a.rose

There are some things in life that you eventually have to concede that you will never be good at doing. For me, making a sultry face is one of those things. I've tried.  Oh, I have tried.  But I am tired of looking like a duck, and therefore, tonight, with you as my witnesses, I retire my efforts. Click here to see pictures of the last time I tried to make sultry faces.  And click HERE to see a picture of the original effort at looking sultry, and to see what I mean when I say "channeling Nicole".  (You know you look good too, Melissa!)  Just scroll until you see the pictures I am referring to.  Keep scrolling... you'll get there. And you'll know you're there. Just before I tried this last time my friend Alison recommend I try channeling my inner Nicole, again.  Which is another thing I think it's about time I faced openly and honestly.  I have no one inside me, but me.  FAIL.  FAIL.  AND ANGRY FAIL. ...

Last year the day before Halloween was a Sunday.  Our church meeting started at one o'clock.  Around 12:40 on the Sunday before Halloween last year I was putting on my own shoes, looking for the lost pair to a tiny black shoe, and wondering if it was cold enough for jackets.  We were just gathering ourselves to walk out the door when the phone rang.  On most days, at that point in the departure process, I probably would have ignored it, letting the machine take a message.  I think perhaps there was some small crisis involving hair bows or some such and I thought that granted me enough time to at least check and see who was calling. The caller id said it was my mother on the other end, and you can't ignore a phone call from your mother.  I answered, "Hi, Mom." "This is Dan." was the response I heard.  In my impatient, self-important hastiness I did not pick up on any of the clues in his voice. "Oh, hey Dan.  Is this important, because we are...

My smart friend Sarah pointed out that I neglected to give you the link for the new blog.  Silly, silly me.  Here it is: Weighting On The World To Change Hello Friends! I wormed my sneaky way into being an author on my friend Alison's blog. I'm super excited. Come check it out, it's going to be lots of fun. AND have a great weekend.

I owe a lot to Shakira.  If it weren't for her and her awesome Waka Waka song, I would have curled up and died my last quarter mile of the Market to Market.  Maybe not died, but definitely curled. If you need a song to really get your legs pumping, you should check it out. Also, check out these pictures from the race: I was a little hyper.  Listen, I only got four hours of sleep the night before, and I was the first runner of our team.  With my team, I am the one wearing all the flashing lights.  Passing on the "baton" to Torrie.  My teammates are actual runners, see, so they're fast. Just because it is really fun, more shots of me wearing my reflective vest and flashing lights.  They were required when running during "nighttime hours".  I had a head lamp and a butt flasher.  It's a classy look.  Our team, after we finished.  Yes, it's dark again.  And Amber had to wear the vest, but not the flasher!...

Earlier this week I posted some pictures of Hanna helping out around the house.  To be fair, Hallie does her fair share. My mom sent me some pictures she took of the girls while she was watching them for me so I could run all day.  Among them: Most days Hallie makes her bed and tidies up her room all by herself.  Most days. And some days I manage to not remake her bed more neatly.

Here's the deal.  I made a new friend a few weeks ago.  Yes, that's a good thing.  She invited me to come to a party? celebration? holiday festivities? of some sort.  Yes, that's a good thing. What you need to know is that she is Muslim, and this is Eid al-Adha that she has invited me to celebrate with her family, and all of her Muslim friends.  Again, that's great and I'm really looking forward to it. Trouble is, that I am in fact not Muslim, nor do I know much about their customs.  So, when I talked to  her she said her little girls would be wearing dresses. That's easy enough, I can have my girls wear dresses. And then, fool that I am, I asked her what I should wear, like what would she be wearing? She's a nice person so she didn't let me feel awkward, but I still don't really know what to wear. She told me I could wear a dress if I wanted to, but that I should just wear whatever I will be comfortable in.  I don't know what that is! T...

What you need to know to understand what I am about to say: - My mother recently visited my sister. - Some sort of fancy grocery store (what is it called, again?) recently opened near my sister's house. - My mother and my sister went to the said fancy grocery store, and they bought some things. - My mother brought me some of the spoils of said grocery shopping trip.  Those of you who know what that is are now nodding your heads in appreciation, and perhaps casually swiping some drool of your chin.  For those of you who don't know what that is, I'll try to explain. - Guarana is to Brasil as Root Beer is to the U.S.A. Got it now?  Yeah, good. When my mom handed me this delicious thing, all I could think was, if only I had known in Brasil what I know now, I would have consumed much, much more of this stuff. But I figure, if that's the main regret of my life, I haven't done so badly in life, have I?

When I go about my business around town, people often remark to me, "Wow, you have quite a crew of little helpers!" or, "I bet they are a lot of help!" And I don't know if they are being sincere or sarcastic, but I almost always reply - in all honesty -  "Yes, they are." And now, I have proof.  I was tidying up the house just before bedtime last night.  Heather was already counting sheep in her bed, and Hallie and Hanna only had minutes left on the clock.  I came into the kitchen and found Hanna like this:  And I looked to the dishwasher and she had filled it with all the dishes that were in the sink!  I mean, I may have to rearrange a few things... take the lid off that cup... and remove the chocolate milk (I mean, she's 2. I feel like I have some time to teach her proper dishwasher filling technique) THANKS HANNA! So yes, world.  They really are good little helpers.  Most of the time.

I don't know what other people think about when they are going on long runs, and I have myself never spent more than 30 or 40 minutes running, so I've never really had to keep myself entertained for all that long. Last Saturday I ran with some of my friends in the Market to Market relay, a race from Omaha to Lincoln.  I was originally slated to run 9.3 miles, but then last minute one of our runners couldn't run with us, and so my mileage went up to 11.5.  Now for someone like, any of my other teammates, or Devin that probably wasn't a big deal.  To me, however, that was like...this fun thing I'm doing with my friends is now something that might cause serious damage to my body. Turns out I hobbled along just fine, definitely the slowest on our team (but that was no surprise), and probably the slowest person there overall (again, not really a shocker).  I did run with my ipod for my last segment (3 miles) - because I don't think I could have even hobbled in i...

We've been busy busy beavers around here lately. I have completed the following projects:  I started making most of these back in January, before Heather was born.  I finished all but four of them, and decided the other day it was about time I just finished.  I think there are 8 of these little beauties.  I know, I know, you're wondering why I wanted 8 jungle animal pillows?  Meh, who knows.  But now I have them!  So I finished the jungle animal pillows, and then felt like I wanted something kind of girly to liven up the place, you know?  So I made these. All out of scraps.  Take that scrap pile!  Also, I think one will be up for grabs in this year's ThanksGIVEaway ... I'm starting to get excited for that, who's with me?  I FINISHED HEATHER'S QUILT! Now all three of my girls have Winnie the Pooh quilts, and I am sort of tickled pink and just down right pleased with myself.  I quilted it by hand, and this is wh...

My favorite General Conference talk from today was either the one by Neil L. Anderson on Faith, or the one by Dallin H. Oaks on Children. Really though, the one by Shayne M. Bowen had me crying throughout. What was your favorite? You can watch tomorrow's sessions of General Conference, here . They still only have the audio or video versions of these talks, but to watch or listen to them click here .  If you want to hear or watch the ones I mentioned, just scroll until you find it.

You know how sometimes you wake up in the morning and the sky is cloudy and the air is chilly and everyone is cranky and whiny? So you lay in your bed and think, "How am I going to fill all the hours of today?  There is no where to go and there is nothing to do." And you get up and you mope around in your pajamas for a while looking for inspiration to strike, but it doesn't, and the only thing that happens is you get sleepier and the girls get fightier, and the whole day seems to be swirling down the toilet. If only the sun would come out from behind the clouds, right?  Problem solved. But it doesn't.  So you get dressed, and then one, two, three you hold down everyone else until they are dressed too.  Socks, shoes, sweaters, because it is cold outside today. You pile in the car to drive to somewhere that will cheer everyone up.  Somewhere really interesting and perhaps full of mystery and excitement.  Like, Walmart. But to spice it up a bit, h...