Book Review: The Help

I recently finished The Help by Kathryn Stockett.  (No, I did not take this picture – I got it off of Amazon.)  It is the story of three women who bravely cross the racial boundaries of 1960’s Jackson, Mississippi to write a book about the experiences of black women who work in white women’s homes.  Each chapter in the book they write focuses on various white women that they work for – observations from the inside.  Aside from the expected revelations about bigotry in a time a place I do not understand, the things that stuck with me most where the incredible strength and power of these black women.  I was humbled as I read about them working all day cleaning someone else’s house and taking care of someone else’s children (many times offering more love and affection than the child received from their own mother), only to come home at the end of the day to their own homes and families that needed tending.  I cannot stay on top of my own life, let alone two completely separate lives. 

Another thing that stuck out to me and that I keep asking myself is: “What would my chapter look like?”.  If someone were to silently observe my life, all facets, what would they see?  And I guess, more importantly, how would my children write my chapter?  And my husband?  And myself?  Because it is our little life going on here.  So I keep asking myself: What do I see?  And what am I doing about it?

One more thing, I want Aibileen to come live at my house for a while and teach me how to be a whole lot more like her.

Halloween? Really?

Is anyone else astounded it is time for Halloween already?  Normally I relish fall.  I can’t wait to dig out all my sweaters and jackets and wear snuggly socks all day long.  But this year I’m just not ready.  I think it has something to do with the fact that the sun did not shine and the weather did not get above 75 until the second week in August around here.  Dah! 

My trees are not even ready for it to be fall.  I have only one tree that is starting to turn colors at all – and that is just barely.  It’s cold and wet enough to be fall, but it wasn’t warm enough long enough to really be the end of summer (I don’t think it helped that my kids started school an entire week later than any year ever before!).  My internal clock is telling me it’s just not time for all this.  So how do I force my way through it?  I listen to Christmas music while I cut out Halloween decorations.  ;>

The Top

There is no substitution for genuine happiness.  Life is going well, but is very busy.  Between school and band practice and swimming lessons and a cold or two and a rather large sewing project and General Conference and Family Night and a small trip and Activity Days and Scouts and homework and dreams about my retainer breaking (again) and a few bad days (oh, that math homework), life is feeling quite fantastic at the moment.  I have so much to blog about but this morning is already full of cleaning and shopping and stories and cuddles and dishes and laundry.  All I have time to post today is my favorite picture from our family beach trip.  My niece, Brooklyn, and I climbed all the way to the top of the dune in Pacific City.  Today I feel like this picture – at the top of the world with someone I dearly love.  I realize the feeling may not last long, but it’s the best feeling there is – so I’m enjoying the moment.  I hope life is looking good for you, too.  Now I’m off to answer a child’s call for help from the school office (never a dull moment, I tell ya).

Baptism Dresses

I have no real excuse for not keeping up on my blog lately, other than my camera died.  And then it died again.  And then it died again.  And then it died one more time and I think I’m ready to throw in the towel and move on.  But I don’t want to shell out a whole bunch of money right now with Disneyland, Christmas and braces for Djeryd just around the corner.  Dah!

Regardless, I can still blog without my camera.  And I managed to to get in enough pictures between camera-deaths to compose a decent amount of posts.  So first up, because I have been dying to post this one, is a dress and a skirt I made for two of my nieces.  Please forgive the bland photography.  I was seriously like a crazed maniac just trying to capture these to garments digitally before my camera died again.  The sun was setting and it was cloudy and I was forced to scramble up to the studio and use a flash.  I didn’t know if I could eek out even one shot of each item.  But enough about the camera.

When each of my nieces turn eight years old and get baptized I make a dress for them.  They get to pick out the pattern and the fabric and I construct it.  Erik and two of his girl cousins have birthdays within three months of each other, so I had two things to whip up this time.  One of my sweet nieces wanted a dress that she picked out from Girls’ World.  I added a little ruffle sleeve to make it feel like a dress and not a jumper.  I found a tutorial for the flower online after being completely inspired by my dear, sweet friend who made a dozen of these babies for me for a family photo shoot.  I wish I could tell you exactly where I found the tutorial, but there are a zillion out there – just google “singed flower tutorial” and take your pick.  I love how the dress turned out and cannot wait to make one for Annaliese (I am determined to finished her current skirt though, before I start something new).  I lined the entire dress in the lilac satin.  For some reason when she put the dress on that sash shot up to the ceiling.  I don’t know if it was an engineering problem on my part or if the bow just got tied a little too tight and the dress is a little too big.  No matter, she loved it.  Yippee!

My second item was this gorgeous fuchsia skirt.  This skirt took about three hours from start to finish.  You could probably do it faster, but I iron A LOT and I had my girls “helping” in the studio.  It is a Lizzy McGuire pattern through Simplicity.  Emma chose the fabric and wanted a top to go with it, but I somehow lost the pattern pieces for that one.  And I was in a time crunch so I did not pursue any other avenues (consequently, I offered to make her a dress instead, but she said no, just the skirt).  The fabric is a shimmery rayon blend that I LOVED!  It was a little tricky to work with, but not bad.  And the drape is just incredible.  Don’t you love how it hangs?  I lined this one with a golden buttery satin because the fabric was quite sheer with any kind of back-lighting (oh, my).  I wish I had the blouse pattern because I would have loved to include an offset handkerchief hem in the yellow on the skirt, and then made a yellow top with some fuchsia ruffles.  Can you see it?

Take Me to the Fair

 

We all trotted out to the fair last night and had the best time I remember having.  We were there a little less than two hours.  We had a pretty small agenda which made the time we spent very relaxing.

First off we got a demonstration in gold panning.  This kind of stuff is has Djeryd written all over it.  He is, at this very moment, panning for gold with a cereal bowl in the backyard.

Djeryd and I both entered handiwork in the fair this year.  Djeryd built a model of the iconic van from The A-Team.  He won third place in his lot.

I just scrabbled up some things I had made over the past year or two on the sewing machine.  I entered eight items and all but two of them earned ribbons.  That is not anything to be impressed with, however, since most of the categories only had two or three competitors (or in the case of my blue-ribbon-winning flower-power capris – only one).  ;>  If you look really close in the picture above you can see a little tear running down my face.  So as cynical as I may sound, seeing my little creations up there literally brought tears to my eyes.  I am already dreaming about next year.

Erik astounded us all at the Army booth doing the push-up challenge.  This little guy did THIRTY Army-style push ups!  He tied the record for little kids.  All of the Army guys were so impressed they told him to wait while they rounded up a t-shirt.  We were ridiculously proud of Erik and bragged about him to everyone we saw for the rest of the night.

Little Miss Annabelle got her wish.  All she wanted to do was see the pigs.  Anna loves to snort (a very unladylike trait I did NOT teach her).  She wanted to go snort with the pigs.  It was hilarious.  I should have had Sean videotape it.  She would walk up to a big pig that was awake and snort at it, then wait for it to snort back at her.  Then she would snort some more at the pig and burst into giggles.  I’m sure they were telling each other little piggy jokes.  ;>

I think one of our goals for next summer will be for each of the kids to enter something in the fair.  Anna is begging for a sewing machine for Christmas so she can stitch up some “t-shirts, socks, pants, and skirts and tights”, and the boys are already coming up with new Lego designs for an impressive display in 2012. 

Oh!  And one more note to myself – the 4-H hall was amazing!  I was astounded at the work and craftsmanship produced by little fourth graders all the way up to high-schoolers.  I am definitely planning on looking into 4-H opportunities for the kids this year.

Yea for the fair!

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety-Jig

Sean and Djeryd spent a week at Scout Camp and returned last Saturday to cheers and shouts of joy.  The littles and I had a great week together, but it was sure nice when Daddy  and Djeryd came home. 

The kids waited on the front lawn for the van to pull up.

Djeryd carved a little something for both Erik and Anna.  You can’t see it, but the end of the stick has the name of the Boy Scout camp they went to carved into it.

We made a poster and yummy things to eat and had a pizza and movie party to celebrate the night.

Within a few short hours of Sean being home, Anna talked him into taking off her training wheels and heading out to the track for a test ride (she still needs her training wheels).

Sean graciously and sweetly steadied her all around the track until his back could no longer bear the hunch.

Anna and Alyx could not get enough of that sweet man.

I do not have very many pictures of Djeryd because he was not very excited about the camera that day.  He was so very happy to sleep in his own bed and play with his Legos and “take a shower!!”  We are so glad they are both home to stay for another year.

Lazy Summer Afternoon

On August first summer finally arrived in the Pacific Northwest.  Halleluiah!  I am generally not very good about making the most of lazy-daisy summer afternoons, but I am working on relaxing with my kids during the day.  I am usually so worried about all that has to be done and running here and there that I miss out on the enjoyable part of child-rearing.  So today, after I put Alyx down for her nap and all the kids trickled outside, I set aside all of my “shoulds” and headed out to sit under the sun umbrella and simply hang out with my children.  It was wonderful and I highly recommend the exercise.  Here is a little snip of this afternoon’s activities:

Djeryd made a movie, complete with a crashing-down-waterslide scene and rain.

 

Erik painted a really cool geometric picture (which I personally believes rivals plenty of pieces I’ve seen in galleries and textbooks).

And little Miss Anna painted and painted and painted, mixing all her own colors (I love that green on the rainbow).

I was a lazy bones and simply browsed a cookbook from my little chair in the shade.  (Now my baby is SCREAMING and I have to go be a mommy again – the not-fun-not-relaxing part.  Of course evening snuggles with my sweet baby girl . . .mmm . . . doesn’t get much better than that.)

Messy Pictures

While there are many things I like about a beautifully framed and shot photograph, I must admit that a part of me is drawn to these messy, everyday, raw sorts of pictures.  I feel like these capture our life a little more realistically sometimes.  The things I love about this picture is what it really says about our family. 

:: Like how we love fresh strawberries in summer, and a big family breakfast all together makes us smile. 

:: You can see that Sean likes to put peanut butter on his pancakes. 

:: Because I have a mug at my place setting, I know that the dishwasher was full and we were out of regular drinking glasses. 

:: Alyx has been captured using a real fork for one of the first times (she’s a natural). 

:: You can see that Djeryd is learning his states (look behind Sean’s head), and we always keep an inspirational quote on the wall by the door. 

:: Erik is the only one dressed which means he was very excited about whatever was going on that day and did not want to miss a moment. 

:: Anna’s glasses are on her face at breakfast, which means that she spent the next two hours reminding me that she gets a piece of candy for having her glasses on without my asking, and I kept saying “I’ll get it in a minute”. 

:: The “6 B’s” on the wall above Erik’s head because we love the prophet. 

:: And lastly, you can see a notebook next to my plate proving my compulsive need to write everything down (oh, how I love a good list).

So here is a real snapshot of our family.  No filters, no tweaking, no tidying.  Just us.  In a good moment – because look – we’re all smiling.  ;>

A Little Friendly Advice

We are so not good about our kids having friends over.  I can’t decide if I’m too tired or lazy or if I just like having my kids all to myself.  I want to encourage my kiddos to have friends over to play and hang out, but it just does not seem to be working.  Does anybody have any suggestions on how to nurture this part in a child’s life.  They play with cousins once a week or so, but they have virtually no interaction with neighborhood children or even kids from church outside of the church or scout setting.  We do not do sleepovers at all, but we do encourage late-overs (so far they only happen once a year on Djeryd’s birthday).  The other thing is I feel more comfortable with kids coming over to our house and not my kids going to someone else’s house.  I seriously need some advice.  I think this is an important part of my kids’ lives that I am neglecting.  Any advice is appreciated.  Thanks in advance.  ;>

Sleepy Lu

Alyx went from here . . .

to here . . .

to here . . .

 

in about 45 seconds.

A Visitor

Djeryd and I got home from the library the other night and this amazing creature was hanging off the fuchsias on the front porch.

I am fascinated by the wing structure, not only the black-lined skeleton that makes the wings strong, but also the muscles and joints that connect those huge wings to that thin body in order to enable flight.  An engineering miracle.  The details on a body so small (the little gripping hairs on the legs, the small strokes of color for beauty, the microscopic hairs and joints, the perfect symmetry of the entire creature) compel me to marvel at the wonder of God’s creations, and reflect on the thousands of miracles that must be taking place inside my body on a moment by moment basis.  I am not sure how anyone could really believe that we were not lovingly made by a brilliant Creator.

My Yummy Red House

I have been dying for a red house for years, but it costs a fortune to paint a house so we waited and waited.  We moved and then waited some more.  Then, due to a series of water problems, we were forced to repaint the house this summer. We hired it out to a friend.  His company did a fantastic job. (If you want his information, you can zoom in on the picture below.)  Admittedly, we were a little concerned about how the neighbors would react to such a strong color (our neighborhood is full of varying shades of beige).  We originally opted for a light blue.  But once the red and the blue were on the wall, side-by-side, there was no question whatsoever.  This house was meant to be red.

The solid red (without contrasting trim) was overwhelming.  I felt much better once that black paint was whipped out.  We love the change. It’s like getting a new house for a fraction of the cost.  Everything feels fresh and I think it is absolutely gorgeous. 

An Exercise in Green

I don’t know about you, but my kids cannot seem to make it through a whole day without someone getting angry or feeling left out by their siblings.  I am not usually very good at dealing with this, but I’m working on it.  The other day I came across an idea while perusing my favorite blogs.  She suggested handing off the camera to your child with an assignment to keep them busy for a while.  I tried it out and it worked pretty well. 

Anna was complaining that her brothers would not play with her or let her in their room.  I handed her the camera, told her to pick a color and then find as many things in the house as she could that were that color (the pictures of outside were taken from the office window).  She needed a lot of hand-holding (me pointing out things that were green), and it was more short-lived than I would have liked.  However, the upside has been that I have been able to call her back to the activity whenever a quarrel starts to brew.  Taking the pictures off the camera, looking at them, sorting them, creating the collage, and now the blog post, have all headed off a mini explosion of some sort. 

While brainstorming one of the last of Djeryd’s Faith in God requirements I suggested he do a photo exploration of things that represent his faith.  He has not done it, but I keep thinking I should do it.  This little activity with Anna may prove to be the perfect catalyst for getting my camera in my hand and opening my eyes to a discovery of the visual elements of our faith.  I will share it when I’m finished. 

In closing, Anna wanted to compose part of the blog post telling about her pictures.  The remainder of the post is straight from her cute mouth.

Annaliese’s green pictures.  Alyx. I took a picture of her and she had green pajamas.  And so I took a picture of the waterfall river.  That’s it.  (Then you can write, “I love you, Annaliese.”)

Favorite Things

:: future husband extraordinaire making dinner for the whole family all by himself, without any prodding (and willingly mowing the lawn)

::  sunshine in her hair and on her cheeks, with giggles and smiles and kisses

::  my girly girls playing together, discovering they are sisters

::  blueberries, and grey-green eyes, and the two of us learning how to enjoy one another

Garden Promises

In a former life (read: when I only had one child) I indulged in an absolute addiction to roses.  Over the following seven years and three children that addiction proved too costly in both time and energy.

However, I feel my spirits reviving.  Are roses in my future?  (For all you garden snobs out there – yes, the pink ones are peonies.)  Sean and I have created a new bed in the back yard to fill with roses and their friendliest companions.  My problem is I doubt myself – my energy, my ability to water, feed, prune, maintain a twenty-foot long bed of these gorgeous blooms. 

Do you ever worry about that?  Do you ask yourself: “Should I really spend money on plants that I am not even sure I will actually get into the ground?”  I want to raise my trowel-filled fist to the sky and scream “Yes, yes!  I will do it this time!  I will feed you!  I will weed you!  I will under-plant you!  I will water you!  Even if it kills me, I will do it for you.  Because I want you to live, to thrive, to be the most amazing plant you could ever be!”  But then I cast my eyes around the rest of my yard, at the shriveling hanging baskets, the weed-choked blueberry bushes, the un-staked and flopping delphiniums trying desperately to stand up, to look me scornfully in the eye and say, “You, you did this to me.  You left me to be trampled, to die here in the middle of this parched piece of earth you call a flower bed.  How dare you take the name ‘gardener’.” 

It sends chills down my spine.

And so I am left with the question that I seem to face on a daily basis: Can I make a promise and keep it this time?  Will I actually exercise today?  Will I help my children say their prayers and read their scriptures tonight?  Will I be patient today, no matter what happens?  Will I clean up the breakfast dishes sometime before 7:00pm?  Will I teach my children to work hard today (or just work at all)?  Will I show my children they come first - before the house, before the yard, before the schedule?  Will I sit down and figure out the kind of person I really want to be?  Will I do it today, this morning?  Will I ask too little of myself?  Will I stop demanding so much of myself?  Can I make a promise and keep it this time?