house

My parents have lived in the same house since 1957. It is a great old house, built in 1913, with so much character. It's even on the state's historic registry. I grew up in this house and so it holds so many memories for me. My brothers and I have tried to talk my parents into moving into something smaller and more manageable for them, but my mom refuses to leave. She raised her children in this home. She grew old with my dad in this home. She knows it would be much too difficult for her to leave it. So there they stay, in this historical home full of solid wood doors, leaded glass windows, and workmanship that is now almost impossible to find.

My mom loves Christmas. She has so many decorations and her Christmas village could easily fill two rooms. She loves her Christmas tree, full of Victorian doll heads that she painted herself. The heads hang on little motors that turn in circles so that the viewer can see all sides of the head. We sometimes make fun of the "spinning heads" on the tree, but we can't imagine it any other way. Those spinning doll heads are SO my mom!

Here are my mom and dad in front of their tree. You can also see the tole-painted (by my mom, of course) piano. I spent many hours on that piano from the age of 8 to 18. Her two rocking chairs sit across from each other, covered in needlepoint that she stitched herself. On one side of the room you can see the framed embroidery hanging on the wall that she, again, made and entered in the Utah State Fair so many years ago. On the other side of the room, her framed needlepoint roses hang by the piano. You can also see (to the left of my mom) her tole-painted carousel horse sticking out from behind her. A large Victorian doll sits atop that horse. The wooden file cabinet (bottom right corner) sits next to my dad's organ and is filled with all of his organ music, most of it from the Big Band era. My mom loves to listen to my dad play the organ. And he's good. Really good.

You can see the love my parents have for each other.

This picture tells a thousand stories. I love this picture.

thank you, mr. clause

As usual, the jolly ol' man was kind to me this year. . . he brought me this. I think it took me 2 hours to stop shaking after I opened it. And then I had a horrible night's sleep that night. I lay awake. . . thinking about my new camera.

Then I slept. . . and dreamed about my new camera.

Silly, I know.

Actually, a little pathetic.

Nonetheless, here are a couple of first shots.

I didn't realize how dry Matthew's lips were until I was editing this pic. He told me they are always like that. I guess I need to look at my kids more often.

This is the face of a boy who does not want his picture taken. Adam is never one to hide how he feels.

the polar express

The train was wrapped in an apron of steam. Snowflakes fell lightly around it. A conductor stood at the open door of one of the cars. He took a large pocket watch from his vest. "All aboard!" the conductor cried out. "Well," he said, "are you coming?" "Where?" we asked. "Why, to the North Pole of course," was his answer. "This is the Polar Express." We took his outstretched hand and he pulled us aboard.

Waiting for our 5:30 p.m. departure to The North Pole.

Complete with elves and all. This elf, Peanut, asked us all what we wanted for Christmas, jotted it down, and promised to pass it along to Santa.

The conductor punches our tickets.

The train was filled with other children, most in their pajamas and nightgowns. We sang Christmas carols and ate chocolate chip cookies. We drank hot chocolate as thick and rich as melted chocolate bars.

Outside, the lights of towns and villages flickered in the distance as the Polar Express raced Northward. We traveled through cold, dark forests, where lean wolves roamed and white tailed rabbits hid from our train as it thundered through the quiet wilderness.

As we climbed mountains so high it seemed as if we would scrape the moon, we read one of our favorite Christmastime stories - The Polar Express.

Finally arriving at The North Pole, Santa boarded our train. He marched over to us, and pointing to Adam said, "Let's have this little fellow here. Now what would you like for Christmas?"

Adam knew he could have any gift he could imagine. But the thing he wanted most was not inside Santa's giant bag. What he wanted more than anything was one silver bell from Santa's sleigh. He gave Adam a hug and told the elf to cut a bell from a reindeer's harness. Santa stood, holding it above him, and called out, "The first gift of Christmas!" then he handed it to Adam.

Soon the train gave a sudden lurch and started moving again. We were on our way home.

Our journey had come to an end. When the train reached the station, we sadly left the other children. We stood and waved good-bye. The conductor cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, "MERRY CHRISTMAS!" The Polar Express let out a loud blast from its whistle and sped away into the dark polar night.

He's baaack!

Wow, two years went by fast. Click here.

(BTW - the sign means "Welcome, my little cabbage." Apparently, it was a joke between Brooke and Brady in 9th grade!)

Dutch Christmas

In our house, my kids have it pretty dang good - they get not one but TWO Christmases (kind of), thanks to their grandpa (Opa, as he is affectionately known) being born in Rotterdam, Holland. Thus we celebrate "Sinterklaas Day" every December 6th.

Sinterklaas lives in Spain during the year. I have no clue as to why he lives in Spain and not Holland-seems like a bit of a traitor to me.

Anyway.

In December, he arrives in Holland by ship along with his helper Zwarte Piet (Black Pete) who is Sinterklaas' helper (Black Pete has a dark and creepy history but we won't get into that here - my kids could be reading this!). Sinterklaas and Zwarte Pete travel on a white horse to all the children's houses on the eve of December 5th where the children have set out their klompen (wooden shoes), either outside or by the fireplace, filled with hay and carrots for Sinterklaas' horse. If the children have been "good" that year then Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet fill the children's shoes with goodies. If they've been bad, they get sticks and coal.

Apparently my kids were okay this year as they ended up with lots of Dutch treats and NO STICKS! *woot* Thank you Mr. Sinterklaas and (creepy) Black Pete for filling my kids with more sugar!

The children always get a "chocolate letter" in their shoes. Adam checks out his "A".

"M" for Matthew :o)

Thanksgiving is next week and I'm just now posting Halloween pics. Lame, I know.

official bed-head poster child

The results are in. Announcing the winner of the highly competitive "bed-head contest." Congratulations Adam, this morning you officially took the prize!

zion's canyoneering

One of my favorite movies of all time is "Cast Away." I especially like when Tom Hanks' character finally is able to build a fire for himself on the beach of his lonely little island. I love his reaction to his amazing accomplishment when he jumps all around beating his chest and pointing to the fire and saying, "Yaaa, look what I have created! I have made fire. I. Have. Made. Fire!"

Love it.

So....I recently experienced a similar feeling of accomplishment. I, yes ME, Maryanne, went to Zion's National Park and I, yes ME, Maryanne, went rappelling! Down cliffs. Steep gangly cliffs.

It's true. It happened.

So here, look what I have done! I went rappelling.

I. Went. Rappelling!

My practice run. We stopped just outside of Zion's to have our lesson given by my expert-canyoneering-brothers-in-law, Jim and Bryson.

John dangling on his practice run.

The beginning of Keyhole slot canyon where we would spend the next two hours dropping, climbing, sliding, crawling, sloshing.

Our pre-descention salute.

First official rappel into the canyon. I must say that I was NOT prepared for that first step backwards. The human mind was just not meant to be "okay" with stepping backwards off the edge of a cliff!

At the bottom of most of the rappels was a pool of ice-cold water, thus the wet-suit attire. Some are so deep you have to swim through them.

Me and my beau in the narrows.

Looking upward. Ya gotta love the beauty of Zion's, the true definition of awesome.

Hurrah! We made it out! Alive and happy and wet and with my fair share of a few scrapes and bruises (and sore muscles in places I didn't even know I had muscles!).

gunpowder, treason, and plot....

....is what was on Guy Fawkes' mind when he tried to blow up Parliament in London back in 1605. Fortunately he was caught before King James 1 was annihilated. Parliament was saved and Mr. Fawkes was subsequently chopped into 4 pieces whilst his head hung in the town square. I bet no one tried that one again!

What has come out of this twisted conspiracy is an odd little yearly celebration in England called "Bonfire Night" or "Guy Fawkes Night." Since we had the privilege of living in the jolly ol' place for three years, we have continued with this fun, yet extremely odd, tradition which goes like this....

On or around the anniversary of the plot, November 5th, people gather around a big bonfire for a rather macabre celebration. With them they have brought homemade "Guys" which are stuffed dummies (or drawn versions on cardboard, or made out of anything you want, really) of Guy Fawkes. Jacket potatoes are served and a feast ensues.

A contest is often held for who made the best "Guy," and then, with the fire roaring, the guests one by one hurl their "Guy" onto the fire while cheering and laughing. Sometimes a chant will be heard amongst the crowd as the "Guys" are thrown to their death....

Guy, guy, guy
Poke him in the eye,
Put him on the bonfire,
And there let him die.

Weird, I know.

So this brings me to last night. Our very dear friends who lived in England with us have carried on this yearly tradition. So here we are, celebrating this rather bizarre, but somehow really fun, holiday....

Everyone lines up with their "Guys" for judging. There were probably about 10 entries.

Adam and his guy...."locked in jail, with chains on him, missiles hitting his head, a bomb in his hand, and a skull on his shirt and foot." (Should I be worried as to what this celebration is doing to my child?)

The competition is steep. Who knew guy Fawkes was a "Y" fan?!

Haylie drew a picture (free-hand!) of his real likeness which gave her the prize for "Best over-all Guy."

The prizes were, well, shall we say, a little Deseret Industries-ish? Haylie tries to act like she likes her beautiful new woman statue.

This one is painful for me. There was also a pie baking contest. Mine is the luscious-looking coconut cream pie you see here (left, third from bottom). I know, your mouth is watering. It should be, it was The. Best. Pie. EVER and, in my very humble opinion, should have won. However, I believe that, somehow, bribery was involved here.

Haylie, Raegan, and Adam by the bonfire, watching the poor Guys being flung to their demise.

Poor guy.

my life.....where are you?!

Lately, I have been facing cruel mocking from people whom I thought were my friends. All because my blog has lay idle for apparently "way too long!" I want to take this opportunity to publicly announce to you all that......my life lately does not belong to me! It has involved Primary, Primary, and a bit of, well, yes, Primary.

And to top it off I am now I am painstakingly pouring over 1700 plus photos from India trying to decide which ones to show at the Fireside that John and I are doing for our ward next week. THEN once I have chosen my photos, I must edit them. THEN once I've edited I need to somehow figure out how to put them in a PowerPoint presentation. THEN I must figure out how to put my video clips into the aforementioned PowerPoint. THEN I need to experiment with making Mango ice cream (as they LOVE anything Mango in India and we must serve something with Indian flair for the "after-fireside" treat).

I guess I'll end now and go ask my 8-year-old to show me how to do PowerPoint.

My computer skills are so pathetic.

the story behind the picture

Two days ago I spent the day with my mom on her birthday and I was talking to her about the photo below. She told me the story behind it which just made me laugh!

She said that picture was taken in the basement of her parent's home, on the cold concrete floor. My dad, who was not yet her husband, had her lay her coat down on the floor underneath her with the satin side up - he thought it would make a great background. He took several gorgeous black and white photos of my mom and then hand colored them.

Apparently, when my grandma (my mom's mom) saw the picture below she was so angry! She felt it was way too seductive and inappropriate for a young lady to be posing in such a way.

Oh, I love it!

83 years young

I'm not sure how old my mom was when my dad took this picture of her, but I think it was maybe last year.

Perhaps it was the year before....

Wasn't she a bomb-shell?! She still is.

Happy Birthday Mom!

(I sure wish you had the internet so that you could see this!)

Read about the Leprosy Colonies at.....

http://rsoindia2009.blogspot.com/

the gamut

Yesterday:

8:00 a.m. - Help move Brooke into her new apartment at Brigham Young University

11:30 p.m. - Be at the elementary school for Adam's kindergarten assessment.

A college Senior. A kindergartner. And everything in-between.

I have the whole gamut.

And I'm really tired.

Adam playing in the grass today, his first day of kindergarten.

sixty years

That's how long my parents have been married. Sixty years. Today.

I was talking with my dad last week and asked him if he had a recent picture of the two of them for me to submit to the newspaper. He told me that indeed he did have one. But after asking a few details I found out that the most recent photo that he has was taken 14 years ago! He thought that would be fine. To me, that wasn't good enough. So I made them pose for me at my nephew's reception last weekend. I am proud to say....this is how my parents look after 60 years of marriage - happy, content, in love. And don't you think they look young?!

Their marriage has been a good one. I have never once seen nor heard my parents argue, quarrel, or exchange harsh words with each other......"That's because we never, ever have," my mom will tell me. It's true. A match made in heaven. Two peas in a pod. Soul-mates.

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad, Grandma and Grandpa, Sam and Maryloo!

slacker

I've slacked horribly on my India blog. It would be really nice if the blogger people would allow us to upload more than 5 pictures at a time (it actually will only let me do 4, and even at that it takes about 10 minutes each upload!). Duh.

So I've finally posted .....
http://rsoindia2009.blogspot.com/

ahhh......summertime!

india blog

Everyone keeps asking me why I set up a separate blog for India. Here is the answer: We needed several thousand dollars to purchase our dental equipment that we were to take with us to Rising Star Outreach. David Archuleta got on board and raised thousands of dollars for this purpose! We were not only able to purchase all the equipment with the money he raised but the thousands of extra dollars left over is going towards the building of a new portion of the school there for the children among other things there at Rising Star. I was asked by several of David's fan sites to set up a blog of our experiences there at RSO so that David's fans, especially those who had donated, could feel a part of the whole experience. I didn't want to post to my personal blog as I didn't really want the entire world of David's fans having access to it so thus I set up a completely separate blog for our Rising Star Outreach experiences.

What is Rising Star Outreach? It is a school, like a boarding school really, that was started by an LDS woman from Atlanta, Georgia named Becky Douglas. The children of RSO have parents who have Leprosy. These types of children in India are denied education because of the horrible social stigma of Leprosy. If a parent has it then the children carry that stigma for the rest of their lives, and they usually end up getting Leprosy as well, leaving them destitute and begging on the streets. So the cycle continues - no education, Leprosy affected, begging, dying. Their lives have no hope. That's where Rising Star comes in. The purpose is to stop the cycle. The children live there at RSO, are cared for, and are given a good education especially in English. If these children know English by the time they enter the work force their earning potential goes up 500%.

The children there had never seen a dentist before, so we went in and spent a week there at RSO doing dentistry on all 160 of them. We saw so many miracles that week. Just the fact we got through every single child was a miracle of it's own! Our hope now is that other dentists will also go in and continue the work. We left our dental equipment there for that purpose.

It was the most amazing life experience that I could never put into words.

I continue to post to my India blog so again here is the link:
http://rsoindia2009.blogspot.com/
(or you can click on the link on the upper right)

privacy, please.

The time has come to make my blog private. If you would like keep following along then please email me or leave your email address in the comments.

Also, it's true...I have finally posted to my India blog! I hope to post daily for the next week or so. It's a daunting task since I took over 1500 photos while I was there!
http://rsoindia2009.blogspot.com/

america the beautiful

About 3 hours ago we were driving down the street in Delhi, India. It happened to be the street on which a lot of the embassies sit. As I watched out the window, looking at each embassy as we passed it, suddenly there it was; the American flag. It sat on top of a big white building, and on the side of the building was the Seal of the United States. As I looked at that flag and that seal, I was filled with emotion, filled with such a great love for my country. My country. The land that I love. I have never in my life felt so much love and appreciation for America as I do right now. That is what two weeks in India has done for me. Words cannot describe how very blessed I feel to live in such a glorious land. My time here in India has been amazing and surreal and I would do it again in a heartbeat, but what an eye-opener it has been. A most humbling experience to say the least.

I sit here now in the Delhi airport, waiting for our 2 a.m. flight. I'm coming home to my beautiful America. I'm coming home!

I can't wait.

India

I am headed to India and I have set up a blog specifically for my India trip. I will try to post while I am there but there are no guarantees. It may have to wait until I get back, but hopefully not. The internet connection (I will be at a Leper Colony) will be spotty at best, and we are sure to be exhausted after each long and HOT day. I can't even explain how excited I am for this! It's sure to be a life-changing experience.

http://rsoindia2009.blogspot.com/

i ♥ new york

I know. I KNOW! It's been 6 weeks since our "girls' weekend in the Big Apple" and I'm just now getting around to posting some of my pics.

That's how it appears, however it's not entirely true. About 4 weeks ago I spent countless hours over two days (TWO DAYS, PEOPLE!) posting my NYC pics to my blog.

Yes, my blog.

But little did I know I was posting it all to the wrong blog! I know, duh. So I, in vain, desperately tried to move all that I had posted to the wrong blog over to the right blog. That should work, right? Cut. Paste. Voila!

It didn't work.

This sent me into deep denial and a bit of, well, depression over the whole thing....."How many ffffflippin' hours did I spend on those DANG pictures and it was all for not?!?"

So here I am, over one month later, feeling the pressure to try it again. I am off to India soon and surely will have 586,342 pictures to post when I get back so I either get these NY pics up now or it will never, ever happen.

John's sister Nancy decided to turn forty in May, so we decided we needed to celebrate. New York City was where the 3 day party took place.

So, let me start out with food. Yes, the food. The highlight of my weekend. The glorious New York City food where no bad food is to be had. Anywhere, anytime.

Pommes Frites. As far as I know this is the only place in the U.S. of A. to obtain European style french fries. (Actually, to call them french fries is, well, a bit of an insult.) Definitely worth the subway ride and the walk. Even worth the extra walk we took of getting completely getting lost - (2nd Avenue and 2nd Street - aren't they the same thing? No Virginia, they aren't. Two totally different streets in two totally different locations. Now we know.)

Julie and Judy enjoying their Pommes Frites with a variety of dipping sauces.

This picture makes me want to cry.
Almost as much as the next picture.....

Europan. Can I just say.... I. Love. Europan. They have a panini sandwich that I crave daily, each and every day of my life. It is lovely. Spinach, fresh mozzarella, basil (fresh, of course), and look at that, Julie - tomatoes (long story that only Julie will understand)!

Julie with her panini and Jana with her Vegan.....something.

My panini. Even the pickle was delicious! (No bad food in New York, remember? Not even bad pickles.)

Oh baby. There's nothing quite like fresh dumplings in Chinatown!

I must admit that when I found out that New York City has not only one, but many PinkBerry Yogurt shops, well, I couldn't sign up fast enough. I first tried this amazingly scrumptious frozen yogurt in Hollywood. I have dreamed about it ever since. And this was the bonus of eating it here, in New York City- I didn't have to share with anyone. Not one kid. Not one adult. Not one husband. I got the entire thing to myself. See me there, crouching down on the left, holding my little cup of heaven? I ate the whole thing. By. My. Self.






Nuts. Roasted nuts. Roasted, candied nuts. What would New York City be without these famous nuggets fragrantly roasting on every other corner? Mmmmm..........

And corn, roasting at a street market.

Riding bikes in Central Park......

Picking up our rental bikes a few block away from Central Park. We then had to ride IN the road WITH New York traffic to get to the park. A red-knuckle experience indeed.

A picturesque lake in Central Park. See the big building on the top right? With the 3 towers on it? Our tour guide told us that's where Jerry Seinfeld lives, and he reportedly paid 16 mil for his apartment. Sheesh, some people just have a lot of money.

I don't recommend trying to take a picture of your fellow bike-riding mates while you yourself are trying to ride your own bike.

Here is our tour guide guy pointing out where the "Frick Museum" is. However, that's not what he called it. One of the best quotes from the trip was from this guy -- "Over there is the Freak Museum. But I don't know why they call it the FREAK Museum......it doesn't really have anything freaky in it."

He was serious.

Me and my bike. I liked my bike.

Our bikes, taking a break.

You never know what can happen when you get a bunch of women together in NYC. Just look at us, showing off our legs. This is proof we went crazy - livin' life on the edge!
Need more proof? Just look at the next picture of Julie, striking a "woman on the loose" pose in Times Square.

Need I say more.

Guys and Dolls -one of two Broadway shows I saw. The other was The Lion King (completely awesome!).

Apparently, you are not supposed to take pictures inside the theater, and I can't remember if I took this picture of the stage right before the guy told me "no pictures mam, please put your camera away," or if I took it right after he told me. I think it was after. Ya, I'm pretty sure if was after. But what a great low-light shot of the stage!

The subway. The only way to get around NYC (that is if you can figure it out! We actually only went the wrong way once, thanks to me, and this was right as I made the confident declaration that "we are doing so great figuring out this subway system, it's really not a big deal!" Little did I know I had just put everyone on the wrong train going the wrong way. That's what happens when one gets a little too confident in oneself. I was quickly put in my place (thanks Jan) and have since humbled myself).



The whole gang riding the rails, with Nancy's family (the birthday girl) who joined us from Pennsylvania for the evening.



Julie was just SO exhausted that it looks like she fell asleep on the subway! Must have been all that "fun" she was having in Times Square (see previous photo).

I love the tile mosaics in the subway - so retro!

Flat Iron building. Always wanted to see this iconic building, finally got to!

Pedi-cabs....

Jan and Jana ready for their pedi-cab ride.

The three of us, Nancy, Julie, and me squished into a pedi-cab built for 2 people.

Passing Park Avenue.

Our guy taking us through the street of new York with Carol and Judy ahead of us.

Jan and Jana.

On the steps of the Met Museum (my blog header picture was taken in the lobby of The Met). This pic was taken just after we had descended upon a street vendor selling men's ties. I think in total we must have bought 50 or more ties. What do you expect from a bunch of Mormon women? Little did this guy know when he woke up that morning that it would be his lucky day! Seven Mormon ladies = good business!).

Our Bed and Breakfast....which wasn't really a "breakfast" at all. I like what Julie called it, a "Bed" which is more appropriate since there was no breakfast included. HOWEVER, it was a glorious place! The name is "1871 House." It is a brownstone built in 1871 (hence the name) and is nestled on a darling street full of other brownstones right near Central Park. This place is full of charm! For this I will forgive them for the lack of breakfast.

Me, Julie, Nancy, Jan, Carol, Judy, and Jan in front of our brownstone.

And a few inside shots of the rooms. Aren't they darling?! I would stay there again in a heartbeat.

Looking down the staircase with Carol and Jan.

There was a wonderful corner flower shop just down from our brownstone. I had to get a pic of this sign. At first glance you may think it says "Peony and Lilac." However, if you look closely you can see what it really says...."Peony and LIRAC!" (Apparently someone was having issues with their English.)

Oh, another picture to make me CRY! (Why does good food make me cry?) This is Jan, gazing at the delectable confections at our favorite bakery/cafe, Le Pain Quotidien. Oh my cow - that stuff was so yummy! I even brought a stash of it home for my family. We rationed it for days after I got home.

Julie and Jana doin' some damage to their pocketbooks in Chinatown!

The ladies in Chinatown.

I hate to end my post with such an odd picture, but I just had to include this one. It's not everyday that you find a cut-off chicken head in the gutter (along side a few cigarette butts).

Only in New York City.