Daring Young Mom

Lately I’ve been misty around the eyes from all the kind comments and emails I’ve been getting regarding a certain Blog Award mishap. I think I responded to everyone individually but if I somehow missed you, thanks to everyone who has taken the time to send me well wishes and support.

Catez Stevens was a frequent commenter on my recent post about the controversy. I know some people were concerned that she was attacking me in some way but the two of us have been emailing and commenting back and forth and it’s been a great exercise in resolving differences calmly, while remaining firm in our own beliefs. I want to thank her publicly for taking such a serious interest in my little problem.

She posted about me this morning and offered me an Award that I am proud to accept. It is an Aroha Award, an award that she has created to honor blogs with a unique feature that deserves acknowledgement. Aroha is the Maori word for love and I’m feeling a lot of it coming from Catez and many others of you who have been kind enough to drop me a line. Thank you so much for the sweetness.

The award in my sidebar is also a link to her site (It’s a beautiful graphic, yes?). Please check her out and feel free to vote for her in this year’s Weblog Awards. She’s up for best New Zealand Blog.

DYDad is wet from doing dishes and taking Laylee to the park in the Seattle winter. He’s kept the tears to a minimum.

Laylee is crying because of the “consequences.” Sheeeeee’s been testing the limits this week and we’re trying to get more creative. Yesterday she refused to put on clothes to go to the park in freezing weather. After repeated attempts to reason with her, Dan let her go outside in nuthin’ but a pull-up so she could decide whether wearing clothes was a good idea. She quickly renounced her fervent nudity and bundled up. Why does she have to act so childish and immature all the time? Oh…wait….

Magoo cries because he’s eating a ton of carrots but none are coming out. Hmm….I’d cry too.

In other precipitation news, I have been laughing so hard I’m crying since taking the new quiz my sister and our mutual friend came up with. They are so funny, I can’t even write about it without laughing out loud.

Please go take the quiz if you’ve read any of the Harry Potter books, ever taken a silly internet personality quiz, or ever thought you might like to try laughing so hard that liquid squirted from every orifice of your body.

You scored as Argus Filch. Congrats! You are most like Argus Filch. You torment the dickens out of the students under your care. You also flunked out of magic school. Your precious cat is the only one who loves you.

Harry Potter Mania
created with QuizFarm.com

1. Paying less than $3.00/gallon for gas. I remember back in college when gas was hovering right under a dollar and I wondered if it would really go that high. Ha! Now I call it a bargain if it drops below $2.50. Yikes. Check this out for tips on saving money on gas. (reminder – I’m only in my mid-twenties…..okay upper-mid.)

2. Funny cool people with a great attitude. Check out posts by the two newest bloggers I link to on my sidebar, Fallible and Rocks in My Dryer. I hope to rotate and change these links around, based on who I’m currently reading.

3. My daddy. He wrote the sweetest seven sevens I’ve ever seen and sent it to me by email. I want to be like him if I ever grow up.

4. Good Great Super-Hero-Type Babysitters — We have a pretty steady babysitter who we’ll call Ruby. We adore her. The kids adore her. I am happy to pay her for the peace of mind it brings me when she’s watching the kids.

We have a “mother’s helper” (read this — too-young-for-me-to-feel-comfortable-leaving-the-kids-alone-with-her-but-we’re-trying-to-brainwash-her-into-loving-our-kids-so-we-can-monopolize-her-on-weekends-for-the-rest-of-her-life-when-she-gets-older) This past week, she spent over two hours sitting in the car (Laylee jumps in at this point and says “VAN! It’s a van Mommy. It’s MY van!) VAN (for the love, stop YELLING at me!) with the kids reading stories every time I stopped to run in and do an errand.

Over two hours of errands without having to unpack the kids from the car ONCE and the whole time with them thinking it was the best thing ever — all for the tidy sum of $6.00, which she argued was too much. She then told me she’d had a “really fun time.” Ahh! I’m in love.

We discovered another awesome babysitter last night. She brought a “kit” of activities for the kids and did all kinds of a great job. People at the Mega-Corp Christmas party asked us who was watching Laylee and Magoo and it felt so great to say we were confident in the care they were getting.

5. Cartridge World. Save the world and save a couple bucks. They recycle your old cartridge and sell you refilled used ones for half the price of new. We tried them for the first time today. One more step towards actually sending out Christmas cards this year. It really may happen….preferably before the 25th.

6. Fun links to my site:

I am quoted on an Indian Cooking Site. I feel like I’m Martha Stewart-style famous now, without the prison record. (Look about half-way down on the left sidebar for a quote by Kathryn. Pst……that’s me.)

Also, I am the second hit if you do an msn search for the word “daring.” Sweet!

Today Blackbird has asked to see some decorations. Here it is:

Just kidding! That still cracks me up until I cry…in a good way.

My favorite kind of decorating involves taking ordinary items and making them look festive. For example, our ever famous train picture. I seem to post it all the time, not because I love it (although I do), but because it hangs over the fireplace in the main living area of our house and it’s just always there in the background….. watching us. Come to think of it, that kind of freaks me out.

Anyway, here’s what we did to make it Christmassy.

Notice the small red flower in the smokestack. I was not always so subtle in my Christmas decorating. In college, I would just make little Santa hats and put them on all the people in the photos in my apartment, The Lady of Shallot, my grandma, the dancing in the rain rich people who don’t give a hoot that their poor servants are freezing in the cold (I still love that picture).

I think it is time to share how I got the train picture. It is a super-cool street vendor creation using ordinary household/garagehold items to create a train. If you look closely, you’ll see the spark plugs, flashlights, keys, washers, hinges, etc.

Dan fell in love with this when he saw it hanging on the wall of my college roommate’s sweet parents’ home in Seattle shortly after we moved up here. I fell in love with it because he liked it so much and never expresses an interest in home décor.

Several months later, the couple was moving to a much smaller home on their way to retirement and wanted to get rid of a bunch of stuff. They told us to come by their garage sale and start thinking of stuff we wanted because it would probably be out there for sale.

I took this literally. So a few weeks later we were over for dinner, they were talking about the garage sale and I said, “If you sell that train picture at the garage sale, I’m calling dibs on it.”

They sort of looked at each other and said, “We….weren’t planning on selling it….”

Awkward silence.

Me: Oh, that’s cool. I was just kidding. We just really like it.

Nice Lady: I guess we could sell it to you if you really want it. Right, hubby? We don’t need that picture anymore. We’ve had it forever.

Me: (oh my word! It’s a freaking family treasure) No seriously, it’s okay.

Nice Lady: I’ll sell it to you for $20.

Me: (writing a check) If you’re sure…….

We left our free dinner that night with a $20 painting and a huge blank spot on the host’s wall. Have you ever gone into someone’s home, seen a wall-hanging or piece of furniture you like, pointed to it and said, “I like that! How much do you want for it?” Well I have. You should try it sometime. Then every time someone compliments you on the item once it’s in your home, you can tell them the story of how you got it……or I guess you could ask them to make an offer…..

I will do a meme from a cool blogging momma who tagged me the other day, MyNewFriend at Blest With Sons.

Thanks for encouraging me to move on and post something else tonight. Whew! What a day. I was out all evening with Karli, listening to some beautiful music and feeling a great sense of renewal. I love the feeling of true peace. It’s especially nice after a day like today.

Here goes the Seven Sevens…

Seven things I hope to do before I die:
1. Raise an eternal family who love each other, love the Lord, are smart, compassionate, understanding and happy – and good at playing Rook, the Rook skills are definitely a must.
2. Complete a feature length documentary film and submit it to a major festival (I’m sort of working on this one but too scared to reveal any details).
3. Write and publish a non-fiction book (a novel too but I’m more fascinated by non-fiction).
4. Travel the world, France, Australia, Ireland, India, The Holy Lands, your mom’s house, etc.
5. Show Dan the kind of love and support he showers on me daily.
6. Invent something really cool, make a bazillion dollars and randomly pay off people’s mortgages anonymously.
7. Become an expert kayaker.

Seven things I cannot do:
1. Kayak well.
2. Keep from laughing when DY Dad does his “crazy Monster’s, Inc. face.”
3. Get a speeding ticket. I’m not saying I never speed, but somehow I never get ticketed. The one time I was pulled over, I accidentally evaded the police. I’ll explain more later.
4. Teach Junior High students. I have no patience for this age and too many painful memories, being a former brace-faced, four-eyed, band-member, straight-A-student in grades 7-9.
5. Spell to save my life. In college, I was almost denied a secretarial position because I failed a spelling test. I convinced the person in charge of hiring that I did indeed know how to press the spell-check button.
6. Be rude to telemarketers. I can joke about it, but when I’m on the phone with them, I just don’t have the heart. I try to let them down easily and politely.
7. Let my kids boss me around.

Seven things that attract me to my spouse (significant other, best friend):
1. His patience with my semi-spastic nature
2. His calming presence
3. His love for our children
4. How seriously he takes everything he does. He is the most dedicated person I know. One of his favorite quotes is from jazz musician and composer Wynton Marsalis, “Invest yourself in everything you do. There’s fun in being serious.”
5. His interest in everything I do and his burning desire to help me achieve my goals and even my craziest dreams.
6. His gorgeous blue eyes and his back (it’s true, I love his back).
7. His ability to be still and see the goodness in everyone.

Seven things I say often
1. Like….
2. For the LOVE!
3. (fingers snapping)…umm…What were we talking about?
4. Cheese. (This word has many uses. Ex — I’m tired as cheese. What the cheese are you talking about? Don’t lay there like a piece of dead cheese.)
5. Do you want a story tonight? Okay, I’m gonna count to three…..
6. That’s too bad. Those are the consequences (yes, she’s only 2 but she talks about consequences and fully understands what that means).
7. I love you. (I say this to my family members every time I talk to them in person and on the phone, which is often since none of them live around here. Lately, I’ve started accidentally saying it as I say goodbye to my friends. Un peu embarrassing. Not that I don’t love them, I just don’t like to say it so casually and randomly to people I’m not related to.)

Seven books or book series I love:
1. The Scriptures
2. Annie Dillard books (specifically Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. Go read it NOW!)
3. C.S. Lewis, The Narnia books, Mere Christianity and A Grief Observed, to name a few.
4. George Elliot and Jane Austen (I think I can safely glump them together)
5. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
6. King Lear by Shakespeare
7. Recently I have loved These Is My Words by Nancy Turner, a frontier romance, fun reading, not classic literature.

Seven movies I could watch over and over again:
1. Ordet — my favorite film of all time (strange timing, it concerns two small-town religions battling over doctrine, only to be healed by a miracle from God)
2. The Man Who Planted Trees
3. Babette’s Feast
4. Lord of the Rings
5. A&E’s Pride and Prejudice
6. Sleepless in Seattle
7. White Christmas

Seven people I want to join in this “Seven Sevens” meme:
1. Karli of Eulallia – my blogging mentor and the best pumpkin pie sharer and comforter I’ve had all day
2. Moonface of Midnight Musings – the best quiet chronicle of a satisfied life I’ve found so far
3. Stephanie of Princess Mom – funny as heck and puts it all out there for us to laugh our way through motherhood
4. Kim of Life in a Shoe – a real inspiration, awesome mother and kick-butt blogger
5. Heather of Pieces of Cheese – If I make a list, she’d better be on it. She rocks.
6. Liz of My Corner of the World – a sweet and encouraging future daring young mom
7. RGLHM of The Reluctant Good Little Homemaker – a great new blogger I’m glad to have discovered

***update – the writer M**** is no longer blogging publicly and has asked that I help protect her privacy so I’ve removed her name from this post and comments and removed any links I had up to her previous site, which no longer exists but which had a URL bearing her first and last name.***
I may be a festering, Satan-worshipping vegetable, lurking under the bedsheets of Christian Beauty, but at least I’m still funny. So says M**** of “Always Thirsty.” I think this is my first official “review.” How nice.

A couple of weeks ago I was nominated for a Blogs of Beauty Award. I still do not know who nominated me. No one will admit it. I was touched and pleased and surprised that someone or someones could see through my sometimes sarcastic humor a deep and abiding love for the Savior and nominate me alongside these other excellent women.

The days went by and I tried to say I didn’t care who won. It was so cool just to be nominated. But I can’t say I wasn’t beaming when Sallie (the creator of the awards) announced on her blog yesterday that I had won. It is SO nice to be recognized for my writing and I felt honored that it was an award given by other Christians.

I do not consider this a “Mormon blog” but rather a personal blog by someone who happens to be Mormon. I want this blog to be a support group for moms, a place where people of any religion can come, laugh a little, share in the excitement, fun and heartache of parenthood and feel a touch of grace and tolerance.

You can rip on my writing all you want and it won’t make me cry. But there are two things I must ask you never to do, post angry hateful things about my most sacred core beliefs or say horrible nasty things about my family.

Number one has already been accomplished and I’m still bawling. If someone writes a blog entry about how stupid or ugly my kids are tonight, it may just send me over the edge (and we don’t like the edge. The edge involves large amounts of extra calories and way-too-long bubble baths. Well, we like the edge, but we shouldn’t stay there for long.).

I found her post as I was looking at my traffic today and noticed a lot of hits from her URL. So I went to the site to see who my new “fan” was…..WHAM! A hit to the gut.

As I was getting Laylee ready for bed tonight (complete with Christmas carols and prayers in Jesus’ name. Gasp!) I had a hard time hiding my tears. Daddy explained that I was crying because someone had written something very mean about me on the internet. When I left the room Laylee exclaimed, “Oh Daddy! I want to write something very very very nice to Mommy.” I guess I still have a couple of fans.

What really makes me sad about this is that Sallie set up these awards as a way to promote the love of Jesus Christ and she did so right during the holiday season. She is a wonderful, caring and deeply religious person who has spent hours putting this together. It makes me sick and sad to think that people are sending her bitter and hostile emails because she didn’t dig deep enough to find out “what I truly am.”

If I gave up the award and passed it on to Amy’s Humble Musings or Jeneric Jeneralities, would you stop harassing Sallie and let us pass the holidays with the true Spirit of the season?

On her site, M**** stated, “I wonder how you would react if a Jehovah’s Witness won a contest showcasing the blogs of Latter Day Saints. I’m not here to convert Mormons, but it is my duty as a Christian to make people aware of false teachers, especially those who claim the name of Christ but add to his words (the Book of Mormon) and falsify his very essence, thus stripping him of his divinity.”

Well M**** — When the Jehovah’s Witnesses stop by and offer to share a scripture with me about Christ, I invite them in. No one can strip Christ of his divinity.

A note to my well-meaning friends: I don’t want anyone else to feel like this. So, please stop the cycle and don’t give my “reviewer” a hard time. I don’t want to have to delete you when you’re just trying to make me feel better but I’ll have to if you turn my comments section into a rip-fest.

It looks like I won that Blogs of Beauty award by a very slim margin. Thanks to whoever nominated me and to all of you who voted.

Most of all, thanks to everyone who stuck with me through “the twinge” and stoked my ego in the process.

Now, no matter where I go, no matter what I do, no one can ever say that a couple of people on the internet don’t think I’m funny. And that’s saying something.