9 Strange Years

It wasn’t what I was expecting.  I’d just broken off a relationship with an interesting but insane girl from Ukraine, and I was not really in a mood to be serious.  I decided I was going to date the next fairly normal American girl I met, and behold, there was a young Kathleen.  A Mormon girl at BYU, from the boring mid-west, and seemingly pretty nice.  After 11 days of dating, we were engaged.  4 months later, we were married.  We’d known each other less than 6 months.  And here we are 9 years later.

In that time, I’ve had 6 jobs and started 2 companies (it sounds less stable than it was).  We’ve had 3 children, each one stranger in new and interesting ways.  We’ve moved three times: from our home in Springville to Ohio, back to our Springville home, than back to good old Orem, my home town.  We’ve had 5 cats, 3 of them still with us.  We’ve also had mice, rats, a hamster, and 3 tarantulas (one still with us).  We’ve gone through 7 cars; 2 Japanese, 4 American, and 1 German.  We’ve driven to both the east and west coasts.

We’ve learned an awful lot.  Utah folks forget how different we are; I was 23 and Kathleen was 21 when we were married.  That’s pretty weird in a world that seems to celebrate perpetual adolescence, but it’s nothing unusual here.  The point is, 23 is awfully young, and I had to grow up pretty quickly.  I wasn’t even employed when we were married (I lost my job during a bout of mono).  Things haven’t always been easy.  At one point, we sold nearly all our possessions to pay our bills when one of my businesses foundered.  We both worked graveyard shifts for about a year after that as we caught back up.

Even in our struggles, life has been sweet.  While this life isn’t exactly what I would have expected, Kathleen has made it far better than I could have hoped.  9 years isn’t any particular milestone, but I’m grateful for every one of them.

Our Home on State Route 18

I should apologize in advance for the woeful supply of pictures I have of my old home. I was able to get some images from Google, but they’re from very far away and show several things not present in my childhood.

Sometime after my brother Lee was born, but while I was still 2 we moved from Marion to Tiffin. Tiffin is located about 40 minutes North of Marion. We moved into a two story house with a flat roof. We used to say it looked like a lunchbox without a handle. It was about three miles to the edge of town, technically located in Clinton Township.

We were mostly isolated from neighbors with cornfields partially surrounding our house  and a small forest and a farm across the street. Satalight image of my house in Ohio
We had one neighbor, the Drolls, who lived next door to our property. Our houses were separated by a worn out old wire fence and a line of trees. It was roughly about 100 yards from our front door to the fence and then maybe the same distance from the fence to the Droll’s house. The Fence ran almost the entire length of the yard.  It ended just a few yards before the street.  Where it ended, there was a small patch of trees with a little brook. The brook had a small bridge over it on the Drolls’ side of the fence. Considering the fact that we lived next to the Drolls for most of my life, I hardly knew them. They were elderly with no children living at home. They had a dog that used to come into our yard and take our toys. We would get in trouble for leaving toys out where the dog could get them and every so often we would go to the Drolls house to see if any of our toys had been dragged over. I think I was inside their house one or two times, but I can’t say that I remember anything about it. I picture him wearing dirty old jeans and her with dark hair done up “old lady style.” I’m not sure I’d recognize them if I ran into them on the street—that’s how little we saw of them. I can remember him bringing over things from their garden a few times. The only other thing I can say about the Drolls is that in later years they put a sign out that said “Droll’s Hair Fashion” and they outlined the sign in reflectors so that you could see it from a distance. The sign eventually became my landmark to slow down so I could turn into our driveway.

Read more »

Story-Time

One of my favorite things over the Christmas break was having our extended family participate in the bedtime routine. I particularly enjoyed our story-time sessions where we read stories like Lucky Socks, Here Are My Hands, Trains, Violet the Pilot, Put me in the Zoo, and Two Little Trains.  The last one was particularly fun because the book repeats this phrase "to the west" and each time it said it, everyone pointed to the West. Isaac really enjoyed this pattern and laughed and smiled after each time he pointed. 12.31.08 Storytime (13)

The Christmas Story

This is late, but I love this rendition of the Christmas Story and I finally took the time to listen to it today.  Click here for the link.  My apologies if the link disappears before you can listen.  I don’t know how long it will be available.

Family Squabbles

This needs to stop.  I haven’t heard one assumption tonight that’s anywhere close to true.  I’m sick to death of the gulf between my siblings and the ridiculous ideas that widen it.

Everyone is hurt.  Everyone is oversensitive to the slightest rumor.  Everyone judges too quickly and too often.  I’m not excluding myself.

I challenge each of my siblings to write five genuine, honest, true, kind things about each other sibling over the next week or so. 

It’s 1 AM here, so I’ll start my lists tomorrow.

Happy Birthday Zachary!!

Scan10007 Today Zach is 32 years old.  Next week we will celebrate our 9th wedding anniversary.  Tonight as I reflect over the years we’ve spent together I’m grateful for the man that Zach has become. 

I admire his Zest for learning. He’s always reading and studying one subject or  another.  He’s incredibly smart and has an answer for almost any question I ask.  He can talk intelligently on almost any subject (he claims to know just enough to sound intelligent, but I think he’s just being modest).  I always thought I had a fairly good vocabulary, but Zach’s vocabulary is much broader and deeper than mine.  He is really good at defining words and spelling them and he’s much better at grammar than me (I still don’t completely understand the uses of the semicolon).  I’ve heard that he’s also very good at diagramming a sentence, but I don’t know exactly what that means.Zach and Kathleen

He has a good head for music, although he laments that he is out of practice on everything.  I wish I had some of his musical ability.  When I did try out an instrument or two back in school, I didn’t have the commitment or the musical background to succeed at them and I quickly quit.

Zach has a good sense of humor.  He sometimes makes the best jokes, and it makes me smile.

Where I tend to be stingy, particularly when money is involved, Zach is generous.  He is always willing to give to others and he has a compassionate heart.  11.19.05 Ike and ZachHis philosophy is to "Cast your bread upon the water.  . . " and as you do, you find out that you have enough for yourself as well.  When he knows that a family member is having a hard time, his heart goes out to  them and he wants to be with them to comfort and help.

I admire his knowledge of the scriptures and of history.  I know whenever there’s a question relating to historical events or scriptural knowledge in Sunday School that Zach knows the answer even if no-one else does and I’ve never been aware of a time that he didn’t know. 

I admire the way he accepts less than ideal situations sometimes in callings and other things, 12.14.08 Zach, Isaac, and Charlotte (3)and he has a mature attitude about them.  He respects authority even when he disagrees with it.  He sustains his leaders in spite of their flaws.

Of all the things I appreciate about my husband, one of the things I appreciate most is that he’s a good dad.  I appreciate when he takes over with the kids and reads stories to them or takes a child who is having a rough time into his arms and helps him or her calm down.  He’s a kind and thoughtful dad who loves his children and they love him. 

Zach, I’m lucky to be your wife!  Have a great birthday!

My earliest Memories

I feel like my memory is Swiss cheese. I have all of these disjointed memories with no order to them, so hopefully writing them down will help me make sense of them all.

image1I was born at Marion General Hospital in Marion, Ohio. I have only three memories and one story from the time we lived in Marion. My very  earliest memory is rather morbid and comes to me now almost as a memory of a memory instead of an authentic memory. I was in the back yard of our home in Marion and my mother was holding me. We were looking at a dead dear slung across a ladder in the back yard. That’s it. Isn’t that a wonderful first memory? My dad has never been a hunter, he’s way too soft hearted for that so I’m sure he hit the dear with his car and then brought it home to be cooked and eaten, as this was the case on a few other occasions when we ate deer.

My other two memories surround the time we moved when I was about two. I faintly  me3remember staring into a big box and seeing my teddy bear inside. The other memory is of my friend Matthew giving me a strawberry shortcake doll just before we moved. I can almost picture us in a room with our parents and I’m too shy to properly accept the gift. It seems like I’m standing between one of my parents knees. I do remember the doll had a big hat with oranges on it that smelled like oranges. I know from my parents that Matthew and I were good friends and that I couldn’t say his name so I called him “muffroom.” Years later we visited his family and he told me what he remembered of me as a girl. He was a little older than me and must have had a good memory, because I couldn’t remember a single thing about him. The sad thing is that I can’t even remember what he said that he remembered about me.

meI know we used to walk home from church sometimes when we lived in Marion. I think it was about two miles away. I have this image in my mind of skipping along next to a large hill, but I’m not sure where that comes from. My dad made up songs for each of his children. My song originated on one of these walks home. It went something like this “yippee-kai-ay-kai-ee galloping all the way, here comes Kathy Alicia (sung like A-LEEEEE-sha).

I have a very limited selection of pictures from when I was little here in Utah.

Where I am

Well, the year’s winding down, and I’ve got a few thoughts about where I am now.  I thought I’d write them down to compare down the road and see how I change.

Favorite sports teams remain the Colts (NFL), Jazz (NBA), Cougars and Vols (NCAA Football).  I also like watching the NY Giants and keep my eyes on the Steelers. 

Musical taste is mostly the same, except I started to really like some varieties of country music.  That’s a change few people might have seen in the younger me, but I realized I was just being ignorant.  New artists added to my favorites are Steve Earle, Emmylou Harris, Guy Clark, Carl Jackson, and so forth.  Doubters ought to give Steve Earle’s Guitar Town a try.  I’m still digging in here, and might find more that really astonishes me.  If I had the money, I’d buy a pedal steel guitar and learn to play.

The year before I came to appreciate Synth Pop/Dance Pop (OMD’s Sugar Tax should probably be required listening before you dismiss this genre).  Again, the younger me had some contempt for this genre, but I’ve become a little more open as I get a little older.  I think that the social pressure is off now, so I can listen to whatever I want.

So, for the past year, my most listened to artists were U2, Belle & Sebastian, Counting Crows, David Bowie, Billy Joel, Steve Earle, Dire Straits, Paul Simon, OMD, The Cure, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, The Beatles, Van Halen, and Bon Jovi (in that order, according to Last.fm).  My favorite track was Strangers When We Meet, by David Bowie.

I read a few new books, but not as many as in previous years.  Other media took over, I’m afraid.  I read bout the Six Day War and I read Paul Johnson’s Intellectuals.  I read Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and Richard Price’s Clockers.

Read more »

When I was a child. . .

My mom describes me as a very happy smiling baby. She says I was a very easy baby, Mom and Iwhich was good because my older sister (Barbara) was not well pleased when I was born. My sister was 10 days away from turning 2 when I as born and I am told that when my mother brought me home, my sister took one look at me and “promptly peed her pants.” According to my mother Barbara was already potty trained at this point.

At some point Barbara become intrigued by the way I was fed (nursing on mother’s milk) and tried feeding me in the same manner, which  didn’t work. She also tried feeding a doll and feeding herself.

Barb and IShe was jealous of the attention that I got as a baby and would try to hide me from my mother. I’m told that one day she tried to bury me in toys and clothes, but that when my mother found me I was just laughing and cooing. At least once when I was walking to my mother in my walker, Barbara pushed me out of the room and shut the door.

Of all of my siblings I nursed the longest, making it an entire year. Sometime before my  first birthday, my mother was in a car accident and spent a few days in the hospital pregnant with a dollexpressing bottles of milk for my dad to feed me at home. Mom says she’s not sure what my father did, but when she came home she was frustrated to find several full bottles of expressed milk in the fridge.

Mom says I enjoyed pretending to be a mom and that I’d stuff dolls in my shirt and pretend to have babies.

For some reason, I always had a very short haircut as a young child. You can recognize me in all our old pictures as the one with very short strait brown hair. I also had very long eyelashes and apparently when asked about them I would say “Heavenly Father gave me my eyelashes, he also gave me my bottom.”
short hair

My Parents

My friend Erin has been writing about her childhood and as I’ve enjoyed reading her blog post, I’ve thought I ought to write my own.

Maybe the best place to start is with a short description of my parents.  (I copied the pictures from a little book my mother made me, so they’re not ideal)

In many ways my parent’s upbringing couldn’t have been more different.

My dad was an only child. All four of his grandparents me and Dadwere Lithuanian immigrants. His father, Leo Joseph Bird, was a heavy drinker and smoker who died of lung cancer when my dad was only 7. So for most of his life he was raised by his widowed mother. He recalls living above a bar as a child and watching the drunken men stumble out and deciding that he would never drink alcohol. His father’s death was traumatic. He said he saw his father coughing up blood and running from room to room trying to hide what was happening from his son. My dad grew up in PA. He became interested in agriculture at a young age, through 4-H I think. In his twenties he started to investigate a variety of churches. As he learned about each sect of religion, he would study the Bible to find passages that conflicted with the beliefs of each church. While trying to disprove the teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, he had a spiritual experience which changed his direction and he stopped trying to disprove it and started learning the doctrine of the church. He was later baptized. None of his family joined and I think my grandmother was unhappy about his decision.  <<Don’t you just love the suit?!  My mom now helps him with his wardrobe>>

My mother on the other hand was a descendant of Mormon Pioneers and raised in aOBryant 0658  big family with both of her  parents. She was the second oldest of 7 Children (3rd of 8 if you count the sister who died before she was born). My grandpa worked for the military and they moved around a lot. Mom was born in Idaho Falls and graduated from High School in Idaho Falls, but her family moved several times between her birth and graduation. Being raised in a big religious family like I was, I suspect our upbringing was fairly similar in several important ways.

The details are all from my memory, so if I’m off a little or not as descriptive, now you know why!

Christmas Eve

I spent some time with the toadlers today building train tracks.  We had one track to the North Pole, on to Orem, one to Ohio, and one that meant to go to Wyoming and then got carried away and went all the way to Nebraska.  Nebraska is new; Isaac has some limited geography, and that one wasn’t in the noggin until today.  (Isaac knows Wyoming from a drive with me, Seattle for Great-Grandma’s house, Orem for obvious reasons, and Ohio for Grandma Bunny).  3135088072_a3621a781d_b 

We had family over.  My folks (less one) and Krista, Paul and little Paul.  We had a good time acting out the Nativity.  Charlotte was a good little angel: "Don’t be scared.  I have good news.  Jesus is born!"  And Isaac was a good little shepherd: "Let’s go to Bethlehem to see the baby Jesus!"  Nicole played baby Jesus for us.P1040585

We had some good snacks, had some stories and our family prayer, and off to bed went the kids.  Charlotte was out like a light, but Isaac was excited and watched for Rudolph (just like I used to). 

It was nice to play games with the family.  There’s some inertia when it comes to games; we have a great time once we get going, but letting ourselves play sometimes takes an effort (and I’m among the worst offenders there).  It was good fun, though.

We’re down one member of the family (on my side).  My youngest sister is with her boyfriend’s family this year.  I would like the children to know her better and to have a relationship with her.  We can’t crash her place with all five of us, and she doesn’t come home often, so it’s tough.  I guess life does that to you. 

Christmas is funny for me.  Once I grew out of the "magic" and "anticipation" phases, I don’t think I ever got the "worship" phase right.  I’m a firm believer in Jesus Christ; I’ve had many experiences in my life that confirmed any faith I’ve shown.  I never really get it right, though.  I’ve had a few moments where I felt the spirit of Christmas, but I feel like I can do more.  Nevertheless, we do what we can to remember and to teach our children.

The same sister I mentioned above posted a note about hating Christmas.  I can put that in the context of some personal devastation she’s experiencing, but I suppose Christmas is what you make of it.   Tragedies come to us.  Nothing gold can stay, at least in this world.  With apologies if I sound preachy, the answer to Frost’s lament is here.  If this sister of mine chances to read this, and would take a moment to read the passages linked above, I hope it gives some comfort and perspective.  I didn’t mean to spend much time writing about this, but my mind is troubled and sad.  It seems there’s no opportunity (and maybe no real wish from her) for me to help.

And now it’s Christmas.  I think I’ll close this post with a carol.  I had the chance to sing this in church last week (it went much better than I thought, in spite of me being a bit nervous).  I don’t think most people get to hear the 4th and 5th verses very often, so I took the liberty of singing those as well:

O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by.
Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.

For Christ is born of Mary, and gathered all above,
While mortals sleep, the angels keep their watch of wondering love.
O morning stars together, proclaim the holy birth,
And praises sing to God the King, and peace to men on earth!

How silently, how silently, the wondrous Gift is giv’n;
So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of His Heav’n.
No ear may hear His coming, but in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive Him still, the dear Christ enters in.

Where children pure and happy recall the blessèd Child,
Where misery cries out to Thee, Son of the mother mild;
Where charity stands watching and faith holds wide the door,
The dark night wakes, the glory breaks, and Christmas comes once more.

O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in, be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels the great glad tidings tell;
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!

Merry Christmas, everyone, and may God bless each of you.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder

And what could be more beautiful than a house made of candy?  Apparently not much.  Isaac and Charlotte made a gingerbread house with aunt Heidi on Sunday and lets just say it wasn’t Heidi’s most aesthetically pleasing creation.  Isaac, however thought it was great and described it as "beautiful ever all" Charlotte pronounced it finished and then said "now lets eat it!"

Polar Express

This movie is once again Isaac’s favorite movie.  He watches it endlessly and if you ask  him what he wants for Christmas he’ll say "PolarExpress" (yes, it’s one word on purpose, that’s the way he says it).

polar_express Last year his favorite part was when the caboose becomes "uncoupled and drives all by itself."  This scene remained his favorite the first few times he watched it this year.  Now his favorite part of the movie is "the stupid underware part" in which a know-it-all complains that the only gift he can find for himself in Santa’s sack is full of stupid underware.  Only Isaac misinterprets this scene and thinks that the kid actually wants "stupid underware" for Christmas.

The other day as he watched he pretended that he was both of the boy characters and encouraged Charlotte to be the girl.  He tried his best to repeat each line with the movie.

He’s watched the movie so many times that he can tell you the entire path the ticket takes when it flies out of the boy’s hand, which is somewhat amusing to hear.

We’re wondering if he’d like the 3-D version with the fun red and blue glasses.  Has anyone seen it?  Can you watch it without the glasses ok or does it look bad without?

Nicole (with drugs)

With the exception of a few lines on Nicole learning to splash, I think my last blog about 12.16.08 Nicole (4) her was a candy-coated gripe session.  I love my little girl, but in some ways she has been my most challenging baby. 

I think the Zantac she’s been taking may have worked because her fits of uncontrollable crying have stopped.  She still spits up constantly, but I can deal with that.  Since starting the Zantac she has gone from a fussy baby who could tolerate less than 5 minutes of not being held unless she was asleep, to a very pleasant and happy baby who enjoys playing with toys or sitting in her excersaucer.  She has also increased the amount of time she generally naps in a day, although she still has those days where she hardly naps at all.

The best part is that her funny little personality is starting to show more and more.  She’s very expressive and makes lots of funny faces.  She also likes to growl (like a tiger according to her siblings).  She thinks Isaac and Charlotte are hilarious and regularly laughs and smiles at their antics.  When she’s excited she flexes all her extremities with joy.  Isaac loves to call her wiggle.  She also seems to enjoy locating voices.  Zach enjoys singing and then watching her jerk her head around until she finds him then as soon as she looks away he repeats his song and she repeats her search.

Things have been going so much better that I even took the doctor’s advise and took away her pacifier at 6 months and she does fine without it. 

Charlotte’s Birthday Party

12.16.08 Charlotte's party (9)After being invited to several birthday parties for three-year-olds this year, I decided to bite the bullet and try hosting one for Charlotte.  This is the first birthday party I’ve thrown and after all the time I spent planning it, I know why many parents decide to wait a few years!  We had three 2 1/2 year olds, two 3 year olds, a 4 year old and a one year old for a total of 7 children, but it went really well. 

I had activities to fill the entire time, so it went by fast and we didn’t have to get out toys to entertain the kids.  Here is the list of activities:

1. Stories and songs (I read "Happy Birthday Moon" and "Snow Day")

2. Fishing snack (cream cheese with blue food coloring in a bowl and goldfish crackers around the side, the kids dipped celery sticks in the cream cheese then "caught fish" with the cream cheese coated celery)

3.  Watermelon caterpillar snack (I set the timer for 3 minutes to see  who could build the fastest watermelon caterpillar with toothpicks and watermelon balls, then they ate them)

4.  Picture treasure hunt (They raced around to find envelops with clues.  The clues were a few lines of rhyming text and a picture of where they’d find the next clue, at the end of the treasure hunt were birthday cupcakes)

5.  Sing Happy Birthday, Blow out candles, Eat cupcakes, Open presents

6.  Ice cream game (I checked out a game from PERC where they had to find matching ice cream pictures)

7.  Dancing to Christmas Music and playing with balloons while moms arrived and children left.

Charlotte

11.16.08 Charlotte (2)Charlotte was born at 2:16 in the afternoon on Wednesday December 14, 2004.  She  was about a month old on the day we blessed her (January 15th) and on that day I remember having a distinct feeling that I was holding a very special daughter of God and I had a sense of the strength of her spirit.  

Charlotte is a treasure and a joy to me.  I love her more than I can say.  I feel a special connection to her at times that is beyond what words can describe.  There are times that her tender hugs lift my spirit and give me strength.

 

Read more »

Candy / Nutrition

Last month I wrote about my candy controlling issues.  Tonight as we arrived home 10.20.08 Isaac and Charlottefrom the ward party, Isaac handed me the unopened bag of candy that Santa gave him and asked me if I would add it to the candy container in the pantry. I didn’t even have to  sneak it away when he wasn’t looking!  If the story ended here it would have been great, but he actually changed his mind when he saw his sister open her bag of candy and pull out a few pieces, so he came to me and asked for it back.  After eating only a piece or two he gave it back and told me to put it up.  Charlotte, on the other hand ate several pieces and cried when her dad took it away.

Read more »

Isaac

I hope I don’t forget all of the little things about my kids as they get older.  The other day Nicole was very tired and she stared singing herself to sleep.  It reminded me of how 12.7.08 Isaac with blocks-1 Isaac used to do that all the time.  Obviously at this age they’re not actually singing, but they make sleepy vocalizations continuously which sounds like "ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh" and it fades out then starts again.  When Isaac was a baby he would do that regularly and sometimes he was very loud.  You could hear him "singing himself to sleep" in other rooms of the house.  The other thing he did to put himself to sleep was rub my thumb.  As he got older he would actually rub so hard that sometimes my thumb would hurt by the time he fell asleep.  He did this by rubbing his finger across the top of my thumb towards the nail.  He eventually learned how to rub his own thumb to fall asleep.  I think he has finally retired this habit, but I also don’t see him fall asleep anymore so I can’t say for sure.

Recently he decided that his new favorite color is green.  Yesterday I wore a white shirt with green writing.  He told me that my shirt was saying "I like you" to him because it was his favorite color.  Then he said "I want to wear a green shirt to say I like you to myself."

One day I told him the neighbor (Makenna) would come over.  Shortly after I told him that he changed his clothes and as he put on his Incredibles underwear he asked "Will Makenna want to watch Incredibles all day because of my underwear?" (I found it funny that he would think his underwear had any control over what someone else would want 12.8.08 Isaac, Charlotte, and Nicole-1to do).

Today he said "you don’t want me to die before you because you love me?" to which I  responded that I would be sad if he died before me because I would miss him.  He said "so we all want to die at the same time?" 

Last night he woke up crying which was extremely rare for him.  When I came in he said worms were all over his bed.  I convinced him to say a prayer and he prayed that all the worms would die.  He woke up crying a second time and said that "grabbing things" were in his bed this time.  He then prayed that all the grabbing things would die.  I brought him into my bed after that.  Tonight he was afraid that worms would come in through the door and prayed in his nighttime prayer that all the worms would die.  I’m wondering if worms will be his next big fear.  (recent fears:  Tigers, seals, babies, Ocean animals, and bugs, the Abominable Snowman)

« Older Entries Recent Entries »