Circle of Life

Shane called. He asked if he could speak to Claire. This is how the conversation went from Claire's side.

"Hi, Shane. . . . watching TV. . . .okay. . . okay. . . . okay. . . . .okay. . . . yes. . . . okay. . . . okay. . . okay. . . um. . . okay. . . I want to go watch TV now. . . okay. . . okay . . . okay. . . okay. . . okay. . .see you later, bye."

Again, Cody wasn't happy, Claire is more interested in the tube, and I am left reminiscing about the first time a boy called me. Kyle Isaat in the third grade. He called me and yet I was the one who got in trouble, by my dad. The circle of life.

The Master

My dad is an incredible artist. I have known that my whole life, since we had some of his artwork on display in our house. But he has really taken the last 30 years off from painting and drawing. He recently started devoting time to doing the art projects that he has been brain-storming, collecting, and planning for my entire life. He hasn't lose a touch of his genius. When I saw them for the first time, I was blown away at how good he is. His favorite medium is charcoal and he loves to draw people with interesting faces (i.e. wrinkles). I give to you his masterpieces.

This one has been hanging in our house for as long as I can remember.

This one was done years ago and then folded and stored in our basement forever.

This is one he recently completed. It is my favorite.

This is also a recent one.


This is a recent one, though he has been planning this one for a long, long time.
And he is still going, most recently completing this one:

The Hazards of Being Cute

So apparently Claire has a boyfriend. She doesn't know what that term is and she doesn't know that she has one. I didn't hear it from her. I heard it from the parent of one of Claire's friends at school. Shane. Shane's mom told me that Shane came home to her one day and announced that Claire has his girlfriend. His mom was a bit thrown for a loop since last year, Shane had announced that his girlfriend was Paige.

"What happened to Paige? I thought she was your friend."

"No, she is in a different class this year and I don't see her anymore. [long distance relationships are hard]. Claire is my friend now." Shane is pretty decisive, which I guess is a plus.

The first time we heard about Shane was a couple of weeks ago, when Claire brought home a piece of paper that had some drawings on it, including a heart and Shane's name. I asked what it was and Claire said it was card that Shane had made for her. "He loves me." She said it so matter-of-factly I was hoping she meant that like the way we love chocolate milk, or the way we love 30 Rock. But she kept talking, saying that she loved him, too, and there was a suspicious part in the back of my head wondering what she meant by that exactly. I don't think she has a clue about boys liking girls, girls liking boys. She still thinks she is going to grow up and marry her dad. She doesn't have a clue.

I knew Shane was the instigator of this whole thing. Boys. They are no good. And Cody knows that boys are no good, so when he found out about the love note and the terms affection being thrown around with such abandon, he wasn't happy. He gave Claire the lecture about how girls aren't suppose to love boys (but doesn't that just open up a wave of other questions???) and Claire just looked at him like 'what on earth are you talking about?' It was a little bit of an overreaction by Cody, who I can tell is going to be pretty darn protective in the the whole boys department with our girls.

If you want a little mental picture of Shane, he looks just like Will Forte from Saturday Night Live and is about a whole head shorter than Claire. This might sound harsh, but I just want Claire to dump him to the curve. And I hope her next boyfriend isn't until she is college (and hopefully isn't a head shorter than her).

Our Open House

This morning as I rolled out of bed (too early for my liking) I felt exhaustion mingled with relief. Okay, let's be honest, the only feeling I ever feel in the morning is tired, but I like to imagine that this is what I felt. We had a tough, tough weekend. We had an open house for our home and since Cody and I had procrastinated some major touching up (painting, washing walls and windows, de-junking closets) we had a lot to do in two short days. And those two short days seemed sooooo long. I worked from the moment I woke up to the moment I went to bed, late at night. I haven't worked that hard in a long time. In my mind I was O-Lan from The Good Earth, who birthed her own child, cleaned up the mess, and then proceeded to fall back in beside her husband, working in the fields, with newborn in tow. Okay, so maybe I wasn't working that hard, at all, not nearly close. In fact, I really wasn't working that hard at all compared to other normal people, much less fictional people. I guess I am so use to being semi-lazy that two full days of work seemed so hard. So, so hard.

It is times like these that assure me that Cody and I would not fare well on the Amazing Race, simply because we are both too bull-headed when it comes to home improvement. I always know this going into it, but I can't seem to play nice when our opinions want to thumb wrestle. My commands must be obeyed. Why doesn't he get that? Plus he was complaining about his chest hurting the whole time, being Mr. Drama Queen. I told him to cowboy up, stop crying like a prepubescent and move that big heavy china hutch two inches back and forth and back and forth again, until I can decide where I want it. Amazingly, we got everything done and we are back to being nice to one another.

While perfect strangers were walking around our house, opening up our closets, and hopefully praising our sweat, and tears, we were at church, trying to relax a little, when right in the middle of sacrament meeting, Claire barfs up everywhere. Sweet. And the kicker is, we couldn't take her home because we had an Open House going on. So Cody drove around in the car with her for two hours (in which she threw up again). Sweet.

In the evening, Cody simply couldn't cowboy up and handle his chest pain any more, so he went to the ER to find out if he broke a rib or not. Turns out he punctured his lung. That's what happens when you give me lip and don't do exactly as I tell you. Actually, he got injured five days before playing soccer and suffered through the pain (of which I gave him zero sympathy for, made him lift heavy furniture much to his peril, and called him things like 'sissy' and 'little dancing flautist') all that time.

So to sum up this weekend, I just reconfirmed to myself that I am semi-lazy, will never be on the Amazing Race because I don't work well with others in high pressure situations, and I mock those in pain. Who wants to be my friend?

6

Pittsburgh just won the Super Bowl and the streets are full of cars honking, scores of people screaming, fireworks, people banging on pots. There is nothing, NOTHING, like a Steeler's fan! It is just pure excitement and celebration! Really, I am almost crying (partly because I am excited, partly because loud noises make me tear up). Way to go Steelers!!

It's has been this way for the last 30 minutes! Still going on as I type. Awesome. Good thing me kids are deep sleepers.