State of Obvious

I'm going to wax philosophical. If you don't like that kind of thing or you're only here for pictures of the cute kids and fluff, you can stop reading now. It's not like I'll know. Let's just say, for the sake of argument, that I have a strong dislike for someone. I'm not saying who, I'm not even saying I do, I'm just speculating here. I wonder if Jesus doesn't get along with some people. I wonder if sometimes so-and-so rubs Him the wrong way, I wonder if their annoying habits irritate Him to no end, or if it bothers Him that they are manipulative, controlling, loud mouths? I wonder if He let's his dislike control His behavior toward said person. I wonder if He just says "Oh well, I don't have to get along with so-and-so to love them." Somehow I think the answer is no. And I wonder how I can be like Him if I harbor those kind of thoughts and feelings. You know, for purposes of the illustration and all.

1. Today is Fun Friday. It's been fun. No really. We went to a hobby toy store and bought stuff we don't need. THEN we went to Chuck E Cheese, ate really bad greasy pizza and spent 60$ worth of tokens on tickets that we traded in for 5$ worth of plastic toys guaranteed to break in the next day or so. Josh somehow scored a 31$ pirate ship, something to do with his big brown eyes and his father's large soft spot for said eyes. Carly doesn't know if she should be afraid of Mr Cheese or embrace him. Witness: As Mr Cheese walking over casually, looking cool (for a mouse) Carly attempts to meld her body into our legs and vanish. She then begins to scream "No no no no!" When Mr Cheese arrives she says "I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I love you!" all while shaking and smiling in that sort of "OH MY GOSH I HOPE MY EYES DON'T FLY OUT OF THEIR SOCKETS!" kind of way. Then, after exchanging high fives, Mr Cheese s...

I have 8 followers! {flex} And! Mary's back !

I had a Dr. Pepper. And it was good . (Eric brought it home as a treat because I'm sick. Cha-Cha says I didn't fall off the wagon, I was shoved.)

...we got to go spend frivolous hours wandering around the Salvation Army and Target. ...we had time to take a long afternoon nap. ...Cha-Cha made cupcakes with the kids while wearing heirloom aprons from my grandparents' house. ...I didn't have to think about real life worries. And those are wonderful things.

I finally broke down and accepted meals from the awesome people at church. I didn't want to do it. I didn't want help. I wanted to be strong enough to get through this. I wanted to be Super Mom. My sister got here yesterday, she flew all the way from California and took a week off work to come help. Eric and I both are sick, really sick (but getting better) and she got here just in time. She swooped in and took charge of two whiney (also sick) kids. She cleaned my kitchen and went to the store for some essentials we were lacking. She let Eric and I go to bed. At 8pm. She put my kids to bed. She got up and went to church with Eric and Carly (Josh and I stayed home) and now she's doing homework with Josh in the kitchen. My sister rocks. As llegue said, on facebook, everyone needs a Cha-Cha. It is not as hard to accept service from my sister. There is the whole pushing-you-out-of-the-way factor (she can be pretty tough under that angellic facade), but also she h...

Because we all have them. 1. I wish I had been kinder. 2. I wish I had been more understanding. 3. I wish I had been more giving. 4. I wish I had complained less. 4fer fit roundup: Craving: Probably pretty obvious, I'd love me a tall glass o' fizz right now but not as much as you might think. I think that our major distraction this week helped me over the hump. That and intense fear of failure in front of million thousands hundreds tens. Indulgence: Comfort food. And I didn't punish myself at all for it. In fact, I went to the grocery store and my receipt read like a diet how not to list. Cheetos, pie, whipped cream, danish, cookies, bread. I don't care, we're entitled for now. Landmark: 4 days off the sauce! Goals for next week: Cut out the late night snacks, check out the weight loss site and exercise suggestion from the posse members.

I picked a really bad time to quit the sauce, don't you agree? Had I known in advance I probably would have delayed quitting by a good month, or year or never. Today on the way home from making the funeral arrangements, Eric and I reasoned together that falling off the wagon in this case would probably be okay. I decided that I wasn't going to fall off the wagon after only 3 days. It just really sounds good right now, a tall icy glass of Dr Pepper. Ahhhhh. The funeral arrangements are all set. Saturday January 31 at 10:30 at the LDS Troy Building followed by a lunch at 12:00 pm at Kim's for family and close friends. If you are so inclined, instead of flowers please send a donation to the American Cancer Society in memory of Sam. If you desire memorial information for the donation you can email me at jtedst at yahoo dot com. Everyone wants to know how we are doing. (It's the most common question behind "Was he ill" and "How old was he": yes and 72.)...

Some angels look like normal humans. People like Cute Pam that wake up at 1:30 am to help a friend in need. And then offer meals and babysitting and phone calls and anything else I can think of. Thank you. Some angels look like doctors, with lab coats and id badges and floppy-fish cold handshakes. Those angels offer kind words and reassurance that you're doing the right thing. Some angels look like little boys with sticking-up bed hair and brownest of brown eyes. Little boys like Josh who pat your back and tell you that "It will be ok" and "Poppa can do back flips now if he wants to." Some angels look like Poppa, freshly minted, off to meet his Annie in the ethereal space we call Heaven. No more pain, no more Diabetes, all the donuts, Red Lobster and peanut butter he can stomach. Rest well, dear one. Something tells me in Heaven they don't run out of toilet paper. And I'm sure Pavarotti will be available for personal concerts. That will make Dad ...

Come closer. Lil' more. A little too close. Perfect. Are you awake? I am, but soon I won't be (hopefully). I've got a lot on my mind. It's all swirling around in there like a word tornado, crashing and mixing together, causing total destruction. Yesterday was a memorial service in Tucson for my Grandparents, a small gathering of family and friends to honor two amazing people. I missed it. Tomorrow is inauguration day. I am sure there will be a billion blogs talking all about it, summing it and recapping it and jotting it down in the backlog of history. I can't help but wonder how high the pedestal will have to get before it tips. I can't help but wonder if there is going to be a colossal fall when the history recedes and the reality sets in. I remain cautiously hopeful. I worry about some of the things President Obama plans to do. I wonder how our country will change in the coming years. I wonder if I will change with it. Today. That's what matter...

The bottle is empty and I haven't bought more. Yes, it's painful. I can't stop thinking about it. I should be using this as motivation to stay 'clean' but I keep thinking about how awful water tastes.

Poppa update included for your convenience. High Light: Poppa is doing better, he is off dialysis and his kidneys seem to be functioning. He was having some fluid pressure on his brain which is why he was so loopy (see I'm not just making stuff up). They had him on dialysis for a dayish and now are waiting to see if it kick started his kidneys again. Eric went and spent about an hour and a half with him today, he was sitting up in a chair (very good!) and was worried about Eric coming to see him in this weather. Low Light: They were able to determine that he is NOT a bypass candidate with just the portion of the test they made it through. They will be putting in a defibrillator at the end of next week. He is going to be in the hospital until then and probably for at least another week after it's in. Poppa wanted to know if he was coming back home to us when it was over. Apparently he hallucinated that we were going to put him in a nursing home. Which we're not. Hi...

Even though we had a "HOLY CRAP IT'S COLD!" day off of school, Cute Pam was nice enough to take both my kids for 2 hours so I could go check in on the Poppadoodle . Let me just say that hospitals are really sad places. Especially cardiac intensive care units. All the people were old, frail, white haired and sleeping. With oxygen masks and beeping machines. One little old man literally looked like he would shatter if he got out of bed. Poppa was sleeping hard when I got there. He had a busy morning, according to the nurse. They ran the first part of his heart viability test. For the second part he had to hold his arms up and go through a tube similar to getting an MRI and he flat-out refused to have it done. He didn't show any of this vinegar when I was there, in fact he was so out of it that I became alarmed when the nurse told me his is not on pain meds . He says he has no pain. That's good, I suppose, but he sure seemed loopy to me. They took him off of dialysis...

I've been thinking a lot about my weight the last few days. I always think about it but the last couple days it's been heavier, pun intended. It seems as if the jell-o six pack has shifted it's way up. Which is odd. It feels like I am carrying it differently. Perhaps I am not, but it is very uncomfortable. It was uncomfortable before, but more like a sock sitting crooked in your shoe. Irritating but manageable. Right now it feels more like 12 socks wadded up in your shoe. Really full. Too much detail? It isn't quite the right explanation but I digress. So I decided that it's time to do something about it. Something in a real concrete, can't back out, can't flake out, can't hide kind of way. Because that's what this extra weight is, and always has been - hiding. Sure some of it is genetics. Some of it is bad habits. Some of it is a sweet tooth that won't quit and a soft spot for Cheetos. There is also that bit that belongs to Dr. Pepper. How do I...

Poppa is doing well today. He was stable enough to be transferred to Royal Oak Beaumont Hospital so that he can undergo the heart viability tests in their cardiac unit. They weren't specific about whether or not he will be moved back over to the first hospital but we hope so because it is about 5 minutes from home which means we can be there lickety-split. RO Beaumont, not so much. I plan to go and see him in the morning, thanks to the generous babysitting of Cute Pam.

The report from the hospital is good, a steady day without any real peaks or valleys. Given the state of affairs when Dad first went in, we're feeling pretty good about that. He spent the day resting and getting things tested. I'm not quite sure how those two things go together but hey, I'm no medical doctor type. In other news, Josh had his first orchestra concert tonight. It was much better than we expected (a bunch of 5th graders playing instruments for the first time in their lives? Yeah, you get me) . Joshua was nervous and excited but had a great time. After every number they would bow and Josh would blow kisses to the audience. He said he did it because 'that's what famous people do'. He was dead center of the pack so we didn't get many shots of him actually playing. Mostly shots of his partially obstructed head. I did record the show and once I figure out how to convert from camera movies to wmv type files I will throw it onto the interweb for consum...

So we were able to get phone updates today. Apparently we just had a rotten nurse yesterday that didn't feel like sharing. Sharing is good, people. Remember that next time you feel greedy. Dad had a better day today. They did not do the stomach scope because his blood work was all wonky and they wanted to get his kidneys back on track. They put him on a non stop dialysis machine and got a positive response from his kidneys almost immediately. That is very good news. Tomorrow he is lined up for more testing and evaluating and such. Eric and Scott were able to spend about an hour with Poppa tonight. He is a little disoriented and feels like he has been there a long time, he keeps wondering what day it is. There are some signs of progress you can't track with blood work and medical tests and we're glad to report that Dad was cracking dirty jokes and asked to have Red Lobster delivered on the sly. Eric and Scott both came home smiling so we're feeling upbeat fo...

Is a load of crap . First off you should know that the hospital policy where Dad is staying is that you can't get info over the phone about patients. I understand the theory behind this, protecting privacy and blah blah blah, but in practice? It really sucks. Despite Cute Pam's offer of babysitting (I will probably take you up on this at some point!) I decided I would stay at home today and let Poppa rest and recover. The Dr's know what they are doing (right?) and he is best taken care of in their hands. The effort it would require on his part to have a visitor {X} the effort it would require on my part to go visit {=} me waiting around at home for an update. It's simple geometry. And you thought I couldn't do math. The hospital didn't call us today, which they were supposed to do in case of emergency/bad news etc. No news is good news, right ? (Please refer to the above statement for the answer, if you haven't already figured it out.) Eric went to...

- Get up for early church (Unless you are Eric and you're just not right in the head) - Shovel snow - Dishes - Fast (OK come on, really? You like fasting?) - Wake up from a deep sleep to the sound of Eric's dad calling for help. Only one of these is something I did today...the least pleasant on the list I'm sorry to say. Before you panic, the good news is that he is stable and resting. Eric's dad starting feeling unwell at about 4:30 am. At about 5 he was able to shuffle over to the living room and call up the stairs for help (we got him a cell phone for Christmas but he didn't think to use it or forgot about it, but a tutorial on emergency procedure is going to happen after he gets home - that or an intercom is going in!), he recognized the signs of a heart attack - nausea, sweating, severe pain in the middle of his chest - and he took an aspirin right away. The EMTS were here within 10 minutes. At the hospital they took him in for surgery pretty quickly. The ...

Carly: You want some pie? Me: Pie and a milkshake. Carly: And some Christ? Me: What? Carly: Some Christ? You want some Christ? Me: What? Carly: Some Jesus Christ? You want some Christ? There are a few things of note in this picture: bandaid on the forehead, green marker circles around the eyes, and orange marker all over her wittle fingers. Cute stuff.

You intimidate me. Sincerely, Me --- You know Facebook? Well, it doesn't look like a book at all, and if you aren't careful you'll see a whole lot more than faces. There is also a plethora of annoying applications that are worse than a pyramid scheme. But, all and all, I dig the Facebook. Except for one tiny detail: friends. More specifically, I don't have any (other than the posse {fist bump}, they've got my back...). See back in high school I was a dork. (I'm still a dork, you don't have to point it out.) I wasn't a complete outcast, but I wasn't cool either. I was one of those in-between kind of people. The popular kids tried to cheat off me in Chemistry (suckers) and the not-popular kids didn't (all) hate me. I had a pretty steady group of kids that I hung around with, I had a couple of friends who were uber-popular, I didn't go to the parties or the dances, I wasn't in drama club or sports. The guy I went to prom with, I w...

Wondering just how accurate the ol' Santatometer was? Well: 1. A griddle: The Santatometer totally delivered on this. Not only did I receive a tilting griddle suitable for french toast, grilled cheese, pancakes and burgers, Eric cooked the first meal on it Christmas Day! (I actually haven't used it yet. Shhh, don't tell Santa!) 2. A new jewelry box: Another score for the Santatometer. No jewelry box. Heck, I was lucky Eric didn't spontaneously combust when he price-checked the thing. For now, I'm using a shoe box. It's not pretty but everything fits, it is up high on my dresser and it cost me exactly $0. If you don't include the boots. 3. A stand up mixer: Spot on prediction from the Santatometer, the mixer still lives on the store shelf. Eric did look at a couple, briefly, but it just wasn't gonna fit into the $50 gift cost limit. Maybe for my birthday, you only turn 32 29 once. 4. The Killers new album: Double points for the Santatometer. There ...

Ok this was such a cool idea that I'm going to share it with my posse. Aka you guys. Haven't you always wanted to be part of a posse? No? Oh. Well just pretend. Anyhow, for those of you that didn't click (You know who you are. Slackers.) , it's called a Jesse Tree and it is basically an advent calendar on a little Christmas tree. But, I'm going to adapt mine to represent the prophecies of Christ from the Old Testament, New Testament and Book of Mormon . Something like you'll find here . Still not clicking? Oh, come on. Just give it a try. You know you want to.

It's a funny thing, our words. Fragile and yet unbreakable. Gentle but sometimes harsh. Comforting and still painful. Quick, although at times deliberate. Kept, a word is golden, a treasure, a measure of our worth and reputation. Broken, a word can injure, trash, betray, mislead, and damage. Words instruct and deconstruct, they edify, teach, outline, summarize and simplify. They misconstrue and mislead, intimidate and dominate. Words create a mask and can still strip away a disguise. Both soft and hard, weak and strong, simple and complex - words capture and liberate the reflections of my soul.

I taught my new class today. I know you've been dying to know how it went, practically beside yourselves with wonder and worry (for the lives of the children I mean) . It actually went fairly well. They were cute, as 4 turning 5 year olds tend to be. They were also enthusiastic, especially when we discussed treats. Once we established that I would - in fact - bring treats if they behaved, they were putty in my hand. Well, they tried to be. But heck, its hard for ME to sit around and listen for 3 hours so they are somewhat excused for occasionally acting like crazed monkeys . But the bigger news is: Carly is a Sunbeam . ( I know, right? WHAT?) She even knows the song. I'm not going to brag that she was the only one in her class that knew to jump on BEAM, but let's just say the other kids were wide eyed when her feet left the floor. If you know what I mean. Carly liked Primary, specifically singing time. She didn't particularly like that she wasn't al...

Maybe it's a girl thing . No, I am not going to talk about icky stuff. Sometimes I get stuck in this spiral, down down down. I don't even want to type out the words of my internal dialogue. First, because then it wouldn't be internal or mine anymore. Second, because I know what the response would be. My mom would call, possibly my sister too - she is more likely to email. Someone would (possibly) comment about how wrong I am about myself, and that just doesn't do much to forward my wallowing. Third, it shatters the illusion of self confidence. The thin, flimsy, transparent, ridiculous illusion. My sister, all wise and knowing, powerful and sweet (Eric says I have her on a pedestal but I say nay, if you've met her you will agree with my assessment), says that I have to set a good example for Josh. I do alright with the everyday kind of stuff. You know like don't lie, eat your veggies, wear clean socks, I've got those down. But when it comes to believ...

4 pics of the little white dress so lovingly labored over by Aunt Cha-Cha, with a little help from me.