The Wedding

My youngest brother got married in August!  You can see how blessed [lucky, wildly fortunate, winners of the good wife lottery] Justin and Phillip are here  (Anj-babe is the 4th adult from the left, Swisserpants is the one in the wedding dress):

But unless you know Ang-babe and Swiss, you have no idea how incredibly blessed Phillip and Justin are.  No pressure, Lex.  Just don't ruin our perfect family.  Kidding.  Like I was telling my mom, I don't worry now that Justin and Phillip are taken care of.  Lex is too Lex to have to worry about.
 
Cute.

Note to self: Don't stand like that.  If I had photo shop and knew how to use it, I'd photo shop my legs under my body, rather than behind it.  Talk about freakish defiance of  the laws of physics.

 

This was supposed to be a group hug.  As you can see, we don't hug in our family.  But it looks like we did manage to embarrass Justin, even if we don't know how to express affection.

haircuts

My hairstylist left for greener pastures.  Boo.  He gave me my best haircut ever last month, ask Lynsey.  Anne and I tried out his replacement yesterday.

Doesn't Anne look great?  But she really irritates Damon by holding up my old 4-H ribbon like she won it, because she didn't.  It's not even hers, he says.  (No, I do not have a shrine in my house displaying my 4-H ribbons.  My mom saved all that stuff and Anne has gotten a hold of it.)

Back to the new hairstylist.  Here's a picture of how I looked after she was done with me.

Or maybe it's the Russian from Rocky IV.  I can't really tell.  She gave me such a great scalp massage though, I might give her another chance some day.

The Presidential Campaign

I've probably mentioned before that Damon is a talker.  If he's not talking about interest rates, demographics, or how much money Jake makes (Jake considers this an intrusion of privacy and refuses to discuss it), Damon's talking about the presidential election.  Yesterday, his comments on the election prompted Claire to say,

"I hope Mitt Romney loses."

[Gasp! My child is an apologist and a socialist!]  "Why, Claire?"

"Because I want Dad to win."

[Sigh of relief...hey, why doesn't she want me to win?!]

"And then we'll all be famous."

Anne was on board with that.  Here's her campaign poster:

Anne gets confused.  She isn't sure if Claire has Jake running for president, king, or prophet, but she does know that when he wins, we'll all be wearing crowns.  And Barrack and Mitt (the colorless guys in the middle) will be upset.

Here's Claire's poster (Jack H! means Jake Henderson!):

Parents who think their children are brilliant are so annoying, but when their children really are brilliant, it's less annoying, right?  The guy on the left is Obama the donkey.  The guy on the right is Romney the elephant.  They're both saying "Boo." How does she know about party symbols?  I don't know!  She had no help or coaching with this drawing.  I love the hands on the bottom.  From left to right, they're clapping, handing Jake a trophy, a ribbon, and money.  So Jake could be a communist, a socialist, or a capitalist, since all three are after accolades and money.  But once again he's being crowned which leads me to believe that although there's an election going on, Claire and Anne are more interested in monarchy than anything else.

life expectancy

Anne:  Mom, do people live to be 100?

Me: Yes, some people do.

Anne:  I hope I'm one of those people.

Me:  Me, too.

Claire:  I don't.

Me:  Why not?

Claire:  I want to die when I'm tired of being alive.

[Me: disturbed that a 7-yr-old anticipates being tired of life.  Still freaking out about it.]

Claire:  And I want to see Heaven.  I want to find out what it's like.

[Me: is Heaven Can Wait  on Netflicks...better have a family movie night soon.]

Continuing backward through time

There's nothing exciting going on 'round here.  Jake and I have been sanding, scraping, and re-staining (it's actually paint.  I don't know why they call it deck stain) the deck.  Lame.  So I'll keep blogging about the things I should have a while ago but didn't. [translation: I'll blabber on about nothing to put off dishes and laundry while I wait for the temp to hit 50 degrees so I can finish the deck]

I was called as 2nd counselor in the ward Young Women's organization a few months ago.  I can't believe how fabulous it is!  Maybe my bratty teenage memory is skewed, but YW's wasn't that great when I was a young woman.  Combined activities with the young men were good, but just YW activities were usually [yawn] working on Personal Progress.  The tedium of this was underscored by the fact that while we worked on our Divine Natures, the young men were off water skiing or hiking in the Grand Tetons.  I remember my nature becoming more envious than divine.

But let me tell you about this YW's group: we've been target shooting with handguns (fun!), indoor rock climbing (even more fun!) and are having a scavenger hunt through the mall next month (not sure if that will be fun, but the girls are excited).  I'm telling you, it's the life.  No wonder older women jockey to be Young Women leaders.  I should have been campaigning myself a long time ago.

Each life that touches ours for good

My Grandma Barbara died in September.  A few things about her:

-Valedictorian of her high school class (not unlike a few of her granddaughters)

-Loved my Granddad from the moment she first saw him (but he asked out her best friend before he asked her out)

-Had 6 kids, 26 grandkids and I don't know how many great-grands.

-Feisty and fun

-Served two missions with my Grandad

-Excellent homemaker

-During her last few days at the hospital, family members would take turns staying with her.  She told my Granddad he was the only one she missed when he was gone.

-Ate hot cocoa and toast every morning for breakfast

-Was a good sport, but usually got revenge, when we switched her and Granddad's dentures in the night

-Never had to dye her hair because it didn't go gray

-I cannot do justice to her on this blog

-We all miss her. 

Grandma and Granddad at the mountain ranch, July 2007

Lynsey, Grandad, and my Uncle Jack at Grandma's viewing

(above) All 26 grandkids at the cemetery.  We laughed and cried a lot that day.  You'd be hard-pressed to find a better family.  Grandma and Granddad deserve the credit for that.

tae kwon do tourney, the campaign

Damon took first place in the blue belt 8-11 yr old forms competition last weekend.  I was so proud I almost cried.

Here's the link where you can see the sparring match that earned him a 3rd place medal: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKfxoi9dX-o  (he's the one in blue)

Student Council elections were last week, too.  Damon lost.  He was a little bitter that some of the kids running made promises that would be impossible to keep, like guaranteeing longer recesses and lunches.  And he was annoyed that kids were allowed to run even though they turned in their speeches late.  Ah, well.  That's life on the campaign trail.