Life Via Quotes to My Missionary

 I grew up in a home where being funny was valued as a desirable trait.   I tried really hard to be funny when I was young, but at some point had to admit that quick wit that requires the ability to think on your feet is completely and totally beyond the scope of how my brain works.   Self-deprecatory sarcasm is usually about where my humor efforts land these days--like "Oh, yeah.  I can totally win a karaoke contest.  Just sign me up and I'm there."  It's total hogwash, but relies on the other person knowing I'm a terrible singer to even be slightly funny.   And because there isn't actually any wit involved, it's not actually funny at all.  And some people might actually believe me and think I'm just a really confident singer and if I'm not careful I'll be asked to be the primary music leader or something.

  But, I digress.       

Recently I came across a few of my old blogposts and was reminded of the fact that  I'm not quite as unfunny in writing as I am in person.   Don't get me wrong.   I fully know that 99.3% of the posts on this blog are about as boring as the footnotes of a textbook on ferns, but, I do have written evidence that I have  occasionally posted mildly funny content.    

Here are a couple that made me laugh... (10 commandments of a teenage boy,  princesses don't toot, three versions of how to pack, helpful advice) 

But, I still claim no real wittiness, even in writing.    Really, it's all about the kids.   Kids make life funny and the only kids left in my life are living 2000+ miles away from me, therefore I continue on blogging like an out of work botanist.  Not that I'm calling all botanists boring, but maybe some.       

So, you all know my style well enough to know that I'm not really into writing long essays on any topic, so I must be  leading this blogpost to be about something from our lives and you're right.   Today you get the privilege of reading about our lives via some direct quotes from a recent letter I sent  to my sweet missionary. I didn't really start off trying to be funny, but I do admit to feeling slightly off-kilter that night.   Long Sundays will do that to me! Vote in the comments if you have a favorite quote and whether you think I should always blog in an off-kilter state of mind or if I should stick with   blogging only when I’m well rested and feeling sedate (which would be never). 

      
QUOTE 1: 
" I am writing this letter to you today under the influence of not eating since breakfast, spending 13 hours at church (a typical Sunday of late), then stuffing myself silly at 8pm with a lunchmeat sandwich and previously frozen brownies.

DINNER OF CHAMPIONS!!!!! 💣

Do you want me to send you the recipe? Of course you do. It was fantastic and you'll probably want to make it every day.

INGREDIENTS:
lunchmeat
cheese
mayo
sauerkraut
bread (if you're me then make it gluten free)

brownies, broken into bite size pieces (frozen for at least 3 weeks)

DIRECTIONS:
Slather it all together (brownie bites intermingled with sandwich bites) and eat within 2 minutes 37 seconds.
ENJOY!


Next time I make it, I'll take a picture, so you can see how it all comes together." 


QUOTE 2:   
Oh look at that! We had a ward party on Tuesday night. 


There are cute guys in this picture that I would totally set you and Hermana B. up with....just say the word in 7ish months or so...


Sorry...that's the lack of sleep talking....you can forget I even said anything.

You'll never guess what I was in charge of for the party.

I'll give you three guesses....

1. teaching everyone the macarena?

NO!

2. bull fighting?

Good guess, but no.

3. karaoke leader?

Heaven help us all....that would be a big fat NO to the heck no!


I guess I'll just tell you and you can stop wondering.

I was in charge of making gluten free versions of all the Thanksgiving food.

Shocker, I know.

I made rolls using an expensive mix that were meh. Totally not worth what I paid for the ingredients....


But the apple pie...

It may look hideously hideous, but the taste was perfecto! 😋 Go ahead and lick the screen now. "


QUOTE 3: 
"CAN YOU GUESS WHAT THIS PICTURE IS?

It's the tea set we got Emma for her birthday. She decided that she wanted to keep working on her Britishness, so she's brushing up on her British accent and is holding a daily tea party for the entire YSA branch. 5am every day. For Christmas I'm sending her scones and clotted cream. 

 {Note:  This was meant to be the aforementioned sarcastic humor of which is my specialty, but then my own son asked if this were a true statement, thereby confirming the fact that my humor is actually rather humorless.} 

Speaking of your sister....here she is with her friends at the Boston Temple...probably pretending to be British if I had to guess. I hear she asked for the British translation of her temple session..."



QUOTE 4: Adam, on the other hand, is working on his peanut butter game. He got invited to a peanut butter party and sampled one of everything...Can you guess what he and {his girlfriend} made? HINT: It was my recipe and they borrowed my pie pan for the occasion. 



QUOTE 5: Oh, I have some life advice to give you now. Very serious life advice, which you should probably write in your journal and tell ALL of your friends. Whatever you do, DO NOT GO TO TRADER JOES ON AN EMPTY STOMACH!!!!! It's a problem. Perhaps not the worst problem ever, but a problem nonetheless. 




QUOTE 6:  "The other night, I brought Nutella uncrustables to our friend, J., for her 20th birthday. Lest you think me the randomest birthday treat giver ever, I'll remind you that J. is the one whose Mom grew up in Minnesota and her family now lives in Cami's ward, so I had sent a little text to her Mom and got her suggestions. She was actually quite excited!" 


QUOTE 7: We also went to the temple this week and had an awesome turn-out. Notice who's NOT in this picture? YOUR PADRE!!! Why didn't he come to this beautiful night at the temple? Was he too busy at work? Yes, but he was going to come anyway. Did he bruise his tailbone wrestling with Kiwi? Good guess, but NO! He was all ready to walk out the door and realized that he'd let his temple recommend expire. So Bishop G. didn't come to the temple because his recommend was expired. oops.

Okay, back to cute guys. I would give you and Hermana B the thumbs' up on any guy in this picture. CUTE AND RIGHTEOUS GUYS THAT LIKE TO GO TO THE TEMPLE! What could be better than that?! Absolutely nothing, but there I go again."

QUOTE 8: I'll close off with one more picture of a few of our ward members....


Can you tell this is kind of our lives right now? We had church activities Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday.   This was taken at institute on Thursday night. If you weren't in the habit of going to institute before your mission, I highly recommend it when you get home. It's a night to be spiritually and physically fed AND you get to hang out with friends. It is awesome. And lots of cute guys."  

THE CONCLUSION:  

This blog would probably be a lot more entertaining if I blogged only after spending 13 hours at church and after gobbling down  food for dinner with minimal nutritive value.   Though, perhaps it's best for the people who love me, if I keep things more sedate.   

Also...my poor missionary!  I felt kind of bad the next day after talking about guys so many times.  That is not normal for me.  But at least I wrote a letter, so I'll pat myself on the back for that.     

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!    

The Bad, The Good, The Funny, and the Tender Mercies

I'm slowly making my way through writing up about our amazing trip, but it's slow going and I didn't want to forget any of the details of our Thanksgiving Week, so I thought I'd do a little recap here before diving into our travel posts.  

THE BAD:

1. Our car totally went kaput driving 70mph down the freeway while driving my brother, Matt, to the airport.  I was barely able to maneuver off the freeway to a parking lot, where my brother had to Uber the rest of the way and I had to call someone to rescue me.  (see below for more details)

2.  I got a full-blown stomach bug on Thanksgiving Day and spent the entire day in bed with zero appetite and feeling miserable.

3.  They fixed our car for a somewhat reasonable amount, told us it was ready to pick up, then called us back a while later, and said, "never mind, it's still being weird."   We still haven't heard the new verdict.

THE GOOD: 

1.  My sister, Kristina, and her family (husband and 5 kids), plus my brothers, Nate and Matt,  came to visit.  They came to town for the BYU-OU football game (a game my Dad would have LOVED) and Kristina and Nate stayed for Thanksgiving.  

2.  Ellie and Emma came home from Rexburg and Provo, and Cami and Lucie flew in from Alabama for Thanksgiving, so  we had everyone home but Adam (still on his mission) and Garrett (who was working crazy shifts at the hospital and couldn't get off). 

3.  We had a lot of fun baking and just hanging out together.   We also visited the Orem Temple open house, went to Luminaria at Thanksgiving Point, and got several inches of snow. 

4.  My nephews, Manuel and Isaiah, got baptized while they were here.   They are a year apart in age, but the older one was pretty nervous and wanted to wait for his brother to do it at the same time.    

5. No one else (except Lucie and me) got the stomach bug and thankfully it was only a one-day thing. 

6.  Lucie stayed behind when Cami flew home and I get a bonus week of Gigi time!  

THE FUNNY: 

My nephews' baptism was definitely the most entertaining and memorable baptism I'd ever been to in my entire life.  They were both a bit nervous about getting baptized and that nervousness translated into extreme silliness.  There was potty humor, there was giggling, they screamed as they went underwater, one of them screamed, "I'm blind, I'm blind," as he came up out of the water, and the other kicked his dad in his sensitive parts because he'd been instructed by an older sibling that he may as well, because he'd be forgiven for it anyway.   It was definitely irreverent, but knowing their background of trauma (they were adopted out of the foster care system a few years ago), it was honestly beautiful to see them overcome their fears and embrace it in the best way they knew how.  

THE TENDER MERCIES: 

As inconvenient as it was for the car to break down during a busy holiday week when I had a million places to be, there were so many tender mercies and little miracles that happened with it, that I need to capture them here, so I don't forget. 

Tender Mercy #1. It was me driving it in a populated area, not Glen in the middle of nowhere on his way to Saint George.  He drives that car to Saint George 95% of the time and I only requested it because of Lucie coming to town.  

Tender Mercy #2. I had 3 separate trips to make to SLC that day and the car broke down on the trip when there would be  the fewest people on the road (at 5:30am).  

Tender Mercy #3. It all went down (power steering stopped working and car started losing power) right at an exit, so I was able to maneuver off the freeway quickly and safely. 

Tender Mercy #4.  Our AAA membership is all up to date, so they were able to come tow the car to our mechanic with little stress. 

Tender Mercy #5.  This car literally has 230,000 miles on it and has had very few problems, so honestly it's a tender mercy it's lasted as long as it has.  We clearly need a new car soon, but we  are hoping to get it running again and working well enough to hand off to Adam when he gets back from his mission. 

Who's the biggest nerd you know?

I just sent Happy Fall/We Moved cards to everyone on our Christmas list...

including this goofy picture. 

  

Why did I do it?  Because, with three moves in 2 years' time,  I was actually worried that way too many of our Christmas cards would be lost forever in the mail system and as you all know....Christmas cards are one of my favorite parts of the season!   I think about them months in advance and enjoy every part of creating them, writing them, addressing them, and then get absolutely giddy when I send them off every year.   And then get even more excited when our mailbox starts filling up.   

Plus I hoped they would make people smile.  😆    

And that's not even the end of it!    I'm such a nerd that I totally volunteer to help family members with their Christmas letters and cards every year too, because I don't want anyone I love to be deprived of the joy of sending out cards too.  You want help?   Call me and I'll be thrilled to help you too!     

So, now that you know all that....do I win the nerdiest nerd you know contest?   😜

The Most Boring Letter in the Universe {Written to our Missionary}

9/26/21

Hola Girlie Girl {aka my favorite missionary in the universe}!

How's life? Guess what?! I'm actually starting this email before 9pm, which means that you can be prepared for the most amazing, profound, awesomely awesome email ever. Or perhaps just the normal random boringness.

😀😁😂😃😄😌😒😑😐😏😛😝😞😠😘

Keep reading and I guess you'll find out which one wins.

So, I taught the RS lesson today. It was fine. It wasn't the most amazing lesson I've ever taught and it wasn't the worst. We were discussing Elder Christofferson's, "Why the Covenant Path," and I was pleased that we did get a good discussion going. I appreciate lessons with good discussions, so that was a positive. Also, no one threw tomatoes at me, so that was also a plus.

The two main concepts I wanted to emphasize in my lesson were:
1. Following the covenant path is a personal journey that has to do with our relationship with Christ. We can't force others to follow or accompany us on the covenant path
2. Perfection is not only not necessary, but can be a hindrance to our following the covenant path. Remember ME + CHRIST = MORE (not ME + MORE = ANYTHING). We can never be enough MORE, without Christ.

“Brothers and sisters, every one of us aspires to a more Christlike life than we often succeed in living. If we admit that honestly and are trying to improve, we are not hypocrites; we are human. May we refuse to let our own mortal follies, and the inevitable shortcomings of even the best men and women around us, make us cynical about the truths of the gospel, the truthfulness of the Church, our hope for our future, or the possibility of godliness. If we persevere, then somewhere in eternity our refinement will be finished and complete—which is the New Testament meaning of perfection.” Jeffrey R. Holland

Ellie also taught today. She taught her YW class about the keys of the priesthood. There was a big miscommunication about who was supposed to teach, so one leader {who was out of town} asked Ellie to teach and another leader, unbeknownst to the first leader, asked another girl to teach. Thankfully "other" girl flaked out and the "other" leader {who was in town} was pleasantly surprised that Ellie had a lesson prepared. I hear it was the most amazing lesson ever taught.

So, are you feeling ready for General Conference this week? Adam is having a bunch of friends over to watch in our theater room. Apparently good food is expected too. Next conference, you can invite a bunch of friends over too. Don't worry though, we'll only let dad run the skunk machine and tell embarrassing dad jokes between sessions. 😆

WOOHOO!!!! We are getting super excited that it's not seeming all that far away that you'll be here for us to hug and kiss and embarrass you every chance we can get. I am planning on wearing a sequined dinosaur ballet outfit when we pick you up from your mission. Probably right from the mission home, right? I'll be brushing up on my opera singing too.

What else is going on here in Alpine? My dad's surgery on his bladder has been canceled due to COVID--not that any of us have COVID, but that the hospital is canceling all non-urgent surgeries because there are too many COVID cases. Apparently my Dad's bladder issues are considered unimportant {although my mom would beg to differ} and he gets to suffer with bladder drama for an additional couple months...at least. Also, I forgot if I mentioned it, but his lymphoma diagnosis was as good as it could be, in that it's considered slow-moving and not aggressive. So basically, if you're going to get lymphoma, it's the type to get.

Your dad is having his colonoscopy on Wednesday. He's about as excited about his as I was about mine. yay

Okay, okay. Are you sleeping yet? I guess I need to step up my game here in the pre-9:00 email department (despite the fact that it's now 10:00pm exactly) and get some amazing profundity spewing out of the internet your way.

Raspberries grow in our backyard. They're freaking amazing and I love them almost as much as being done with colonoscopies for the next 10 years.



Here is a random picture of your brother, sister, and dog-sister. They miss you.




Your Uncle Nate came to visit for 2 weeks and I was shocked to discover that he's still taller than me. He's also still 13 months younger than me. What's he up to these days? He's living in an income tax free state (Tennessee) and is eagerly planning a trip to country #76. $100 billion if you can guess where he wants to go next? {Hint: He doesn't like when siblings beat him to countries}



It's your sister and her hubby bubby. They're cute and I can't wait to meet their cute baby. You're cute too and will have cute babies, but I can wait to meet them until you're home from your mission and married.




I broke a blood vessel in my eye (how? I have no earthly idea) and I look like a freakazoid. It looks bad but apparently it's no big deal at all {according to Doctor Google and Doctor Cami}. Thankfully it doesn't hurt a bit, though I do make small children and sensitive adults cry.


I decorated for Halloween and I think it looks amazing.



 There used to be another pine cone here, but Kiwi ate it. Literally.



This meme made me giggle. hard. And I don't even like cats.



Hmmmm...here's a random picture from the photo roll. Don't know her name or anything about her (so she could be a nun from Nebraska for all I know)....but she's cute and chilling with Adam long enough to take a picture with him, so here you go....


We went on an awesome hike on Saturday. It was in Kaysville/Layton and it was absolutely lovely. The leaves were just starting to turn and it was just the kind of challenge level I like--hard, but not knock-your-socks-off-hard. It was called Adam's Falls and we didn't see Adam the entire time, nor did we hear of any random falls he had, so that was kind of a bust.





We sang, "There is Sunshine in My Soul," today in sacrament meeting and we all sang it at the top of our lungs...opera style. It was amazing. And AnnaLisa heard us from my parents' house and started crying. She threatened to disown us and to spike all our cookies with gluten forevermore, but we set her up on a date with David Archuleta and all is forgiven.



I am 1000% enraptured by the view coming down from our Horsetail Falls hike. We hike up to the trailhead from our house (exactly 2 miles). It's all uphill on the way there and all downhill on the way home. In a few months, you can join us for it, though the wildflowers will likely be covered with 12 feet of snow by then!

Alright....I guess this email wasn't that great.



Sorry for being super boring again. Maybe next time I'll try and throw in a few more interesting tidbits.

In the meantime,

WE FREAKING LOVE YOUR GUTS!!!!!!


Have an awesome week!
Love,
Your very boring mother

January Shenanigans

  I was feeling overwhelmed by getting caught up here on the blog and remembered that I write a weekly email to my missionary each week that does a nice job of summing up what we've been up to lately.  Mostly the letters are pretty boring, but sometimes they're a little silly.   This letter from January 24th falls on the silly end of the spectrum.  Here's a glimpse of our life...

*******************************

Hola Hermana!
I'm attempting to get off to an earlier start than usual writing my letter to you. Partially because I'm really tired and would likely write you a nonsensical diatribe filled with useless tidbits about the square root of pi ( because I hang out with Adam) if I wrote to you at my normal time. Or I would fall asleep writing it and it would say something like:
"This week was ajfjkjfjjjjjzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" phhonahgenn
and you'd be left wondering all day if our week was good, bad, or full of crazy shenanigans.

Don't worry, it wasn't any of those.

So here I am, attempting to be coherent. Plus dad's on a ward council zoom call right now (yes, it's 10pm) and I can't go in the bedroom, so here's me being all productive in the living room instead of wasting my time getting ready for bed and all that kind of useless jazz.

This week was.....

normal.

It wasn't exceptionally good or bad, and shenanigans were all on the minor side of things.

Here's a glimpse:

The good:
There were no broken bones, the food was exceptional, Rocky stopped eating his own poop (because we now watch him like a hawk every time he goes in the backyard and run out in our barefeet to chase him away if he so much as gets within a yard of his poop), I got rid of some crap sitting around the garage, and we got 3 more Christmas cards in the mail.

The bad:
Adam cut his foot on a tape gun.

 Ellie sliced her leg open with the car door. I ate wayyyyyyy too much of that exceptional food. I'm pretty sure that Rocky isn't actually a puggle, but perhaps a puggunk (part pug, part skunk).

Things I accomplished:
I sewed a boatload of masks and helped Ellie earn over $200 for her HEFY fund. Never mind that I've spent about $500 on fabric and have a long ways to go before we ever break a profit; it's just the project we needed to help us stay engaged and creatively motivated. Plus I'm pretty sure all the fabric store employees are starting to recognize me now (even though I try to vary the mask I wear each time), so don't be surprised if I get nominated Joann's favorite customer of the month soon. I'm pretty sure that's a thing. And I'll be so flattered, I'll probably buy another $200 of fabric.

Things we ate:
burgers with guacamole, grilled cheese and cauliflower soup, garlic chicken pasta with sundried tomatoes (over zucchini noodles), tomatillo chicken chili, hearty chicken pesto pizza, chicken and cheese enchiladas with roasted tomatillo sauce, and the best dang green beans I've ever eaten (thank you, Ellie)

Random news of the day:
I think we may be going to Florida this weekend. This is a development as of today, because we're just that random and just that spontaneous....and tickets are super cheap and Kristina's family is going to be there too.


Some shenanigans:
We went on a 5-1/2 mile hike in the 28-degree weather. It was a lovely hike, but very cold. Adam talked about the square root of 2. Ellie had a good math day, then hated it again the next. We also played Clue and I lost. I sent some super random postcards...

See I told you our shenanigans were on the minor side of things.

News from home:
Did you hear? M.K. is starting her mission and has been reassigned to Temple Square? Oh, and last night I had a dream about N.Z. driving me in a car while he sat in the passenger seat... I'm pretty sure there's some good hidden meaning in there about you marrying him someday, but it also could have just been a random flashback nightmare about teaching all you kids to learn to drive. I don't know....you're the missionary...you decide the meaning.


Pop culture trend of the week that you may or may not have missed:
Someone snapped a picture of Bernie Sanders at Biden's inauguration that has gone viral in a hilarious way. It's him all bundled up in his very casual winter clothes, with a pair of amazing mittens on, and looking somewhat ill impressed. People are taking that image and photoshopping into famous paintings, scenes from movies, and just in general making it hilarious. It honestly was a bright spot in my week. I'll attach a few for you to enjoy.


Well, it's a good hour before I normally send off my weekly epistle to you, but I'm running out of things to tell you. And I'm afraid that my writing will quickly devolve into musings on the advantages of sleeping without socks on or about how Spence wants an air fryer and a cookbook for his birthday. Or I'll just... aahklhklhlkjlkjlkzjklzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Or I'll just sign off and say I love you (all) like crazy! Have an amazing week!
Love,
Mom

Bear vs. Bare

We went on a hike around Burke Lake on Saturday morning and came across this sign....

We didn't know if we should be more nervous about the purported bears 🐻 or the other side of the sign....🙈

We went 7 miles and you'll be relieved to know that we didn't see any bears or naked people, so I guess you could call our hike a success.

Is this a round of Telestrations? Or the best doggone letter you've ever received?

Letter to Cami, dated 9/24/16:
***********************************************

Dear Soeur G.,

Well, you'll be happy to know that despite the subject line of this email, this email has absolutely nothing to do with us playing Telestrations.

First off, I just wanted to give you a very sincere and dire warning not to attempt to pop any wheelies while on your mission. This guy was going 65mph on 495 like this....with a semi truck right behind him. We all agreed that he was being rather STUPID and needs to learn the gospel ASAP. I should have rolled down my window and gotten his contact information to send to the missionaries, but, alas, I'm pretty sure I saw his brain slip out the back of his helmet when we passed him.

Where were we going on 495, you ask? Don't guess. I'll just tell you. We were on our way to FedEx Field in Maryland to watch BYU play WVU in foosball.

Ellie and I just went to look cute, eat junk food, and dance wildly whenever music came on...


But dad and the boys were actually there to cheer the Cougars on, which is why they're wearing white and we're wearing gray....


Actually, you know us both pretty well, and I'm pretty sure you won't be surprised to hear that I yelled way louder than dad ever did. And I've got the hoarse voice to prove it if he tries to disagree.

Dad did get this random lucky butterfly to land on him though. It actually landed on Ellie first, then dad, which means they're both cooler than me, but we already knew that, so, you know, just keep reading.

Alas, it did not prove to be as lucky a butterfly as it bragged to be and we lost in another super close game (32-35).

We did have fun being there with half the LDS population of the DC area and it was a waaaaaaaaaaaay better than last year's fiasco in Michigan. And you'll be very happy to know that we had to drive down **** ***** Drive (names hidden to protect the innocent) to get to FedEx Field. I thought you'd have enjoyed being there with us and maybe taken it as a sign that you need to name your first child "Momo" or something.

So, what do you think?

I started this letter with warning you not to pop a wheelies, suggested that the guy needed a referral to the missionaries, went to the subject of football, dancing wildly, yelling louder than dad, lucky butterflies, and ended with a suggestion for your firstborn child.

Wouldn't that have made for a good round of Telestrations?

"NOOOOOOOOOOO, NOT YET," your mother exclaims loudly!

You, Cami Rose, need to know that YOUR MOM STILL HAS HER MOVES!!!! Check out (ignoring how disproportionally humongous my leg looks in this picture) how I can totally still kick Spence smack in the face....if I wanted to.

And with that uplifting bit of information (haha, I UPLIFTED my leg in a kick, making this picture UPLIFTING), this awesome letter must now come to an end, for I worry about overwhelming you with so much random amazingness in one sitting.

Tu es belle - à l'intérieur et à l'extérieur! Votre maman est tout à fait sérieux tout le temps et ne penserait jamais à écrire une lettre à vous tandis que dans l'une de ses humeurs stupides.

I LOVE YOU! JE T'AIME! Câlins et bisous!

Love,
Votre mère très grave