If You Give Your Husband A Backhoe . .

. . .he's going to want to landscape the backyard. First he'll build a retaining wall.

While he's building the wall, he'll uncover the electrical conduit that goes to the site of his future workshop, and he'll have to dig a deeper trench to bury it below the wall.

When he starts digging the trench, he'll realize he wants to have water in his workshop too, so he'll dig another trench back to the house, to lay the pipes.

Once he reaches the house, he'll need to drill a hole through the foundation to put the pipe through.

When the hole is drilled and the pipe is through, he'll need to frame out the wall to cover up the pipe

After he frames out the wall, it'll need to be drywalled and mudded.

The new wall will look so nice that he'll want to re-do all the other walls and the ceiling in the basement, too.

But before he can finish the ceiling, he needs to finish re-wiring the basement.

Re-wiring the basement will end up being the final straw that causes his wife to lose what remains of her patience and decide they should just tear down the house and start from scratch.

And chances are, if you let her tear down the house. . .she's going to need a backhoe to do it.

Q & A (& Q & A & Q & A. . .)

Sometimes I feel woefully underqualified to be the parent of a preschooler. You'd think a degree in early childhood education would be plenty. It's not:

Conversation 1
Elizabeth: Mommy, what do mommy horses do?
Me: They walk around and eat grass and neigh. . .just horse stuff.
E: No, I mean, how do they make baby horses?
Me: Well, the baby horse grows in the mommy's tummy, and then when it's ready to be born it comes out.
E: I know, but where does it come out?

I should've majored in animal husbandry.

Conversation 2
(We're driving home from the store where Elizabeth saw some candy she wanted to buy, and I'm explaining how much it costs.)
Me: You know what a penny is, right? Well, a penny is worth one cent.
Elizabeth: What's a cent?
Me: It's one penny. One penny is the same thing as one cent. A dollar bill is worth 100 pennies, or 100 cents.
E: Well, where do dollar bills come from? Does the bank make them?

No, wait, make that economics. . .

(Conversation 2 continued)
Me: No, honey, the bank doesn't make money. The government does.
E: What's the government?
Me: It's the people who take care of the country. Like the president.
E: What's a president? Does the president make the money?

. . .with a minor in political science.

Conversation 3
Me: Here, put some Purell on your hands before you eat that.
Elizabeth: It kills the germs, huh?
Me: Yes, it does.
E: How does it kill the germs?
Chemistry and microbiology might have helped, too.

I've decided I'm going to start outsourcing my job. Next time you see our number on your Caller ID, you can expect to hear Elizabeth on the line with a question (or ten) for you.

Tooth Fairy

One night last week, Elizabeth was taking a bath--as usual, she was making up elaborate stories about her toy frogs and rubber duck and narrating their adventures out loud. I was in my bedroom and heard her say, "Whoa! My teeth are loose!" I figured it must have been one of the frogs "talking", but a minute later she dashed into my room and excitedly showed me--her two bottom front teeth were indeed loose!

After a couple of days of wiggling and checking and endless questions about the Tooth Fairy ("What does she do with the teeth? How does she get to my room? Does she have an alarm clock that tells her when my tooth falls out?"), the tooth on the left was extremely loose. On Saturday morning Elizabeth bravely said she was ready to pull it out, so we tied a little lasso of thread around it, she gave a good tug. . .and changed her mind because that first tug kind of hurt.

That afternoon after lunch, I gave Elizabeth an ice cream bar and sent her out to the porch to eat it. A few minutes later she ran inside, tooth in hand (and chocolate all over her face). She said she had been finishing up her ice cream bar when she felt something hard, so she spit everything out and voila: there was her tooth!

Bedtime was particularly exciting that night. Books about losing teeth, another volley of questions about the Tooth Fairy, and finally the placing of the tooth under the pillow. The next morning Elizabeth was thrilled to find the Sacajawea dollar the Tooth Fairy left behind. (The coin went straight into her "scooter box"--just seven more teeth and she should have enough money to buy that scooter!)

Love, Preschooler Style

This afternoon I was driving around town with the girls, and Elizabeth started telling me about which park was her favorite:

Elizabeth: "I really love B____ Park. I love it from the bottom of my carseat to the top."

Me: "Do you? How about Anna? How much do you love her?"

Elizabeth: (pauses) "I love Anna from the road up to the sky."

Me: "Wow, that's a lot! How about Daddy and me?"

Elizabeth: (pauses again) "I can't show how much I love Daddy and you. I just love you one hundred!"

Summer Days

Apologies for the stagnant blog. It seems like the blog always falls by the wayside during the summer, because we're so busy with. . .well, summer.

I'm still trying to get the house back in shape after some back-to-back-trips. . .At the end of June we went camping with Nonny & Poppa and approximately half of our ward. We had a lot of fun sighting wildlife (2 black bears, 1 coyote, and a plethora of buffalo/deer/elk) and looking at many, many "stinky geysers" and other sights of scenic wonder.

Mammoth Hot Springs

Anna, sacked out in her carseat

My cute family

Jared and I got a kick out of this sign.

I especially like the guy casually walking away in the background,
seemingly totally oblivious to the catastrophe.

The bison in Yellowstone act like they own the place.

Awe-inspiring sight of scenic wonder #37

Obligatory family photo in front of aforementioned sight of scenic wonder

I can't say enough good about our campsite, just a few minutes' walk from the Madison River. I think the girls would've been happy to spend the entire trip wading around and throwing rocks into the river.

Where Mom got her testimony that the church is indeed true. We attended sacrament meeting in the employee rec hall at Old Faithful--with a Coke machine just a few steps away from the pews.

Old Faithful, about 30 minutes before showtime. . .

Anna and Poppa

Old Faithful in full glory. It was truly spectacular-- this photo doesn't do it justice at all.

We got home from Yellowstone just in time for me to shower, re-pack, and head to the airport. I flew out to Tulsa with Amy for some training for her brand-new Just Between Friends franchises in Layton and Utah County. (Everybody, go to those sites right now. And come to the sales in October. But mostly go to the sites--I was the one who put them together, and I need you all to proofread/link-check them for me.) We had a great time in Tulsa. . .considering we were in Tulsa. No, really, I was pretty thrilled just to have someone else make the beds and wash the towels for a few days! After a long day of training, we would spent most of the evening just driving around Broken Arrow, sampling the local cuisine and making fun of the store names.

Mmmmm. . ."Kupcakz"!

We never did find out what they sold here. . .

I got home from Tulsa just in time for the 4th of July--which we celebrated in "classic Olson" style: dinner at the park by the 16th Street Gallery, followed by parachuter fireworks and sparklers galore. . .Aunt Skylar, Lael, Sinead, and Anna with Jared--

showing off their mad sparkler skillz

"B" is for Bronwen

And now here we are in the middle of summer. Our garden is. . .hmm, flourishing would be an exaggeration. It's growing, though. We've gotten a handful of peas, and there's a little cluster of cherry tomatoes on the plant that didn't get chomped by a deer. The girls are doing well, growing like crazy. I just realized I haven't even mentioned Anna's second birthday. My poor little second child. I'll start setting aside money for your therapy right now. I think I did manage to get some pictures this year, at least.

The birthday girl gets ready to. . .warily eye the candles.

She was a lot happier with her presents, thankfully.

Happy belated birthday, Boo Bear! You are such a ray of sunshine in our family. . .We love ya! (No, Brandon, I'm still talking about Anna here. Yes, she totally kifed your nickname. But the same sentiment goes to you--just replace "ray of sunshine" with "piece of work".)

Spring

"You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep spring from coming. "

-- Pablo Neruda

". . . And you would accept the seasons of your heart just as you have always accepted that seasons pass over your fields and you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief."

– Kahlil Gibran

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”

– Anne Bradstreet








"The day the Lord created hope was probably the same day he created Spring. "

--Bern Williams

Loss

No easy way to say this. We had to say goodbye to our baby last week. . .For some as-yet unknown reason, my body went into labor far too early and I delivered our little boy on Thursday, February 19th.

Our girls have been an immense source of joy and healing in this difficult time--what a blessing it is to have them both! We are also so grateful for the love and support of our family and friends. Thank you, everyone, for the kind words and the prayers said on our behalf.

"We could never learn to be brave or patient, if there were only joy in the world." (Helen Keller)

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