twilight brain

Anyone? Anyone?

Yeah. Thought so.

big art contest

My mom is a high school art teacher, and several of her art students have entries in an art competition called the Big Art Contest. Winners are selected by popular vote via internet, and she is hoping to spread the word around a little bit so that more people hear about the competition and subsequently vote.

Click here to visit the website and to cast your votes-you have ten [per browser].

And please, please, PLEASE vote for either of the two entries from Redwood High School! If you're so inclined! ;) The artwork above is from one of her students, Rey S.

happy leap year day!

Picture circa London 1884

Happy Leap Year Day!

Some fun facts about Leap Years:

In older times in England, February 29 was ignored and had no legal status. This custom also migrated over to the United States during that time. You probably wouldn't want to close escrow on your house on a Leap Day back then.

This is even better: a Leap Year was the only time that society permitted a woman to ask a man for his hand in marriage. And if he declined a proposal in a Leap Year, he owed her a silk dress and a kiss on the cheek!

Leap Year Balls were all the rage in both England and America. They were given all throughout the Leap Year, and the women were the ones to ask the men to dance. They could even cut in on other women during dances, just as men are wont to do. To learn more about the picture above, check out this link to make sense of it all!

And finally, here's a link to a funny little story about Leap Year that appeared in the Washington Post today.

Enjoy your extra day!

a word to the not-so-wise

Apparently someone is worried about me spending too much time on my blog. Click on this link to get the whole story.

Know someone who could use some advice as well? Make sure you take advantage of the offer at the end of the video! I will say no more-now you have to watch.

go now!

Per my post on Monday, 7 January: if you haven't checked out http://www.marklivesinikea.com/ go there right now! It's hilarious! You have to watch the videos-use the sidebar on the right of the videoplayer to scroll down to get all the videos. What are you waiting for-get out of here!!!!!!!

have you heard about the guy who. . .

. . . moved into his local IKEA store for a week while his NYC apartment is being fumigated? Yes, it's true! Read all about it at http://www.marklivesinikea.com/. He just moved in on the 7th [today] and is supposed to be posting a new video every day this week.

Whenever I mention IKEA to Owen, he gets this distant, irritated look on his face, put there no doubt by his harrowing first experience there about six years ago. It was my first visit as well, and since my mom was with us, together we explored the many wonders of the store for over three hours. With Owen and kids in tow.

He hated every minute.

Owen is not a shopper at heart anyway [unless we're talking power tools], so the fact that he made it through a three-hour-tour of IKEA is in itself no small feat. My mom and I still love to tease him about it, and he still adamantly refuses to spend time there. Although I was able to talk him into a brief stopover when we were passing through the Bay Area two summers ago.

Thinking about IKEA also reminds me that I bought some great prints there [during the aforementioned last visit] that I still need to get framed. Yikes. Talk about procrastinating. I should add "stop putting off house decorating projects that really should have been done years ago" to my New Year's resolutions this year. Hmmm. It's gonna be a long list this year.

today's quote

Seen on a t-shirt worn by a toddler at the mall after our visit to Build-a-Bear:

"What happens at Grandma's, stays at Grandma's."

'Nuff said.

go elf yourself!

Last Christmas my sister-in-law Deana got me hooked on the OfficeMax "Elf Yourself" website. This year it's back and better than ever! Now I can have all four of my dancing elves on the same page! Check it out here for a good laugh! And if you make your own, you'd better send it to me, 'cause I want to laugh at yours, too! For even more laughs, click on this link to see actors from "The Office" getting their elf on.

breathe

taken on the way home from school one foggy morning

It's been awhile, I know, but I'm still here. Still trying to catch my breath after a hectic couple of weeks. A lot has happened: the trip to DC [so much fun!], Halloween [will post pix of the kids soon], working a lot at the school, and just your basic everyday stuff to keep me constantly on my toes. At least it has all been a good busy. I promise to post about the fun trip and update my Flickr stream with some of my favorite photos. And I need to catch up on what everyone else has been up to as well!

right on target

Collin standing in front of the brand new SuperTarget. Apparently the new stores are sporting a series of red concrete ball sculpture balls in front! Of course Collin thought that they were so awesome, so we had to get a picture.

And can I say how much I love Target? We already have a regular Target not too far from our house, but this new SuperTarget has groceries, too! You know, in case I need to pick up shirts for one of the kids AND some apples for lunch the next day. You've just got to love Target. I don't know what I'd do without it. Some people are crazy about Walmart, but I've always been a Target girl. If I had a Walmart next door and a Target across town, I'd drive across town in a heartbeat. Which is what I actually used to do before we moved to our current house nearly four and a half years ago. Anyone else have a preference, or am I just an incorrigible Target snob?

And it just occurred to me: with my blog's current musical selection [you know, they're playing "La Ti Da" in the newest Target ads] this could basically be an ad for Target. Where do I pick up my paycheck? :)

quote for the day

Seen on a T-shirt at the bank this morning:

"If I got smart with you, how would you know?"

i dream of . . . barack obama?

Have you ever just been going through your normal business when all of a sudden you suddenly remember part of a crazy dream you had the night before? There's a quick flash, almost a memory, but not quite. A fleeting picture in your mind, the feeling you had in the moment. And then it's gone.

Just a few minutes ago I remembered a crazy dream I had last night. I was talking to a friend from high school that I hadn't seen in a long time [in real life]. She invited me to come over to her house for dinner, so suddenly, as is wont in dreams, we are travelling in her car and arrive in front of her house. It looks just like any normal house should. But as we walk up the steps and open the front door, she tells me that she is dating Barack Obama and that he is there, right now, and is making dinner for us. What? In my dream I remember that she was always very political and a Democrat, so after my initial shock I'm not terribly surprised. But as we go inside, I am panicking. What in the world are we going to talk about? What could I possibly say to Barack Obama? I meet and shake hands with him [I'm pretty sure he was wearing an apron] and then the dream starts to get fuzzy. The most I can conjure up at this point is something about levitating stemware and golden candles, and the rest is a blank. Crazy. I should really watch what I eat before bedtime. . .

progress

A funny story to relate just how crazy it's been around here. First of all, in the midst of preparing for Sonoma and playdates for the kids, I get a call from the superintendent of the school we would like to transfer our 3 kids to. It is K-8, meaning Bailey would be spared all the trauma of middle school woes, and I have heard super things about the school. So, I'm sitting outside Libby's friend's house, waiting for the girls to collect Ciera's things so they can turn their playdate into a sleepover, when I get the call on my cell phone that they want to interview the kids [and us] for the coming school year. Which starts in 6 days. Fortunately I'm parked, so I rummage about trying to find something to write all the critical info on, and then it's off to gather all the records they need for registration. And I haven't stopped since! Their interview at the school went well-the only question is room for Julia. They have an extraordinarily large 1st grade due to an extraordinarily large kindergarten class last year. However, the superintendent feels confident that there will be room. The only kicker is that we have to wait until the first day of school to know for sure.

Anyway. Back to my funny story. After a day of errands, packing, cleaning, 2 well-child visits, and new school interviews, I come home to look at my list to see what is still left to be done. I realize that I haven't made the gluten-free bread yet. So, at 9 pm, dead tired and still not done with for the day [night], I put the bread in the bread maker and go off to finish packing. A little while later I hear the bread machine knocking about and being extremely loud. Frowning, I I open the lid and peer inside. I stir it around with a spatula, but otherwise everything looks fine. But it's still really loud. When the timer goes off at 11:15 to take it out, I take it out in a dark kitchen and go up to bed.

This morning I am getting ready to put the bread into a bag when I notice a shiny silver something poking out the side of the loaf. What the heck? I pull away pieces of bread until I have in my hands a FORK. Inside the bread. All baked into it. I am about to blame one of those darn kids for putting flatware in my bread machine when I suddenly remember that I always use a fork to stir around the water, oil, and eggs before I add the mix. Except this time I left the fork in.

why the rucksack?

First of all, I happen to love the word. Rucksack. Let it roll around in your mouth. It's a great word. You can put anything in a rucksack. I just wanted a place to collect all my musings, rants, etc. that isn't permanent. You know, permanent like a journal or a diary is permanent. I already have one of those. But sometimes you just feel like writing random stuff, things for no good reason, things that you don't necessarily feel the need to have people reading 20 years later, and and have them wonder what was wrong with you and why ever did you stop taking your meds? I keep a journal [sometimes] and even maintain a family website with all the requisite cute pics and updates on what the kids are doing in school, but I wanted--no, I needed--a place to call my own. Just something informal and accessible. And so this blog is born.