home again

I think there must be a special section of hell where sinners have to relive their first day home from vacation over and over again. That is where I am, people.

I hate coming home from vacation. As if it isn't depressing enough leaving loved ones behind and returning to work, there are mountains of laundry, an empty fridge, a car 5 inches deep in cracker crumbs, moody kids, 25 messages on the phone (or in our case, 1. Thank you, Saturday night power outage! I love you!), a church activity to whip together for tonight, and a vegetable garden that looks like it might not recover from my two week absence (it was watered, but I can't expect my ten year old neighbor to fix the overwatering problem of our drip system.)

Oh, and two robberies in our neighborhood while we were gone. What?! Medford's total criminal activity for the year had to happen on my street!

If I close my eyes, I can still imagine that I am back in my in-laws' sunny kitchen, listening to the screen door bang as the kids run outside to play. My favorite day - my favorite hour- of our entire trip was the afternoon that Jared's sister, mom, and I made an impromptu Sonic run. We came home heroes, our arms full of slushies and shakes and cherry-limeades. The kids all piled happily onto the porch swing while the rest of us lounged in the shade, sipping summer through a straw. It was perfect.

I know by tomorrow everything will look better and we will settle back in to our old routines. It will be like we never left, I suppose. *sigh*

rocky mountain high

We have arrived! We got here a few days ago, having survived 20 hours in the car with the kids. Not as bad as expected, I have to admit. In fact, the kids were doing so great that first day that we decided to push on through lovely Wendover, NV where we had intended to stay the night, Instead, we made it to the edges of Salt Lake where we spent a quick night at Motel 6 before hitting the road the next day. And I'm glad we did - Day 2 is not as good as Day 1, as it turns out. A few things about our trip:

• They should really make caffeinated peanut butter M&Ms. It would really save me some trouble. And potty breaks.


• Kids who are accustomed to traveling without portable DVD players are not abjectly grateful and well-behaved when presented with one, as one might think. They are actually not super impressed and spend a lot of the time poking each other. Anyone want to buy a new, once-used portable DVD player?


• Some cities are allowed to have their initials on mountains. Like Elko and Winnemucca. But not Battle Mountain, NV.

After a weary two days, we were greated with clean sheets, dinner in the oven, and fresh flowers next to the bed. *sigh* Such bliss!

And before I forget, Happy Father's Day, Dad! Eleanor wanted to send you a Costco pizza, so maybe you will take a raincheck? :) Love you!

newbery update

I am in the middle of pretrip craziness right now! After the stress and hectic schedule of last week, I did no cleaning or laundry, so today I am faced with 6 loads of laundry, floor mopping, bathroom cleaning, and all the usual pretrip odds and ends (stopping mail service, asking the nice neighbor boy to water our garden, etc.) I want to bang out all this today so tomorrow I can focus on grocery shopping and packing.

In all the bustle, however, I realized I haven't posted a Newbery update in a while. So in case you were worried the The Giver put me off of my Newbery challenge, I am still on track. Since The Giver, I have read

• I, Juan de Pareja (1966) A historical fiction about the life of the African slave who became the assistant to famous Spanish painter Diego Velazquez. The author freely admits that there is very little historical fact to substantiate some of her plot, but she puts together the bits and pieces nicely, creating a sweet story about friendship and loyalty and the passion for art. Pareja did learn to paint during this time and one of his pieces hangs in the Prado in Madrid. Here's Velazquez's portrait of Pareja:
  
  

• The White Stag (1938) A bizarre stylized account of Hungarian mythology, delving into the anguished origins of Attila the Hun. The coolest part about this book was the 1930's socialist-propaganda-style illustrations. An interesting, poetic book... but an odd choice, especially considering Laura Ingalls Wilder's On the Banks of Plum Creek was a Newbery Honor that year, a book I consider superior. I think it's a shame she never won.

Then I hit The Story of Mankind, the first Newbery winner from 1922. I have not made much progress since. This book is a doorstop and doesn't read much better than one (no offense, Hendrik Willem van Loon!) It has some witty asides that occasionally make me snort, but mostly it is a laborious and colonial take on history, beginning in 500, 000 BC. That said, I have learned quite a bit about the Phoenicians. And the Etruscans. Can you tell I haven't gotten very far? I'll still give it the old college try.

For our trip, I checked out a few more Newberys and the number generator kindly gave me quite a few that I have been looking forward to (Caddie Woodlawn, Basil E. Frankweiler). So those will give me a nice break from the Phoenicians, I think.

My mopping awaits. And the last three loads of laundry. Wish me luck!

the home stretch

It is the last week of school and there are a million things going on, which would explain my lame posting habits of the past week or so. A few things going would include

• Eve's last week of 2nd grade, complete with a Field Day/BBQ thingie on Thursday
• The girls' dance recital is on Saturday which, for some reason, is including evening rehearsals every day this week. Perhaps the teachers are unaware that all we parents really want is to see them twirl around adorably in tutus. None of this alleged "choreography."
  
• I decided...oh, a week ago... that I really had to make quilts for my three graduating seniors at church. Two down, one to go!
  
• Dear friends that I would drop everything to see visiting town for only one day. Today.
  
• Dear friends moving away in only 3 days.
• The usual youth activities and presidency meeting schedule

Oh, and I forgot: we are driving to Colorado in a week and I really need to be (bracing) preparing for the adventure that is being in the car with my children for a grand total of 4 days. That means raiding the library for books on DVD and I Spy books, washing every article of clothing we own, buying endless amount of new and surprising snacks (cereal straws! Surprise!), figuring out how my vegetable garden will get watered while we are gone, etc.

Also on our to-do list is to finally buy a portable DVD player. I know Laura Ingalls crossed the plains without one, but I just can't do it! We were thinking of a dual screen player. Any input? How do you show movies to your kids if they sit in both rows of your van? Any advice in general about the drive?

Now I must go bake a cake for our visit with out-of-town friends tonight (see above), prepare a meeting agenda, and go work on a quilt. I will leave you with some pictures of our Memorial Day hike to Lost Creek Lake. Made me wish every day was family outing, so maybe that bodes will for our upcoming adventure.

Eleanor is the posiest child I know.

friends and relations

My brother and his family drove all the way from Utah to our little corner of Oregon last weekend to visit us over the holiday. How nice is that? I always feel like we live in the middle of nowhere, meaning we are not really on the way to anywhere, so it meant a lot that they would drive 13 hours just for the pleasure of visiting us. Thanks, guys!

We had a great time while they were here and they tolerated my three-ring circus very nicely. Their little boy, E., is a sweetie. It was so much fun to see how he has grown and changed so much since I last saw him a year ago. He is sweet-tempered and playful and outgoing and so much fun (and behaved very well, contrary to what his parents may have thought.)

It was kind of a short visit, but we tried to do a few fun things: eating out frequently, visiting Ashland, hiking, going to parks, staying up late talking and watching movies. Sadly, we were a little short on pictures (I will be punishing Jared later for taking 83 pictures of wildflowers and 0 pictures of all the cousins together...just kidding, I love you, honey!) so you can check out my sister-in-law's very cool blog if you want to see more of our exploits.

Thanks for coming, guys! We had a great time and have a lot of happy memories. We will be crashing your place in a few short weeks!

Our little family hiking Table Rock, picture courtesy of my sister-in-law.

My very adorable nephew. I love his little cheeks.