When Will I Die?

Sometimes the sensitivity of my brother is outstanding. Well, you'd think so being the father of five cute little girls he'd at least try. The other night while his four year old, who just spent four days partying at Grandma's house, was leaning against his arm and playing with the new baby.

"Look at her little toes!"

"Mmmm hmmm" he replies.

"And her little hands! He finguhs are so tiny!"

"Yeeeeah, they are!"

"Daddy, is she going to die?"

Ben doesn't miss a beat. "Yes, but not til she's 95."

Sadie, who can't count past ten, starts looking heartbroken, so he tries to fix it. "But don't worry, by then you'll be dead, too."

She didn't stop crying for twenty minutes, and will continue therapy probably until she's twenty five.

Grateful

Have you ever been to this site before? I have seen one of his videos before, but tonight it was just extra touching. I think there are many times in our life when it is really easy to get down on ourselves, or to look at other people and either be jealous or want to blame them for our problems. But, I have found personally that in the rare occasions when I have been truly grateful and been reading my scriptures daily, there is almost nothing in life that can bring me down.

I wanted to list ten things that I am specifically grateful for:

• Jeff
• Close proximity of family
• Church/The Gospel
• A car
• The ability to drive that car
• Being able to walk
• That I am healthy almost all of the time
• The lights in my living room
• Chunky... gosh I love that little dog, and the smelly squirrels
• A place to live and someone to share it with
• Flip flops
• America, but more specifically the Republican/Die-hard conservatives and Tea Party Patriots

So there we have it. I am grateful for a lot of other things, but those were the first few things that came to mind.

November Was a Popular Month

Apparently, because there are a lot of birthdays in August. This month we've celebrated my anniversary, Tonia's anniversary, Whitney's birthday... my cousin's birthday,This kid's birthday.... This girl's birthday.... And the birth of this little one. She is the tiniest baby I have ever held, barely weighing in at six pounds and three ounces. Little Hannah Claire showed up early on Audrey's seventh birthday. Audrey was so excited she told everyone that it was the best birthday present she could have ever gotten, and that she was going to name the baby after her, well, her middle name. Seven year olds are hard to resist, especially when they've got curly blond hair. So welcome to the family, numbero thirteeno! We're excited you're here!!!

San Marcus

San Marcus is one of the prettiest places in Texas, according to my book. I love the college town, the river, and the laid back atmosphere. Jeff and I went and spent a few days out there at the end of July so we could float the river. We camped at one of my favorite campgrounds and had the entire place to ourselves, with the exception of fireflies and cicadas, but they were welcome. The night before we set up camp, swam in the river and watched the fireflies look for each other in the dark. After a while we went into town and enjoyed a concert in the town park, and walked along the river where we saw giant turtles and a beaver. The next morning we woke up, ate some fresh fruit and spent a couple hours at our camp site with our feet in the river. The San Marcus is spring fed, so the water is actually pretty chilly all year round, which feels great when at about lunch the temperatures hit close to a hundred degrees. So we loaded up and went to the Lyon's Club to rent tubes. For $7 you can rent a tube and have unlimited shuttle rides back up the river-totally a steal. Especially because the pick up place is at City Park where they have some rapids to play in. The next morning we went to San Antonio. This was Jeff's first time seeing the Alamo and the River Walk. I don't know if you have been there or not, but it still hasn't changed in about twenty years, and they have the best Fuddrucker's I've ever had in my entire life.

Last weekend I went back to San Marcus to teach some Scouts how to canoe a river. Dal is a good friend of the family and has taught Scouts (and myself) to canoe for about thirty years. Some Scout troop convinced him to come hang out with them for the weekend, and he enlisted my help. I always forget what I get myself into when the word "Scout" is involved. I usually forget that 90% of them lack any brain. As we were loading the canoes at our take out spot one of the boys spotted this Golden Globe spider. It was huge. It was disgusting. And I poked it.

And then the little brat Scout on my left took a blade of grass and ran it up my leg. This was the last time anyone saw him alive.

1987

Today we celebrate the birthday of my favorite little sister, Whitney. In honor of the fact that it's her birthday and I forgot to mail her card Monday, I am using this opportunity to exploit a little bit about her for the rest of the world to enjoy. All three of you who read my blog, anyway.

I remember my Mom being pregnant with Whitney. No, I don't remember how it happened, but I have one snapshot memory of my mom kneeling on the floor, and pulling up her shirt so we could all see her tummy. I think the baby was moving because she was letting us all put our hands on her stomach and I was thinking, "Um, it feels like a stomach.." because I couldn't feel the baby moving. At any rate, it was the first time I poked Whitney. One of the last times I poked Whitney I got a broken toe, and I haven't done it since. And even though I was only two and a half, I remember her birth. I won't go into details, but mostly they involved the waiting room, wondering what was going on, and eating tiger bars.

After she quit being a baby and could walk, Whitney and I were best friends for a long time. All the older kids would go off to school and left just me home to play with Whitney. Even when I went to school it was still only a half day of kindergarten (all day kinder is sooooo wrong), so we'd play a lot. We could play for HOURS with our cabbage patch dolls. Mostly mine was bossing hers around and I think I scarred her for life. I love this picture of us, we used to wear our slips EVERYWHERE, mostly when we were A. Playing mountain goats (Thank you, National Geographic for the inspiration) and we were jumping on the fireplace or B. When we were getting married. Groom never showed.

Somehow Whitney skipped from four to whatever age and went and got married. After she announced her engagement, I think most people said, "Is she even old enough to drive yet?" ... I know! That's how it felt! But somehow she got older although I still see her as eight. I mean, twenty. Two. And I really like the guy that she married. They are a great couple. I think she is turning twenty three today, although in reality it's more like thirteen. Since when has she gotten so old?? Anyway, I am going to share twenty three fun things about Whitney:

1. She has fabulous hair, I've always loved it
2. She has a great sense of leadership-at eighteen when most girls her age were smoking pot, she was volunteering with the Red Cross. When Katrina hit New Orleans, she basically ran all the shelters in our area by herself. She's pretty awesome.
3. She has had more stitches as an adult than as a child. ... yeah, I know, what gives?
4. She no longer thinks I am the smartest person ever and has quit being my personal gopher. Although that ended years ago, I am still not over it.
5. She is taller than me. And Tiffany. And Katie. And Mom. But not Jeff, he reigns supreme.
6. When we were little I used to beat her up frequently. My Dad's favorite story is when we were about two and four. I shoved her down and took her toy, and of course, was walking away triumphantly. Something inside her snapped, and instead of crying, she got this "look" in her eyes, jumped up and ran over to me, grabbed my hair, threw me on the ground and took her toy back. Um-rude.
7. When we were eighteen and twenty, she refused to give me her juice box. We proceeded to get into another fight. I won that time. While my Dad was watching his daughters roll around the dirt at the paintball field and whack each other, he commented, "And my son sells Mary Kay." He does, and I highly recommend the time-wise 3 in 1 face wash.
8. When we were twenty-two and twenty-five we got into roughly the same fight, although we will never know who won because Katie broke it up. No juice box involved.
9. She has super pretty grey eyes.
10. She used to drive a red truck named Roy. It was Ben's truck, then Katie's, then mine, then she stole it and got gecko's painted on it.
11. She could probably save your life, she is a life guard, first responder, Wilderness First Responder, and knows how to tie eight different knots. Including a bowline.
12. She repels off two hundred foot bridges.
13. She takes pictures of bears for a living.
14. She has really a really pretty face never needs to wear make up.
15. She's my Mom's favorite, and don't you believe that woman for a second when she says, "They're all my favorite!" Cause we all know the truth.
16. I like her clothes.
17. I like her snowboarding boots best-oh wait. Its cause they're mine.
18. I like it when she lets my squirrels live in her truck for two days. They liked it, too.
19. She is obsessed, and I mean, OBSESSED about Lord of the Rings. The last time we played the trivia game with her, she played for all of us and won. (Insert hissing noise)
20. I miss her so much, we had so much fun living in Idaho.
21. She always tells this crazy story of how Katie and I were fighting and almost ended up in the canal water but Dad rescued one of us and whateverblahblahblah but none of us remember it. We always give her that weird look like, What .. are.. you .. talking .. about?
22. Her famous quote is, "I'm stupid!" It was said on August 17, 2000, the day Tonia and Ben got married. Her next best quote was said to a group of Boy Scouts, "Get naked, go long!" See, we had just watched Home Improvement where Tim built a "Man's bathroom" and he told Al to catch a football as he was running to the shower. It made sense on TV. ... haha, now that we're on quotes... one time she wanted to tell us what some girl had said, because it involved swear words she tried to beep it out. Uh, but she didn't beep it out, she said, "I don't have a fu%$&#% beep clue why the h#ll beep that fu#$^%&# beep happened..." Oooooh man, still makes me laugh every time I think about it.
23. She is a great friend.

So there we go. I could go on, but I better not. She might kill me. But you can read more about her by checking out her blog. Whitney, happy birthday! I hope you had a great day today, everyone was thinking about you and I am going to eat some blue bell for ya!!! Love you!

The Best Three Years

Three years ago today we got married. I can hardly believe that it's been three years already, but so it has! Three whole fabulous years. I was reminiscing about our wedding day last night,

and it made me smile. We had the most amazing day. I was out til midnight the night before, and was up at four the next morning to get my hair and makeup done by seven. Fortunately, I am always running off an hour or two of sleep so it wasn't so bad. See, I had this brilliant plan that if we got married at nine in the morning, somehow it wouldn't be 1,000 degrees by the time we were going to take pictures. ....But apparently I forget that in August in Texas there is no such thing as "cool." Unless you are standing in a freezer. The nice thing is that you can see how bad we were sweating in half the pictures, although if you look at the group shots you'll notice that no one is touching each other and everyone looks miserable. I mean, besides that you can't tell that it was 10,000 degrees. We both thought we were going to die of a heat stroke.

But, if I had it to do all over I wouldn't have changed anything. Except maybe the humidity. I can deal with heat, but the humidity.. oh the humidity! Besides the heat, the day couldn't have been any smoother and more beautiful. Jeff and I always look back and say to each other, "Gosh! We had SUCH a beautiful reception and wedding! That day couldn't have been any more perfect." And we really owe it to the love and support of so many friends and family, we felt so loved to have so many people help pull everything off, there just aren't enough thank you's we can say. It was such an amazing day.

So here we are, three years since the big day. We have had a lot of fun memories in just three years, mostly stemming from crazy road trips where we've driven all night (ticka... ticka... ticka.. Whooooooooooooooom!!), short little day trips, working together, camping, singing ridiculous songs together, having a calling where we work together, having our own language that sounds like we're dropping silverware down the stairs, and learning that anything can be solved by playing paper, rock, scissors.

Haven't tried solving the world's problems by playing that? Try it. It works.

So here is to a fabulous three years with Jeff! I love him with all my heart, and I think he's the best thing to have ever come into my life. Especially since before I met him, I used to have to get a chair to reach things above the refrigerator.

On the plus side...

Our Stake has become ginormous. Our ward split again today, for the millionth time since I've lived here. When my family first moved to The Wooodlands in 1987, it was population 22,000, and there was just the Woodlands ward. We were in the Houston North Stake. Now The Woodlands has grown to somewhere near 90,000 people and there are seven wards in this area. That is a lot of Mormons. It's always bittersweet when the wards split. The first time it happened my friends and I were stunned and upset. How could they split us up like this?? We recognized it had to be done, but we didn't want to miss seeing each other so often. We vowed that we would attend every ward, every week so we could all see each other. There were three wards then, and lemme tell you going from nine to five every Sunday lasted less than a month. That's when we realized that somehow life would still go on and we'd still all see each other at other activities... And that nine hours of church is a LOT of church. The sweet part of splitting the wards was that my friends made friends with other friends and those friends became friends too. Well, more like friendly acquaintances but still, it made the friend circle bigger and that is usually good thing. It also put some people into my ward that I ended up being best friends with, and we're still best friends to this day (wait, maybe we weren't in the same ward but whatever, it worked out).

So I will look at this ward splitting as a wonderful blessing-the gospel is growing and we'll be able to add to the friend circle again, and ... um we still have the 8:30 church slot in the same building. Suckers! Some people have to drive to Timbucktu to get to church... and speaking of Tim Buck Tew, that's what we're naming our first kid. Boy, girl, cat.. whatever.

Drug Cartel

This is America, and we only have room for one flag.

Has anyone else been following the circus that Obama is dragging Arizona through? I've been going nuts every time I read the news about anything and everything our tacky President does, but this one is really, really making me angry. I don't understand why the Federal Government isn't cracking down on our borders. Why are there thousands of people crossing over illegally every day? Those are NOT the kind of immigrants that we want, they have no respect for our laws, demand free health care, welfare and education and refuse to learn English. Living in Houston, I am getting SICK and TIRED of seeing everything in freaking Spanish and English. I am sick and tired of seeing entire classrooms that teach ONLY in Spanish, while our own REAL CITIZEN children are shoved into over crowded classrooms. I am sick and tired of illegal immigrants closing down hospitals because they end up going bankrupt, I am sick of them causing crime, killing our citizens, and not getting deported. This is ridiculous, and I was so proud of Arizona for finally doing what needs to be done.

I think what finally sent me over the edge today was reading that Arizona's Sheriff now has a bounty on his head by the Mexican drug cartel. I wonder what Obama is going to do about that!? Probably nothing, probably apologize to Mexico for having police officers in Arizona. Our uniformed men and women deserve our Nation's loyalty and respect, and they are NOT getting it from the Federal Government, in fact, they feel like the Government is now the enemy. The Government is choosing to protect the leeches of society over their own citizens who put their lives on the line to protect us. What is it going to take before someone finally does something!??!

I think I am also struggling because I feel so helpless. It seems like EVERY day I am making phone calls protesting yet ANOTHER stupid, selfish and Anti-American act our "President" does. Every. Single. Day. I am starting to feel at a loss trying to keep up, but you know what it feels like? It feels like when you're standing on a stage after a concert and they drop the entire roof of confetti, and you're trying to run around and pick up every piece before it falls. Impossible to do-there's too much and within five minutes, the whole room is COVERED in the glitter/confetti and pretty much in shambles and you're stuck cleaning up what you can. I just hope we have a lot of help with the clean up cause man, at this rate it's going to be a giant mess.

Galveston

We haven't been to the beach yet this summer and I finally couldn't take it anymore-so we packed up 5 of the kids and took off to Galveston for a few hours. I know most people don't consider the Gulf the beach, but hey, I like it. It was a short but great trip catching crabs, playing in the waves and feeding the seagulls. We stayed until it was dark and the mosquito's finally chased us off the beach so we reluctantly carried everything to the car and left to head home. I know most people don't like the sticky feeling of leaving straight from the beach and heading home, but for me there is always something refreshing about driving home all sandy and salty. It gives me a sense of fulfillment, knowing that I just spent the day doing exactly nothing but playing and enjoying the sun. Gotta love that feeling.

Off to The Jamboree!

And He's off to the National Scout Jamboree!

To see his adventures, visit www.grampacraig.blogspot.com

Mosque at Ground Zero

After watching this video I was so disgusted I sat down and wrote a letter to the Mayor of New York City. I realize I am behind on the news now that I am just hearing about this, but why hasn't there been a bigger stink about this building? It's like someone murdering your family, and then building a shrine to themselves in your yard,. How in the WORLD is that happening in New York? The Mayor said it was private property and has been zoned to do that. That site used to be a Burlington Coat factory before debris from 9/11 ruined the roof. Now it's going to be turned into a Jihad-supporting building-the same religion that murdered 3,000 people almost nine years ago. Is anyone else freaking out??? I am so angry about this.

If there is one religion in this world I can't and won't tolerate it is Islam. That religion is so violent and hateful I don't see how anyone could support those beliefs. I think America has become too soft and too politically correct. There are some things in life that are so heinous and evil that we should put our foot down and say, "No thanks. Not in my Country, not in my town, not anywhere near me."

I am mailing a letter today to the Mayor of NYC and am going to complain. They say that if someone takes the time to send in an email/phone call about a subject, there are probably 100 other people who share that point of view. They say if someone sends in a mailed letter, it counts for about 500 opinions. I'm not saying that so you can say, "Oh good, she did something so I don't have to." I'm saying it to encourage you to write your own letter, join a protest group. Do something. Anything! This is America, and we need to stop being so sympathetic to murderous groups of people. Like Pat says, they can build their stupid temple somewhere else, like Death Valley.

It's Raining Babies!

This was the Fourth of July. And this was last Friday night. I forgot my camera in the car, of course, so I stole these pictures from the proud parents. Isn't she a darling little baby? Autumn Christine, blonde hair, blue eyes, barely weighs as much as a hamster and is so adorable Jeff and I wanted to steal her but she had a baby "Low Jack" device around her ankle so we couldn't.Jenni and Chris are just so natural with her it's like she has always been there. Congrats, you two! She's a keeper!

A Day at the Pool

Usually when I take the kids to the pool it's not an emotionally scarring experience. But that's usually, and you can tell where this is going. We've spent most of the summer pleasantly enjoying the pools at our apartment complex, or going to the YMCA and enjoying the ones there. So far, the only scarring incident at the Y involved my eyes (which hurt after I had to bleach them), and an ethnic woman who thought her see-through shirt was a good choice to wear around children at the pool. I am not sure if she thought the kids were judging a wet t-shirt contest or what, but there was no way she was going to win with them things. Let's just say "Ew" with a capital "Ew." Anyway, usually the day at the pool is all fun and games. They play games, dive for random things on the floor of the pool and make you help them take their goggles on and off over a thousand times. On exceptionally fun days, Uncle Jeff throws the girls as far as he can into the deep end where they try desperately not to drown. When they finally make it back to the shallow end, he does it again! For some reason they love this game... The nice thing about the neighborhood pool is that the neighbors come and play and you get to meet new people. Some people like to come out and barbecue while they leave their four month old baby unattended in a pool floaty.Now this is where I preach modesty, modesty, modesty! ... and more Modesty! I believe that once you reap the ripe old age of Mommy, you should dress like one. I didn't say dress like Grandma-Mommy-Pioneer, but I am saying that at some point you really should consider setting a good, conservative example for your children. And for the rest of us, but mostly for heaven's sake please for the rest of us.

The great part is that she is blocking the view of her other friend, also wearing a child's bikini and weighing more than the four kids we brought to the pool combined. I think they were best friends. Best friends who smoke, eat and cuss loudly in the pool. And that was just on the surface...

And to top it off, it's not that those girls were the only other scarring event at the pool. These two were practicing their rescue breathing techniques. Or pretending to be vampires. Either way, they got them all wrong. Vampires and lifeguards look good when they do that. She's looking at me like, "What? It's totally not creepy to sit here and stare at my friend while she makes out with her boyfriend vampire! I'm trying to learn something new here!"

Needless to say, our fingers were pruney, our toes were pruney, and we needed to take the kids home so we could bleach their eyes. Let that be a lesson to us all, that we need to be better member missionaries. If these people knew about modesty and the law of chastity, we wouldn't have had such a scarring experience.

... Note to self: Send over missionaries...

My newest niece!

Here is little Andie Renee, just minutes old!  She showed up at 11:14am, weighing 7lbs, 11oz and reaching 19.25 inches in length!  I think a good pound of that is just her hair, she has so much! 

Congrats to the whole family!!! She's a little angel!

If you wanna see all the cell pictures I took since I forgot my camera click here!

Alice In Wonderland

We went over to Ben and Tonia's the other night to hang out and eat steaks.  They have nothing to do with the photo below, but I just thought everyone should know that Ben really knows how to grill.  Who knew Ben would turn his pyro skills into being a great grill chef?  Not his old Scout Masters, they nicknamed him PyroBob.  I'm sure they'll be glad to know that the National Park he almost destroyed didn't burn in vain.

We also watched Alice in Wonderland.  It wasn't my favorite, but it wasn't the worst kids movie I've ever seen.  I just felt like it was too much like Narnia, and I am a big fan of sticking with the original story line and not screwing it up Disney style.  Anyway, I think the movie somehow affected my Mom...

Either that, or she really is this short...