway, so needless to say I didn't read the books. I put them on my bedstand with the other books I intend to read and would look at them every now and then and think, I really ought to read those books. They look like very good books. I think John made a couple of obscure comments about how he was glad that I "eventually" got to the books he bought me. (Which I do by the way, it just takes me a while, especially when I'm not reading that much anyway.)

So fast forward to this morning. I was kind of grumpy this morning. I stayed up way too late last night and was really tired. This combined with a couple of stinky diapers and screaming girls made for one not happy me. I was laying on my bed thinking I needed to be more happy when I saw those books. I thought maybe some uplifting reading would get me in a little better mood. I started reading the first book and got like 15 pages into it and found a little paper that had the date of my birthday on it and one thing John appreciated about me. I thought that's interesting, I don't remember reading that before. So I started flipping through the book and about every 20 pages there was another little paper that said something else he appreciated about me. I couldn't believe it. I looked at the other book and sure enough every few pages there was a little paper. I was shocked. Here was the list I had requested months ago and I didn't even know it. I might not have read those books for a while (years actually) and missed it. At first I had a fleeting thought that maybe these were books that he gave me last year. But when I looked at the date it was this year, phew! It only took me 3 months to get it. My next thought was what a turkey (in a good way) John was. I could have been mad at him that whole time and he would never have said anything even though he had done the requested thing. I wasn't but I thought that was a pretty big gamble. Anyway, it did make me happy and laugh. I do like surprises and John sure is full of them. He's a good guy. Maybe it was just his little way of motivating me to read books sooner.

Incidentally, one of the last pieces of paper said, "I'm glad that you eventually read all the books I buy you." Ha Ha. Very funny. He is funny. But maybe a little too subtle for me sometimes.

Writing Emma and Reading Ruth

Emma and Ruth are obsessed. Emma with writing and Ruth with reading. Emma first. Emma really wants to learn how to write. She copies everything she sees. She copies out whole books. One day she showed me a sheet and told me she was "practicing her letters". All the letters were run together so it took me a minute to pick out words but I finally realized that she had been copying the computer screen. The girls had been playing one of their computer games and it had been left on the menu screen, so Emma had copied things like "options" and "start game". It was really funny. She always signs her name on everything too, but usually in mirror image. I think it is because she is left-handed or something. If I ask her to do it the right way, she does but she prefers the other way. I was talking to my visiting teacher and she said that she and two of her siblings were left-handed and they always wrote things backwards when they were first learning. She said she still reads clocks backwards. I don't know. But Emma is intent. She found an old spiral notebook of mine and she said it was her long lost notebook and has been diligently writing in it everyday. She also found an old folder that my mom gave her and she is filling it with paper so she can practice her writing. I asked her what she wanted for Christmas if she could only have one toy or thing. Her answer: I need some more paper for my folder so I can practice writing. I said, "You want that more than any toy, like a littlest pet shop or something?" "Yea, Mom. I need more paper!" Whatever. Paper's cheap and writing is good. At least it keeps her busy. I just wish she didn't have to write all over the house sometimes, but you got to take the good with the bad.

Then there is Ruth. Ruth wants to read, bad. She spends hours a day sitting with a huge stack of books just going through them. When I asked her what she wanted for Christmas, she just said, "Books." She loves to look at them all and then stack them. She doesn't like them to be on shelves. She would much rather have them in little piles all over the house. I find little piles everywhere. And she will read anything. It doesn't have to have pictures. She still meticulously looks at every page. She knows how the whole thing works. About a week a go she must have had a bad day because she took two books, one a picture book and one a 60 page chapter book and meticulously ripped each page out. In my anger when we found her I said, "Ruth, if you do this again, I'm just going to have to take the books away." And she responded in a tone that said I had just threatened to cut off her hand,"No mommy! Don't take my books away! I'll be nice. Don't take away the books!" It was so melodramatic that I almost couldn't help laughing. Ah well. If she teaches herself to read, then she'll have one more way to amuse herself.

Schmoozing

Our Ruth is a schmoozer. Today I took her and the other girls (except Lily) on a walk to pass out some things for visiting teaching (my current calling). Anyway as we stopped at each house Ruth enthusiastically talked to each of the people and then gave them a big goodbye at the end (maybe she has been spending too much time with Tom J/K).

At the first house we visited a couple who are in their 70's. They have quite a few knickknacks displayed in their entryway. The wife took me back in the back to show me some quilting projects and while I was gone Ruth accidentally broke a little glass dog of theirs. I was very apologetic, but Ruth just gave Br. Duffin her big smile with dimples and all and said, "You can fix it huh?" He laughed and said that he put together 5000 piece puzzles so he was pretty sure he could put the dog back together. Then we said our goodbyes and Ruth said very enthusiastically, "Bye-bye Grampa!!Bye-bye!!" and waved as hard as she could with her big smile flashing again. It really was super cute.

At the next house, Ruth ran in the lady's house to see her cat and again flashed her smile and dimples and gave her the wave. The lady asked where she got her dimples from and I just smiled.

At the third house, she gave the girl a great big hug and hello and good bye, dimples and all.

At the forth house, she kept calling, "Bye-bye livie" because their 2 yr old daughter Olivia is in Ruth's nursery class. The mom kept saying, "That's so cute!"

And at the last three houses she did the same. I'm glad she could be so friendly but I think it wore her out. When we got back home, she started screaming because we were going in the house and she wanted to get in the car and go somewhere. When I dragged her in the house, she flopped down in front of the closed front door and cried. Eventually she went and took a nap.

She's a good kid and I love her but I think I'll have to keep an eye on her. You never know what she'll use those dimples for.

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.