Holy Produce, Batman!

This beautiful head of romaine came from my Garden Goddess friend (CM). It was just so pretty that I needed more witnesses.

I Feel...?

I don't know. Sad? About the passing of Senator Ted Kennedy. I'm not terribly familiar with either his political career or personal life. However I feel saddened for the loss of what he represented in my narrow little world.

I hate the end of Things As They Were. Senator Kennedy represented that for me. A family of Movers and Shakers. There isn't another family, in my mind, who comes close to possessing the power, romance and magnetism of John, Bobby and Ted*. The Camelot President, The Peace-Seeker, The Politician (with incredible bi-partisan clout).

Where is the next dynasty? If I didn't strongly dislike the B--- family, well, there's them. Who else is there? It's like when Johnny Depp became the new Willy Wonka. Gene Wilder is a classic. Who can top that? No one. But it's Johnny Depp -not better, just younger and cuter. But not the same. You know?

Or like when my parents sold our home in SR. No other home will have the memories and character of that one. It's like they changed the location of our favorite sitcom. Same stories new setting. (What if Friends took place in Nashville? Not. The. Same.) Same Bat-time, new Bat-channel.

Anywho, I wanted to say something and it turns out I have very little to say. Just, I'm sad. How are you feeling?



*don't get me wrong, I appreciate that these men were mere mortals and made mistakes like anyone else (sometimes bigger mistakes)

Best Day Evah

The Gracetress with birthday cake (courtesy of JL -you rock, btw):

Unfortunately, there was an "incident" involving fire and the umbrella.
I think the princesses may have had a little too much fun.

Her birthday this year was an act in two parts:
Act I: dinner at "The Salad Restaurant" (also known for their steaks, maybe you're heard of it? Outback, anyone?) because The Girl wanted a "house salad, no onions, no tomatoes, with ranch please". I love a girl who knows what she wants.

We were so excited to have a favorite duo G&G Halverson (one in person and one by skype) with us this year. Yay! Thanks for being here. (I'll post pictures from Act I as soon as I find my cable.)

Act II: a meeting of friends at the pool for cake. This year The Gracetress got to share the birthday love with a favorite little friend, who also has an August birthday. A good time was had by all.

Green Salsa

For Erika:

Okay. This isn't precise. Perhaps J will take over and fill in exact amounts. Short of that, here's what we do:

1 white onion, sliced,
a jalapeno or two, washed
a couple Anaheim peppers, washed
a couple Serrano peppers, washed
~1 lb tomatillos, washed and cored, paper removed
garlic cloves

Place all ingredients, as is, onto a foil lined cookie sheet under the broiler. Turn veggies over as their skins crackle and brown (this is supposed to happen). When skins appear more brown than not, start removing veggies from oven (this happens at varying times). The garlic is often done first of all the game.

Place onion, tomatillo and peeled garlic into a blender. Peel and core all peppers and chilies and also place in blender. Blend.

Add a bunch of cilantro leaves.
Salt to taste.
Also, I like to add an avocado. So awesome.

Blend until smooth. Enjoy.

I hope that was everything.

Oh wait... add a few shakes of cumin. Cumin makes everything better.

You can eat it warm or refrigerate and eat cold. This also makes an amazing sauce for chicken enchiladas. Great for tacos and chili verde burritos (of course).

School Lunch?

Hi folks. I have a request.

If you have time please head on over here and take a look at the SlowFoods Movement. This is a petition to help improve the quality of the school lunch programs around the country. This is something I really believe in and I hope you'll give it a little think-over.

Thanks and I'll write more after the Fourth.

Happy Independence Day!

Bid'ness

Once again I have nothing to say. Here's is some of May and most of June in pictures:

Grace and I went to Gettysburg for a school field trip. The house has a little tiny speck in the upper left-hand corner. Apparently, it's an unexploded mortar from the Civil War.
Dude.



Then I saw the biggest worm in my entire life. It was really dark so I was just guessing on where to point the camera and I tried to put my shoe next to it but believe me... it was HUGE. Longer than my foot!

Then J taught The Gracetress to ride her bike (in all of ten minutes, she was ready,what can I say?):
Pre-bike: Post-bike:

Then I spent every spare minute crocheting an afghan (sp?) for a friend's wedding gift:


Then J built a Star Wars Drone to fight off the bad pirates:


And he made green salsa in the molcajete (because he's awesome like that):


And I went to a friends wedding:



Finally, The Gracetress being her lovable, darling self:

The Staying Story

Thank you to M for pointing me to this blog post. If you have time, go on over and read about one woman's decision to stay married. Honest and powerful.

As noted,we don't talk about this a lot. The how and why and what happens after. Maybe because we can just observe and draw our own conclusions? Because it's too personal to talk about? No one wants to air dirty laundry?

But here's what I'm thinking. Save the sordid details for your best "in the vault" friend but share the other stuff. Surely anyone would acknowledge that no marriage, assuming partners are on equal footing and honest with themselves, is without bumps and disagreements. Not everything goes along swimmingly all the time.

Marriage can be (dare I say it?) work at times. Even the best of times. It's no longer you and your merry self. Now there are other needs to consider. Time constraints. Menus to discuss and agree upon (such as "what" and "who shall prepare"). Clothes to coordinate (okay, I'm kidding about that one but J and I have had several strange happenings of late wherein the same colors were worn on the same day. Coincidence? Or maybe we've just been married for awhile. Great minds and all that.)

I've had the thought before that being single is certainly simpler (yes, I'm familiar with "the grass being greener..."), whether it is or not I think could be argued at length. But what is it about being married that makes people choose to stay married?

The whole why is such a huge question and very different for many people: love, companionship, kids, someone to sit on the couch with and complain about commercials to, money, power, support, belonging, monkey business, someone to read books with, live-in road-trip buddy.

And then the other million dollar question: how? Once you decide it's worth it, how does one go about insuring it happens?

My parents (yours too, if you're a Holmes) talked a lot about this in FHE, Sunday walks, at the dinner table, car rides, etc. The how for them, according to me, was about compromise, forgiveness, date nights, praying together, keeping in touch throughout the day, laughter, letting the kids know their place.

Probably the most important: assuming the best of each other. Always with the benefit of the doubt.

And of course the main phrase I heard often was, "to treat each other in such a way that our spouse would never want to leave or look elsewhere."

With J and I, I would say that we both try to assume that we each are trying our hardest. And that we show respect for each other's opinions (unless they're crazy—we don't do crazy around here.)

Granted, no one is perfect. And so with the whole forgiveness thing. I really think these things work for them and us because we want them to. I think the key is that we're all trying (mostly every day or at least more often than not). I have no answers when only one is person wants to stay, except: that totally stinks and I'm sorry.

You're welcome to go anonymous for this but I would love to read the why or how you have stayed married. Or avoided it. Either one.

And Now To Please The Grandparents

Because we love you.

Here's a brief pictorial of our recent activities:

Grace made a cake. We had extra time. I had extra ingredients. "Why not make a cake?" we said.

Indeed.

Let's make it pink and green.

And so we did, Grace taking the lead in actual work. Mom supervised.


Next, for MissKitti's birthday bash we had our favorite little people* over to celebrate. Things were said. Cookies were eaten. In all, a great night.







Cookies. by Grace





The BlueWhite Game at Penn State.
76,500 fans at the scrimmage. Yes, folks. Scrimmage. This is why Penn State rocks. I believe I've said it before: they know how to do football.

And now what you've all been waiting for....The Gracetress does Softball. Our little leftie hitter and 1st Basewoman extrordinare. She hit a single last night and got to run home. Yay!!!




_____
*of course we have lots of favorite little people. Of which, these are a few.

Birthday Wishes

I could go on and on about how I remember the day Miss Kitti was born and how it changed my life forever, except I was like 2 and have no memory of mom & dad bringing her home whatsoever. But having her as a sister has made my life better. Kitti is caring, thoughtful, smart, funny, and I could go on but I really can't think of all the words that I'd like to use to descirbe her.
Anywho I really just wanted to make sure that Kitti got the recognition that she deserved on her special day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MISS KITTI

love you and I'm so blessed to have you as a sister

Y tú?

On Sunday, the Relief Society lesson was on persecution. Specifically about the early Saints being driven west. I was curious as to where the teacher was going with this. Mostly wondering if she was going to focus on the persecution of those who plowed on before us or if she would focus on modern-day persecution.

She said both. I agree on the former and have to disagree on the latter. I have great admiration for the pioneers who left home and family to follow their faith and convictions. I can only imagine how difficult and terrifying that must have been.

Currently, I don't doubt that religious persons do indeed get persecuted for their faith. However, I feel more comfortable vigorously asserting that this is much more common in Other. Parts. Of. The. World. Having to remove prayer from schools doesn't strike me as persecution so much as making it safe for everyone to play in the sandbox.

I guess I should mention that I have never felt nor do I feel persecuted. (Except for that one time that a mean boy said I had a terrible haircut and his mother agreed with him. To which I must honestly respond: mean people suck. Also, there was that Time with the Thing in the Place.)

Getting back to safe sandboxes.

One woman shared an observation that most ways of living are becoming accepted and everything is being labeled as "okay." She didn't like this state of things because it meant that if she wasn't okay with the way another individual chose to live their life then she was the intolerant one. She was speaking specifically about her teenagers in high school and how impressionable they are. Naturally, one wants their children to be impressed upon by the right things.

(Let's be clear here. I'm talking about religious practices and life choices* that don't harm me, my family or my community. I'm not talking about the animal-torturing, pyromaniac, car-stealing druggie friends that we're all afraid our child will befriend.)

I do see her point. And I also don't. Tolerating someone's ideas, living harmoniously with people of other faiths, isn't the same as accepting their ideals or habits. It just mean you can get along. For example, I'm friends with people who drink. We like each other. We respect each other. Science supports the occasional drink. My dietary guidelines say no way. My friends are no more likely to give up drinking than I am to take it up. I have friends who don't believe in Jesus as the Messiah. Yet we still can live peacefully in the same town and get appetizers together from time to time.

As for teenagers, I obviously do not have any yet. Perhaps I will feel differently when I do. However, I won't let that minor detail stop me from giving my opinion. J and I are taking the Brother Joseph approach with Grace, teaching correct principles and letting her govern herself. We teach Grace what we believe and try to show her how we would like her to act. Then it's up to her to let that information guide her choices and actions.

As scary as it is to let her go out into the world, I have to wonder how strong her/my/our faith can be if it doesn't bear examining. Of course she will have questions. Of course she will see that others do things differently. And while the LDS church does actively recruit, most others do not. I'm trying to send out respect and good will, hoping that it will return.

The laws that govern our land make it safe for us to practice our religion. These are the same laws that keep other faiths and groups of people safe, as well. If we want to live in a society where we start drawing lines about what's okay and what's not (beyond basic crimes like murder and theft), we should be prepared for the dark times ahead.

I don't think we can have it both ways. Either we (by "we", I mean LDS faithful) want to be accepted and not be driven out and exterminated or we don't. And if we expect to be accepted we must extend that same benefit to others.

Next time, I'll just post some non-controversial family pics.

_________
*Yes, I'm (very nervously) inserting families of ANY type. I see families as a good thing. People wanting to form families should be supported, helped, encouraged. That's all I'll say on that point for now.

I'm A Changed Woman

No, it's true. And here is the evidence.

When J and I first started dating, I mentioned that I like to read (shocking, I know). He suggested a few authors and I took a lit. course at BYU. It turns out that, from time to time, in both classic and critically acclaimed literature, things don't always go well.

By that, I mean, loyal dogs die, people are inexplicably crucified, innocent men are accused of murder, and older brothers are less than perfect. Reading these short stories and novels was fairly depressing, assuming I understood the story at all.

Another sore point was all the ambiguity and loose ends. What do you mean there's no ending?!?! How can the story be finished when no one has gotten married or packaged things up tidily? How is that possible? Did she have an affair or didn't she? Was the woman a snake or just weirdly interested in eating rats? What was the author getting at?!

At one point I just got mad at J for encouraging me to read Good Literature,* and squarely placed the blame for all the unhappiness and tragedy within literature on his shoulders. (Perhaps unfair, but whatever.)

After a particularly difficult time with The Brothers K (not Karamazov, just "K") and an even more harrowing experience with Crime and Punishment, I gave up on serious books for awhile. How long, one might ask? Hmmm, how old is Grace now? Almost that long.

(Enter Harry Potter and YA lit. Good times. We've talked about this ad nauseum.)

Oddly enough, I've been noticing a shift. A higher tolerance, if you will, for sadness. Maybe because I'm less angry as a person I can better tolerate the anger in books? I don't know. Maybe I'm becoming a darker person. Any thoughts on that?

Granted, I don't always want a heavy theme or taxing subject. But more and more often these days I do.

_____
*My words. J would never call my preference in books "crap"—even if they sometimes are. For the record, J is happy for me to read anything that makes me happy or at least makes me happy to be reading, even if it does make me cry.

Please Excuse The Swear...

But Mr. Obama is pretty darn badass.

Tell Me Truly

Are you a regular soda drinker or a diet? Water or juice? For reals, what do you drink?

Studies* (and by "studies" I mean that several studies my lab has conducted) have shown that people who consume caloric beverages do so without the benefit of feeling full. So, you can drink 600 hundred calories in one sitting and still be ready for appetizer, entree and dessert.

Dude.

This is not the way to go. Even if you're not trying to cut calories. Think of all the sugar and your teeth and and....

But what really gets my goat is the fact that many schools around the country have vending machines and offer large varieties of soda and juices to our young, impressionable, and sugar-loving youth. So not cool.

Our children, bless their hearts, do not need to be drinking the fruu-its of the deveel at school. Let them get it at home or on the way home. We need not encourage the bad behavior at our places of learning. Save that for the parents.

Seriously, if we could all teach out kids one thing (for starters) about nutrition, let it be to NOT drink their calories. **WITH THE HUGE EXCEPTION OF MILK. DRINK MILK, PEOPLE** It adds to an individuals total daily calories without providing the fullness necessary to cue that individual to stop eating. It also, often doesn't even provide a significant amount of nutritional benefits (IE, vitamins, fiber, minerals).

A sort of related side-note: A colleague of mine reminded me, today, that for a person to gain ten pounds a year, they have only to over-eat by 100 calories a day, everyday. One hundred calories is not a lot, my friend. (Believe me, I know. I've been keeping track lately.)

Anywho, all I'm saying is give peace a chance. No wait. That and,

Don't drink your calories. Encourage your local schools to find alternative means of raising funds -get rid of the junk-food vending machines. And one serving of juice is only 1/2 a cup. Just so you know.



* refers to experiments conducted using the scientific method, published in peer-reviewed journals of good report. The results reported are statistically significant, meaning that the chance that the findings are random is such a small possibility so as to be considered impossible. If Burton read my blog I would ask him to confirm and he would, so there.

The Gracetress Does Etiquette

Last night Grace went to an Etiquette Dinner. She came home and told us there was one thing we must absolutely never do:

NO SHOULDERS ON THE TABLE!!

Right-o. No problem there. Now elbows, that might be another story.

I love my little Sweetie.

It's All In How You Look At It

Last night I dreamed that J was snoring. Really loud. Guess what J was actually doing? Snoring. Really loud.

The upside of this is that one must be sleeping to dream. The even greater thing is that I was sleeping through loud snoring. I know, right?! Good job body.