I look a little like a pumpkin in the rust-colored shirt, but I am okay with tha because I love my new haircut! I can feel the cool fall air rushing through one ear and right out the other.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
8 months pregnant
I look a little like a pumpkin in the rust-colored shirt, but I am okay with tha because I love my new haircut! I can feel the cool fall air rushing through one ear and right out the other.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
Young Women at Camp
Here they are!
It was wonderful for us to have 9 YW at camp this year. We nearly had 12, but 3 weren't able to come at the last minute. Compare this to 5 last year (and 4 in my stake the year before that) and it was vastly different...better!
It was wonderful for us to have 9 YW at camp this year. We nearly had 12, but 3 weren't able to come at the last minute. Compare this to 5 last year (and 4 in my stake the year before that) and it was vastly different...better!
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Wolf intervention
No, I am not talking about Jacob vs. Edward.
A 14-yr old recently told me that she had only ever read one book. I was shocked. But then as I thought about it, I have been in every room of her house and not seen a single book other than an old family bible found in the attic that the previous resident had left. It fills me with sadness. I had hundreds of childhoods, one with every book I read. And some I lived dozens of times over and she's only ever experienced that one lonely book.
She continually tells me what a terrible memory she has and has given me great reason to believe it. But I was amazed as she recounted to me the plot of "Lone Wolf" that she read years ago. She remembered it in great, vivid detail that brought her to tears. She is very interested in animals, so I immediately recommended to her "Julie of the Wolves" and its 2 sequels that are among my favorite books.
I think about how I grudgingly read "Old Yeller" when I was 25. I ended up using it, tearfully, in a Relief Society lesson. Books often bring me to tears, and although her tears were probably just felt in reaction to the tragedy in the plot, I read them as so much more. The tragedy to me was the struggle she has in school, her common problems with her family, her awkward age and challenge of teen social life. All of these could be alleviated and improved by reading. At a bare minimum it's a place to escape to. A private endeavor of the mind and soul that can elicit great emotion and learning.
I will be buying Julie of the Wolves very soon and I hope she will read her second book.
A 14-yr old recently told me that she had only ever read one book. I was shocked. But then as I thought about it, I have been in every room of her house and not seen a single book other than an old family bible found in the attic that the previous resident had left. It fills me with sadness. I had hundreds of childhoods, one with every book I read. And some I lived dozens of times over and she's only ever experienced that one lonely book.
She continually tells me what a terrible memory she has and has given me great reason to believe it. But I was amazed as she recounted to me the plot of "Lone Wolf" that she read years ago. She remembered it in great, vivid detail that brought her to tears. She is very interested in animals, so I immediately recommended to her "Julie of the Wolves" and its 2 sequels that are among my favorite books.
I think about how I grudgingly read "Old Yeller" when I was 25. I ended up using it, tearfully, in a Relief Society lesson. Books often bring me to tears, and although her tears were probably just felt in reaction to the tragedy in the plot, I read them as so much more. The tragedy to me was the struggle she has in school, her common problems with her family, her awkward age and challenge of teen social life. All of these could be alleviated and improved by reading. At a bare minimum it's a place to escape to. A private endeavor of the mind and soul that can elicit great emotion and learning.
I will be buying Julie of the Wolves very soon and I hope she will read her second book.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Money for the boys and Haiti too
Besides the automatic monthly deposits we make into the boys' bank accounts, this year I have started making additional matching transfers when I do these things:
1) return something to the store
2) get a reimbursement check
3) resist the temptation to splurge on a want
Today when I read about a Haiti relief donation challenge on moneysavingmom.com I decided to transfer yesterday's $100+ return to LDS Humanitarian Services instead. By linking this post to some other blogs, I can more than double this amount.
1) return something to the store
2) get a reimbursement check
3) resist the temptation to splurge on a want
Today when I read about a Haiti relief donation challenge on moneysavingmom.com I decided to transfer yesterday's $100+ return to LDS Humanitarian Services instead. By linking this post to some other blogs, I can more than double this amount.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Food Storage Analyzer
When Emergency Essentials released their Food Storage Analyzer I pulled up my complicated excel spreadsheet and entered my food storage inventory into the analyzer. I projected teenage boy ages for the baby and pre-schooler and it told me to project 9200 calories a day. Based on this, I learned that I have 163.81 days of food stored up with percentage shortages of sodium and fat. But we're at 220% of fiber! Now where's that wheat grinder?
The best feature is that you can add things to the inventory from the grocery store or that I've purchased from their competitors like Walton Feed or the LDS Cannery. If you look at the nutrition panel, you can easily plug in the carbs, protein, fiber and the system will tally up and tell you if you've got a good balance of nutrition. My own spreadsheet tracks the retailer, price and date of items that I've bought (so that I can rotate FIFO), so I won't be getting rid of my separate inventory, at least not until the analyzer adds fields for this info. Overall, I am pretty excited about this feature. Oh, and also the $10 gift card for writing this review doesn't hurt one bit.
The best feature is that you can add things to the inventory from the grocery store or that I've purchased from their competitors like Walton Feed or the LDS Cannery. If you look at the nutrition panel, you can easily plug in the carbs, protein, fiber and the system will tally up and tell you if you've got a good balance of nutrition. My own spreadsheet tracks the retailer, price and date of items that I've bought (so that I can rotate FIFO), so I won't be getting rid of my separate inventory, at least not until the analyzer adds fields for this info. Overall, I am pretty excited about this feature. Oh, and also the $10 gift card for writing this review doesn't hurt one bit.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Pear Galette
My mom sent me a recipe for this crust years ago. Nice pears were abundant on the clearance rack and this was the result. We will definitely be making this again! The free-form crust was so much more my style than a nicely crimped pie crust.
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