Just curious.

I'm just wondering if anyone in real life ever caresses photographs when they are lonely and missing the loved one pictured in the photographs. I've noticed they always do that in movies--you know, gently rub their finger down the face of the person in the picture...Do people really do that? I hope not... Uh oh. I'm having an old memory swirl back to me... It looks like I'm sitting at the end of my twin bed in the Prince Lane house... And I'm holding something. It looks like a picture. Yep. It is. It's a picture of my best friend, Kim Carlson. And the light blue Sony tape player's on. I can almost hear the song. Tiffany, was it? Debbie Gibson? I could never love again--like I did when I met you. And when you said goodbye! Oh the look in your eyes! Left me beside myself--without your looooovvvvveeee....** Oh, here's an idea, Ann. Usually, that would be the kind of song that would remind a normal person of his/her lover--not his/her elementary school best friend. And can I really be remembering a forced tear running down my cheek? Oh, my heavens. I totally remember now. I remember that I was lonely and missing Kim (who had moved across town) like crazy. And I wanted my whole family to recognize the pain I was experiencing so I left my bedroom door open while the drama unfolded. And come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I waited for so long for someone to feel sorry for me that I ran out of manufactured tears and had to close down the whole operation. Hmmmm....at least I didn't caress the picture.

Oh, and guess what? I know what I want to be when I grow up! An editor.

** Remember--my recollection or interpretation of lyrics cannot usually be trusted.

Criminals

My Dad used to tell us how common it was to have people in court (while testifying to exonerate themselves of the crime being prosecuted) incriminate themselves in another serious crime. For example:

My dad: Were you in the Madison home when this beating took place?

Witness (or suspect): No, sir, I wasn't. How could I have been there when I was busy robbing the bank on Fifth and Ivy?

Incredible, but not so incredible that my kids don't do the same on a regular basis.

This morning as I was lying in bed, Jane rushed in crying to tell me that Camp had hit her in the eye. Camp soon followed, yelling, "Liar! I didn't hit you in the eye. I hit you in the cheek!"
It wasn't ten minutes later that Camp came running to my room to say that Jane had called him stupid. This time it was Jane who yelled, "Nu uh! I called you stupid boy!"
I'm glad we're all getting our details straight.

By the way...

If you happen to be using Internet Explorer, I have to apologize for the crazy formatting on some of my posts. In that last post, for example, there are huge gaps between stuff. I use Mozilla Firefox, so if you are using that one, too, the formatting will be normal. Just thought you should know.

Chinese torture

Does anyone know what the heck I'm talking about when I say Chinese torture? Actually, I don't even know what the heck I'm talking about when I say Chinese torture except that my siblings and I spent at least half our lives claiming that somebody or something was giving us Chinese torture....I'm feeling a little bad right now because I just took a second to Google Chinese torture and it turns out it is probably not something we should have been trivializing by making reference to it so lightly all those years. But anyway, if you will forgive my ignorance... Chinese torture to us consisted of those things that gave you the yucky chills down your back, or just drove you crazy. You know--the nails on a chalkboard kinds of things. Well, do you know what gives me Chinese torture (again, please excuse me)these days? Bare feet shuffling or rubbing across smooth cement that has dirt on it, when women wear eyeliner without mascara, utensils falling half way through the darn holes in the utensil basket of the dishwasher so that you cannot pull out or push in the bottom rack, and crayons falling through the crack of the pew all during sacrament--forcing the poor people in back of us to bend over to pick them up fifty times. Ahhhh!!!!!
Anyway...
Things continue to be pretty good here--except for the fact that Camp informed me that my teeth are indeed yellow. If I only had a dime for every time a kid told me I have yellow teeth...I specifically remember, for example, going with Curtis Townsend to visit our "little brother" (as part of the Big Sister Big Brother program)--oh, what was his name?....Kyle!....And he informed us that Curtis's teeth were white and that mine were yellow. It's nice to be able to rely on kids for an honest opinion, but seriously! One can only take so many honest opinions. Besides, if I could change my yellow teeth, I certainly would. In fact, new white teeth would be my plastic surgery of choice--way above a boob job, or botox, or vericose vein removal...and yep, even above eyelash extensions. The thing is--getting white teeth is not as easy for me as it would be for most of you. Why? Well it's a long story, and I'm not good at making long stories short. Oh, alright. I'll try. Needed fake teeth. Long time ago. Teeth whitening new. Didn't know enough. Got yellow fake teeth. Fake teeth don't bleach. Wish I could do it over again. Don't have the five grand to. Bummer.

But, yeah. Easter was super fun. We went up to Jigg's and Julie's property to spend Saturday and have lunch and an egg hunt, and then on Sunday, the kids got to wear their new Easter outfits from Becky and we had a nice ham dinner with Jen and Tim and their kids.






















And my mom surprised us and came up on Thursday! A girl couldn't ask for a better surprise than that! (nor could her kids), so we were spoiled with attention and candy, and had to take her back to the airport today.

And that's about it.




















































































Oh, wait! I trimmed my trees. Yes, I decided they did indeed need a hair--scratch that--needle cut, so I shaped those babies right up. And I think they look marvelous.
































Oh, and we saw turkeys gobbling through our back yard! I mean, we had gotten used to the bear sightings (it pretty much freaked my mom out to see one for herself), but a turkey? We could be selling tickets to our own private zoo! I'm just kidding, Mom. I really will start looking into a solution to the bear problem tomorrow. It really is scary. (f you look carefully, you can see the bear in the picture with the swing set.)
































Oh, and you know what is ALMOST as scary as our bear problem? This.

Here it is--finally.

Here she is

I'm really having a hard time with the computer right now. Sometimes I just want to punch the computer. Anyway, things are good here. I've had a good weekend. Since Brian is done with the armoire, we spent the evening together watching Slumdog Millionaire on our Clearplayer and eating slow-churned low fat cookies-n-cream ice cream. (Of course, by the time you put a third of the box of ice cream into your bowl and pour Heath Magic shell all over it, it's anything but low fat.) You guys have all heard about the revolution that is Clearplay, right? Oh my heavens. It's fabulous. You buy a Clearplay DVD player at Target for like fifty bucks, and then you pay like sixty bucks a year to have access to the filters of every movie that comes out. So we rented Slumdog Millionaire last night, I downloaded the filter off of Clearplay's website, we stuck the little USB filter stick into the Clearplayer, put in the movie, and poof! No more F bombs (or other swearing, for that matter) and no more extreme violence. Isn't that fabulous? Very cool movie, by the way. I always appreciate a movie that reminds me how much I have to be grateful for and has super cool music.
Aaaannnnddd, it was sunny today which means that my house stayed clean all day. I know! The sun up here is magical! It cleans your house....in the form of keeping your kids outside. I love it! And I watched a bunch of conference and loved it. I so appreciate hearing truth...And I took the kids to the park while Brian was at the Priesthood session. Camp took his scooter and spent all his time at the skateboard park--despite the multitude of mostly hoodlum teenagers. He meant business. I couldn't help laughing as I watched him because I was so impressed by what a cool kid I have. (Part of my wanting to punch the computer has to do with not being able to upload the video I took of Camp today to Blogger. Ahhhhh!)
Pretty much the only thing that is not cool in my universe right now is the fact that I lost my temper with Camp today--something I will NOT do tomorrow--and my perfect little ficus that has done so amazingly well is now turning brown and dropping leaves suddenly. How does that happen?
P.S. I'm gracing you with a little poopie picture to make this post a little more interesting. Hope you like it.