Good Samaritans?

Today in Seminary we acted out the story of the Good Samaritan. I let my kids dress up in costumes and do their own interpretation of the scriptural account. I think they had the most fun beating up the man on the road with ping pong paddles. Hey, at least they were awake!

It's like working in Disneyland

On Saturday we had a single adult Halloween party. One of the ladies brought her 4 year old daughter who was dressed up like a princess. I also happened to be dressed like a princess (using an old bridesmaid dress that comes in handy at Halloween.) This little girl was in awe of me and my costume. She stared at me and kept hugging me. Her mom asked if she could have her picture taken with me and I, of course, said yes. Then I totally got into the princess role and milked it for all it was worth. The little girl was in awe of my princess act.

Then in walked my friend (also Amy) dressed up as Snow White. Well, that was the icing on the cake for this little girl. Turns out there were 3 princesses at the party and I'm pretty sure we just saved this little girl's mother from a $1000 trip to Disneyland to have princess encounters. It's as close as I'll ever come to working as a Disney princess at my age.

So we took a photo of all the princesses...














And here are some of my non-royalty friends...

Radiant Reds

I just couldn't pass up taking a photo of the radiant red leaves outside my apartment complex. I am sure New England leaves are beautiful but the mile high mountain reds, yellows and oranges are spectacular.

My Colorado tv debut

Want to see me on the news in Colorado? Click here for the Fox News video. (BTW...I don't normally answer phones in the phone bank but I ultimately supervise that operation so when the media came, I was there on phones.) You have to click on the video link on the sidebar for it come up.

It finally came!

I got my diploma in the mail today. It's official. For some reason I am so paranoid I kept thinking that they were going to find a reason not to give it to me. Now it's mine, all mine!

I also bought a new camera today because mine was old and crappy. I think the freezing cold of Albania really did it in because it has never been the same since. Clearly I hadn't set the date and time when I took this photo.

Workdays, Weddings and Winter

Today I got a nice break from my 15 hour Saturday workdays. I got to attend my friend Ketie's wedding. I met Ketie at a singles activity right after I got back from Albania a year and a half ago. I heard her telling someone where her country is located and of course I went running over to say that I'd just come back from there. We have been friends ever since. Ketie and her son Jimmy were baptized into the LDS church in June 2007. She is a wonderful mom and a very caring friend.

David is from the Czech Republic. He treats Ketie and Jimmy so well. I am so happy for them. Ketie's ward put on a fabulous wedding and lunch. (I also attended a shower for her last week.) It's really wonderful to see a ward rally around one of the new members and really support her. Ketie's sister came from Albania for the event. I got to bust out the 3 or so Albanian words that I know--yes, good and thank you. I'm sure she was either really impressed or wondered what I might be thanking her for.

After the wedding I had to go back to work. During the drive home at 10:30 p.m. I saw snowflakes! It's supposed to snow in the city tonight and tomorrow. Can't say I really follow the weather much anymore since I am usually cooped up in my office these days.

Oh the Irony

Today in seminary we were talking about when Christ was suffering in the garden of Gethsemane and he asked his apostles to wait for him. Instead of waiting and watching, they fell asleep. He then asked them something like, "could you not watch with me one hour?"

When I looked up from my scriptures, 5 out of 7 of my students were sleeping. Seemed like a perfect time to draw some kind of parallel--can you not stay awake for 45 minutes in seminary while your teacher is doing every song and dance she knows to keep you entertained? Probably not the most Christian way to teach the scriptures but some of them actually opened their eyes for a moment while I pointed out the irony.

"Whatever it is, it's not enough"

That's what I said to my boss when she handed me my paycheck today. It's only Wednesday and I've already worked more than 40 hours. A little bit bitter on payday, are we? YES!

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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!

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

Friends for Life

Last night my friend Leslie from DC was here on business. She got to my place last night and we went to dinner and then she stayed here (couldn't get a hotel room in Denver during the DNC!)

It was so great to see Leslie. We met back in 2001 when she recruited me to go on my first election mission to Belarus. Because I had listed my church mission on my resume she knew I was Mormon and told me that she was as well. We met for the first time in Minsk, Belarus.

The election was very interesting and it was very clear that we were not really welcome there by the government of Belarus. We were all anxious to go home when it was over. On Tuesday, September 11, 2001 thirteen of us from the US boarded a very early flight from Minsk to Frankfurt, Germany. We landed in Germany thinking we'd be boarding a plane to the US when we learned very sketchy details about the attacks on our country. We ended up stuck in Germany for 3 days because we couldn't get home. (There is more to this story that I'll tell some other time.)

United airlines put us up in hotel rooms but we had to have a roommate. Since Leslie and I are the same religion and we decided that it would be good for us to share a hotel room. After all, both of us realized we had to do laundry in the sink and well, you get the point.

Unfortunately with the lack of sleep from the election, food issues, stress, etc. we both ended up sick, and I mean really sick. Both of us were throwing up, had diarrhea, had coughs and had colds. Hotel bathrooms are not so sound proof and we put up with each other in this condition for 3 days, add to that not knowing if or when we would be able to go home.

So last night Leslie was on the phone with her husband trying to explain to him how she knows me. She was retelling the hotel/sickness/September 11th story. I commented that once you share an experience like that with someone, you are friends for life! That certainly holds true for Leslie. I think we got to know each other at the worst possible time and we both still liked each other. Though I don't get to see her often, she is my friend for life.

This photo was taken in Minsk on Monday, September 10, 2001. That's me in the middle and Leslie is on the right with the yellow sweater.

The World of Star Wars According to my Nephews

While in Utah I took Mason and Ethan to see the Clone Wars movie. The movie was alright. They enjoyed it anyway. After the movie we went back to their house and we played Star Wars, talked about Star Wars, and watched Star Wars. Here are some Star Wars references I learned.

Light savers=light sabers
The force=a power people have to "force" things to happen like people to choke and light sabers to fly.
Eterial walkers=Imperial walkers
Dark Sivious=Any bad character who cannot be otherwise identified
Chihuahuas=Ewoks

I sure love those boys. They are so good. It was fun to spend the day with them and babysit them Saturday night.