What's in Your Shoebox?

Today I had to brave the crappy snow to take Millie to the doc for some antibiotics. She's so miserable and it's so sad. (Good news: She should be feeling better by tomorrow. Bad news: She may not feel better until tomorrow.) (And, Good news: the snow is supposed to stop tomorrow. Bad news: it's supposed to rain for several days after that.) (And, the total snow in Great Falls from this storm is 19", most of that has actually begun to melt.)

Anyway, I went to Walgreens to fill her prescription and stood around reading the greeting cards while I waited. I love greeting cards. Specifically, I love Shoebox Greetings in the "For Fun" category. Those are the cards that seem to have no point except to make you laugh out loud. Here's the one that had me going today (I think I remember it):

(A picture of a girl doing a high front Celtic dance kick)

"When I'm President I'm going to settle all disputes with a dance-off...

..You'll be Vice President, so start working on your moves."

It's so much better in a card. I used to buy them all the time. I'd go to the card section of whatever store I was in and spend hours reading everything and then spend several dollars buying the ones I liked. Sometimes I'd plan to give certain cards to specific people. Sometimes I'd just keep them on hand for another time. Ah, the hobbies we sacrifice for marriage and children.

I also found the coolest blog tonight. It's the Shoebox blog. You have to check it out. Go here for that. I laughed my head off. It has a daily Newsdroppings, blips of commentary from different headlines. I love news like that. I'd rather read something like that than watch the real 10:00 news. For some reason the sarcastic comments appeal to me.

It's like, how I like to watch SNL...

And how I like to stay caught up on celebrity gossip and television with The Soup.

This makes me scared and slightly fascinated with Twitter. I may have to follow the crowd and check it out.

Springtime in Montana

I love springtime. The grass is green. The trees are budding. The flowers are blooming. It's beautiful.

But that's the stereotypical idea of spring. (This picture is of Norway, not Montana.) Here's our reality:

So, we've gotten six inches of snow so far. We've already had about three or four power outages. The snow storm warning is in effect until 6am Thursday morning. That's not tomorrow. Tomorrow is Wednesday.

Plus, Millie has a runny nose and possibly an ear infection. Poor baby can barely eat without crying. When she's not hungry she's in great spirits, though.

Save The Drama Fo' Yo' Mama

Does anyone else get a lot of drama in their lives? My personal drama has slowed quite a bit since leaving the theatre world (and Alamosa and residents thereof). But it can never fully end.

Today we took the van in for some routine maintenance which required us to use the car to carry everyone home. It wasn't that big of a deal, except Matt had to sit up front with Josh and me. It did remind me of another day we were forced to use the car for several people...

(Insert Wayne's World dream sequence here complete with wavy lines: Doodle-a-doo, doodle-a-doo, doodle-a-doo.)

Last April we moved into Mom and Dad's new house. We were living in their basement and hadn't found our own house yet. The day we moved in, the neighbor across the street seemed to be having some issues. There were three police cars with several officers milling around the outside of the house. Dad's truck was parked in our driveway and ours was in front of the house with one cop car parked behind me, the second across the street and the third parked on our side of the street on the other side of the driveway. Got the picture? Things calmed down eventually and all seemed fine. (BTW, someone else was going to buy the home before Mom and Dad and prompted a letter to be sent to the neighbors around us that a group home for mentally challenged adults was going to be moving in. That deal fell through so Mom and Dad got the house but no one bothered to let the neighbors know that the first letter was now void so between the letter and the cop cars, some neighbors were very hesitant to get to know us.)

By June, problems with the neighbor across the street happened again. Josh and I left the house to vote and we had left the kids with Mom. My sister Lori and her three boys were staying with us and Pete had just gotten home from his mission. After voting, I called Mom and she told us that cop cars had shown up across the street again and they needed us to take care of the kids because Tyler (Lori's oldest boy) was having a bad asthma attack and needed to be taken to the clinic.

Josh and I were almost home when we saw that our street had been blocked off. We began turning the corner to get to the house from the alley behind it and heard over the police radio that the people at our house were standing in their front window and needed to get away from it to be safe. Josh sped up a bit and we parked in the alley and went quickly into the house. Along the way we met a police officer who came around to the back door to talk to Mom. We let them in and discovered that the guy across the street had an arsenal of guns and ammunition and was suicidal. With Tyler's health and a total of six little kids in the house, we agreed with the officer that it was a good idea for us to leave (he also asked Mom if they could use their front room as additional surveillance--that was kind of cool). Unfortunately, the only vehicle that was safe to leave in was the car parked in the alley.

So,

Mom

Lori

Pete

Tyler

Trenton

Teagan

Emma

and Abby

all sat in the back of

the car

while Josh, Matt and I (two months pregnant) sat in the front seat. We got to the clinic and met Dad there (who was driving the Mustang). Mom, Lori, and Tyler stayed at the clinic while Dad took Pete and maybe a kid or two and the rest of us went to stay at Gramma and Grampa's house for the next several hours.

By the end of the day, we were allowed home and the neighbor was taken into custody. The house across the street is currently for sale.

A Letter to "Santa"

Dear Mr Bill Gates,

I would like to thank you for allowing me so many opportunities to better myself during this economic downturn. Yes, times are tough for so many people--the banks, the housing market, the automobile industry--and I'm so happy for this chance I have to ignore my position as a member of a single-income household and contribute to the pockets of those around me.

Now, you, Mr Gates, are probably sitting there thinking, "But, Ms Johnson, I don't know who you are. How have I given you a chance to serve others?" I will tell you, my friend.

Two weeks ago my brand new laptop crashed. I discovered it was a software issue. For some reason, Vista, the program automatically loaded onto my new laptop, discovers problems that don't really exist and then shuts down unable to work again without doing things to the hard drive that I don't understand completely. I was very upset because there were some important documents on there that I needed that weekend. And here's where my service began: I got to pay a very nice, but very stereotypical, computer guy to take care of things for me. Thus, there went $84.

Now, mere weeks after repairing my brand new laptop, I have the same issues yet again. Software problems that have nothing to do with my laptop itself, except for the fact that it came with the Microsoft program. But, I'm looking for the bright side of this, Mr Gates, because my mother always taught me to look for the good in things. Now, I have a few choices. I can pay the same guy in the strip mall down the street from my house. OR, I can pay Uncle Sam and the United States Postal Service to mail the laptop (actually, it's laptops, because my husband's crashed a few weeks ago as well) to my computer-savvy brother-in-law to fix them for us. OR, I can just leave them broken and unused. But you, Mr Gates, may think, "Why, Ms Johnson, would you consider leaving the laptop(s) broken when you can be so generous and share the wealth?" And I have to consider your point. My husband very unselfishly spent several hundreds of dollars to purchase that laptop for me. It shouldn't go to waste. So what if my four children need food in their mouths? So what if they must bypass extra-curricular activities because our charitable contributions to the economy are more important? Oh, this reminds me, there's a chain-letter requiring me to send five dollars to ten different people or I'll have bad luck for the next fifty years. I better get on top of that soon.

Now, Mr Gates, I understand that you have stepped down as the acting CEO of Microsoft, but you do understand that you are the face of the corporation still, right? I mean, you and Jerry Seinfeld had those really clever commercials a few months back and everyone knows who you are. I find it refreshing that you would allow the corporation that has funded your lifestyle and charitable organization to keep my family and me "in the mix" with the current economic times. I appreciate it. And, Mr Gates, please, keep up the good work.

Sincerely,

Shelly L. Johnson

'Fess Up Friday

Just a short one today. Somehow life thinks it needs to force me to have stuff to do...

This week went fine--another 1/2" here and there. Only half a pound loss, but I could feel the plateau starting last week. We'll see if I can get past it this week because next Friday is..

DAY 90!!!

Be prepared for a big party next week filled with before/after pictures and *gulp* maybe even my full results so far. We'll see how brave I am.

My biggest thing this week was getting rid of all the maternity clothes (back into the boxes) and the Women's size clothes that have haunted me for so many years. They are gone. See ya!! It makes me happy and it feels good to have that phase of my life over!

April Update

I realized that I have some miscellaneous things to report, so why not?

Millie had her 4-month checkup yesterday. She's healthy. She's weighing in at 14 lbs 5 oz and measuring 24". She's about average for her age. She's strong and gets bigger everyday. But she's been abusive to my left thigh today. First she pooped on it and just a bit ago she barfed on it. My poor leg.

Matt has been found in the yard naked from the waist down twice this month. Once in the front, once in the back (yards, that is). Both times he said it was because he needed to pee. What? I thought that's what that whole "indoor plumbing" deal was for.

Emma and Abby are tweens, whether they are old enough or not. They go to the bathroom together all the time. It doesn't matter that they're at home and that we have two bathrooms. I don't get it. What are they doing, primping for their imaginary beaus?

Josh doesn't play the PlayStation 2 very much, but he got a new game a couple weeks ago and has played a few times after work and now he's on his stretch off. I don't do video games. Not even a little bit. I can tell you the first ten seconds of Super Mario on Nintendo because that's how long it takes for me to die. I'm about as good at video games as I am at sports. It must be a hand-eye coordination thing. Or maybe it's just that I don't care.

Matt gave me a lesson. He told me that what he does (this is a Star Wars game with lots of fighting) is jump up and down and run away. I watched him and sure enough, he jumped up and down and then ran off the battlefield. That's one way to survive.

Emma gave me a lesson too. She said that what she likes to do is get into the little battleship and do loop-the-loops because she doesn't know what she's supposed to do and gets bored.

Abby is the only one that is somewhat competent at the game. No matter what she thinks, she is her father's daughter.

Google, Anyone?

Tonight I was catching up a little on my Saturday Night Live fix and watched the episode from last week or the week before with Zac Efron as the guest host. They did a sketch parodying the Today Show with Kathie Lee Gifford and some lady I never heard of before I saw the sketches on SNL. Anyway, Kathie Lee (played perfectly by Kristen Wiig) mentioned that before she started on the Today Show she was just sitting at home Googling herself. I laughed, thinking how vain and weird that is, but truthfully, I've done it before!!

While attending college, if you Googled "Shelly Johnson" on the Images tab, I came up on the first page a few different times. Thanks to a couple of good friends who did all of the theatre's and college's publicity, I got my picture in the paper quite often. But, the lime light has begun to fade and my Image is now on the fifth page. Yes, I checked it again tonight.

That's me in the background for a photo for Dead Man. My brother JC played the bad guy and I was the nun.

So, now, I dare you. Do it. Google yourself. Are you out there? Are you in the Web or Images? It's okay. A little vanity and curiosity are okay. I won't tell!

I Come to Wive It Wealthily in Padua

Yes, I quote TV, movies and Shakespeare. Who can't help but love Taming of the Shrew? Katharine's got some of the greatest lines ever. (Ever seen the Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton version? It's GREAT!)

I can't quite tell you why I have a fascination with Shakespeare, but I do. By the way, I totally feel a lesson coming on here, so be prepared. I took a course on Shakespeare from my mentor Carolyn, who is revered as the Shakespeare scholar throughout Colorado colleges. I learned so much and then had the opportunity to sit in the class again and lead study groups as her teaching assistant the year after I graduated. I loved it. The theories...the symbolism...the puns. It's great. And yet, if Shakespeare lived today he'd be thought of as a hack since back in the 16th/17th centuries it was no big deal for someone to plagiarize another person's works. The only thing was, Shakespeare tweaked it enough for it to live for centuries. Ever hear of Christopher Marlowe? Didn't think so. (BTW, Marlowe may have written the original Romeo and Juliet.)

Anyway, April 23 is listed as Bill's death day. No one really knows what happened. Some think that it may have been his birthday (he was baptized as an infant on April 26) and he partied too hard and died. Don't know. But I thought I'd pay tribute to the man that I've often considered gaining a Master's Degree in. I still may someday. According to Carolyn, even better than studying Shakespeare in school is to be a dramaturg for a Shakespeare Company. A dramaturg is the researcher to make sure a play is historically-correctly portrayed. I did that for a George Bernard Shaw play I was in and loooved it. I have my dad's interest in history and trivia and my mom's intensity to study. I was born to dramaturg.

Going on...my New Year's resolution for 2007 was to begin our family genealogy. As everything I begin, I worked my tail off. Matt was having heart surgery in the middle of March and I had found a lot of names to enter on Josh's side of the family. I entered over 5000 names before Matt's surgery. It was a lot of work, but I happily did it. (Less than two months later my laptop crashed and I lost all of my work and hadn't backed it up. Can we say, "Oh crap!"?) Someone else in Josh's family had already done a lot of work and I just discovered it and entered it. I found out that Josh's family had a lot of royalty in their line: Charlemagne and other various kings and queens. Even Old King Cole. Did you know he was real? I had printed all this information out and flipped through it at one point and discovered that there was a King Malcolm from Scotland. This one stumped me. I knew I'd heard of him before, but couldn't figure out from where. I asked Josh if he was the king in Braveheart, but Josh said that king was English. I continued what I was doing and eventually forgot all about it. Finally, I got to inputting the information on those pages I had flipped through. I entered King Malcolm and then turned the page to his father, King Duncan. At this point I was reeling. Who the heck were these people? I knew them, I knew that I knew them. And then I found the dude's death date. It was a specific day and year (sometime in the 13th or 14th century). At this point, all the dates were listed as just years, so I knew this was something of interest. Then I saw the note next to the death date and place: "Killed by Macbeth." Josh's extremely great-grandfather was the king killed by Macbeth, whose son was accused of it so he left the land and eventually came home to reclaim his crown when he was found innocent. Granted, Shakespeare altered historic events to create great drama, but Josh's family is FAMOUS!!! I thought this was soo cool! We have a famous family.

Now, don't judge me for claiming Josh's family line as my own. I brought some royalty to the mix as well. Such as the Spencers, as in Diana Princess of Wales. Oh, yeah.

And we've got Lady Godiva. I was going to post a picture of her, but she's famous for protesting against her husband's taxation on the people by riding her horse naked through the town. (Anyone else think of Abby on that one?)

So, Josh brings to our family a man killed by "Something wicked this way comes" and my contribution is a nudist. Are we the coolest people, or what?

Happy 445th birthday, Shakespeare!

I'd Love a Make Over

I've had a bad couple of days. And it all hit the fan this afternoon. So, to distract myself and chill out a bit, I was sitting and watching tv tonight. I turned on the Style Network and after watching "Clean House" (which I watched to make myself feel better about the state of my own house) I didn't change the channel when "Style Her Famous" came on.

I've never seen it before, so I was intrigued. It was all about taking an ordinary woman and using a celebrity-inspired style to make her over.

It got me thinking. Who would I choose as my celebrity inspiration?

At first I thought Kate Hudson, but I think Reese Witherspoon is a closer match.

She's usually very casual and pretty modest, compared to many others on the red carpet. Plus, I really like the accessory she's got in her hand in this photo.

Who would you choose?

A Proposition

To all my friends out there with a husband interested in watching the new X-men movie, let's let them all go together ...

... and we girls can go see....

...or am I the only post-adolescent female interested in that one? Actually, I saw an extended preview for it last night and it looks cute. I think it would be fun to watch.

I totally have to take a second to tell on Josh and Wolverine. Right after the first X-men movie came out, Josh was curious about the strength of Wolverine. The dude has metal bones. Wolverine, not Josh. Anyway, we had this old Bronco II and it had a crack along the bottom of the windshield. Now, I'm really not sure how this all processed through his brain, but Josh decided to see if he was as strong as Wolverine by punching the windshield of the car. He punched and left a bull's eye break. Thinking that was so cool, he tried it again. And again. And again. The windshield was nearly impossible to look through by the time his experiment was completed. Josh was satisfied with himself until he got pulled over for having an obstructed windshield, or whatever the term is. Luckily for him we already had to replace the windshield because of the previous crack.

'Fess Up Friday

This week was awful. It didn't just suck, it su-uuuucked! Despite the beauty of Emma's birthday, baptism, and Easter, I could feel myself all messed up come Monday morning. I weighed myself and discovered that I had GAINED a pound over the weekend. What??? I was not happy. Somehow, intense stress, chocolate and jelly beans are not conducive to my weightloss program. I didn't get a chance to workout on Monday because we took a day trip to Billings to take my MIL back to the airport, but I tried to kick my booty by doubling my workouts the rest of the week. Ugh.

I also was upset because today I officially have two weeks left of my Power 90. I'm about to be lighter than I've been in YEARS and be 30 lbs lighter than I was the day we moved to Montana just over a year ago. But, I've been secretly hoping that I'd be much closer to my goal weight. I'm not. I still have quite a way to go. I remembered today that I was hoping to do the P90X after I finished the old Power 90 to get me the rest of the way to my goal, but we went to Disneyland and I have no money to buy the program. Grr... So, I've been a bit down this week. I have to remind myself of the good stuff: Pete (my brother) was shocked to see how much weight I've lost. Granted, last time he saw me I was bigger than a hot air balloon, but still, that made me happy. Also, I did still lose a pound this week (2, actually if you count my 1 lb gain) and 1/2" off both my waist and hips. It's working. It's just slow.

Here's my new mantra:
It took me more than a day to gain the weight. It'll take me more than a day to lose it.

If I'm honest with myself, it took me about eight years to gain the weight and keep it. It's taken me 76 days to lose about half of that weight. I'm trying to convince myself that good things are happening. I'm just way too impatient.

How'd you do?

No Urkels Allowed

A couple of days ago I brought this idea up to Josh:

Why can't there be a sitcom that's clean, meaning it's focus is not sex? The shows I like all have a strong theme of sex running through them. So, I've decided to stop watching them. Josh and I both have for the good of our children. They don't need to have that theme paraded in front of them and what's bad for them is bad for us, too. Just because we're adults doesn't mean our spirits are any stronger than our childrens'. Is this getting too deep?

Anyway, I wish there was a situation comedy that the whole family could watch that was funny. Like, FUNNY. Like, laugh-out-loud-belly-laugh funny. If I were a sitcom writer (or even a playwright), I'd write up the pilot and send it to LA. If anyone else wants to write it, I'll act in it. Happily! I bet we could get quite a following.

The only risk we'd take is making it a lame show full of corny jokes and Steve Urkel. Funny but annoying after a while. (Sorry, Celine, for referencing another old American tv show. Here's a clip.)

Emma's Baptism

This hair accessory is actually a bracelet Emma wore on her wrist as a baby when she was blessed. I braided it into her hair. The next time we pull it out will be to put on her garter on her wedding day.

Emma with Aunt Genica and Uncle Peter

Abby and Emma with Aunt Jo and Gramma.

All four kids with Poppy (Josh's dad).

Emma's baptism was an incredible experience. We had a great turnout, even though it was Easter Sunday and so many people were out of town. We started a little late because finding a white jumpsuit to fit Josh is a trick. He's losing weight, but he'll always be 6'4".

Aunt Genica played the piano (and did MUCH better than I could've done!), Grandma Diane gave the opening prayer, I gave a talk about baptism, Josh baptized her with our dads as witnesses, Mema Rose gave a talk on the Gift of the Holy Ghost, Josh and our dads and Pete confirmed Emma a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and Pete gave the closing prayer. We involved as much of the family as we could. Gramma Courtney and Aunt Jo also came. It was a great night.

After Emma was baptized, as she, Josh and I were all walking from the changing rooms to the meeting room to rejoin everyone, Josh asked her how she felt. She said, "Wet and happy!" What a sweet girl!

Be sure to scroll down to see pictures from Emma's birthday celebration and click here for pictures from Easter.

Emma's Birthday and Sightseeing

We celebrated Emma's birthday Saturday night. It was fun and we loved having so much of our family there with us.

We had dinner at 3-Ds for Emma's birthday.

Curtis (Josh's dad), Abby and Josh

Dad, Mom and Gramma

Mom, Gramma, Curtis, Josh, Rose, Grampa, Pete (what a goon!)

Then we headed to our house for ice cream cake.

Me, Curtis, Emma, Gramma and Grampa

Rose (Josh's mom), Abby, Genica, Emma, and Matt

Curtis and Josh

Gramma, Grampa and Dad

Emma, Genica, Matt, Mom, and Millie

We went to check out some of the falls that are supposedly so "great." They were all closed, so we went to Black Eagle Dam and crossed the bridge to the island and took some pictures.

Our question was, What happens if there are only seven short blasts?

I almost forgot to mention that Emma got one more birthday present yesterday. We went to Claire's (at the same mall I went to) to get her ears pierced. She's growing up sooo fast!!

Here's a Question...

What do...

Dwayne Wayne

and I

have in common?

Answer: We both seem to have fallen off the face of the Earth.

Last week my computer crashed. It was dead. Then on Saturday, Josh's crashed. We were left computer-less. No big deal anyway, since I've been caught up in family vacation and Easter and Emma's birthday and baptism and out-of-town guests. Someday I'll be able to recapture my idle, internet-obsessed ways. But not tonight. Tonight I sleep.

(To all my friends that didn't watch a bunch of tv in the 80s and 90s, Dwayne Wayne was a character on A Different World which was a spin-off from The Cosby Show. Was that random enough?)

'Fess Up Friday

Did you know you can buy sugar-free cough medicine? It's true, you can. Just thought I'd share.

This week I worked out, but we went to my favorite temptation restaurant yesterday--Johnny Carino's. Oh, it's sooooo good! It's better than Olive Garden. I swear if I had served a mission for our church I probably would've been sent to Italy and then come home 150 lbs bigger. Mmmmm...pasta. And bread. And sauce. Ahhh... The good news is that I ate half of my entree, I didn't gorge myself! Go, me!

In result news, I only lost 1.6 lbs, which bummed me out a bit since I was averaging a full 2 lbs a week. I know less than 1/2 a pound shouldn't be that big a deal, but my inches hadn't moved much over the last several weeks. Fortunately, those inches have begun to move again. I lost a total of 2 1/2 inches this week. Finally!! In fact, I need to go buy myself a new pair of jeans a size smaller. Yes! I'm not quite in single digit sizes yet, but I'm sooo much closer. My underwear are too big (TMI, but I'm happy about it) and all this was discovered this morning after several weeks of wondering if my inches were ever going to change again. Hurrah! (That was more of an Army Hurrah than a Hooray Hurrah.)

How'd you do?

Springing into Cleaning

Anyone else think Gary Larson is a comic strip genius?

Today I began my Spring Cleaning. For no other reason than because it needs to be done. Ha *choke* yeah, right! I never clean unless there is some sort of ulterior motive. My MIL is coming into town and is staying, you guessed it, with us. Not that I want to appear to be something I'm not, but the last thing I need to worry about this weekend is having a dirty house. I may be done with my cleaning tomorrow, but I'm not going to worry too much. Que sera sera, eh? If it gets done, it gets done. If not, then it won't. Now, the trick is going to be, will I wear my usual exercise clothes with my MIL in the house, or will I try to dress a little more appropriate for company? I guess we'll see, won't we?

Behind Closed Doors

You never know what is going on in someone's life until you are invited to witness it. If you're reading this, then you are stuck. There is no way out. If you try to stop reading this now the curiosity will eat at you until you come back to find out what it is that I'm talking about. That's right--you are mine...

A monster has invaded our home. She's slithered in from underneath the door and then proceeded to disguise herself as one of us. She wears my clothes. She makes her voice to sound like mine. But the volume she uses is so much louder than mine. And the anger...oh, the anger. She sucks the life out of everyone around her and then uses that kinetic energy in a whirlwind of complete impatience and intolerance. She's mean and nasty. When she appears the wolverines run away in fear.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Reflections of Christ

The other day while perusing Facebook, I saw that a friend of mine had opted to become a fan of John Bytheway and I decided to do the same. John Bytheway is a member of our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, commonly known as Mormons) and is a very inspirational speaker. He uses a lot of humor, but knows when to be serious. He asked what people thought of this slideshow.

My suggestion is to turn up the volume and tune out the world as you watch it. It's incredible. Somehow, it is possible to feel the love of our Savior by watching these images.

I watched it and the Holy Spirit reaffirmed my faith in my Savior. I love our Savior, Jesus Christ. I love everything that He did while ministering upon this earth. I love everything He does for me today. I know that without His love, I would be nothing.

One of my favorite parts of the slideshow is as John the Baptist is baptizing Jesus. The look of absolute elation on His face reminds me of the importance of the ordinance of baptism. Next Sunday, Easter Sunday, Emma will be of the age of accountability, meaning that she will be old enough to be able to understand right from wrong and be able to take responsibility for her own actions. Emma will be baptized Easter evening. It's amazing to me to think of my eldest child being old enough to pass through this step of life. It's scary and exciting to realize that she will be just as responsible for her actions as I am for my own. She's growing up. She's becoming a young woman.

I'm so excited for Emma to become an official member of the Church. She will also be given the Gift of the Holy Ghost--the ability to have the Holy Ghost as her constant companion. I know as a child I never fully comprehended the importance of that gift, but I understand so much better now. He keeps me close to my Heavenly Father. I know my Heavenly Father loves me and He has given me blessings beyond what I deserve. I have an eternal companion that I love with all of my heart. I have beautiful children. I have goodly parents. I've made it through times of my life that I never dreamed I was strong enough to overcome. And all of this because my Heavenly Father and Elder Brother, Jesus Christ, love me. I love the Gospel. I love that we have a prophet upon this earth today who leads us and guides us. We have the opportunity to hear from him this weekend as our church gathers, via television, radio and telecast, for our annual General Conference.

I bear my testimony to you, my friends and family, that I know that Jesus lives. He rose out of the tomb and continues His ministry, even today, by giving us the guidance we need through the Holy Ghost as well as our living prophet, Thomas S. Monson. The Book of Mormon is an additional testament to the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. It was translated by the hand of Joseph Smith who was lead by our Heavenly Father to restore the church of Christ on this earth. I'm forever grateful for my membership in the Church.

'Fess Up Friday

Okay, it's late on Friday, but I've got to get back into the routines of yore if I'm going to keep this healthy lifestyle thing going.

It was my first day back to exercising after taking eight days off. I'm gonna hurt tomorrow!! I kept up, though, and was even shocked to discover that I actually lost 2 lbs over the last two weeks. I'm just happy I didn't gain any back. Disneyland is not conducive to a healthy lifestyle. I had meant to do at least push-ups and crunches in the hotel, but that was really more of a pipe dream than anything else. Even more proof of my naivety at the beginning of this vacation.

So, here is my obligatory post on 'Fess Up Friday in an effort to get me back into the habit of exercise and public ridicule if I fail. I know, I know. You wouldn't ridicule me publicly, just quietly behind my back. That's really mean, you know! (Wow, I have not recovered from this vacation yet, have I?)

Vacation Journal

I've written about our vacation with plenty of details. I used this as a chance to pretty much journal our trip so I can write it out in an actual journal someday. If I didn't do it this way I'm afraid I'd never get it written down.

Okay, so to make it easy to write, I wrote this out in small posts. Unfortunately, I don't know if it's possible to rearrange posts so they can be read in an order other than when they were chronologically written. So, here are links to the posts. Or, you can just scroll down. Either read it from Day One on or from the end to the beginning. Whatever floats your boat.

The "Days" are mostly overviews of what we did. The random stuff is just that, random. If you don't want to scroll through everything, just click below.

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Day Four

Day Five

Day Six

Days Seven and Eight

Random Details

We had tons of fun. Hope you have some fun reading about it.

Random Details

And some details I thought of during the course of our vacation:

Travel

I hate snow. I like the sun. I hate driving in the snow. I like driving in the sun.

Rides/Broken Rides

I broke three rides. Not really, but it felt that way. While riding the Mulholland Madness roller coaster, the girls and I (and another single rider that filled the fourth seat) got almost halfway through the ride when the car stopped and we were stuck. What sucked the most was that we were stuck in the sun. After several minutes, Josh called me on the cellphone, he was with Matt and Millie. He asked where we were and I told him we were stuck in the sun in the middle of the roller coaster. Just then, a cast member came to tell us to stay seated and that we would be escorted off soon. A member of maintenance had to help us off, so he got there and we got to do something not many laymen get to do: take the stairs off of the roller coaster. As an "I'm sorry" we got six fast passes for any ride we wanted. We used them to ride Soarin' Over California. It was a very fair exchange.

The monorail also broke. This one happened right before we got on it. We weren't in a hurry, so we just waited for it to be back in service. It took about an hour. We didn't get fast passes for that one, but everyone got a little nap while we sat in the non-moving monorail.

The third problem happened right after Abby and I rode Indiana Jones. Josh said that right after I got on, an announcement was made that it was down and out of service for a while. He and Abby got to ride it later that night.

Character Dinners

The character dinners were really cool, but Josh said he didn't think he'd recommend them. Pretty much, we spent $20 for each kid to eat a hot dog at Goofy's Kitchen and close to that much a plate for fancy shell macaroni and cheese and Matt's roll at Ariel's Grotto. Seeing the characters was really, really incredible, though. The biggest bummer of Goofy's Kitchen was that Mickey wasn't there. I'm glad we did them, but we won't do them again.

Illnesses

Our first night at Disneyland we realized that Emma had a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI). That was great. Josh started out the trip with a sinus infection. I ended the trip with major head congestion that was completely irritated by flying and driving over mountain passes. Yuck.

Fanny Packs and Backpacks

We bought a fannypack for Josh to wear and we were laughing that he looked like the 30-something dads that we used to make fun of. But it was probably the best $10 we spent in preparation for the trip. Josh used it four of the five days at the Park. We used the back pack the other day and it was actually not such a good idea. We planned to keep it underneath the stroller we rented, but it was too big to fit under there. We had to affix it to the stroller handles instead. We also had the kids wear their own backpacks. They carried around their waterbottles, a jacket and sunglasses. They didn't mind them at all and they were very useful. It was a brilliant idea, despite the fact that it sounds like we were mean to make them carry them around. It worked.

Celebrities

On Saturday, the rumor was that the Jonas Brothers (if you don't know who they are, just ask any young girl) were in Disneyland Park for a few hours. Emma was so upset because we spent that day in California Adventure. She had no chance to see them, even if they were there. She was so sad.

You know how you see someone and for a split second think they are someone you recognize? I did this as California Adventure was closing. Josh and the big kids were on Soarin' Over CA and Millie and I were waiting for them. I looked up and swore I saw Kevin James (King of Queens, Mall Cop). Then I noticed that his uniform was that of a Disneyland employee. And he was emptying the trash. Probably not Kevin James.

The next morning Josh thought he saw Screech from Saved By the Bell. It wasn't him either.

Travelling With an Infant

Travelling with Millie really wasn't so bad. There were a few things that we figured out and I know at least Cindy will appreciate these. Maybe other people will benefit too.

I learned to use a combination of Fast Passes and Rider Switch Passes. Fast Passes are available for most big rides. You're given a ticket that assigns you to a certain time to return to the ride and you get to go in a much shorter line. Rider Switch passes are for parents that have a child too small to ride the ride. One parent rides with the other kids and then the parents switch so the second parent gets a chance to ride. Here's the problem. The Rider Switch pass only allows two people to ride, but it doesn't require you to use your Fast Pass. So, on rides when we got Fast Passes, I could go with the big kids and then Josh could go with two kids by using the Rider Switch pass and the extra Fast Pass. Does that make any sense? Anyway, some attraction guides would give us two Rider Switch passes so all three kids could go with the second parent, but some were very strict and held onto the rules with white knuckles. But, we rode almost every ride that uses Fast Passes with a combo of Rider Switches.

We figured out to use the Snugli or baby wrap on the days Millie could ride most rides with us. That way we didn't have to mess with leaving the stroller around or packing it up to take on the train with us. On the days we switched a lot, we used a stroller so she didn't wake up when we switched back and forth. We rented a stroller during California Adventure and our final day when we did so many different activities.

Millie could actually ride many of the rides. All of the ones in Fantasyland, Haunted Mansion, Pirates, Winnie the Pooh, Tiki Room, Jungle Cruise, Buzz Lightyear (Astro Blasters), Toy Story, Heimlich's Chew Chew. Matt could ride anything the girls could except for Indiana. The minimum on that is 46". He's about 43".

There's also a Baby Center on the north end of Main Street. It's a place where you can change or feed your baby. I'm not that shy about nursing, so I just used a blanket wherever I was. I nursed on the train is it went around the park, in the courtyard of the Tiki room, in line for rides, in the shade out of the way, it didn't really matter. I went to the Baby Center once to check it out. Only the mother and baby are allowed in the nursing room, so it was pointless since Josh was riding Indiana with Abby, so I had Matt and Emma with me. I just ended up nursing Millie in the front room of the Baby Center. I could've done that at the tables near the ride. But, I thought I'd see what it was so I could report it. Use it if you want to, but I don't think it's that big a deal. Either no other mothers were nursing or everyone else used the Center, though, because I didn't see anyone else nursing their babies. I did have several mothers tell me that I made them miss that part of having a little infant.

Mickey is The Godfather

I've decided that Mickey is the Godfather, or Don, of the animated world. He's paid his dues. He did what he needed to make his name, but now he gets to sit back and relax. Others do all the hard work now. Mickey hasn't made a new appearance on the silverscreen in YEARS. However, everyone knows him. Everyone loves him. Everyone waits in line for hours to be able to kiss his ring. Figuratively speaking. And if Mickey doesn't like you, you have no hope left in this world. Never cross the Godfather. Who knows which animated character's head you'll find in your bed.

Disney Vacation Days Seven and Eight

We left the beautiful weather of California and made it back to Seattle. We decided to try to explore Seattle a bit before leaving it since it's so far away from us and I know I really have no desire to drive back there any time soon.

We went to look at the Space Needle and even go up to the top, but it would've cost us around $60 to just get to the top. That didn't include anything other than riding an elevator. After just spending a small fortune at Disneyland, we decided to hold off on that one.

We did stop at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Temple before leaving town. It's very pretty. We were a bit surprised at the number of security measures that were established around it--gates and security posts. The neighborhood around the temple didn't look questionable, so it was surprising that so much security may have been needed. Anyone have an idea?

The weather of California was so nice, so we were, of course, thrust into the middle of snowstorms in Washington. We couldn't go faster than 25 mph at one point. We saw one car spin out and the aftermath of an accident. It was not fun. I really liked the weather in CA, even on when it was rainy and we had to wear jackets.

We got as far as Spokane before Josh and I both about dropped dead. We were soooo tired. We left the next morning and stopped at the Cabela's store just outside of Cour d'Alene, Idaho. We got back on the road and got home just in time for Josh to change his clothes and get to work. Needless to say he came home exhausted this morning.

By the way, we finished the first and second Harry Potter books and are well into the third one, just in case you were wondering.

Disney Vacation Day Six

This was our final day in Disneyland. We tried to do about everything we wanted to the first four days so we could save this day for all our favorites.

We did the Jedi Training again to see if Matt would get picked this time, but no such luck. Then we rode Indiana Jones, Splash Mountain, Winnie the Pooh, Star Tours, and Pirates after eating dinner at the Blue Bayou. We also went to the Tiki Room again and had pictures with Pooh Bear. Having been told the story about Pooh being the only character she liked the last time we were there, Emma was excited to see him and tell him that. He gave her an extra hug and kiss afterward. It was so sweet.

After we rode Star Tours we almost missed our reservation at Blue Bayou because we were playing with the pictures you can super-impose your face into. We couldn't resist splurging and buying these:

Josh joked that I should get a picture with Leia in the Golden Bikini. Uh, yeah....

We also caught the fireworks that night. I'm glad we took advantage of them and rode rides the other nights, but they were totally worth watching that final night. It was a great show.

Emma's favorite ride of the day was Pirates, Abby's was Indiana, and Matt's favorite were the fireworks.