Update

It appears that the only time I can post anything on my blog is when I'm not on my own computer. (I'm currently in Utah and using my dad's computer.) There is some sort of a glitch on my laptop that makes it impossible for an illiterate computer user like me to post anything on my blog. I hope that my computer genius husband can come to my rescue soon, but from the looks of his gargantuan "to do" list, it will be quite a long time before that happens. I DO have things to say, and I do want to say them, but I will have to wait . . .

Still Living

I typed up a lengthy post a few weeks ago, and blogger "rejected" it. I got discouraged. I sat on my hands. (Not really.) I want to write. I need to write. But writing will have to wait until at least the middle of June. Then I will try to write something worth reading. Stay tuned. If you dare.

*I'm 800 miles away from home using my dad's computer, and so that is why I could publish these two posts. Once I return home, who knows how long it will be before I can get my own computer to cooperate.

Viva Las Vegas!

Earlier this month I traveled to Las Vegas for my lovely niece Nikki's wedding. It was a short trip, but it was packed with fun, sun, and time with family. I shared a tiny hotel room with my parents. They slept in a king-sized bed, and I slept in a roll-away (with the obligatory sunken mattress) pushed up against the wall on one side and a had a 4-inch space between my parents' bed on the other side. There wasn't much time for sleep anyway.

I have a tradition of making quilts for my nieces and nephews when they get married. I'm rethinking this "good idea" since 3 nieces are getting married before mid-August. Here is a photo of new bride Nikki's quilt.

We spent a few hours on "The Strip." I'm glad we went during the day because the pimps don't appear to be too active then. Plus, M&M World is very family-friendly. The casinos not so much. It had been a long time since I had smelled much cigarette smoke.

Let me just say (in case you couldn't tell), that I'm not very good at arranging the layout on my blog. That is why you see the photos all clumped together and the text all clumped together. I'll try to improve the layout some time in the next 5 years, but for now, you'll have to settle for the way it is.

I even managed to get a photo of Donald Trump's campaign headquarters. Our hotel was a hop, skip and a jump from there. I didn't see The Donald, though.

As you can see, Elvis is still in the building. Or should I say "Elvises?" They were out in full force on the strip.

I'm not a Madonna fan, but I wanted to include the photo of her bizarre and unique bustier. I hope you can read the description included on the picture.

Try to use your imagination and picture me flanked by two Michael Jacksons. They looked incredibly like the real Michael Jackson, although I had never seen him in person. Their voices even sounded like MJ. My sister took a very gory picture of me getting my head cut off by Jason. (At least my nephews tell me that's his name.) If you must see the photo, go to my Facebook page and look at my photos.

Fortunately, the Las Vegas Temple is not on "The Strip." It's next to some very brown, dirt-covered mountains. The temple is beautiful inside and out, and the grounds are lovely, too. We attended a temple session with Nikki Thursday night and her wedding Friday.

My mom and dad will be so happy (?) that I posted a photo of them, too. My siblings (2 brothers and 1 sister) will be overjoyed with their photo as well. The only spouse missing was Lance. He had to stay home and hold down the fort here. Sometimes he gets to take a vacation. We even take occasional trips together. (Those are the fun ones.)

The lovely bride, Nikki, and her groom, Tyler, pose with Karen, Nikki's mom, and Scott, Nikki's step-dad. Then they pose with Nikki's dad, Blake (my brother) and step-mom, Lanette.

Then, of course, there is the obligatory photo of the grandparents with the grandchildren. Some of the grandchildren. Why are my kids always missing? (They didn't go on the trip.) Niece, Hannah, was missing, too. She was preparing for her college finals. Her wedding day is in August.

A trip to Vegas wouldn't be complete without a photo of double cousin Janet and her adorable, precocious children.

YOU ARE NOT BLIND. THERE ARE NO PHOTOS WITH THIS POST. THERE WERE PHOTOS WITH THIS POST, but I couldn't post them. Just use your imagination. I'll try to redo the photos if my computer will cooperate.

Gray is Beautiful

Call it vanity, call it what you will, but I think my natural (gray) hair color makes me look old. In other words, it makes me look like I'm 51.5 years old.

Something happened this morning that shocked me to the core and pushed me to make a decision I really didn't want to make. I will explain.

I "colored" my hair like I always do every couple of months. I used the product I've always used. The one with "no ammonia." I donned the gloves, applied the dye, rinsed my hair and conditioned it. My loving husband then noticed that I had somehow gotten just a dab of hair color on our new bathroom door. As he wiped off the SMALL amount of dye, the door paint peeled off with it. Horror of horrors!

This begs the question: if my "gentle" no-ammonia-based hair dye is strong enough to peel paint off wood, what is the dye doing to my scalp? My blood? My brain? Yikes!!!!

Now for the decision: I will no longer dye my hair. There I said it! This means that when you see me gradually turning gray and staying that way, you'll know why. Try not to stare. I hope I will stay strong and committed and will stick with this decision. Try not to stare. (I know I just repeated myself.)

Hypothetically Speaking

I wonder if anyone has sued their child/children for mental anguish? Just doing a bit of pondering today.

Blood Draw and Writing

I have deep, hard-to-find veins. If I'm dehydrated, it makes finding those veins next to impossible. Just ask the nurses that tried to start an IV before I had my colonoscopy a few months ago. I'm always thrilled when I encounter someone who knows how to get my veins to cooperate, someone who will listen to me when I tell them to use a butterfly needle. I really don't mind getting my blood taken. It's never bothered me. Needles have never scared me. But, I don't like it when health professionals dig around in my arm for minutes on end trying to find a vein. It begins to hurt after a while.

Imagine my delight today when I showed up at LabCorp and was greeted by the same phlebotomist who drew my blood a few months ago. He was a pro. He still is a pro. He is one of my new best friends. I should have asked his name.

Before lunching with a group of friends today, I met up with one of my dearest friends, Julie, for a little chat. We talked about our kids and a few other things before she asked, "Are you writing?" She knows I completed a 2-year course in writing children's literature. I was a little embarrassed to tell her that I really don't write much. I should write. I want to write. But it's probably important to have something to write about. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm . . .

Stay tuned . . .

For the Love of Reading

I like to read. Strike that. I LOVE to read. Recently I read five books at once. (Trust me, it's possible.) I have a large library; it's actually a lending library and books come and go. I enjoy lending my books to other avid readers, and I love recommending good books I've read. Here are some of the books I've recently read and recommend.

*The Grand Sophy by Georgette Heyer
*Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls
*The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls (pardon the "French")
*The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan
*NurtureShock by Po Bronson and Ashley
*Better by Atul Gawande
*Complications by Atul Gawande
*The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
*Look Me in the Eye by John Elder Robison (PAPERBACK version)
*Hiding in the Spotlight by Greg Dawson
*Betsy-Tacy Books by Maud Hart Lovelace
*Villette by Charlotte Bronte
*Take Good Care of the Garden and Dogs AND If You Lived Here I'd Know Your Name by Heather Lende
*Too Close to the Falls by Catherine McClure Gildiner

Bad News First

Bad News: I had to pay $200 to the Kirkland Municipal Court today.
Good News: I was given a deferral on my speeding ticket, and the ticket will not go on my driving record. I just have to remain ticket-free for six months. (The normal deferral is one year, but since I have a perfect driving record, the judge reduced the time to 6 months.) I didn't even have to recite the speech I had sort of prepared.

If you choose to be a passenger in my car, get used to being driven to your destination very slowly (at least for the next 6 months).

More Cupcakes!

Since my living room and kitchen double as sewing rooms, it's kind of a pain to set up my trusty Viking Classica 100 machine every time I want to sew. While the machine is "up," I like to cram as many sewing projects into that time as my shoulder and neck muscles will allow. I spent the MLKJ holiday weekend sewing 17 of these nifty little cupcake oven mitts. I really like them. While the pattern and directions are easy to follow, they are a bit challenging to make. My mom has requested that I make 30 for her to give as Christmas gifts. Unfortunately, these will be used for other purposes, so I have at least 30 more to make.

How I Spent My Christmas Vacation

Can you tell which photo is not holiday-related? It's the photo of Mark holding an adorable baby Ella. I included this photo because it's cute and because it shows Mark doing something that he loves to do. Since I didn't gift him with a younger sibling, I give him opportunities to hold babies from time to time. Now, onto the holidays.

Five of us (Lance, Sara, Zach, Mark and myself) traveled to a very cold Rexburg, Idaho on December 22 to spend Christmas with Annica and Josh. Rachelle finished Fall Semester a few days prior to our arrival, so she had taken up temporary residence at her sister's home. Josh's mother (aka Mark's "mother-in-law"--which is a story for another day) joined us Christmas Eve. This is the first time in a long time that our entire family has been together. We played games, ate, shopped (a little), chatted, and went snow-mobiling. I should note that only the boys went snow-mobiling. Josh prevented Mark from rolling theirs.

The day after Christmas, Lance, Rachelle, Zachary and Mark returned to Washington. Sara and I traveled to Utah. The Washington-bound group was blessed with relatively good weather and roads on their journey. Sara and I had to brave the slick roads and snowy weather on our trip. It took my back and neck 4 days to recover from the tension built up on the drive.

We had a family get-together in Kaysville Monday evening. My brothers and sister and their families came, and we had dinner and played games. This is an annual event and the first one in years that I had attended. The rest of the week saw us playing games (Canasta, usually), shopping and getting Sara ready to go to BYU.

Sara and I ventured to Provo on New Year's Day. We paid a short visit to Lane and Cindy's family in Alpine. Sara checked into her apartment at Heritage Halls. I lived at Heritage Halls during my freshman year. That was (gulp!) over 33 years ago. The apartments look almost identical to the way they looked when I resided there. The few upgrades they made were: a microwave, dishwasher, kitchen flooring (no more waxing!), and raised bed frames. Oh, and a kitchen "couch." We had to buy our own at Deseret Industries when I lived there. Sara's roommates wouldn't arrive for a couple of days, so she spent the first two nights alone in her apartment.

Sara was amused by the "Mexican-themed" restaurant where we ate lunch. There were no Mexicans in sight. She was less amused by the frigidly cold weather. I gave her a little tour of the BYU campus and showed her the buildings where her classes were. Unfortunately, since it was a holiday, all of the buildings were locked. We couldn't even visit the BYU Bookstore nor buy Sara's textbooks.

I spent that night in Springville with Melanie and Greg's family and went to church with them the next morning. From there I returned to Kaysville and got to spend a little time with niece Nikki and meet her boyfriend.

After consulting weather forecasts along our route, Dad and I determined that Monday would be our best window of opportunity to drive to Washington. So we left Monday morning and arrived in Pendleton, Oregon just in time for dinner. We ate dinner at Hamley's Steak House (highly recommended mostly for the ambience) and slept at Oxford Suites. We resumed our journey Tuesday morning and made it back to Redmond in time to pick the boys up from school. We were blessed with good weather and mostly ice-free roads. The weather was ICE cold for most of the trip ranging in temperature from 1 to 36 degrees.

Dad flew home Friday afternoon. I was grateful for my wonderful traveling companion, but am not anxious to make that trip any time again soon. But, April is fast-approaching.