Table for Eight

Yes, my eyes are GIGANTIC. But it's kinda my signature feature. Well, that and my Jay Leno/Grandma Dotty underbite. But my point! See ... I'm still here! I know most university students dread Finals Week, but I guarantee you their teachers LOVE Finals Week. Why? Because while our students are studying and taking exams, we have a tiny reprieve from classroom teaching. AND it's the one time in our lives when we can justifiably lock ourselves in our offices--without interruption--and read student papers. It's AWESOME. I really REALLY love Finals Week. (And my students at BYU. I feel really fortunate to teach there.) Now, about blogging ... It's been a few months since I've posted consistently, but I am still in that "meh" mode when it comes to sitting down to blog each day. BUT I'm trying to accept this phase and just remember, "sometimes you feel like a nut; sometimes you don't." This is just a time in my life when i...

Well it's not even 8am and I've already managed to break the diswasher, clog some pipes, and curse for about 20 solid minutes. I'd say today's going to be pretty awesome. And it's really all my own doing. You see, one of my New Year's goals was to meditate each morning for just 5 minutes (don't want to kill myself at the start--LOL) AND be more easy-going with household routines and chores (primarily with the kids' doing theirs). But I'm telling you, that is EASIER SAID THAN DONE (for me).  I have some kind of learned/DNA-backed obsession with people following through on jobs and keeping our household running smoothly. I know emptying trashes or washing dishes isn't a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but for some reason it's the principle of it for me. I just want our kids to "do their part" to contribute to homelife AND learn life skills that will help them to be self-reliant peeps. But they're teenage a...

Elder Meehan's bday carepackage. (A "candy cake," an old man's beard, bday candles, a motivational church talk, and a set of pens.) Today is Elder Meehan's first birthday in the mission field! Yehoo! And even though we aren't able to celebrate this birthday WITH HIM, we are definitely celebrating HIS BIRTH ... because he is one amazing (and joyful) missionary, son, brother, cousin, grandson, friend, engineer, dog-owner, and bicyclist. We love you Elder Meehan!  PS: It's snowing a TON today where he is serving ... so guess what ? CHURCH WAS CANCELLED! Yup, Elder Meehan got SNOW for his bday.  So fun! A close-up of the "candy cake." It's really a hat box that we got at Hobby Lobby. The kids all glued his favorite candies to it to make it look like a birthday cake. We added a photo of his missionary tag and sent candles with it for him to blow out.  I really like this idea, but can't remember when we firs...

We are super excited that it's Christmas Eve and we're about to celebrate the birth of baby Jesus! We are also super excited because we get to have a phone call tomorrow from Elder Meehan--one of two phone calls during the year (Mother's Day is the other one.). It's hard to believe that we haven't heard his voice in months. Months! Wow. As I sit here typing this early morning, all of our kids are sleeping. It's a pretty rare occasion; usually one or two are awake by this time. And since I have a few solo minutes, I thought I would share a few of the thoughts I have about how much Christmas means to me: --I love Christmas because it's a holiday that seems to impact all people for good. The Christmas season brings out the best in all of us. It's the time when we really get to feel what it would be like if we chose love, generosity, and selflessness every day of our lives. I love that. It kinda makes me feel more connected to all people (my own f...

 Once a year the youth program for the young women in our church celebrates the girls' accomplishments with a program called An Evening In Excellence . The goal is to honor the different activities, hobbies, sports, and other good works the girls are accomplishing--as well as encourage them to pursue new goals in the coming year. (And each girl puts out a small display of projects they have worked on during the year. Papaya put out her school books, a volleyball, and some writings. Bam put out her song-writing journal and a CD of her singing.) The program is always BEAUTIFUL and truly inspiring. This year Bam was part of a musical number that was incredible. And Papaya gave a talk that made us so proud.  As I sat and watched them both I thought to myself, "When in the world did they stop wearing size 2T? Where did our 'babies' go?" Life moves so fast. Holy cow. Thank you to all of the Young Women leaders who prepared for the program. It was ...

This past weekend was "General Conference" for our church--which meant our church meetings were broadcast over a two-day period and we could watch them from home, the internet, at our local church building, or even in downtown Salt Lake City at the LDS Conference Center. We do this twice a year in our church and it's awesome. We get to hear from a lot of amazingly inspiring people (they each deliver 15-20 minute talks) AND we get to spend extra time with our family. It's something we really look forward to each October and April (every 6 mos.). So, it was a low-key weekend for us. No rushing around. And even some lounging around. Oh, and a lot of volleyball. *Dave and the kids love volleyball!  They played in between Conference sessions and after dinner with our neighbors. Just in the street. It was awesome. And kind of funny. Hard to believe we have enough kids to play 3 on 3 volleyball. (Though we did miss Elder Meehan.) (*I love volleyball, to...