Last Monday for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, I remembered Family Home Evening and had this feeling that we should talk about Martin Luther King stuff. I told the kids about Rosa Parks and some of the different kinds of discrimination that black people dealt with, and pointed out how sad it made Heavenly Father to see people being unkind to each other in those ways. Then I told them about Martin Luther King and how he had a dream that we could all love each other and be kind to others even if they are different from us. I tried to make my focus on the principle that we are all God's children and he wants us to show love and kindness to each other. I think it was a good experience and I hope that the kids learned a little bit about kindness.
On Tuesday morning Heidi was acting her age and being pretty grouchy. I can't remember what the exact situation was, but she did something unacceptable and I was too harsh in response. I went and put her on the couch so we could both take a break, and then after she had calmed down I came over to her and said, "Heidi, are you ready to have a hug?" She nodded and threw her arms around me and I told her I was sorry that we had been fighting. And then I was amazed when she squeezed my neck and very sincerely told me she was sorry for what she had done. I was grateful that I had humbled myself enough to apologize to her so that we could have that sweet and healing experience.
I have been thinking a lot this week about remembering to fill my spiritual reservoir. On one such instance, I was listening to NPR (the only radio station that works in our car) and feeling frustrated with what I was listening to, and then I realized that what I really needed then was something more spiritual, so at the next stop light I put in a Mormon Tabernacle Choir CD. One of the songs was Lead Kindly Light, and as they sang the line, "Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see the distant scene--one step enough for me," it reminded me of this blog. I used the title Keep Thou My Feet because I wanted it to be a reminder to me of the many ways God is taking care of us and leading us. As I look back on the past several years, I can see many times when I have been blessed by following the promptings of the Holy Ghost. The series of events that led me to Ryan, to North Carolina, to UNC, to having children, and to studying geology have not been coincidental. God always gave me enough information to help me keep moving in the right direction, but usually the instructions have only come one step at a time and I couldn't see the ending (I still can't).
Monday, January 27, 2014
Saturday, January 18, 2014
in which I write about armpits
I'll tell you something that may or may not be surprising: I care what you think about me. Probably a little too much sometimes.
Today I took Kevin to basketball practice and I was mortified when I whipped off his jacket to find that he had a huge brown blob that resembled chocolate on the front of his basketball shirt. He had put that shirt on five minutes before we left, straight from the laundry basket, and somehow managed to get it dirty in that amount of time without me noticing (I think he snuck a chocolate chip cookie). I was so embarrassed that I was the mom who showed up with the kid in the dirty basketball shirt and I worried for the first ten minutes of the practice that people would judge me harshly before mostly getting over it.
I put a fair amount of effort into impressing people. I wouldn't say it's excessive, but if I'm going to the grocery store I will make sure that the kids' clothes are clean and cute and that I'm wearing one of my nicer outfits, just so that I can impress the strangers.
When a large group of LDS women decided to wear dress pants to church on a certain Sunday, I had one friend who wrote on Facebook that she was glad she was participating because she didn't feel up to shaving her legs that day. I commented and said that I wish the feminists would start a movement encouraging our society to stop expecting women to constantly shave their armpits. I'm a little surprised that I had the courage to even say that, but I regretted it soon after when a friend of my friend, a person who I don't know at all, said that, ewww, as a woman she disagreed because hairy armpits are unattractive and gross (not her exact words, but that was the gist). I was hurt by this comment that a complete stranger made, and I ended up replying with some pathetic apology about how I agreed that hairy armpits are kind of gross but I still don't like having to shave.
I know that woman is probably never going to read my blog, but right now I am going to publicly retract my apologetic comment. I stand by what I said. The expectation that women shave their armpits is forced on us by our culture and our society, and I see little reason for it. The only actual benefit I've heard of from having shaven armpits is that it diminishes body odor, but my personal experience doesn't support that claim. I have, however, experienced plenty of unpleasant side effects from shaving my armpits, which make it completely not worth it to shave frequently, which is why I decided long ago to shave if I felt like it, not because of what other people think. Besides, if you're examining my armpits that closely then you're really weird.
First of all (and this is the main reason), shaving my armpits hurts. I know that many men find it painful to shave their faces (I am married to one such man), and for many women it is the same for shaving their armpits. It hurts when I'm shaving, it hurts afterwards, it hurts most of the time for the next week when tiny hairs are growing in and poking the sensitive skin everywhere. And yes, I've heard all the recommendations for making it hurt less, and it doesn't work for me. Why in the world should I endure such pain all the time just to impress everyone else with my clean-shaven armpits that they probably won't even notice?
Second, shaving takes up a lot of showering time. As it is, I resent that it takes me about 45 minutes to get the shampoo to rinse out of all my thick hair (and then several more hours for my hair to air dry). I would much rather read a book with my kids, or go on a walk, or fix my hair, or even clean the baseboards than waste valuable time on my armpits, of all things. Don't get me wrong, I believe in good hygiene and I love being clean, but whether or not your armpits have hair isn't necessarily a hygiene thing. I still wash mine with soap regularly and they are clean.
And that is why I stopped shaving my armpits regularly a long time ago. I do it if I feel like I want to for my own sake, but I don't care anymore what society thinks of my armpits. And if you are grossed out by that, I don't really care anymore. You are welcome to shave your armpits if you like it, but I think it's dumb to judge people based on their armpits. My face is just a few inches higher--how about you look there instead?
Hopefully my family isn't too mortified that I posted this, but occasionally I like to rant. I will try not to be too sensitive about differing opinions.
Today I took Kevin to basketball practice and I was mortified when I whipped off his jacket to find that he had a huge brown blob that resembled chocolate on the front of his basketball shirt. He had put that shirt on five minutes before we left, straight from the laundry basket, and somehow managed to get it dirty in that amount of time without me noticing (I think he snuck a chocolate chip cookie). I was so embarrassed that I was the mom who showed up with the kid in the dirty basketball shirt and I worried for the first ten minutes of the practice that people would judge me harshly before mostly getting over it.
I put a fair amount of effort into impressing people. I wouldn't say it's excessive, but if I'm going to the grocery store I will make sure that the kids' clothes are clean and cute and that I'm wearing one of my nicer outfits, just so that I can impress the strangers.
When a large group of LDS women decided to wear dress pants to church on a certain Sunday, I had one friend who wrote on Facebook that she was glad she was participating because she didn't feel up to shaving her legs that day. I commented and said that I wish the feminists would start a movement encouraging our society to stop expecting women to constantly shave their armpits. I'm a little surprised that I had the courage to even say that, but I regretted it soon after when a friend of my friend, a person who I don't know at all, said that, ewww, as a woman she disagreed because hairy armpits are unattractive and gross (not her exact words, but that was the gist). I was hurt by this comment that a complete stranger made, and I ended up replying with some pathetic apology about how I agreed that hairy armpits are kind of gross but I still don't like having to shave.
I know that woman is probably never going to read my blog, but right now I am going to publicly retract my apologetic comment. I stand by what I said. The expectation that women shave their armpits is forced on us by our culture and our society, and I see little reason for it. The only actual benefit I've heard of from having shaven armpits is that it diminishes body odor, but my personal experience doesn't support that claim. I have, however, experienced plenty of unpleasant side effects from shaving my armpits, which make it completely not worth it to shave frequently, which is why I decided long ago to shave if I felt like it, not because of what other people think. Besides, if you're examining my armpits that closely then you're really weird.
First of all (and this is the main reason), shaving my armpits hurts. I know that many men find it painful to shave their faces (I am married to one such man), and for many women it is the same for shaving their armpits. It hurts when I'm shaving, it hurts afterwards, it hurts most of the time for the next week when tiny hairs are growing in and poking the sensitive skin everywhere. And yes, I've heard all the recommendations for making it hurt less, and it doesn't work for me. Why in the world should I endure such pain all the time just to impress everyone else with my clean-shaven armpits that they probably won't even notice?
Second, shaving takes up a lot of showering time. As it is, I resent that it takes me about 45 minutes to get the shampoo to rinse out of all my thick hair (and then several more hours for my hair to air dry). I would much rather read a book with my kids, or go on a walk, or fix my hair, or even clean the baseboards than waste valuable time on my armpits, of all things. Don't get me wrong, I believe in good hygiene and I love being clean, but whether or not your armpits have hair isn't necessarily a hygiene thing. I still wash mine with soap regularly and they are clean.
And that is why I stopped shaving my armpits regularly a long time ago. I do it if I feel like I want to for my own sake, but I don't care anymore what society thinks of my armpits. And if you are grossed out by that, I don't really care anymore. You are welcome to shave your armpits if you like it, but I think it's dumb to judge people based on their armpits. My face is just a few inches higher--how about you look there instead?
Hopefully my family isn't too mortified that I posted this, but occasionally I like to rant. I will try not to be too sensitive about differing opinions.
Thursday, January 16, 2014
"Washing ABCs"
"Washing ABCs" is what Heidi called Washington D.C., although I'm pretty sure both kids were confused about what Washington D.C. actually was. When we were at the National Mall they kept saying they wanted to go back to Washington D.C., meaning they wanted to go back to the hotel, but once we were at the hotel they would ask where Washington D.C. was.
So, we went to Washington D.C. on Monday through Wednesday (Jan. 6-8) when they were experiencing record low temperatures. Ryan was presenting a poster at an astronomy conference there on Tuesday, and since it costs the same for four people to stay in a hotel as one person and his advisor's grant money was paying for the hotel, we decided to all go.
Monday morning we woke up to the sound of the kids running around in the living room and shrieking, "We're going on a trip! We're going on a trip!" with their mouths full of the cookies I had baked the night before to bring on the trip. Monday was mainly finishing packing and driving. Since I would be taking the kids to the National Mall by myself on Tuesday, we wanted to get there early enough to figure out how to get there on the metro and see a couple of things in the Air and Space Museum so I would sort of know what I was doing the next day. So we went and saw a couple of things and got really cold and then came home. Ryan picked up some food from McDonalds and we watched Spirited Away before going to bed.
Heidi was really preoccupied that evening with opening all of the drawers and the refrigerator in the hotel room. It was getting in the way, so finally we told her it was time to close them, and she said, "No! I need some fridge air!" (Is that what she always thought we were saying when we said "fresh air?")
The kids had a hard time settling down and going to sleep, but they did eventually go to sleep for a while. We had put them both together in one of the double beds. Then around 1:00 am Heidi woke up in the middle of the bed leaning against Kevin and started pushing him while saying "I need space!" (even though she was the one hogging the space). I tried several times to scoot her back over to her side, but she kept rolling back, and eventually both of the kids were wide awake and kept talking about things (opening the curtains and looking at the buildings outside, asking if we were going to ride the train again, saying they didn't want to because it's too cold, etc.). They talked for an hour and a half despite my persistent orders that they be quiet and go to sleep. It was ridiculous. Finally they fell back asleep for a while and we all slept in later than we had planned.
We got dressed and went to eat our "free" $20 breakfast (like I said, Ryan's advisor's grant money was paying for it), which the kids barely touched. Then I drove Ryan to the conference. I felt like half the battle for the day would be getting back to the hotel from the conference. There was one point where I was freaking out because Ryan said I was supposed to get on 495 West, which goes east and west at that point, but the signs were for 495 South and 495 North (even though it goes east and west), so I made a lucky/somewhat educated guess and chose south. It worked out okay and we got back to the hotel.
I got the kids dressed in several layers of clothes (several shirts, 2 jackets for Kevin and a jacket and coat for Heidi, 2 pairs of pants for both, hats, gloves) and packed some snacks, maps, extra clothes and such, and we caught the shuttle bus to the metro station. I had an umbrella stroller for Heidi and a harness/backpack for Kevin. The stroller was great once we were at the National Mall, but mostly a pain for buses and the metro since I had to carry the stroller and herd the kids down the escalator. The kids were actually really good at the metro station and they did a good job of staying with me. Riding the train was Kevin's favorite part.
We wanted to go see more of the air and space museum first. By the time we got there, it was already noon. Did I mention it was really, really cold? Kevin refused to walk because he was so cold, so he got in the umbrella stroller and I carried Heidi. I was kicking myself because I had opted to not bring my Ergo, although I'm not sure how well it would work for me at this point in my pregnancy. Heidi had refused to wear gloves and she was freezing. By the time we got inside the air and space museum Heidi was screaming and Kevin was whimpering too. All the security people made a huge deal about how cold my baby was, and I really wished they would leave me alone. The "best" comment was, "Where's the baby's mother? She needs some gloves!" Um, I'm the baby's mother, and she refused to wear them. Once I managed to get the kids inside and get Heidi's hands warmed up, it wasn't that big of a deal. (She didn't refuse to wear gloves after that, by the way.)
Kevin was really interested in all the planes and space stuff, but he was frustrated because he couldn't drive any of them. There were some planes that you could walk through and look at through glass, but he wanted to drive them. Fortunately, there is a section in the museum where there are a lot of interactive activities about air pressure and how planes fly, and one of the things there was a Cessna 150 that you could sit in and "drive", so that saved the day. I'm sure we spent a half hour there while the kids took turns driving the plane, which I'm sure would never have worked on a busy day. Kevin figured out how everything worked, and whenever people walked by he tried to get their attention so he could teach them how the plane worked too. There were some sweet college-aged girls with British accents who listened really nicely to Kevin's entire explanation of how the plane worked while they were taking turns getting pictures sitting in the plane.
Kevin was getting pretty wild around 2:00, so I decided to take the kids to the Natural History Museum because I knew there were several cafes there where we could sit and eat our lunch (yes, I know that you're supposed to picnic on the National Mall if you are just eating your own food, but I was not going to make my kids eat lunch out there and I was prepared to defy anybody who got on my case about it). It was a huge ordeal to get them there, though. Heidi actually fell asleep in the stroller on the way, but Kevin was cold and tired, so I had to talk him through the entire walk to get him to keep going (whimpering the entire time). I kept trying to distract him by pointing out different things, and that kind of worked. One time there were a ton of tiny little birds pecking in the dirt, and Kevin stared at them for a long time. I thought he was just interested in what they were doing, but then out of the blue he started roaring at them until they had all flown away. I don't know why I'm still surprised when he does this stuff, but I am.
A very cold little boy in front of the Capitol building. It was 6 degrees outside.
The cold and the food seemed to subdue Kevin quite a bit (by the way, I refused Kevin's request to buy him a cupcake for $3.50[!!]), and we spent quite a bit of time looking at dinosaurs and other fossils, which was pretty cool. I knew we were getting very close to our limit, but I really wanted to see a couple of things in the gems and geology section, so I dragged the kids up there. Kevin was not particularly thrilled by anything there and made sure to let me know, so all I got to see was the Hope Diamond, a brief glimpse of some of the other gems, the huge sandstone concretion, and the Acasta Gneiss (the oldest rock ever collected--my advisor was actually the one who collected it when he was a postdoc). Oh, well.
Heidi and a stegasaurus.
Heidi and a ground sloth.
Did I mention that Kevin was completely unimpressed by the fact that he was looking at the oldest known earth rock?
Kevin really wanted to see the butterflies, so we went there really quick. You could go into the butterfly exhibit for free on Tuesdays, but you still had to get a timed ticket, which I knew was not going to work, so we looked at the few exhibits in the front and peeked through the window at the butterflies. By that point I knew we were more than done. I was kind of surprised that when I asked Heidi later, she told me her favorite part was the butterflies. We didn't really spend that much time in there.
Kevin wasn't thrilled to have to walk back to the metro station. Every time we passed a bus he asked if we could get on it. At one point Kevin found a stick, and then Heidi got out of the stroller to get a stick, and while she was out Kevin took his chance and hopped in the stroller. You should have seen the shock on Heidi's face when she turned around and found him in her spot. Heidi just couldn't walk fast enough for us to get there in less than three hours, so finally I plopped her in Kevin's lap in the stroller and told him to hold her really tight. I'm sure we were quite the sight, but we moved a lot faster.
A sweet lady offered to help me get through the gates, and then since we were going opposite directions she also asked a man to hold Kevin's hand while we were going down the escalator. When we got in our train a bunch of people also jumped out of their seats to offer them to us. Also, on the bus we rode to get back to the hotel from the metro, Heidi fell on her face on the steps and I couldn't get to her because Kevin and the stroller were in my way, but a lady picked her up and got her off the bus for me. I was really touched by all the nice people who offered to help us, especially because we were pretty tired and I know that they were all on their way home from work and probably eager to get home.
I had gotten a coupon for a discount on a pizza, but apparently the cleaning lady threw it away or something because I could not find that coupon anywhere, and by the time I had found another option for dinner it was late enough that I figured we might as well get dinner after we picked Ryan up at the convention center. So I looked up directions to a Pizza Hut and we watched Spirited Away some more and then went to get Ryan.
The kids were completely zonked out by the time we got there. They were really exhausted. It sounds like Ryan had a good day and met a lot of people. He was able to go to a talk where he got some good ideas for networking effectively, and he was able to put them to use while meeting some other people presenting posters. So we went and got pizza and ate it while finishing Spirited Away for the second time. (We did bring other movies, but Kevin really likes Spirited Away.)
We had brought a sleeping bag and pad in case the kids didn't sleep well in the same bed, so that night Kevin slept on the floor in the sleeping bag. He was pretty excited about the idea after he realized it would be kind of like sleeping in a cat bed. The kids slept much better that night. (Whew!)
We chose better for our "free" continental breakfast the next morning. Kevin and Heidi both ate plenty of food--they just ate it really slowly. We figured as long as they were still eating we would let them keep going. Then we finished packing everything and took it down to the car.
The lady at the front desk had a treat box for kids and the purple glasses were what Heidi chose.
The view outside our window. We were on the tenth floor.
We put papers in the kids' pockets that said their names, our names, and some contact information for in case they got separated from us. Heidi was really interested in her paper on Wednesday morning and kept taking it out of her pocket.
The packing chaos and a five-months-pregnant Marcelaine.
That morning we did a drive-through tour of downtown D.C. to see most of the monuments from the car, then we went to the other air and space museum that has all of the really big planes. Kevin had a hard time because we wouldn't let him run wherever he wanted and he couldn't touch the planes. But we still enjoyed seeing everything. It was pretty cool to see the Discovery space shuttle.
I was trying to take a picture of Heidi, but she was too excited and started running. Still cute, though.
Discovery
Enola Gay--the plane that dropped the bombs on Japan in World War II
The quarantine facility that the astronauts had to stay in for several days after going to the moon for the first time.
Concorde and a lot of other planes.
The almost first airplane. The builders attempted to fly it a few days before the Wright brothers successfully flew their plane, but it kept crashing because it was too complicated.
We started looking for somewhere to get some lunch and we saw a Costco, so we stopped there for pizza and sundaes. Then we went and visited my cousin Vanessa for about half an hour. Kevin enjoyed playing with Miriam and the toys and it was fun to see what their new house is like and chat for a while. We had to leave pretty soon, though, because we didn't want to get home too late.
The drive home went okay except we did end up getting caught in the rush hour traffic, so that added a couple of hours to our driving time. Heidi was pretty distressed for a while when we were still a couple of hours away from home. She just kept sobbing, "I want to go home! Let's go home!" She was tired and wanted to sleep in her own bed. She did okay after Ryan gave her a toe massage.
We come home to a very cold apartment. The thermostat said 53 degrees. Apparently before we left it had been set to only do air conditioning and not heat, so the heater hadn't run at all while we were gone. Whoops. I think it took over a day for the temperature to equalize at a decent temperature throughout the apartment. It's fun to go on vacations, but it's also nice to be back and doing our normal things again.
What would I do differently next time? Go when it's warmer, check the thermostat before we leave, bring Ryan along to the National Mall, and maybe take an extra umbrella stroller or else a double stroller that folds up small. Actually, what I'd like to do is go with just Ryan so we can see all the stuff that the kids weren't interested in (National Archives, Museum of American History, all the rocks) and actually read about the exhibits instead of guess what they are while chasing kids. The backpack/harness was one of our best purchases ever. It made everything so much easier because I didn't have to stress so much about losing Kevin.
So, we went to Washington D.C. on Monday through Wednesday (Jan. 6-8) when they were experiencing record low temperatures. Ryan was presenting a poster at an astronomy conference there on Tuesday, and since it costs the same for four people to stay in a hotel as one person and his advisor's grant money was paying for the hotel, we decided to all go.
Monday morning we woke up to the sound of the kids running around in the living room and shrieking, "We're going on a trip! We're going on a trip!" with their mouths full of the cookies I had baked the night before to bring on the trip. Monday was mainly finishing packing and driving. Since I would be taking the kids to the National Mall by myself on Tuesday, we wanted to get there early enough to figure out how to get there on the metro and see a couple of things in the Air and Space Museum so I would sort of know what I was doing the next day. So we went and saw a couple of things and got really cold and then came home. Ryan picked up some food from McDonalds and we watched Spirited Away before going to bed.
The kids had a hard time settling down and going to sleep, but they did eventually go to sleep for a while. We had put them both together in one of the double beds. Then around 1:00 am Heidi woke up in the middle of the bed leaning against Kevin and started pushing him while saying "I need space!" (even though she was the one hogging the space). I tried several times to scoot her back over to her side, but she kept rolling back, and eventually both of the kids were wide awake and kept talking about things (opening the curtains and looking at the buildings outside, asking if we were going to ride the train again, saying they didn't want to because it's too cold, etc.). They talked for an hour and a half despite my persistent orders that they be quiet and go to sleep. It was ridiculous. Finally they fell back asleep for a while and we all slept in later than we had planned.
We got dressed and went to eat our "free" $20 breakfast (like I said, Ryan's advisor's grant money was paying for it), which the kids barely touched. Then I drove Ryan to the conference. I felt like half the battle for the day would be getting back to the hotel from the conference. There was one point where I was freaking out because Ryan said I was supposed to get on 495 West, which goes east and west at that point, but the signs were for 495 South and 495 North (even though it goes east and west), so I made a lucky/somewhat educated guess and chose south. It worked out okay and we got back to the hotel.
I got the kids dressed in several layers of clothes (several shirts, 2 jackets for Kevin and a jacket and coat for Heidi, 2 pairs of pants for both, hats, gloves) and packed some snacks, maps, extra clothes and such, and we caught the shuttle bus to the metro station. I had an umbrella stroller for Heidi and a harness/backpack for Kevin. The stroller was great once we were at the National Mall, but mostly a pain for buses and the metro since I had to carry the stroller and herd the kids down the escalator. The kids were actually really good at the metro station and they did a good job of staying with me. Riding the train was Kevin's favorite part.
We wanted to go see more of the air and space museum first. By the time we got there, it was already noon. Did I mention it was really, really cold? Kevin refused to walk because he was so cold, so he got in the umbrella stroller and I carried Heidi. I was kicking myself because I had opted to not bring my Ergo, although I'm not sure how well it would work for me at this point in my pregnancy. Heidi had refused to wear gloves and she was freezing. By the time we got inside the air and space museum Heidi was screaming and Kevin was whimpering too. All the security people made a huge deal about how cold my baby was, and I really wished they would leave me alone. The "best" comment was, "Where's the baby's mother? She needs some gloves!" Um, I'm the baby's mother, and she refused to wear them. Once I managed to get the kids inside and get Heidi's hands warmed up, it wasn't that big of a deal. (She didn't refuse to wear gloves after that, by the way.)
This is the face of a cold little girl who didn't sleep enough the night before.
Kevin was really interested in all the planes and space stuff, but he was frustrated because he couldn't drive any of them. There were some planes that you could walk through and look at through glass, but he wanted to drive them. Fortunately, there is a section in the museum where there are a lot of interactive activities about air pressure and how planes fly, and one of the things there was a Cessna 150 that you could sit in and "drive", so that saved the day. I'm sure we spent a half hour there while the kids took turns driving the plane, which I'm sure would never have worked on a busy day. Kevin figured out how everything worked, and whenever people walked by he tried to get their attention so he could teach them how the plane worked too. There were some sweet college-aged girls with British accents who listened really nicely to Kevin's entire explanation of how the plane worked while they were taking turns getting pictures sitting in the plane.
Kevin was getting pretty wild around 2:00, so I decided to take the kids to the Natural History Museum because I knew there were several cafes there where we could sit and eat our lunch (yes, I know that you're supposed to picnic on the National Mall if you are just eating your own food, but I was not going to make my kids eat lunch out there and I was prepared to defy anybody who got on my case about it). It was a huge ordeal to get them there, though. Heidi actually fell asleep in the stroller on the way, but Kevin was cold and tired, so I had to talk him through the entire walk to get him to keep going (whimpering the entire time). I kept trying to distract him by pointing out different things, and that kind of worked. One time there were a ton of tiny little birds pecking in the dirt, and Kevin stared at them for a long time. I thought he was just interested in what they were doing, but then out of the blue he started roaring at them until they had all flown away. I don't know why I'm still surprised when he does this stuff, but I am.
The cold and the food seemed to subdue Kevin quite a bit (by the way, I refused Kevin's request to buy him a cupcake for $3.50[!!]), and we spent quite a bit of time looking at dinosaurs and other fossils, which was pretty cool. I knew we were getting very close to our limit, but I really wanted to see a couple of things in the gems and geology section, so I dragged the kids up there. Kevin was not particularly thrilled by anything there and made sure to let me know, so all I got to see was the Hope Diamond, a brief glimpse of some of the other gems, the huge sandstone concretion, and the Acasta Gneiss (the oldest rock ever collected--my advisor was actually the one who collected it when he was a postdoc). Oh, well.
Kevin really wanted to see the butterflies, so we went there really quick. You could go into the butterfly exhibit for free on Tuesdays, but you still had to get a timed ticket, which I knew was not going to work, so we looked at the few exhibits in the front and peeked through the window at the butterflies. By that point I knew we were more than done. I was kind of surprised that when I asked Heidi later, she told me her favorite part was the butterflies. We didn't really spend that much time in there.
Kevin wasn't thrilled to have to walk back to the metro station. Every time we passed a bus he asked if we could get on it. At one point Kevin found a stick, and then Heidi got out of the stroller to get a stick, and while she was out Kevin took his chance and hopped in the stroller. You should have seen the shock on Heidi's face when she turned around and found him in her spot. Heidi just couldn't walk fast enough for us to get there in less than three hours, so finally I plopped her in Kevin's lap in the stroller and told him to hold her really tight. I'm sure we were quite the sight, but we moved a lot faster.
A sweet lady offered to help me get through the gates, and then since we were going opposite directions she also asked a man to hold Kevin's hand while we were going down the escalator. When we got in our train a bunch of people also jumped out of their seats to offer them to us. Also, on the bus we rode to get back to the hotel from the metro, Heidi fell on her face on the steps and I couldn't get to her because Kevin and the stroller were in my way, but a lady picked her up and got her off the bus for me. I was really touched by all the nice people who offered to help us, especially because we were pretty tired and I know that they were all on their way home from work and probably eager to get home.
I had gotten a coupon for a discount on a pizza, but apparently the cleaning lady threw it away or something because I could not find that coupon anywhere, and by the time I had found another option for dinner it was late enough that I figured we might as well get dinner after we picked Ryan up at the convention center. So I looked up directions to a Pizza Hut and we watched Spirited Away some more and then went to get Ryan.
The kids were completely zonked out by the time we got there. They were really exhausted. It sounds like Ryan had a good day and met a lot of people. He was able to go to a talk where he got some good ideas for networking effectively, and he was able to put them to use while meeting some other people presenting posters. So we went and got pizza and ate it while finishing Spirited Away for the second time. (We did bring other movies, but Kevin really likes Spirited Away.)
We had brought a sleeping bag and pad in case the kids didn't sleep well in the same bed, so that night Kevin slept on the floor in the sleeping bag. He was pretty excited about the idea after he realized it would be kind of like sleeping in a cat bed. The kids slept much better that night. (Whew!)
We chose better for our "free" continental breakfast the next morning. Kevin and Heidi both ate plenty of food--they just ate it really slowly. We figured as long as they were still eating we would let them keep going. Then we finished packing everything and took it down to the car.
That morning we did a drive-through tour of downtown D.C. to see most of the monuments from the car, then we went to the other air and space museum that has all of the really big planes. Kevin had a hard time because we wouldn't let him run wherever he wanted and he couldn't touch the planes. But we still enjoyed seeing everything. It was pretty cool to see the Discovery space shuttle.
We started looking for somewhere to get some lunch and we saw a Costco, so we stopped there for pizza and sundaes. Then we went and visited my cousin Vanessa for about half an hour. Kevin enjoyed playing with Miriam and the toys and it was fun to see what their new house is like and chat for a while. We had to leave pretty soon, though, because we didn't want to get home too late.
The drive home went okay except we did end up getting caught in the rush hour traffic, so that added a couple of hours to our driving time. Heidi was pretty distressed for a while when we were still a couple of hours away from home. She just kept sobbing, "I want to go home! Let's go home!" She was tired and wanted to sleep in her own bed. She did okay after Ryan gave her a toe massage.
We come home to a very cold apartment. The thermostat said 53 degrees. Apparently before we left it had been set to only do air conditioning and not heat, so the heater hadn't run at all while we were gone. Whoops. I think it took over a day for the temperature to equalize at a decent temperature throughout the apartment. It's fun to go on vacations, but it's also nice to be back and doing our normal things again.
What would I do differently next time? Go when it's warmer, check the thermostat before we leave, bring Ryan along to the National Mall, and maybe take an extra umbrella stroller or else a double stroller that folds up small. Actually, what I'd like to do is go with just Ryan so we can see all the stuff that the kids weren't interested in (National Archives, Museum of American History, all the rocks) and actually read about the exhibits instead of guess what they are while chasing kids. The backpack/harness was one of our best purchases ever. It made everything so much easier because I didn't have to stress so much about losing Kevin.
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Christmas
(Skip to the end if you just want to see pictures.)
At the end of dinner on the 23rd, Heidi started throwing up all over herself. I wasn't too surprised since about a week before I had found her licking Kevin's toothbrush while Kevin was in the midst of fighting a stomach bug, but I wasn't exactly thrilled either. Ryan was feeling under the weather himself and he just ran out of the room (unfortunately, I am the designated throw-up cleaner in the house). The next 24 hours involved four throw-up loads of laundry and a very sad little Heidi getting her hair washed four more times than she would have liked. I was sure she wasn't going to get to enjoy Christmas very much.
We had a fun time getting everything set out for Christmas. We had gotten a huge bin of Duplos from someone off Craigslist, and it included a lot more Duplo trains and tracks as well as a barn and some farm animals, so Ryan put them all together and set up a train track around the Christmas tree, then we put all the presents inside the train track. Considering that Heidi hadn't kept much down in the past 24 hours, I figured that her stomach probably did not need a stocking full of candy, so the kids got one small bag of M&Ms in their stockings in addition to a dinosaur and a small flashlight, and Kevin also got a little tape measure in his.
Christmas morning, I woke up at 7:45 and thought, "I am one lucky mom." The kids didn't get up until 8:00. It occurred to me that my parents and siblings had probably already been up for half an hour. Kevin was so excited with what Ryan had done with the Duplos. He was dancing around and saying, "Did you guys do this? Oh, I am so happy!"
The Duplos were probably the thing the kids were most excited about, and Ryan was excited too. When he brought them home several months ago and washed them thoroughly in the sink, he was dancing around excitedly and saying, "Is it Christmas yet?" My aunt also sent us even more Duplos and Duplo trains (she was the one who introduced us to Duplo trains last year), so we have quite the stash now. We've been building a lot.
Amazingly, Heidi seemed to be doing better. There was no throwing up on Christmas and she had a nice day.
After we opened presents, we were able to talk to Ryan's parents and his brother Jared's family using a Google Hangout, and then my family called me so that I could listen in while they skyped with my sister Michelle, who is serving as a missionary right now. It was great to hear about the interesting experiences Michelle is having.
The day after Christmas we went to the annual Boxing Day celebration with some friends. This was the third year that we have done it. Everybody brought their boxes from Christmas and we used them to make towers, slides, and robot costumes. The Rasmussens salvaged the boxes that they thought would be useful for moving, and the rest went to the recycling.
In the evening we went to the annual Annandag Jul celebration at the home of our ward choir director. Annandag Jul is a Swedish/Scandinavian holiday that means "Another day of Christmas." Ryan said this was probably the best one yet because we didn't have to chase kids around the entire night, which meant we got to talk to people. Kevin mostly stayed in the living room with the other kids playing with toys and watching A Muppet's Christmas Carol. There is always good quality cheese and a few kinds of fish, and for dessert the Johnsons always serve rice pudding with strawberries and the Kearsleys bring a Kransekake (a cake [ingredients are almonds, sugar, and egg whites] made with concentric rings stacked on top of each other to form a cone). I made some Andes Mint Cookies, and they disappeared pretty fast. Between dinner and dessert we did ring dances (Kevin actually participated a little this year!) and then danced Christmas through the house.
Oh, and we also had maintenance people come four different times to fix the dishwasher. The first time the guy didn't finish fixing it, the second time they realized that the door hinge was having problems and did a temporary fix, then it started leaking water all over the floor so they came a third time and put in a "new" (i.e. "refurbished") dishwasher, then that dishwasher wasn't draining so they came a fourth time and figured out that the plug wasn't aligned properly and wasn't moving to let the water drain. I still haven't decided if it's even worth it to have a dishwasher here because the dishwashers are pretty pathetic (and I have now used four different dishwashers in our apartment complex, so I know from experience), so you practically have to wash the dishes before putting them in anyway. I'm not sure if it took any more time for me to wash everything by hand in the sink. But at least the door on the new dishwasher isn't breaking toes every time we open it. We were a little upset because when they took away the old dishwasher we forgot to take out a plastic basket that we use to hold the small things like sippy cup lids that tend to fly around, but then one day Ryan realized that the dishwasher that had been sitting in the garage for a week was our old one and he retrieved the basket. Also, the know-it-all maintenance man unclogged the sink in the kids' bathroom (which actually was draining fine--it was just the master bathroom sink that was draining slowly) and replaced the plug, despite my attempts to explain that I took the plug off on purpose so the kids would stop flooding the bathroom. Guess what, I took that plug off too the first time I found the kids splashing in an overflowing sink of water.
On New Years Eve we had the sister missionaries over for dinner and had a nice time. We had potato soup, rolls, and wassail. I had postponed making wassail for Christmas since the apple juice I had bought for it was the only thing Heidi was able to keep down. It was great to be able to share it with the sister missionaries, though, because they really enjoyed it. It was a good batch.
Here are some pictures from Christmas.
This was one of our Nativity sets. I think we have five now. This is one Ryan inherited from another missionary while serving a mission. After helping me set the figures out on the shelf, Kevin went and got the geode from where they are normally displayed on the wall shelves and put them next to the nativity set, saying, "Here, this will be their home." I was feeling pretty pleased because we fully intend to teach the kids that Mary and Joseph probably stayed in a cave, not a wooden barn (see Stone Manger), and I thought Kevin had put the geode pieces there to be like caves. But when I called them caves, he looked at me like I was crazy and said, "They're volcanoes, Mom."
Here is our tree with the new tracks around the presents.
Ryan is excited that now we have enough duplos that he can build multi-story houses complete with stairs.
Here are a couple of videos of the Christmas excitement:
At the end of dinner on the 23rd, Heidi started throwing up all over herself. I wasn't too surprised since about a week before I had found her licking Kevin's toothbrush while Kevin was in the midst of fighting a stomach bug, but I wasn't exactly thrilled either. Ryan was feeling under the weather himself and he just ran out of the room (unfortunately, I am the designated throw-up cleaner in the house). The next 24 hours involved four throw-up loads of laundry and a very sad little Heidi getting her hair washed four more times than she would have liked. I was sure she wasn't going to get to enjoy Christmas very much.
We had a fun time getting everything set out for Christmas. We had gotten a huge bin of Duplos from someone off Craigslist, and it included a lot more Duplo trains and tracks as well as a barn and some farm animals, so Ryan put them all together and set up a train track around the Christmas tree, then we put all the presents inside the train track. Considering that Heidi hadn't kept much down in the past 24 hours, I figured that her stomach probably did not need a stocking full of candy, so the kids got one small bag of M&Ms in their stockings in addition to a dinosaur and a small flashlight, and Kevin also got a little tape measure in his.
Christmas morning, I woke up at 7:45 and thought, "I am one lucky mom." The kids didn't get up until 8:00. It occurred to me that my parents and siblings had probably already been up for half an hour. Kevin was so excited with what Ryan had done with the Duplos. He was dancing around and saying, "Did you guys do this? Oh, I am so happy!"
The Duplos were probably the thing the kids were most excited about, and Ryan was excited too. When he brought them home several months ago and washed them thoroughly in the sink, he was dancing around excitedly and saying, "Is it Christmas yet?" My aunt also sent us even more Duplos and Duplo trains (she was the one who introduced us to Duplo trains last year), so we have quite the stash now. We've been building a lot.
Amazingly, Heidi seemed to be doing better. There was no throwing up on Christmas and she had a nice day.
After we opened presents, we were able to talk to Ryan's parents and his brother Jared's family using a Google Hangout, and then my family called me so that I could listen in while they skyped with my sister Michelle, who is serving as a missionary right now. It was great to hear about the interesting experiences Michelle is having.
The day after Christmas we went to the annual Boxing Day celebration with some friends. This was the third year that we have done it. Everybody brought their boxes from Christmas and we used them to make towers, slides, and robot costumes. The Rasmussens salvaged the boxes that they thought would be useful for moving, and the rest went to the recycling.
In the evening we went to the annual Annandag Jul celebration at the home of our ward choir director. Annandag Jul is a Swedish/Scandinavian holiday that means "Another day of Christmas." Ryan said this was probably the best one yet because we didn't have to chase kids around the entire night, which meant we got to talk to people. Kevin mostly stayed in the living room with the other kids playing with toys and watching A Muppet's Christmas Carol. There is always good quality cheese and a few kinds of fish, and for dessert the Johnsons always serve rice pudding with strawberries and the Kearsleys bring a Kransekake (a cake [ingredients are almonds, sugar, and egg whites] made with concentric rings stacked on top of each other to form a cone). I made some Andes Mint Cookies, and they disappeared pretty fast. Between dinner and dessert we did ring dances (Kevin actually participated a little this year!) and then danced Christmas through the house.
Oh, and we also had maintenance people come four different times to fix the dishwasher. The first time the guy didn't finish fixing it, the second time they realized that the door hinge was having problems and did a temporary fix, then it started leaking water all over the floor so they came a third time and put in a "new" (i.e. "refurbished") dishwasher, then that dishwasher wasn't draining so they came a fourth time and figured out that the plug wasn't aligned properly and wasn't moving to let the water drain. I still haven't decided if it's even worth it to have a dishwasher here because the dishwashers are pretty pathetic (and I have now used four different dishwashers in our apartment complex, so I know from experience), so you practically have to wash the dishes before putting them in anyway. I'm not sure if it took any more time for me to wash everything by hand in the sink. But at least the door on the new dishwasher isn't breaking toes every time we open it. We were a little upset because when they took away the old dishwasher we forgot to take out a plastic basket that we use to hold the small things like sippy cup lids that tend to fly around, but then one day Ryan realized that the dishwasher that had been sitting in the garage for a week was our old one and he retrieved the basket. Also, the know-it-all maintenance man unclogged the sink in the kids' bathroom (which actually was draining fine--it was just the master bathroom sink that was draining slowly) and replaced the plug, despite my attempts to explain that I took the plug off on purpose so the kids would stop flooding the bathroom. Guess what, I took that plug off too the first time I found the kids splashing in an overflowing sink of water.
On New Years Eve we had the sister missionaries over for dinner and had a nice time. We had potato soup, rolls, and wassail. I had postponed making wassail for Christmas since the apple juice I had bought for it was the only thing Heidi was able to keep down. It was great to be able to share it with the sister missionaries, though, because they really enjoyed it. It was a good batch.
Here are some pictures from Christmas.
Stockings with dinosaurs standing guard.
Here are a couple of videos of the Christmas excitement:
Monday, January 13, 2014
dealing with my space bubble
I am not a cuddler. I am a person with a space bubble. Occasionally my space bubble even becomes a porcupine skin. Sometimes it's because I don't want to be touched and I am purposely avoiding touching somebody, and sometimes I'm just avoiding it out of habit without thinking about it. Apparently it's obvious enough that when Ryan and I had recently started dating, there was a guy who saw us sitting pretty close together (not even holding hands at the time) and guessed based on that that we were dating because he had observed how much I like my personal space.
(As a side note, I think I'm lucky that I've never had a stranger touch my belly when I have been pregnant, because I really would have no idea what to do.)
For most of my life this characteristic hasn't been a problem, but recently I have become more aware of it because kids need physical touch. Part of the issue is that my kids are wiggly and when they are like that I tend to get away because I don't like being kicked and jabbed, but even then I feel bad because sometimes I find myself saying things like, "I need space!" or "Just stop touching me!" which are phrases that the kids now repeat. But even if they are calm, I often forget to cuddle them or hold them. It's just not something I think about. And I am starting to sense that my kids need more physical love than I am giving them.
So this isn't really a measurable goal, but I am trying to be more aware of this problem and give Kevin and Heidi (and Ryan) more cuddles and hugs. One thing that I know is helpful is to read books together a lot. And as they get older and more aware, maybe we can come to a compromise where we respect Mom's personal space but also have a family that shows love to each other through physical touch.
(As a side note, I think I'm lucky that I've never had a stranger touch my belly when I have been pregnant, because I really would have no idea what to do.)
For most of my life this characteristic hasn't been a problem, but recently I have become more aware of it because kids need physical touch. Part of the issue is that my kids are wiggly and when they are like that I tend to get away because I don't like being kicked and jabbed, but even then I feel bad because sometimes I find myself saying things like, "I need space!" or "Just stop touching me!" which are phrases that the kids now repeat. But even if they are calm, I often forget to cuddle them or hold them. It's just not something I think about. And I am starting to sense that my kids need more physical love than I am giving them.
So this isn't really a measurable goal, but I am trying to be more aware of this problem and give Kevin and Heidi (and Ryan) more cuddles and hugs. One thing that I know is helpful is to read books together a lot. And as they get older and more aware, maybe we can come to a compromise where we respect Mom's personal space but also have a family that shows love to each other through physical touch.
Sunday, January 5, 2014
News Years Resolutions
In the past I have not really been one to make new years resolutions. I figure that if you want to make a change you should start right away, not wait until January 1st. But last year I decided to make some goals for what I wanted to accomplish during the year, and it actually worked out really well, so I guess maybe there's something to it after all. I think it is really important to have measurable goals, not vague, "I want to be more _________ this year" type goals, because then you can look back and evaluate yourself more honestly.
Goals I made last year:
Read Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling--Yes!
Sew a little bit every week--No. I think this goal was a little too lofty for me in this season of my life. However, I did finish several projects. I made four skirts for myself and a dress for Heidi, and over Christmas break I finished an embroidery sampler that I've had since I was ten years old (although I am thinking about adding some extra details because I found an amazing website with tutorials for some beautiful embroidery stitches). Oh, and I finally figured out how to do a french knot!
Read twelve books for fun (one per month): I looked on Good Reads and I read 28 books this year, so I did a good job of making more time for reading.
Read most of each month's Ensign: Yes.
Another thing that I really wanted to try this year was to set up and follow a budget. In the fall of 2012 I had tried using Mint.com to set up a budget, but it wasn't really what I wanted. After talking about it a lot with Ryan we decided to set up a line-item budget using Excel. This was probably one of the best decisions we made this year. At the time, we didn't know that we would have to buy a new car this year. Then our Honda Accord was totaled in a small car crash. We thought a lot about it and decided that we wanted to get a minivan. Because we had set up a budget for the year, we had a pretty good idea of what we could afford, so we were able to pay cash for our minivan and have the peace of mind of knowing that we still had enough money left for the rest of the year. Even in the everyday purchases like groceries and home supplies, it was nice to be able to refer to the category in the budget and see how we were doing.
Goals for 2014:
Go to the temple every month.
Read 30 books.
Read 4 non-fiction books.
Get all the dishes washed before bed.
Tweak the budget for 2014 and continue to keep it updated.
Goals I made last year:
Read Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling--Yes!
Sew a little bit every week--No. I think this goal was a little too lofty for me in this season of my life. However, I did finish several projects. I made four skirts for myself and a dress for Heidi, and over Christmas break I finished an embroidery sampler that I've had since I was ten years old (although I am thinking about adding some extra details because I found an amazing website with tutorials for some beautiful embroidery stitches). Oh, and I finally figured out how to do a french knot!
Read twelve books for fun (one per month): I looked on Good Reads and I read 28 books this year, so I did a good job of making more time for reading.
Read most of each month's Ensign: Yes.
Another thing that I really wanted to try this year was to set up and follow a budget. In the fall of 2012 I had tried using Mint.com to set up a budget, but it wasn't really what I wanted. After talking about it a lot with Ryan we decided to set up a line-item budget using Excel. This was probably one of the best decisions we made this year. At the time, we didn't know that we would have to buy a new car this year. Then our Honda Accord was totaled in a small car crash. We thought a lot about it and decided that we wanted to get a minivan. Because we had set up a budget for the year, we had a pretty good idea of what we could afford, so we were able to pay cash for our minivan and have the peace of mind of knowing that we still had enough money left for the rest of the year. Even in the everyday purchases like groceries and home supplies, it was nice to be able to refer to the category in the budget and see how we were doing.
Goals for 2014:
Go to the temple every month.
Read 30 books.
Read 4 non-fiction books.
Get all the dishes washed before bed.
Tweak the budget for 2014 and continue to keep it updated.
Friday, January 3, 2014
Goodreads Review: The Jefferson Lies
The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed about Thomas Jefferson by David BartonMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
I think this book was worth the read and I highly recommend it. Aside from all of the things I learned about Thomas Jefferson, I gained a lot of important insights into the way our society currently views history, people, politics, religion, civil rights, and so on. It has given me some useful tools for recognizing truth and lies when I see things on the internet.
Many of the myths that are addressed by Barton originated with people of Jefferson's time who were trying to ruin him politically. The rumor that he fathered at least one of the children of one of his slaves probably originated with a person who got mad at Jefferson and spent the rest of his life running a smear campaign against him (Jefferson actually wanted to free his slaves but was prevented by Virginia laws). Many of the myths about his religious beliefs were originated by clergymen and/or politicians who were Federalists and told outright lies about Jefferson in order to dissuade people from voting for him. It's kind of like what would happen if someone 80 years from now used nothing but Fox News to write a biography of Barack Obama. Probably the biography would be biased and not very accurate. Barton has done a great job looking at the original sources, especially Jefferson's own writings, and trying to understand the historical context so he could paint a more accurate picture of what really happened.
I do think that it might have been better to organize the book a little differently. Most of the chapters were about Jefferson's religious beliefs, and by the end I felt like it was becoming a little overkill because the myths were already obviously false based on previous chapters. That's not to say that he shouldn't have included some of the content, but I think it should have been organized a little better so that it didn't feel like I was reading the same chapter over and over again.
The last chapter is really interesting, and not just because of the content, but also because Barton's point of view about Christianity is very obvious. In the last chapter he is addressing whether Jefferson was an atheist and whether he was a Christian. After addressing whether he was an atheist (definitely not), he moves on to discuss why he believes Thomas Jefferson probably was not a Christian when he died. In his later years, Jefferson was very interested in the Restorationist movement that aimed to become more like the church Christ organized on the earth. The leaders of this movement generally rejected the creeds and the doctrine of the Trinity because these were not in the Bible. Jefferson seemed to agree with them and wrote that he believed that the focus should be mostly on the gospels and not on the epistles. That is why Barton argues that Jefferson was not a Christian. (LDS friends, keep in mind that most Christians' definition of being a Christian is not simply believing in Christ, but also has a great deal to do with whether a person believes in the creeds and the Trinity.) Interestingly, Sidney Rigdon was a follower of Alexander Campbell, one of the leading ministers in the Restorationist movement. A lot of the principles supported by the Restorationists were also important in the organization of the LDS church, which is interesting since Thomas Jefferson was one of the Eminent Men whose temple work was done by proxy by Wilford Woodruff.
View all my reviews
Thursday, January 2, 2014
It's a . . .
. . . baby. A human baby.
Ryan knows the gender, but I wanted to wait until the baby is born to find out, so you'll have to wait too. Kind of anticlimactic for you, but oh well.
As a side note, I was curious to see how moms felt who had decided to wait until the baby came to find out the gender, so googled it and read through some of the forums. Interestingly, one of the common comments was that as an adult there are so few surprises, so they figured they should take advantage of one of the few opportunities to be surprised and wait to find out until the baby came. That made me laugh because these parents haven't figured out yet just how many surprises you get to experience when you have kids.
Everything looked normal and healthy for the ultrasound, which is always a relief to hear. The baby is about 14 oz. When they looked at the heart, the ultrasound technician got excited and said, "That is a beautiful heart. It's a treat to see a heart like that." Also, it appears that we may have another little thumb-sucker.
Here are some pictures.
.jpg) |
| In this one you can see the baby's leg on the right. Baby was moving a lot. Maybe showing off. |
 |
| Did I mention the baby was moving a lot? This is a profile and it's blurry because of how fast the baby was moving. |
 |
| Foot. |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
