SNOW! Winter 09-10

Soo--as the pictures and the news you've surely read, indicate, we've had a lot of snow here! These first three pictures (which might not be the first three any more since blogspot's made some confusing changes to how the pictures are loaded) are from December, just before Christmas. We definitely had a white Christmas! I didn't join the kids sledding down the hill, but it looked like they were having fun. I did, however, make the snow angel.  We got more snow through January and early February, cancelling school a few times, and making it a little hard to get around. But until February 5 and 6, it wasn't enough to play again, but then, oh boy was it. These next three photos are from that storm.

And yes, I even made a snowman! With the help of my roommate Tammy. I suggested a carrot, but she had a better idea, pulled off the icycles from the patio, making him a snow alien! Isn't he adorable? I was actually quite anxious to make this snow man because my memory doesn't seem able to recall a time when I've actually made an upright snow man. Can you believe that? I grew up in Colorado and attended college in Utah, big snow states. And yes, fortunately, I can answer that I skiied every time someone asks, which is almost every time. But I don't remember a snow man, which curiously, no one ever seems to ask. I do recall my brother making forts, and I remember making a lying down snow man because the snow wouldn't let us make him stand upright, and well, that served our purposes well enough. And I made a snow shark with my nephew once. But  helas, finally, I have made an upright snow man! I found the time to do that actually on Tuesday, I think, and then the next day we got, yes, another snow storm. Can you believe it? Now, our alien is just a small hill in a new covering of snow--see below--right and left, respectively.

Beauty

As I was in the temple the other day, I was working with a woman who was completely wrinkled. Every inch of her face was a wrinkle, it seemed. But, she was glowing with happiness and kindness and I couldn't help but think she was beautiful for that. Seeing her wrinkles, however, reminded me of an ad that's popped up on websites frequently, that shows the difference this product can make for wrinkled skin.  (Curiously, there's also a disclaimer on the ad that says the results aren't typical. Ha!) Nonetheless, it does target this supposition in society that wrinkles aren't attractive, so people must not want them. But thinking about this woman, I tried to imagine her wrinkle-free, and it just seemed to me that it wouldn't make a bit of difference. If anything, she was more beautiful for her wrinkles. But really, her kindness and happiness--that is, having the Spirit of the Lord with her is what made her beautiful. She simply glowed with it.

Then, I took another step in my thinking. Is the wrinkle-free, shininess that is advertised as making one beautiful a way of women trying to target that glow they know they want, but with a misunderstanding of the source? Is there something innate in us that sees the glowing aspect of beautiful people that makes us want to emulate it, but without a knowledge of where it comes from, it's pretty hard to replicate. You can draw the conclusions you want from here, but I just thought I'd share some ponderings.

Books I've Finished Reading in 2009

Just for record keeping's sake, I'm pasting the list I'd kept on the sidebar here. Don't think I'm a crazy reader, though maybe I am. A lot of these are short, though--picture books or easy readers. With all my tutoring and teaching ESL this summer, I've tried to keep track of the books I read. Might help me recall some good ones in later times if the opportunities arise again. Also, I did a lot of books on CD this year, driving to and from work and just around town. 

• A Friend for Dragon; Dav Pilkey
• A Snout for Chocolate; Denys Cazet
• A Year Down Yonder; Richard Peck
• All Things Bright and Beautiful; Cecil Alexander, ill. Anna Vojtech
• Appointment with Death; Agatha Christie
• Austenland; Shannon Hale
• Bear Snores On; Karma Wilson
• Bee-bim Bop!; Linda Sue Park; Ho Baek Lee
• Blink; Malcolm Gladwell
• Bones and the Math Test Mystery; David A. Adler; Barbara Johansen Newman
• Boo to a Goose; Mem Fox and David Miller
• Book of a Thousand Days, Shannon Hale
• Born Blue, Han Nolan
• Clarice Bean Spells Trouble; Lauren Child
• Clarice Bean, Don't Look Now; Lauren Child
• Clifford's Happy Easter; Norman Bridwell
• Consider Love; Sandra Boynton
• Crash; Jerry Spinelli
• Crispin and the Cross of Lead; Avi
• Crispin at the Edge of the World; Avi
• Dancing on the Edge; Han Nolan
• Dragon's Fat Cat; Dav Pilkey
• Dragon's Merry Christmas; Dav Pilkey
• FableHaven, Grip of the Shadow Plague; Brandon Mull
• Fablehaven: Rise of the Evening Star (Fablehaven, #2); Brandon Mull
• Fairy Dust and the Quest for the Egg; Gail Carson Levine
• Fancy Nancy at the Museum; Jane O'Connor
• Fancy Nancy Sees Stars; Jane O'Connor
• Flat Stanley: Jeff Brown
• Flipped; Wendelin van Draanen
• Flush; Carl Hiassen
• For Biddle's Sake; Gail Carson Levine
• Good Night, Washington DC; Adam Gamble
• Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods; Suzanne Collins
• Gregor and the Marks of Secret; Suzanne Collins
• Gregor and the Prophecy of Bane (Book II); Suzanne Collins
• Hercule Poirot's Christmas; Agatha Christie
• Hiroshima; Laurence Yep
• Hooray for Fly Guy; Tedd Arnold
• Huggly Gets Dressed; Tedd Arnold
• Iris and Walter, the School Play; Elissa Haden Guest; Christine Davenier
• Jody's Beans; Malachy Doyle; Judith Allibone
• Julep O'Toole Miss Independent; Trudi Trueit
• Julep O'Toole: Confessions of a Middle Child; Trudi Trueit
• Just Me and My Little Brother; Mercer Mayer
• Le Petit Prince, Antoine de St. Expuery
• Leaf Man; Lois Ehlert
• Letters from Rapunzel; Sara Lewis Holmes
• Little Monster's Neighborhood; Mercer Mayer
• Little Rat Sets Sail; Monika Bang-Campbell; Molly Bang
• Little Whistle's Dinner Party; Cynthia Rylant, Tim Bowers
• Little Witch Goes to School; Deborah Hautzig; Sylvie Wickstrom
• Llama Llama Red Pajama; Anna Dewdney
• Madeline; Ludwig Bemelmans
• Marvin K. Mooney will you please go now!; Dr. Seuss
• Max the Great; W.L. Heath
• Millie Waits for the Mail; Alexander Steffensmeier
• Mississippi Trial, 1955; Chris Crowe
• Money Troubles; Bill Cosby; Varnette P. Honeywood
• Moon Glowing; Elizabeth Partridge and Joan Paley
• Nake Mole Rat Gets Dressed; Mo Willems
• Nate the Great and the MIssing Key; Marjorie Weinman Sharmat; Marc Simont
• Nate the Great Saves the King of Sweden; Marjorie Weinman Sharmat; Marc Simont
• Now You See It...; Vivian Vande Velde
• One of the Third Grade Thonkers; Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
• Pish and Posh Wish for Fairy Wings; Barbara Bottner and Gerald Kruglik
• Pollyanna; Eleanor Porter
• Redwall; Brian Jacques
• Scat; Carl Hiassen
• Seven-Day Magic; Edgar Eager
• Spiderwick Chronicles #1; The Field Guide; Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi
• Spiderwick Chronicles #2, The Seeing Stone; Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black
• Spiderwick Chronicles #3, Lucinda's Secret; Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black
• Stan the Hot Dog Man; Ethel and Leonard Kessler
• Tales from the Hood; Michael Buckley
• Teachings of the Presidents of the Church, Joseph Smith
• Tess of the D'Urbervilles; Thomas Hardy
• The Bear Snores On; Karma Wilson
• The Berenstain Bears and the D... The Berenstain Bears and the Double Dare; Stan and Jan Berenstain
• The Berenstain Bears and the In-Crowd; Stan and Jan Berenstain
• The Cat Who Went into a Closet (Reader's Digest Book version); Lilian Jackson Braun
• The Dark Hills Divide; Patrick Carman
• The Everafter War; Michael Buckley
• The Fairy's Mistake; Gail Carson Levine
• The Foot Book; Dr. Seuss
• The Frog Prince; Gillian McKnight
• The Graveyard Book; Neil Gaiman
• The Last Book in the Universe; Rodman Philbrick
• The Long Winter, Laura Ingalls Wilder
• The Midwife's Apprentice; Karen Cushman
• The Nake Mole Rat Letters; Mary Amato
• The Name Jar; Yangsook Choi
• The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency; Alexander McCall Smith
• The Princess Test; Gail Carson Levine
• The Secret of the Old Clock; Carolyn Keene
• The Silly Gooses; Dav Pilkey
• The Three Silly Girls Grubb; John and Ann Hassett
• The View from Saturday; E.L. Konigsburg
• The Warrior Maiden; Ellen Schecter; Laura Kelly
• The Wednesday Letters; Jason Wright
• The Willoughbys; Lois Lowry
• The Witch of Blackbird Pond; Elizabeth George Speare
• The Worst Witch Saves the Day; Jill Murphy
• The Year of the Dog; Grace Lin
• There was an Old Lady who Swallowed Fly Guy; Tedd Arnold
• Things are Gonna Get Ugly; Hillary Homzie
• Three Stories You Can Read to Your Cat; Sara Swan Miller
• Toot & Puddle: Charming Opal; Holly Hobbie
• Waiting for Normal; Leslie Connor
• We the Kids; Founding Fathers and David Catrow
• When Zachary Beaver Came to Town; Kimberly Willis Holt
• Where the Wild Things Are; Maurice Sendak
• Whoosh Went the Wind! Sally Derby and Vincent Nguyen
• words + math + seasons = mathematickles!; Betsy Franco and Steven Salerno
• Young Cam Jensen and the Ice Skate Mystery; David Alder

It's a Wonderful Life

Since I watched this movie in its seasonal norm a few weeks ago, I've been thinking a lot about it. I've always liked it, since I was little and it played on regular TV every Christmas time. I especially liked the end, where George got to see what a wonderful life he led. How different the world would have been without him. And now as an adult, I watch it, and I still like the end. I got the tingly happy feeling watching all his neighbors bring their few dollars and tell him how grateful they are for him.

But I'm a little more perplexed as an adult, particularly by one of the last lines of the narrator that reminds us of the everyman spin onto it. Let me see if I can explain. There are a number of reasons that people enjoy pieces of fiction (books, movies, etc.) For some pieces, it's the escapist quality, the adventure, and for others its the pulls at the heart strings.  In most cases, though, regardless the genre, there is an appeal to the everyman. In an adventure, it's a temporary opportunity to imagine yourself heroically, or doing something out of the mundane. The heart string pullers are a little closer to reality, having the "this really could happen to you" feel about them. But still, they're a pull from the mundane. Whatever the case, the audience pulls themselves into the story. Facebook quizmakers are very well aware of this as they don't seem to have an end to the number of "Which character are you?" quizzes and people continue to love taking them.

So what is the everyman take home from It's a Wonderful Life? It's not too much of a great adventure. In fact, one of the great conflicts is that George never gets to go on the travelling adventures he's always wanted to. So, it seems to fit more tidily into the "This could happen to you." And indeed, as the narrator tries to convince us in his summary, who, in their everyday everyman life doesn't want to feel like their pittance of an existence has made a great mark on the world?

This is what perplexes me, though. See, it's not quite as tidy as that. Although a young person watching it can be inspired to live a selfless life, as George did, giving to others for the sake of his love for them, not everyone will be able to look back on their life with the same results. How many people can say they've saved the life of a war hero who went on to save hundreds of other lives? How many people are able to save a city from being clutched in the grasp of a greedy monopolizer? Seeing these big things as the marks of a "wonderful life" can leave the everyman feeling his life is not quite so big a stick as that.

Nonetheless, I don't think we can stop here and write off the movie as not up to snuff. There's something that's just under the surface that needs to come up. And that is what makes it a great story. That is, what is it that makes George feel as if his life is wonderful? Is it realizing the good he's done? No, I don't think so. He does have some kind of recognition here. But that's not what brings about his change of heart. It comes to a culmination when he sees Mary unhappy and his heart yearns to have her and make her happy again, when he realizes how happy she's made him. And then it continues there to his other friends--it's not how much good he's done for them that he rejoices in, but how happy they made him: the reasons that he did the good deeds he spent his life doing, because he loved them.

This too is why this is such a great Christmas movie. Many movies have a Christmas scene in them, and sometimes they get lumped into the Christmas movie category and sometimes they don't. It's a Wonderful Life, as far as setting goes, could fall in with those. It has a Christmas scene, which happens to be at the end. But it's the focus of the whole movie. No, what makes this a Christmas movie is the theme--the demonstration of the Savior's love through a single person. There was an angel, though not a Christmas angel, but he served to represent how the Savior makes our lives wonderful, by providing us with people we can love, if we choose to, by providing us with opportunities to help each other. Not all of us will have life-saving opportunities, not in the grandiose sense, but we can all in our small ways make our lives wonderful by choosing to be grateful for the lives of the loved ones around us.

Fun with French

My first NOVA class is finished and I haven't written anything about it since I started! How did that happen? Well, it's called--this isn't my only journal. I have written elsewhere. But maybe I should share a few things with you about it. I had seven wonderful students enrolled in my Introductory French course, and we covered a lot of ground together.

So much ground that I'm positive some of the things that came up as questions or during my preparations as seemingly significant to teach, I'm positive I didn't learn in my introductory French course back in 8th grade, and yet we met in that class for an hour every week day for an entire semester. What on earth did we do in all that time we had? I have to confess that I wonder that about a lot of subjects. But that is for a different conversation.

I think those things came up just because of this man named Murphy. You've probably heard of him. He has a law. That is, as I feared, students asked me questions I didn't know the answers to. It has been a few years since I was regularly conversing in French, and even more since I studied it.

Still, I think I didn't do too badly.  After all, it's not like they were asking these questions because we moved  so quickly as to bypass my abilities. No, they still had a hard enough time learning the things I was trying to teach them--things I did know. I think that's a unique problem to teaching adults. They just know enough to ask obscure questions--like the gentleman who had a litany of military-related questions. I'm not really much of a historian, let alone a military historian, and much less a French military historian. True, I probably should have brushed up a bit on the masculine/feminine case of a few words I got stumped on, but no, I'm not so sure it was all that big of a slight that I didn't know all the answers.

At least they were learning something, and I could definitely tell in this case. That's a nice thing about taking people who start with next to nothing in a subject--you know when they make progress.

And still, in spite of the embarrassing questions, I had fun--even learning answers to those questions, as well as finding things as I prepared for the classes that I didn't know. For example, I had thought that lavabo was the word for sink, of any kind. So when I was in France, I never completely understood the funny looks I got when I used the word to refer to the kitchen sink. Eventually I stopped using it and just used  "bobiné" if necessary, since I'd at least gathered as much as to know that that probably meant tap, since when they gave me tap water they said it was "du bobiné." But I learned that evier is the word for a kitchen sink. Who knew? What's the big difference, I don't know. But there you have it.

There were a few other obscure words I learned, as well as I had refreshers of lessons I learned back in the 8th grade that for whatever reason haven't come up as significant since then. Isn't language interesting?


One of the best things I learned from teaching, however, is that some students can actually be forgiving of blunders and embarrassments, and keep on smiling as you push forward. Maybe because French is such a beautiful language, it's a little easier to see le prof en rose.

Substitute Teaching

Why are Substitute like diapers? Because they catch a lot of crap from kids

But it's a lot harder to change these diapers because these kids are old enough they should know how to act by now. So with that, and the load I take on from them, I can't always change the diaper quickly enough, so I start to stink.

Okay, that wasn't terribly pleasant an opener, was it?
Well, I'll try to be more positive. I have had some good experiences subbing lately, but it is pretty tough.

A few weeks ago, while a Spanish class was Venn diagraming the differences between the US and Spain, I thought I'd draw my own Venn Diagram (They seem to be popular in this district--I've subbed for several classes who have had to make one for something or other). Mine is on the similarities and differences between my school experience between elementary and high school, and the schools where I've been subbing. The things that are somewhat in the middle but hanging over into the Con Ball side mean that those things are at some PG schools but not all.

Can you get a little bit of a sense of what difficulties I've encountered? There was no such thing as an ipod or a cell phone or a PDS when I was in school, so no teachers had to take these things away. There were toys, of course, and you can be sure teachers took them away. Why students think they "need" their phones for emergencies now when we've gotten by without them for so long is beyond me. But it's not just student silliness that causes problems, as you can see. It's the nature of the whole beast. In the first class I subbed for this school year, a class I had for three weeks, several kids consistently did not bring their books to class. So I tried getting into their brain that this class was ESOL and the most important book for them to bring to ESOL was the ESOL book. Get your other books from your locker after class. But then I heard an administrator in the hall get after a kid for getting into his locker between classes. There's no winning. I can see to a degree why they have minimal time in their lockers. But it's also a pretty tough burden on those kids to make them carry all of their books to every class.

And there's this other issue. Aside from typical disruptive students, one of the big disruptions is having several children one after the other raise their hand, or approach you without raising their hand, to ask to use the restroom. You think you're onto something good and then bop--it's only a restroom break. Maybe the children need some more diapers in these classrooms.

Socks

As the cold weather has hit again, I've had socks on the brain quite a bit. Why? Because I'm not terribly fond of socks. Generally speaking. There are some socks that I like, however, and I love getting warm, fun socks as gifts. But generally, I'm a barefoot baby, quite happy to run around with pebbles poking my arches.

Why do I not like socks?

1. They're the key to letting people know my pants are sometimes not long enough

2. Finding the right ones to match whatever I'm wearing is tricking and expensive

3. Wearing shoes and socks makes my feet stink.

4. They're either too thick or too thin--either can't fit into my shoes, or so thin they're falling down my ankles all the time.

5. When they get holes, I'm annoyed with the hole all day, and probably longer because I don't want to throw them out and pay money to replace them, especially if they happen to match something.

6. They look funny with skirts and dresses which means I have to have pantyhose, which are even worse.

7. Pairs get split up all over the place

in the wash

in the bed

behind the bed

between the shower and the hamper

8. If I'm wearing only socks and I have to go outside, they get dirtier or sopping wet a lot faster than if I'm only wearing shoes.

9. I have nice looking ankles without the socks.

Why do I, therefore, like socks that are gifts, or fun socks?

1. These socks are cute, so it doesn't matter if they match anything. I'm not wearing them for that.

2. They keep my feet warm enough that I don't have to wear shoes, too.

3. They make people smile.

4. Of course, they still get lost and separated. Especially because these are often night socks that are bound to be worn into bed. But because they're colorful and fun, I can usually notice readily when they're missing and see them as they stand out in the mess of sheets, etc.

Happy Birthday Cyndi!

The last but not least, my sister Cyndi. That is, since I started with John whose birthday is later this month, Cyndi is the final immediate family member to be recognized in her birthday month.

Cyndi is the child right after me in birth order, number four. We're just over two years apart, and so we tended to play dolls and house together a lot. We also had next door neighbors that had girls each of our ages, so we went together over to the Menkes a lot to play with Jenny and Becky. But even on Sundays, when we didn't play with neighbors, we had our box houses in the basement and played quite a bit. Although I think I shared a room longer with Kim, I did also share with Cyndi, especially after Kim moved out.

This is not to say, however, that we were best of friends. No, I was probably more often the annoying big sister who liked things quiet so I could get my homework done, and who didn't always like her music, and was jealous of her popularity, jealous that our big brother seemed to like her better, that she was cuter, or something. Typical sibling rivalries. And yet she still loved me and missed me when I went away to college. Will wonders never cease.

But Cyndi has always been a cheerful person and she turned out quite all right.

I have nice memories of her coming with my mom to help out when I had my car accident back in 1993--her senior year in high school. The next year, when she was at Ricks, she came down with a friend to visit me, and we braved a little car wreck together. Poor Cyndi, sitting up front, got a taste of air bag face. She still looked cute, of course.

Since her husband and I are about the same age, we both graduate with bachelors' at about the same time, so when I moved home after BYU, he was starting his graduate work, and it just happened to be at Denver University, so in 1998 and 99, we were once again in the same state, and not that far apart. I went down there a few times to watch her oldest and then second after he was born. And they, of course, came up from time to time. Those were fun times.

Now, she's on the other side of the country from me, but we talk occasionally on the phone, and communicate through our myfamily website. She's a fun and bubbly mom of five wonderful kids, four of whom she has enrolled in soccer right now. Plus she's doing a pre-school again for her fourth child, and taking care of a one year old (her fifth). Amazing!

Most recently, I saw her at the reunion in Colorado this summer. I had fun playing with her kids and laughing with Cyndi at things. She has a very fun, catchy laugh, and I love her to death! Happy Birthday, Cyndi!

Busy-ness!

The last two weeks I've had what I wrote awhile ago about only hoping for--busy-ness. And I've learned to be careful what you wish for. Well, it's actually been a blessing in a few ways. A week after the Korean kids left, school started in PG's county, where I subbed and will sub. But, as you can imagine, it will take some time before teachers need subs. So, although I had a few tutoring assignments that carried through for a week or two after (and picked up a new one that will go through the school year), it wasn't really a lot of work. Fortunately, however, as I was volunteering at the library that week, a man came in looking for a typist for a book he's working on. Although the librarians are technically not supposed to recommend companies or people--endorsement concerns--since the librarian knew I was in need of work and figured that I was probably a decent typist considering my experiences and interests (she was right, of course--I can do 70 wpm)--she went over to where I was shelf-reading and asked if I wanted to talk to him. So I did, and to make it short--for the last two weeks I've had typing work. The timing, as indicated, was of course, fantastic as far as employment in general, but also because I've started teaching my NOVA continuing ed (workforce development) courses this week, so I've needed time at home to get those ready, so working from home these two weeks has been great. It's also good because I tend to like to mess around on the computer, and so it's nice to have something productive to do--typing at home--which has more or less forced me to drop out of some silly farming games on Facebook that I was really looking for an excuse to drop.

The things I've been typing, too, have been kind of interesting. But also kind of depressing. It's about this man's efforts to change the name of one of the Senate buildings because the name after whom it's named was a terrible racist. When that effort didn't bring the immediate desired results, after a year, he switched gears to seeking for an apology from the Senate for not passing anti-lynching legislation in spite of several efforts to pass such a bill. I don't have a lot of experience or understanding about the workings of the government, so this has been educational in that regard, too, but it seems, based on my reading, that the Senate was seriously messed up considering the ability of one senator to block bills through filibustering. I think filibustering laws/rules have changed since that time, so hopefully they're better. But seriously, seriously, that was messed up. To think that one man could basically throw a temper tantrum--though a "mature" version of one-- just talking for hours on end--in order to get his way, well, as I'm indicating, it's all rather childish. Considering my lack of knowledge on the subject, this post might seem a little childish, though hopefully more child-"like," but I seriously hope that laws have changed to make it a lot harder for one hard-headed, hair-brained nut to keep a good bill from passing.

The man for whom I've been doing this typing asked me, after the first batch of typing--last week--if I would collaborate with him on bringing this book about, and I agreed. As I've typed this second half, though, I've been wondering if that was the right decision. It's all rather complicated to know, sometimes, what's really good and what's specious. Reading about the terrible things this man did, and about the terrible things themselves--the lynchings--is all rather depressing. These are terrible, terrible things--is there a word strong enough to describe the horribleness of it?--that people in American history did. If I understand correctly, the man's point in writing is to bring these aspects of our history to more people's attention--for history's sake. On one hand, I can see the value of that. It is good to know even the negative things about our history, isn't it? But why? Before I can move forward with the collaboration, I need to understand the why more clearly, more thoroughly. So we don't repeat it, of course, is one of the standard reasons for history, but I think I need a better understanding than that. Something to help me understand how "If there is anything virtuous lovely, of good report, or praiseworthy" applies to this situation. So that I understand how to present it in a non-hypocritical way--with love rather than hate.

Happy Birthday Thom

As is becoming my habit, I'm a few days late, but I can't forget my brother Thom! He's the brother who is exactly like me in every way! Okay, no, he's not my twin. He's actually about nine years younger. Ten for a month. But we both have summer birthdays! And we were both English majors, both are creative writers, and like fantasy. I tend to like lower fantasy, which he does too, but I think he might like some higher fantasy too. Anyway, we also both served missions, and we're both the third child. Yes, I can hear your "huh?" According to some birth order theories, there are only four possible children in every family and then it starts over. It can also start over a certain amount of time passes between births--like a lot of time. Anyway, since my parents had eight children, Thom and I are both the third child. Get it? I might even have explained this before on here. I have had to explain it on occasion.

Anyway, obviously, we have many differences, too, even aside from the boy-girl thing. He's married and has a wonderful wife and a sweet daughter and another on the way. He's got a very upbeat personality, loves to sing, and act. He even just got hired as the acting coach for the high school where he lives. Otherwise, he teaches middle grade English. So, we're both teachers, too--though he actually has a certification. Anyway, anyway, so I really love my brother Thom.

Let's see, what's one of my favorite memories? Well, going to his house over Christmas break in 2007, when he was still finishing up his degree and they lived in a tiny apartment down in Alamosa, was a good memory. We even had each other's names for the gift exchange, and he condescended to liking the aprons I made for him and his wife. I actually like them, too, but you never know with homemade things and particularly aprons for me. I had tried to make a bow tie for him, but it didn't work. I thought he looked cute in the apron anyway. He got me a couple books, one from Elder Wirthlin, who passed away recently, so that was good timing, and the other was the first in the FableHaven series which I'm continuing on now as we speak--very good series. Captivating.

I also have nice memories of Thom when he was little. He was an adorable little boy. I left home for college when he was young, like 8 or so, I think, though I bounced in and out of the house during his middle school and high school years. During that time, I remember shaving his face--yes he was quite brave. It wasn't like I was inexperienced, though. I shaved the faces of many willing young men in my ward at BYU around that time. With a women's razor even. Beat that! I also did the little braid things in Thom's hair once, as I did John's, and I might even have dyed his hair a tinge. Yes, I think I did.

Most recently, I saw him at the family reunion, which I neglected to document on the blog, for various reasons, but anyway, we had a great time. He was in charge of the Q-lympics and did a fantastic job with that. We partnered in an event of doing word puzzles and rocked the house with that one! (How could two such intelligent English major types not?) :)

Anyway, Thom is great, Thom is awesome. I hope he had a great birthday!