10:07 amPot-Luck
My recent absence from my blog has made people question my whereabouts. I left with the threat of running off to Hawaii with a musician. One friend/reader even asked the question: And judging by your lack of posts recently —- you really are gone? To which my answer is: No, but I wish. Nope, I’ve been here the whole time. At home. And stuff has been going on. And I’m going to throw it all in a pot and stir it around and make a post with semi-coherent results. Much like the dinner casserole on left-over night. The following post will contain bits of info about the following topics: the kids going back to school, my sister’s birthday movie night, my hormone-induced inability to stop laughing and/or crying about everything, an upcoming trip to Yellowstone, and my BFF’s brief return to Utah next weekend. I will throw in a few pictures for texture. Feel free to skip ahead to any parts that interest you.
The Kids Are Back to School!
This year Zoe is going to the local public elementary school with Jachin. We are temporarily done with the snobby private school thing… until the new baby is ready for preschool. The first day of school was exciting. Zoe picked out a few of her new duds to make a smashing entrance to her new school. Jachin picked out clothes that are almost too small for him which he’s had for several years. He didn’t put on a single new item of clothing, aside from perhaps fresh underwear. He tried to wear the shirt he wore on Sunday afternoon and then wore to bed Sunday night. He even tried to wear his too-small, mangled shoes from last year. I swear, I bought the boy new, correctly sized clothes. He just didn’t want to wear them. Which was fine. I was picking my battles that first morning of school, and clothing wasn’t one of those battles. One battle I did pick: the first day of school also happened to be trash pick-up day, and with 6 minutes to get out the door to school, Jachin still had not emptied the garbages and taken the can to the curb. Yeah, I picked that battle. And I stuck with it like a hard-nosed Army General.
Me: Jachin, you have got to empty trashes before you leave.
Jachin: Ugg, fine! (He grabs a trash bag and empties 4 of the 8 trash cans throughout the house. He then tries to take the bag out to the outside can.)
Me: Hold on, you didn’t get the downstairs trash.
Jachin: Ugg!! Fine!! (He drags the bag downstairs and slams doors and metal cans around as he empties the computer room trash. He then tries to take the bag outside.)
Me: You didn’t get the upstairs trash or the laundry trash.
Jachin: (with more slamming around of things) Since when do we have a laundry trash?!?
Me: Since we moved in a year and a half ago.
Jachin: Uggg!! Fine!!!
This went on until finally all trashes were empty and he was 20 minutes late for school. Not really… he got out the door on time. And I even got him to wear his new, non-toe-crushing shoes. But not before I got a picture of him wearing his old ones.
Here are my kiddies on the first day back to school:
Tropic Thunder!!
For my sister Sam’s birthday, I told her I’d take her to dinner and a movie. After relentlessly telling her for days about how hilarious Tropic Thunder looked, she magically picked that as her birthday movie. Our little brother, Paul, went with us as well. We picked a theater that is out in the middle of nowhere and you have to have a special map to find the entrance to it. Hence, there is never anyone at this theater. You can show up on opening night of a show only 10 minutes before the previews start and get primo seats. The only other creatures who know about this theater? The cows in the pasture surrounding the theater. Occasionally they try to sneak in the back Exits to a show, but you just have to send them back outside with a swift kick to the udders. Even though it was completely unnecessary, we arrived 20 minutes before the movie began. We were the only people in the theater. I kid you not. There wasn’t even anyone at the ticket-ripper stand. We just walked in (after buying tickets, because we’re honest like that). We then decided it would be hilarious for us to take turns acting out scenes from the Tropic Thunder trailer at the front of the theater. I would record it all on the camera for the blog. Because nothing would be more hilarious than seeing me 6 months pregnant acting like Robert Downey Jr. acting like a black guy, right? But the theater lighting was too dim, and the camera wouldn’t pick up any picture. There was just a lot of audio of me and Sam and Paul laughing our freakin heads off at incoherent movie lines. It really was one of those times when you just had to be there. But we did get a few still shots of us:
I’m not sure why I was signaling for everyone to hang ten, but there it is.
Oh yeah, and the movie was funny, too. Surprisingly, the highlight of the movie was Tom Cruise, whom I absolutely can not stand. But he was almost unrecognizable, and his part of the sweaty, balding, meaty-handed movie exec was amazing… if not rather gross. Because I have issues with hairy, meaty hands. But his dancing skills are seriously something to watch, man.
A Camping We Will Go…
So what do you do when you don’t have any money to go on a big family vacation? You go camping at Yellowstone! I’m actually pretty excited because I’ve never been. I’m not so excited about sleeping on the ground, but I’m uncomfortable no matter where I sleep, so it really doesn’t matter. We’re driving up this weekend and staying a couple of nights, along with Jon’s sister and her family. The compground where we’re staying has flushing toilets and showers, so it shouldn’t be too bad. If nothing else, the trip will yield some awesome photo ops: me pregnant, swollen, hot, and make-up-less standing next to a moose; me pregnant, swollen, hot, and make-up-less standing next to a geiser…
In BFF News:
Diana returns to Utah next weekend! Yay! Only for a couple of days, but I’ll take it! Pics are sure to be taken, and I will be crying, hugging her ankles when she tries to go back to the airport, but I’m excited.
One More Thing
Jon and I watched a fantastic movie last night. It’s called The Fall. And I mean, wow. Even Jon really liked it… and for those of you who know Jon, well, you know that he hates all movies. So the fact that he thought it was good means that it’s amazing. Just thinking about it makes me want to watch it again, because I’m sure there’s so much that I missed the first time through. If you get a chance to watch it, please-oh-please do.
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I can’t believe you posted that picture!! The one of Paul, funny; the one of all of us, nice; the one of me, scary! To everyone who sees it…I’m sorry!:)
Comment by Sam — August 27, 2008 @ 12:12 pm
Hey, your stew was yummy!! It was good to catch up after the long in-your-mind vacation. Your kiddies looked cute for their first day of school, would’ve loved to have seen your reenactment of Tropic Thunder and I’ve added The Fall to our Netflix queue. Have fun camping and enjoy the visit with your BFF. Really, though, you all looked great!
Comment by Joan — August 27, 2008 @ 12:33 pm
That’s a whole lot of posting. Sheesh
Highlights: Your kids are cute, the adults cuter. What’s in your juice, folks? You are a beautiful family. Um, what else? I’ll have to check out The Fall.
Hope you are well.
Comment by Lisa Milton — August 27, 2008 @ 3:18 pm
It was so great to see your post pop up in my feed reader! I’m glad you’re doing well. The kids are cuties and Yellowstone and BFF and The Fall and the movies and funny pictures….but where are the baby belly pictures?
Comment by Leslie — August 29, 2008 @ 9:26 pm
That was a great post! I can’t wait to see you, I’m totally doing a countdown and than when I get there it is highly possible that I won’t be getting back on the plane. There will be no need to hang onto my ankles i’ll be hiding in your basement; I figure you are totally going to need a nannny by the time this new Gale makes an appearance and I am just the girl for the job. You better not get eaten by a bear while in yellowstone!
Comment by dianalolsen@gmail.com — September 1, 2008 @ 9:36 am