Totally Awsumb Indiana Jones

Pack up your gear!
 It's time for another exciting expedition! 
All this boy wanted for his 10th Birthday
 was a real leather jacket.
What mother could say no
 to a face as cute as this?

  Awsumb has been using this little notebook
 to keep track of Geocache Expeditions,
which for a 10 year old boy
 are an exciting archaeological expedition!

Check back in the next week to see pictures from the big

Indiana Jones Birthday Adventure! 

Because here at
AWSUMB EXPEDITIONS
 Adventure Is Just Around The Corner! 

 Showing off his shark tooth necklace
 from Auntie and Uncle,

who always send the perfect gifts! 

 And check out that cool
WWII MKVII Gas Mask Bag
(which I made! click above to learn more) 

It's not a purse, It's a satchel! 
Indiana Jones wears one!

 He about took out all the lights in the studio trying to get some whip shots!

 The Idol

 It's not the years, It's the MILEAGE!

It really has been fun to be a mother of 

The Most Totally Awsumb

little boy on the planet!

Why Doesn't Winnie The Pooh Ever Get Stung By Hunny Bees?

I was stung by a bee the other night.  I have been stung before and knew the second it happened what it was.  it was the underside of my arm, which swelled so much that it wasn't until a couple days later I realized I also had 4 mosquito bites on the outside of that arm...  I have always relied on After Bite, which is basically ammonia to deal with mosquito bites. It stops the itch. This past couple years I have been having a more severe reaction to mosquito bites.  So I had recently picked up some Benadryl gel, which didn't seem to help much...  But Caladryl that really did the trick!  Soothes, stops any oozing, cool and calming, doesn't smell bad at all. I have bathed my arm in this stuff for a few days and it's doing much better!

This  wasn't the first time I was stung. The first time I was shopping in Fred Meyer with Kenneth. The bee was stuck in my finger and Kenneth wouldn't help me!  He just backed away insisting he was allergic ... thanks a lot Kenneth! 

Then a few years later when Awsumb was only about 6 months old I had been out shopping all day and come home to a warm house. I laid Awsumb on a blanket and opened some windows. We have these windows that open out, so you lift a flap on the screen, push the window out, then you have to shut the flap. We used to have these rhododendron brushes that wrapped around the side of the house and they were a a major attraction to all types of bees.  So I go upstairs to put away my goodies from shopping and then I noticed Awsumb making this funny sound.  I knew instantly what it was.. he was mimicking a the sound a bee would make if it was swarming around your head!  Remembering that Kenneth is supposed to be "deathly allergic"  I run downstairs to rescue him and find 3 bees swarming around his head and that stupid flap left open on the window screen. I shut the flap, run him upstairs and shut him in by bedroom.  Then I called Kenneth, who refused to come and help... "I'm allergic..."  OK so maybe he was in a meeting of something.. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, but his friend Robert came to rescue us! 

I was able to chase one out the front door, kill a second and totally lost the third.  Needless to say all slept locked in our master bedroom.  In the morning I took Awsumb into his room to change him at the changing table and found a dead bee on the floor. 

 Awsumb 2002 - 6 months
with his Classic Pooh
from our dear friend Robert!

We saw the new Winnie the Pooh movie the other night.  (see Awsumb above with his little Pooh bear!)  I am so glad that at almost 10 he still loves simple things, such as Winnie the Pooh!  As as only child, Awsumb often plays alone.  Awsumb is a regular Christopher Robin, always exploring, making things up and usually accompanied by a "stuffy."

 So why doesn't Pooh every get stung anyway?  Maybe he just doesn't notice with all that fluffy stuffing?

3-D

I just hate 3-D.  So I was pretty mad when we showed up at the last Harry Potter movie to find out it was in 3-D.  I am pretty sure Kenneth knew this and choose not to tell me.  At least we got these cool Harry Potter style glasses (more about them later).

Why does every new movie have to be in 3-D anyway?  It's like they are just putting it into random things now, not even just movies that go with the whole 3-D effect.  I HATE 3-D!  It gives me a headache!  And when we end up at a movie we didn't realize was in 3-D I always pout about it. I get 3-D for a campy movie like JAWS.  But in general the 3-D effect should only enhance the movie - just enough to make it seem more real... The viewer should be able to forget about the effect rather than having something pop up in their face every two minutes reminding them they are sitting in a theater and removing them from the story.

Here are some of my complaints: 3-D glasses are always too big for me.  My 3-D glasses are always crooked.  My 3-D glasses are always scratched or foggy because they have cheap lenses.  3-D glasses at an IMAX leave that dumb mark on your head.  And finally that nasty headache I end up with...

Some people might say it's all in your head, but they are wrong, there is a name for it:  vergence-accommodation.  And apparently the act of trying to focus can cause headache for some people.

The night after we saw the final Harry Potter movie we went to see Captain America in 3-D.  As a joke, partway through the movie when my son left to use the restroom, I swapped my big glasses with his kid sized glasses. OH MY HECK They were soooo much better!  And he was so kind he told me I could wear them the rest of the movie.  I was able to forget the movie was even in 3-D!  Then I realized that besides the fact that my Harry Potter glasses were warped they actually fit better than any 3-D glasses I had worn... The lesson- wear smaller glasses?  Maybe that will help me in the future...

Click to read What's the problem with 3-D? 

What's wrong with teaching dance to 6 year olds!

Recently we saw the movie Adjustment Bureau, which all about destiny.  The main character is faced with the choice to let the love of his life lead her life without him as she goes on to be a great dancer and choreographer or spend their life together AND.... wait for it... teach dance to six year olds!

What's so wrong with teaching dance to 6 year olds anyway?  Happily Ever After with the love of your life, a family and inspiring six year olds, giving them a love and appreciation for music and movement sounds like a happy ending if I ever heard one!  After being released from serving for years in the Children's Primary Presidency at church I was presented with a beautiful framed saying:

One Hundred Years from now

It will not matter

what kind of car I drove,

What kind of house I lived in,

how much money was in my bank account

nor what my clothes looked like.

But the world may be a better place because

I was important in the life of a child.

 
Sometimes I think people mix up priorities...  Besides the fact that this movie was advertised to look like adventure, it was simple a love story and because I don't usually like romance stuff... I didn't think think it was very good.... This movie was so predictable, I actually spent time checking out the decor and lighting in the theater!  BLACK SWAN on the other hand - LOVED IT!

What's your version of Happily Ever After?

I am coming up on 16 years of marriage. Click to read about my Love Story

And don't forget this artists version of these Fallen Princesses

To read more about this subject and the Divine Role of Women see my previous blog: Making the Home a Sacred Place

Common Sense Media

Common Sense Media is a great resource for parents. This site review movies, games, etc. We have been using this as a reference for years. I love it because, instead of just listing "language or violence" this sight give specific info and descriptions about the language or violence in the movie. These reviews include comments from kids. They also rate how scarey or intense the movies might be. Check it out!

The Problem With Shrek

Now that Awsumb is old enough to have a voice I am outnumbered in this house 2-1... and well, super heroes, cartoons and video games are just part of our little home. So, when the boys choose Shrek 3 for family movie night I wasn't surprised. I figured I would catch up online and see what's going on with friends who live far, far away.

But when the movie started I was reminded why I really don't like Shrek. The first movie was all about this big green ogre names Shrek, who somehow ends up escorting the Princess Fiona back to her Kingdom, "Far, Far Away." At first the Princess is high maintenance and the ogre is well, an ogre, what more is there to say! LOL! And like all romantic comedies of this type, in spite of it all the two fall for each other. But a Princess can’t be with an ogre… even one with 'many layers.' Until of course she finds out SHE’S and ogre too! Happily Ever After…

What I hate about this story is that it doesn’t show that two people from different cultures, classes, etc. can be together. Could Fiona still love Shrek, and make a happy marriage with him, if she wasn’t an ogre? Why can’t the ogre just turn into Prince Charming? Or it just implying that we are ALL ogres?

All I know is that I could never have married an ogre, and am thankful for my Prince Charming… who I would like to remind would still be a frog without me!

“MUUUAH” Kenneth!

9/11

After years trying to conceive I was finally pregnant. The pregnancy had started out with a few problems, but by summer everything was normal and we were told we were expecting a baby boy. Still, after all those years, I couldn't let myself believe we were really having a baby. I didn't buy anything, save one little pair of overalls and two coordinating shirts (to combat a pair of pink socks and a pink blanket a girlfriend had given me... even steven ya know, I was afraid she had jinxed me and maybe she did.. for the better!).

So, there I was, about 7 months pregnant with none of the usual stockpile most expecting mothers had begun to gather... when I was told that I had preeclamsia and that the baby would have to be delivered right away. It was the last weekend of August. We had just been on a vacation to the Oregon beach. During the next couple days I was given steroid injections to help the lungs grow and was told that my baby would be whisked away to the NICU at the Children’s Hospital in Seattle and we wouldn’t even be together. Things seemed grim, but we were hopeful.

And so I laid on my left side, for all but a few minutes a day, trying to incubate that baby just long enough for him to grow strong enough to survive. Our routine was to go into the doctors office, every other day for stress tests and monitoring. 9/11 started like any other day and I soaped six times in the shower… Which I had been lectured about by my OBGYN bytheway... Yes, there was much discussion about my showers and cutting my routine down. But I digress…

Then we saw the news. At that point no one knew what was really going on. Just as we were about to leave for our appointment my brother called. He has been working for a U.S. Congressman at the Capitol building in Washington D.C. His wife at the time worked for the FAA and in the parking lot watched the Pentagon burn. He assured us that they were O.K. it was just a matter of figuring out transportation, which was completely shut down and getting home. We were not able to have any more communication with him until later that night. The distraction of our own situation forced us to continue on with our day... And after a few tests we were sent home yet again, to wait things out another day or so.

During the next few weeks I watched a lot of news, as this was about all I could do laying on my left side 24 hours a day. I remember watching the U.S. Army move into Afghanistan. Seeing these troops LIVE on the news laying on their bellies over some bridge … is this really happening?

Through many prayers and miracles I was able to keep my pregnancy for altogether 2 months of bedrest. During that time this baby was our distraction from the changing world around us. But also baseball. The Mariners were in the playoffs and being the diehard baseball fans we were that was exciting. We even watched the game the day I gave birth, all the while being told Awsumb would come at the end of the game… Well, we lost and Awsumb had still not arrived … and didn’t until 6:30 the next morning on October 19th when I finally gave birth to a perfect baby boy. And of course the Mariners had lost the playoffs and did not make it to The World Series.

That fall was such a time of sadness and joy and mixed emotions at our house. These are two documentaries I enjoy watching each year about 9/11. Each time I see this footage, especially the one from 9/11 I am taken right back to the emotions and puzzlement I felt that day.



9/11 is by two French filmmakers who set out to make a documentary about 21-year-old Tony Benetatos a firefighter trainee at Manhattan's Duane Street firehouse, located seven blocks from the World Trade Center. The only footage of the command center set up in the Lobby of WTC Tower 1. It’s an amazing film about these two brothers, separated during the call and their reunion back at the firehouse. And of course it also tell the story of the men at the firehouse, who miraculously safely made it out.

For something a little more heart warming don’t miss…

Nine Innings From Ground Zero: The 2001 World Series (2004) about the Yankees vs. Diamondbacks Series Playoffs and how baseball healed the hearts of New Yorkers.

Where were you on 9/11/01?

Fallen Princesses

We all know how I feel about Fairy Tales right? As all young girls do I love them, but I do NOT care for Disney's sanitized versions. For instance, The Little Mermaid? Well, she's supposed to turn into sea foam in the end. Why? Because you can't have your cake and eat it too. It's a story about sacrifice. Reading the original version with your child will lead to a great discussion. As I have said before….

Though we might think the original version of fairy tales might be too frightening for young children they “admit to the child what so many parents try to cover up or avoid. The fairy tale confirms what the child has been thinking all along – that it is a cold, cruel world out there waiting to eat him alive.” It tells the child to, “take courage and if you persist, you can overcome any obstacle, conquer any foe. And best of all you can achieve your heart’s desire,” writes Jim Trelease.




“By recognizing the child’s daily fears, by addressing his courage and confidence, and by offering him hope the fairy tale presents the child with a means by which he can understand his world and himself,” continues Jim Trelease. To only read dramatically altered versions of fairy tales, “you rob your child of their essential meaning.”

Kenneth stumbled across these stories today. Enjoy!

The Disney Blog: Fallen Princesses
JPG Magazine

I must also mention the cruelest part of fairy tales is that as a young girl you may grow up to believe that once the princess gets the prince the story is over. In real life, that is just the beginning!

A few other links you might be interested in...

Wicked the book or broadway playSnow White: A Tale of Terror 1997 (DVD)
And didn't we all love Enchanted 2007 (DVD)

And to read about my own Happily Ever After read my blog Love Story