Getting to Know You

We had a very interesting and amusing Relief Society meeting this week. We have a new set of women who have been called to be the leaders, so they wanted to introduce themselves to us, and then have us get to know one another a little better. It was clever and very well done. First we took a little quiz about their lives and likes. Then we had the chance to sit and chat with other sisters in our ward.

We were instructed to sit at one of the tables set up in the room, which had each of us across from another woman. Then, a deck of index cards was placed, face-down, between us partners. At the sound of the timer, we picked up the top card, read the questions and took turns answering, so that we could learn some interesting facts about our lives. One card was all about music: Do we play an instrument? What kind of music do you like to listen to? What is a favorite song? Etc. One card was about where we'd lived, traveled and where we'd like to go. Another topic was about school: Did we like it? Would we go back to finish a degree? What was our best/worst subject? After just a minute, the timer would ding again, so that each team only answered the questions on one card. At the "ding" one side of the table would move right to the next chair, with a new partner, for the next card and question.

Here's one I read that I decided to share in this post. "What was your first job?" The first job, for which I got money, was babysitting for various neighbors. I'd go and put their kids to bed, and then do some homework or watch T.V. while they were out on the town, often dancing at one of the bars that had a band, and when they'd get home at 11:00 or closer to midnight, I'd collect my 50 cents and get driven home. But...my very first job--meaning responsibility--that I remember was watching my little brother.

Actually, I had a partner in this endeavor--my sister, Patricia, who was fifteen months younger. Our brother would have been about six or seven months old. He didn't crawl yet, but he could sit up. So he was tucked into the red wagon, with a blanket around him for extra support. He was probably wearing little overalls with suspenders. He was a rather big baby. I think he weighed nearly 11 pounds when he was born. So we weren't expected --- perhaps forbidden-- to try to pick him up and carry him. After all, we--the "babysitters"-- were only four and five years old ourselves! So, brother sat in the wagon and we were to watch him and keep him entertained. The wagon was parked near the fence that was about 30 feet from the open barn door. Between us and that door stood about a dozen cows, lazily flipping a fly now and then with their tails, chewing their cuds, as they waited their turn inside the red barn. That's where our mother was. She and our two older sisters, nine and ten years old, were milking the twelve cows that were standing in the stalls, munching their tasty rolled barley ration. Our dad was up in the fields either harrowing, or drilling, or --most likely on a beautiful June evening like that--irrigating the alfalfa, armed with a shovel and canvas dams, dressed in his hip-high waders and his straw hat.

Our mother milked the cows every evening in the summer, so that my dad could do all the multitude of jobs that really never ended. Our big sisters were almost old enough to handle the whole chore on their own, and I know that by the next summer, with my mom queasy with another baby on the way, they took over from her. Mother had grown up milking her father's cows, so she was an experienced hand at this farming business. It really takes everyone in the family to make it a success. Also, she wasn't exactly a sissy. She spent plenty of time in a tractor seat, herself, from harrowing to running the buck rake before my dad owned a baler. In the fall, she would drive the grain truck, taking loads from the combine in the field down to either the feed store or to one of the granaries by the barn to be stored for winter use.

So, when it was milking time, everyone was expected to step up and do their job. My job, as the bigger sister, was to supervise my little sister and my little brother. I'm pretty confident that we needed watched almost as much as he did! But, I remember floating lilac leaves on the little stream of irrigation water that floated across the barnyard to the pasture. I remember having the kitties frolicking near us, batting at the little bugs that would fly up from the grass along the fence line. If there were lambs in the pasture, they would crowd near the wire, hoping we had their bottles of milk. It was warm and wildflowers were blooming. I don't think the milking took more than an hour. I don't even know if the herd was up to two dozen cows by then--probably. We had old-fashioned milkers that got carried from cow to cow. A few cows were fussy, and had to milked by hand into a bucket, but a nine or ten year old girl could do that. We all had our chores and we all did them and afterwards, went inside for supper and bed. When you are farm girls, you learn early how to just get to work and get it done. It was excellent training for my grown-up life.  

 

This is the brother, when he was just a few weeks old. I'm the sister in the blue dress. By summer, he could sit up and you can tell that we two on the front row would have been excellent babysitters. The two sisters on the back row were very responsible cow milkers at that point, too.



Cat Life

I read today a comment that said, "If the NSA is archiving all of our Facebook postings, then you're saying that about 30% of our national security information is cat pictures?"  Well, here's another contribution to the cat database....

I've talked before of the magnificent KitKat. She rules the house. One of her most favorite sleeping surfaces is our bed cover. It is a patchwork quilt made from corduroy. If I get into bed and only place the sheet over my body, because I'm a little too warm, then she will stand beside me and stare impatiently until I pull the quilt over my legs so that she can cuddle on the corduroy. On the days when I wash the sheets, and the corduroy is piled randomly in the center of the bed, she is beside herself with unrest. It simply is the best nap surface, ever.  Here's an example of her devotion to this quilt.

So, it was with extra irritation a couple of nights ago that I walked into my room to find that she'd chosen a new place to sleep. I'd placed a pile of clothing from the dryer on the bed, intending to fold them after I'd put dinner on to cook. But, I found the KitKat sound asleep, curled up comfortably on my black knit pants. NOT on the two pair of jeans; NOT on the denim shirts; NOT on the vast expanse of the Special Corduroy Quilt. Oh, no! That would be too obvious! She chose the small bit of black knit pant leg that was exposed. It was the one object on the bed that would most vividly display the cat hair she was shedding as fast as she could in the limited time she had to nap there. Sigh. Cat life---so incomprehensible.

Birthday! Birthday! Birthday!

It's birthday time again! Here's a little retrospective of  years gone by.

 

 Such a funny book! It's called "Miami Mice" about some Florida rodent detectives. 1988

 

 

Hiking in the canyon above the Pacific Ocean along Highway 1. 1992

 

 Thoughtful? Exhausted? We'd just had five kids born in eight years, and he wasn't a sit back and watch kind of dad...1985

 

Monterey, California...such a nice place 1991

 

Baby boy and daddy  1984

 

 

Santa Barbara weekend get-away 1990

 

Admiring the artist Cristo's work along I-5 in California 1991

 

Daddy and Sweetie-Pie 1981

 

 

Grandpa! 2005

Navy Achievement Medal 1980

 

Biker Grandpa! 2013

 

Horsey-ride Grandpa 2007

Off They Go

My whole married life, I've lived by a military air base. In California it was always a Naval Air station (or two). In Maryland, we had a Naval Air Station and then, about 30 miles up the road from my school was Andrews Air Force Base. Some days, while at recess duty on the playground, I could see Air Force One up in the sky on its final approach. Cool. Even in our brief time in Idaho, CoolGuy worked at an Air Force Base. Here, in Las Vegas, our home and my school are only a few miles from a large Air Force base that also happens to home to the United States Air Force Thunderbirds. In fact, one of my student's father is their videographer.

Living near air bases means there is usually the noise from planes and helicopters. But, I've just become accustomed to it as the background sound of life. Once, in California, the U.S. Navy Blue Angels air team was performing at the base where CoolGuy worked. They put on two shows that weekend, but we didn't drive over to the base and struggle through the traffic. We just went into our backyard and laid on the trampoline and watched! Of course, we couldn't see the entire show, but they flew over our house regularly in their turn-arounds and you could count the rivets on the wings.

Today, as we do each Friday, the entire student body met upstairs on our playground for flag ceremony. Each class gets a turn to present it. Students march up the center aisle carrying the U.S. flag and our Nevada state flag, place them into the holders, and then we all remove our hats, and join together for the Pledge of Allegiance. Just as we finished reciting it today, as we all still stood at attention following "...with liberty and justice for all" the six jets from the Thunderbirds team swooped up and over the air field to the north of our school. They had their smokers on, leaving a white trail, and they soared straight up in the sky. One jet peeled off to the west, while the other five turned north and then, we couldn't see them anymore. It was awesome! How many other elementary schools get the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds flying team to provide the perfect accent for their flag ceremony?

Ringing in the New Year

Or, rather riding in the New Year. It was 65 degrees, and beautifully sunny this afternoon when CoolGuy and I set off into the desert for the Because-We-Can motorcycle ride. Seriously, the air felt warm on my face and we tooled along the road that goes east up through a gap between two mountains and leads out into the Lake Mead Recreation Area. It is always so desert-y stark out there. It doesn't really matter what time of year it is--it will never be green out there. A few hardy pieces of vegetation poke up out of the hard packed alkaline soil, but the scenery is dominated by rock.

So have a great day and a great year. We hope to able to ride out to the desert again, 365 days from now and take another photo. Hopefully, it will be on the motorcycle, and not wheelchairs.

2013...2014

 

It's New Year's Eve in Las Vegas!! Whoooo!!

 

And when all the action that you see in that photo is happening at midnight, I'll be up on my roof with CoolGuy watching it. And then, we'll climb down and go to bed. Because we are Major Partiers!! Dude!! Well, not since about 1982...The last time we actually went out on New Year's Eve. We used to go to a command party at the base, or to one of his co-worker's homes, and we danced and laughed and drank lemonade. But that year, as I went out to pick up the babysitter, something broke on our truck, and, although CoolGuy could fix it, right then was not a good time. So we just stayed home that night. And it turned out to be a great new tradition.

As the kids grew older, there was a lot of fun to be had there at home. We don't drink, and --for sure now---I'm not much of a dancer. And at your own home, you don't have to worry about drunk drivers or other troubles. So, after we got a T.V. again, we started having movie night, and at midnight, the kids would go outside and bang pots and pans and wave sparklers around and we'd holler in the New Year. Most of the places we've lived have had plenty of people willing to shoot off their semi-legal fireworks all around the neighborhood. Now, we just climb the ladder to our roof, and enjoy our panoramic view of Sin City and all the various fireworks that light up the sky.

Here are some of the favorite New Year's Eve movies over the years:

• It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
• The Great Escape
• Some Like It Hot
• Casablanca

These were memorable to the kids because they'd never seen nor heard of them. Plus, they had famous people from our youth in them (Marilyn Monroe, Steve McQueen, Phil Silvers). And, two of them are black and white. These are also movies that all ages can enjoy. It was interesting how three of them also are set in historic contexts, so they gave our children some cultural literacy, too. But...mainly we watched them because they were such great entertainment!

So, this year, with no children around, we're still going to watch a movie, and then climb up on the roof and enjoy the fireworks. We had an amazing 2013---two college graduates, three summer trips to Wyoming, and a wedding! Here's hoping that 2014 will be a memorable year, too--also for good reasons. It is a landmark year for one thing: 40 years of the CoolGuy and EarthSignMama collaboration. That's worth a WHOOOOO!! isn't it?

Celebration Time

Today is the day! The Last Day of Darkness! December 21st, the winter solstice, is a date I anticipate eagerly each year. It means that the dark times are finally moving on and we will experience the gradual increase of daylight. By February we will start to notice that the sun is slipping behind the mountains a little later each day. When I leave the school at the end of the day, there will still be a little light in the western sky. Joy will fill my heart.

I've never enjoyed winter. It isn't hard to know that It wasn't all that fun to trudge around in the snow and the cold. Some days could be beautiful with the sun gleaming off the brilliant white snow, the stunning blueness of the sky arching over the mountains. I didn't dislike winter when I was a child. I had no particular opinion of it. It was what it was. Winter was a normal part of my life. I reveled in the mini-thaw that always came along in February, melting the snowpack off the highways, leaving the sidewalks bare and easy to traverse. Of course, March usually came in with a lion-like roaring blizzard, and we often had snow storms right through April, too. But, that is life in the higher elevations of the Rocky Mountains. Summer was more pleasant than winter, but winter was just the way it was every year.

Then...I lived in Southern California for twenty years. So, I'm ruined. I'm a certified weather sissy. I do not ever again want to live in an environment that makes me walk or drive on snowy, icy roads or sidewalks. I like to see the bare ground, or---even better--flowers and shrubs and grass and trees that are green year round!

So, this time of year, I laugh with CoolGuy about how we should light a big bonfire in the yard, and paint our faces and dance around with antler crowns and amulets and cheer for the end of darkness. But probably, we'll just soak in the hot tub and tomorrow I'll go to church and play the organ for the celebration of Christmas. I know...the old Christians just incorporated all those ancient customs into a new reason to have a ritual joy-filled event in the dead of winter. But, doesn't it really make sense to take a pagan celebration of the return of light by replacing it with a Celebration of the Light of the World---He who conquered the ultimate darkness--death? Sure it does! So join in the joy and have a great day tomorrow as we begin our seasonal journey to the days of light.

 

Some day I'd like to go to Stonehenge and join these devotees in their celebration.



I'm Glad I Was Invited

Yesterday, the ward mission leader left a message on my cell phone. He apologized for the late notice, but asked if I'd be able to come to the church on Thursday at 6:00 P.M. to play for a baptism. I called back and said I'd be happy to be there. I just assumed that this was for the missionaries. They are quite busy in our ward, I've played for five or six baptisms this year. It was quite a different event than I expected, however.

When I arrived at the church and walked into the foyer, I recognized the older lady sitting on the sofa, but I hadn't seen the fellow who was reclining beside her. His feet were on her lap and his head resting on a pillow with an oxygen tube in his nostril. His wheelchair was off to one side. Several other people from my ward were chatting with them. So I just went right into the font room and sat down at the piano.

The ward mission leader came over to greet and thank me, again. That was when I looked in the program to see what songs I'd need to play. The baptism was for an eight year girl---not the adult convert I'd expected. The very frail, elderly man in the foyer was her grandfather, who is dying from cancer. His son is the father of the young girl and is in the Air Force, stationed in Minot, North Dakota. His parents live in our ward, but the father has been ill for as long as we have been a ward (a little over two years) and has never been able to come to church. But that is why I recognized the woman--occasionally she can attend.

Son had come home from Minot to baptize his daughter, and---I presume---to be with his dying father. Apparently, the daughters and the mother of the children live here in town with her parents. There are a few questions that I'd like to someday get answered: are the parents divorced? Why do the kids and wife live here, if not? How did they both get such an amicable set of in-laws if they are divorced? The two sets of grandparents were pleasant and warm with one another. On and on....

Here's how it went: We were going to just hold our meeting in the usual way, when our bishop (who was presiding since it is the grandparents' ward) said, "Let's just move it all out there by grandpa." So, we picked up our chairs, the full-time elders rolled the piano, and we took the meeting to the foyer so that grandpa wouldn't have to sit in his wheelchair, but could continue to recline on the sofa. We sang, we prayed, we listened to a very nice talk by the mother's side grandma. Then, they gently lifted Grandpa into his wheelchair and we all went back into the font room. With each grandfather poised as witnesses, Dad and his little daughter entered the water and performed the ordinance. Then, they moved Grandpa back to the sofa, we all sat quietly in our foyer meeting place and listened to a couple of testimonies. Dad and daughter returned.

Then, daughter sat in a chair right next to the sofa. Grandpa leaned up with support from Grandma, and joined the other grandfather, dad and a couple of men from our ward and all put their hands on the sweet little girl's head. The father pronounced the confirmation and blessing. When the prayer was finished, Grandpa sagged back into the sofa, and his little sweetheart gave him a tight hug. She hugged all the grandparents and both parents and then sat down by Dad, who by now was wiping tears from his eyes. Me too.

I don't know much about this family. But it was evident that this is likely the last of these precious events that Grandpa is going to attend. Son will have to return to the base in North Dakota, at some point. Life will go on. But I'm so glad that I had to opportunity to be a witness to this very precious hour they all spent together tonight.

What Great Cooks Do

Here's what was prominently featured in the grocery store where I went for a few things tonight:

 

If you look closely, you'll see that it is a display with large bags of whole dried chilies, piles of cleaned corn husks, big cooking pots, and just behind the corn husks are bags of masa. Because....tamale time!

I've lived most of my adult life in communities where making tamales was a critical part of the Christmas preparation. I've even been the blessed recipient of some of these tamales. It just isn't Christmas without tamales. And believe me---it is no small thing to make them! It requires hours of work and many hands. And love and devotion to your family, because it wouldn't be the holidays without this traditional food.

Which is why I am writing this tonight. Today is our mother's birthday. She would have been 86 years old. I'm pretty sure that she wouldn't have been actually still cooking all of the bounty that came out of her kitchen when I was living there at home, but I imagine she may have been directing others in the "right" way to prepare these foods that we all associate with Christmas and our mother's kitchen.

We didn't make tamales in that kitchen, but we did make hand-dipped chocolates. She made a variety of fondant centers---cherry, mint, maple, orange, lemon, vanilla. She would also wrap some of it around a Brazil nut and then all of the centers were dipped in chocolate that was gently melted in the top of the double boiler. When she used up all the centers, she'd pour raw Spanish peanuts into the remaining melted chocolate, stir it around until they were all coated, and scoop little heaps of them onto the waxed-paper covered cookie sheets. These trays of bounty were then carefully carried into her room where they were lined up on top of the chest deep freezer that stood along the wall. [There wasn't any other place to put that behemoth.] Our house didn't have the greatest heating/insulation and so that corner of the house was cool enough to allow the chocolates to set up.

Another big production was lemon meringue pies. These weren't  specific to Christmas, but were regularly served for dessert, usually on a Sunday. Now, as an adult, I've become quite skilled at baking lemon meringue pie, and I still marvel that she whipped out two of them on those Sundays. It's not like she had extra time. There were many small children to dress, feed and whisk out the door by 9:50 so we'd have time to drive past an elderly lady's house and pick her up, and yet arrive on time for Sunday School. She'd get up with the milking crew on Sunday, bath and wash her hair, set it in brush rollers, and then make the pie crusts. They'd be put in the oven and she'd brown the beef roast or the huge chicken that would then be set to roast while we were at church. [This was back in the days of one hour Sunday School, and then you went home and came back in the evening for Sacrament meeting.] After the pie shells cooked, she would kneel on the floor in front of the open oven door and let the warm air flow over her hair to dry it in the curlers. Then, the roasting pan lid went on, and on the other front burner, she made the lemon filling. As the filling cooled slightly in the sink, she'd beat the egg whites into meringue, dribbling in the sugar just soooo, in order to dissolve it completely. The warm filling was poured into the cooked pie shells, the meringue quickly swirled over it--ensuring that it was smoothed right over to touch the pie crust so there'd be no gaps---and a sprinkle of coconut flicked over the egg-white peaks. Back into the oven for 15 minutes to brown the meringue, and after the pies were set to cool on counter top trivets, she shut off the oven, but again...leaned down to dry her hair a bit more in the still warm air.  By the time we finished Sunday School, the roasted entrée was finished, the pies cooled enough for dessert and we'd feast.

I could go on and on: scratch Angel Food cake for every single birthday.  Fruit cake at Christmas (and it was delicious -- I don't know why fruitcake has such a nasty reputation). We ate cherry pie for Washington's birthday and three birthday cakes within a ten day period in February. She made outrageous fresh strawberry pie in the summer. She cooked ridiculously delicious fried chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy. I don't even make fried chicken because I don't want to be disappointed. Homemade root beer, cinnamon rolls, fudge, and ---twice a week---six loaves of bread. I'm drooling now.

Ask any grandchild and they'll tell you of all the amazing feasts they ate at her table. And the interesting part to me is that many of their favorite culinary memories of Grandma are foods that she didn't even cook when I was child living there. The menu differences between we older four girls, and the younger four children are even startling. But....that's what good cooks do: they change it up. She was a kitchen adventurer. She looked for new ideas as well as using the old standards. I thought of the joyful memories that will be made this year by the Latino mothers and aunties and grandmas as they unite over the tamale ceremony this next week or two, and I remember the joy my family experienced all because our mother was a GREAT COOK.

 

Here's my dad with one of those Angel Food cakes on his 50th birthday.

 

That's my mom (in the blue shirt) with her two sisters. She was the best cook, they all agreed.



Two of My Friends

Throughout my teen years, I knew that winter meant I would have cracked and bleeding cuticles. I always assumed this occurred because of the two hours every morning, and two hours every evening, that I spent milking cows. My hands were usually wet or cold, or wet and cold, from washing udders and carrying the milking machines around. Out in the barn, (in the olden days) it was impossible to wear gloves because your hands were wet so often. The whole process involved lots of washing, rinsing, etc. Anyway, the ultimate result was chapped hands. I used lots of lotion, carried it around in my purse and had it by my bedside. Actually, in an attempt to keep my hands from being a total disaster all winter, I became very faithful at applying the udder cream to the cows that my dad encouraged us to use. By "greasing" the cows, I was also slathering it on my own hands and it helped to protect my skin from the ravages of the job.

However, after I moved away from the farm, I found, to my dismay, that my hands would still get dry and cracked and my cuticles would peel and bleed anytime the weather got cold and dry. Blah! I spent years rubbing Vaseline on my hands and sleeping in gloves, or over-lotioning. Then...I met the best friend that cracked cuticles ever had:

 

This blurry photo may not show you the title clearly: Burt's Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream. It smells lovely (unlike Bag Balm) and really, really works! When I use this faithfully -- i.e. night and morning--- it really keeps my pathetic fingernails from having raggedy cuticles. There isn't any cracking, peeling or bleeding. I only wish I'd found it sooner. But when I went online to look up the history, it seems that Burt's Bee cosmetic products have only been widely distributed since the early 2000's.

I've used another product of theirs longer than the cuticle cream:

This is Burt's Bees Res-Q Ointment. It is a first aid cream that has one of my favorite healing herbs as an ingredient: comfrey. When I had a serious injury to my hand in 1980, my mom made some poultices from comfrey leaves she'd been given by a friend and the wound healed up very quickly. I've used comfrey leaves in poultices for a variety of injuries and bruising on myself and some friends with excellent results. So I was quite pleased to find an ointment with comfrey.

Anyway, I just wanted to introduce you to two of my "friends" and recommend them to you. We'll be buddies for many years to come or until I move to the tropics where there is never cold, dry weather. But...I'll probably still manage to hurt myself, so I'll keep Res-Q in stock.

Feliz Navidad

Well, this is .... well ... I'll just let it speak for itself. Here's a still photo. Then, definitely, play the video.

 

This is a little friend I borrowed from the music teacher at my school. He has a musical message for you at this festive time of year.

 

Preparing for the Freeze

Well, it didn't snow--much to the great disappointment of my students. But it has been mighty cold here. Yeh, yeh...I know. We're sissies here in the desert. It barely made it into the 20s. And in the state of my birth and childhood it was in the  MINUS 20s. I know. But, I don't live there anymore and there is a very good reason for that. I don't like to be cold. I didn't like it then, either. But I didn't realize that there were options. Actually, when I was a child, there wasn't an option. But, as an adult, I've discovered the regions of our country where one doesn't have to shovel snow or cow manure, and I plan to reside in one or the other of them for the foreseeable future.

Here's how we prepared for the coming frost:  First I harvested the remaining tomatoes.

 

After the blast furnace of August, I let my tomato plants just sit there in my garden and they begin to recover and, by early October, I can usually pick another small batch of the lovely red orbs. These were the remaining green ones that had formed in the balmy November days we enjoyed. But I knew that temperatures below freezing would wipe out the plants, so these can ripen on my counter.

Next: CoolGuy helped me bring in all the potted plants that line the patio. They didn't all fit in this corner. There are ten here, and two more on the other side of the room.

 

I always plant geraniums and pansies in the fall, and they thrive all winter in the [usually] mild temperatures. But, frost would kill them, too. And the ice doesn't do a thing for my succulents. After a few more days, it will be safe to put it all back out there. I'm glad we brought them in, however, because all the other yard plants are now showing the signs of the frost: dead leaves, curled up blackened flowers. We'll have a big yard trimming "party" in January.

 

This morning, there was a thin sheet of ice across the swimming pool. Usually, we leave the pump running all night to keep it circulating. But we didn't even go to the hot tub last night because there was a brisk breeze rushing that cold air across the yard. It just didn't seem like a very inviting idea.

 

But, the wind has stilled, the thermometer isn't supposed to be dropping below the freezing mark tonight and by Sunday----60 degrees is back!  So, we're going out to the tub tonight. Sigh. Survived another "winter" and we're ready for .... well, it's not quite Spring, but at least it isn't Wyoming in December.

Excuse Me???

 

 

Do you see that little snowflake icon on Saturday????  That is just SO WRONG. I'll be expecting a correction right away, Weather Gods. This is the Mojave Desert and we only want our snow falling on the mountain tops, where we can gaze on its beauty while walking around on our dry, bare ground in our shirt sleeves. Okay, okay, I'm willing to wear a sweater, even. BUT NO SNOW.

Thankful

I'm thankful we got to spend Thanksgiving with our daughter's family here in the desert. They arrived on Wednesday afternoon because they didn't have school that day. So it was a pleasant drive during daylight to get here. I came home about a half-hour after they arrived and we all  enjoyed a pleasant little meal. Then, we started in on the fun.

First, we went over to see the Christmas lights in the cactus garden! Doesn't that sound like a very Mojave Desert-y was to celebrate the season? The cactus garden is adjacent to a chocolate factory, and I don't know why I was a little surprised to see that the factory and the store were open. Duh...So after we wandered around the beautiful outdoor scenes, we walked through the chocolate factory tour and got our free samples. Yum...then, naturally, I bought some chocolates, and we headed for home.

The little people got tucked into bed for the night and I baked a pumpkin pie. I spread out some bread slices on a cookie sheet so that it would be dry enough to make dressing the next day, and then I went to bed. About 1:00 A.M. the three year old starting vomiting. Poor mom... Grandma slept through it all.

I woke up the next morning and found out about the disaster of the night before. The little sick sweetie was sitting forlornly by mom on the couch, with a bowl standing by. Mom had had very little sleep---little sister almost none, too. That is where the sweetie ended up spending Thanksgiving---on the couch. Her seven-year old brother (with the help of Grandpa Cool-Guy) made breakfast pancakes --from scratch---for the rest of us. So cool.

I started the turkey roasting, and then I heard the discontented quarreling of children who've done nothing but lie on the floor and watch T.V. The sick one was quietly enjoying not moving and just letting Minnie Mouse and friends entertain her. But those two older ones got scooped up by grandma and we went off to explore one of the entrances of the wetlands that is near our house. Binoculars, hiking shoes, sunscreen---off we went.

After about an hour and a half, we headed for home and finished making the whole meal: rolls, dressing, a pumpkin and a pecan pie, pickles, olives, cranberry sauce, salad, mashed potatoes and gravy. Those of us who could eat, did just that. We ate and we ate. Then we cleaned it all up, and by then, it was late afternoon and so, as the sun set, Grandpa and I and the two big kids went out and played in the little pool (hot tub) for a while, just enjoying the orange sky and the warm water. We watched a movie and everyone got into their beds/sleeping bags and actually spent the entire night sleeping. No puke. Yeah!

The next two days were filled with hiking and eating and playing with their uncles' old Legos. Little did I know that old Legos are "super awesome" because all of the figures are "classics" and my Lego loving grandchildren were thrilled. It was pretty sad when we finally tucked everyone in on Saturday night, knowing that the next day they had to pack up and go home. Well...sad for me. Actually, they considered staying with us and Grandpa almost had them convinced that they'd love going to my school, too. But, ultimately, no matter how much fun you're having---there's no place like home.

So we bid farewell, found all the missing socks and sweaters and packed up their clay and their stickers and their really dirty clothes and they headed north on a beautiful morning. They're going to get snow this week. We're going to get really chilly weather (for us). We had an idyllic holiday to enjoy together with nothing more important to do than stop and examine rocks and dig in the clay.

 

The cactus garden is a pretty fun place to go. If you're ever down here during the winter holidays, we'll go there and get a couple of cups of Mexican hot chocolate and wander around and enjoy a unique light show.

 

 

This is my new motto.

 

Grandpa and one of his Sweetie Pies enjoying a lovely afternoon in the desert.

 

Here's who they were gazing upon. He was only about 30 feet away. These wild desert bighorn sheep graze in this park during the day. It's a great life, if you can get it.

 

Here's the formerly sick girl giving her brother, sister and grandpa a ride.

 

Clay! Real clay! It's just part of the ground out here in the Mojave. It rained for three days the week before they came to visit us, so in a shady spot like this part of the trail by a mountain, it was still damp. It was just such a new experience to find REAL CLAY out in the wilderness that the hike was over and a new fun time was begun.

 

The afternoon light is beautiful out there by the lake and it was a great place to take a photo.

 

The next day we went to the wetlands near our house. Here we are looking at the mosquito fish darting about in the shallow water. Also, some coots and moorhens swam near to us.

 

Again, there are lots of photo ops in this place. In fact, we came across a large family taking pictures with the grandparents, the little babies, the grown children. It was a beautiful day, just warm enough, no wind and so many nature things to see.  

Mr. Li-Zard

My dad had a favorite joke. It used a barnyard word, so I rarely retell it. It goes like this:

There were three friends, Rabbit, Turtle and Lizard. They spent a lot of time together and when they grew up, they went their separate ways. Turtle and Lizard hit it big in the stock market and got filthy rich. They built a big mansion and were thinking of how they were going to landscape it, when they remembered that Rabbit had opened a nursery and so they decided to hire him to do the work. Rabbit drives into the long driveway in his truck with a big load of fertilizer in it, and stops at the front door. He gets out and rings the bell and the butler answers it. The butler gives the up-and-down look to the Rabbit, standing there in his overalls and his work boots.
The butler sniffs a bit, and asks, "Yes?" 
Rabbit replies, "Is Turtle here?" 
The butler pauses and then responds, "Mr. Tur-tell is down by the well." 
"Well, then is Lizard here?" Rabbit tries again.
Butler sniffs again and says, "Mr. Li--Zard is out in the yard."
So, by now Rabbit is a teensy bit annoyed at all the airs being put on, and he says to the butler, "Well, please tell Mr. Tur--tell and Mr. Li--Zard, that Mr. Ra--bbit is here with the sh**!" 

Okay, maybe you're not laughing. But as a nine year old girl, helping my dad milk cows, and surrounded by the very item that Rabbit had loaded in his truck, it was hilarious. I was reminded of Mr. Li-Zard this weekend when we were cleaning the living room.

We'd moved most of the furniture out so that we could shampoo the carpet. We'd had the beautiful oriental carpet cleaned at a shop and now were trying to clean up the rest of the living room floor so that we could put the 8 x 12 foot rug back out on the carpet. I was crawling along the baseboard with the hand-held vacuum, dusting behind and around the big cabinets we couldn't move, and I heard a clatter and felt a hard piece of something slurp up into my little dirt holder. I decided to check if I'd sucked up a game piece or a Lego or something else like that, so I felt around in the debris for it.

Here is what I found:

 

It's a mummified lizard. He used to look like this:

 

 

Although, we definitely put this little guy out on the lawn when we found him in the house, hiding under the rug from KitCat. But that desiccated little fellow I've encased in plastic in the top photo is about the right size, so maybe our little friend from last spring came back in. 

 

The lizard I put in plastic (so I can take him to school and we can all admire him) is completely mummified. His eye sockets are empty, but on his belly, you can see his internal organs are all dried up. He lost his tail, but a new one had started to grow. Every little claw on each little toe is intact. He's only about 2 inches long, just like that lizard on CoolGuy's hand in the second photo. His skin is all there--every little bump and stripe visible. It's so awesome! A very thoroughly dried and preserved lizard.

 

It's such a great find because, just today, we were reading in our text about a prehistoric person whose mummified remains were found in a cave in Northern Nevada about 60 years ago, and how the archaeologists have reckoned that the person lived about 1000 years ago. So, I'm totally taking in Mr. Lizard Mummy for show and tell tomorrow. I've put him between two pieces of clear tape, and he's inside a small glass jar so he can be viewed but not touched, shaken or broken. I love my job!

 

As I was examining him with a magnifying glass (yes, I'll let people use it tomorrow) CoolGuy pointed out how inflexible he was. Yes, Mr. Li--Zard, you've gotten very hard. Mr. Li--Zard, you should have stayed in the yard. (I'll stop now.) 

 

Rain-maggedon

I live in a desert. The definition of "desert" is a biome that receives 10 inches or less of rain a year. It began to rain yesterday in our desert. There has been about an inch of rain fall so far, according to a report I just read. It is predicted to continue to rain through noon tomorrow.

In just 24 hours, there were 141 car wrecks that police responded to because people here don't make any allowances for the newly wet roads. These are roads that have had oil and grease and other slimy offal, from machines and the air, building up for a couple of months...since the last time it rained.

In front of our school, there is a low place in the road, and with this rain, we have a lake from side to side. It's a pretty impressive pond, too. Cars really have to just creep carefully through it because the water comes up to the axles for most cars. It is strategically located right by the entrance to our parking lot. Sigh.

Today, it rained all day. The students were dropped off by anxious parents, and then were directed straight to the classrooms because there was no other place for them to be. We also had no opportunity for recess because...rain, puddles, soaking wet grass.

The electricity went out twice in our school today. Rain...we have that happen whenever it rains. Fortunately, it was only out for about five minutes each time. But, most of our classrooms do not have any windows. But---they do have emergency lights which popped on within 15 seconds of the power stoppage.

It was 48 degrees when I went out to direct traffic and help students cross the busy, wet, flooded street this afternoon. Everyone came back in their cars to collect their children. Lots of cars.  Brrrrr....at least the rain took a break for about 15 minutes. We only had a brisk wind. Some of the clouds lifted off the mountains to the north of us and we could see the fresh snow.

It's still raining. Blah. I live in a desert. Bring on the "less than 10%". Please?

Field Trip Marathon

Every year, our favorite fourth grade field trip is to a local wetlands area. I wrote about it last year. I'm sure some people are surprised to discover that there is a wetlands here in the desert, but the name Las Vegas is Spanish for "the meadows." On the early Spanish Trail, this was the one area in the surrounding bleakness where one could find a spring with grass and trees. Now the springs are gone, but the water that flows from rain run-off and out of the water treatment plants, still goes to the lowest place which trails it right down to Lake Mead. And, there is a lovely natural habitat where we take our students each year. Volunteers are there to lead us around and point out cool nature stuff and the students absolutely love going there.

In order to get this experience, I call for our reservation on the first day that teachers return to work in August. It is hard to get in if you wait too long, because they only give field trips two days each week and you risk not getting a spot. So, before I even had students this year, I had booked two field trips: we take two classes one day and two classes the other day. We were all set for a great week and then, another opportunity came up about a month ago: another field trip!! And...bonus! We didn't have to pay for the buses. They were being donated.

The wrinkle: this new field trip was on the day in between our fourth grade trips to the wetlands park. It wasn't really a problem, it was just interesting! So, on Tuesday, I took my students, along with a fellow grade level teacher and her class, and we hiked all morning along the trails. We saw coyote tracks and scat. We measured the height of a tree stump that had been chewed down by a beaver. We watched the American coots and moor hens on the pond. A large road runner dashed across the trail in front of us. Some quail scurried out of our way into the bushes. A jack rabbit hid in the brush, hoping we'd just keep on walking. We investigated some owl pellets that were at the base of trail marker post. The sun peeked in and out of a thin cloud cover, keeping the day at a pleasant temperature. We tasted the leaves of a salt bush after we'd looked at it closely with our hand lenses to see the white crystals glittering on the green surface. It was totally awesome, as it is each time we make this visit to nature. I walked along with one of my students who usually is mostly silent, often blinking at me with the eye of a chicken. But, today! She talked my ear off: this reminded her of a camping trip she'd gone on with her mom and grandma and sister. They saw a deer! They saw some rabbits! They cooked marshmallows! On and on she chatted and kept interrupting herself to tell me, over and over, that this was so fun!!  It was astonishing---usually I get one word replies or just that chicken-eye stare. It was wonderful! Now, I'll know what to talk to her about when we need to write a story and she just sits there...I told her special ed teacher, who partners with me, and he was thrilled, too.

Then, today, we boarded the buses again for a trip to the university from which I finally made my escape with a diploma last spring. The university has a lot of community partners and together they sponsor a reading incentive program for 4th and 5th graders all over the city. They invite all the elementary schools in the district to come to the sports arena on campus and attend a huge pep rally/kick-off for the reading program. Many of them came today, and it's a blast! Again, free trip! The community sponsors provide the money for the buses and the prizes. A group of mascots are dressed and playing basket ball in their costumes. There's loud music playing--all the fun songs the kids know from the radio and like to sing along and dance while listening. There are the cheerleaders from the college, lots of student athletes in their team shirts taking us to our seats and throwing beach balls into the crowd. It's loud and rowdy, full of yelling and singing and screaming and the Wave. Then, they introduce all the schools who are in attendance and we cheer and holler. Local T.V. celebrities read a book to the kids, we learn all about the reading challenge and the prizes being offered. Every student ends up with a free book (they were sent to our school in advance, and we passed them out when we got back.) In all, it is a big wild party where the main chant is: Read to Know! Read to Grow! For some of our students, it may the only time they go to that campus in their entire life. But, for others, it is a nudge toward finishing high school and joining all the cool young adults they spent a really fun morning with, yelling and cheering about.....reading? Yes!

And, as an added bonus: we arrived on our buses, a couple hundred of us from our school, and many hundreds of others and as we were climbing the steps to the stadium doors, some poor person's car caught fire in the parking lot! We were never in danger, neither were the buses, but it was very exciting to watch! The smoke started up and a few kids pointed it out. Then, FLAMES!! and lots of black smoke! Then, we got a fire engine roaring up and they extinguished the fire before it involved anyone else's vehicle. I'm sure there were many disappointed elementary students that there was not a violent explosion. I'm rather surprised there wasn't either. But relieved...In all, it was almost more memorable than the pep rally!

But, by the time today ended, poor old granny-teacher was ready for the hot tub and bed. Two days in a row of disrupted schedule, walking-walking-walking on the pathetic feet, and general chaos, and the extra attention used to keep 23 little friends from wandering off, have left me really tired. But, it's a good tired. We have had a fabulous week of new experiences. We're going to have a lot to write about!

It's a Birthday!

We've been celebrating for two days now! The person whose birth is being noted was born on November 17 in San Diego, CA. But he is currently living in Guam, aboard the U.S.S. Chicago, a submarine. Here in North America, today--Sunday--is the anniversary of his arrival into the world. But yesterday it was today in Guam. Get that?? International dateline and all that...So, on the Internet, we celebrated with him yesterday, and I'm celebrating today, too. It's awesome---he gets a two day party. Except, I understand that he had a duty watch yesterday, and got to strip and wax floors. Go Navy! That's the life of the sailor.

A fun fact: his new mother-in-law was born November 16, so his bride pointed out on Facebook that she got to enjoy the birthdays of her two favorite people on the same day!! Cool.

Well, I'm sure I've talked all about the wonderfulness that is him many times on this forum. But here I go again!  It's my prerogative as the mother to go on and on about my fabulous children. This post will be no exception.

He was my first child to experience ear-tube surgery. I wasn't convinced that he really needed it, until the otolaryngologist did the hearing test and one of his ear drums didn't move at all and the other barely moved. He was a year old, and didn't do much babbling or chatting. But he had four older siblings who waited on him hand and foot, and he didn't need much communication. So, we had the ear-tube surgery and that night, while he was in the bathtub, the dog barked on the patio, near the open window, as he had done often. My little guy, with his newly cleared-out ears, jumped out of his skin at the sound he apparently heard for his first time. Oh, I felt like such a bad mother...

But, evidently, his failure to hear much for the first year of his life didn't hold him back. He learned to play multiple instruments and was found to have a lovely bass singing voice. He had never tried singing much, till a friend overheard him singing at the campfire one night while out with the Scouts. The friend encouraged him to try out for high school choir, where they sorely needed more male singers.This required a schedule change, which first had to be signed for by the choir director. He told me about the audition. She played a little something and he sang it back to her. She played some more lines. He sang those. Then, she played a note, "Sing that." Then she just said, "What is that note?" And then she asked him to sing a particular scale. Sure, he could sing that, too. She went down the bass notes, he kept up with her. Finally she laughed, "Give me that schedule!" and happily signed for him to rearrange his classes in order to add choir. That was the beginning of beautiful relationship between him and singing. Who knew he was a natural talent with a perfect ear for tones?? It must be something in the gene pool, because neither his dad or I have any great musical skill.

So, now, he is utilizing that amazing gift for tones and notes as a sonar technician on a submarine. We're quite proud of him---well, we've always been proud of him, and this Navy gig is the gravy on the frosting of the cake. Enjoy a few photos of his progression from the cutest little brother, to a grown man who just celebrated his six-week wedding anniversary. Too bad the bride is still living in a different hemisphere. But that will soon change...Exciting!

 

"Standing" on Dad's chest

 

 

First birthday!

 

Two years old in Idaho.

 

Getting rained on in Wyoming in Grandma Frome's yard.

 

We're back in California. He loved to swim.  

 

 

Did I mention that he made it all the way to Eagle Scout, finally. (This photo is his first or second year.)

 

He was a pretty awesome baseball player in Little League.
 

 

This uniform is the favorite of his wife: a life-long, multi-generation Boston fan.

 

 Clarinet for freshman and sophomore band; saxophone for junior year; drums and tuba as a senior. Mr. "Hand him an instrument and give him a couple of hours...."

 

This is Tuba Christmas. I think he's playing a euphonium for this gig. He got to perform at the Kennedy Center for the Washington D.C. Tuba Christmas.

 

Singing in Les Miserables for Summer Stock production during college.

 

 

He's also a fantastic piano player, and plays guitar: electric and acoustic. He even learned the banjo, which I love, too.  

 

 

Standing with the ever-shrinking Mom at the submarine training base in Connecticut.

 

 

He looked so cute in this uniform, he almost upstaged the bride....well, at least for me, anyway. But I have a serious bias. He's been so cute since he was born 29 years ago.