Skeletons...

(or I Hope Ruby Will Still Love Me after Reading This Post or Maybe She'll Love Me More)

Today I thought it was time to show my 5-year old some of the demons from my past. It's time he knew truly where his mother came from and what she's made of. This decision was prompted by my response to my 7-year old's declaration, "I'm a cowboy!" What else could I do but scream/sing, "On a steel horse I ride. I'm wanted (wanted) dead or alive!" (J, on the other hand, always thinks of "I want to be a Cowboy! Baby!" Yes, Kid Rock. How we ended up together is still a mystery to me.) It was time to find Bon Jovi's album Cross Road (Thank you, Rhapsody!) and listen with H to the whole thing while we played with homemade, vanilla-scented play-dough.

For those of you who don't know, I was born and raised in New Jersey. I am a Jersey Girl. Maybe not what you think of when you think "Jersey Girl," but I am a product of the Garden State nonetheless. Is it only natural that we would be listening to Bon Jovi, this fine snowy, sunny day? It is not. Believe it or not, I did not like Bon Jovi for oh, about the first 33.95 years of my life. I didn't grow up liking them; I never owned an album; always changed the station when they came on the radio. I spent most of my youth listening to They Might Be Giants, classical music, and whatever music filtered out of my brother's room (which did not include Bon Jovi, at least that I remember).

Today, however, something changed. It changed somewhere in the first verse of "Livin On a Prayer." And (this is embarrassing) it brought tears to my eyes. I mean really, "...hold on to what we've got cause it doesn't make a difference if we make it or not. We've got each other and that's a lot for love. We'll give it a shot...We're halfway there. Livin' on a prayer. Take my hand and we'll make it I swear." (By the way, that's how the Kid Rock hearer and the Korean-American, NJ-born, Bon Jovi hearer make it together.) We won't talk about that abrupt and less-than-inspired key change in the middle of it. Anyway, them's some powerful hormones wacking out my body (very possible), or there's some truth in Bon Jovi that's resonating within me (also possible). Not fading, as a bell tolls, but getting louder and louder, reminding me of my roots.

And how's that for a random post? I'm not sure when this blog turned from updating about life with kids to my own personal sounding board, but I'm okay with what it is now. I hope you are too. I'll bring back the journaling about the monkeys, but for me, this is all about life. Life as a stay-at-home mom of three boys. Birthdays; holidays; school events; feelings of inadequacy; feelings of love and joy; kids' triumphs; my own triumphs as I learn and grow into being a better person, wife, mother; faith growing; manic-depression ebbing and flowing; managing; balancing; all that stuff.

And the Not-As-Exciting...

While J was in the Pacific Northwest being Mountain Man, I took the boys to New Mexico to see my parents. Here are the Monkeys and Grandma Kim. So happy to be there...


Grandma, H, and O built this awesome ranch in the family room. H didn't want me to take his picture.


We drove to Albuquerque and visited with my friend Rita and her husband Sne.


We went to Explora Children's Museum. It is the coolest place. I highly recommend that you go there the next time you are in Albuquerque. S put together this gear system, complete with elastic and handles.


O worked on this one by himself,


and H made a friend who helped him with his.


In addition to our Albuquerque trip, we went to church in Gallup, played with the coolest toy ever invented -- namely Legos -- splashed in G Kim's kiddie pool, ate our fill of yummy homemade Korean food, read lots of books, and watched "Toy Story 2," "Night at the Museum," "The Sound of Music," "Mary Poppins," and "7 Brides for 7 Brothers." I was reminded of my mom's crushes on Captain Von Trapp, Howard Keel (Adam Pontipee), and Frank (you know, Frankincense, 'cause he smelled so sweet) and my own crush on Gideon (ah, Russ Tamblyn, you cutie!)

This is summer to me:




And the partying isn't over yet. We have G & G Kim coming into town on Thursday and my wonderful friend Emilia coming on Friday. Ahh summer!

Old Friends

The first Saturday in January we headed up to Hyrum to attend the baptism of my friend Louise's second daughter. We were up about 1 1/2 years ago for her first daughter's baptism and decided that it was a good tradition to keep up.

Louise and I were roommates at BYU the year before we both got married. She is an amazing lady! She has a degree in Music Education, but is the Special Ed teacher at her daughters' charter school and is working on her Master's in Special Ed (I think. Is that right, Weaz?) Her husband Cordell is a police officer for Logan City and is my resource for the future when we get a dog.

When we pulled up to their house after the baptismal festivities were complete, O was scared that the police car belonged to someone who was going to arrest him. (Secret life of crime, O?) I spoke thusly to Cordell, "O is afraid of the police officer here. Will you reassure him that he is not a threat and there's nothing to be scared of?" Cordell replied, somewhat distractedly, "Uh huh," as he packed a handful of snow into a snowball to throw at a random dog running down the street. Thanks, Officer Hoth. Thanks a lot!


Me and Louise. We pretty much look the same as we did 12 years ago when we lived in that tiny apartment on University Ave. Good times.

Now she's out of kids to have baptized, but I've three coming up -- one this year. With the triathlon she's doing in American Fork and the Ragnar (which goes right through Hyrum) that I'm planning on doing again this year, we'll see each other again soon, I'm sure of it.

..., Part III

We started Friday in Gallup off by making homemade strawberry ice cream. My mom has this beauty:

It's the 1.5-quart model. It is a wonderful thing. When I got back to Orem I bought this:

It's the 2-quart model because, after all, I have a growing family of all boys and you can never have too much ice cream, right? At least that's what I'm telling myself! Homemade ice cream is a part of my childhood. My mom used to make it on our back patio in NJ in one of those wooden bucket ice cream makers. She'd pack it into a big round Tupperware and stick it in the freezer to get nice and hard. I remember the imprint of the circular lid on the ice cream when she took it off. It was almost always strawberry ice cream because my dad loves strawberries. Sometimes vanilla, rarely chocolate. Anyway, back to Gallup...

Ice cream must taste better all over your face. At least H must think so.

While waiting for the ice cream to harden the kids played around on the death trap my dad has in his living room. It's a couple of Little Giant ladders, some rope, pipes, and carabiners all strung together. The Monkeys lived true to their nickname.

We drove to Window Rock, AZ to see the headquarters of the Navajo Nation. In the same area as their government buildings is this:

It is a monument to the Navajo Code Talkers who helped win WWII. It's a solemn and sacred place for the Navajos. The history of the Code Talkers is fascinating.

Also in Window Rock is the

In it are many of the animals found on Navajo lands. Seeing how disappointed O was at not seeing the Albuquerque Zoo the day before, we decided to take a look. It was impressive.

This spotted owl was in an open enclosure. Its wing was injured so it couldn't fly away.

This bobcat was raised as a housecat until it got too wild and was donated to the zoo. Can you imagine the events that made the owners determine it was "too wild"?

On the drive back to Gallup H fell asleep. Here we are lunching at Denny's. Doesn't H look so snuggly?

On Saturday my dad had to work, so Mom, Boys, and I drove to Ramah to the Farmer's Market. It was tiny -- the town and the Farmer's Market. We bought a bag of cookies and some homemade bread. My mom also purchased a drum and some organic skin balm stuff. Then we drove through Ramah looking for the museum which we heard was there. Well, we blinked and were at the other end of town. Tiny tiny town. We did locate the huge LDS Stake Center with its massive satellite dish and then almost missed the museum.

Here is a statue of a Mormon pioneer woman that was in the yard of the museum. I took the opportunity to point out to my boys that the little boy weeding was probably 4 or 5 and that's what he had to do all day -- weed alongside his hard-working pioneer mother. There is then no cause for complaints when I make them weed for 30 minutes every day. All I got in response were blank stares. Then, "But he's a statue, Mom." Oh, my children...

The museum was filled with random pictures and objects donated by people in the town. Ramah was settled by Mormon pioneers so there were a lot of pictures of the Presidents of the Church, pictures of Pioneer Day celebrations (the 24th of July, the day the Latter-Day Saints entered the Salt Lake Valley), some sacrament trays, shoes, stuff like that. My favorite were the ancient canned jam and green beans that some ladies found in their mom's home after she passed away. They were cleaning things out and decided to donate some of their mom's things to the museum. What will I have when I die that my kids will think belongs in a museum?

When we got back to Gallup the boys talked their grandma into getting into the pool with them. Aren't they all so cute (Grandma Kim included)?

...Part II

On Thursday Mom Kim, the Monkeys, and I drove to Albuquerque (two hours East) to see Rita, a friend from high school. We went to the

"Sandia" means watermelon. The mountain is called that because when the sun sets and reflects off the rock, the whole mountain turns pink and looks like an enormous watermelon. The tram is the longest one in the world. It was lots of freaky fun.


Here S is trying to avoid the inevitable ear-clogging that goes with pressure changes. He is why I buy gum from Costco.


This is at the restaurant at the top of the mountain. It is called High Finance. The food was yummy, but my boys were more occupied with catching two enormous moths which were flying around the window by our table. By the end of the meal they had succeeded in catching them and entrapping them in the air vents in the window sill. Isn't Rita gorgeous?



After lunch we hiked around a little and followed a trail that gave us some beautiful views. They'll be easier to enjoy once the boys are older and I won't be so freaked out about them falling off the mountain!





Once we were safely down at the bottom again we found the Albuquerque LDS temple.

Due to the fact that there were at least 3 huge dead bugs floating around in the fountain, it was a struggle, to say the least, getting the Monkeys to turn around for a picture.



But we succeeded in the end!


It was HOT that day, and since grass is scarce in that part of New Mexico, we all took the opportunity to lounge around on the temple grounds. Very pleasant.


After locating a Bed Bath & Beyond and buying my mom her much-desired cherry pitter, we picked up Rita's husband Sne and toured the climbing gym where my parents go. It's huge! The Monkeys were especially fascinated by the overhang that was 40 feet up in the air and the "Fall Zone" that was down on the ground below it. It prompted all sorts of questions: "Why is there a 'Fall Zone'? Do people actually fall from way up there? Why do they have it go over like that if people could fall? Don't they know it's not safe?!?"

And here is a picture of one of Sne and Rita's cars. Oh blessed New Jersey license plate. It immediately made me homesick!



Rita and Sne. It was so nice to see her again. I'm afraid that when I left high school, my only intent was to be out of there and away from NJ. That Dixie Chicks song, "Wide Open Spaces" totally used to make me cry with the profound truthfulness of it all. I've grown up enough to know now that I was only running away from myself...hmmm, but that's a whole other post. Anyway, it was so nice to see Rita and remember that I do have friends who aren't white Mormon housewives. (Don't get me wrong, white Mormon housewife friends, I love you all dearly!) I'm so glad she's moved West and is only a 2-hour plane ride away from Salt Lake City. I hope she'll come see me soon!