The Scampering Horse

So there is this really fun thing to do.  It is called going "out" with my baby. I feel that I am on vacation when I am out with my baby. I also feel like a liar. I've mentioned my beautiful two year old before. She is really lovely. Eyelashes 2 inches long. Beautiful round cheeks, with cute little pink lips that say cute words. This walk she has is a strut, swinging her arms, tossing her hips. Very adorable. She also screams at me a lot, with that lovely little mouth. Her beautiful self-curled hair framing her perfect little features, and that face produces a sound. Like a cricket, but 1,000 times louder. Sort of shocking like a car horn, but I can't get away from it.  I walk away and it follows me from room to room.  Like a police siren.  It is as if she is the police officer and I am getting pulled over, and I never even voted her the police officer of my house.  She is a usurping dictator with an obnoxious police siren stuck in her esophagus, relentless in...

My husband is a public accountant and works in auditing.  These are a lot of words. Don't look too far into it. It basically means he travels. He travels to little towns all over the state and audits utility companies and governments and banks and pension plans. So, he has this "government season." He works more than normal, and travels more than normal. Government season he gets to go on these exotic mini-vacations to places like Farmington, New Mexico and I am here. It is government season right now, and for the next few months. He tells me he works a lot.  Maybe 12 hour days. Works all day at the client site, and then he works again in his motel room. He eats out for every meal. Part of me knows that this isn't fun. Part of me knows that he can't hear the giggles of his children and eat a home cooked meal. But there is this other part that can't help feeling like the man is on vacation. It is in the morning, before school starts and I am trying to pack ...

Morning was so good. I woke up to waffles, made on my new adorable heart shaped waffle iron. Ian made them. He also made home-made syrup that exploded all over the stove top. Sometimes Ian thinks homemade syrup should have some baking soda. That syrupy heart-shaped waffle tasted great. We practiced the song we were singing in church.  Our two big little girls and Ian and I were all singing a song together.  I thought it sounded pretty good. I was excited for our big day. Things were really going my way. Then I sat there while it happened to me. Ian walked out of the bathroom and his face was bald. Bald. There was no warning. No conversation. Not even a whisper that this moment was coming. Needless to say, I did not take it well. I love that beard.   Some people have talents they were just born with. Like they instinctively know how to play with two year old people, or they are born with a fantastic sense of style, or a fast runner right from the star...

Sports. I am a huge fan of playing sports.  Exercise and competition are fun.  If I could exercise every day by playing a sport,  that would be awesome. My favorite sport is basketball. I haven't played in years.  I don't know why basketball isn't part of mommy park groups, but it isn't.  Boo. I love ultimate frisbee because it encompasses every ability level. Right now I play indoor soccer.   This isn’t about playing sports.  This is about watching sports.  It is that time of year again.  That time of year for football. If I know nothing else about facebook, I know that it loves football. It talks about statistics and games and players.  I went to school at BYU, and football is preached from the pulpit.  I heard talks every fall about BYU football, the one true and living team. Guys. I am going to say something that is hard for many many of you to hear.  Football is way too long.  Way, way too long. H...

Recently I had a conversation with my oldest daughter.  She is 7. "Mom, I am just wondering why I didn't jump off the diving board." We had gone a a party at a house with a swimming pool. Kids her own age and younger were jumping off the diving board.  Julie had run up to the edge and back of the diving board 7 times or so over the course of the party. She would run to the edge with a donut floaty around her belly, look out at the water, and then run back to safety. "I would just look down at the water and it looked so big. Like the ocean." She thought her floaties would pop when she hit the water.  I explained to her, even if her floaties popped she would have kicked her legs, and tried to swim. If she had trouble, I would have jumped in and saved her. "But mom, why weren't the other girls scared?" Well, they had done it before.  They knew what would happen when they hit the water.  They knew they would survive. I cut my hair. Short.  So...

Yesterday was my birthday. Now I am 31. But I think I have layers. Like a cake. Or an onion if you are of the ogre persuasion. I prefer cake. Chocolate cake, and vanilla custard filling. So, now the top layer is 31. The layer of frosting. Buttercream. My buttercream layer is the mother of four children, and is getting fine lines around her eyes, and unfortunate cellulite on her thighs. She is learning how to be a writer, a photographer, and has lately given up cooking. Underneath are all the layers of every other age I've ever been. The 25 year old chocolate layer and graduate student and mother of 2, the 22 year old first time mom, the 20 year old custard layer who is struggling heart-broken, starving college student, the 18 year old kid who can't wait to leave the house, the 14 year old freshman high-school basket-baller, the 12 year old with the broken wrist doing algebra with my left hand, the 10 year old in love with Gilbert Blythe, the 8 year old obsessed with my ki...