I must confess...

I am having a love affair with my new vacuum. This beauty...

I'm not OCD by any means, but I get so much pleasure (a sickness according to Zach) seeing things get clean. It's not that I'm worried about germs. It's a visual thing. Can't explain it. Whenever I see a really dirty truck, it's all I can do to not ask the owner if I can wash it for them. So this vacuum, the Dyson DC25 Animal, is meant for me. It's the most expensive vacuum I've ever owned. I charged the whole thing on my RC Willey account much to Zach's dismay which is SO not my nature. I'm not an impulsive buyer by any means. I couldn't help it! When the salesman delivered his pitch, I knew that every monthly payment with interest would be justified by the sheer pleasure of seeing how much dog hair, dander, dust, etc. I sucked up on a daily basis. I almost want to take pictures of the cannister after I vacuum for you! But I'll spare you. Just know that I can't wait to vacuum again. And I just did like half an hour ago.

Packin' the summer fun in

I remember back to my working years and it seemed like my days were packed with unpleasant things I HAD to do like work (obviously), laundry, grocery shopping, appointments, etc. Now, my life is a bit simpler thanks to my sweetheart who wants me to be at home. And there is time for everything, the fun and the not-so-fun. Yesterday was ALL fun and not at all productive. Here's how it went...

10:00-11:30 Tennis. I have joined a womens' tennis league at the park to practice my newly learned tennis skills. I am by far the least experienced of the bunch and I have to laugh when it is my turn to serve. Nobody really gets to play then, just watch me fail time after time to get the ball over the net. But I am learning a lot and having fun at the same time. Emmy is earning money watching Simon and my friend Tiffany's kids so she's happy about it as well.

12:30-2:00 Swimming. After a few hours in the heat at tennis, I was more than happy to oblige my kids at the outdoor pool. Connor even went because Josey, a girl he likes from his tennis class, came along with us. Simon is still a little cautious around water. He doesn't like to get his head wet, but he is getting more confident in deeper water and is probably ready for some lessons. Emmy just had fun tagging along after Connor and Josey.

3:40-6:30 Movies. Connor and Josey suggested we go see Karate Kid after swimming and that is one I have been waiting anxiously to see. I have great memories of the first Karate Kid and the previews and early reviews of this one were sounding great. I thought Simon would be all over it because he's such an aggressive kid and loves fighting. I was wrong on that account. About half way into the movie, he said he wanted to go home because the movie was scary. I think the scenes where Dre was getting beat up by the Chinese bullies were a little too hard to watch for him. They were a little too hard for me, even. I actually got teary when Dre is crying and telling his mom that he hates their new home in China. Emmy and Connor laughed at me for letting it get to me. So I spent the last hour with Simon out in the hallway and in the arcade.

8:01-8:37 Yes, those times are pretty specific. I know exactly what minutes this activity started and ended on because I was timing myself running 3.1 miles in preparation for Saturday's 5K race before the Murray Fun Days parade. I met my sister-in-law Adri, sister-in-law Melissa and her boyfriend Nick down at the parkway to run. Emmy wanted to follow along on her bike. A funny thing happens when you run with someone. You feel pressure not to stop! There were several times on the run that I thought to myself, "if I was alone, I totally would be walking now". Adri said the same thing, so we are sticking together at the race on Saturday to help each other get through without stopping.

9:00-9:30 I rewarded myself for running with a long overdue Diet Dr. Pepper at Sonic with Emmy. I haven't had a soda in a few months now. I don't really crave it, but thought it was a better reward than say ... a Big Mac and fries. Emmy and I enjoyed a little time in the car together talking about our "Eclipse" girls night coming up.

So like I said, a full day of playing - but there are enough days of nothing but work that I feel good about it. My kids had a great day and that's all that matters.

Guest Post by Emmy

(Emmy's Denver Trip Report - kind of long but important details Emmy wants to remember)

Last week I went to Denver for my Clayton Productions tour. Before I went, I was really nervous because this was going to be my first trip without my mom. I just don't like being away from her. We were there for 4 days. We had to wake up at 3:30 a.m. so that we could do my make-up and hair (we were performing later that day) and be at the airport by 5:00. Surprisingly, Connor chose to come along which made me pretty happy.

Here I am with my friends, Hannah and Ashlyn. Ashlyn's mom was my chaperone. She is a flight attendant for Southwest, too, so she knew it was the captain's birthday and we sang to him at the airport when he walked by.


I took this picture for Simon because he loves planes, especially Southwest which he calls "so louds" because he thinks they are louder than other planes.


When we got to the Denver airport, we had to drive to our first hotel (Snow Mountain Resort) in Granby which was up in the mountains. It was supposed to be about a 2 hour drive but ended up being about 3 because of traffic and roadwork. Most people slept on the bus or took pictures of CTR's (Clayton Tour Romances). I was asked by a boy to be his CTR but I said no because I really like a boy at home.

Kim (our director)

Laurel, my dance teacher


Once we got to the hotel, we settled into our rooms and headed to our first performance at Estes Park (the stage was really slippery!). After our performance, we walked a couple of blocks down the street to get lunch. Even though I got up really early that morning, I was pretty hyper. We had another performance that night after dinner but it was kind of sad because NOBODY showed up for that performance. The only people there were our teachers and chaperones so it was more like a rehearsal. My teacher, Laurel, made it fun by telling us it was a competition between girls/boys. The girls won! We were seriously performing our hearts out and nobody was there. Kim (our director) asked us why we were so energetic when nobody was there and why couldn't we perform that way all the time. We told him it was because we didn't feel any pressure and no reason to be embarrassed.

After that, we were really tired so we headed back to the hotel. My friend Haley ran into a glass door. We laughed our heads off! There was a park by our hotel and everyone wanted to go there at night. But me and my roommates decided to go to the vending machines and have ourselves a big cup of sugar to stash under our beds.

The next morning, we loaded on the bus and went back into Denver for 2 performances. One was at a retirement center which was supposed to be at 12:00 but ended up being at 1:30. We were starved! Kim wanted us to shake all of the residents' hands. Most of them thanked us for performing for them. We headed for our 2nd hotel - Hotel VQ - which was right next to a big stadium. Our next performance was at an LDS church. A boy in my group almost fainted in the middle of our performance because he was so tired. He was laying down on the ground and having a hard time breathing. We felt so bad for him. He was fine after though. At that performance, the ward provided us some pizza and popsicles.

Back at the hotel, we had about an hour and a half to swim. I was pretty hyper there, too! That was the night that we had a girls night in my friend Lauren's room (her dad is the One Call That's All guy!). Her mom french braided my hair. We got to sleep at about midnight every night and wake up at 6:30 every morning. We were so dang tired!

One thing that was fun was every day, my mom had sent me a note to open in the morning to cheer me up with a treat. They were very special to me. The first one I opened on the plane and it said, "Princessella – Today is the beginning of your adventure. You will miss me (and I will miss you!) but I KNOW you will have so much fun that it will make up for it. Be brave and help others who might be a little sad without their moms, too. I will be thinking of you!". Thursday's note said "Millie Moo Cow! Have a fabulous Thursdsay. Today you will see new places and perform for new faces. Bring a smile to their day with your amazing talent. Hey – is that sunshine I see in your pocket???" Friday's note said "Amelia Rose – it’s Friday Fun Day! You get to go to Six Flags. SO jealous, little one. Have fun and be safe. Remember who you are and who loves you (me, Dad, Connor, Simon, Yoshi, Buddy….oh yeah – and Beamer)" and Saturday's said "Emmy – it’s Saturday – you come home today!!! I am so excited to see you at the airport at 4:55. Look for the skinny mom with teary eyes and a crazy 3 year old hanging onto her leg." Johnette, my chaperone, also gave us something every morning, too, like notebooks, funny teeth and crossword puzzles.


In the morning, we went up to the 14th floor to have breakfast. It was called the SkyBox and we could see all of Denver from there. We could see the 6 Flags park (Elitch Gardens) that we were going to perform at later and we were so scared because we saw all the big rides. That morning we went to the Butterfly Pavilion. The butterfly room was so cool because there were like butterflies flying all around. We weren't allowed to touch them because the oil from our skin could kill them. We were allowed to hold a tarantula named Rosie (I didn't!) and starfish (I did!). I bought the cutest starfish necklace there with my money.

Then we headed to Elitch Gardens. Before we could go on rides, we had to perform. It was very hot. Sadly, I stayed in my tights and leotard the whole day. I didn't want to change because their bathrooms were disgusting. I went on about 5 rides and then headed to the water park for the rest of the day to cool off. I don't really like big rides. We were there for about 7 hours. That night we had a special dinner up in the SkyBox again. We got to choose from spaghetti, cheeseburgers or taco salad. Our waitress was Russian and had the strongest accent. We could barely understand her. Our curfew that day was 10:30 but I didn't get to bed until 12:00. Everyone went swimming back at the hotel even though we just went swimming at the park.

The next morning (our last day), everybody headed to Kim's room for his Clayton traditional poem that he does on every tour. He writes a poem about how the tour has been going and everything that happened. Some of the things he included were "unless CTR's mean choose the right, drop it!", how Rafael and Whitney were a cute couple and how both of his daughters (my teacher and her sister) have been helping out so much (he started to cry then). He also talked about his son, Barrett, who is in the other group, and how he is so happy that his son is following in his footsteps. People started to cry and this is the point when Laurel and Vanessa talked about how the groups have improved. Laurel, of course, started to cry. I got tears in my eyes but I tried to blink them away. When I first started in Laurel's class, she was a bit harsh but now she is a big softie and cries a lot.

We had one more performance that day at the 16th Street Pavillions which seemed like a mall. During one of the serious songs, for some reason I did a silly walk back to my family pose and totally made Laurel laugh. She totally would have yelled at me for doing that earlier in the season. Our Russian waitress from the hotel came to that performance which was totally nice except she kept clapping off-beat to the music and messed us all up. That was our last performance of the season so we tried to make it the best. We got to explore the mall after that and do some shopping.

After that, we went straight to the airport. Since I was so happy that tour was almost over, I did the same silly walk that I did in my performance and made Laurel laugh again. I got a TCBY yogurt at the airport which is cool because my dad does design work for them and we don't have any in Utah yet. We finally got on the plane. I was giggly the whole time. When I got to the airport, I was kind of nervous that my parents would bring the boy I like to the airport because that is something they would totally do. But they didn't. I was so happy to be home!

Hair

Total random blog subject...

After hating the way my hair looked and felt over the last month or so, I finally realized that my Pureology (nectar of the hair gods) shampoo and conditioner I had been using was actually conditioner and conditioner! That means I haven't really washed my hair for a month and been double conditioning almost every day!

What a weekend!

This weekend I...

...said goodbye to my sister Erin as she and Brett packed up their home of 11 years in Bountiful. They are in the process of moving their family of 7 to La Canada, California (L.A. basically) where Brett is working for BeachBody. I will miss Erin sooo much, specifically her big family dinners, her kids, her sweet dog Rudy, her willingness to host family parties, going to the occasional late night movie, her spunk and musicality, her appreciation of my husband's sense of humor, her creativity and general love of life! Luckily she is a devoted blogger (read her blog here) and I think I might just keep in better touch with her far away than when she actually lived here. Sadly to say, I could go months without seeing her when she lived a short 20 minutes down the freeway. The plan is to stay with them on our next trip to Disneyland which isn't in the works YET but just as soon as we can do it, we will be there. And I'm sure she will be back here from time to time since her oldest son Spencer is starting at BYU in the fall.

...anxiously awaited the return of my baby girl from her Clayton Productions tour in Denver at 4:55 Saturday. We sent her off bright (actually dark) and early Wednesday morning at 5:00 a.m. at the airport with about 30 other kids and parent chaperones. Connor was so sweet to get up at 4:30 on his own and join Emmy and I on the drive to the airport. He had only been asleep for a couple of hours so I was amazed he could actually get up. Poor Emmy had been so nervous about her first time traveling without a parent that she could barely sleep the night before and says she cried herself to sleep. But she made it through the trip okay and actually had a pretty good time considering the grueling schedule they were on (2-3 performances a day 4 days in a row). I'm going to have her do a guest post with pictures in the next few days.

...sent Connor off to Youth Conference. The theme was "Be of Good Courage...Be a Good Friend" based on the scripture in Joshua 1:9 that says "Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest." I love love love this scripture/theme. This was a 2 day activity/camp for the church youth ages 14-18. They started off Saturday morning with a breakfast and then a service project downtown of doing yardwork at some elderly apartments (the tenants, not the apartments themselves :) Then they headed up to the mountains for a night of camping and fun activities. I can't get any details out of Connor other than he ate well and wasn't cold at night. That's Connor for you. Hopefully I can get him to do a guest blog, too, but don't hold your breath.

...had a picnic dinner on the lawn of the golf course out at the airport with Simon and Zach watching the airplanes come in. The last time we hung out at the end of the runway like we have many times, one of the pilots must have not liked us snapping pictures as they landed over our heads and told security on us. So we kept our distance this time and watched from the golf course.

...got up super early Saturday morning and mowed the lawn with Zach. Simon followed along with his Little Tykes lawnmower. It was the perfect weather for yard work, sunny and still relatively cool in the morning. I stayed out for a few hours afterwards and tried to make a dent in the weeding. I wish I could spend a little time planting and not just weeding but that's not in the cards right now.

...saw Toy Story 3 with Zach, Emmy and Simon. We pretty much picked Emmy up from the airport at 5:00, rushed to the theater, ordered dinner and went straight to the theater. I thought she might be too tired but she was game for it and we had a great time. I had the most delicious Mediterranean crepe for dinner with mozzarella, roasted red peppers, prosciutto and spinach. Simon is just discovering Toy Story movies and he sat through the entire thing without budging except for one run to the bathroom. I thought the show was a little intense at one point and sure enough there were a few wails from kids in the audience. The ending was so touching that I teared up a little and Emmy shared with me later that she did, too. Now we need to catch "The Karate Kid" this week which Zach says he is happy to miss out on.

Welcome Baby Girl!

My little brother Thomas and his girlfriend Katie just welcomed their daughter, Leokadia, to the world a few days ago. She was 8 lbs. 14 oz. and the birth was a breeze for this lucky first time mom. They live in Philadelphia near Katie's family so chances are I won't get to see her anytime soon, but I'm hoping! It's so strange to have a new niece so far away.

This picture is from the hospital photographer. I'm so impressed with the quality of it compared to the terrible ones I've always gotten in the hospital of my kids. Apparently the photographer goes into the room and does a quick semi-professional photo session with some really artful shots, then uploads them to their website for the parents, family and friends to buy if they wish. I love that system!

Going green

How I used to get Simon to sleep...



How I get him to sleep now...

How to speak "Simon"

Simon has a unique way of pronouncing certain words and I've kept a running list on my phone as each new word pops up. I finally have a list long enough to blog:

Swede bumps (speed bumps) as opposed to German bumps
Nacho eBay (Nacho Libre)
Papa lapes (Frosted Flakes or chocolate grapes, they sound the same)
Ahlike a budder...white (we have no idea what this means)
Odieu? (pronounced like adieu only with an "o" - translation is hold you)
Kapeller (propeller)
Skellybones (skeleton)
Skellycope (telescope)
Kabloon (balloon)
Kazzert (dessert)

He can tell that we get a kick out of his pronunciations, so he makes up complete nonsense words to get more laughter. Some of our favorites are: 
Collywench
Sapopeen
Keenowad 

Activity Days - Ice Blocking

We took the Activity Days girls ice blocking at Murray Park (at their request). I was so nervous someone was going to get hurt. The one and only time I've been ice blocking was as a kid at Sugarhouse Park with my cousins and I came away with stitches where my eye hit the corner of a sharp ice block. Apparently someone in our ward knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who died at a church ice blocking activity. So I made sure we had all the permission forms from parents and said a prayer before we left. Good news - no one got hurt. More good news - it was a great activity and everyone had fun. I think I need to relax a bit.

Emmy's braves the Flowrider!

We went back to Flowrider in Ogden last weekend to let Emmy have a chance to try it. The last time we went, Connor was the only one who got to do it, but Emmy liked the looks of it and decided she would work up the courage the next time we went. She loved it, but was SO sore for days afterwards. They both now want to have their birthday parties there. Simon is obviously too young to do it, so I took him back to the hotel pool for a swim while the older kids had the real fun.

Memorial Day Mischief

Memorial Day for some people means Disneyland, or boating, or a trip to the cabin. None of those are in the cards for us this year, but we weren't about to sit around doing nothing. Zach and I brainstormed for some unique places to go and came up with the following...

We started out by having lunch at Moochies Meatballs in downtown SLC. It's this little house that has been turned into a sandwich shop and pottery store. It has been featured on The Food Channel and has gotten rave reviews from local critics. I always worry when Zach takes us to places like this because we have 3 picky eaters, but they each found something they liked. I had an awesome philly cheese steak.

From there, we headed to the Gilgal Sculpture Gardens. This is an interesting little place located at 749 South 500 East. Zach remembers sneaking into it at night as a teenager with dates. Now it is an official park and isn't hard to sneak into since it's open to the public, but it's a bit strange nonetheless. The sphinx sculpture with the head of Joseph Smith is a bit creepy. My kids got a kick out it. For Mormons, there is a lot of symbolism that you will recognize.









Next on the list was the International Peace Gardens. If you don't mind the seedy area of town, it's fun to see...once. I remember going there as a kid and I thought it was awesome. Now it's a bit run down. It's supposed to have representation by lots of countries, but some countries, like England, didn't find it worth their time. Others went all out. Switzerland was the best with a miniature Matterhorn and swiss village. Japan's garden was pretty good, too.

School's OUT!

Let me take a deep breath. Because I think I have been holding it for the last month as I watched my kids' grades take a bit of a nose dive. Call it spring fever or what have you, but I was not going to let it happen! It took some communication with lots of teachers to get it all figured out, but Connor and Emmy pulled their grades up JUST in time for school to get out. Whew! I love summer MOST for the fact that I don't have to worry about grades.

Emmy's 5th grade teachers started a cute end-of-year tradition. They called it Camp EggDowSea (the 3 teachers' names combined). The kids brought camping gear and camp food, and spent the whole day out on the field reading in tents, sneaking into eachothers' tents, eating, etc. Emmy took a camera and snapped a lot of great pictures, but Connor has that same camera at EFY this week so I can't show you :(

Emmy's Field Day ended with its traditional Fireman's Squirt. Simon and I went over to observe, and Simon ended up getting drenched on the playground that we THOUGHT was far enough out of the way, but wasn't.

This is Emmy's "boyfriend", Beamer Wilcken. He is the 5th grade heart throb and is liked by many girls but he asked Emmy to be his girlfriend. They hardly ever talk, or make eye contact for that matter, but it is common knowledge that these two are an item. We have so much fun teasing her about him.

Emmy and cousin Mikayla.


Connor finished 10th grade without as much festivity other than a friend coming over to game the rest of the day away in our basement. The week prior to school getting out, though, Murray High put on it's annual Art Fest where all the different clubs represent themselves out in the courtyard with a big party - i.e. languages, workworking, music groups, etc. It was the coolest thing! Murray High has definitely come a long way since Zach and I were there. The students get the day off, there's food from the different clubs (Connor's Japanese class had a booth), and it's just a really fun atmosphere. Connor performed with the percussion ensemble so Simon and I went over to watch.

Some things I've learned from my trainer

My mother's day present from my sweet hubby was 10 sessions with a trainer/nutritionist at the gym. Aw, what a great guy. Actually, I told him that's what my present is, and he said OK. I'm about half-way through and think it is the best money I have ever spent. My trainer's name is Heather. When she's not training others, she competes in swimsuit competitions for fun. Kind of makes you want to hate her, except that her life isn't so put together in a lot of other areas, so I don't. But I do get to spent 1 hour a week with her talking about everything under the sun while I'm trying all sorts of new workouts I never would have thought of, like going up and down the gym stairs with a weighted bar on my shoulders, or throwing a 10 lb. weighted basketball up high on the gym wall and then lunging down when I catch it. So when I have the breath and strength to talk, we talk, mostly about nutrition.

1. Food is fuel, not fun. I actually came up with that little slogan. It reminds me of the line in Finding Nemo when the shark says "Fish are friends, not food." I've had to totally change my attitude about food. Not everything I take into my body has to be delicious. A lot of good foods don't taste all that great (like eggs and fish for me), but they are such great sources of protein that I've just got to find a way to get over my dislike and know that they are serving the greater purpose - strengthening my body and helping to lose weight. About once a week, I allow myself a cheat meal (not cheat DAY) and eat whatever I want. And I have never gained back a pound doing that.

2. Never skip a meal. Your body needs a constant source of fuel to keep your metabolism high, especially if you are working out. In fact, never skip a snack (except no snacking after dinner). When I hand over my food journal for the week to her, that's the first thing she notices and highlights. Highlights are bad. The less pink highlights means I've done a good job and probably lost more weight (we're up to 20 lbs. here people!!!). My snacks consist of pretty much the same 4 things: yogurt (Activia is the lowest in sugar that I've found with the exception of plain yogurt which I just can't do), raw almonds which are a great source of protein (not roasted - they lose the benefits that raw almonds have), fruit or veggies, and string cheese. When it comes to cheese, always choose white over yellow.

3. I've found that I don't NEED that morning glass of orange juice like I always thought I did. My orange juice was other peoples' coffee. But there is so much added sugar in most orange juices that it's just like drinking regular non-diet soda. So instead, I have a half grapefruit and a glass of water instead. That's huge for me!

4. Try to eliminate carbs from your evening meal if at all possible. If you're going to eat carbs, the earlier in the day, the better. Heather's rule is actually no carbs on the days you don't work out, carbs on the days you do. It's pretty extreme, but while I'm in weight loss mode, I'm sticking to it.

5. Stretch before working out, not necessarily after. Stretching before better prepares your muscles for change and prevents risk of injury.

6. When shopping at the grocery store, stick to the outer edges (produce, meat) as much as possible. Stay away from the inner aisles where most of the processed foods are.

7. Some of the obvious items - whole grain breads and pasta only, no soda, skim milk only, fist size servings, tons of water, vitamins a must, less eating out (SOOO hard for me), dressing on the side and dip salad in vs. pouring it on.

8. Read "Eat This Not That". What an eye opener! If you miss Chili's Awesome Blossom, you can blame this book for highlighting it as one of America's Worst Foods. Chili's took it off the menu shortly after it got the bad press.