Monday, September 29, 2008

The Orphan Car

Every morning at 6:45 a.m. when seminary is over, I pile 3 of my students in to my car and drop them off at their high school, which happens to be on my way to work.

They told me awhile ago that they call my car "The Orphan Car." I asked, "Why do you call it that?" They said, "Because we are like your orphans."

Still confused I asked for further explanation. One girl explained, "Look at us. We are each a different color. It's like you adopted 3 orphans." I looked and sure enough, one student is white (Caucasian), one is brown (Native American) and one is black (from Liberia). I love my diverse little seminary class but I never noticed the "colors" in my car.

Now they think it's hilarious that when they get out of my car in front of the school they yell, "Bye Mom!" It makes me laugh every morning.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

What?!?! Shocking!

I saw this on Yahoo tonight when I checked my email. I'm still reeling from the shock of the news. Wow! All the years I've been a Clay fan, I never saw this coming. It's going to take me many hours to get over this bombshell.

I'm not ashamed to say I own all his CD's. I voted for him on AI (2nd season rocked) and saw him two times in concert with my sister. Aahhh...the memories of my sister screaming at the ten year old girls in front of us to put their posters down so we could see.

Be what ya gotta be, Clay but I won't be buying the magazine.

Friday, September 19, 2008

I'm having a Melinda Moment

Melinda? Are you reading this?

Tonight I made my own home-made laundry detergent and it was truly a Melinda moment. My friend Melinda is the most resourceful person I know and this seems like something she would do.

I am trying to save a little money, oh and the environment. All I needed was my (NEW!) food processor, 2 small bars of Ivory soap, baking soda and Borax. I can't wait to try this fine concoction on my laundry. There are many recipe variations. The one I tried was at instructables.com. Good thing I have no life and I can do my laundry on Friday night!

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Rule #27 of Salsa Dancing...

If you don't feel like going dancing, DON'T GO. You'll only embarrass yourself and no one wants to dance with someone who is ornery and tired. Furthermore, you won't have fun and then you'll come home and write a miserable post on your blog for your friends and family to see.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Premonitions?

On Saturday night I went to an open house. A friend of mine has launched her own on-line clothing boutique. Check out www.vintagefringe.com to see her cute clothes. I bought a new shirt and I was so excited because it's unique and I haven't bought any clothes for a long time. Today I wore my new shirt to work.

Now I have this co-worker who doesn't quite live in reality and she, shall we say, makes up a lot of things. Most of the time I think she makes up things so as to try to initiate a conversation with me and I just refuse to oblige. Here is a recent example:

Co-worker: "It's gorgeous outside."
Me: "It's 50 degrees and overcast. What are you talking about?"

She tries to initiate a conversation about the weather and I just flat out won't go for it. It always begins with "It's gorgeous outside." I don't know that I've ever used gorgeous to describe the weather conditions. In fact, I don't know that I've used gorgeous since junior high when we said things like "Ralph Macchio and all the guys in Duran Duran are sooooooo GORGEOUS." But I digress...back to the shirt.

So I walked into work today and here is how the conversation went:

Co-worker: "I had a dream about you last night."
Me: Silent but slightly freaked out.
Co-worker: "Yeah, we were processing ballots and you were wearing that EXACT shirt."
Me: "That's not possible. I just bought it this weekend."
Co-worker: Acts as if she has just had a premotion about my weekend clothing choices.

Good thing I didn't buy the green one or I would have really blown her dream.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Remembering

This morning in Seminary my students and I were talking about September 11, 2001. Most of the students in my class have no real memory of that day because they were 7 and 8 years old at the time and they couldn't really grasp what was happening. One of my oldest students is an immigrant from Liberia. She was still living there and even though she was 10 at the time, she doesn't really remember much about that day.

Not only did this seem strange to me but it also made me feel old. As adults we have the ability to remember where we were, what we were doing, and how we were feeling when the September 11th attacks happened. Sometimes I'm not sure if I like those memories.

I mentioned before that I was on my way back from an election mission in Belarus and was stuck in Germany for several days. Here are the snippets of memories and feelings I have from that day:

--The kindness of strangers. A man at the airport let me and my friend use his cell phone to call home because the land lines were jammed, we said, "but we have to call America" and he said, "that's okay."

--The love shown to me by the people in Germany. So many times people out of the blue would say to us how sorry they were and how their prayers were with our country. Many of the churches opened their doors to just let people come in and sit and reflect.

--The longing to be with my family. I remember that I just wanted to be home with them. Not that there was anything I could do and it didn't make much difference where I was. I realized, though, that I really, really wanted to hug my whole family.

--When I finally made it back to Salt Lake several days later I remember the American flags that were hung and posted everywhere. It felt like coming home to a different and changed world. I wondered at that time if that "united" feeling would last. Seems like it's hard to hold onto that.

Hearing the news reports is still hard for me. I can't even imagine how hard this day is for those who lost family and friends. Though it's hard to hear, I don't want to forget.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

What's that barnyard smell?

Still feeling (or rather smelling) the effects of henna.

Tonight I went salsa dancing and the minute I started to sweat I could smell something repugnant yet strangely familiar. Yes, the smell of wet straw in a stable. It was my hair and the henna has come back to haunt me. Who knew the smell would come back when my hair was wet with perspiration?

Well, I hope no one noticed it. I don't want to be known to the guys at the salsa club as "the girl who smells like a farm." How embarrassing!

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Amy+Henna Hair Color=Bad news

Since I had major car repairs last month, I am trying to find ways to be more frugal. The woman who does my hair is on extended maternity leave so I figured this would be a good time to try to color my own hair without feeling guilty for ditching my hair stylist. I love her dearly but it costs me a fortune to have brown hair!

I went to the Sunflower Market (my favorite store!) and bought some henna hair color. Yes, I'll admit that I am much more granola since I moved to Colorado.

Well, the henna was a disaster, a total mess and it smelled like wet hay in a stable. After I mixed together the green concoction I tried to paint it on my hair as the directions said. When I was done my hair looked and felt like green straw and my sink looked like this.















The rest of the bathroom was splattered with green henna as well. I thought it was such a bright idea because I could let it sit on my hair for an hour while I prepared my seminary lesson for the next day. That didn't happen because I spent the next hour cleaning my bathroom. When I finally rinsed it off the shower was a green disaster--the tile, shower curtain and tub were covered in henna. Luckily it was a good excuse for me to clean my bathroom and the seminary lesson went on the way back burner.

Lessons I learned: 1) Henna is a bad idea when you don't know what you are doing. 2) Suck it up and pay $150 for someone to color your hair for you because it's worth it.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Finally some down time

I actually had a free weekend this week. I haven't had one of those in many, many months...probably since before Memorial Day. Granted, I did have to go into work yesterday but I went in when I felt like it and worked until I felt like it. No rushing around trying to get in 5 hours of schoolwork for me anymore!

Saturday I went to the gym with Renee' and we did power walking on the treadmill and a Pilates class. I got my grocery shopping and laundry done. I also went to a singles activity up in Lyons. It's about an hour from Denver and it was fun.

Today I went to church, did my Seminary lessons for the week, had a nap, talked to my mom, and caught up on my email. Aahh...I love being back to my boring life!

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Aunthood!

"Aunt Amy" is one of my favorite titles. The last 2 weekends I was able to be in Utah with my family. The first weekend I took Callee's kids and last weekend I took Tony's kids. It's so fun for me to do things that I never get to do in Colorado because I have no kids here to play with.

Saturday I took Megan, Logan and Kimball to the Children's Museum at the Gateway. We had so much fun that it was hard to leave. Afterwards we had ice cream. The great thing about being an aunt is that the kids are always obedient and well-behaved around me. I don't have to discipline or get after them like their parents do. Funny how that happens...

I also survived Kimball's bloody nose (a real gusher!) at the Museum. The next day in church Kate had a major explosion and pooped all over me. So I think I've had enough with the bodily fluids for now.

Sunday the whole family was together for my mom's birthday party. It's so fun for me to be with my family. I love them so much--I must because I've seen them four weekends in a row and I live 500 miles away.














Silly kids! Logan, Megan and Kimball at the Gateway. (Notice the tissue I stuck up Kimball's nose. Enlarge the photo and you can see the blood all over his shirt!)















Aunt Amy and little Kate















Grandma Liz and her seven cute grandchildren