Vegan Shoes

Really, I never thought about "Vegan Certified" shoes before, but now I own a pair.  I have a pair of favorite "tennis" shoes.  They are about 10 years old.  They were white leather; now they are cracked and grayed.  They are ugly.  They are beyond worn out.  I've been looking for a replacement pair for a couple of years now and I finally found the pair!  I ordered them online and the first thing I noticed about the shoes was the tag that proudly announced that the shoes were "Vegan Certified."  That really amused me.  It got me thinking about other organizations that could certify things.  Do "Kosher Certified" shoes exist?  No idea, but it intrigues me.  So today, I am happily wearing an extremely comfortable pair of vegan certified shoes.

And the worn out pair of definitely not vegan certified shoes?  I can't get rid of them.  I'm sure that sometime I'll need a trasher pair of shoes for something and they will fit the bill perfectly.

Blogging isn't Cool

Blogging is so 2011; it's old school; it's not cool.  Now it's Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, etc.  Well, I think that's wrong.  It's so annoying when those that I stalk through their blogs stop blogging.  Really?  You "invite" me into your life, get me hooked on reading about whatever you had for breakfast/what color your master bedroom has been painted/all the naughty things that Junior did in a matter of minutes, then you just stop blogging.  You cut me out of you life.  You leave me hanging.  Seriously?  How dare you?  Seriously, maintaining a blog can be a lot of work and enthusiasm ebbs and wanes at times, but I miss some people via their blogs.  Well, guess what?  My blog isn't going away because I really don't write it for anyone other than for myself, and so that my kids have an erratic record of what their childhoods were like.  When Jonathan was little, I was often told to "write that down" because I would forget it; I didn't believe it at the time, but looking back, it's amazing how much I don't remember.  So, my blog is here to stay because it's MY blog, for me and my family, and it comes with an open invitation to any who want to read it.

Punishment for Not Blogging Regularly

Okay, so I've been slacking on regularly blogging.  But knowing that I would eventually get around to blogging, I keep a list of things I need to blog.  I pulled out that list as I sat down to update the blog tonight and I see that one of the things that I need to blog about is listed as "Packing."  Packing?  Ummmm, okay.... I have no idea what the word "Packing" is supposed to remind me of.  Packing?  Packing what?  No idea, but I'm sure that if I could recall what that post was supposed to be about, it would have been a brilliant post.

I HATE Cancer

This week, 2 people I know got bad news.  Both have previously battled cancer, and now they are on round 2.  The first is a mid-50's lady whose stage IV ovarian cancer has returned.  It's pretty much everywhere... peritoneum, live, lungs, etc. so she's not a candidate for surgery again, and is starting chemo again shortly.  The second person is a 19 year old girl who is doing battle #2 with leukemia.  She was supposed to leave for a mission this Wednesday, but instead is at PCMC doing chemo again.  Not fair.  Not fair at all.

Nolan's New Toy

In addition to the trumpet and snare drum, Nolan plays the marimba.  Since we were not the owners of a marimba, Nolan had to stay after school to practice using the school's equipment.  That worked fine while school was in session, but was difficult during holiday breaks and summer vacation.  Off and on for over a year, I've been watching the KSL classifieds for a decently priced used marimba.  I've seen a total of 2 marimbas listed...one was for $3500 which was way more than I was willing to consider paying, and the other was an Adams brand which I was not interested in.  Earlier this week, I checked KSL and there was a Musser 4.3 octave marimba listed for $1500.  For a decent marimba, that was an excellent price.  Nolan was interested in checking out the marimba.  It was in "like new" condition.  Nolan decided he wanted the marimba, so now there is a new toy in his room.  He's practiced everyday since he got it (that means he's 3 for 3 in practicing!).  It's fun to hear such a different sounding instrument in the house.

Junior High Honor Band

Last weekend was the Alpine District Honor Band for the Junior High kids.  Nolan was selected as a member of the band playing the trumpet.He had a great experience.  I can honestly say that this was the best junior band I have ever heard.  I recorded the concert, but unfortunately the memory card wasn't formatted so I can't access the recordings.  Grrrr!  Anyway, here's a couple of pictures...the big group, and Nolan with Todd Campbell, the guest conductor.

Nolan is in here somewhere!

Shopping

I hate going to the grocery store with Miles.  It's anything but efficient, especially when he thinks he should be the one pushing the cart.  He tends to get distracted and looks around and the cart goes wherever his eyes are looking so I have to constantly redirect the cart away from endcaps and displays.  He was so proud of himself (and it was pretty cute!)

A New Food!

Yesterday Miles willingly and happily ate Angel Hair pasta.  He didn't eat a ton, maybe 2 noodles, but he ate a new food that wasn't sugar based.  Today for lunch he asked for more noodles.  Exciting (to the point that I took a picture to document this awesome event)!!!

Less than Angelic at School

On Friday, Miles came home from school with a "yellow zone" behavior card.  Yellow is the second best behavior he could have, however, this is the first time Miles' behavior hasn't been in the "green zone."  I was curious what he'd done.  His teacher indicated that Miles dropped a toy on another student's head.  I asked Miles if he'd dropped a toy on a kid's head and he told me, "I not drop a toy on Tony's head.  I bonked him."  Knowing that there are some pretty heavy toys at Miles' school, I asked him what he'd "bonked" Tony with.  He answered, "an alligator."  Well, Miles and I had a little chat about being kind and not bonking other people in the head with toys because that could hurt someone.  For penance, Miles wrote a note to his teacher, "I will play nice" and had to tell Tony "sorry".  I still think the whole thing is pretty funny.

Google Image

Last night, Miles wanted me to find him a picture of an octopus on the internet.  Easy... I went to Google Image and, in less than a second, there were thousands of pictures of various octopus species for Miles to admire.  We looked at the various types of octopuses and then Miles asked to see pictures of crabs which were followed by sharks, whales, fish, snowstorms, rainstorms, "moonstorms", boogers (but I said "no" to that request), toilets, sinks, "bouncy bounces", M&Ms, xylophones, electric guitars, classical guitars, harmonicas, McDonalds, and many other nouns.  Miles was fascinated.  He was amazed.  For over an hour we explored various subjects using Google Image.  Miles wasn't ready to be done when I was going crazy with boredom, so Miles went and got his iPod and used his logo games and vocabulary building games as dictionaries and spent another hour typing in words and admiring the images.  Fun babysitter!

Treasured Memory vs. Reality

Remember this?

Growing up, I envied anyone who possessed this gum. My mom was a believer in sugar-free gum.  Smart lady.  I had strong teeth.  However, this gum was highly desirable to me.  I don't know why; even as a child I knew the flavor lasted for less than 5 minutes and then the gum was nasty.  But, I have such fond memories of the extraordinarily sweet gum; especially the yellow colored sticks of gum.  I don't remember what the yellow flavor was, but I remember it being my favorite.  Well, several weeks ago, I was putting together a box of treats for Jonathan to be consumed during finals week.  I found the Fruit Stripe gum at Dollar Tree.  I hadn't seen it in years.  Well, I threw it in Jonathan's care package.  He brought 96% of the box home with him over Christmas break.  The gum was untouched.  I was excited and happily opened the pack.  I was looking forward to a taste bud trip down memory lane.   What I got was not what I remembered.  Nasty! Nasty!  Nasty! adequately summarizes what this gum is.  The yellow sticks of gum were still there, but they didn't taste like I'd remembered them.  Every flavor was terrible.  I'm going to choose to believe that the manufacturers of Fruit Stripe gum have changed the artificial flavors over the past 30 years because there's no way that this gum could ever have been considered desirable.  Yuck.

Oh, and as a mom, I too am a believer in sugar-free gum!

Driving in a Snow Storm

Yesterday we had a little snow storm that was supposed leave 2-3" of snow behind.  We got 6".  Evidently the cities and their snowplow teams didn't take the storm serious because the road were awful.  In the afternoon I had to go run an errand.  It was snowing. The driving required at lot of focus.  Miles didn't like what was on the radio.  It was the local news channel giving the news at the top of the hour which ends with a weather report.  I wanted to listen to what they were saying about the storm while Miles wanted "number 6 song."  Well, I told Miles that he'd have to wait because I wanted to hear the weather report, and it was too dangerous for me to mess with the radio.  Miles did not accept my answer so he responded by throwing a huge tantrum.  He was screaming and kicking and causing a major distraction for me from the backseat.  I told Miles that if he didn't stop screaming, then he was going to cause me to wreck the car and he'd have to go to the hospital and get lots of needles.  Well guess what?  That quieted Miles immediately.  The tantrum ended instantly.  A few minutes later though, Miles spoke up.  He said, "The hospital is all closed.  It's locked.  I not go hospital."  I thanked him for ceasing the screaming and kicking, and told him we didn't need to go to the hospital.  Several times during the afternoon, Miles felt the need to restate his position of "the hospital is all closed.  It's locked."

Waste of Money, Hopefully

I like to update the food in our 72 hour kits around the start of the New Year.  I pull out all the food and tell everyone to eat what they want and to let me know how the food survived the year... stale, nasty, okay, actually good, or whatever.  Last year I didn't update the food, so the boys were a bit more cautious as to what they were willing to sample. Well, I don't put MREs in the 72 hour kits.  I put a lot of shelf-stable "comfort" foods.  My theory is that if we are actually eating what is in the 72 hour kits, then something horrible has happened and hopefully the food can be a comfort source rather than something that adds to the stress of whatever is going on.  So instead of a "Spaghetti and Meatball MRE", my boys are eating individual boxes of sugar cereal, cup of noodles, jerky, Oreos, candy, canned pineapple, gatorade, chipotle chicken salad, etc.  Well, everytime I buy the 72 hours kit food, I am reminded that shelf stable food is amazingly expensive.  I spent $130 on food that I am hoping will never be consumed.  What a waste of money, I hope.

Out of the Mouth of Miles

The other night, after Miles had been put to bed, I went in to tell him "good night".  I gave him a love and as I was leaving the room, I said, "I", and Miles usually finishes the sentence with, "Love you!"  However, this night things went a bit different.  I said "I", and Miles finished the sentence with "like the dark.  Shut the door!"  Too funny!

Jonathan's 2013 Year Review

I stole this from Jonathan's Facebook page.  Here are his 2013 highlights...

What hath 2013 brought?
All-State Band and Utah Wind Symphony Youth Ensemble.
HOSA and Region Science Fair.
18th Birthday.
Graduating from Timpanogos High.
Maple Dell.
Starting at the University of Utah.
Mt. Whitney.
The Dean's List.
High hopes for 2014.