Christmas Recital - Video!!

At LAST! The videos from the Christmas Dance Recital! I know it's taken me three days to get this posted, but I have literally spilt blood trying to get this up. I woke up at 4am this morning and decided to get it finished once and for all!

I'm a little frustrated at the poor quality of the video. You can't really see faces, so I'll describe where my kids and I are at the beginning of each dance. There were ten dances total with kids ranging in age from 4 years to teenagers, but we only taped the ones my family was in. Now I'm wishing I had them all!

The Opener - Lollipop by Mika

Megan is the little blonde girl in the center front, wearing a turquoise sweater and pink mini-skirt, holding an orange lollipop. She has a couple of little solo parts in the song, and had a blast doing that. Nathan is second from right, wearing a red sweatshirt with a blue scarf, holding a yellow lollipop. I know it looks like he has braids... but it's the hat he's wearing, not his hair. :D

Check out the Coffee Grinder move by the boys at the front near the end of the video.



Intermediate Clogging Class - Gummy Bear

Nathan is on the far left wearing Orange. Megan is second from right in Blue. Scottlynn (Crazy Lady's youngest daughter) is third from right wearing Pink. These kids had such a fun time learning and performing this song and I think they did a great job! It's hard to believe that my kids have only been clogging for 16 months. I'm absolutely thrilled with the progress they're making, and they absolutely love it!



Lyrical Class - Song for a Winter Night

Megan starts on the far right. She is the tallest blonde girl in this class. Scottlynn starts on the far left. I think. I have a really hard time telling girls apart when their hair is all pulled up!



Adult Clogging Class - Chocolate

From left to right: Sara in Blue, Erin in Yellow, Amidey (The Crazy Lady) in Green, My Lameness in Red, and Jessica (my fave Sister Out-Law) in Orange. We had soooo much fun with this song. This clogging class is literally the highlight of my week. I love all these ladies and can't wait for class to start again in January!



And NOW.... the REST of the Story!

Remember This Comment from the Crazy Lady the other day?

"Btw - It was fun pinching your butt!"

Here's the incident she was referring to. What the HECK?! I guess she was trying to make sure I would smile through the performance! Well... it worked!


All I can say is, it's a good thing my husband didn't see her do that!

Something happened before the camera started rolling that I desperately wish had gotten filmed: Jessica started out on stage and nobody followed her! Somehow she didn't get the memo that we weren't quite ready. When she realized she was all alone up there, she did a little curtsy and then ran back behind the curtain wondering what the heck was going on?! HAHAHAHAHAHA! Sorry Jessica! Love you!

Like I've said before... the laughter is one of my favorite things about clogging. Good times. Good times indeed!

Anyone in the area who wants to sign their kids (or themselves) up for clogging or ballet/lyrical dance classes, just contact The Crazy Lady!

Great Hair Day

Women like to talk about 'bad hair days' - and from the frequency of complaints, you'd think that most days find most women follicularly challenged.

I had a great hair day today.

I like my hair. It is naturally dark blond with summer highlights. I normally wear it shortish and curly, with the help of regular visits to my hairdresser for a perm. My spring perm is growing out. No longer can I just wash, gel, and go. Most days I require some serious help from the curling iron to get stuff to stay where it should. Despite the extra time, I like the softer look, so I'm holding out a little longer before going back in to get curly again.

But not today. Today my hair went just where I wanted when I combed it. The bangs are long-ish and wavy and brush over the tops of my eyebrows, thus eliminating the need to wax. Well on one side, anyway. It all just "worked" somehow, and I had no idea what I'd done to make that happen. I gave the mirror a wicked smile and sprayed the head down with hairspray, then off I went to the store, to a cooking class and lunch, and then into the garden to plant some fall vegetables. Just before driving Susan to saxophone lessons, I checked myself in the mirror briefly, and decided that the windblown look suited me.

Then we opened the front door to a hailstorm. Susan balked, unwilling to get wet. I squealed "what are you waiting for?!" because I, who was holding the storm door open wide so that she and her saxophone could clear it, was getting soaked by her indecision. And then we ran together screaming and laughing into the storm and were promptly wet through in the 20 foot race to the van.

I figured my great do was ruined, which was a shame because I still had two more public appearances to make today. I flipped down the visor to check the mirror, and do you know what? My hair got EVEN BETTER as a result of the hail, if it were even possible. Now I was not only windblown, but had that sorta random kinda spiky just-gelled look that is so hip nowadays. I was stylin', baby! Sexy, even.

I should have taken a picture... in fact I did take a picture. I took several. But they just didn't capture the amazingness of my true appearance, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

It is possible that I was just deluded. And I'll thank in advance my IRL friends that saw me today NOT to burst my bubble if they're holding their sides laughing and rolling on the floor right now. Ignorance is bliss, they say.

21st Anniversary

I met my amazing hottie husband twenty-one years ago today.

Would you like to hear the story?


It was August 24, 1987, and I had arrived for new student orientation the weekend before classes started for fall semester at BYU-Provo. My parents and sister had helped me unload my belongings into my on-campus dorm room that afternoon. I had met my new roommate and several other girls on my floor. At dinner we learned that our Y-group was going to meet for get-to-know-you games and a tour of campus that evening, and there were going to be boys there.

Boys?! Sign me up!

I went down a few minutes early to the lobby where our group was to meet, towing my roommate and a couple of other girls for security. After all, there were going to be boys there!

And boys there were. A lean, muscular young man with dark hair and large blue eyes looked up as my giggling group entered the room. His teeth were perfect, and his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. His biceps bulged out from the sleeves of his blue t-shirt. I'm sure there were other boys there too, but I don't remember much about them. I saw only him. Dang, but he was cute.

At BYU, the mandatory cliche pattern was always followed when meeting someone new: "What's your name, where're you from, what's your major?" His name was Tom. He was from Seattle. He was studying Electrical Engineering. When I told him I was from Idaho, he asked which town.

"Blackfoot," I said. (I grew up in the potato farming community west of Blackfoot, but no one knows or cares where backwater Pingree is, so I always say Blackfoot. It saves time).

"Really? I have an aunt and uncle that live near Blackfoot."

And because Idaho is a little hick state with exactly 25 people living in it, he told me the name of his uncle, naively confident that I would know who that was.

I did.

I gaped. "Mr. **** is your Uncle?! Mr. **** taught me how to drive!! Your aunt is the librarian at my high school! No way!"

And with that, a bond was formed between us. A pretty weak bond at first, actually, considering that he didn't ask me out for nearly two months after that despite me being oh so available, but there was something there, to be sure. Well, I felt it, anyway.

And the rest, as they say, is history.

A Piercing Scream Ripped the Air. Twice.

Alternate Title: The one with disjointed thoughts and run-on sentences.

Okay not really on the screaming. Anyone who blogs knows that coming up with a clever title that relates to the post contents is the hardest part of blogging. Well, maybe not THE hardest part, but it's right up there with finding time to sit down and blog, thinking of cool things to blog about, inventing provocative poll questions, waiting for videos to upload, embedding code in posts without mangling it beyond functionability, and being real without embarrassing family members to death and losing their trust so they never tell me anything again.

Anyway - while at first glance the post title above may not seem to be related to this post. Keep reading, and hopefully you'll see how in my twisty, windey way, I tie it all together at the end. You can even suggest alternate titles, and I'll put the best ones at the top of this post.

So, I've been moaning publicly about my lack of feminine qualities lately. I think this issue is on my mind because I've been hanging out with cute people who are more stylish and skinnier than I am. This actually pretty much sums up going to church. About 90% of my ward is younger and thinner and more hip than me. It's that dratted comparison game - I always lose and can't for the life of me figure out why I continue to play. If only we'd purchased that other house we were considering in that older neighborhood in Orem, where most of the ward would be in their 50's by now, I wouldn't be going through this painful introspection today!

Now what was I talking about before? :slaps cheeks lightly: Come on girl, focus...

Oh yes. While I've never been a lover of lace and bows and frills, on clothes or anything else, I remember an era around 1-7 BC (Before Children) when I was skinny and I did enjoy dressing up more and owned a few cute stylish clothes and wore pierced earrings and painted my fingernails and spent time on eye makeup and performed the batting of eyelashes when cute boys were around and once even tweezed my eyebrows! So I know that I do have it in me, somewhere. Somewhere deep.

I had my ears pierced in High School, right before the Junior Prom. Over the years my parents gave me various pairs of earrings and I loved them all. Every now and then I'll run across the box where I store them, and reminisce and feel a little sad that I can't wear them anymore due to the fact that I let my post holes heal over during early motherhood after baby Karianne yanked on my earrings one too many times and I removed them.

There is the pair of pearls I wore for my wedding. And the green jade dangly ones dad gave me when I graduated from college. There is a lovely pair with freshwater pearls dangling from short chains - except that this pair is now a single lonely earring due to the other being lost one night while I was bidding an enthusiastic farewell to my future husband (but neither of us knew it at the time) outside my dorm. But because this is a family-friendly website I'll just leave that story be. Ahem.

And then there are the several pairs of earrings that I have brought home from my mother's vast jewelry collection in the last year: dainty porcelain roses, delicate silver butterflies, and sparkling zirconia with matching pendant on a thin gold chain. I've brought them home, planning to give them to my girls someday, but secretly wishing that my ears hadn't healed shut and I could wear them myself.

And then a friend told me that getting ears re-pierced through the same holes doesn't hurt like the blazing suns like I thought it would, and I began thinking about actually doing it.

Do you think I should?

Too late. I already did. And while I was at it, I took Megan and got her ears pierced too, since she's been nagging me for over two years now and I figured that I might as well reverse my earlier wise parental edict that girls must reach the completely arbitrary age of twelve before paying people to poke holes in their ears, which will probably have the effect of spoiling her rotten and teaching her that family rules are debatable and starting her on the slippery slope into a rebellious teenager-hood and I'll have guilt and grief over this decision. But hey, at least I'll look cute while it happens.

I'm so glad I got my priorities straightened out on this issue.

Here is the photographic evidence of our mutual mutilation at the mall.

One ear down, one to go, and she's still smiling! (It's all an act, folks. That thing stung. But I didn't want the bossy little asian chick with the gun to see me cry. She scared me a little bit.)

Megan is so excited and takes heart because mom made it look so utterly easy.

Ouch!

OUUUUUUUCH!

Megan decided that she would probably live, and sucked it up for the pictures.

And this is how I came to understand that I am a real woman after all: because I am willing to endure pain and torture for the sake of fashion and I am teaching my youngest daughter to do the same.

There's a lot of personal policies being thrown under the bus lately.

Stay tuned for the next exciting installment of my feminine metamorphosis: Lisa Shaves Her Legs!

Almosta Woman

I suspect that maybe I'm not a real woman. I mean, sure, I have all the right body parts, so there's no confusion there. But there are so many typical feminine things that I just don't get. For example:

1. Shopping: I would rather stick hot needles in my eyes. Unless we're talking about Home Depot--then I am so there!
   
2. Clothes: What do you mean, t-shirts aren't 'fashionable?'... whatever the heck that means...
3. Shoes: 8 pair is a lot of shoes for one person to own, isn't it?
4. Accessories: I have one black leather purse. 'nuff said.
5. Jewelry: Wedding ring-- check. Watch-- uh... the battery needs replacing. Necklaces, earrings, bracelets, etc-- Ahahahahahahahahahaha--Ahem. No.
6. Hair: I have never colored my hair and I have worn the same hairstyle as far back as my memory goes, which actually isn't very far, so hey, I could be wrong about that last one.
   
7. Pedicure/manicure: I am not exactly sure what those words mean. All I know is that I don't own nail polish.
8. Makeup: I do wear makeup, actually. DingDingDing - there's one for the woman column! No lipstick though.
9. Wedding: I wanted to elope. We only had a reception because mom was afraid of what the neighbors might think.
10. Multitasking: I can't talk on the phone and fold laundry at the same time, let alone cook dinner or drive.
11. Interests: I like computers. And power tools. And farm animals. People.... not so much.
    
12. Crafts/scrapbooking/home decor: Bwahahahahahahahahahhaa.... nope.
    
13. Babies: The early phase of life that parents endure until their children get interesting. Sure, they're cute. Next?

I'm sure there are more. I'm just too depressed to keep listing them. Okay not really depressed depressed. Hi dad! :wave:

Knee update

So the knee was getting better, and I hiked at Zion's over spring break; everything looked rosy. Then the next week I twisted it again, and it was worse than before. I went back to the orthopedist, and he recommended arthroscopic surgery to fix what he was certain was a tear in the meniscus cartilage that cushions the joint. He figured I'd be on crutches for 1-2 days, with average recovery at 4-6 weeks.

Tuesday May 6 was the big day. Monday evening at FHE we were discussing what would happen, and I expressed that I was a little nervous about being put to sleep for the surgery. Megan (who had surgery for a broken arm at age 5) smiled wisely and patted my arm and said "Don't worry mommy, it's not scary at all! You just get really sleepy and warm and then you wake up!" Wait a minute. Who is the child here?

The paperwork instructed me that I would need a babysitter for 24 hours after surgery. My wonderful father drove down Tuesday morning to provide domestic support (interpretation: do everything for me) for a couple of days until I was back on my feet. We arrived at the surgical center at 12:35pm and the fun began.

I traded my snap-up warmup pants and tee shirt for a stylish, faded hospital gown, a surgical cap, and disposable brown footies. Then a urine sample to ensure I wasn't pregnant, and it was time for bloodwork. After two painful strikes, the pre-op nurse finally got my IV in. Once I was on the operating table and belted on (click it, or ticket!), the anesthesiologist warned me that I would get dizzy really quick once he put the meds in my IV. He was right. Wheeeeee! The last thing I remember was saying, "Gee, I've never been high before...."

Then some annoying woman was shouting at me to wake up. And someone had stolen my knee and replaced it with a thousand blazing suns. I whined until she gave me both a pill and put medication in my veins. And then I asked my father what time it was at least four times in 2 minutes. I babbled on about who knows what for who knows how long -- I don't remember anything I said. I hope I didn't divulge any information critical to national security.

So we sat there and I dozed in between inane bursts of gutteral noises, and then the doctor was standing at the foot of my bed. He said something ridiculous about removing a quarter sized piece of cartilage and then joked that I had to be on crutches for four weeks. I laughed and shook his hand and then he left. Wait.

Then a nurse who moonlights as an auctioneer came and rattled off the post-op instructions. Whatever, lady. She also said something about no weight bearing on the left leg for a month. I told her I'd already heard that joke. Then another nurse came in and took out my IV and helped me get back into my cool warmup pants and put my socks and shoes on my feet, which is harder than it sounds, and then wheeled me out to the van.

My daddy bought me an oreo raspberry shake at Arctic Circle and I ate it while he picked up my Lortab pills. And then we went home and I took up residence in the same place I am writing this post from: the recliner on the living room couch. And I think it's time for another pill. Hello, lover.

The Great and Terrible Day of the Dance Recital

Nathan, Megan, and I began clogging lessons in September... and worked on these songs for four months before the performance on December 15. It was scary, it was fun, it was exhilarating... and all too soon it was done. Fortunately for you, my loyal fans, my dad captured it all on tape. Unfortunately for you, I don't have the vids posted here.

And this is why:

I tried in vain for a week to get the video of our recital off the camera and onto this blog. Well... technically I was successful in getting it uploaded to google video (it took overnight!!!). The bad news is that somewhere in the process, the video and sound got off synch... so it's maddening to watch because the legs don't kick when the music says they should. So I'm not putting it up. Perhaps I'll try again with YouTube and see if it works better. No promises.

For now, all you get is pics of us before we went on stage:


Nathan and Megan's clogging number was at the beginning of the program, and then Megan had one song during which she frantically changed into her ballet costume (not as hard as it sounds; she has her white leotard and tights on under this ensemble, so all she had to do was strip the pants and shirt off, and put on a blue tutu). I wish we'd gotten a pic of her as a ballerina. She was a most adorable one.

Jessica and Me. Yep, we're it. Our class started out at six ladies, and four dropped out by mid October. We were just ornery enough to stick with it, and we had an absolute blast. I think we spend 25% of each class laughing uncontrollably -- usually the teacher and Jessica are laughing at me because I cannot master the new incredibly difficult step she has just taught me. Or else I just slipped and fell flat on my fanny. Good times.

Nathan and Megan dancing "Run Run Rudolph" in formation.

Here's a closeup. Notice the creepy alien eyes. Okay, my kids are not really aliens. I'm just too lazy to fix it since I've already postponed this silly post for three weeks. Deal with it.



Okay... somehow the vid of Nathan and Megan's dance got on here, so I'll leave it. The video does kinda catch up to the music near the end of the dance. Nathan starts out at the middle back, the tallest kid at the point of the V. Megan is on the far left side of the screen. She's the tallest girl with the pile of blonde curls on her head.


As scared as I was beforehand, dancing in recital was one of the funnest things I've ever done. Afterward I felt a little sad that after four months of working my tail off to learn the steps, it was over in 3 minutes on stage. At least I have the consolation that class starts up again next week. Yippeeeee!

Do you think it will be a problem that I've done almost zero exercise and gained at least five pounds since recital?