Emptying My Head

Quite frequently I have blog posts running through my head.  Sometimes they are in the form of a blog, sometimes a letter to a long lost friend, or a phone call with a friend, not so lost.  Occasionally, I have conversations going on with people I haven't seen or heard from in years, only to realize as I'm walking down the street or changing the laundry, that I'm actually talking almost out loud.  And I'm sure the facial expressions are out in the open also.   I always think that I'll write a post or a journal entry and get all that minutiae out of my head so it will quit bouncing around in there and maybe give me some peace.  But, alas, I don't.  There's always an excuse, a reason, a streak of pure laziness or 'not interesting enough', 'nobody cares anyway', 'you're just bragging', or my favorite, 'really, nobody is in terested, give it a rest.'

Isn't it sad that we let an inner dialogue dictate so many of our actions, or in my case in-actions?

So these are the things that I can't seem to get out of noggin today - I'm just going to put it out there and let it go where ever it may.

Ben has a cross country meet today, but I don't know any details, like where (Sugarhouse?), what time or how does one watch a cross country meet?  Did he take snacks?  Are they stopping for dinner?  Does he have money?  Did he take his shoes?  Is he WEARING the new million dollar shoes to school, that I told him ONLY to wear at meets?

Kinsey has early-out.  It's my turn to pick up kids.  I forgot to change cars.  I hope I have enough seatbelts.

Oh, yeah, it's my day off.  I should see about making some visiting teaching appointments.

I have a batch of tomatoes waiting to be made into salsa.  This HAS to be done today.  And the peaches, too.  Why did I plant a garden?

The porch is full of cobwebs and dust.  Can I just leave it until halloween and call it decoration?

I heard from an old friend a week or so ago.  I'd love to respond back to him and find out how his life is going.  BUT - did he really try to friend me or is facebook just seeing that we have a mutual friend and assuming that we want to talk.  I don't want to appear anxious or over zealous.  But, I would like to know how he's doing.  So, if you stumble across this, Bryan.  Hi, back from Utah.  How are you?

I would love to ask other friends from high school - Does anyone know what happened to Kelly Smith - Willis - Johnson?  I last talked to her in 1991 when I was expecting child #2 and she and I both had  3 year olds.  I would love to see how she is.  Also Kim Register, the one whose mother owned the Children's Whistlestop Daycare in Bartow.  I 'd like to know where/how she is.  Last I talked to her, she was thinking about living on a boat. or something like that.

Today is my day off and I'm supposed to be paying bills, making salsa, cleaning house, etc and here I sit at my computer just trying to empty my head.  On the plus side, I'm home alone (almost) and have control of the radio, thermostat and lighting.  The sun is shining in the sliding glass door, which really needs to be cleaned.  

Can you see all those hand, finger, face and nose prints?  Trust me, they look worse in real life.  The grass outside is looking good, though' the leaves are green and pretty, right before the fall changes.  The weather is just right for almost any activity.

I just got home from a vacation last week to Lake Powell.  It was a very different trip, not having any kids along.  At first, I was put out because, hey, if I don't have any teenage boys with me, who's going to carry all my stuff to the houseboat.  Well, I carried my own stuff - got all of it in just two trips with the cart.  And, I say teenage boys, but I only have one teen boy left and a teen girl.  The rest are all grown up.  Insert sad emoji here.  The water, weather, stars were beautiful.  We all slept up on top so we could see the stars. One of the most peaceful feelings in the world - a quiet house boat in a quiet canyon where the stars are close enough to touch, watching shooting stars and discussing all manner of ideas from the head and heart.  So quiet, tranquil and peaceful.  Until the snoring starts.  One of our clan is a photography enthusiast, so I counted on her for pictures.  These are the only ones I got this trip.

One more thing.  See these two guys -

Yeah.  The one on the right is mine.  The one on the left just got home from his mission. They have been best friends since, well, birth, I guess.  His mom and I were Cub Scout leaders together when they were just little.  Then they went to primary, school, mutual, scouts, high school and swim team together.  They've been apart for two years while they served their missions.  I came home from work last week and this is where they were.  It took me ten minutes watching from the (dirty) sliding glass door, before I could go out and hug him, because it was such a tender moment for me.  I have SOOOOOO missed these two faces together.  Glad to have them back.  Yeah, he's giving me that, 'oh look, I made her cry' face.

Well - that's it for now.  I've emptied my head sufficiently to get at least a few things done now.  I'll leave you with a few pictures, just to make things interesting.

Avoiding the very appearance

Yesterday I cut some cucumbers to mix with red onion and red wine vinegar.  I didn't have enough vinegar, so I borrowed some from my mother-in-law's kitchen.  One of these pictures is of my vinegar, the other is the view of her vinegar which was faced on her whirl-i-gig in her kitchen. 


This is the bottle one would find in my pantry.

This is the bottle from Gma's Pantry.
 

 This just made me smile.  If you come to my house, you will find this

empty vinegar bottle in a place of honor.

 

Swim Season Begins

It's that time of year at our house.  When the leaves change color and the weather gets cooler our family starts with swimming.  J was on the swimming team for four years before A started swimming for four years, then L started and N year later.  So we're on our 13th straight swim season year.  This year they are S E R I O U S about their swimming.  After the initial Parent meeting, that's the one where they tell you how hard they are going to work your children, how much sleep they are going to need, no more junk food, no more soda, and take vitamins, blah, blah, blah.  The boys asked gma to make her homemade wheat bread.  She obliged by making a double batch on Tuesday.  Today is Friday and we have one, count them: ONE, loaf left.  This is a picture of what I came home to after my workout this morning.

Please forgive L - he has never been a morning person, so 5:50 is the hardest part of the day for him.  Any way, look at that, five swimmers eating breakfast at my house before the morning workout.  All of these boys live fairly close, within two blocks.  The two on the left are brothers, JN and BN.  Next is BB and then my N and L.  They apparently have worked out a schedule amongst themselves to have breakfast at each other's homes on the days that the swim team parent's don't provide breakfast at the school.  This is the best group of boys EVER.  All Eagle Scouts.  They have worked so hard together and supported each other in scouting and biking and hiking and service projects and now swimming.  I can't wait for the swim meets to start.  I'll keep you posted.

What could these boys possibly be watching that has them so engrossed in the television?

Is it Myth Busters?  Psych?  NCIS?  Will It Blend?  1000 Uses for Colored Duct Tape?


Why, look at that...

It's Veggie Tales.

Christmas Day 2011

We had a lot of Hale Family over for dinner today. Great times, Great food.

Sure missed this guy...

Family Picture taken in January 2011 at the Brigham City Train Depot.

Photo taken by Annette Anderson.

This is my kids favorite climbing tree. It is in Grandma & Grandpa's front yard. It was a beautiful maple tree until it got a disease and started dying limb by limb.

Levi, Adam, Ben, Nathan and Kinsey - the last climb in the maple tree.

Grandma & Grandpa are getting their house ready to sale, so they can move with us into the new house we designed together. The tree had to go.

Levi decided he deserved a little rest.

After lots of hard work, cutting and digging and cutting and digging some more, only a little swearing, and alot more digging and cutting, using the truck and a chain, the stump finally came out.