Rocks

It seems like I am a Friday poster. Just an observation. Okay now for the crazy stuff - ROCKS. This past Monday, Memorial Day, we took part in a Colorado new home-owner ritual/rite of passage. We laid rocks, rocks, and more rocks all around the foundation of our house. Who am I kidding, Adrian laid rocks all around our house and I leveled some of them. Crazy crazy hard work, but doing it ourselves (look I'm pretending like I helped again:)) saved us tons of money. So early Monday morning a big ol' truck dumped 10 1/2 tons of rocks on our drive way and the rest was up to us... uh, Adrian. I tell you my man is a hard worker. He managed to work all day shoveling rocks, with help from 2 of our neighbors for a couple of hours, and actually finished shoveling and wheelbarrowing them all into the right places by night fall. I was seriously impressed. And it was raining for part of the time. That is dedication. So now we have the requisite 2 feet of rock all around our foundation and we feel like true Coloradans. If you come to Colorado to visit you will see just why we felt so out of place with out our rock laid for the last 9 months - I think our neighbor must have laid about 20 tons of rock around his house and back yard. All I can say is way to go Adrian!! (I refrained from saying "rock on" instead of "way to go", which I'm sure you are thankful for. :))

SYTYCD!!!

Woohoo-di-woohoo-di-hoo!! So excited that SYTYCD (So You Think You Can Dance) started up again last night! Why is it on Thursdays now?? I almost forgot about it, but then I was reading my friend Cami's post at exactly 7 o'clock were she mentioned it and screamed, "Oh no I'm missing it!!" But that was quickly remedied by 7:01 when I ran to the TV and started it recording on the DVR. After we got the kids to bed I made Adrian watch it with me. He is going to be my SYTYCD buddy now whether he likes it or not, hey I watch Fringe with him. I so missed my wonderful girlfriends in Maryland and Utah as I was watching it. We always used to get together to watch the show and I have a feeling there would have been some shrieking in Cami's basement if we could've time warped back there to watch last night - the 2 guy team from Denver?? And then they fell horribly. *cringe* I was excited about a lot of people. Excited that Natalie was back (she was the girl who tried out with Katie last season) and the guy that she came with (his name escapes me) was great too. And surprisingly I didn't think there were quite as many horrendous auditions as I remember from the last seasons. Maybe they edited them all out of the show. So glad Sex didn't return again in New York - that guy is just too creepy to have to see every year during the auditions. Oh and I have to say the dudes with the green faces freaked me out and don't get me wrong I am a certified freak fan (Maaarrrrkkkkk!!!!!), but the bizarre double-jointedness was just too much. Well anywho can you tell I'm excited for this season?? Can't wait for the top 20 to be picked so the real fun can begin. Let it begin!!!

Ben's First Camp Out

Last night was the Father and Son Camp Out and it was Adrian's and Ben's first time going. They had a great time and didn't let the weather which turned from drizzle to rain dampen their spirits. Reportedly Ben kept saying "Oh I love camping!" and he loved climbing on all the rocks. I was a little worried that Ben wouldn't enjoy the fire-side activities because he's a bit nervous around fire, but he liked listening to the stories and being with his Dad. Only thing is now he wants our whole family to go camping... Hmmm I'll have to think about that.

Oh and just to let you know what us girls did while they were gone, we got dinner at Wendy's (both Sophie and I quite enjoy their chili) and then watched the cupcake episode of Good Eats and America's Funniest Home Videos - my kids, even Nina, love that show SO much. After the girls went to bed I read my book while listening to the rain against the windows feeling sorry that my guys were out in the rain, but they still had a great time so yay!

Art History Pic for May

Moses by Michelangelo Buonarroti, marble sculpture, c. 1515, Church of San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome

Okay I'm finally going to switch over my art history pic for the month. I just LOVE that illustration of Heathcliff so much that I'm sad to see it go. But for this month (or for a few months - I've been so naughty about not changing them) I'm going to do a work of art related to the book club I just hosted last night. We read The Rule of Four. I think it's a great book. It's suspenseful, full of art and history, riddle cracking, murder mysteries, and did I mention art? Fun stuff for me. After a lengthily discussion of the book which was great we all kept talking and laughing into the wee hours - it was a great night.

Back to the art history piece for the month. In Rule of Four one of the riddles is effectively "who put horns on Moses?". I was so excited when I read that, because I knew it right away! Michelangelo Buonarroti. Michelangelo sculpted an incredible Moses with horns on his head and I have always been intrigued by this sculpture. As it happens St. Jerome mistranslated a passage in Exodus were Moses has light radiating from his face, well I guess the wording was either translated as "rays of light" or "horns" and he picked horns. Crazy, hu?! So Michelangelo in full knowledge of that mistranslation put horns on Moses for kicks. Awesome. Not exactly awesome that Michelangelo gave Moses horns, it's not nice to diss prophets, but that he had the chutspa to carve this gigantic sculpture with a sense of humor. I mean, it was for a Pope's tomb! Don't you wonder what Pope Julius thought about it?! I had a great conversation yesterday with Sophie over the sculpture and told her all about it and the mistranslation and she thought it was really funny. It's so fun to share art history tid-bits with my kids. She spent some time looking through my big Michelangelo book after that and my heart swelled with pleasure.

I know it's not very original to talk about how cool Michelangelo was. But he was COOL. He was a genius. Of course. His sculptures are spell-binding. If I look at the Pieta too long I want to cry and my freaking goodness the David is amazing. His paintings and frescoes: beyond belief. Sometimes I wonder how people like this have existed. Their talent is just so over the top. Of course Michelangelo himself thought he was incredibly cool too. A bit annoyingly. But hey maybe it's hard not to let that kind of genius go to your head. Leonardo wasn't a shrinking violet about his talents either. Of this sculpture Michelangelo was said to have called it his most life like work (probably minus the fact that it has horns:)). The account goes that when he finished it he gave it a whack on the knee and told it to speak. Working in a cloud of marble dust for long periods of time must do something to you. There is actually a strike mark on the knee (supposedly from Michelangelo's hammer) which has kept this story going through time. Next time you're in Rome be sure to check it out and see the strike mark for yourself, that's what I'm going to do!:)

Mother's Day

I had a lovely mothers day. It started off with a nice snooze in (thanks to 1 o'clock church) and then cards and presents from my sweet family. Sophie made me a lady bug paper weight and gave me an essay she wrote "My Special Mom". Okay I'm going to admit that I usually cringe a little (inwardly) when reading stuff about myself from my children's point of view. It's a mixed bag, it can either be super sweet and flattering or it can be a window in on your not to stellar motherly qualities. Ben once wrote on a preschool mothers day card, "I love my mom because she gets me happy meals at McDonalds". Yep, I cringed at that one. Mostly because I knew that the teacher probably chuckled as she wrote that out for him. Well, Sophie's essay was so sweet, yes very sweet, but did not escape a tiny inward cringe:

"Here are the reasons my mom is special. One reason is she cooks the best food. One of the best foods she cooks are rolls. She makes them with a lot of butter.(*Smiling Cringe*) My mom's soup is a dip in paradise.(*Aww that's sweet*) Another reason my mom is special is she helps me with projects. Once I had a science project and it was the night before it was due and my mom helped write it because I write slowly. (*Ouch - okay so that was not my most stellar motherly moment but at least Sophie remembers it with fondness. For the record Adrian was suppose to be in charge of doing this science project with Sophie. Can you blame me for throwing him under the bus here??*) The last reason is she loves me. She loves me by giving me hugs and kisses. That's why my mom is special. (*Rallying here and feeling much better - Sophie is a sweetheart!*)"

Ben made me a very cute sun catcher at preschool and Nina came up to me and gave me her most treasured pink floppy bear - of course I gave it back, but it was an incredibly sweet gesture on her part. I have great kids!! Adrian knows the sure-fire way to my heart and gave my an organizing gadget - a label maker!!! I was and am SO excited to have a label maker. I set right to work and labeled the label-less sage and cilantro in my spice cupboard, all the label-less containers in the pantry, and the shelves of the upstairs linen closet (twin fitted sheets, standard size pillow cases, mattress pads...). Oh it was heavenly! There is nothing better than a closet with labels!! After relishing in my new label making capabilities I leisurely got ready for church and while Adrian got the kids ready (minus the hair - I did the girls' hair). Great morning.

At church there was an actual dessert buffet in Relief Society which I got to go to - yay! Then after church Adrian made the most wonderful dinner of honey dijon chicken with bacon and cheddar, spinach salad, rolls, and awesome angel food cake and strawberries for dessert. We finished out the night watching the finale of Amazing Race after the kids went to bed. Lovely lovely day. Thanks to my wonderful family for making me feel special and also happy happy mothers day to all of you and especially to my mother. Mom, you are amazing and I love you! Happy mothers day!!

Now this is blog worthy

As of today we are totally unpacked! Every box! It has taken us over 8 months but today we went through all the unpacked boxes in the basement, organized our food storage, and now have huge piles to be taken to the Salvation Army. I think I must have got the spring cleaning bug and suckered Adrian into spending the whole day hefting boxes around. It feels so good to not have all those boxes and piles of stuff lurking in the basement making me feel twitchy. Once we got it all cleaned out the kids went down there and were astonished by how clean it was (they had been riding their bikes and trikes amidst the mess for months). We rewarded ourselves with dinner out, because honestly who feels like cooking after a crazy day of dejunking. My particular reward was a big Frostie. Now I just have to organize a few closets and hang pictures... Hanging pictures always seems to be that last phase of settling into a house for us and hopefully that will happen soon.

Prepare to be bored.

I can't believe it's already been a week. Just as a note I've used my lovey-dovely Bosch a few more times in the last week and have LOVED it! Anywho, I've not been up to much. One thing that did happen this week was both Sophie and I woke up one morning with killer sore throats and fevers. Crazy, hu? That is not exactly what I was hoping for after obsessively watching tons of news all about swine flu. Of course we didn't have that, I think there are only 2 cases in Colorado right now. Just a run of the mill bug, but in Sophie's case it has turned into croup. Serious. We took her to the pediatrician and that's what they told us it was. I can't believe my 9 year old is still getting croup. Weird. Of course having a respiratory infection going around our family has completely freaked me out. I bought a huge thing of hand sanitizer and randomly have the kids sanitize their hands all day and especially when any body comes in from outside or before meals... And then I'm freakish about wiping everything down with Clorox wipes. I just really don't want to deal with Nina getting a cold again - it can turn from a normal cold to horrible asthma stuff so easily with her and I don't want her to go back to the hospital. Please, please no. I'm going to be a complete worry-wort till Sophie stops coughing I'm sure.

Well for the rest of the day I'm going to make a couple freezer meals (lazy lasagnas), do some laundry while watching disc 2 of Jane Erye (the best part!), and hopefully finish reading my book (Rule of Four - really great book in my opinion) during Nina's nap. Not very exciting. Can you tell why I haven't been blogging much? See, I'm sure I bored you to death with this post.