Playing Catch Up

It is way past time for me to post--whatever readers/stalkers I might have have probably gotten tired of looking at the pictures on my last post more than a month ago. My best excuses are that I have been busy--there has been Temple Celebration, Young Women's activities, community theatre productions, volunteering at Adrianna's school (just two more weeks till school is out--hooray! I think), stalking other people's blogs who write better and more often than I do, more Temple Celebration, camp, Arbonne, and oh yea, more Temple Celebration--just five more days and that will be all over!

So I thought I'd post a few pictures to catch up. In March we were involved in a production of Disney's Aristocats Kids. The entire cast was kids. Adrianna was one of the Alley Cats.

This is her on closing night. She had a lot of fun singing and dancing--Bryce, once again helped build sets--as our friend Grant says, it's the same three guys everytime!

April started out with a snow storm--What a great April Fools joke. Fortunately the snow had melted by late afternoon! But this is what it looked like all morning around our house.

What a forlorn looking little house with snow swirling all about!

The view to the west

Buried treasure?

Then came SPRING!


some of the daffodils in our neighborhood

For Easter we did our traditional Easter Egg rolling/hurling. This year the kids (Austin, Parker and Adrianna) added a new level to the game. Instead of just rolling/hurling eggs down a hill they decided to switch things up just a bit and hurl eggs at each other! Mostly it was Adrianna who got hurled at--she made the best target. It was pretty hilarious! We also learned that hard boiled eggs can be used as nose cones for our air compressor rockets--they are only sturdy enough for one launch though!

Adrianna with one of her favorite eggs (just before she hurled it down the hill--no conscience!)

Parker and Austin all ready to roll!

Adrianna playing "egg target" for the boys

Tired of being the "target" Adrianna tries to "target" Austin (she wasn't very successful)

Paul and Lisa

To be continued . . . . . . . .(hopefully before the millenium!)

Ladies and Gentlemen Your Vote Please!

A few weeks ago my beautiful and talented daughter-in-law, Christy, took some pictures of me. She managed to make me look pretty good in all of them--due to her talent not my looks, I'm sure. Anyway, I need to choose one to use on an email business card that I will be using for my Arbonne Business. Please help me choose by commenting and letting me know which one you like best for the business card and which one you like best over all! Thanks--if you vote there just might be something in it for you. Like some free Arbonne :)

The pictures were taken on Patrick's birthday, so here are a couple of the two of us--and yes please feel free to tell me that I don't look nearly old enough to have a 27 year old son!!

And, just in case you were wondering. Our BBC America is back up and running--it only took them just over a week to figure it out!

TV Update. . .

Still no BBC America. I have spent more quality time on the phone with a SUPERVISOR this time who assured me that we would have the channel back working at the latest by Wednesday evening. Well, it's Thursday NIGHT and no BBC America! I guess I will have to spend more QUALITY time on the phone tomorrow--the only good thing is that I now have the SUPERVISOR's direct phone number!!

Maddening Monday, or. . . .

TV/Telephone Torture
When we moved, about a year and a half ago we signed up for Qwest's TV service. It was pretty reasonable, the sales/service reps I talked to were nice and we have had very few problems with it (until this weekend that is). We signed up for the "basic package" when we moved and at that time they were having a promotion where you got to try the "family package" free for a month--of course a great marketing ploy because who wouldn't want Nick or Disney or in our case, BBC America was a big draw. It includes lots of fun shows like Monty Python, Doctor Who, Top Gear lots of James Bond this past month, and other British shows we like. So, after our free month we added the "family package." Things were going along great. The channel on which we watched BBC America changed from 80 to 60 several months ago, but no problems.

On Friday, all of a sudden we couldn't get BBC America. When we switched to that channel up popped a notice saying we weren't authorized to watch that channel and to call an 800 number if we wanted to add it to our lineup. We ignored this thinking that someone at Qwest would figure out their mistake and we'd have our channel back. But no! By Sunday--when Dr. Who is on and we wanted to watch it--I gave in and made the phone call. After a lot of time spent on hold while the guy at the other end kept checking on stuff I was assured that "they are checking it out and our channel should be back on in a couple of hours." I was told that if it wasn't fixed I could call back.

It wasn't fixed by Monday evening and so I again called the 800 number and asked why our TV wasn't working properly. It was a nightmare. Suffice it to say that 4 phone calls (2 with people who definitely didn't have a proper knowledge of the English language), many minutes spent on hold and an hour and a half later I still don't have BBC America. According to Qwest we should have never had it and they don't know why we did--but I can order an additional package that includes the "News and Information Channels" because apparently in Qwest's wisdom BBC America is classified as a "news channel"--I always knew that Monty Python was really a serious news source---!? They are checking into it and someone will call me back in 24 to 48 hours. I'm not holding my breath. . . . .

8 Item Tag...

I'm joining the TagEd - You're it now! Here are the rules: 1) Post rules on your blog 2) Answer the six '8' items 3) Let each person know by leaving them a comment.

8 favorite TV shows:

1. Doctor Who
2. Law and Order (all of them)
3. Masterpiece Theatre
4. Monarch of the Glen
5. Globe Trekker
6. This Old House
7. Mystery
8. Eyewitness News

(6 out of the 8 are PBS--how nerdy is that?)

8 Things I did yesterday:

1. Went to Church
2. Fixed Lunch for five
3. Snuggled Tegan
4. Had too short a nap
5. Went scouting with Christy for great photo locations
6. Made refreshments for a fireside (brownies and Jan Hagel cookies--with a side of grapes thrown for a little shot of healthy)
7. Hosted and attended fireside and proudly listened to Patrick speak--another one of those parental payback moments
8. Nagged Adrianna to "get to bed NOW!" when it was more than an hour past her bedtime and she needed "just a few minutes"

8 Things I'm looking forward to:

1. SPRING! I saw pansies on Saturday--can't wait to be able to go for a walk without bundling up
2. Losing 25 pounds (yes, I know that I have to actually work at it not just look forward to it. . . .!)
3. Girls Camp (yes, really! We get cabins, showers and flush toilets this year--makes me smile big)
4. Having a temple just down the street
5. Tegan learning to talk and walk (ok--crawl first)
6. The Arbonne FC-5 Roadshow at the Grand American on March 27th
7. Our neighborhood pool being open--it's so fun to be able to walk to swim laps every day! What a great way to start my day
8. HALLOWEEN and CHRISTMAS (I always look forward to my favorite holidays!)

8 Favorite restaurants:

1. Paloma Blanca--in San Antonio--worth a trip just for the food!
2. Indian Oven--in Logan
3. Cafe Rio
4. Market Street Grill
5. Mis Amores--in Preston--best "dang Quesadillas"
6. Z'Tejas
7. Biaggis
8. China Chefs

8 Things on my wish list:

1. World Peas (I couldn't resist)
2. Go back to Europe
3. Buy my dream house
4. Become an Arbonne NVP
5. More Vacations with family--kids, grandkids, etc. Bryce would even wear his "happy hat" :0)
6. That our country survives the next 4 years mostly intact
7. My very own Sauna
8. Serve a mission with Bryce
9. A theatre of our own for our little community theatre group

People I tag:

Rebekah
Christy
Katie
Angie
Connie E.
Barbara
Ann
Marisa

Today's Awakening

This morning I suddenly awoke thinking that the doorbell had rung. So I bolted out of bed thinking that it was my friend Amy who was coming over this morning before work to bring a life-sized cardboard cut-out of Edward Cullen. He was going to be part of the decor for Adrianna's birthday party which was scheduled later in the day. As I jumped out of bed I looked around--well actually felt around since I didn't have my contacts in and my glasses are broken--for my robe so I could run and answer the door. I couldn't find/feel it anywhere so I ran to the front door and turned on the porch light so that she would know that at least someone was alive. Then I ran back into the bedroom to find something suitable to answer the door in. Finally I found something to put on and rushed back to the door. Opened the door to discover there was NO ONE there. Turned off the porch light and opened the door again--don't know why, maybe I thought she was afraid of the light--my thought processes aren't too clear early in the morning. I still didn't have my contacts in or glasses on. I couldn't see anyone except that fleetingly, way in front of my actual field of vision I did see a shape flit by. (cue Twilight Zone music here) This shape could have been a dog, a jogger, a vampire, a phantom doorbell ringer or something totally different. So in my puzzlement I just shut the door, locked it, and went of course, back to bed. That was when I looked at the clock in the bedroom and realized it was only 6:20 a.m.! Even Amy isn't that much of an early bird! I wonder what exactly it was that woke me out of a sound sleep. I also wonder if I scared some poor jogger who was out running in the dark, minding his/her own business when on came a light and a crazy-looking and confused sort of woman looked squintingly out her front door. I hope I don't repeat this morning start again!

p.s. in case you are wondering I found my robe--much later in the day--in the laundry room closet where I had hung it yesterday after washing it so it could finish drying.

p.p.s. Amy came about an hour later with Edward--so what was the the phantom door bell? Real or imagined? And what was it that flitted out beyond my limited field of vision? (cue Twilight Zone music again)

SCIENCE NERD!

A couple of weeks ago Adrianna's school had a SCIENCE FAIR for all the 5th and 6th graders. Now we have done Science Fair projects before--in third grade a snoozer one about mirrors--I was all about trying to blow something up--but NO! It had so be some boring thing about mirrors. I think I was finally able to lose the display board for that one when we moved (we of course had to save the MIRROR). Last year she did another project with a couple of other girls in her class. They didn't start it until the day before it was due (the SCIENCE FAIR at that school was an optional activity) so needless to say it didn't make much of an impression on the judges and I don't think I ever even knew what their project was. HOWEVER--this year and this school was very different! All the fifth and sixth graders participated and they had a lot of time in school to work on their presentation boards, charts, graphs and other written information. Adrianna also spent a ton of time on it at home (fortunately--he,he ;)--for her she was sick a few days during the preparation phase and so she had extra time at home to work on her masterpiece.

Her original idea had been to hatch chicks--not an idea that we as parents living in the big city in a "pet free" home were too keen on. Fortunately it didn't take too long for her to come to her senses about the chick idea--the part about it being winter and not an ideal time to hatch babies, and also the most convincing, was the part where we told her that NO we were NOT going to pay $100 to order a automatic egg rotating incubator online, nor were we going to spend nearly that much for all the parts to make our own incubator out of a Styrofoam ice chest and then have to still put it together as a little chicken hatching suite! I know, we are mean parents (and proud of it).

So, idea number two, which was much more workable, was to do an experiment on synaesthesia (no, in case you are wondering, I had never heard of it before either) It isn't a contagious disease. It has nothing do with germs, noxious mold, stinky fumes, or thank goodness, live poultry--or any other living organism either. On the negative side it also doesn't have anything to do with causing an explosion--darn! The title of this project: "Which age group of people have more of a sense of synaesthesia?"

Now I am sure you are waiting breathlessly to know what exactly this involved. And also--what the heck is SYNAESTHESIA? In short it is a cross-over between sensory pathways in the brain. Where colors may evoke tastes or smells. Also sometimes music can be involved. For her experiment Adrianna (with a little help from me) baked 400 tiny cookies--exactly alike except she colored them differently with food coloring (red, blue, green and brown). She then had 100 people taste one of each color of cookie and tell her what they thought they tasted like. She got all kinds of reactions and tastes--they were really all vanilla flavored.

first you mix the cookies, then you roll and cut the cookies!

She was one of the winners of her school SCIENCE FAIR and so got to go on to the next level--the Charter School Fair. That was held yesterday and she was a big WINNER there so now she gets to go on to the next level--this one has cash ($) and prizes not just nerdly glory! Who knows how far she can go--well not as far as she could have gone last year because I just went online to the big National SCIENCE FAIR website and found out they have suspended their program this year for lack of sponsors--dang that means no possibility of an all-expense paid trip to Washington, D.C. this year!

I think she and Jordan (another girl in her class that also got to compete yesterday) had the most fun yesterday meeting the boys across the aisle from their displays and flirting with them. They didn't use the flirting word--they were just "talking science projects." . . . . right?

Adrianna and Jordan--we didn't get pictures of the boys across the aisle. . . .