The Good Life

So Addie woke up a few hours ago and was walking around the house in a daze. I got her a drink and felt her forehead because she had had a slight fever before she went to bed. She was very warm, so I got the thermometer and while I was taking her temperature (which was 102.3), she pointed to the other side of her bed and asked,"Will you take his temperature too?" I was confused because Paul was not in the room and neither was Clare who is definitely not a he. I asked her who she was talking about. She pointed again and said,"Him." I told her that no one was there. She looked over in the direction that she had been pointing and she said, "What the?!! Where did he go?" I grabbed her up and put her in the bathtub to lower her temperature. She started to seem less cloudy as her temperature went down. She told me that the boy was Jake from her class at school. I told her that he was never really there and told her to tell me if anyone else shows up tonight. I talked to the the physician on call just to ease my mind. Everything seems to be fine.

There is nothing like your child being sick to remind you how very much you love your kids. Paul is passed out between the two girls, I want to crash the party and cuddle my girls and psychotically check Addie's temp every 20 minutes. I should be sleeping but I am wide awake listening to Ingrid Michaelson and feeling so very grateful for my sweet little girls and for a husband who loves to be a dad and who helps with the kids in the night and lets me sleep in on Sunday mornings. Life is good.

WE SOLD OUR HOUSE!!!

Last week the sale on our house in Idaho closed. Bittersweet. I am so glad to no longer feel the financial obligation but we sure had some great memories in that house. Our first back yard, all the neighborhood parties and playtime, we brought Clare home to that house, lots of fun with cousins and my family, we built our first playhouse from scratch, we owned a goat for 2 weeks, our super fun Sunday school class, my sweet beehives and some of the best friends that I will ever have.

Ketchup

Addie's First Day of School

August 12 was Addie's first day of school. Ever since her first day, she has had a sweet little friend named Ada that has her back. Before school starts each day, the kids get to play on the playground for awhile, several times Addie has walked through the playground timidly waving at the other kids, hoping they will come play with her and every time it looks like Addie is looking especially lost in the crowd, this sweet little Ada grabs Addie's hand and walks her around the playground. Thank heavens for the Ada's in the world!

Clare on Addie's first day of school or one day that week

This is not a set up and not uncommon for her either. She is full of mischief and energy and some days I just can't keep up.

"PINKY PROMISES CAN'T BE BROKEN!!!"

Today has been one of those funny days. I walked Addie to school today and as we approached the front of the school, I stepped in a big pile of doggy do on the sidewalk. Huge pile! Addie was yelling,"Waaaaatch ouuuuut!" as my shoe and poo became one. There was no avoiding it. I am so happy to report that nothing profane shot out of my mouth or into my head. I don't know what it was about the poo but I have had a fantastic day and a grin on my face ever since the "do
incident."





Addie is now in kindergarten. It blows my mind. I have really missed her each day until we get her from school. On our way home she tells funny stories or vents her frustrations.

Today she was very upset about friend titles. The other day she and some girls at school pinky promised to be best friends forever. Today it became clear to her that two of her friends liked each other maybe more than they liked her. In a most destraught voice Addie said,"But...pinky promises can't be broken." Tender moment, but it took great effort not to bust up laughing. I hate to see her sad, but she was over it almost as soon as she said it, so I feel fairly justified finding the humor in the situation.

The drama level is at an all-time high and the things that come out of her mouth are getting more and more hilarious. I need to keep writing them down.

Back in AZ.

Texas and Honda's world famous reliability

We are stuck in the Lone Star State with the worst excuse for a transmission.

While in Florida we decided to go ahead and throw way to much money/plastic at an old car (1999 Honda Odyssey)Getting the vehicle fixed is it's own story, but once it was fixed, it worked great, for like 2 days... then the check engine light came on, it began to shift funny again and was stinking to high heaven. So we took it back to the transmission shop, and they took it all back apart and did some stuff to make it work again. And that worked great until we were just West of San Antonio, TX where it once again started to shift funny and stink. No check engine light this time, but one look under the hood, and sure enough, there was automatic transmission fluid everywhere. So we are in a hotel for who knows how long (the shop is saying 5-6 days) waiting for the car to be fixed.

We are looking at this as a good thing though, rather than rush back to AZ, we now have the opportunity to have a little vacation.

Anyone know what to do in San Antonio?

Back to the Promised Land

We were offered a lot more scholarship money at a law school in Phoenix, and my parents are going on a mission, so we will have 18 months really cheap rent. We are coming back to AZ, we should be there the first week of August, and for those of you who didn't know, I am going to law school starting this Fall.

So much for Flomerzida, but it was fun while it lasted.

Seatbelts

I hate to have one of my only posts about Florida on Flomerzida be about something negative, but this is really lame. As of today, police officers can pull you over and ticket you solely for not using a seat belt.

It is import to know that I think everyone should wear a seat belt, and I wear a seat belt 95% of the time (the 5% is when I am driving away from a location). However, this dumb law is all about money, and not about safety. In fact, I would argue it has the potential to actually decrease safety. What a complete waste of time for police officers and highway patrol officers to pull someone over for not wearing a seat belt. There must be better, more safety-encouraging, crime preventing/intervening activities these peace officers could be participating in.

This new law will however provide revenue to a state that is in serious financial trouble. It strikes me that again, if finance was the concern, there are again other activities that may actually do more to fill the state coffers. For instance, the police could form some kind of partnership with the drug dealers, maybe providing protection for a nominal fee. If money is the driving force, do we really need to be bleeding the poor guy who forgot to put his seat belt on?

What a complete waste of time and resources.

And Another

Clare Bear Talking It Up

Yesterday, Clare had a word explosion. These are just some of the words that she is saying right now. The first word she said yesterday was rocket and she walked around the house all day saying rocket. We can only put 90 seconds up at a time.

DIRTY LENTILS

Growing up I HATED lentils! Despised them. I choked them down quite often and didn't openly complain about them, but I wanted to. I thought they were the most loathesome and depressing foods ever placed before me. But they were cheap and got us by when we didn't have much. Times got better and they were gone. Then I went to work for the Anasazi Foundation, where a huge part of my daily diet consisted of nasty lentil eating, and still my aversion to lentils remained fairly consistent. It wasn't until 3 years after the trail that I gained a true love for those "dirty lentils," as the young walkers called them.

Raygon Postert Hymas, a fellow Anasazi-ite, shared this awesome recipe with us. It is SOOOO good!

Lentil Chili

• 1-1/4 cups dry lentils (half a pound)
• 4 cups tap water
• 2 tablespoons oil or bacon grease
• 1 to 2 tablespoons dry onions
• 3 beef bouillon cubes
• 15 oz can tomatoes
• 2 teaspoons chili powder
• Dash hot pepper flakes or Tabasco sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Place the lentils and the water in a large pot. Put the pot on the stove and bring it to a boil. Reduce the heat so that the lentils are simmering gently. Cook for 30 minutes. Do not add the other ingredients until after the lentils have cooked. If the lentils begin to get dry, or if their water boils away then add more water. You want the lentils to remain juicy while they cook. When your 30 minutes are up, add all of the remaining ingredients. Simmer the chili for 15 to 20 minutes and serve with crackers or cornbread or over rice. Makes 4 servings.

This is a very good chili recipe. If you have ground beef or turkey, or some cooked chicken, you can add these to the chili too. About 1/2 a pound of ground meat or about 1 cup of cooked meat will be plenty. This recipe doesn’t need meat to taste good though. It is excellent just the way it is.

Last Sunday we had a Sunday School lesson devoted to cooking with food storage and being prepared now that we have entered hurricane season. We are going to find some other good'ns to post throughout the summer. If anyone has any great recipes that they wouldn't mind parting with, I would love to try out some more recipes.

We have been in Florida now for about a month, and it has been great. Jen and the girls have gone to the beach several times, and I have been able to go with them a couple.

Here are a couple of pics:

We made it to Scott, Louisiana (just outside of Lafayette). Hopefully we will be in Orlando tomorrow.