About Me, Change and Twilight

Here is a blog about me. I have to have change. I have moved around a lot for most of my life and have become to rely on that. So I find that I get tired of things when they do not change. For example, I get really sick of the way my furniture is arranged if we live in one place for more than 2 years. So I rearrange it all of the time. I also get tired of our dishes. I like new dishes. I threw away a bunch of our plastic dishes and got new glass dishes just because I knew the kids would break the glass dishes and I would get to replace them. That way I would never get too sick of the same old plates and cups. Fortunately, clothes wear out and we use up soap quickly enough, so I can count on change in the wardrobe and in the smells. I am also always continually wanting to paint our walls something different. But that crosses the line of how much change my husband can handle. (I thrive on change, but John seems to thrive on consistency. It makes John nervous when I move the furniture around. But that statement is about John, not me. :)) Recently, I have realized that I need my blog to match the seasons. I have been struggling to find a theme that fits winter. I think I will have to take more wintry pictures. But it does not snow much in Wichita. Hmmm.... maybe I should picture surf the web.

Now, about me and Twilight. I have held out on reading The Twilight series because I have heard that there is a fair amount of making out. (I am also not a fan of teenage romance or vampires.) Since I felt guilty reading Dear God, It's Me Margaret by Judy Blume when I was 12, I felt certain that I did not want Ruth and Kate reading the Twilight series. In fact, I have not let them read Judy Blume books. However, there has been a fair amount of peer pressure on the matter. Most of my family on both sides have read and loved the books, basically all of the women in relief society read the books and went to movie together, and all but one of my friends outside our ward, as far as I know, have read the series. Now the one friend of mine, who has been holding out, read the first book over Christmas break because her 11 year old daughter has been begging to read it. Well, I have felt pretty good with my decision until now. I do not like being the only one. When I told John about my friend, he praised my decision and I had to tell him that actually, the pressure is getting to be too much and I am thinking that maybe I should read Twilight after all. My friend that just read them said they weren't as bad as we have heard on the making out side of things. So now I have to decide-- do I want to be the last man out, or read the books and then let my preteen daughters read the books?????? If Ruth and Kate are going to read the books then I should know what is in them. And if I read the books then I cannot tell my daughters that they are inappropriate for them to read and expect them to respect me. Alas, I feel torn and like a bit of a loser for caving in so easily to peer pressure at the age of 33. Don't get me wrong, no one has actually said that I have to read these books, it is just that everyone else is doing it. Fortunately, once you reach adulthood you can expect your friends to remain your friends even if you don't do what they do. Everyone has been very respectful to my decision. I just don't like to be 'the only one'.

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Why is it that Sunday through Friday I have to force my kids out of bed at 7:15am for school and church and on Saturday's when they can actually sleep in they wake me up at 6:50am to ask if they can watch TV?????????

The Most Important Thing

This morning we woke up late and had to rush to make it on time for the bus. Johnny was having a particularly hard time going fast enough. He took a long time to get dressed, and a very long time to eat his breakfast. Because of this, he did not have time to make his bed, and I am not sure if he got his teeth brushed or not. Just before the bus pulled up I told Johnny to get his socks and his shoes on. He said that he did not have time to put on his socks. About the time Johnny argued about socks the bus pulled up. Johnny grabbed his backpack and I said that he could not leave the house without his coat. Ruth began yelling at Johnny to get outside as she and Kate were running for the bus. Johnny grabbed his coat, shook his backpack and stopped in the doorway. "I don't have my ds," he yelled. I said, "the bus is waiting for just you--GO!" But Johnny would not budge. So I went and grabbed his ds for him. He then fumbled in the doorway trying to get the ds into his backpack. We told him to just go and get on the bus and finally he did. I just thought it was so funny that Johnny declared that he did not have enough time to put socks on, but that he would not leave the house without his nintendo ds. The kid is obcessed!!!

Long Term Decision

In his spiderman costume, Adam walked up to me and in a very serious voice declared, "I've decided to be spiderman for the rest of my life."

More Christmas Pictures

Adam got weapons and armour

Ruth and Kate with lovely American Girl doll clothes from Grandma

Anya feeling like breakfast should have come before presents

Johnny and my sister Amber

Rachel getting toy food. Anya attacked this package. Poor baby was really hungry.

Christmas Pictures

Jeremy, Rosanne, Ada, Rachel, and me caroling at the Robertson's

James, Rebecca, Jay and Grace caroling

Grandpa Robertson

Adam obeying Grandpa about the Christmas bulbs

Christmas

We got to spend some time with Amber, my parents, Monika, Ben and Tommy between the wedding and Christmas. It was so nice to see them and be with them all. My kids were in relative heaven. They just need to learn that Aunts and Uncles are made for things other than wrestling. Johnny and Kate seem to think that if an adult is related it is okay to punch them. We will have to work on that. On Christmas Eve we went to PF Changs with my family including Seth and Natalie, and then Monika's in-laws plus Monika's in-law's in laws (Who happen to be friends from our child hood.) I think that I enjoyed the bit that I got to visit with people, but John felt miserable as we had Adam break 2 or 3 plastic chopsticks, as well as stab himself in the eye with one of them. Each of our 5 potty trained children had to use the bathroom at separate times so we went to and from the bathrooms 5 times. Anya fussed about wanting food when it wasn't there, and then not getting the food fast enough and then not wanting that exact food but different food. She was just a handfull the entire 2 hours we were in the restaurant.

After dinner we all went to Amber's apartment, read the Christmas story in Luke 2, and sang Christmas carols. It was really nice. We left Amber's when Monika and Ben went to bed at 8:30. When we got the Robertson's, all of John's siblings were just arriving for their Christmas eve caroling so we joined that party just in time. While we were caroling with the Robertson's, Adam started taking the red Christmas bulbs off the tree. Grandpa Robertson said that the Christmas bulbs had to stay on the tree. Adam them put tham all on one branch. We know that wasn't what Grandpa meant, but boy it was funny. Later Adam strung all of the bulbs together and hung them on the tree.

When we put the kids to bed we told them that they could not get up until 7am. Ruth woke up at 4am but, was good and waited until 7am. I think that the kids enjoyed opening their stockings and presents. Rachel's favorite thing seems to be the ring pops in her stocking. She still is telling me how she got ring pops for her birthday. Johnny got lego star wars for his nintendo ds and disappeared for 4 days until we took the ds away just to see if he could still talk. Thankfully, he can. All in all I think we had a nice Christmas.