Highlights and Lowlights

This past week has been interesting. Good and bad, I say.

Bad: Sooo much rain here. We've lost some of our garden veggies to frost:(
Good: The lawn is so green! And our basement has never flooded.

Bad: My 4-year old said to me, quite seriously, "Mom, you don't like me sometimes, huh?" (Ouch!)
Good: Everytime my kids leave the house they say "Love you, mom."

Bad: I had to give an 18-minute talk in church yesterday and halfway into it, I started to pass out. I turned and looked at my husband sitting on the stand behind me asking him for help standing, but he misunderstood me. I can't remember the middle two pages of my talk at all. Did I get through all of it? I don't know. What I do know is that I am still embarrassed because people were calling me after church to see if I was okay. Hu--mill--ee--a-ting!
Good: I learned so stinkin' much from preparing for that talk! My testimony grew profoundly on the subject of the Restoration of the Gospel. Dangit, I wish I could have conveyed those thoughts to the congregation.

Good: Lizzie only had one accident this week.
Bad: Lizzie had an accident this week.

Bad: Baseball games in the rain and wind really stink. Six innings + Two Hours + cold rain = unconditional love for my son.
Good: Our neighbor has two sons with Autism. They are starting up a Special Needs Baseball program called "The Field of Angels" and each special needs participant chooses a mentor to help them run the bases, know when to bat/hit/catch, etc. This 12-year old chose my son (who is an underdog at best on his Single A team-first-year). Everyday since he was asked, he gathers his bat and glove and takes his autistic buddy over to the park to practice drills. Priceless.

Very Bad: I had to go to the *butt* doctor this week. It's one thing to go to the OB/GYN for a womanly checkup. There's some dignity in that; but to bend over and spread your abundant cheeks? Not so much. "Got the whole fist up there, doc?"

Very Good: I had a missionary experience with a girl in London via cjane's blog. She loved a quote I sent her about trials (by Elder Maxwell), and she liked it so much, she commented on my blog and put the quote as a header on hers. Very cool, Maddy. God speed.

Unfortunate: the Mister did our laundry and washed my cell phone in with the darks. (Honey! My pants weren't in the dirty laundry basket! Didn't they feel kinda heavy???!!!)
Fortunate: $50 later, I realized how lucky I am that my husband is the kind of guy who helps out with chores. Lay off him a little.

Good: planting flowers, family matinee to see "The Lightning Thief", grilled ribeyes with family and new neighbors tonight, last week of school is upon us, awesome visiting teachers.

Bad: I found a hairstylist in Utah that is cheap and excellent. She did my hair over Conference Weekend. I can't get down there for at least another month. Yucky dark roots.

Sweet: My 4-year old asked me in Wal-Mart (while shopping for flowers to plant) if I knew when he and I will be resurrected. Deep question number two (also in the Garden Center): "What does Satan look like?"

Until We Meet Again

Happy Memorial Day, everyone.

Emma's Baptism Day

Emma was baptized and confirmed by her father on May 1, 2010.



She has her white blessing dress and this beautiful baptism dress (which incidentally, my sis-in-law found at the American Fork Costco for $15!) I can't wait to follow through with this exceptional girl and add the final white dress to her hope chest; culminating all of her saving ordinances to the day she enters the temple as a bride. If she will just keep her face toward the Savior...






I'm so grateful for this wonderful angelic girl in our family. I am also grateful to our extended family who made the sacrifice to come (especially Andrew & Amber who drove from Utah), as well as Emma's dear friends Aubrey and Kelson and also her primary teachers.

And our sincere appreciation to our wonderful neighbor, Angie Bailey for the beautiful photography. Isn't she talented? I was so thrilled with the way these turned out. This day was so important to us, and Angie captured it perfectly.
You can visit her blog here.

Welcome to the Kelly's Bayou

Put potatoes, corn, onions, sausage, garlic, lemon wedges and garlic cloves into a pot of boiling water. When veggies are crisp-tender, add the *live* crawfish. When the crawfish are living, they are gray-brown. Drop them into the boiling water, and when they turn red, they are done. (Only a few minutes.)
Drain the water and then dump the pot's contents on a table. Everybody serves themselves from the pile--Louisiana-style.
"It's just like Christmas! I'm so excited!" the children say.
Sarah (my lil' sis) and her new soul mate.
Josh ate so many crawfish I quit counting. (Tate was pretty disgusted by it all. He didn't get a sense of adventure from this whole experience.) And he disected every one of them. Body part by disgusting body part. (I'm convinced that because he was born in Orlando, Florida, he is obsessed with seafood...he once ate live baby octupus at a restaurant; two years ago he ate a live grasshopper.) Fearless Protein Boy.
Tim demonstrating how to get out the meat from his crawfish; Chrishel intently studying his technique.
Sierra took much convincing. (This hesitation could be in part because Tim hid a baby crawfish inside her roll, which resulted in a high- pitched, deafening scream.) Finally she succumbed to a delicious bite.

Here's the scoop:

I wake up a few mornings ago and during breakfast the Mister enthusiastically says, "Honey! Come see what I have in the garage for dinner this weekend!" He proceeds to show me a bucket full of *living* crawfish. ~ insert wincing and vomiting sound effects here.~

His co-worker dug a bunch of them up from Rose Lake near Shelley/Firth, Idaho (a few miles south of I.F.) Joseph brought them home thinking I would share his enthusiasm. Nonetheless, I get online and research how to cook the suckers. Problem is, they've been cooped up in a bucket domestically for 3 days now. (That means they've become aggressive and are fighting each other.) Everytime I go into my garage I can hear them scratching and clawing to get out. Creepy. From this research, I also discover that prior to cooking them, you have to ~purge~ them. (That's fancy talk for putting the living ones in a salt water bath in the kitchen sink until they vomit out their intestines. Repeat until water is no longer brown.) Then they are ready to boil in the kettle.

Thanks, Leech's for joining in the culinary fun! We're glad you enjoyed the cultural experience. I wanted to invite other neighbors, but I knew most of them would be repulsed and think we were crazy. And that would result in Christmas-goodie losses at the end of the year.

Perspective

On the sidebar of my blog is a link to the NieNie Dialogues. This is who she is. I was deeply touched by her message. Enjoy.