Shhhh! Don't tell Tessa!

I'm here to share the obsession that has taken over the last week of my life. I like to call it the First-Ever All-Santa Tabernacle Choir, but it's more than that (and less, since they don't sing...or have a tabernacle).

This is my play for missionary mom-of-the-year. They are about to be sent to their new home in California to be with Sister Shnookie2. Except now that I've spent so much time with these little jolly fellows, I want to keep them! Just kidding; I am so excited for her to get them that I can hardly stand it. 
What's inside them, you ask? All sorts of stuff, I answer. I will give you a complete list at the bottom in case you are really THAT interested, but each has a little goody and a scripture that ties in (sometimes rather loosely!) with the goody. For example, here are the innards of Claus #4:

 The goody is a stick of Sister Shnookie2's favorite lip balm, Burt's Bees. (And if you know Sis S2 and her luscious lips, you know why she goes through a lot of this stuff.) The balm is inside of a penguin lip gloss holder, which for some reason is not showing. But it's cute! The scripture says something semi-inspiring with the words "lips" in it. My intent was to make 12 of these little guys, but then I got excited, bought too much stuff, and ended up with 15. You've heard about the 15 days of Christmas, right? If 12 is good then 15 is great--who's gonna complain?? Let's face it, I'm an over-achiever.
 

Oh, and I know I should've counted DOWN to Christmas instead of UP, but I didn't realize that until I was half-way through, and I didn't have the heart to tear each of those signs out of the little guy's hands and start over.

Sister Shnookie 2 is going to FREAK OUT when she opens this package. And isn't that what it's all about? ( I don't know, really, is it?)

Here's the list (in no particular order, because I can't remember what is where):
1. A mini gingerbread house (dollar store score). Scripture:  Doctrine and Covenants 109:8

8 Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing, and establish ahouse, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, ahouse of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God;

2. Sour gummi worms. Scripture:         Jeremiah 31:30

30 But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.

·         Job 19:26

26 And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: 

3. A necklace of Christmas bulbs that light up (dollar store). Scripture:

·         Luke 12:35

35 Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; (Plus a friendly reminder to NOT wear the necklace around her loins. Yes, I did that.)

4. Mint LifeSavers: Scripture: JST Mark 8:37 For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; or whosoever will save his life, shall be willing to lay it down for my sake; and if he is not willing to lay it down for my sake, he shall lose it.

5. Skittles (red & green version). Scripture:

·         Matthew 7:20

20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.

6. Penguin Toothbrush holder (Forever 21): Scripture: 

·         Amos 4:6

6 ¶And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

7. Spider Floss Cover (Forever 21) Scripture:

·         Psalms 3:7

7 Arise, O Lord; save me, O my God: for thou hast smitten all mine enemies upon the cheek bone; thou hast broken the teeth of the ungodly.

Proverbs 25:19

19 Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of trouble is like a brokentooth, and a foot out of joint

8. Snickers bar. Scripture: 

·         Ether 12:26

26 And when I had said this, the Lord spake unto me, saying: Fools mock, but they shall mourn; and my grace is sufficient for the meek, that they shall take no advantage of your weakness;

9. Sharpies (gold, silver & copper)

·         1 Nephi 21:2

2 And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath he hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver hath he hid me;

10. Sunflower seeds

         Luke 17:6

6 And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of *sunflower* seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.

*poetic license taken

·      

11. Money; folded as a dress and a shirt (learned on youtube.)

  Isaiah 55:1

1 Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price

12. Werther's Caramels

Doctrine and Covenants 18:10

10 Remember the Werther’s of souls is great in the sight of God

*poetic license taken

13. Mentos Mints
But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. 2 Nephi 21:4
And a friendly reminder to not slay anyone with her breath.

14. Lip balm
In the mouth of the foolish is a rod of pride: but the lips of the wise shall preserve them. Proverbs 14:3

15. Refreshing eye mask
D&C 84: 98 - 102ish about the Lord's kingdom being brought to the earth. Plus a little note about refreshing and basking in the day. Hugs, kisses, etc, etc.

All of these notes were written on cards from a free set by my friend Dani Mogstad, which can be found here: http://www.designbydani.com/?p=7157

And the Santas were another generous freebie, found here: http://kathyscottage.blogspot.com/2011/12/merry-christmas-from-kathys-cottage.html

Time Warp

Ya know how time flies when you’re having fun? Let’s be honest, time just plain flies. You don’t have to be having fun, although that’s a more…well..fun…option. We have lived here in this house for twelve years. My brain knows that that is a long time. My brain tells me that that’s longer than I’ve ever lived anywhere. My brain likes to point out that two of our four children have never lived anywhere else; and they’re not little kids anymore. HOWEVah, some other vital organ—probably my heart—will say that our house is fairly new, that we had all the kids when we moved here, that we look FORWARD to living here a long time.

THEN I COME ACROSS A PHOTO LIKE THIS:



and all of my innards are forced to comply with reality. Because here’s the exact same shot now:


I can't even get all of that tree in the picture now! And getting those two to hug was a little more difficult this time. I'm sure there was some pinching going on somewhere in there. But they're still cute, aren't they?

Here, have a fake cigar

So, I participated in the "grandmother for a weekend" program. I don't want to brag, but I think I did pretty well. I should be ready to grandmother a real baby sometime in the next decade.

Shnookie2 is taking child development in school, and the pinnacle of that experience is being entrusted with a fake baby for a weekend. And when I say 'fake,' I mean fake on steroids. These babies have computers inside that simulate the craziness of motherhood pretty well. In fact, I think they may have surpassed the mark on discouraging teen pregnancy here--we'll be lucky if this generation will EVER have children after a weekend with these little gremlins.

As you may have guessed, this weekend was Shnookie's long-awaited turn with Robo Baby. She was hoping for an Asian boy, but ended up with a Caucasian girl (we've all been there). Of course, she was just thankful it was healthy. She named her Payton Shea Bishlack (which is the compound last name Shnookie's friends have started using for her to avoid the 2 last-names confusion). Please note that Payton is pronounced according the Utah dialect: no T... "Pay-en." (To hear Shnookie saying it like a Utahn over and over was somewhat disturbing. Then I realized that she has been raised in Utah, so what do I expect?? It's not like I can blame someone else! Not that I won't try...)

Here's a picture of Pay-en with her custodial parent. (She won't tell me who the father is, but I'm suspecting it's either one of those Old Navy mannequins or else Ken ((Barbie will be livid!))):

I think she has my nose. Speaking of which, the girls were playing the "I'm gonna steal your nose" game with her, and she didn't smile once. Hmph! Fake kids these days.

In case you haven't seen one of these babies, the rules are pretty much like Parenting 101. When it cries, try changing its diaper or feeding it or burping it. If you do the right thing, it will giggle once and then be quiet. HOWEVER, sometimes it just cries and there's nothing that will make it stop. That was a condition I was all too familiar with. This process goes on 24/7--right through the night.

The biggest concern when mothering one of these creatures is that you avoid abuse at all costs. You can't let its head tip back, or drop it, or shake it, etc, because it registers abuse in its little implant computer and its parent will have to answer for it. Protecting your charge sounds much more simple than it is, since humans seem to have an inordinate amount of macabre curiosity. Social situations--especially of the teenage boy variety--are a nightmare. Evidently, there is nothing more people would like to do than throw a plastic baby against the wall and see what happens. And the more Shnookie begged them not to hurt it, the more they wanted to see blood. I had to reassure Shnookie repeatedly that this phenomenon is unique to fake babies and she won't have to fight people off of her future real babies. We are an odd group, we humans!

So here's the visual that will stay with me from this experience: Me walking out of the chapel and seeing Shnookie2, holding her baby out in the foyer, right in the middle of a group of other mothers and their (real) babies. They were swapping stories. I kid you not!

And here's the audio I will remember, from a phone call: "MOM!! Come and get the baby! I'm in a meeting and she won't stop crying!!"

Well, I drove over to the meeting, picked up the baby, and thanked my lucky stars that I will never hear that phrase again from my teenage daughter.

And then I went home and put the baby in the dryer on fluff cycle. Just to see what would happen.

Things that go bump in the night

We had a bit of excitement in the neighborhood last night. Unfortunately, we were at the center of it. And nary a single one of us even knew it at the time. There we were, going about our business, blissfully ignorant (like always). Personally, I was on this here machine, cursing the phone for its ringing, ringing, ringing while I was doggedly ignoring, ignoring, ignoring it. Next thing I knew, half the neighborhood was on our doorstep, knocking, knocking, knocking.

(Take note: when there's an emergency and you don't answer your phone, your neighbors will gather all their friends and come to your door.)

Through my dogged ignoringness, I hear my kids open the door (they just don't get the 'hit-the-floor-and-don't-move' policy we have for such occasions.), and I hear the words "car" "tree" and "Snookie1" float up to me. You can imagine how fast I threw down the laptop and flew downstairs. When I got the whole sentence, it went something this: "Shnookie1's car just rolled down the hill and hit our tree. He's not in it."

Okay, whew. But last I knew, Shnookie1 wasn't even home, so I was a wee bit confused. (Evidently,this is another disadvantage about holing up in your room with the laptop. Children come and go and live their lives without you.) Anyway, I found him in the shower (well, not literally). I was pounding on the bathroom door, yelling the situation through it. No doubt he only heard snippets like "your car" and "tree," because his "what?"s became more and more incredulous the more I yelled. Finally, I belted a "GET OUT OF THE SHOWER AND COME HERE!!!"

We live at the top of a curved incline. Somehow, Shnook's car started it's little journey ever so slowly, then picked up momentum on the hill, where it crossed the street, missed a shiny new truck by mere inches, went across a lawn and then met with a sturdy tree. If it had missed the tree, it would've continued straight into a house. And by then it would've been going at a pretty good clip.

By the time Shnookie1 and I got there, quite a crowd had gathered. Who knew that many people were out after dark on a Monday night?! I, of course, grabbed my camera before we left home. (I told myself it was for insurance purposes, but who am I kidding? I want to be able to remind him of this the rest of his life in visual form.)

Here's the scene: (Shnook isn't slumped over; he's bending over to see the ignition.)



And here's how the tree looks:


I think everyone will live.

We're still not sure exactly how the car got a'rollin. It's always parked in the same place, and it's never happened before. Shnook is pretty sure he had it in park, but who knows. My theory? The Headless Horseman moved to town recently and is chaffing from too much time in the saddle. He saw a sweet ride (he's headless--he can't see well) with cushy seats and took off in it. Obviously, it's the only logical conclusion.

Skack to Bool

I did some back-to-school shopping for BETTY. After all, it's hardly fair to spend on everyone else and leave her out. Doesn't she look fetching? Poor thing hasn't had a new look in ages. Why, it's tantamount to blog abuse. Anyone know a support group she can go to?

And speaking of back-to-school, the shnookies are...well...back to school! It's a pretty big year for all of them, with #1 starting his SENIOR year, #2 starting her first year in high school, #3 being top of the heap in 6th grade, and #4 launching into 4th grade--the signal of her downward trip in grade school. Oh my, I think I lost an inch just thinking about it--I am an old woman! (See how that works? I started out talking about them, but it always ends up about me.)

And speaking of me, I have to admit that it was a heavenly day for me. With the kids back in school and Hubby out of town, I had the whole house (except for the 6X6 area occupied by Boozer) to myself. I savored, I basked, I reveled. And then I went inside and put my clothes back on.

An early lesson in gender differences

I have a friend a few blocks over who has a pool. A gorgeous pool with waterfalls and a waterslide, all built-in amidst the almost-real rock cliffs that surround it. Lucky for us, she is a very generous friend and has extended an open-pool invitation for every Wednesday afternoon. Unlucky for us, she's trying to sell the gorgeous home with the gorgeous pool. But then again, lucky for us, the housing market has bottomed out here and she can't get a decent price for all of that gorgeousness. (For some reason, she doesn't to see that as lucky. Go figure.)

Lucky for you, I'm done with all the lucky/unluckydness.

Yesterday, being Wednesday, we went to said friend's said pool, and it was wonderful! The great part about her pool as opposed to the pool at our gym is that the girls have their friends to play with. (Which is why it's like pulling teeth to get my girls to go swimming at the gym. Me: "We are going swimming and that is THAT." Poor, tortured girls. But that's another story...)

So, the pool population yesterday consisted of 4 girls and 4 boys. They had a double bed floaty thing in there, which the girls got to be on first. So they all decided to play a game: the boys try to steal the floaty thing from the girls. And here's how it went:

Girls: "You boys try and get the floaty from us."
Boys attack.
Girls scream: "NO, NO, NOOOOO. WAIT!!! You boys go to that end of the pool and plan how to attack. We girls go to this end of the pool and plan how to keep you off. Then we meet in the middle."
All pause momentarily.
Boys attack.

Hopefully he'll be an heir to the tennis shoe fortune

Last night, Shnookie4 shared some more of her future plans with Hubby. It turns out, she already knows her future husbands name. It shall be .... Zeke Puma.

Bear in mind, we do not know any Pumas, nor any Zekes for that matter. I do not know where she came up with this mystery man. What I do know is that it's a good thing for me, in that she will not get married until she's 40. It will take her at least that long to find a man with that exact random name. A wise parent would probably advise her to aim for something more common...maybe a Michael Smith...but who am I to tamper with the inspiration given to a 9 year old girl?

And we have more information on the Puma's future home. It will be filled with five little Pumas, all with their own rooms, the decor of each having already been determined. As for Mr. Puma, his room will be a baseball room. Mrs. Puma? A jungle room. Hubby's response: "But won't you two share a room?"

Shnookie: "No, we will have separate rooms."
Hubby: "But won't Zeke be sad not too share a room with you?"
Shnookie: "TOO BAD."

Our Little Planner

Shnookie4 has reached that ripe old age of nine, where you start to look ahead and plan in minute detail the next 72 years of your life. Isn't your nine-year-old doing that? (Heck, I have a 17-yr-old who struggles to plan the next 72 MINUTES of his life.)

The other night, Hubby was tucking Shnookie4 into bed, and she says:

"I've been making some plans. When I grow up I want a nice house. Nothing too big, but just kinda big. (Describes every detail of the backyard)I want to decorate the house so that it's colorful but not too flashy. Like I want a room in two main colors, with just a hint of a third color."

Do you thing HGTV is on too much in our house?

Then a few days ago, after school, she tells me:

"Mom, I've decided that when I grow up, I want to be a genius in college."

I'm so glad she's pacing herself. There's just no use wasting genius on public school. She's gonna save it for the big leagues.

!!YADHTRIB YPPAH

Shnookie4 turned the ripe old age of nine this week. Despite all of the begging, guilt-tripping, subliminal images and unwilling hypnotism, the child just will not conform to my anti-growing wishes. I don't know what to do with her!! I just can't get through to her, and I'm at my wits end. She's even resisting now when I swaddle her and rock her to sleep at night with a bottle. I blame it on that public school we send her to. They are just way too liberal with their 'grow up and be yourself' dribble.

So we threw a big party for the rebellious child. It was a backwards party, and the TEN girls she invited had a great time. The mom did not. I NEVER have let the kids invite more than seven friends to their parties, because...well...I'm just not THAT mom. I know my limitations (see last post about terrorizing innocent children). It was a weak moment when I told Shnookie4 she could invite all 10 of her friends. It was Tuesday...the party was Friday...and I was sure that most of them would not be able to come. Apparently, these are 8-yr-olds with very little on their plates, because there they were--every single one of them--amped up on sugar and ready to par-teh. Here they are in a rare physically restrained moment (you can't tell, but all of their mouths were still working a million miles a minute):



We played 'pin the donkey on the tail,' silent chairs (walk around the chairs in silence, sit when the music STARTS), backwards relays, ate the upside-down cupcakes UNDER the table, said 'goodbye' instead of 'hello,' and all sorts of other silliness. Of course, the kids thought it was great fun to tell me 'yes' when they meant 'no' and let me try to figure out what they meant. I was so over that within minutes!

It was wild. One of the gentler, meeker souls that attended the party literally ran out the door when her mom came to pick her up. The mom was inside talking to me, and her daughter was out in the car, buckled up and ready to jet. It was that crazy of a party.

Now we just have to send out the thank-you invitation notes (because we sent out the thank you notes as invitations--written backwards of course. It's all backwards--get it?) and it will all be behind me.

That was Friday, and on Saturday, we had a much more relaxed day. We had our Somalie friends, Rugia and Fatuma come stay the day with us. They are sisters who were relocated in Utah from a Somalian refugee camp. (I can't imagine two places more different than Somalia and Utah, but it is what it is, I guess!) We went swimming and the girls played a lot of Wii, and they seemed to have a great time. Aren't they gorgeous??

Stalker Mom Hits Paydirt

I know I've mentioned before that my oldest child is not much into communication...at least not with us. Judging by his texting record, he knows how to do it--A LOT.

Let's be honest, though, how teens text can hardly be called communication. "You suck." "No, You suck." "No YOU suck" "Huh-uh" "Uh-huh" and so on. (And oops--I actually included punctuation there for a second. As if.) I've texted with my son. He answers most of my queries with "You would" or "Maybe" as in:

(Me) I need you to come home for dinner.
(Him) You would
(Me) So you'll be home at 6:00?
(Him) Maybe
(Me) I'm going to be upset if you're not here.
(Him) You would

(To be fair, he always does what I ask him to, so I enjoy his sarcastic little answers. I might even do the same to him. But admitting all of that would ruin my point, so let's pretend this paragraph doesn't exist.)

When I succumbed to the Facebook pressure, I hesitantly sent a friend invitation to my son. I could just picture him cringing at the thought of letting his mom into this corner of his life. I was pleasantly surprised when he accepted my invitation right away (not with any fanfare, mind you--there was no "Look everyone! My mom's here! Hooray!!!).

Having access to my son's Facebook wall has opened up a whole new world of deep communication for us. He's pretty diligent about updating his status on there. Sure, most of the time what he posts makes absolutely no sense (which is the way he likes it IMHO.), such as this one: "Shnookie 1 is rain master." Ooooookaaaaay...

HOWEVER, a lot of the time I get more out of his little one-liner synopses than I could ever gather from 3 sentences of forced face-to-face conversation. For example, yesterday I bopped on over there and found this little gem: "Shnookie 1 is happy with everything that's going on." Whoa. That's just too much information for mom to handle--especially in complete sentence format. He almost sounds--dare I say it--like an actual mature person.

(I wonder where he learned sarcasm?)

It is rather ridiculous how happy Shnook 1's statement made hubby and me. If you have one of those 'can't shut them up' teenage boys (I'm sure they're out there...somewhere...maybe?), this might not make sense to you. But for ME, I'm walking on air. It's the most revealing conversation he and I have had all year.

A flash into the future

This week, Shnookies 3 and 4 participated in a 3-day dance clinic put on by our high school's drill team. They got to perform at half-time of the school's basketball team last night. Look how cute they are!:



I was so proud of them! They both worked really hard and had a lot of fun. And in true girl fashion, it took them 2 hours before the performance to do their hair and make-up. My bathroom looks like a war zone this morning. We are sooooo in for it.

Fondant is French for 'Torture Your Mother'

Shnookie2 LOVES to bake cakes. Unfortunately I LOVE to eat cake. You can see the problem. HOWEVER, this post is not about me (as if that is possible). Hand in hand with the joy of baking for her is the joy of decorating said cakes. Do I dare say she gets a wee bit obsessed with the cake baking slash decorating? Yes, I think I do. When she gets ahold of fondant (for which she gladly spends her own money), she cannot rest until it is shaped and smoothed over some confection of her own creation.

When she was in California over Christmas break, it seems that she couldn't get to a store to buy fondant, so she looked it up on the internet and learned how to MAKE IT HERSELF. That surprised even me. And, wouldn't you know it, HER fondant turns out tastier and easier to use than store-bought fondant.

So, after she got home from Cali and had re-connected with all the important players in her life, the next order of business was to show her new-found cake skills. And here is what she presented to us:


Pretty impressive, eh? And pretty dang tasty, I might add.

And the next post will be about the extra 10 pounds I've mysteriously gained.

Oh, yeah, none taken!

A conversation immediately after picking up Shnookie4's little friend:

Little friend: You need to clean out your car, I guess. It stinks in here. (pause) NO OFFENSE.

Shnookie4: Maybe it's YOU that stinks. NO OFFENSE.

All of us laughing, but me secretly high-fiving the Shnook.

Idle hands

Shnookie4's last soccer game was on Saturday. Two hours before the start of the game, I decided that I had time to wash her socks, so I put them in with a load of like-minded clothing. I have had the same washer and dryer for TEN YEARS and I'm still in denial about how incredibly s-l-o-w they are. 15 minutes before we had to leave, I check the dryer, and the socks are still beyond moist. So I take out all of the other clothes, believing the personal attention will accelerate the drying. Not. We've done EVERYTHING else we can possible do to get ready, and they've still made no progress.

Shnookie4 is very punctual, so the sock drama is stressing her out big time. In one of those rare mom 'ah-ha' moments, I decide to secure the socks in the passenger window and let them flap in the breeze while we speed to soccer. Except that we get behind not one, but two Grandma's out for a leisurely drive. I am not against Grandma's and their need to drive slowly (it's probably best that we slow down at some point in life), and I didn't even really care if we got to our destination on time. BUT what I did need was as much kinetic energy as possible to blow dry my baby's socks. It was kinda like the movie SPEED. Except that we were racing for foot comfort instead of a bunch of strangers lives. You can see how high the stakes were.

I managed to get ahead of Grandma #2 (who didn't care for that much, btw, even though I followed all laws and made no hand gestures whatsoever). And, as is inevitable in these cases, I got stopped at a light 10 blocks ahead, and there she is, right behind me. I mention that tidbit to Shnookie4, and she turns to look behind, saying, "I want to see what the grandma is doing." Pause. "Probably knitting." When I laughed, she said, "What?? That's what Grandma's do." I think the fact that Grandma Williams was at our house the night before, knitting in the 10 seconds between serving trick-or-treaters, had something to do with her assumption. Now I'm wondering if maybe my mom does knit at stop lights when no one is looking.