saturday doings

Megs and I threw our first and possibly only garage sale yesterday, and we were pretty well pooped by noon. At 4:30 we headed up to the Conference Center in SLC to support our Keny, who was singing in the choir. As far back as we were it didn't take us long to spot her. Front row, middle section, 6th person in from our left. We could hear her singing above all the rest:) Man, we love our little songbird.

We parked about three blocks away and trooper Meghan hobbled along with her swollen pregnant lady feet. She finally removed her shoes and we were able to quicken our pace.

Other highlights, apart from the excellent singing and blistered feet, of course:

The gal sitting next to Megs in the conference center who decided to clip her toenails with her fingers and flick them on the carpet. Eww.

President Uctdorf's wonderful talk about the little blue flowers. I leaned over to Meghan before he was even through and whispered: "How long do you think it will take Deseret Book to start merchandising and stocking all things related to Forget-Me-Nots?"

After the meeting, we hobbled back to the car and drove home, straight to WinCo, where we purchased a few things for Sunday dinner. Exhausted as we were, the whole trip a thumbs up. Sweet little memory, a 'forget-me-not' occasion. He he he.

Grandy's SRC Bookworm Party

Bookworm Bubbie, she heard 3 little girls were celebrating a big achievement, so she popped in for a visit.


Some achievements are worthy of a certificate, eh? 100 books read for Cate, 50 for Maddie and Faye.


Their very own bookworms. Thank you All A Dollar. Yes.


Balancing a book on your head is trickier than it looks. But toss the worms off the blanket parachute style, well, that kind of fun is addictive. Just ask Maddie Sue.


Roll the dice, match it to a circle and build your worm. Such fun for the 3 and under crowd.


Bookworms love sugar, dont'cha know?


Reading is FUNdamental. He he he.


Children are made readers on the laps of their parents. Yup.

claim to fame

Added to this months MoDa selection, a wonderful short story, just recently published in 322 Review:

http://www.322review.org/issue10.html

Yup. The author of A Thousand Distant Cousins is our very own Lacy Lee.

Love her writing. Love her.

internet i love you

You’ve heard of the Khan Academy, yes?*
It is a godsend for math dummies like me. Seriously, I don’t want to die so stupid.

http://www.khanacademy.org/

And just look at all there is to learn. Even a G-mat test section, Kody & JLW please take note. It’s a little weak in the humanities category (like none) but promises to be coming soon.

Seriously, go check it out. You don’t want to die so stupid either.

*Click on the link and then scroll down to Khan Academy news reports and interviews. There’s been quite a bit written about it, I am late to the game. And before you pooh-pooh it consider that BYU-Idaho’s Kim Clark has been given a charter to develop just such a radical new education model. They are starting to assemble a global online adjunct faculty that doesn’t need to be full time, or reside in brrrr cold Idaho. It’s possible Khanacademy will render Math (and others, too) departments obsolete.

de fam

When Chea was here last month she asked me where I wanted to go to take photos. I showed her my favorite spot and she said she could make it work. I love this view driving from Kenzie's back to Orem. Thanks fam for braving the weeds and tall grass. It was worth it.


Time never changes,
The memories, the faces
Of loved ones, who bring to me,
All that I come from,
And all that I live for,
And all that I’m going to be.
My precious family
Is more than an heirloom to me.
--Amy Grant

hard is good

Went out to cheer H and Lexi on today. They both ran the Spanish Fork Half Marathon. They are some kind of awesome.


Here’s Lex, tired but triumphant. 13 miles and she ran the whole way.


And here’s H.B. Gotta say, it was inspiring seeing him push himself across that finish line.

Here I was losing faith in human nature and bemoaning the aging process, then here comes H being so inspiring and all. Luckily, I wore sunglasses so the leaking tears wouldn’t show, eh? Anything is possible and it’s not too late. To run a half-marathon or to achieve personal goals. I needed the reminder.

He wasn’t in much of a talkative mood right after. I think he was hurting and just wanted to get home.

"There will be days you don't think you can run a (half) marathon. There will be a lifetime of knowing you have."
--Unknown


Nicely done, good brother and lovely niece. Nicely done.

guadium #99,993 an outing with the grandies

Highlights:
1. SLC and Trax. A new experience for Cate and Maddie.
2. Gateway Olympic Fountain. The dancing waters are magical. Citius, Fortius!

3. Bubble gum and Mike & Ike's.
4. Children's Exhibit at the Church History Museum.

5. We were hungry from all that fun, luckily J.B's is just down the corner from the Museum. Spaghetti, French Fries!, Sprite & Chocolate Pudding. Yes, I felt sorry for the waitress who had to clean up after us.
6. Rode Trax again to where we parked the car. The girls were zonked out not 5 minutes into the ride home.

We were originally hoping to visit the Discovery Children's Museum but found out when we arrived they were closed for seasonal maintenance. Some guy in the elevator felt sorry for us and secured us some free passes for next time. But the Interactive exhibit at the C.H. Museum was more than a suitable replacement. We've been to several in the past and I think this one is very well done. The girls loved it.

More info if you go here:

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705387015/For-the-kids-5-things-youll-find-at-the-new-Church-History-Museum-exhibit.html

http://lds.org/churchhistory/museum/exhibits/current/0,16116,4089-1,00.html

http://www.heraldextra.com/momclick/activities/article_ca0cfb94-7208-11e0-a87d-001cc4c002e0.html

More pics at the GP.

happy birthday mr. jlw

A beautiful, wonderful man. Knows what it is to fight his own personal monsters and demons, just like we all do.

A grape juice toast then: To Janny. Here's to all your hard work in overcoming your Goliaths and here's to a bright and hopeful future. Clink.

http://youtu.be/j0IMASimhRo

Close your eyes,
Have no fear,
The monsters gone,
He's on the run and your daddy's here,
Beautiful,
Beautiful, beautiful,
Beautiful Boy,

Before you go to sleep,
Say a little prayer,
Every day in every way,
It's getting better and better,
Beautiful,
Beautiful, beautiful,
Beautiful Boy,

Out on the ocean sailing away,
I can hardly wait,
To see you to come of age,
But I guess we'll both,
Just have to be patient,
Yes it's a long way to go,
But in the meantime,

Before you cross the street,
Take my hand,
Life is just what happens to you,
While your busy making other plans,
Beautiful,
Beautiful, beautiful,
Beautiful Boy.

Keep your fingers crossed for him. Jiao has her exit interview on September 28th.

Unkulele has inspired me

So here’s the deal.

After much tinkering and fiddling around, we're almost ready to go into mass production with the, drum roll please …Aunt-ordian.

What’s the difference between an Aunt-ordian and a regular accordian, you say?

Well, the sound for one thing. Water damage and mold produce a truly unique squawk, er sound. The Aunt-ordian has been aged in a temperature uncontrolled, damp garage for like, 30 years. Sort of like a fine wine, you can’t rush the process.

And if you tape down the F# it creates an outer spacey mood.

Oh, and here’s where the biggest difference comes. Through a lot of trial and error I figured out how to tone down that sometimes big and annoying accordian sound. Yup.


By putting a pillow muffler on the back of the instrument it significantly reduces the volume. Which is useful when you want to go for a more mellow and romantic mood. Like if you want to be one of those strolling guys who play in restaurants for people in love and such. Or if you need to play in church.

But here is the biggest selling point, people. When you get tired of wandering around playing for lovers and church goers and need to take a nap, well you can just turn your dang Aunt-ordian over and Presto! Your instrument turns into an amazing pillow pet.


Yup, yup. I know. Genius.


Selling for $899.03 plus tax.

milking & churning

At it again. Another talk and lesson to prepare. How do I make the topic fresh and relevant, especially if said topic has been hashed and re-hashed? Yeah, dilemma. It's all been said before.

I've been hitting my files and researching ideas. Reading what others have said, certainly. But in the end, like it always does, it will come down to my own take, my own thoughts and words or it will not fly.

In other words, I milk a lot of cows but I churn my own butter. Yup.

Ok, this then. It's fitting. From "Do I Repeat Myself? The problem of the 'already said'”:

Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But since no one was listening, everything must be said again.

Originality, after all, includes not only saying something for the first time, but re-saying (in a worthy new way) the already said: rearranging an old tune in a different key, to a different rhythm, perhaps on a different instrument. Has that been said before? No matter: on with the story!
Whole article found here: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/08/do-i-repeat-myself/8572/

Oh, and this, too: http://tmiesen.com/tag/creativity/

People think creativity is like that; “creative” people are able to invent something new and original.
Well, I’ve got a sad story to tell you: Nothing is original. Everything is a mutation of a previous idea; it came from somewhere. It’s a recombination of previous words, objects, and technology to build something different.

and later:

Nobody has experienced the world in exactly the same way. Anything you make, everything you do, and any ideas you think of are combinations of every bit of the world that you’ve ever encountered. Nobody has been subjected to the same stimuli. Nobody has had the exact same conversation with the same person, and nobody has devoured the exact same media, pop culture, and advertising as everyone else. Your creative output is defined by your past. It’s only fitting that creative things come in many different forms.