Mormon Mafia

My friend Bridget posted this on FaceBook and said, "I can't stop watching this." I can't stop watching it either. The "moving my hips like 'yeah'" is so hypnotic. But, that's not what I want to talk about.

Both of us just know that this guy is Mormon. But how are we so sure? Sometimes I see women at the library or wherever and they look Mormon, so I casually look for clues. Nine out of ten times, I can spot some dead giveaway, like a Young Women's bag or a glimpse of their garments as they wrestle their kids.

It's not like being able to spot Mormon churches. One time, I was up in Half Moon Bay with Candie on a Sunday, and we were driving to church. I had never been to that building before, so we were driving along the street slowly, looking for addresses. I looked up ahead a little and saw it on the left and said, "oh, it's up there." It was probably 150 yards away and obscured by the building next to it, so Candie didn't believe me.

Me: That's it. Trust me.
Candie: But how do you know?
Me: I just. Know.

All the churches kind of have the same sort of architectural style with a steeple instead of a cross so once you've been to 40 or 50, they become pretty easy to pick out.

But, what about the people? Is it their squeaky-clean look? Their penchant for doing silly things like making a movie of themselves doing ASL to Miley Cyrus?

Or, is this my superpower?

NaBloPoMo Roundup

Phew. It's over. Thirty posts in 30 days is tricky, especially since for approximately 27 of those days either one or both of my children, my husband, or I was sick, which I could have discussed, but I think it would have gotten really boring. I held back. I really did.

Instead, I discussed hot button topics like illegal immigration, 2nd amendment rights, and immunizations. Here's the stats on the rest of the posts:

Crafts- 1
Kids- 4
Mommy Madness - 4
Books- 2
Adventures- 2
Sickness - 3

Add a couple of Tuesday Reminiscences in there, plus a very successful De-Lurk Day! (even if the person from Montrouge, France never showed up), and you get 30 posts.

I'm sorry if the writing started going down hill towards the end, or the editing got sloppy, but I tried my best, and I did it.

P.S.- To all those people who, on De-Lurk Day wrote some variation of "I don't know if you remember me but we were in [whatever] together," I remember all of you! Thanks for reading.

Home Again, Home Again

For those of you with no children, I'll tell you a secret you probably already know: when you fly, you can take your stroller right up to the gate and just leave it right there at the bottom of the jet-way, and it will be waiting nicely for you at your next destination. This is called "gate checking." On our return flight today, we were on a smaller airplane, so a lot of people's carry-ons didn't fit in the overhead bins and had to be gate-checked.

Usually, it's just me and maybe one other mom waiting for them to bring up our strollers, but this flight, there were about 30 people waiting for bags. We waited. And waited. And waited some more. Probably 15 minutes. I always find it so interesting to watch people in semi-stressful situations. Thirty people standing around in a small space, all cramped after flying for two hours, hungry because it's lunch time, and just staring at each other.

I have a pretty solid No-Complaining ethic, (see earlier post where I discuss how I am not a squeaky wheel) so I held Nora and chatted with the lady next to me. But, other people... I'm amazed at the lengths they go to make themselves upset and miserable.

We were only there for 15 minutes, and by the end I thought these people were going to riot, led by a grumpy old man and a middle-aged man who kept complaining how cold he was (when we just came from the bay area and it's at least 20 degrees warmer here... like the temperature in the jet-way is the airline's fault as well). "I CANNOT believe they are making us wait for our bags! You would THINK that they would know how to do this and that they would have the STAFF for this sort of thing!" "It's ridiculous that I had to gate-check my bag. I've NEVER had to check that bag. EVER!" "The reason I DIDN'T check my bag was because it had fragile things in it. And now, they're probably BROKEN!" "I'm NEVER flying this airline ever again!"

Does that really make people feel better? The staff who is responsible for this problem are most likely underneath the plane, rummaging around for our bags, and they can't hear you.

So, chill out.

Changing Children

When Lillian was born, people said she was the spitting image of Tyler. Then, she got older and people said she looked just like Tyler.

When we had Nora, I thought she looked a lot like me. Phew, because truth be told, I didn't really like ALL the people who told me How Much she looked like Tyler.

We went to church today with Tyler's parents, and everyone (why do people like to comment on this so much? I don't think it ever occurs to me to say to complete strangers what parent their children look like) said the exact opposite: that Lillian looked like me, and Nora looks exactly like Tyler. I was skeptical (and a little sad) about this until I was looking at pictures of Tyler as a baby and they look almost exactly the same. I looked and looked for a picture of Nora making this face so we could do a side-by-side comparison, and I found one, but Nora has different eyes (probably mine) in the picture, they didn't really look that much alike, thus negating my assertions.

Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow

Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
If you liked The Goose Girl, you'll probably like this book. It has the same elements: little known fairy tale retold with some twists, oddly compelling, and squeaky-clean writing.

Before I knew it was based on an old Norse folk tale, I thought the author had totally ripped of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe- land of never ending winter, gowns made for giant women, fawns. But, turns out, she didn't. I tried briefly explaining the plot to my husband, but he didn't get much past "enchanted polar bears and talking wolves." So, if you just get over the fact that it's fantasy, but with only cursory mentions of fairies, dragons, and brownies, and it's written for teen-aged girls, you'll do fine. And, I think you'll like it too.

View all my reviews >>

No

Untitled from Amanda Ball on Vimeo.

Tyler was sick, then Nora was sick, then I was sick. Lillian was a rock. She got a little wheezy somewhere in there, but nothing too bad. Mostly, she just watched a lot of TV in a two week period, and this is what happened.

Thanksgiving

It was so good- I ate too much, and now I feel a little sick. This hasn't happened in a long time. It was all those yams my MIL makes. I'm pretty sure the recipe reads:

Yams+awesomeness=totally amazing.

You should try it out sometime.