A scrapbook page from my baptism

Some of the writing was cut off in the scan (it's too big a page for the scanner), but it's my favorite part. It says, "The specelest Day of my life I'm not kidding I'm serist it was becaus I didi't have a singgel sin."

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Jason didn't think I should post this because it is very personal. But I hope you know I'm not mocking my child self by putting this up. It's one of the best treasures I have, and I love it.

The best prank ever

I'm going to take one more walk down memory lane (I've been scanning in old photo albums), but trust me, this one is worth reading.

My freshman year in college, the Olympic torch was coming through the city where I lived. My roommates and I, along with most of the city, lined up on the street, bundled up in the cold, with our cameras. We waited and waited. The torch was over an hour behind schedule, apparently. Finally, we saw throngs of people rushing up and snapping pictures. We were excited, and ran up and started snapping.
After it had passed, I sat there a little disappointed. It wasn't what I expected the Olympic torch to be like. It seemed a little unprofessional and the torch was small (and looked like aluminum foil). Oh well.

We were getting ready to head inside, when a bigger commotion happened. People again were rushing up to snap pictures. There was another torch. This one was preceded and followed by police cars and fire engines. Their outfits were definitely more Olympic-like (the first guys were wearing long-johns), and the torch was big and beautiful.
The thought of what happened has kept me laughing, over the years, every time I think of it. How fun would it have been to be the first guys, running 5 minutes ahead of the real torch, knowing everyone is totally expecting to see a torch anytime soon so they just assume you're the real thing and take pictures of you as you run up the street smiling and laughing. Who's idea was that? And why wasn't it on the news?

Genius.

My little Danes

Here's Dana pretending to play with her toys. I say pretending, because neither she nor Levi actually play with toys unless I am sitting there doing it with them. Okay, she really was playing with toys when I took this picture, but every parent knows what I'm talking about, right? My kids aren't the only ones who would rather hang onto their mom's legs than play with a room full of toys. This is normal, right? (Fishing for reassurance here).
I'm convinced that people like to eat what they have been given since they were young. Most kids like bland foods. Well, Dana loves hummus. The raw garlic and lemon juice really give it a zip, but it's not too strong for her tastebuds. She loves it. I've tried a few hummus recipes, and I like this one best (I half the cumin, coriander, lemon juice, and omit the olive oil).
The coat I bought her from the thrift store.
I just had to post some cute pictures, because right now she's up in her bed crying, trying to get out of taking a nap. It makes me a little tense to let her cry, so I thought I'd just see some cuteness to make me happy.

Motivation

I've been going through some old pictures, and I came across one from a hike Jason and I took while we were dating, almost 6 years ago. It was a steep hike, and was a pretty good work out for us young, fit college students. We were sitting at the top enjoying the view when an old man came hiking up behind us. His name was George and he was 82 years old. We didn't pass him on the trail, and since he came up maybe only 15 min. after we did, he must have been keeping pace with us. Every time I see someone old and active, I feel like putting on my running shoes, because they remind me that I want to be like that.

*And my shirt - I was so naive, I didn't know what it was talking about when I bought it. Anyone who really knows me will not be surprised by that.

I read this quote on a blog and loved it. John Wayne movie where a father is talking to the daughter:

"Becky! Come here. Somethin' I ought to tell you. Guess now's as good a time as any. You're going to have every young buck west of the Missouri around here tryin' to marry you - mostly because you're a handsome filly, but partly because I own everything in this country from here to there. They'll think you're going to inherit it. Well, you're not. I'm going to leave most of it to, well, to the nation really, for a park where no lumbermen'll cut down all the trees for houses with leaky roofs. Nobody'll kill all the beaver for hats for dudes nor murder the buffalo for robes. What I'm going to give you is a 500 cow spread on the Upper Green River. Now that may not seem like much, but it's more than we had, your mother and I. Some folks are gonna say I'm doin' all this so I can sit up in the hereafter and look down on a park named after me, or that I was disappointed in you - didn't want you to get all that money. But the real reason, Becky, is because I love you, and I want you and some young man to have what I had, because all the gold in the United States Treasury and all the harp music in heaven can't equal what happens between a man and a woman with all that growin' together. I can't explain it any better than that.

So the other morning I was sitting at the kitchen table reading, when out of the corner off my eye I saw something move by the closet door. I looked over, and out runs a mouse. Ran out, ran back in. That night we set traps and 24 hours later found this in our crawl space:

We are hoping that's the only one, though we still have traps set up. It is really weird, though, that we had a mouse. This is the nicest place BY FAR that we have lived since being married (actually, since ever for both of us, I think, since our townhome is pretty new). We've lived in places that are 80 years old, and never saw mice.

So I, of course, expected Jason to dispose of our little friend. He's always been my big harry spider-getter. And once in a very old basement apartment we lived in, he came home to see a 3 ft snake lying in our living room. He bonked it on the head and threw it outside (and never told me about it for over a year, after we'd moved out, because he knew I'd make us move). But when I asked him to throw out the mouse, he was soooo grossed out. When it comes to blood, and apparently mice, he has a hard time. But I assured him that his man job of disposing of a little mouse corpse is a lot easier than my woman job of making babies.
And he did it. And this picture is not posed.

Mornings at our house

We have no car, it's cold outside, visitors are rare, so why not play legos and build forts all day in our jammies?







I want my kids to stay these ages forever. All that bigger-kid stuff is too complicated for me.

PS I can't end this post without mentioning that these legos (over $100 worth) were $2 at a yard sale. A huge proportion of the things we own are from yard sales, but legos are a rare find.