Feeling kind of lazy

Blame the sudden onset of humidity. I'm just not that inspired today.

So as a result I bring you a re-post. Its something I wrote back in a simpler time, when I had one follower, my sister. But its one of my favorite posts.

So without further ado, I bring you I Heart Barbies!

Today I was over at someone's house and I noticed that her dog had chewed on a couple of her daughter's barbie dolls. The thighs had some teeth marks and the arms had little stubs where the hands used to be. It reminded me of all of my chewed up dolls and made me a little nostalgic for the days when I had my love affair with barbie dolls.

As far back as kindergarten I can remember playing with Barbies. I dressed as a Barbie for Halloween that year, even though the costume basically consisted of a plastic smock and a mask I wasn't allowed to wear. Instead my mom put makeup on me, probably blue eye shadow and pink lipstick, because that was Barbie's official makeup look of the 80's.

I tried to give Barbie a makeover once too, so I cut off her hair. I thought with the shape of her face and her high cheekbones she would look cute with a bob. She didn't. If you've ever experimented with the length of Barbie's hair then you know if you try and cut it short it sticks straight up and you can see all of the little places where they put the hair into her head. It's not attractive at all.

Nicole and I always played Barbies together. I remember always trying to convince her to let me play with whatever brand new doll she got for her birthday, even though at my birthday there was no way I was gonna let her play with my new Barbie. I used my newest Barbie for bartering when I tried to convince my sister to let me play with her doll. If she let me play with her brand spanking new doll with its permanently in high heels feet and still untangled hair then I would let her play with my "new" Barbie, even though it was 5 months old by that point. She usually gave in too. Never underestimate the bargaining skills of a bossy older sister.

We played Barbies together pretty much our whole childhood. Sometimes we would gather them up, get them all dressed up nice and do all of their hair. Barbie needed to look her best in case the one Ken doll that we had showed up. Sometimes when Ken would come visit Barbie they would lay together in the bed. Thats all they did. Just layed there. Pretty risque, I know.

We also liked to make Barbie go swimming in the bathtub. In case you didn't know, the faucet makes an excellent high dive and Barbie can do lots of awesome dives and flips off of it. She will even jump off of the shower head when she's feeling extra brave. When we got to the age where modesty was a factor when in the bathtub, we did the only logical thing to do. We put on bathing suits. We took baths with our Barbies diving off of the faucet while wearing our bathing suits. It's even more awesome than it sounds.

Other times Barbie enjoyed doing gymnastics. She is infinitely flexible, she can always do the splits, even without stretching. She performed countless floor routines of awkward cartwheels and flips and splits across our long dining room table. She was really quite talented.

Barbie always let me braid her hair, sometimes even a french braid if she was going for a fancier look. That's how I perfected my braiding technique and she never complained if I pulled her hair too tight. Barbie was always happy to entertain the dog, even if that meant it chewed off her arm. Some of my Barbie's were scarred for life where the dog had gnawed on their hands, leaving their permanently bent arm disfigured. She always took it like a champ though.

One year at Christmas time my mom told me and Nicole that we could open one of our presents if we guessed what it was. The only guess we could come up with was that it had to be a Barbie. The box was long and thin and pretty much flat, but we still insisted that it contained a Barbie. Is it a Barbie? Its gotta be a Barbie. Are you sure its not a Barbie? It wasn't a Barbie, it was a rack you hang on the wall and hang junk on. Definitely not as cool as a Barbie.

Barbie was a good friend. She never let me down, never talked about me behind my back and she always let me get the last word. She taught me lots of lessons, including never leave your toys laying around because the dog will chew them up, legs can never be properly reattached once they've come off, and blue eye shadow is always classy. She was my favorite toy for a long time and now I get to play with her again because of my ladies. Alana is just starting to appreciate Barbie and all of her girly characteristics, but for me its like I've been reunited with an old friend, and I didn't even realize how much I missed her.

Parents are people too

In the early years of life we think our parents are invincible.

They have super-human strength, are all geniuses and we even think that their jokes are funny.

But as we inch towards adolescense, our opinions change.

We roll our eyes at their jokes. We don't find it amusing when they offer to remove a splinter with their pocket knife or say we're having frog legs for dinner.

We realize they're not geniuses. We see limits to their strength. We no longer think they're cool.

We definitely don't think that their clothes are cool. Or their hair-do. Or the oversized or aviator sunglasses they wear that are (at that time) out of style. They were way ahead of their time on those. Or way late.

I remember when I stopped thinking my dad was cool.

It was at the end of my slug-bug phase. My sister and I were manic slug-bug fanatics. We even dabbled in a little beep-jeep. We loved to play it so much that we encouraged my parents to do so also.

They followed suit and pretty soon we were a family of slug-bug players. Shouting it out in the car, slugging each other on the shoulder. We did it all.

But soon the honeymoon phase with slug-bug was over. We weren't as enthusiastic about it anymore. It had lost its appeal. It wasn't as shiny and new as a few months before. It was slightly lame.

One day while my sister and  I waited in the car at the bank for my dad, we came to a decision.

Slug-bug was lame. Beep-jeep was even lamer. Therefore, anyone who participated in said games was lame. The lamest of them all.

We were much too cool to be pointing out stupid cars and yelling about it. Better to maintain our composure. Keep it chill.

By the time my dad got back in the car we had moved on to an unrelated topic.

We pulled out onto the road and within minutes we saw a Volkswagen. My dad was the first to spot it. "Slug-bug," he said.

We rolled our eyes and snickered to ourselves. Didn't he know that game was so yesterday?

And that's when I decided that my dad wasn't cool anymore.

Sorry Dad. You knew it had to happen eventually.

I'm lucky for now though. My kids still think I'm cool. My jokes are still hilarious. I'm still awesome. It helps that I don't wear "mom jeans". But my years are numbered.

So tell your lame jokes while you still can. Before you know it your kids will be calling you old and rolling their eyes at your jokes.

It can happen to anyone. It will happen to you.

Not me!

I can still hear it. At least, the echo of it. I heard it so much my entire childhood that no amount of time will erase it.

I'm talking about the perfect way to deny anything. The unspoken alibi.

NOT ME!

Growing up with lots of siblings no one EVER admitted responsibility when something went wrong. No one ever took the blame. Unless there was solid evidence you couldn't pin a crime on anyone without reasonable doubt.

Most of the time all evidence was circumstantial, but for my parents that was enough. They would convict without the right to a fair trial. They were the judge and the jury and you did not have the right to an attorney or the right to remain silent.

As soon as my dad would ask who did something my brothers would both yell the same answer. It was their go-to defense. NOT ME! Then he would say he didn't ask who didn't do it.

It was probably them anyway. Who else was going to leave huge globs of jelly in the peanut butter? The most likely suspects were any and all boys under the age of ten.

I just asked Alana who did something. I know it was her. Ava is only eight months old. But she took a lesson from her uncles. NOT ME!

Somebody must've told her that the best defense is a good offense. Or deny, deny, deny works everytime.

I don't know if that will be her tactic everytime, but I hope not.

Did I shave my legs for this?

So I don't know about everyone else, but I started shaving my legs when I was like eleven. I just couldn't take their hairy-ness anymore.

Not that they were even that hairy. I have blonde hair so therefore I'm lucky enough to have blonde leg hair.

But I wanted my pale white chicken legs to be smooth and touchable.

The only razor I had access to was my dad's. It was a cheap single blade Bic razor, with no moisturizing strip or anything. Just a plastic handle, a blade and a piece of metal over the blade.

So I locked the bathroom door and gave it a shot. I don't recall if I used some kind of shaving cream, but I'm thinking I didn't.

My calves were the hairiest part, so I started with them.

Remember the previously mentioned chicken-ness of my legs. It was an understatement. My legs are skinny now, but when I was eleven they were like twigs. So therefore I had boney shins. Really boney.

I was in the bathroom, by myself, with a cheap razor and a vendetta against my leg hair. Nothing left to do but try to eliminate all blonde leg hair immediately.

The problem with boney legs and cheap razors is that when you combine them with a girl who is shaving her legs for the first time you have a recipe for disaster.

I shaved the skin off of the front of BOTH of my shins. Not just one, but BOTH. I don't know how I managed to repeat the same mistakes from the first leg on the second leg, but I did. I must've pressed so hard with my cheap razor that I cut my skin off with the hair.

The main problem with the skin being missing from both of my shins was that I now had to explain it to my dad. Or wear pants till it healed. I'm pretty sure I made up some far-fetched story about hitting my legs on the door. I don't know if he bought it, but he didn't say anything.

After that I didn't shave my legs again for at least a year.

No one ever told me that shaving your legs is a fine art. You have to learn just the right angles to turn the razor, the right amount of pressure to apply to not shave your skin off and what to do to not get razor burn. Plus, getting all the hair off of your knees takes lots of practice.

Now I have a Venus razor, which I appreciate so much since my first razor experience left me scarred for life (not literally). Its next to impossible to cut myself with it so I no longer have to explain 9 inch cuts on my shins.

Vacation envy

I guess I shouldn't be jealous that the Shermans and my parents are going to Disneyland without me tomorrow. I did just go in February.

And my dad sometimes drives me crazy on vacation with his chronic cheapness. How many boiled chicken sandwiches should one person have to eat?

But family vacations are fun. The good and the bad and the ugly. Memories are made. Good times are had. Boiled chicken sandwiches are eaten.

Makes me think of the last real vacation my entire family went on.

That's me on the right with the awesome hat on. Don't be jealous. You can get one too. Just go to Walmart in 1998. Melissa had one too. Hers was also awesome. I know you're also jealous of my dad's cowboys hat. 

This is five out of six of us at the Grand Canyon. Don't know where Nathan is. Probably annoying someone else or being dangled over the edge. That's me on the left, with the awesome sandals you can't see very well. I'm holding my cheap-as-can-be souvenirs. Postcards. Had to ration out my money. Tell you all about it here. And Melissa is now wearing her awesome 1998 Walmart hat. I like Nicole's red shirt/orange shorts color combo. You gotta love the 90's.

This is me at Excalibur in Las Vegas. Someone should've told me parting my hair in the middle looked stupid. Hindsight is 20/20. I've got my awesome sandals on again. Maybe I should mention that brown leather sandals were all the rage at this point in time. Doc Martens were the best but substitutes were accepted and everyone had them. And your eyes do not deceive you. I'm wearing an anklet. This picture makes me appreciate my flat iron even more.











I do love Disneyland and vacations and I'm grateful for everyone that I get to go on. I hope there are lots more in the future.

Change is good

Yesterday I saw an old TV someone had left by their trash can. It was the kind with a wood console. Awesome.

Took me back to my childhood. When we had a giant wood surrounded TV. It was like a piece of furniture. We put decorations and junk on it. Dusting it was quite a task. It had knobs instead of buttons and I don't think it had a remote. For as big as it was, I don't remember the screen really being that big.

Now I have a 50 inch TV. Quite different from the TV we had when I was growing up. We don't even have to unplug it when there's thunder and lightning. We've moved up in the world.

We went from this:

To this:

Then in my lifetime I've also witnessed the slow death of the cassette tape. We went from cassette tapes that had to be re-wound and then you'd push play and it would be halfway through your song of choice, so you'd have to keep trying.

Then we moved up to cds. They were slighty better than cassettes. At least the sound quality was better. And you could completely skip songs if you wanted to, or restart the song from the beginning with minimal effort. But if it got scratched it was over. And if you only liked one song you would never listen to it. And they were so bulky. David used to have so many cds and they were so annoying. He'd pay $15 for it and it only had one or two songs he liked. And storing the cases was such a headache.

Now we've moved on to Ipods. I'm an ipod convert myself. Its sleek, its compact, its pink. All points for the ipod. You can get them with video, you can play games, they don't skip and if they get scratched its merely cosmetic. And they don't skip when you hit a bump, like discmans. And you can buy individual songs, instead of entire albums of crappy songs for one good one. I love my ipod.

We went from this:

To this:

(By the way that's not my ipod. I don't listen to Nelly Furtado. No offense to anyone who does.)

Everything is made to be more convenient these days. We need to save time and energy. So even broccoli has been streamlined for our convenience.

We went from this:

To this:

The last thing that has changed drastically compared to the way I remember it is road trips.

We used to have to rough it on long cross country trips. Fighting with each other and kicking the back of the seat till we got yelled at was our entertainment.

Now everyone has portable dvd players. You can watch Ratatouille in the backseat when you're driving to Disneyland.

I personally love that there is something to keep my kids entertained on long drives. Saves me from getting a giant headache.

R.I.P. Hyundaii

After almost ten years I had to say goodbye to a good friend yesterday. Someone who was with me through thick and thin. Someone who's been there since before I even knew David, before I had either of my kids. Someone who knew me when I was just an 18 year old kid living with my parents and working at Wendy's.

Yes, its true. I got rid of my car. My 2000 Hyundaii Elantra is no longer with us. Let's all take a moment of silence to remember my car.

The story of my car began August 2000. I was driving Melissa's old car, a 1984 Oldsmobile, but it wasn't really "mine". Its main purpose was to get me back and forth to work. So I traded it in to Jim Click for a brand new car. Compared to the Oldsmobile it was a luxury car. It had 19 miles on it when I got it, just a baby. I was so grateful to have a car where everything functioned, a/c, power windows, speakers that worked in the front and the back. Plus, it was MINE. I paid for every single penny of it and no one could take it away.

Not even two months after I bought my car someone hit it in the school parking lot. I had a crappy rental car while it was getting fixed and when I picked it up I was really grateful to have it back. It was a good reunion.

One year after getting it I rear ended someone, and it was almost totalled. It took almost 2 months for it to get fixed. It was such a headache until they finally called and said I could officially come pick it up, and take back the crappy Corolla I'd been driving that whole time.

My car and I moved out of my parents house, then back in, then back out again. We ended up in Mescal, where someone put a rock through the windshield. I didn't have glass coverage so I had to wait until I had $250 to replace it. By the time I got it fixed I had a flat tire and a dead battery.

After the windshield fiasco we moved away from Mescal, down to an apartment right next to where we live now. Then six months later we moved a few doors down, to the place that we still live in now. My car was in a constant battle with David's car for the carport. A couple of years ago David's car died and my car won that battle forever.

Then my insurance got cancelled which suspended my registration which meant I needed to get special insurance. I waited forever to get news tags and insurance. Seriously like 2 years. I still drove my car even though it had no insurance or tags, but just to work and back. In the mean time all of the power windows broke at one point, the charger/cigarette lighter broke, the rear view mirror fell off and I had to have the hood replaced because they put it on crooked when it got fixed. The a/c also leaked out all of the cooland in it and I spent a couple really hot months driving it back and forth to work, since at that time none of the windows rolled down.

Then when it was finally legal to drive my car again I was pretty happy. For awhile we had a second honeymoon, everything worked, my a/c worked great, the paint still looked okay. But after awhile we started having problems again. The transmission broke, luckily while it was still under warranty. It took a lot of pulling teeth to get them to fix it correctly. The first time I went to pick it up it wouldn't go in reverse, so I ended up with a brand new transmission.

Then the rear drivers side window wouldn't stay up. I never did get that fixed. For a long time we tried taping it up, but it ripped half of the tinting off of it. Then we discovered that if you shoved in a folded up piece of thick paper, it would create a wedge and hold up the window. Around the same time the switch on the front drivers side window broke, so it wouldn't roll down. One window wouldn't stay up, the other wouldn't go down.

About five or six years in the paint started to look really crappy. It wasn't that it was just scratched or old, it wasn't really peeling, it just started to turn kind of gray. It started with the back bumper. It got big spots on it where the paint was just deteriorating. Then the roof and hood started to look the same way. Spots on the doors and front were rubbed off where we would touch the car when we were opening the doors. It just started to look like a piece of junk. The interior still looked okay, and up until I had Alana I kept it really clean, but the outside looked horrible, and I was judging it by its cover. It had really let itself go.

Little problems came up here and there but we were mostly happy. I payed off the loan in August 2006, 2 months before Alana was born. No matter what problems we had, I was willing to overlook them since I had no car payment. Even though we had to rent cars to go on vacation, my car was paid for so it was worth it.

Then something unforgivable happened last summer. The a/c broke. The estimate to fix it was $1100. They may as well have been asking for my first born child. There's no way I have that kind of money laying around to spend on a car that has a value of less than $1000. To add to the suffocating heat inside the car, it was June, the drivers side window doesn't roll down, and I was 8 months pregnant.

We decided to leave it as is, since we really didn't have a lot of options. That meant driving a hot black car around Benson, and borrowing David's parents truck whenever we had to go to Tucson so I could go to the Dr. Then when Ava was born, we had to borrow my dad's car to bring her home from the hospital, since our car was way too hot to put a newborn in.

And when David came up to Tucson when I was still in the hospital, he had to borrow his parents truck to get there, since it was August, so his mom tagged along. All I really wanted was to see my husband since I was stuck in a hospital room for three days, but instead I got my husband plus my mother in law. It wasn't exactly relaxing.

At the end of summer when the weather got much cooler (probably closer to winter), riding in my car became a little more bearable. We don't really run the heater, so it would figure that it works great. Then two of the tires blew out, in different months at least, and both had to be replaced.

We had kind of figured that we would fix the a/c with our tax refund, but when that money came we had a long list of other stuff we would've rather spent that money on. We needed a vacation, some new clothes for our ladies, and we wanted to pay off a couple of bills. So we put it off. We said we would wait until March/April when money gets deposited into David's retirement fund, then we would use that money to fix everything that was wrong with the car.

Then we rented a car to go on vacation. A brand new car, that had a/c and everything in working order. The day before we were supposed to take it back, we were driving around and decided that we couldn't settle anymore. We needed a new car. I was going to trade in the old crappy car for a newer model.

Saturday we drove our car to Sierra Vista to go to Target. We did not intend on getting a new car. But when we got back into our non-air-conditioned car to leave Target, and the temperature had started to climb and the sun had come out, we knew it was over. We decided to go look at used cars, and maybe see what they would give us for trade in on our car. We didn't have a cash down payment, so we didn't want to get our hopes up since our car wasn't worth much in cash to them, just in sentimental value to me.

After a grueling 4 hours of waiting at the car dealership all of our financing and everything finally went through. It took longer than usual since we hadn't planned on buying a car, so we didn't have any of the paperwork they wanted. David had to call his boss and have her fax over paycheck stubs (turns out we had some in our old car the whole time), I had to call Progressive and make changes to our insurance policy to make it full coverage, we needed a copy of a bill with our address on it so I had to log online using their computer and print out my cell phone bill. It just took forever.

Finally it was time to sign the papers and get the heck out of there. Then we were handed the keys to our new car. It's a 2008 Pontiac G6. Not brand new, but new to us and 100 times newer and better than our old car. Then we had to take our carseats and junk and switch them over.

After we had moved everything it was time to say goodbye. I couldn't help but feel a little sorry. That was my first car. Despite everything that broke on it it was a good, reliable car. It never broke down and left me stranded somewhere, or just wouldn't start in the morning for no reason. It got me where I needed to go for ten years. It took us to Dallas once, even to Las Vegas. I will never have another first car. I took a picture of it with my camera phone and said goodbye. I have to move on, even if I don't want to. If the a/c hadn't broken we probably would've kept it another year. It was nice not having a car payment for 3 1/2 years.

Independence

Alana is at an age where she will just leave me for the day without a second glance. I'm going to Nana and Tata's he-youse, see you later. Maybe I'll be home for dinner. They do have a swingset, how can I compete?

The only time she's spent the night away from me was when I had Ava. I spent two nights in the hospital and Alana spent both of those nights at home with David. Then when she would come visit me she didn't want to leave. But now she sees me all day every day so she figures a few hours apart won't do any harm.

I wonder if I'll cry when she goes to school for the first time. She is such a social butterfly that she probably won't even notice when I leave her there. Ava and I will just go back home and wait out the day until Alana comes home at three, excited from getting to spend all those hours away from me.

I haven't seen enough of Ava's personality yet to know if she'll have separation anxiety. She is a pretty independent little lady though. She plays on the floor by herself for up to an hour at a time, just rolling around to different toys that she can put in her mouth, as happy as can be. She also doesn't need to be held to go to sleep, I just put her in her swing and she falls asleep on her own.

I know I had my share of separation anxiety. I cried everyday of first grade. I HATED my teacher. She was an evil witch who I'm pretty sure cast spells on people. She was always yelling at me to pick up my feet when I walked. The sound of my white fringe cowboy boots on the tile floor drove her crazy. Well guess what Ms. White? I still drag my feet when I walk and its been 22 years. Ha. I showed you. I'm gonna do it forever too, even if it means that I get shocked by the dairy case at Walmart, because of the static that built up when I was dragging my feet.

I came home early from my share of sleepovers too. I got homesick, which made me sick to my stomach, so my friends parents called my parents and said I didn't feel good. I sometimes got a little homesick when I was spending the night at an aunt or uncle's house too, but then I usually sucked it up because I wanted to play with my cousins or continue getting spoiled by my aunt Beth.

I even got homesick on my senior trip. I'm such a weiner that I cried because I wanted to go home. In hindsight I can blame it on exhaustion, hormones or teen angst, but I just wanted to go home. I should've been having an awesome time, but instead I just wanted to go home. So much for being independent at 18.

David's brother just turned 21. He still lives with his parents and doesn't have a drivers license so if he needs driven somewhere they drive him. If I still lived with my parents when I was 21 I would've gone crazy. I probably would've pulled my hair out at the roots, or drove my car off of a cliff. And I had a car and license so I could come and go on my own terms. He doesn't, he's stuck there with his mom still telling him to clean his room. If he wants to leave, someone else has to drive him. I do not envy him. Not that I don't love my parents, but if someone was still telling me to clean my room when I was 21 they would've had to commit me. I would never have been able to stand it.

I hope I don't drive my kids that crazy, but it's natures cycle. They drive you crazy when they're teenagers so you don't miss them as much when they move out, and you drive them crazy so they learn to do things for themselves and hopefully move out on their own someday.

High school dances

Today I heard a sappy cheesy song on the radio that took me back in time a little bit. It was Firehouse "Love of a lifetime". For those of you who don't know, that song is awesome. Every time that I hear it I can't help but think of a simpler time in my life, a time without bills and jobs and responsibilities. A time of high school dances.

When I was a freshmen/sophomore in high school I went to every single dance that the school had. There was always a dance after home football games and that was the perfect opportunity to do a little bit of socializing. Of course there were going to be boys there so that made it even more appealing. I'm married now so I won't elaborate on any boys who I may or may not have danced with. There's only one boy that I dance with now and he's the best dancer of them all. He is who I dance with on every last song.

First thing when you got there you had to find a good spot on the bleachers/chairs set up around the cafeteria for all of the wallflowers to sit on. K-hall never seemed more romantic. In St. David circa 1997, everyone was a wallflower (during the fast songs anyway). NO ONE danced during the fast songs. Sometimes there would be one or two random alternative type girls out there, but everyone else just looked at them like they were weirdos.

Back then it was all about the slow songs. The slow dances mostly. Just sitting there waiting for that cute boy to ask you to dance, then holding his sweaty hand to walk to the dance floor and hoping you didn't have stinky breath to scare anyone off. We usually stopped off at Tiger Mart before the dance for some Winterfresh gum, just to insure no one had stinky breath. After a few minutes of stiff, awkward dancing you would be escorted back to your spot on the bleachers by the same sweaty handed boy who then politely thanked you for the dance.

Of course the whole experience was way different if you had a boyfriend. Then you knew at least one guy would ask you to dance, you were guaranteed someone to dance with on the last song and sitting there in the bleachers was a whole different experience. Dancing with your boyfriend meant dealing with your hands being sweaty too and then of course the butterflies. Those butterflies plagued me quite a bit in high school. They were a constant presence whenever I danced with anyone special. If you haven't experienced the butterflies, then you've never experienced high school infatuation.

At every dance I ever went to they played exactly the same songs. November rain, Nothing else matters, Always, Bed of roses, Love of a lifetime, Wind of change, etc. Always lots of slow rock songs with sappy lyrics. Awesome. November Rain was a good choice for the last song since its like ten minutes long, but you have to remember that towards the end of the song there's a pause, which causes most people to think its over. You just have to wait out the pause cause afterwards the song continues for like 4 minutes and that is a significant amount of time to keep dancing. We used to laugh at everyone who started to leave the dance floor and then get all confused when the song started up again.

Everyone knows the last song is reserved for that someone special, so if you didn't have a "date" or anyone special in mind then you always hoped you'd get asked. No one wants to be that one person left in their chair like a leper during the last song. Its like being picked last in PE, its just not cool.

Going to the dance when you just broke up with someone is probably one of the worst ideas ever, especially if they're there with someone else. Then you just give them the evil eye all night, and go to the bathroom when staring at the two of them across the room just gets to be too much to handle. Another strategy is to pretend like you are having the time of your life in a lame attempt to make them jealous, assuming they are watching you. Its not proven to work, but you can try it.

As high school went on I went to fewer and fewer dances. They just weren't necessary when I could date and drive without chaperones. But I still have fond memories of sappy slow songs, sweaty palms, flickering fluorescent lights in the bathrooms, winterfresh gum and of course the butterflies.

One awesome pic!

Here you go Krystal, memories that you thought were safely secure in your mind. After you commented earlier I was racking my brain trying to think of what your dress looked like so I dug around some and with minimal effort I found this picture. Look at it this way, it could be worse, you could've done your hair like Melissa's!

Random Memories

After writing my last blog and remembering random things about my life I kind of realized all of the things that we tend to remember are sometimes so totally random. I can't for the life of me remember what it was like to hold Alana when she was Ava's size. But I can remember my phone number from when I was in fifth grade and live in Tucson. 795-4872. And my address? 4626 E. 15th street. I remember the name of my 2nd grade teacher, but I cannot name a single one of my classmates.

I can recall our dog Lady having seizures, but can't remember ever having played with that same dog. I remember when my cousin Alissa dared me and Rhonda to eat the weird prickly pears growing on the cactus in her yard, but I can't remember if either of us actually did. (I'm pretty sure I didn't). I remember begging to stay the night in Catalina, because it was awesome, but then being kind of homesick in the middle of the night.

When I was in kindergarten in Illinois I remember going down to the basement of our apartment complex when there was a tornado warning. I would bring toys and random crap down there with me, like that was all I needed to salvage if there ever was an actual tornado. Once while we were on vacation in Missouri there was an actual tornado. It broke the windshield of our suburban and flattened a shed. Then Nathan walked through the rubble left behind from the shed, even though he was told not to and he stepped on a nail. Then he got Dairy Queen along with his tetanus shot. There is no justice in this world.

I remember defending Janette's honor in algebra in 8th grade, because Mr. Bryant made her cry. I called him a male chauvinist pig. But I can't remember what he said to make her cry in the first place. I remember when Mrs. Smith got hit in the face with a wiffle ball during P.E., so we all laughed, then we all got in trouble.

In high school I remember the junior and senior boys seeming like they were all 6 feet tall, because I was a puny little freshmen. I was probably like 5'4", 90 lbs, but they seemed like giants to me. Just going into the breezeway to go to the soda machine was intimidating. Then when I was a senior, all of the freshman seemed tiny, even though I'd only grown a few inches and about 5 lbs.

I remember when Kendi wiped her face with a booger washcloth during halftime of an away football game, and Ami and I just watched and tried to contain her laughter. Probably wasn't the nicest thing I've ever done, but it could've been worse. I also remember standing there in my cheerleading uniform, the first time I tried it on, thinking it was the coolest thing ever. Cheerleading brought me out of my shell a little bit, so I could actually act like the crazy person that I am.

I remember having a permanent smile on my face during graduation, then at some point I realized I would probably not see most of those people again. I had gone to school with most of them for 6 years, but that was the last time we would all be together. Or during eighth grade graduation, when we were paired by height to who we would walk with, I remember just hoping it wasn't Nathaniel Arters. I know that's mean too, but I couldn't help it.

I hope I can hold on to a lot of the memories of my ladies the way I can hold on to my memories. It almost seems sometimes that by the time they get to the next stage we've already forgetten the previous one. When they are born and they are so small its always amazing, because we forget how small they start out. Then before we know it they are 10 lbs, then 15, then they can crawl and roll over and sit up, then they're 20 lbs and they can walk. What happened to that tiny little girl who just slept no matter who was holding her? Who didn't even fit into newborn clothes, designed for little people who only weigh 5-8 lbs?

We do have a little bit of selective memory when it comes to pregnancy and childbirth too. If we really remember how nauseous we felt during the first trimester, how hot we were the whole month of August, we probably wouldn't have any more kids. If we remembered how crappy contractions really are, how anxious we feel leading up to our due date, wondering when we will get to meet our newest lady, we would probably stop at one. I'm lucky when it comes to pregnancy, I don't get swollen ankles, I only gain 25 lbs, I'm only nauseous till about 20 weeks and I never throw up (knock on wood). But even if I suffered the whole time I probably wouldn't remember.

Not that you forget everything, it just gets a little fuzzy. I just hope to remember how excited I was when I found out I was pregnant, how I texted David to tell him the news with Alana, after I took a pregnancy test in the bathroom at work. How David thought it would be funny to tell me my test with Ava was negative, when it obviously wasn't. Ha ha. How happy I was to hold each of them for the first time. I hope my memory holds onto the good ones.

Embarassment

Its crazy the random stuff we remember. My mom asked me to think of something embarassing that she's done and I'm drawing a blank. I can however, think of plenty of embarassing things that I've done.

I once walked around the entire grocery store as carefree as possible, then when I got to the register the courtesy clerk told me my zipper was down.

At the same store I opened the dairy case and three gallons of milk fell on the floor at my feet, they all broke and made a giant mess. When I got up front my boyfriend at the time and his friend were standing there laughing. They were in the dairy cooler and pushed the milk out when I opened the door because they thought it would be funny. Ha ha.

I fell a ridiculous amount of times ice skating, then had to crawl to the side to get up while little kids passed me by pointing and laughing. Then when I finally pulled myself up the whole front of my pant legs were soaking wet from the ice.

Once on a van trip to who-knows-where in high school I was sitting there, minding my own business, listening to my discman (which was awesome by the way), I decided to make a suggestion about where we should drive. So I said "WE SHOULD TAKE THE CARPOOL LANE" in my "kloos" voice, not realizing how loud I was since the volume on my discman was turned up so loud.

More than one time I had pen marks on my face during class, and of course I didn't realize it. Someone had to point it out. After that happened a couple of times I became very careful when I was writing or putting my pen behind my ear. Its even worse if nobody tells you, then you go to the bathroom and look in the mirror and wonder how long that mark has been there.

I never personally experienced this next one, but I know plenty of girls who got their monthly visit from their "Aunt Flo" at very bad times. Sometimes it was in the middle of class or during lunch, but more often than not they didn't realize it and someone had to point it out, usually a boy. That would be really humiliating.

All of my most embarassing memories are all from high school, since at that point in most people's lives they are so unsure of who they are. If any of these happened to me now, as a self assured 27 year old, I wouldn't even care. But in high school I'm sure my face turned red and I thought I was going to die of embarassment.

Sisters

My 2 hot ladies Alana and Ava are just so cute! They are such good sisters right now. Alana is always insisting that she get to hold her baby sister although at this point its more Ava just laying across her lap unless I prop her up next to her in the chair or on the couch. Ava just looks up at Alana and smiles. They really like each other right now.

I'm sure they'll fight when they get older, that's what siblings do. Its easier for them to get along right now since Ava is not old enough to want to play with Alana's toys so there are zero sharing issues. At some point Alana is gonna want someone to blame stuff on too and who is an easier target than your sibling. If you're an only child and something goes wrong, goes missing or gets broken you're the only suspect, but with a sister the blame is split and you can just deny, deny, deny.

I may have blamed my sister for stuff when I was young. (Not an admission of guilt). When a couple of Barbies mysteriously showed up with super short hair and my mom asked who did it, I pointed the finger at Nicole. Sorry. How was I supposed to know that if you cut Barbie's hair it doesn't look cute. Not at all. It sticks up in every direction and you can see every little hole where they shoved the hair into her little plastic head. Lesson learned.

I know all of these sibling rivalries are in the future for our family. Lots of Mom, she's looking at me funny. Mom, she pinched me. Mom, she won't do what I want her to do. Why does she get a candy bar and I don't? How come she never gets blamed for everything? Its not fair! I guess I will have to deal with it and referee the fights as they come along. Until then I'm gonna enjoy the peace and quiet.