Misgnomers & Misterees

A Conflicted and Unspoken Relationship with Gnomes

2012-02-06T12:58:00.001-08:00

The Formal Announcement: It's a . . .

2012-02-04T18:12:00.000-08:00

. . . baby!

Yes, I'm a total jerk and pulled the rather passive aggressive move of announcing Lambson Baby No. 2 at the very end of our very long-winded Christmas Newsletter. I thought, well, if so-and-so were really my friend they'd read the whole thing and be thus "rewarded" with our little secret. So after Christmas when a few friends were totally surprised to find out the news, I thought, "Ha! You didn't read it! Fail! I win!"

So if you were too lazy (and I don't blame you), here's the formal announcement: we're expecting!

Due Date: June 20, 2012.

Father: Sam. Yes, I am monogamous.

Current Gestational Age: 20.71428 weeks old

Age Distance from Our First: Approx. 19.666 months

Nickname: Blueberry

Weight: (Heavens, no, not mine.) Approx. 1lb--ahead of the game, apparently. According to my unreliable sources, if weight actually multiplies by 15 from week 20, we're gearing up for a 15lb baby. Pray for me.

Gender: Well, wouldn't you like to know! To keep you interested, all shall be revealed at the conclusion of this post. Yes, you actually have to read more than just a paragraph. Can your internet-affected attention span bear it? Too bad for you--either way, I demand your attention on such rare occasions as this. Thank you very much. So . . .

Is it a girl?


Or it a boy?

Here's Bean at 20 weeks. See a resemblance?

Our 20-week anatomy scan yesterday, and it was a much better experience than we had with the tech we worked with last time (i.e. she looked at the baby from the wrong angle, saying she could find no heartbeat and he might be dead, and shared that she didn't really like kids but preferred her dogs, etc.)

Check out that adorable spine!

I loved our tech this time, Larissa. She was very personable, answering my questions and sharing what she was doing with great detail. She looked at the liver when I asked about the liver and other things to satisfy my curiosity. I love going to the doctor just to learn more about medicine.

Blueberry looked very healthy on all accounts and was a very, very active baby during the whole process, waving and kicking and twisting around. Such fun!

And now, for the moment of truth! Dun dun dunnnnn! We're having a . . .

. . . boy!

We're thrilled! Any name suggestions?

To Seek Betterment

2012-02-02T18:23:00.000-08:00

I’m kind of a negative person—glass half empty, if you will. But I don’t necessarily see this as a bad thing. For one, I’m constantly learning to accept myself for who I am, someone who teeters between mellow and melancholy; and secondly, I am one who is constantly seeking for betterment. If the glass is half empty, I ask myself, By George, what do we need to do to make this glass full? Why walk around with a half empty glass in the first place? Who poured this glass? Where’s the pitcher? Give it to me. Let’s improve this situation.

But, I admit, on occasion I just want to toss the whole glass in the sink.

Perhaps it goes along with a perfectionist paradigm in which nothing and no one are perfect, but this doesn’t dissuade from pursuing perfection. For example, if my house is messy, which it usually is, that is an example of a half-empty glass I yearn to fill by remedying the situation.

I guess I’ve been thinking about this as I evaluate what is now a past experience of being a full-time working mom. It’s been about three weeks since I switched to part-time, working Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays now that the busy season has passed. I’m learning again how to relax when I’m at home and let go of the pressure I felt having two hours in the evening to do a day’s worth of chores, wifery, and parenting. I’m learning to pace myself again. This also includes learning how not to be a complete couch potato during the day just because I can. That’s probably my biggest problem when I’m home all day, really. Almost nothing motivates me to get out of the house or work on a meaningful project—but a job will.

What I learned as a mother working full-time was a deep understanding of physical exhaustion, which leads to mental exhaustion.

On the other hand, what I learned from being a full-time mother confined in a small apartment with little contact with the outside world was mental exhaustion, which leads (for me) to physical exhaustion.

A healthy balance of physical and mental exhaustion is what I’m looking for. A life void of any exhaustion (or work) would be hardly worthwhile to me. From what I hear, parenting is the greatest source for both mental and physical exhaustion around the clock, and yet the occupation with the greatest reward. A high-stress job that requires 80-hour work weeks or what have you might have a similar effect.

Anyway, I diverge. What I wanted to do mostly, is apologize for my negativity. I find that no matter what my life situation is, I am constantly wondering how it could be better. It’s not that I’m displeased with or ungrateful for whatever circumstances I find myself in, but I am always looking for ways that my life can be more enriching and meaningful to not just myself, but others. I want to maximize the effect of my life and my influence on others.

And so this blog is just one of the forums on which I ask questions and evaluate the areas of my life that I would like change for the better. Not that the water in my glass tastes bad or isn’t the stuff of life; rather, I love the water so much that I want more of it. And if I could, it’d be nice to have enough for not just myself.

The Suffering

2012-01-26T21:14:00.000-08:00

. . . of this neglected space. Poor bloggy. I'm getting to a point where I'm hesitant to post because I wonder if I have any readers anymore. Hello world! Are you there?

After seven months of full-time work, I've switched to a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule. There are finally a few moments to breathe, to catch up, to return to doing little things that were neglected or set aside out of necessity and a bona fide lack of time. Since last June I let go of all my hobbies, allowing work to be my hobby, and now I'm finding I have the luxury of idle time at home again, time when I think it would not just be possible, but nice to work on a project or something. Knit a mitten, sew a pillowcase, paint a painting. Not that I've done any of those things yet, but it's refreshing to have a moment to even think about doing one of them.

I have started reading again--that's the one thing I've picked up, and just that is a wonderful treat, almost a guilty pleasure. And I've had more precious time to play with my darling son. On Saturday I also joined my old gym again, and that has made me so happy. I've gone four times already because I love how it feels to sweat. A real detox, I think. Exercise is a very important part of my life that I neglected since becoming a parent, thinking I didn't have time. I'm making time again, even if that means going to spin class at 5:30am, and I feel refreshed.

In my spare time this month since the M-W-F switch, I also started a new project I'm excited to be a part of: I'm editing a book. Funny--filling my time off work with more work! But I love editing, and it's a special piece of writing, by a PhD even! I hope to do more of this kind of thing in the future. I really enjoy it. And there have been a few gigs. I'm playing again with the Bach Cantata Choir soon, which is a great group. That's exciting.

Right now Sam is gone on business. I shouldn't even be doing this, I think, right now because there is always so much to do. There are groceries in the car I need to bring in. I'm making chicken salad tonight for a baby shower at work tomorrow, and then gallons of New England clam chowder tomorrow night for Stake Women's Conference. At least I like cooking, right?

I don't feel overwhelmed, per se, but I do feel this constant anxiety that I can't rest or take my mind off the millions of things that need to be done. As soon as I get home from work I have to hit the ground running--or at least I think I do--and the thought of everything that must be done is enough to paralyze me and lay me down on the couch. My head spins, and I'm not sure what to do first. Change the baby, prepare the dinner, go to the grocery store, fold the laundry, wash the dishes, sweep the floor, change the crib sheet, fill the bath, write that e-mail, make that call, pick up the Cheerios, brush my own teeth, take off my eyeliner, say my prayers. You know. All of that. It's all there, waiting for me at every moment. All I can do is close my eyes sometimes and try to forget it's waiting for me.

The night before Sam left I was lying down, again, and put on Downton Abbey on Netflix from the beginning again, and for the briefest moment I was able to let go of my guilt and anxiety and truly forget about the hundreds of tasks that constantly loom over my head. I was able to rest my mind for just a moment. It was like a single gasp of air, oxygen to my lungs, after feeling like I've been breathing through fifty layers of cheesecloth--layers of the many, many things I have to do, constantly, that never end.

It's a mindset I find myself in all too often, this mind-numbing anxiety that there is more to accomplish than I am capable of, on and on into the endless future of my life, all to the point that I'm physically exhausted even thinking about it and I attempt to sleep it off. I'm known to sleep for twelve hours if I can. Last night I went to bed at 8:30, so exhausted, and didn't get up until eight this morning.

Maybe it's just the weather. I can't wait for summer because spring doesn't really exist here, if I remember correctly. Today the sun shone, and it's like a strange memory resurfacing when it does.

My Personal Portlandia

2012-01-05T22:50:00.000-08:00

Today I'm crossing the Columbia River on the 205 into Portland. I barely make it over the riverbank when traffic comes to a total halt.

Accident ahead, apparently. Could it be caused by a reckless driver

a) colliding with a street biker changing lanes on the highway
b) operating heavy machinery whilst stoned
c) distracted by vegan, gluten-free, organic food cart wrap dripping on his burlap tie
d) looking up the nearest vintage furniture store on her smart phone to continue search for ugly sofa

Surprise, surprise! None of the above! I eventually pull up to the scene of the crime to witness two lanes of highway traffic on a shoulderless bridge blocked by none other than an entire BOAT! A boat!

The boat is flanked by a small group of men scratching their heads, wondering how on earth they will move said boat.

I miss my appointment, telling the receptionist, "Sorry, I was stuck in traffic. Some guy's boat fell off his trailer in the middle of the highway." She's very understanding. On my way home after getting sandwiches at Jimmy John's, like an hour later, I hear the traffic report. It says there's a boat [still] blocking two lanes of traffic on the Glenn Jackson Bridge near Government Island.

How do you move a 24-foot boat off a bridge? Push it over the edge? Rent a crane? Sail it away? Welcome to Portland.

Spinning into the Wall

2012-01-04T22:19:00.000-08:00

I don't know why, but our videos lately seem to end with some sort of accident . . .

From My Eighth Grade Yearbook

2012-01-04T21:46:00.000-08:00

[Note: I was 95% a nerdy loner in middle school.]

LIZDLE,
Have a great summer. If you wanna get together sometime or just talk don't hesitate to call. Liz maybe you don't know it but you're a great role model and hating getting mushy but your a really great friend
♥ always
Sammi

Liz-
Hay I know we didn't talk much but you wer a good friend. Have a great Summer. Maby call me!
Peace + love
Shell

Liz-
Way, I'm really going to miss you a lot! I wish we knew each other better! have a fun summer! Shannon!

Liz-
You are awesome! I hope you have a good summer STAR WARS RULZ!
Lindsay

Liz,
I may not know you well but your a Really cool person . . . somewhat quiet, but nice and a Really Good artist keep working hard hope to see you next year
-Brandi

Hey Liz!
Congrats on all your Academy Awards this year! You did GREAT! Umm. . . Just Remember: Star Wars RULZ! Esp. The PHANTOM MENACE!!
Kristin

Liz-
Am I your friend? :) J/K
Mari

Liz
I am really glad that I got to know you. You are an extremely nice and thoughtfull person. Speak out sometimes you have great ideas and talents to share w. the world. Have a great summer and work hard next year.
Linda

Hey Liz-
We were in art class together. I ♥ how you draw.
Love,
Heidi

Liz,
Clarinets are DEAD DUKS! :)
Tricia

Hey Liz,
I can't wait to see the next Star Wars w/ you. You're so cool. thx for having me over on a school night. that was GROOVY!
Clarise

[After reading these to Sam, he brought home a Star Wars Clone Wars candy cane for me from work. So sweet.]

From My Sixth Grade Yearbook

2011-12-29T19:39:00.001-08:00

Treasured notes from my sixth grade yearbook:

Liz,
You are a great friend even if you are a little annoying sometimes. You are also a good clarinet player. Have a nice summer,
Kristin

Hi person,
Everyone likes Sarah V . . . that's me.
-Sarah V

I loved all your stuffed aminals
-Samantha

Have a wonderful summe, STAY COOL-
Stephanie

Hope to see ya, agian!
Julia

Liz,
Don't YOU HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE WRITE BIG!

Maurice Sendak on Growing Old

2011-12-26T11:01:00.000-08:00

I was so entranced by this interview with Maurice Sendak on the radio that I stopped what I was doing to transcribe what I could of it, the end of the interview, below. I reread what I caught to Sam and was surprised my voice was getting a little shaky--he is a man so full of heart.

Maurice Sendak is a children's author and illustrator, most famous for Where the Wild Things Are, which I never personally read when I was younger. But what we did have in my home that he illustrated was the Little Bear series, which I read over and over and over--one of my favorites. I'll have to find it for our children.

I was so touched by how eloquently he could express himself in words verbally and on the spot. I lack the talent of speaking with the same fluency with which I write. I wish I could communicate this way all the time, like maybe it would be a blessing to be mute. But I love his voice. You can tell he's a seasoned writer, expressing what's deep inside with such ease.

Such an interesting old man--an athiest who never wanted and never did have children, who came out later in his life, who was solely dedicated to his work, his writing, and his art. Even is his old age, he doesn't believe in an afterlife or that he will see his many friends again. He only believes he will see his brother. Everyone else leaves him forever when they leave this life, and I can see why that makes him so, so sad.

_____________________________________

“I’m not unhappy about becoming old . . .[it's] what must be. I only cry when I see my friends go before me. I don’t believe in an afterlife, but I do expect to see my brother again . . . like a dream life . . . but I am in love with the world. I look right now out the window of my studio--I see my trees, these beautiful beautiful maples. It is a blessing to get old, to find the time to do the things, to read the books, to listen to the music. I don’t think I’m rationalizing . . . this is all inevitable, I have no control over it. The wondrous feeling of coming into my own—it took a very long time. You could be talking to a crazy person.”

“I have heart trouble. I’m very sick. I have nothing but praise now really for my life. . . I’m not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can’t stop them. They leave me and I love them more. I’m in a very soft mood, you gather, because new people have died. It’s what I dread more than my isolation. . . . [young people] if they only knew how little I know. Oh, God, there are so many beautiful things in the world that I will have to leave when I die, but I am ready, I am ready, I am ready.”

“Although certainly I’ll go before you’ll go, so I won’t have to miss you. But I will cry my way all the way to the grave. . . . I wish you all good things. Live your life, live your life, live your life.”

- "Maurice Sendak: On Life, Death, and Children's Lit," Interview with Terri Gross, Fresh Air, September 20, 2011.

Our Son Gandhi

2011-12-26T10:37:00.000-08:00

I’m a little behind. Halloween was a hit. L was Gandhi, I was Mother Teresa, and Sam was the usual Elf.

The Great 2011 Lambson Christmas Newsletter

2011-12-24T11:53:00.000-08:00

Dearest Family and Friends,

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you! If the theory holds true that as you get older time passes more quickly, we are most assuredly aging. This year has passed in the blink of an eye—all of a sudden we have a one-year-old son romping around the house, unplugging the Christmas lights and making off with the tree skirt.

Last year passed so quickly we didn’t even write a 2010 newsletter, so we’ll go ahead and fill you in: we had a baby (if you didn’t notice). L was born on October 30, 2010. We also celebrated our oldest siblings’ marriages: Jack married Susie and Kali married Zach. There was much rejoicing. The rest of the year’s “noteworthy” events pale in comparison. Not even worth mentioning. Enough said.

2011 treated our family well. We survived our second year in Oregon, escaping the tree huggers who hug too hard and Occupy Portland protestors who could probably take some Boy Scout camping gear off our hands. Sam has continued serving as Scoutmaster with true gusto, spending more than thirty nights in the rugged outdoors of Oregon and Washington, from Silver Falls to Lost Lake, Opal Creek, Mt. Hood, Mt. St. Helens, Lewis River, and beyond. Sam’s work also took him around the world: Chicago, Atlanta, Phoenix, D.C., Provo, Memphis, and Honduras. In the latter locale Sam participated in a company-sponsored Habitat for Humanity trip to build a home in Siguatepeque. He also received a promotion this year, which was a nice treat—especially for such a hardworking and service-oriented man.

Liz also had a big year as she took on the role of full-time working mom, starting a new job in June as a luthier in a violin shop (KennedyViolins.com) repairing and setting up stringed instruments. After working part-time for over a year at Ann Taylor LOFT, it was sad to say goodbye to the fashion scene (and a screaming clothing discount), but thrilling to return to the more familiar life of music and artistry. She has continued to freelance on the bass, playing gigs with the Columbia, Vancouver, Beaverton, Sunnyside, Southwest Washington, and Clark College symphony orchestras and teaching the occasional guitar lesson. Towards the end of the year Liz was released from the Young Women’s presidency at church and now teaches a youth Sunday school class.

L has been growing and developing so well. He’s a tall, thin boy with an energetic spirit, excellent sense of humor (like his father), and winning smile for any stranger. A very social baby, he makes friends easily and is comfortable in any environment, from sleeping in a tent on the beach to going on a plane ride without his parents. He is a very independent and loving young man. L took his first step on his first birthday and is now working on his sprint. He loves whole, fresh pears, quinoa, and French fries (like his mother).

As a family, we took an exciting road trip in March from Las Vegas up the California and Oregon Coasts, camping along the way. L, at four months old, was a star traveler. We also enjoyed a weekend in Seattle in October and a great week with the Lambsons in Utah for Thanksgiving.

Sadly, our family said goodbye to Sam’s first truck, the ‘96 Ford Ranger (215,000 miles), and my first car, the ‘91 LeBaron convertible (265,000 miles). With a half million miles between us, it was time to say goodbye. We now have a lovely silver sedan (thanks, Jack and Susie!) and a green station wagon (thanks, used car lot!).

If you’ve made it thus far into this epistle, it is now your privilege to know the most significant news of late: we are expecting Lambson Baby Number Two in June of 2012, doubling the number of grandchildren in both our families! Liz is doing well, Lewis has no idea what’s coming, and Sam is very, very excited.

We are grateful to you for your involvement in our lives, your friendship, and your examples to us, and wish you great joy and peace during this season of hope. Please keep in touch, and remember we love you!

Merry Christmas,

Sam, Liz & L Lambson

Christmas Fail

2011-12-23T13:10:00.000-08:00

A couple months ago Sam was at the food bank doing service with the Scouts, and after spilling some pinto beans or something one of the boys just started going off, saying, "You're a fail, your mom's a fail, your dog's a fail, your wife's a fail--" and as soon as he said "your wife's a fail," Sam grabbed him by the collar, jerking him off his feet, saying no one talks about his wife that way. Chivalry at it's finest.

Someone just knocked on the door and left another Christmas package. I could tell by the way they knocked and the way the box sounded as it bumped the floor. But I can't bear to open the door and receive it. Every package that arrived reminds me that there's one more person for whom I haven't sent a single gift.

I am a Christmas fail.

Let's be frank. I am a terrible gift receiver. I have a very bad poker face when it comes to pretending I like gifts that I don't really. I'm terrible at receiving gifts for this reason; most things I'd like I would like to pick out myself. I don't need much, I don't like clutter (we have plenty of that), and I have a very hard time giving away gifts I've been given, so they sit around for years on the merit of sentimental value.

Conversely, I'm not a very good gift giver. I don't like giving gifts for the same reasons I don't like receiving them: why give someone something they don't like, won't use, and will throw away at some point? Christmas is not a good reason to go broke, either. My only remedy in the name of anti-commercial-Christmas is to make homemade gifts. Traditionally I knit scarves, paint paintings, sew things, etc. That's my specialty. At least I can give gifts that I've put a little of my heart into.

Unfortunately, this whole working mom thing has exhausted my resources as far as having time to make homemade gifts and baked goods. As a result, I haven't gotten gifts for anyone. The extent of my holiday giving thus far has been in the form of sending a Christmas newsletter we didn't even write personal notes on and giving mugs with candy in them to L's teachers. Oh, and a white elephant gift for last nights party. Okay, and gifts I had Sam order for my Lambson sibling not-so-secret Santa drawing. And, yes, I got L something. Other than that, I haven't even gotten my own husband anything. That's the task for this afternoon. Merry Christmas Eve Eve!

I'm feeling grinchy and heartless this year. Isn't Christmas about more than commercialism, spending loads of money, and rolling in booty? And yet, if Christmas is about giving, I'm a horrible person. As my opportunities to mail gifts to family and friends has come and gone, I try not to think about it. Perhaps if I don't admit to sending zero gifts I don't have to face the guilt.

Still, the packages keep coming. It's our first Christmas as our own little family, so I thought we'd be safe from too much Christmas booty from our distant family members. But we put up a tree, and even though I had nothing to do with it, there are piles and piles of gifts surrounding it, and more keep arriving at the door. Make it stop! Each package that arrives has made me feel worse and worse about my lack of giving this year. I don't want it to be a season of stress and misery, but can everyone stop being so dang nice to me already? I don't deserve it.

Utensil Training

2011-12-20T13:18:00.000-08:00

Well, it's been more than a month since last I blogged. You've probably forgotten about me.

It's lunchbreak; I made a commitment when L started daycare that I would visit every day at lunch, which I have. But he's in a new room now with a new schedule and everyone naps like the dickens during my window of opportunity to visit = reason one I'm hesitant to walk over. Reason two: it's cold and misting outside, like the pesky kind of mist that happens when there's no more room in the sky for all the dumb clouds so they sit on their butts on the ground where we all have to deal with the stinky moisture. Moist. I have a friend who hates the word moist. Moist moist moist. It is too moisty cold outside to go out of doors. I shall sit here with my donut and hot lemon water.

But what does one do instead of visit her son? Blog about him! I miss you, L. Sorry I'm not visiting today. It's been a while since I had the opportunity to sit down like this and show you off on the www. See you for dinner! Another messy good dinner! What about spaghetti tonight?

The Nefarious Torture of Jules

2011-11-03T23:29:00.000-07:00

Last night I lay witness to a traumatizing act of a cruel and insidious nature. It's almost too horrible to speak of. Read on only if you dare.

The Woeful Tale
L got a very cute fox stuffy from his Aunt Janet.

We named him Jules, and I am making great attempts to introduce Jules to L as a new sidekick, confidant, best friend, source of comfort, playmate, etc. I place Jules in the crib at night and tuck Jules into the carseat cheek to cheek with L. I try to cheer L up with little kisses and dances from Jules.

Last night Jules was in our bed after putting L in his crib. Sam was trying to sleep, but Jules wanted to give Sam kisses. Then he wanted to give Sam a few loving slaps in the face with his noodly arms to keep Sam awake to talk to his wife.

And then, suddenly, without warning, Sam LASHED OUT VIOLENTLY, grabbing Jules around the neck and choking him, smashing the innocent fox facedown into the bedding to smother him, like Desdemona, in the mattress of his own kin! Jules fought and struggled (with some manipulation by Sam), gasping for breath to save himself from suffocation by the hand of pure evil!!!

Meanwhile, I am screaming and trying desperately to tear away the death grip from Jules' neck! "NO! NO! Stop it! STOP IT! HOW COULD YOU!" I'm yelling to wake the neighbors. "AHHHHH! You're hurting him! Stop, stop! Sam, please! JULES!"

Eventually, I save poor Jules from Sam and am so distraught by the pure, unadulterated, violent evil I have just witnessed that I take Jules and my pillow and go to sleep on the couch, cradling the injured fox in my arms. I didn't go back to bed until waking up at 3:00am to the sound of L crying, either from the ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth teeth poking through, or because he missed his friend Jules. I think it was the latter.

So: the question. Do dolls have feelings? Is it morally wrong to abuse a stuffed animal? I argue in favor of stuffies. Jules did nothing to deserve such torturous cruelty.

Sam thinks I overreacted, anthropomorphizing an inanimate object made of stuffing and fabric who has no feelings. Is that true? Did I overreact?

BYU vs. OSU

2011-10-23T17:36:00.000-07:00

Go team go!

Woo hoo!

Cosmo!

What Lulu did for most of the game.

What Just Happened

2011-10-18T22:25:00.000-07:00

The babe did not nurse today. Maybe this is the end.

Of the world.

My child doesn't need me anymore . . .

. . . so I can go to the mall whenever I want.

Loving Ourselves and Others

2011-10-16T15:39:00.000-07:00

Today I had a great experience teaching the combined Young Women the following lesson, "Loving Ourselves and Others." I needed it as much as they, I know, so I thought I'd write down what we discussed to keep as a reminder. I am also kind of in love with Elder Dieter F. Uchdorf of the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, so all of the quotations below are his.

_________________________

As young women (and I still think of myself as one), it is so easy to think less of ourselves than we truly are. As discussed in more detail below, it is so easy to be a perfectionist, compare ourselves to others, and forget our great worth as literal daughters of God.

WHAT YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF
To begin the lesson, I had each of the young women stand up in front of the class and say something they liked about themselves. They were definitely hesitant, shy, and reluctant to do it and found the task a difficult one. But they had great things to say, saying that they liked being good with children, compassionate and kind, outgoing, funny, etc.

When I asked if that was an easy thing to do, they all said no. I asked, had they been asked to say something nice about someone else, would that have been easier? They all said yes. Then I asked, had they been asked to say something they don't like about themselves, would that have been easier? I was broken-hearted to again hear them all say yes, that would have been SO much easier.

I noticed the girls not only were hesitant in their minds to get up and speak up, but it was reflected in their demeanor. None of them looked all that comfortable or confident standing up there. They looked at the floor, not looking anyone in the eye, crossed their arms to cover themselves up, looked fidgety, laughed, hurried back to their seats, etc. I pointed out a quotation from the lesson manual:

"We may think that we should love other people, but not ourselves. We might wonder how we can love ourselves without being conceited."

But being confident in yourself and aware of your strengths and notable qualities doesn't mean you're prideful or conceited. It's a little different than walking around with a t-shirt that says

. . . although I'd be proud of them if they did.

Anyway, they then asked the leaders to stand up and do the same exercise. It was even hard for the adults, who were similarly hesitant to stand up and praise themselves in front of everyone.

When it was my turn, I tried to be a good example and say endless things I like about myself: I'm very musically and artistically talented, I'm a good wife and mother and family member, I have a good sense of style, I am clean, I am laid back and easy-going, I am patient and not easily riled up, and I am a strong and capable woman deserving of your respect!

THE GOLDEN RULE

We all know the Golden Rule, as outlined in Matthew 22:

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

I wrote the following on the board:

Treating others as you would like to be treated.

Treating yourself as you would treat others.

Treating yourself and others as Christ would treat his children.

We seem to understand the standard to treat others kindly. But if we are mean and unforgiving to ourselves, before we know it, that's the way we treat other people, even subconsciously. It's a double standard to treat ourselves with less respect that we would others, which leads to the next idea . . .

IT'S OKAY TO BE MEAN, IF JUST TO MYSELF

Here's a quotation from Elder Uchdorf's First Presidency Message in the March 2011 Ensign, "Looking for the Good":

Have you ever noticed that people can usually find whatever they are looking for? Look hard enough, and you can discover both good and bad in almost anyone and anything. . . . Unfortunately, at times this happens even within the Church. There is no end to the creativity, ingenuity, and tenacity of those who look for reasons to criticize. They cannot seem to release their grip on grudges. They gossip and find fault with others. They nurse wounds for decades, taking every opportunity to tear down and demean others. This is not pleasing to the Lord, “for where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work” (James 3:16).

For some odd reason, it's easy to understand that treating others with disrespect and cruelty is sin. We know these aren't great things to do:

Criticize
Find fault
Gossip
Deamean
Be Unforgiving
Hold Grudges
Tear Down

And yet, when we do these things to ourselves, we think it's okay. But in reality, treating yourself unjustly is just as sinful and incongruent with the teachings of Christ to love all men and treat Heavenly Father's children (including ourselves) with respect.

PERFECTIONISM

Perfectionism is a common problem amongst the female population. Here's a quotation from Dieter F. Uchdorf's talk entitled "Forget Me Not" from the October 2011 General Relief Society Meeting:

"God wants to help us to eventually turn all of our weaknesses into strengths, but He knows that this is a long-term goal. He wants us to become perfect, and if we stay on the path of discipleship, one day we will. It’s OK that you’re not quite there yet. Keep working on it, but stop punishing yourself. Dear sisters, many of you are endlessly compassionate and patient with the weaknesses of others. Please remember also to be compassionate and patient with yourself."

The problem with perfectionism is that the unrealistic expectations we hold for ourselves are then projected on other people, especially the people close to us. It's that principle in action again that the way we treat ourselves quickly turns into the way we treat others.

I used one of my perfectionist tendencies as an example: I consider myself a clean person and have very high expectations for myself to keep my home clean, even when I'm working full-time and have a baby and don't have time anymore to clean my home even to my own standards. So, as a result, I've been getting very mad and frustrated with myself for not being able to keep a clean home like the other women in the ward with six kids and a perfectly put-together house.

But not only was I getting mad at myself for having unrealistic expectations for myself, I found myself also getting mad and frustrated with my husband and child for also not being able to keep a perfectly clean home to my unrealistic standards. And that's not fair.

COMPARING OURSELVES TO OTHERS
Usually having a perfectionist attitude and setting unrealistic expectations for ourselves is a direct result of comparing ourselves to others, especially our weaknesses to others' strengths. Elder Uchdorf, in the "Forget Me Not" talk, also says this:

"I want to tell you something that I hope you will take in the right way: God is fully aware that you and I are not perfect. Let me add: God is also fully aware that the people you think are perfect are not. And yet we spend so much time and energy comparing ourselves to others—usually comparing our weaknesses to their strengths. This drives us to create expectations for ourselves that are impossible to meet. As a result, we never celebrate our good efforts because they seem to be less than what someone else does."

As a personal example, I brought up my own tendency to be self-conscious of my weight. I always have been. But in constantly looking at myself and observing whether I'm fat or skinny, I've found myself doing the same to others, observing their figures and eating habits and comparing them to my own. It's a very negative thing, and not healthy. It's also wrong to hold others to my own unrealistic expectations of what I should look like.

ANGER AND INGRATITUDE
An immediate result of comparing ourselves with others are sinful and self-indulgent feelings of jealousy and covetousness. The moment we become envious of someones wealth, marriage, looks, or family, we are instantly ungrateful for our own God-given blessings. When our relationship with others is poisoned by feelings of jealousy, or relationship with God equally suffers as we are ungrateful for what he's given us. We can even become angry with God for not giving us more than what we have.

EXUDING CONFIDENCE
Young women with low self-esteem often show it in unhealthy ways, such as objectifying their bodies and wearing skimpy clothes as if their looks are all they have to offer, or being ditzy and flaunting it as if belittling their own intelligence will somehow justify their insecurities. If being and acting dumb can look like a good thing, then phew!--we don't have to rise up to our own potential and take the challenge to treat ourselves with repect!

I also brought up a study from a Radiolab episode called "Laughter" in which they pointed out one of the reasons why young girls especially are super-giggly. Laughter is something we do to ease up when we feel insecure--something young women are definitely prone to do and be.

People who lack confidence in themselves are usually the ones who don't succeed in life because they don't believe in themselves. On the other hand, people who recognize their strengths and abilities are the ones who accomplish great things because they know they can.

YOU ARE WORTH IT
Loving ourselves is such an important principle that the Young Women's Personal Progress Program even devotes an ENTIRE section to Individual Worth, one of the seven Young Women Values. I encouraged each of the young women to spend some time in that section and not be shy about writing in their journals regularly about how great they are, including their physical, spiritual, and mental strengths.

In conclusion I bore my testimony, telling the girls that God loves them. They have so much to offer and were put on this earth for a reason. They (and we) are divinely appointed children of God with great potential as a result of that divine heritage. I hope each of us can recognize the importance of loving ourselves so we can be even more capable of blessing the lives of others.

AHHHHHHHHH

2011-10-14T13:44:00.000-07:00

I just clocked out at work just to take the time to write an EXTREMELY long and educational blog post, and it is GONE! WHY???????? AHHHHHHHHHHH! I hate you, Blogger! WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY

How to Find Gigs: Musical Networking

2011-10-11T11:38:00.001-07:00

My latest blog post for Kennedy Violins:

As with any other career, a musician's key to successfully finding gigs often lies in simple networking. (Image by Sean MacEntee)

It takes a long time to establish your reputation as a musician and performer in a new town. After living in Utah for six years, I felt so well connected to a great number of musical organizations, schools, teachers, orchestras, recording studios, and the like. I enjoyed playing regular gigs, teaching a steady number of bass students, and growing strong relationships with musicians and performing groups throughout the state . . .

. . . and then I moved.

My husband’s work brought us to Oregon, which meant starting from scratch as a stranger hoping to freelance a new music community. So the first thing I did in the months leading up to and following my move to the Portland area was contact absolutely every musical organization I could find. I made phone calls, sent e-mails with my performance resume attached, and inquired about upcoming auditions. During the summer before the move, I took extra lessons, practiced 20 hours a week, and performed a recital in preparation for auditions I hoped to take once arriving in Oregon.

The day after we pulled our moving truck into town I abandoned our unpacking efforts to attend a masterclass sponsored by the Portland Youth Philharmonic featuring Erik Harris, principal bassist of the St. Louis Symphony. Sure, I was a college grad, so what was I doing hanging out with the youth symphony members? I was also looking for connections. As with most professions, the fastest way to find work is through effective networking and personal referrals. So my goal? Get connected!

Let me tell you, it doesn’t take much but confidence. You know you’re a good player, so put yourself out there! And if you don’t feel like a good enough player to get those gigs, try The Art of Effective Practicing. It takes a lot of work to be a marketable performer, but you can do it!

Here are a few ways to get connected with your local music community:

Keep your chops up by performing regularly. Put on a house concert. Keep practicing. Find an open-mic night at a local venue to sing, fiddle, or do whatever you do. Play at your church or synagogue. Busk at the local farmers markets. There are endless opportunities to perform, and you can create those opportunities yourself. Don’t wait for someone else to do what you can do on your own. You’d be surprised by how many restaurants, café’s, bookstores, and boutiques there are that would be so happy to have your live music in their space.

Don’t demand paying gigs right away or all the time. Be generous in sharing your talents with others! You can do this while still maintaining your stance as a professional. Playing for free allows you to enjoy the opportunity to meet other musicians without stressing about money and union talk. You’ll be surprised how many connections you’ll make that can lead to future gigs. And come on, we all know the economy is tight, and if all musicians refused to play without pay our artistic community and musical culture would suffer tremendously.

Participate in your local community orchestras! You don’t have to wait to win an audition with a semi-professional or professional orchestra to play the great orchestral works. Community orchestras are excellent for meeting teachers, performers, and conductors who can hook you up for future work—and they’re just plain fun. You can relax and play great music with a smile on your face. Sometimes when money is in the mix, musicians can become surly, bitter, or demanding individuals, losing sight of why they chose music as a career in the first place. Don’t let that happen to you. Don’t let the joy of playing be belittled by your pride or hunger for pay.

Connect with local schools. I decided to call and e-mail local orchestra teachers offering to conduct a free masterclass for their bass sections. It turned into a very fruitful experience. Give it a try! And who knows, maybe they’ll even ask you to come back. Regardless, reaching out to the youth in school and community music programs is a great way to make a name for yourself as a teacher. Be sure to get your name on the list of private teachers the orchestra directors provide for their students, and remember you can receive 10% off with your teacher discount through Kennedy Violins!

: Photo by Belen Martini.

Don’t just teach lessons—take lessons. Even the most experienced professional musicians can benefit from taking lessons into their old age. Musicians can always benefit from the perspective of another performer with fresh ideas, techniques, and style.

It might be challenging to find the gig of your dreams. But don’t wait miserably for a Golden Ticket while throwing away the chance to enjoy that delicious Wonka Bar right in front of you. There is music to be played, players to meet, and stages on which to perform. So have at it! Make a connection! And keep us posted along the way.

You Eat What You Wear

2011-09-28T12:51:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about doing some kind of diet--not a weight loss diet, but a diet that optimizes my energy and how I feel. Combinations, portion sizes, and types of food seem to work together the way that fashion pieces do to make you feel good. I would like to dress my intestines with the balance and finesse I attempt to apply to the way I dress myself.

For example:

Brightly colored watercolor blouse (meat/protein = accent piece in moderation)
+ Neutral cardigan (lettuce/veggies/produce =wardrobe staple)
+ Jeans/pants (whole grain/second veggie/fruit = base)
+ Shoes/boots/sandals (cheese = small flavor enhancement)
+ Belt (sugar & sweeteners = small flavor enhancement)
+ Jewelry (salt, herbs & spices = small flavor enhancement)
______________
Balanced outfit = healthy meal

But, the wrong combination leads to horrible results:

Hot orange swim top = pulled pork
+ Red and pink paisley and argyle knit cardigan = deep fried onion rings
+ Green-striped trousers = buttered frybread
+ Leopard-print pumps = 1lb shredded cheddar
+ 5"-wide purple alligator belt = box of doughnuts
+ Large nose ring = family-size bag of Doritos
______________
Heartburn, constipation, weight gain, no energy, and sadness.

In conclusion, how shall I dress my stomach?

Vegetarian = no leather
Vegan = no leather, suede, wool, or fur
Paleo = dark, rich solid colors
Raw Food = breathable cottons in a simple color palette
Gluten-free = sans corduroy and heavy jeans/knits
Sugar-free = no jewelry & accessories
Low-carb = no synthetic fabrics/polyester

*Note: Eating nothing equates to running around naked.

I'm leaning towards a varied wardrobe with a combination of the above-listed outfit options, sans tacky, overly rich, and unhealthy alternatives.

What do you think? What do you like to wear?

Was It My Fault?

2011-09-23T00:41:00.000-07:00

[Sidenote: When I have a blog title that is a full sentence, I wonder if I shouldn't put it in headline style because it accentuates my grammar freakiness. This nerdy behavior is the result of two years working as an editor chained to The Chicago Manual of Style. This week I have been seriously contemplating a desire to ditch punctuation and capitalization, at least on Facebook, so I can fit in with the cool kids. Alas, as a writer at heart, I can't bring myself to let go of my dignity.]

I'm having a rough week. I might go into detail in a subsequent post. In the meantime, I'm also stewing over a sad event today: I'm wondering if I caused a car accident and if I handled it the right way.

Here's the long story. For the short story, skip to Part Six.

Part One: Liz has a lot of car troubles this week. The battery was old and needed to be replaced. She takes it to Sears Auto Center on Tuesday evening after work. They replace the battery. Car starts great on Wednesday morning, not turning over lethargically like it did with the old battery. She drives to work, does her thing, and is the last one out of the office. She gets in her car to pick up L and the battery appears to be completely dead. There is not even enough charge to unlock the doors with the remote or even slowly turn the engine.

Part Two: Liz walks across the street to pick up L and wanders around the office complex with him in the umbrella stroller, looking for someone to jumpstart her car. She can't call her husband, who is out of town. She also doesn't know anyone nearby in Vancouver, and her phone is also dead. Her other coworkers left the office earlier. Eventually, she finds a nice man from the neighboring building who drives his maintenance van over and jumps the car. He drives away.

Liz loads up the baby, gets in the car, and accidently turns the key as if to start the car while it's already running. Just turning the key kills the engine. She chases down a girl in the parking lot, who helps jump the car a second time. Liz drive the hour to Sears Auto Center again with sweet tired baby in tow.

Part Three: Sears Auto is really nice about the situation, runs some tests, and gives Liz a second new battery, assuming the old one was a dud since the alternator, etc., tested out fine. Boo and Liz get home eventually for a late dinner. They miss the baby shower they were planning to attend, but were happy to be home and have a meal together.

Part Four: Liz drives to work Thursday morning (today); again, the car starts quickly, strongly, and beautifully--no problemo. But that's what happened the previous morning, so no guarantees. Surprise, surprise: after work, Liz's car won't start again. The car doesn't even make a peep when she turns the key.

Luckily, the others are still in the office. She asks her friend/fellow luthier Marisa for help. Gracie, her little sister, is there and holds Boo while we jump the car. It works. Liz gets on the road and stops at the big intersection. The stoplights are out, and there is mass confusion with like a dozen lanes of traffic trying to work it like a four-way stop. She turns the AC on, and the car dies.

Part Five: The battery is so dead (or so improperly connected, which was Liz's suspicion the whole time), that she can't even turn her emergency blinkers on. She waves cars to go around her, props the hood up so people know she's broken down, and calls Marisa for help again before her phone dies. Why her phone is never charged when she needs it is beyond her.

Part Six: A thuggish young black dude (and she's not stereotyping, here) stops to help jump Liz's car just before Marisa gets there. Liz gives Marisa, who pulled up a minute later, a thumbs up and yells that they'll be okay. Young man, who pulled up next to the dead Nissan, hooks up the cables as traffic pulls around them.

Then, without Liz even noticing, two cars collide in the intersection in front of them. It's not terrible, but the corner of one car is pretty smashed. Of course, there was a lot of commotion in the huge intersection with the stoplight out, but what's strange is that it looks like a car was turning left into the wrong lane, i.e., towards Liz's stalled car. It appears that perhaps the individual in the accident was pulling up to help jump Liz's car, and in the process of turning into the wrong lane of traffic, got nailed.

Much commotion. Liz and young thug* work fast to get the car started again. After a few tries, it starts. The cars in the accident are having their own separate commotion. Liz just tries to get her car out of the middle of the road as quickly as possible. She pulls through the intersection into the New Seasons parking lot (leaving the car ON) and calls her husband for advice. No answer. She calls her dad's cell. No answer. She calls her dad's home. Answer! Yes! He says don't stop the car, go back to Sears Auto right away, and don't turn on the AC this time. He also says not to worry about the accident; it was probably the traffic light's problem, not hers. Liz watches a fire truck go by.

As Liz pulls back into that huge intersection, she sees an ambulance and continued commotion around the scene of the accident. In her moment to pull over and find out if she caused the accident, she also realizes that if she stops her car, it will die again, and she's in the wrong lane to turn that way. She also wonders if the accident happened just because the stoplights were down and there was a lot of confusion on the road.

Q: Should Liz have stopped or kept going?

Part Seven: Liz drives the hour from Vancouver to Sears Auto at Washington Square. Boo and Liz are sweating in the car with the windows rolled down. Boo is crying a lot, but eventually falls asleep. They get to Sears Auto for the third time in 48 hours. While the car idles in the repair garage, it simply dies. Liz and Boo let them look at it. Liz's suspicions are confirmed that the battery was fine, but the connection wasn't. A little bracket connecting to the negative side of the battery is corroded. They replace it. So far so good.

At least as far as the car is concerned. As for Liz, the following have contributed to her very stressful week:

- husband on business trips during three weeks of September, leading to a new appreciation for the life of a single, working mother.
- extreme business at work with the start of the school year, meaning no rest for the weary, long hours, getting up early, and hoping for a moment to eat lunch and visit Boo across the street.
- missing out on my cousin's funeral.
- baby with a cold = baby not sleeping well.
- baby who refuses to go to bed at night, meaning Mama also does not get to go to bed and is almost weeping because she is so tired and helpless.
- car troubles.
- a grocery trip on the way home from car shop with crying, tired baby to have something to eat and laundry detergent.
- a late night of laundry washing (i.e. why I'm up right now) to have underwear and clean rags for polishing violins tomorrow.
- wishes that family or old friends lived nearby to relieve the pain.

*P.S. After the young man helped me with the car, I noticed he had an empty baby carseat in his. I asked if he had a baby, and he said he did. I said I did too, and pointed to Boo in the backseat. He said, "Is there a baby in there? Like right now?" And I said, "Yeah." He said, "Are you married?" And I said I was. He immediately started backing up, putting his hands up in the air, saying, "I didn't mean anything by it, I just wanted to help, I didn't mean nuthin.'" etc. I said, "Oh, no, I really appreciate the help! Thank you so much!" Weird.

Covered in Puke

2011-09-13T23:02:00.000-07:00

Tonight is one of those nights that I feel has inducted me into the True Parent's Club. I have never had so much puke all over my body--my hair, my legs, soaking through my underwear, my feet, my hands. Puke on the rocking chair, the carpet, and on a basket's worth of clothing and washcloths.

It took an hour of cleanup and showering, and now the laundry is running down the hallway and baby is finally back to sleep.

Throw up is so much fun.

Drunk Baby

2011-09-11T17:14:00.000-07:00

Here's a longer rendition of Friday's good story:

Under the impression that the milky substance in the sippy cup [which, okay, I didn't dispose of promptly] was lemonade, horchata, or some kind of formula blend, Sam gives Boo a drink. Boo downs 1/2 C of what turns out to be a strong, yeasty substance which you can easily make at home by fermenting apple juice and water in the trunk of a hot car for approximately two weeks. This results in a very happy, possibly drunk baby and a prompt call to poison control, where a friendly expert says toddlers could make peace in the Middle East because they can do things you don't think are possible, like drink fermented, cloudy rotten juice like it's delicious. Remedy: water to dilute the yeast, and supervision to make sure he doesn't fall over drunk as the evening progresses.

I'm not sure if L is actually drunk. He's very happy, doesn't seem very bothered. But Sam is freaking out. He comes into the bedroom, where I am lying down, grasping the blue sippy cup in his hands with an extremely frantic look in his eyes after I said, "Oh, no," and told him what was really in the cup.

He immediately tries to force me to drink it. I utterly refuse and say, "That's disgusting." Sam tries another sip. He said he tasted it before giving it to Boo and thought it was horchata, or that the chunks in the cup were lemon seeds in lemonade. I can't remember the last time I made fresh-squeezed lemonade. And I hope that's not what horchata tastes like. Remind me to never, ever drink it if it does.

Sam continues to try and get me to drink whatever is in the cup. Boo is having a grand old time playing out in the living room with his belly full of yeasty hard cider. Sam, a truly selfless individual, believes that he must take Boo's pain upon himself, and that I should too. We needed to all drink the substance to know what Boo is going through, to feel what he is feeling, and should it be necessary, be sick like he could be in a matter of minutes.

I refuse the bitter cup. I don't deserve to be called a Christian, I guess.

But after continuing tosay, "What do we do?????" with the frantic face, I suggest calling poison control. The man on the other end is very friendly. Too friendly, apparently. Sam thinks he is flirting with him.

In the end, though, Boo survives, just tripping in his crib a little. Then again, just threw up his entire lunch, and now Sam is in bed with a fever and nausea. Is it possible they could both be suffering from sippy cup disease 36 hours after the fact? Is that what happens when you drink straight up hard cider yeast curds?

The end.

. . . or, perhaps, just the beginning.

A Day in the Life of a Working Mom

2011-09-10T15:25:00.000-07:00

A typical day in the life of Liz that may or may not make me feel like this:

4:30/5:00/6:00am – I nurse L and go back to bed. I'm not sure how much longer I'll nurse; part of me wants to stick with it because I don't want to gain 10 pounds when I stop, another part of me wants to stop so maybe I'll lose the 10 pounds I always carry on my chest. Not a big fan of the triple Ds. Sam will say otherwise.

6:30am – Alarm goes off. I should get up and shower. Sometimes this doesn’t happen right away. But I shower, get dressed, fix my hair, grab something for lunch, and make sure the diaper bag is stocked. I usually grab a banana for breakfast on the go.

7:15am – Alarm 2 goes off, which means it’s time to gather bags and get L loaded up in the car and quickly get him changed and dressed if he’s not already.

7:30-7:45am – My ideal window of opportunity to begin my commute.

7:45-8:20am – A lovely drive with L either babbling or sleeping in the backseat. I try to get my makeup done along the 43 before getting on the 5, saving my eyeliner for the parking lot at the other end. We listen to NPR, sometimes nothing, sometimes scriptures or General Conference talks via the Mormon Channel app.

8:20-8:25am – I usually arrive later than I’d prefer at KinderCare, waking up L as I get him out of the car seat and wrap him in his blanket. I leave all my bags in the car and just take in my keys, unless I need to replenish his stock of baby food, wipes, or diapers. Otherwise, he has a sweet setup there.

This is the most dreaded part of the morning; he usually cries when I leave, which breaks my heart. But if I wait a minute on the other side of the door, he gets focused on his food, stops crying, and returns to being happy. It’s a psychologically confusing moment in the day: I am sad that he’s sad to see me go and think he needs me and maybe I shouldn’t go to work at all and I’m a terrible mom, then as he gets over it pretty quickly and focuses on his breakfast I realize that he’ll be fine without me and maybe he doesn’t need me after all and I know he has a lot of fun with his baby friends.

I also wonder if he feels like I do when I don’t get to see Sam during the day: I’m sad to see Sam go and really bummed we can’t be together all day, but I realize he has to work and I get focused on my other daily activities. And when I do see Sam again when he gets home or visits for lunch I am very happy to see him. That’s a pretty normal and healthy and not-so-torturous familial relationship, I suppose.

8:27-8:34am – Somewhere in this window I hop in my car, buzz across the street, park, and jaunt into the office, clocking in somewhere within this window. It probably takes me a minute to drive across the street, but how long it takes me to say goodbye to L is the real variable in the equation that can make me on time or late to work. I don’t like being late, but I also don’t like rushing out without making sure L is comfortable. Solution? I should leave home at 7:30am sharp. New goal.

8:30-9:00am – I settle in at the office, clocking in, opening the blinds, seeing what instrument orders we have for the day, and pulling out various violins and laying them all out across a long table for setup. We’ve been very busy as school has just started with sometimes more than 20 instruments to setup and pack for shipping before UPS arrives at 3:30pm.

9:00am-12:30pm – I put on some music with Grooveshark and start working on violins one at a time. Right now in the busy season we're working fast. Setup involves any combination of stringing, shaping/carving the nut, smoothing the fingerboard, recutting grooves in the nut, doping pegs, drilling new holes in pegs, cutting down and shaping the bridge, touching up the finish, staining f-holes, tightening chin rests, adjusting fine tuners, adjusting or replacing the soundpost, buffing out scratches or imperfections in the finish with micromesh or rottenstone, fitting bridge feet to the curvature of the instrument face, etc. After setting up a violin, I inspect it with a checklist, put it in its case, and move on to the next violin.

12:30-1:15pm – I take my lunch break and walk across the street to snag L. I get the DL on how his morning has been, and either carry him or pop him in his umbrella stroller to come with me back to the office or walk across the parking lot to Fred Meyer if we need to pick anything up. Most days we go back to the office and L plays on the floor or behind the front desk, saying hi to my coworkers and having a grand old time while I munch on something.

I give myself five minutes to walk back across the street to drop him off at KinderCare, going through the same drop-off procedure as earlier, this time getting him settled for lunch. He’s eating more and more finger foods, trying new things every day: BBQ chicken, steamed vegetables, burrito, pasta, various types of crackers, cheese, yogurt, etc. He gets topped off with baby food if he doesn’t fill up on finger foods. Daycare has led to a crash course in self-feeding, which meant he starved the first week, but by the end of week two, he’s become a finger-food eating pro. (I’ll have to try the same approach with potty training, maybe. Do it yourself or suffer the consequences, matey!) Anyway, I sign him in and out of the center in a binder in the lobby.

1:15-3:30pm – We finish setting up any last instruments and start packing them up in clear plastic violin-shaped bags and boxes. I’ve kind of picked up the role as shop DJ, and I try to pick something upbeat for packing time. Favorites have included Pure Funk, Jock Jams, Chromeo, N*Sync, Backstreet Boys, and Hansen.

3:30-4:00pm – Eventually we’ll have finished packing, Michelle from UPS will have arrived, and we’ll close up shop: put the tools away, sometimes vacuum up the wood shavings and sawdust on the workbench, close the blinds, clock out.

3:45-4:05pm – Whenever we've closed up, I zip across the street and pick up L, who is always very excited to see me, giving me a huge smile and bounding across the room (if one can bound and crawl at the same time), that is, if he’s not asleep in his crib in the corner. He has his own crib, dresser, diaper/wipe supply, and corner of the kitchen cupboard for his food. I sign him out and load him up in the car.

4:00-4:45pm – The commute home takes a little longer than the drive to work with more afternoon traffic on the 5. Lately in the afternoons I’ve been listening to General Conference or NPR. Sometimes I’ll pick something special on the NPR app. I tried books on tape early on, but I never feel like I can focus on them well; I feel guilty if I miss even a sentence while distracted and don’t know how to rewind easily without jeopardizing our safety in our moving vehicle.

4:45pm – We arrive home and I try to carry L and our bags (purse, diaper bag, any groceries) inside in one trip. We get all situated, offloading our luggage, and usually it’s nursing time again.

4:45-7:00pm – Anywhere in this window of time is ideally a good time to make dinner, but . . . this doesn’t always happen. Like I’ve said before, there is always so much to do at home and it’s not always fun, and when I get home from work I don't exactly feel like going back to work as a gung-ho homemaker. I need a little breather, and then I'll get going. While there’s almost always laundry to be folded, something to clean, and floors and counters to be picked up, I usually try to ignore all of that for at least a prolonged moment and recharge.

I don’t know what happens to the time when I get home, but it doesn’t always go towards cooking an elaborate meal, that’s for sure. Instead, L and I will hang out at home or sometimes run errands, go swimming, visit friends, go on a walk, etc. It's a good time to just play and be together, and we anxiously await Papa's arrival home.

6:00-6:30pm – It's L's dinnertime. Hopefully Sam is home from work by then--sometimes he has to work a little later, like when he rides his bike to work. I’d like if we could all eat dinner together, and I think we do most of the time. Sometimes Sam gets home and I haven’t cooked anything at all (shame on me), or there’s some various church activity in the evening that prevents us from sitting down together, or we just give up and go out to eat midweek.

There is no evening dinnertime routine right now. We scavenge, basically. I find myself munching on a lot of L’s crackers and finger foods. Last week I was ambitious enough to bake buttermilk biscuits and buttermilk wheat bread, and that’s what we ate in addition to anything on hand. But I’ve realized recently that one reason I’ve been hesitant to cook is that if I cook, we eat, and we always eat A LOT and I’m so deathly afraid of getting fat. So if I don’t cook, we don’t eat as much, and I don’t gain weight. Probably not a great strategy for keeping my figure.

7:30pm – Bathtime. L loves bathtime. Then there’s usually storytime and playtime until L is tired. We all hang out in the living room and sometimes watch a movie. It seems the 8:00 bedtime has been pushed back, but that's okay with me because the longer he's awake in the evening, the more we get to hang out, and the more he'll nap while I'm working and we're not together.

8:30-9:30pm – Eventually L goes to sleep. One of us rocks him. Sometimes we can just lie him down and he'll fall asleep on his own, which is what used to be the norm until about a month ago. More teething led to rocking (8 teeth now!), and it's just nice to have that peaceful moment with him sleeping in your arms, even if he could fall asleep without it. Gotta take advantage of the opportunity.

9:30-10:00pm – Getting my job has cured me of my night-owl tendencies. After these busy workdays, I’m usually exhausted by 9:30 and go right to bed. I have been trying to clean the kitchen and wash the dishes before the evening is over every night, and usually this happens after L is down.

I don’t like to clean while he is awake because I feel like we have such limited quality time in the evening to spend together as a family. I can’t help myself though and do tend to go into cleaning mode pretty often when I’m home. It's like I’m either cleaning or staying away from home on bogus errands to avoid cleaning. But to have a clean sink at the end of the day has been one of the only goals that we’ve been able to consistently keep since I went back to work. That’s one thing to be proud of, I guess.

10:00pm – Sometimes I take a few minutes to do something I like to do like play online or read a little (or blog!). I especially love talking with Sam. Usually, though, it's not long before I crash and fall asleep so we can start all over again! Woohoo!

But as busy as each day is, I go to bed happy, feeling confident that I've made the most of my day, made use of my talents, contributed to my community, and spent time with my family. And hopefully I've made the effort to at least brush my teeth. At least I have a good dentist.

When I Am Home

2011-09-07T16:47:00.000-07:00

If home is where the heart is, my home is the universe, and not this apartment. My heart is beyond the washing machine and the kitchen sink.

I don't know what to do when I am home. L has an ear infection and the doc said he ought to stay home one more day before going back to school. I call it school. Sam stayed home yesterday with him, and I stayed home today with him.

I guess it's nice, to be home, to watch movies, to have a break. I think of being home as a break, but I don't like when it is the norm.

Today I watched Catfish again and a bunch of interviews on YouTube about it. But the silence in the home--even the silence of the TV in the background--even for one day, is so difficult for me. I like to take L out with me to be out in the community and to interact with people. I like exposing him (and me) to new people. He has friends with other little babies his age, he has fun with them. He is learning more so quickly--motor skills, sounds, how to eat and feed himself. He has learned at his young age to be adaptable and accepting of others. He can sleep in strange places as long as he knows he is safe. He comes with me on the ride to work now, and we have lunch together, and we go home together.

We are more a part of each others' day than when I left him with sitters in LO. I loved our sitters, but I like him to be closer to me. And since I started working during the day, I am relieved that he sees me happier, more active, more involved, more energetic. I feel like I have more to give him now, and he can see me at my best, and not when I am lethargic and blue at home.

When we are home, it is so quiet. Today we went out and had lunch in the park with Papa, which was so nice. It's always nice to get out. Now he has a nap, and I don't know what to do. I spin my wheels when I am at home. I forget to turn on music. I'm not sure what to do other than clean. There is always so much to do at home, and it's not always very fun.

I've developed kind of a weird understanding of what it means to be a housewife, and I'm looking for input from other housewives. What is the role of the housewife? What is the role of a mother in the home? When I was home with the baby full time, as opposed to working full time, I began to feel that my only role in life was as a maid and a cook. I didn't find much fulfillment in doing those two things exclusively. I think I am capable of much more, but the "more" part included things that I found difficult to do in the confinement of our apartment walls.

I don't look down on stay-at-home moms or working moms. I've been gung ho about both roles at different points in my life. In fact, I think of myself as both of those: a stay-at-home mom when I am staying at home, and a working mom when I am working. Who said one had to be exclusively on or the other? When I'm home I am home, and when I work I am working.

I think what works for individual families is unique and personal, and I am especially amazed--unduly impressed by those who are self-starters and selfless mothers in the home, motivated to cook, create activities, clean, teach, and entertain without taking a few hours each day to do something for themselves.

Maybe I'm weak to need something different. I feel weak and useless at home sometimes. When I am home I stay in bed for hours and hours; I can't think of anywhere to go or anything in particular to do. Taking care of the baby is the easy part. He can lie in bed with me and laugh and cuddle whether I entertain him or not.

But I want to see the world and experience it, and I want to bring him with me.

The Art of Effective Practicing

2011-08-29T22:22:00.000-07:00

Here's another blog post for Kennedy Violins. What are your tips for effective practicing?

______________________

When I was a university music student, my daily practice requirements were three hours per day, five or six days a week. My personal goal was fifteen hours a week, or 2-4 hours on weekdays—more than I ever worked in a part-time job up to that point in my life. And in preparation for a recital, I upped it to four hours per day to meet my performance deadline.

For me, as one who had never practiced more than an hour a day before college, this seemed like a daunting task. Up until then, I was fortunate enough that whatever basic talent I had was enough to get me by with minimal practice.

But the problem is, no matter how talented you may be, talent only goes so far. Practice—and effective practice—is what will take you from good to better to even (if you work really hard) the best.

So what’s your approach? When you sit down (or stand) to practice, what’s your plan? When your mom tells you to practice, do you simply go in a room and make noise for the appointed amount of time and resurface to say you’ve finished without accomplishing much? When you practice, do you set goals?

When I had that 3-hour minimum expectation, it was SO tempting to go to the practice room, set a timer, and simply “make noise” until I could check practicing of my to-do list and get on with my other homework. Yay. (Not!) But as I showed up to lessons making the same old fumbles and mistakes, it became clear to me that how much I practiced wasn’t as important as how I practiced.

___________________

Here are a few tips to make the most of your time in the practice room. I mean, if you’re going to dedicate so much time to your musicianship, you might as well make the most of it, right?

Have a plan. And not just a plan for the day, but a plan for each hour, day, week, and even the months leading upto a performance or recital. How often do you sit down—either as a performer or a parent motivating your child to practice—and come up with a plan to not just practice, but practice well?

Break it down. What works well for me is to break my practice time into thirds. Try this recipe out for a delicious result:

• 1/3 C warmup and technique (scales, etudes, exercises)
• 1/3 C orchestral works (audition exerpts, current concert repertoire)
• 1/3 C solo repertoire (for recitals, juries, lessons, etc.)

Don’t practice what’s easy, practice what’s hard. Step out of your comfort zone! Don’t just play your favorite piece or what you’re good at over and over to fill the time. Especially when preparing for a recital, you have to make sure you’re not spending too much time on your favorite pieces, but that each piece is prepared to the same golden (or platinum!) standard.

Don’t always start pieces from the beginning. I’ve seen this over and over with my students: the first line on the page sounds great, and sometimes the last four bars, but everything in between? What a mess! I can tell when students only start practice a piece from the beginning when they pull it out to work on. They perfect that impressive introduction, but never take the time to work through all the tricky material that follows—especially if they only spend a few minutes on the piece before moving on. Don’t be afraid to even photocopy a piece of music and CUT IT UP into chunks to practice individual phrases with equal attention.

Zone in on tricky groups (or even pairs) of notes, not just on tricky phrases. Do you always fudge that big shift up two octaves? Well, don’t just practice what’s around it, take five minutes and practice JUST THAT SHIFT. You’ll be surprised what five minutes of repeating just two notes will do. It’s much more effective than playing twenty notes for twenty minutes, I promise you that.

Don’t skip scales and technique. Until you can play every single note of the scale with each note perfectly in pitch not wavering a cent with perfect bow technique and absolutely perfect articulation (you see where I’m going?), you haven’t practiced your scales enough. There’s no such thing as perfect technique, so take the time to hone in on it before moving on to the “fun” stuff. If you have weak technique, it will show in everything else you play.

Use your time wisely. I remember practicing six hours straight one day just to say that I got my hours in that week, but it wasn’t necessarily productive. If you go back to step one and practice with a plan, be sure to stick to that plan. It’s depressing to leave the practice room at the end of the day feeling like you haven’t accomplished anything. The remedy? Accomplish something by practicing smart.

Practice makes perfect. Ever heard of the 10,000 hour rule? Check it out. Basically, in order to find success, you’ve got to put in your time. And making the most of that time will take you even farther. Developing the talent to efficiently practice requires just as much skill and effort as it takes to become a great performer. No brainer, right? If you’re good at practicing, you’ll be good at performing.

At Kennedy Violins, we not only want to provide you with the quality instrument of your musical dreams, we want to see you succeed.

So what works for you? We want to know! And in the mean time, happy practicing!

The Baby Model Portfolio

2011-08-27T06:47:00.000-07:00

Which one is your favorite?

So I did it. I submitted an application for our son to a modeling agency. And not because I'm an obsessively adoring parent who believes her child is the most beautiful, handsome, cute, amazing, perfect baby in the world. Of course, I do think that. But that wasn't my primary motivation.

Here's the deal, modeling agency. Say you want to appear culturally diverse so you hire a white baby, a black baby, and an Asian baby. Well, how about one baby model for the price of three? Check out this guy! What a steal!

Here are reasons why L should be a baby model:

1) If you're going to be a Lambson, you have to earn your keep.
2) He has a very unique look, especially with his vague multiculturalism.
3) He has lovely olive skin.
4) His penetrating dark eyes are good for advertising, excellent for securing eye contact with the target audience.
5) My home teacher recommended it, so that must be some kind of revelation.
6) Lambsons love a good story. ("Oh, yeah, well back when L was a baby model . . . ")

I didn't have any professional-looking photos to send in. We're kind of bum parents who haven't had any Kiddie Kandids or portraits done yet--maybe because we think we're good photographers but we don't really know what we're doing. I think we'll get some done when he turns one. That's in about two months, can you believe it?

If We Shadows Have Offended

2011-08-25T21:55:00.000-07:00

Clarification: My dislike of dogs does NOT by any means equate to a dislike of people who like dogs. It's kind of like how I don't like pudding cups, but I love people who love pudding cups. They're usually better people than I am."

- My current FB status

I usually hesitate to mention that I don't like dogs to people because animal lovers (and animal haters alike) usually have very strong feelings about the subject and may take it personally. I try not to bring up my dislike of dogs in the same way one might avoid conversations of religion, politics, or previous membership in the KKK.

I will remind fresh readership that I have tried--oh, how I have tried!--to like dogs. Evidence can be found in a series of sad dog-tales that involved us purchasing a darling beagle puppy, whom we named Zio (see above photo), and returning him after ten days. I couldn't handle it. See "The Consequences of Impulsive Decisions" for more information.

But thanks for the advice. And Dani, I'm so sorry I kept you awake! Thinking about dog poo isn't worth losing sleep. And yet, I've done it myself. How I have done it myself.

I Promise I'm Not Heartless, I Just Don't Like Dogs

2011-08-23T23:21:00.000-07:00

Dear Abby,

My husband and I moved from a small rental house to an apartment a year ago and have since struggled with maintaining our privacy. Over time I got used to the thin walls, which allow me to hear toilets flushing, conversations, alarm clocks, and even one neighbor snoring every night. I can deal with the sounds, knowing that comes with the territory. We enjoy the benefits of apartment living too much to move on: the sense of community, energy efficiency, savings, prompt maintenance services, location, etc.

So while I don’t mind sharing sounds with unavoidably non-soundproof walls, I do struggle with one thing: my neighbor and her dogs. She is a wonderful, sweet gal, but her three dogs are always in our semblance of a backyard (a grassy area behind my neighbors' and our cement porches which aren’t separated by fences of any sort).

One of the dogs, who is blind and lame, helplessly hobbles this way and that around our doorway. But collectively, they leave “presents” around our porch (which aren’t always picked up), sniff around our screen door, knock over my garden gnome, and wander around the apartment lawn with no boundaries. As a result, our neighbor is constantly walking back and forth by our windows and porch door to retrieve the dogs, calling their names and rounding them up to go inside after they do their business and run off too far.

To top off my list of grievances, because they use our small bit of lawn as a bathroom, I hesitate to let my baby play out in the grass if he’ll mistake dog poo for play dough. I feel like our backyard area isn’t our own space and we’re confined to the indoors.

Not to mention I've never been much for dogs. I admit it. I'm a cat person. Or a no-pet-at-all person. Hopefully I won't turn out like this:

So with such little sunlight in the Northwest, I can’t just close the blinds and shut the windows to maintain our privacy. Instead we watch the neighbor and her dogs hang around our backyard area while we eat breakfast and dinner and whenever we’re in the living area. Tonight, long after dark, I went to open the screen door on a hot summer night and was caught a little off guard to find her standing outside my door just as I opened it while her dogs roamed around as usual. Instead of a “pardon me” or something of that sort, she started a conversation with me, asking if she could move my garden gnome so it’d be out of the way of the dogs. I said it was plastic and indestructible, so she could leave it where it was. Then I closed the blinds and felt a little baffled, returning to my conversation with my husband.

While I’ve had a couple chances to say something, she has apologized in the laundry room about the dogs roaming around, saying she knows we need our privacy and she doesn’t look inside. I’m too nice to say anything but, “Oh, don’t worry about it,” every time, and wonder if there even is anything I could say.

Is the only way to have that nice sense of privacy to not live in an apartment? Or is there some polite way to request our [again, very sweet] neighbor not hang out around our small living area? Or when I run into her next time, is there something I can say while still being polite? And seriously, how can I request setting boundaries for a blind and crippled poodle? That just seems too cruel.

In a “ruff” spot,

Liz, a.k.a. Cruella DeVille

To Be Gotten

2011-08-17T20:31:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe ["that I couldn't see that you were always right beside me. Thought I was alone with no one to hold, but you were always right beside me. This feeling's like no other. I want you to know" -HSM1].

Pardon the interlude. What I meant to say is that it's hard to believe that our little Lambson family has now been, as of August 14th, 2011, in the fair state of Oregon for two years. Two years! That's enough time to

• run 109,500 ten-minute miles,
• count to 63,072,000 seconds, or
• roast 35,040 heads of cauliflower at 450° for 30 minutes.

Sam and I have never stayed in one place for more than a year until now. We have now been in our apartment for one year and three days, setting a new record. It occurred to me today that we've always been the ones leaving--packing up to move and telling our neighbors it was nice to know them and keep in touch and we'll visit next time we're in town. But in contrast, now I've seen a few families come and go, and our neighbors are moving on before we do. What a funny feeling, to stay in one place and watch the others move forward instead of looking over your shoulder at those you leave behind.

It takes a long time to get to know people and establish friendships. There are some of those lucky kindred-spirit-type friends who are your friends immediately because you were probably friends in the premortal life and you have that uncanny connection. But then there are the friendships that develop (and these are often the most fruitful kinds) over hours and hours and years and years and conversations and conversations spent together and all added up. I like those kinds of friendships. Time and effort contribute to very healthy and strong relationships. It's very difficult to build those kinds of friendships when you're always moving.

I thought again today that perhaps I'm not an easy person to get to know; I believe I give a first-impression that may be very, very far from who I am upon further inspection (sorry, employers). I probably come across as looking more put together, more serious, more closed-off, and maybe more intelligent than I am (is it the glasses, or the clip-on earrings?). If you only knew that my head is full of marbles. Speaking of marble brains, today I decided to manhandle a disc/belt sander while it was ON!!!! and sawed a chunk out of my pinky. Ouchie.

Anyway, I've been loving my job so much. I feel a bit like I did back in the old instrument office days where I spent enough time with my coworkers that we got to know each other really well and talked about all sorts of things. My old musician coworkers there I still consider some of my best friends. I sure miss them.

I love getting to know people, but I also like the feeling of being gotten to know, if it's okay to want something in return from your friendships, such as a sense of belonging and mutual respect. It occurred to me today that at some point during the last 6 weeks of full-time work, those 200 or so hours spent with my small group of coworkers has led to the feeling of being "gotten." I've expressed to my family that for the first time since graduating, my current occupation has given me the great gift of feeling like myself again for the first time in three+ years. All the pieces are in place. All systems go.

And it's little things. Like I can say I went to Fred Meyer without my wallet and hid my would-be purchases behind black and red floral pillows in the pillow aisle so I could find them later, and upon admitting this not be thought crazy, but genuine--or even funny. What a nice feeling, to feel at home in the company of others, and to be myself, no strings attached. Maybe it's the pleasure of spending lots of time with the same people, or maybe it's the luxury of being around musicians like myself. We're all a little crazy. String players have some kind of understanding that can be shared that way. I like that. I like it even when I have a right angle cut out of my pinky. It was so worth it.

Chicken Taco Salad

2011-08-17T12:34:00.000-07:00

I love salaaaaaad! I think I am even willing to retire French fries as my favorite food and give lettuce the honor.

I can't tell you how much Caesar salad we've been eating as of late so I'm branching out to tasty taco land. This was lunch today and dinner last night and I could eat this every day. Nothing gourmet, but tasty!

• Iceberg lettuce (1 head)

• Black beans (1 can, rinsed)

• Corn (1 can, drained)

• Red bell pepper (1 chopped)

• Jalapenos

• Sliced Olives (1 small can)

• Tomatoes [would have been nice if we had them]

• Onions

• Crushed salsa-flavored sun chips

• Cheese

• Creamy homemade Southwest dressing = plain yogurt (1/2 C) + mayo (2 tbs) + pineapple habanero salsa (1/4 C) + chili powder + paprika + dash salt

• Shredded chicken w/ taco seasoning (8 oz?)

Toss all together! Mmmm.

Sleeping in Special Places

2011-08-14T00:07:00.000-07:00

My handsome husband's former mission president explained to him how he encouraged (okay, bribed) his children to behave at Church. He told them that if they were quiet, reverent, and well-mannered, they would be rewarded with the most wonderful privilege: they could sleep in "special places" that night; i.e. the children could pick any nook, cranny, or corner in the house in which to sleep.. (Sam says this must have been before the kids were in school, or maybe during the summer so it wasn't on a school night.)

There's something magical to me about sleeping in special places. I used to have sleepovers with my best friend Mimi almost every Friday night it seems. At her house they had pizza Fridays, like we do at work, but with Blackjack instead of Papa Murphy's. Anyway, Mimi and I had only three options when we settled for the night. We could sleep in . . .

1) a bird's nest created out of sleeping bags and blankets arranged in a circular nest in which we would sleep in the center.

2) a mouse nest identical to the bird's nest, only this time were were make-believe mice instead of birds.

3) the ship deck (if we were at my house), which was made of a spread out blanket in the "L" of our L-shaped blue sofa, which was our pirate ship with a regular crew-staff of stuffed animals. At her house we were usually mice, and at mine we were typically lost at sea. If you rolled off the blanket-deck, you pretended to either be a) swimming, b) drowning, or c) at risk of being eaten by sharks. But this wasn't pretend, mind you, this was very real at the time.

____________________

Last weekend we finally bought an air mattress. We've talked about it for years.

We postponed the purchase for a while when we acquired a free queen bed from my visiting teachee's mother who moved, which we kept in the guest room until the guest room became the nursery. Then the sofa in the living room became the guest bed. The sofa is lovely because it's very long and has comfy cushions. But this last weekend we ran into our first predicament as we had Sam's parents here, and we couldn't have one of the sleeping on the floor. So we finally bought that air mattress we've talked about buying for so long.

After we bought the air mattress we blew it up in the living room and tested it out that night and I was so thrilled--it was like a sleepover and we watched movies and ate grilled cheese and it was fun.

So tonight, Saturday night, I thought of how boring and monotonous things can be at home when you don't shake them up a little and asked if we could pull out the air mattress again for another sleepover with a movie and treats. So after Lewis went to bed, that's what we did. Tonight we're sleeping in special places.

Not to mention that the living room is much cheaper than a vacation, but nearly just as fun.

All-inclusive You

2011-08-12T00:02:00.000-07:00

The following is an excerpt from another good old-fashioned letter to a friend in medical school. It is a response to her response to my response to my first day of work.

______________________________

I had a conversation with a sister in my ward today that really reminded me of you. She’s a nurse and has two children and her husband is a stay-at-home dad. "Unconventional" setup by Mormon cultural standards, certainly.

I ran into her at Loft where I used to work and we got in a long conversation that was so inspiring and comforting. I told her how I recently started a full-time job and asked how the experience has been for her. She's lived this life, working in medicine, for so long. I could tell that it is an undeniable part of who she is as well as a manifestation of her using her talents and God-given gifts to their fullest.

What was interesting to learn as I chatted with her is that she is SO far beyond feeling apologetic or "less than" or even unconventional because of who she is and what she does as a direct result of who she is. She long ago accepted her calling in life, the unique opportunities and talents she's been given, and the roles she and her husband take on in their family life. Of course there are always challenges and adaptations to be made along the way (like her kids being in school and her husband having the opportunity to do other things during the day, like write science fiction novels, for example), but she's beyond the self-denial or the confusion involved in making that initial choice towards what has been her life-long career thus far.

She said she couldn’t see Heavenly Father giving her the talents and skill she developed in medical school and her residency and not use it. I'm no doctor, but I feel the same way as a musician and artist--why would Heavenly Father tease me with these creative abilities and energy and training if I weren't supposed to use it not only for good, but to have joy and happiness in my own life’s journey?

Anyway, it was great to chat with her and she reminded me of you. It's hard to be a working mom, but it is by no means impossible. Being a stay-at-home mom or a working mother or a medical student isn't for everyone, but we are all so different, and we're supposed to be different.

The sister I talked to today made a reference as well to callings, saying it took her a long time to realize that callings in church aren't a reflection of our worthiness. Some people have "more important" callings or more time-consuming callings, but in reality, all callings are equal (just as spouses are equal, but with differing roles). An individual isn't better than another or even more capable than another based on his or her calling. All service rendered in a ward is equally essential.

So it's just silly to think so-and-so is better (or less) than you because they have 9 kids and you have 2, or you can have kids and they can't, or they're married and you're not, or you're the RS president and they're just the bulletin board specialist. I think one of Satan's easiest tools to make us like him is through this temptation to judge others and judge ourselves, creating castes of inequality and ladders of worth. It’s pride and enmity at work, like Ezra Taft Benson said.

But everyone is precious in God's sight, and every one of us are unique individuals with specific gifts, talents, and purposes in life. I've never been one to fit the mold--sometimes that embarrasses me and worries me, but other times it empowers me and lifts me up. Either way, I know I'm doing okay when I feel peace and that confirmation from the Spirit affirming that I'm following the Lord's plan for me. I get that assurance often, especially these days, that it's okay to be myself. As a result, I feel happier. I have less anxiety. I’m not as blue. I don’t feel confused. I feel comfortable in my own skin.

I remember having a conversation with my old stake president, Dr. Mac (who came to Sam's and my sealing--you may have met him), probably during my [first] senior year at BYU. It was almost an argument. Completely exasperated and confused, I told him I didn't see how I could be a Mormon and an artist at the same time. I didn't see how I could fit that "perfect Molly Mormon mold" and still make use of my creative energies.

I didn't see how I could accomplish my dreams and still meet all those other expectations, like to have so many children, bake so many loaves of homemade bread, set aside all the "selfish" interests I have that make me who I am. But he assured me that I was lying to myself and made that same point again that God gave me these talents for a reason and I don't have to meet whatever false and unrealistic expectations I had drawn up for myself. I am unique. I can fight it or I can embrace it.

It's a challenge to do that, to accept and embrace what makes you a unique individual because under a certain light you might mistake those individual characteristics as character flaws. It's easy to be uncomfortable or think something is wrong with you. As a funny comparison, my ability to embrace and accept who I am as I've grown older has gone hand in hand with my ability to accept and embrace my crazy hair. It's still hard to get along with sometimes, but it's a beautiful part of who I am and not something I need to hide or be ashamed of. Sure, I still like to straighten it and get it chemically relaxed, but I don't hate it, and I'm not afraid to let it loose and love it. My hair has come to symbolize my inner beauty and individuality. I am different--maybe not your average woman/Mormon/wife/mother/daughter/whatever--but I'm learning to let myself loose and love it.

I don't think you need to be afraid at all of who you are. You are a very impressive and inspiring individual, and not even because you were valedictorian or because you're in med school--but because you're YOU. All-inclusive you.

Baby Blowing Raspberries on My Face

2011-08-10T20:21:00.000-07:00

My baby is a funny baby.

Lamb Tikka Masaladas (i.e. Lamb Tikka Masala Enchiladas)

2011-08-06T22:01:00.000-07:00

Last night Sam and I entered an enchilada competition.

The rules were as follows:

"Your dish must fall within the definition of an enchilada: 'a rolled tortilla with a filling covered in a sauce flavored with chilies.'"

As I thought of sauces flavored with chilies, the first one that came to mind was tikka masala, the Indian dish flavored with garlic, jalapeno, and garam masala. Not to mention the unsaintly amounts of whipping cream spiked with tomato sauce. No wonder the first time I tasted this dish at Bombay House in Provo (the best Indian food I've ever eaten in my life), I thought it tasted like nacho cheese. Cream, tomato, and jalapeno? It practically is nacho cheese dip.

So I came up with this creation annnnd . . . we won! So if you would like to die in your sleep of a heart attack or would like to satisfy your urge to drink pure whipping cream or enter an enchilada competition in your neighborhood, try this out:

1. Make Lamb Tikka Masala according to the recipe (which I doubled) and a box of plain cous cous (salted and fluffed).

We offered some cous cous to Booble and he didn't like it.

But he did like gnawing pieces out of the naan bread through the plastic bag.

2. Put a little masala sauce on the bottom of a 9x13"pan.

3. Fill a quality flour tortilla with

a) a little shredded cheddar, a non-descript, appropriately colored cheese that doesn't distract from masala spices. In fact, it's a nice compliment!
b) a little handful of cous cous
c) a scoop (1/4 cup?) of lamb tikka masala

d) another sprinkling of cheddar.

4. Roll up and place in pan.

5. Top the enchiladas with more creamy tikka masala sauce and more cheese.

6. Bake in the oven at 360° for 20(?) minutes or until toasty.

7. Brown the cheese under the broiler for a minute.

8. Garnish with cilantro and slivered grape tomatoes.

9. Take home trophy made of pumpkin scoopers and a Christmas tree trunk wrapped in foil!

Thanks to Sam and Jesse, who hosted this second cookoff (the first was lasagnas, and they were amazing).

And now that Sam and I won this round, we get to decide the dish and rules for the next competition! Any ideas? I'm liking the "50 Ideas for _____" booklets that come with Food Network Magazine. So far I've kept the booklets for 50 nacho varieties, 50 potato salads, and 50 things to make with bacon.

If you think of a original idea for a cookoff, please let me know!

The Devil is a Doughnut

2011-08-02T11:39:00.000-07:00

I believe I could be talked into committing great crimes, such as murder, theft, or arson, if I were offered just one thing.

The doughnut is the single most powerful temptation in my life: sugary dough fried in fat topped with sugar and sometimes filled with more fat and sugar in the form of cream and jelly fillings. It is a crime in itself to consume. It is the most irresistible substance of which I'm aware, more so than hard drugs, salacious novels, and ugly clothing that somehow appeals because it's on sale.

Romaan's Sequin Sunburst Tunic, Now $25.49!

Hurry before it's gone!

I've been trying to go off sweets again, but then there was a box of doughnuts at work yesterday. I ate several and felt so guilty, so utterly ashamed of myself that I proceeded to walk to Fred Meyer and buy several heads of lettuce: I will be eating salad every night for the rest of the week as punishment for my sins. I ate watermelon for dinner and refused to partake of Broc-Chick-Cheese when offered (Sam's low-carb broccoli-chicken-cheese creation).

During the "Anuncios" portion of Family Home Evening I announced that I had listened to a Radiolab episode ("Animal Minds") which aptly devoted a segment to my close relative, the whale. Everyone knows the whale is the size it is because it eats dozens of oceanic doughnuts every day. This is common knowledge.

It's amazing how much guilt and emotion can be associated with a single food. But still, I haven't learned my lesson. The doughnuts are here again today, and so I continue to eat my way to the depths of hell . . .

. . . but, maybe, just maybe there will be doughnuts there. I can only hope.

Kicked Out of the Club

2011-07-27T12:05:00.000-07:00

One thing I enjoyed as a stay-at-home mom was my membership in the Bloggernacle, the conglomerate group of stay-at-home mothers who blog about cute homey things and their cute babies and homemaking tips and craft projects.

I do love me some blogging, and I'm afraid as my stay-at-home-motherness led to increasing idleness (does this happen to anyone else?) I started blogging as if it were my full-time job. I would literally spend hours on some days writing and picking images and checking my analytics.

In November I had a baby, so I was a bit distracted, but the more I got the mothering thing down, which led to more free time, what did I do with that spare time? Oh, I blogged. I read blogs, I wrote blogs, I bloggy blogged alllll the time.

I mean, check out the stats:

October 30: Baby born

November: 11 posts

December: 8 posts

January: 6 posts

February: 4 posts

March: 6 posts

April: 23 POSTS???? [Note: Lewis began sitting on his own.]

May: 15 posts

June: 18 posts [began applying for job and musing about it via blog.]

July: 5 posts [working and not blogging/idling]

I've enjoyed my membership in the Bloggernacle thoroughly. But I bid farewell to thee, my bloggy, as my full-time occupation. You and I shall still be friends, but alas, no more shall we be lovers.

Adieu, my sweet. Until we meet again . . .

. . . which will be in a couple days, most likely.

Called to Do What?

2011-07-20T00:43:00.000-07:00

I’ve been feeling a little resentment towards the Boy Scouts. They keep stealing my husband away, even when he’s home and has to send e-mails and plan and do Scout busywork and map out flag delivery routes and call parents. I'm feeling a bit like I did when we were engaged and he was the executive secretary: neglected and befuddled by the magnitude of what he's always required to do at church, at work, and at home.

On that note, yesterday I had a conversation that went something like this:

“What’s a calling?”

“Well . . . let’s see if I can explain this. It’s a lay church, so the church members do everything; no one gets paid. There’s no pastor or anyone who gets a paycheck. I mean, the church won’t function if the members don’t serve—like, there aren’t any janitors. We clean the building ourselves. So pretty much all the adults get some kind of assignment.”

“Who decides what calling you get?

“So there’s the bishop, who also doesn’t get paid and probably spends like 30 hours a week doing his bishop duties, and he receives revelation to assign callings.”

“How do you get out of it?”

“Well, it’s bad form to turn down a calling, so I guess the only way out is to . . . move. But then you’ll just be in another ward and get another calling anyway.”

“How ‘bout just slipping the bishop a hundred to get you off the hook?”

Today Sam managed to get away from Scout Camp for one night. He's using almost a week of vacation days to chaperone at camp, and I'm a little sad we can't use that time for our own family vacation this summer. We went to dinner together as an impromptu "date night," but I spent most of the time chiding and complaining about how we haven't had any time together between all the scout activities and the Habitat for Humanity trip in the past few months.

So on Sam's one night home, the one evening we can spend together this week, guess what happened? We got home around 7:00 and fed the baby a late dinner, and then I got a call from a friend in need. And the moment I heard her voice of desperation, a true cry for help on the other line, I dropped everything and ditched my family to be there for her. I fed and changed and held her new baby so she could eat a meal and get a little bit of sleep. It felt so wonderful to serve her.

I got home at midnight. Tired, exhausted Sam took care of the baby and waited up for me even after all my ranting about serving others taking precedence over spending time with the family.

I am such a hypocrite.

Violins Are Like Legos: They’re Meant to Come Apart | Kennedy Violins Blog

2011-07-16T22:47:00.000-07:00

Here's my first "professional" blog post for Kennedy Violins. Ooh la la! (Too bad I spent more time trying to figure out Wordpress than writing.)

Violins Are Like Legos: They’re Meant to Come Apart | Kennedy Violins Blog

What I Do All Day

2011-07-04T00:14:00.001-07:00

Here I am on Tuesday, my first day finishing a violin on my own. By "finishing," I mean setting it up properly: sanding and smoothing out the fingerboard, reshaping the nut, cutting clean grooves for the strings, removing and securing the tailpiece, adjusting fine tuners, stringing it properly, touching up the varnish, buffing out imperfections, cutting down and notching the bridge to adjust the action, shaping the bridge to the proper thickness/curvature, sanding the feet of the bridge to match perfectly (if possible--this is where I need the most practice) the curvature of the face, polishing, drilling new holes in pegs, applying peg dope, and/or whatever else is necessary to make the violin not just playable, but comfortable.

This is a cool gadget. It cranks up to hold the strings in place while I work on the bridge:

This is a little tool to put notches in the bridge:

After one day of observing and taking pages of notes, I was shocked to be trusted to work on a violin by myself on my second day. As an "apprentice," the only way to master the skills is to actually do them. Observing only goes so far (and not very far in this trade). Watching is not the same as getting a feel for it with your hands: how much pressure, how smooth, how thick, how thin, how tight.

I ask a lot of questions and make a lot of mistakes. It's a steep learning curve (but maybe not as intense as coming home with a newborn?). So far, after my first week, I've broken several strings, one bridge, and one violin (defective scroll box--not my fault), and I put a dent-scratch in two violins with my long fingernails, which have now been cut very short. But I learn from my mistakes, and it's amazing how much more confidence I gain with each hour of practice and experience.

And unlike at the clothing store where I learned to pile on jewelry and accessories, now I take off my ring, my watch, bracelets, and necklaces so I don't scratch any instruments.

This is a small 1/16-size violin for 4- and 5-year-olds. I plan to bring home one of these for L in the near future.

It's so cute! But I'm told the novelty will wear off; they're too small to work with, I guess. But I don't think I could get frustrated and mad with such a cute little thang.

I love my work. I have never had a job quite like this, where I've felt what I'm doing is perfect for me and something I'm truly passionate about. That's how I feel here. I can't wait to keep perfecting this art, learning more luthier skills, and someday making my own instruments.

I know I'm very lucky; I just wish everyone could find their dream job like this. But for me, it comes with sacrifice. I miss my baby during the day, but I am so happy to see him and spend quality time with him as soon as I come home. So it's not perfect, to depend on childcare, but at least I have this creative outlet as part of my every day. Give and take. Balance. Bend. It's going to work out somehow.

My First Day of Work (a very very long exerpt from journal)

2011-07-04T00:05:00.000-07:00

June 27, 2011
Monday

MY FIRST DAY OF WORK

It’s official. Today was my first day as a full-time working mother. Sam and I got up at the same time, ate breakfast, showered, got L ready, and we all faced the day as a family. I can’t tell you how many positive changes I already feel are happening to our family as a result of my working. I am overwhelmed by the positivity of my experience today, what I learned about not only the work I will be doing, but myself, Sam’s life, and the potential of our family.

At Church yesterday I sat in the single’s ward sacrament meeting alone as a result of—can you guess?—work. I now have more work on my hands than I can handle. Although I told my boss at the clothing store on Saturday about my new job and to phase me out, I still have a few weeks of two overlapping jobs, as well as my responsibilities towards my home and family. So we had one of those seasonal mandatory employee meetings, which are always on a Sunday morning, so I missed sacrament meeting. Mallory, L, and Sam went home after our ward’s meetings, and I stayed.

I feel like I’ve been so busy and occupied during church, taking care of L and nursing him during Sunday school, paying attention to him during sacrament meeting, and worrying about my lesson in the third hour, I just hardly pay attention or get anything out of church these days. I haven’t had much time to study the scriptures, although I have still been reading and praying regularly. Sometimes I feel like I am doing all I can do, and other times I feel like I could be doing more and living more faithfully.

With all the confusion in making my recent decision to apply, interview, and go for this new job, I was surprised to feel a strong impression as I was sitting in the very corner of the back row of the singles ward that it was okay; I’m doing the right thing. It was that warm feeling, like a knowing smile, that He was giving me something I have long waited for, needed, and deserve. I can’t describe what that “something” is. Maybe it’s an opportunity to prove myself, overcome idleness, use my skills, embrace a dream, stimulate my intellect, be myself, use my talents, or quench my thirst for learning. Maybe it’s all of that.

I don’t believe that developing personally and being a good mother are mutually exclusive, and that’s also part of the feeling that it is okay that I do this for myself; somehow my family will be blessed as a result. It’s as if my strong desires to fit the mold, especially the mold of a “good” LDS woman, can be let go. I can be myself, recognizing that just because I am a Mormon woman doesn’t mean the Lord has no specific plan and purpose for me.

I believe I am an unusual person with exceptional gifts. I don’t believe God would give me such great powers and talents to tease me, like setting a cake before me and telling me I can’t eat it, or giving me a pile of presents that I can’t open. I honestly feel like the servant in the parable who has been given a talent, but thinking he couldn’t use it, he buried it. I’ve been burying my talents in jobs at McDonalds, hours of sleeping in, the couch cushions of idleness on my sofa, and the internet.

I dug them up today. Something strange happened when I was driving home from my first day of work, listening again to the Fleet Fox’s Helplessness Blues. I was singing, “If I had an orchard, I’d work till I’m sore,” and this feeling of great joy and passion swelled inside me; I couldn’t believe how perfect for me this job is and the dreams it inspires. I have found my orchard: my opportunity to work and exercise my mind at full capactity. I have felt underutilized for so long. I have known that I am not only capable of doing more, but I must to feel whole, to be whole.

A friend of mine wrote a commentary in response to the blog post I wrote, “Do You Regret Majoring in Music?” She said, “Some days, I don't miss playing at all. But some days, it aches so much that I cry, and I remember that a part of me is dead. Some days, it feels like no one can ever really know me again, because Musician Rachel has disappeared, and she's the only Rachel that really ever had anything interesting to say.”

That epitomizes how I’ve felt in the past three years. I graduated from the music school and left my job repairing string instruments and my busy life as a performer to enter a world void of art where I couldn’t find a way to let out the artistic soul within myself. The past three years have been filled with other beautiful dreams of love and family, and a little art and music on the side. But something was missing. Rachel pinned down the sentiment perfectly. I’ve felt like a very important part of me has been dead . . .

. . . and today it came alive again. It filled me with joy as I came home, even happier to see my family and embrace my child and share with them all I learned today. I couldn’t stop talking, I couldn’t keep my excitement from them. I couldn’t resist sharing with them my newfound joy and knowledge.

Today, I felt again the feeling of violin polish on my fingertips, sore thumbs from turning tuning pegs, the purse of my lips whistling an A440 to tune strings to pitch. And more—the smell of wood, sawdust in my nose, the scratch of a pencil, the scritch scratch of sandpaper. Pen on paper, filling pages with notes. Studying standard measurements in thousandths and luthier vocabulary, writing down tricks and tips and new knowledge. Hearing a viola concerto in the background, saying, “Bartok?” and being right—a guessing game that’s meaningless to non-classical-music nerds.

Years ago when I worked in the BYU instrument office I was surrounded with a similar energy. The energy of solutions and polishes bottled on shelves, gadgets in little drawers, tools hanging on pegboards on the wall, carpet across the counter on which to lay the instruments. There is something that vibrates from a workshop: a powerful call to create, mend, and craft. I have always enjoyed the artistry of creation, and even more specifically, woodwork + music + painting + handiwork.

It occurred to me today that only one student of the 30,000+ students on campus, only one person at a time gets the opportunity to learn a few luthier skills and work on the school’s violins, violas, cellos, basses, autoharps, and the like. One person. If you’re at BYU, you have a 1 in 30,000 of being that person at any given time. I’m not a statistician, so that number might really be, literally, 1 in a million depending on the factors at hand.

I was fortunate enough to not only be that one person for a couple years, but to LOVE being that person. What an amazing opportunity. I regret that while I had that opportunity I was kind of immature and sometimes irresponsible—but I was also overwhelmed by everything else going on at the time, namely, the demands of being student, a church member, and a girlfriend/fiancée with a life to plan.

But when it came to working on the instruments, I could do certain tasks for hours and hours and hours on end. I remember being down in the basement scrubbing basses with polish and alcohol, planing fingerboards, gluing seams and tightening clamps. I could do it for hours on end and into the night even, listening to music and using my hands. Precision handiwork has always been one of my greatest talents and one of my greatest creative outlets.

I’d talk with my bass professor about my interest in becoming a luthier. I looked into the Peter Prier Violin School in Salt Lake City. It’s very expensive, the tuition, tools, and supplies. I was warned that it is a challenging niche market to succeed in; you could go to luthier school and not be able to sell your instruments and break even.

I brought this up at work today because I somehow had concluded in my mind that one couldn’t be a successful luthier without some kind of luthier training. But because luthier work is so similar to the arts (it is a true artform, if I’ve ever seen any), it’s not a matter of your training or certifications, it’s simply about the quality of what you produce.

For example, having a music degree doesn’t mean you’re a good performer or musician. You don’t have to have a degree to become a sought-after musician, you win competitions and make a name for yourself through the quality of your playing. When it comes down to it, it doesn’t matter where or with whom you studied, it’s the art you produce, your ambition, and your actual performance that takes you places.

And then it occurred to me that even my bass is made by a local Utahn who decided one day to make a bass for his son. I think he made planes before—little private planes—and decided to try making a bass. And he just kept making them, and people started buying them, and now they are some of the best basses out there—he sells them around the world. My bass, now that I’m out of Utah, is always complemented for its beauty, sound, playability, and setup when other bassists see or play it. It is a truly beautiful instrument.

Today we talked about the “pie,” or the market of violins. Somehow, it can be quantified into so many millions of dollars, and our violins are so much of that market. It’s the same in the luthier world: there is a certain market for luthier skills and handmade instruments, and why shouldn’t I go into that market? Right now the good luthiers in the world are aging, old men. Who will take their places when they retire and pass away? Why not me?

Today I was so inspired by what I learned. Today I got back on the path I began a few years ago. It’s the unique experience I had to dabble in luthier work at the Instrument Office that was a key factor in qualifying me for this job. With the knowledge and experience I can gain now on a professional level, this is really the next step to take me to the next level of expertise. Before, I was a college student, experimenting with rudimentary principles of instrument repair. But it’s like I’m playing with the big kids now.

I haven’t even told you the specifics of what I learned today. So, so much. I’m learning to set up violins and do finish work on them: how to string them properly, sand them, cut down and notch bridges, even out the pressure of the strings on the violin, buff out scratches and spots on the varnish, stain the inside of the f-holes with black varnish, remove and secure the tailpiece, sand down the nut, adjust the string height (action), and use so many tools I’ve never seen before. I took so many notes and was extremely impressed by the speed, precision, and knowledge of my “teacher.”

He told me I couldn’t be afraid. He said I would break, scratch, and ruin many a violin, and so had he, and it’s just part of the learning experience. I’ve always viewed violins as so delicate, especially because I play the bass; I can sit on my bass and run it into walls, like it’s a boat or a large piece of furniture. But violins have been built for hundreds of years in a certain form because that form is strong enough to withstand great force. The strings alone apply something like 60 pounds of pressure on the face of the violin, so I can’t be afraid to use more force, use more pressure, use the strength of my hands, polish with more elbow grease.

I used to be scared to work on my own instrument or take apart a violin, leaving it up to an experienced luthier to do the “dangerous” work—risky tasks involving varnish or filling holes or removing and replacing parts. But now I am to be the professional. I am the one who will be taking things apart, filing down and replace bridges, perfecting flaws in the varnish, and learning the true and professional skills of a luthier.

I am so, so thrilled.

I look forward to experimenting more in the future as I gain more confidence and knowhow in the next year or two. When I feel confident, I could then try assembling a violin from a kit, and then I could learn to carve the plates myself. I’m hoping I can take home one of the defective violins we can’t sell so I can dissect it and experiment and practice my technique.

I’m excited to keep learning. I know it will take months and even years to develop these skills, and tomorrow is another day to improve and learn. It is an incredible feeling to be learning again. I feel as though I should be paying to study this art form. I feel like an intern or an apprentice, and yet, I am there because I am needed there. There is so much work to be done.

It’s interesting how finding the perfect job isn’t as a result of one’s search efforts and convenience. You can’t graduate with just any degree and expect a window of opportunity suited to your specific skillset and circumstances to open at your command. I’ve been looking for three years for some kind of opportunity to use my skills, which include my specific artistry, musicianship, and intellect. I couldn’t just graduate and expect a luthier position to open up on the spot for me. It took many steps and the opening of numerous doors of opportunity to bring this to pass. Our move here, the colleagues I’ve met performing locally. If I hadn’t agreed to play that unpaid gig a few weeks ago, I wouldn’t have run into Dot again and she wouldn’t have mentioned this luthier job. The connection wouldn’t have been made. It’s simply unreal, almost serendipitous how this came to pass.

I really feel that Heavenly Father has designed this opportunity for me as part of my life plan. He’s allowing me to be the multi-faceted woman I am, someone who wants so desperately to have a family and also use my talents and be involved in my community in a meaningful way.

This will be a challenge and a new twist in the story of our growing family. But somehow, it feels that it is meant to be. And somehow, my work makes me very, very happy, like the missing piece of the puzzle that has come into place.

I worried that I would have to choose between being a mother and being myself. Or being a Mormon or a wife or a musician or a full-time worker or an artist and being myself. But I think there is a way.

And as it turns out, all of those roles are part of who I am, and none can be neglected. I shouldn’t have to choose this OR that. I am this AND that, which is hard to wrap my brain around. But when I don’t wrap my brain around all of what I am, my brain unravels, and I am not whole.

More to come. Tomorrow is another day, and I am excited to learn, do, and become more.

The Suspense . . .

2011-06-24T17:42:00.000-07:00

. . . can be thrown out the window.

I got the job.

A job as a result of majoring in music. Go figure. I start on Monday.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Do You Regret Majoring in Music?

2011-06-23T12:03:00.000-07:00

As L approaches eight months old, I realize it’s almost time to get him started with music lessons.

Okay, fine, we might wait until he’s two or three.

Although, we did let him have a go at it when we brought him home from the hospital. Here he is, 2.5 days old, like a natural.

____________

I’ve been thinking about how and to what extent I will encourage our children’s study of, practice, and involvement in music. Classical music and training were always important elements in my life for almost as long as I can remember, and the skills I learned in music certainly contributed to the success of my schooling overall.

But I fear that if I emphasize music too much, and if our children are too passionate about it, they might (heaven forbid!) want to major in it in the future.

That either make you laugh, cry, or both.

I have very, very mixed feelings about majoring in music. Any BYU music student will tell you that the performance programs and music school at BYU are extremely competitive and often difficult to get into. The hours of practice every day, the time-consuming, low-credit classes, and the intense coursework associated with the degree are far from the floofy impressions non-music majors may have of the program.

Sam and I often compare our experiences at BYU. In the business school, you don’t even have to attend or participate in certain courses to get not just a passing grade, but an A. Baffling. Doing a combined bachelors and masters program, Sam got a masters degree in less time, with fewer credits, and taking fewer courses than I to get my music degree and English minor after five grueling years, with spring and summer terms thrown in.

And now we look at the results. Sam’s friends from school are doing extremely well in their careers. I often laugh at the fact that business school students are constantly attending career fairs, going out to lunch, eating free pizza at Q&A sessions, and bowling for free with recruiters who are incredibly anxious to hire them out of college.

On the other hand, the only music professionals who visited us at the music school were accomplished artists who were generous enough to grace our presence with a performance and a masterclass, emphasizing the fact that if we were extremely, extremely lucky and practiced our brains out, we might, just might someday be as good as them and enjoy the luxury of a salaried income and maybe a few niche fans. Did I ever attend a recruiting function at the music school? Absolutely not. We never had recruiters visit. What were they going to do, invite us to sign on and join their quartet? Make it a quintet?

I admire those who are courageous enough to pursue their passions, go after their dreams, and seek self-fulfillment doing what they love to do. I'm one of those types most of the time--that's why I went out on a limb to become a mother (scary!). And the truly passionate, diligent ones do find success doing just that: dedicating themselves to what they believe in important not only to themselves, but the community at large.

But it’s a hard road, especially for musicians and artists. I’ll admit that it was a huge relief to marry someone with a masters from the business school. I wasn’t looking for that at all, I wasn't on the lookout to marry for money. I could care less was sort of career Sam might have. It just happened to work out this way. I don’t know if it’s luck, or what, but he happened to choose one of the most marketable degrees in today’s market, a masters in information systems management. And BYU's MISM program just happens to be one of the best in the nation.

So I find it so interesting to have observed over the past few years the situations and career paths of his friends from school and my friends from school. Sam’s friends seem to be concerned about whether or not they’re working with prestigious companies or the top four, which companies will leverage their resume for future opportunities, how to invest their salaries (Buy property? Pay off student loans?), which health insurance plans to choose, what to do about having to work more than 40 hours a week, etc.

Some of my fellow music school graduates, on the other hand, are still looking for stable work since graduating, consider salaried jobs a huge (and distant) luxury, live from paycheck to paycheck, may not have children yet because they wonder how to afford them, aren’t married yet because they can't support a family, may not have health insurance, live with their parents, use food stamps, work multiple part-time jobs, wish they could work more than 40 hours a week, work pay-by-the-hour jobs that have nothing to do with their field of study, and grow ever more cynical about their past decision to follow their dreams.

So does constantly following your dreams end up blinding you from a harsher reality, like a mask that puts you to sleep, leaving you unconscious of the world around you? As David Brooks pointed out in the article I mentioned in a previous post ("It's Not About You"), should choosing a major have more to do with what you can contribute to a functional society rather than what you can do for yourself? Or is it a combination of what you love to do and what's economically practical?

Does this sound familiar to anyone else?

I don’t mean to sound ungrateful because I had an incredible experience as a music major, and for me, I don’t regret my choice to major in music. It really took me from amateur to professional status in my field of study. I’ve traveled the world as a result. The path I’m on in life would not be what is has been and is if it weren’t for the decisions I made in the past that led me here.

I feel fortunate enough to still play and be a part of my local music community. I have regular gigs, which works really well with being a mother. I can teach students, my children, and even my husband about music. The skills I gained from my music degree translate into other valuable and useful skills at home and in other lines of work. It enriches our lives greatly . . .

. . . but I’m still relieved I don’t have to be the sole breadwinner.

So, music majors, tell me how you feel:

• Are you glad you majored in music?
• What opportunities have you found as a result?
• What do you plan to, or what have you done with your degree?
• Do any of the above sentiments ring true to you?
• Would you encourage your children to major in music or a field the economy demands?
• Do you regret your decision to major in music?
• If you are continuing your music education, what motivated that decision?
• How has music enriched your life?

Please use the comment section below to complain, vent, argue, agree, justify, refute, encourage, or dispel.

What on Earth Do You Do All Day?

2011-06-22T21:41:00.000-07:00

Okay, I’ve heard the rumors that our generation of youth are self-indulgent, lazy, and hardly self-reliant. This may be true. I don’t feel like the most industrious tool in the toolbox these days. More like an octagonal Allen wrench.

Personally, from the start, I had no idea what my dad was up to at work; there were these mysterious tasks he accomplished in his cubicle each day for some grand and unknown purpose. Somehow what he did there equated to a paycheck that sustained our livelihood. Now that I’m married to Sam, I get a better sense of what breadwinners do from 9-5 at the office.

But I still wonder, really, what goes on there, especially when I stop in and see foam swords distributed to his team members for entertainment between all those grueling professional tasks.

So to make a case for the soft generation of youth lacking in work ethic, let me just give you my understanding of the kind of work that awards the highest paycheck. From my earliest memory as a young girl in modern society, here’s what I have gathered thus far as to what constitutes a *good day’s work:

1. Collecting small figurines with which to decorate one’s cubicle
2. Planning lunch meetings at expensive restaurants
3. Sending forward e-mails to coworkers with

• pictures of cats
• poorly written political articles
• warnings about mythical computer viruses
• jokes, cartoons, and comics
• personality tests
• cheesy reminders about what’s truly important in life

4. Spending 4-6 hours on Facebook
5. Chatting around the water cooler
6. Faxing random papers off into the abyss
7. Reading and responding to countless (and pointless) e-mails
8. Decorating cubicles for birthdays or to welcome new employees
9. Eating doughnuts
10. Dreaming of what to wear on Casual Friday
11. Playing golf
12. Tropical vacations otherwise known as “business travel”
13. Accepting $100 of daily per diem to buy $12 worth of food while on said “business travel”
14. Shirking family responsibilities
15. Wearing oneself out so much sitting at a desk that coming home to watch TV is the only way to recover
16. Watering the cactus by the computer
17. Loosening one’s tie after a really intense conversation about the company picnic
18. Selling one’s child’s Girl Scout Cookies and candy bars for the school fundraiser
19. Arguing about whose molding Tupperware is still in the breakroom fridge
20. Deciding who is responsible for cleaning the mess in the microwave
21. Refilling the coffee pot
22. Sitting in useless meetings talking about nothing
23. Contributing the occasional $5.00 to a baby shower gift
24. Using file folders to redirect the air conditioning away from one’s desk
25. Cleaning one’s keyboard with Q-tips

So, am I getting the wrong impression, or is there actually work to be done by white-collared professionals?

And this is why I’m not surprised at all by the state of our economy. Maybe college graduates think we’re all destined to find this mythical, fluffy, rolling-chair office work that makes the world go ‘round. Well, everyone may not need whatever services are offered across the corporate desk. Rather, the higher demand for labor is in areas such as

• clothing retail [a shout-out to myself]
• customer service
• food service
• childcare
• factory work
• waste management
• janitorial labor
• construction
• housekeeping
• care for the elderly

. . . and the like. Are we, as Americans, so far above the world economy that we can justify depending on immigrant labor to provide the dirty work while we get all the “thought”-jobs?

Speaking of thoughts, what are yours? What do you do all day?

*P.S. My dad is a very, very hard worker. Work hard, play hard, as he says. But I mostly observed him after work during the "play hard" part of the day. Thus I learned from my pop the ability to relax and take it easy--sometimes too often and to a fault.

Keeping It Clean

2011-06-22T20:04:00.000-07:00

I’m not talking about your filthy language or your choice of entertainment. I’m actually talking about . . . dishes.

I recently made a new goal, which is to have a clean, empty sink at the end of every day. I’ve now been doing Monday cleaning for several months, and now that the weekly chores actually get done to my satisfaction, I’ve been wondering now how to keep up with the daily chores, namely, dishes and clutter.

My dad’s wife, who’s from Lima, Peru, is this amazing example to me of a very tidy homemaker. My dad’s a pretty clean person, but when I’ve gone to visit since they got married, I’m always amazed by the absolute perfection in the state of the house I grew up in. There is so much attention to detail, from the single chrysanthemum in pure water in a sparkling, mini glass vase perched on a dustless shelf above the immaculate bathroom sink to the crisp clean table runner perfectly centered along the polished dining room table. It just baffles me.

Usually when I visit I end up cooking something, most often the family recipe gumbo, my dad’s favorite. I used to think it was something to be proud of, an extremely messy kitchen after slaving away to make an incredible meal from scratch. But when I cook with Nanabanana (we shall call her), it’s like the moment I set a measuring cup down or spill a little flour, she’s right there washing the each dish and wiping the counters as we go.

When Sam and I got married, he mentioned that after living in Italy, he learned that the mark of a good chef or cook was one who's kitchen was as clean after the meal was ready as when it was started. At first, I totally scoffed at that thinking, what fun is cooking if you can’t make a mess? Like art, what fun is it if you don’t get a little paint on your clothes and in your hair? Or like jazz, where a little mistake here and there leads you to a great new twist in the solo? Real artists aren't clean! Phoo on that!

Well. As time has passed, I’ve started changing my ways, and now, in my fourth year as a wife, I’m seeing the value in cleaning as I go. Now I put things away as I’m cooking—I’m done with the flour, the flour goes away. I’m done with the cream, it goes back in the fridge. I’m done with the oil, it goes back in the cupboard. And if I can wash a few bowls or at least put them in the dishwasher as I go, it’s so much easier to put the last few things away when I’m done.

Same goes for hosting dinner parties. I’ve realized if I run and empty the dishwasher and clear the sink before dinner, all I have to clean up after the party is the dishes we ate off of. And I can just pop them in the dishwasher and call it good.

It’s just a theory; I’m not saying it always happens or that I’m an especially clean person. The thing is, I know I’m not an especially clean person, which is why I’ve owned up to the fact recently that if I don’t clean up after myself, no one will and we’ll drown in our own filth.

I know people who are extremely clean as a result of their OCD character; for me though, I’m beginning to teach myself how to clean as if it were an occupation or a line of work. Somehow, hotel housekeepers can make an entire hall of suites shine in just a few hours. So when I visit people who have very clean homes, I first wonder what kind of magic happens that makes it so; then I realize it's not magic--it's just a high level of work ethic.

I’ve finally come to the realization that clean people are usually those who are very self-motivated, attentive to detail, and industrious. It does take an incredible amount of focus to clean an entire home on a deadline. I’m kind of a lazy bum sometimes, so I’m trying to suck it up and learn to work hard in my own home. Like I can give the baby a bath when I’m tired (and sometimes haven’t bathed myself), or I can change a diaper when I know he could be fine in the wet one for a few more hours, or I can do the dishes now instead of later because they’ll just keep piling up if I don’t take action. I can--I'm perfectly capable--but it takes a lot of motivation when I'm so toasty sitting on the couch with a blanket.

So, going back to dishes, I noticed at my dad’s house that the kitchen sink is almost always empty, glinting silver in the sunlight streaming through the window above the sink. Sometimes there’s a single spoon in it, sometimes a coffee cup. The green and bright yellow scouring sponge is always fresh and new--it's never smelly and mildewy, and it's always sitting on that little sponge holder on the counter instead of laying soggy at the bottom of the sink. And here’s the thing: they never use paper plates, and they never use the dishwasher. What??? All of this happens by hand?

While Sam was out of town I decided to try this concept out. In ten days, I only ran the dishwasher once, and I just kind of washed a dish or two throughout the day as I used them (which is what my grandmother does as well), put them in the drying rack, and put them away when they were dry and I was passing by later to get a drink or something. It was pretty easy: two minutes of a dishwashing a few times a day instead of an hour and a half of dishwashing every few days. And at the end of the day, the sink's always empty.

I also just read on a green/organic blog, Green as a Thistle, (from which I yoinked the cute dishwashing with my sweetie image) this tip to only use soap on dishes with oily residue on them:

"Upon asking a friend of mine for some green suggestions recently, he said I should use less soap when doing the dishes — in fact, he recommended not using any suds whatsoever unless there’s an oily residue.

"'As long as you rinse the plate immediately,' he explained, “and as long as whatever’s on it is water soluble, you can just go without.” He then added in a conspiratorial whisper, 'I never use soap.'"

That's sure to make you germaphobes cringe.

It’s just a goal, to have that shiny empty sink at the end of every day, just a nice thought, perhaps. The ideal though, has actually helped the state of my kitchen quite a bit in the past two weeks. I think there has been only one day so far when there were dishes in the sink at night, and that was because Sam and I both ran to mutual right after scarfing down some food, not having time to clean up after dinner.

Speaking of insanely repetitive tasks, I loved my friend Cathy's analogy, comparing the “Sisyphean tasks of housewifery” (dishwashing, laundry, etc.) to the Greek myth of Sisyphus, who was “forced to roll a boulder up a mountain every day and watch it roll back down because he had attempted to trick the gods.” Constantly cleaning is the same sort of torturous insanity. You wear the shirt today, you wash it tomorrow.

So, tell me, what do you do about the dishes? Any tips? I think I’ll buy paper plates next time I’m at the store.

Riding the Pendulum

2011-06-21T11:09:00.000-07:00

Sooooooooo, I just got a call for an interview at the violin shop on Friday, and I'm not getting that anxious feeling to not go through with it; in fact, now I'm anxiously hoping I'll get the job. I had a phone interview a few days ago and it went well. I mean, no guarantees I'll actually be offered the job with several other applicants, but I'm going to do the interview and see what happens. It would be silly, I think, to turn down an interview and an incredible, almost too-perfect opportunity without even seeing if I can get it.

Sigh. The pay is good, the hours are flexible. I could probably be home with L in time for or during his afternoon nap. I could keep my other job at the clothing store, maybe working one shift a week instead of two or three, and then I could keep my clothing discount and still keep in touch with my friends there. Sam's even offered to work from 6-3. Imagine that--we could all be home together even more! Um, serendipity? Of course, we'd have to go to bed soon after L goes to bed, but it's boring when L is asleep anyway.

Thirty-ish hours a week, good pay plus commission, payed vacation, flexible hours, all doing something I'm experienced with, that I enjoy, using my degree and my arts background. I could probably listen to books on tape, my own music, chat with my coworkers, be available to come home to L if he needed me, etc.

And as far as L is concerned, here we are sitting in the quiet apartment, and again I think it would be so good for him to spend more time around other children in a more lively atmosphere. I wonder if I could find a mother in the ward with other children at home who could watch him for a few hours every day--then he would get to play with other children, which I think would be very good for his development and socialization, and he could be in a safe LDS home with someone who knows more about children than I do.

Hm hm hm.

So now, after chatting with Sam, the stance is this: go through with it until I get a feeling it's not the right direction. Present my best self at the interview, see if I get the job, and we'll take it from there. I'm not feeling any guilt right now.

[P.S. I usually wouldn't publicly chat so much about my employment opportunities and such, but I'm still interested in your thoughts on the matter, and it helps me to "think out loud."]

The Process of Changing My Mind

2011-06-18T12:31:00.000-07:00

Preface: First, thank you so much for all your thoughts on the subject of working mothers. I have learned through these musings in the past few days how wrong I was to judge or make negative presumptions about mothers who choose to work and/or utilize childcare. I do suspect that some may do it without realizing what they or their child are missing out on. But I also realize that for many other women, their mental and spiritual health require what can only be gained through specific types of work, community involvement, intellectual stimulation, or the use of unusual and exceptional talents and gifts. In those cases, it is absolutely necessary for the benefit of the entire family.

Not only that, but because of the distribution of income since women joined the workforce en masse, it is often necessary for mothers to work for the families income to survive. I admit there have been numerous occasions where my small paycheck has been a saving grace. I am blessed with the luxury of not having to work full-time.

________________________________

I wonder if my recent daydreams to work full-time are at all a result of Sam being gone and me feeling like a single mom. But really, I think part of my feeling like we’d all be better off if I went back to work is also spurred on by this thought that I’m not a very good mother. Like, how sad is it that even my pediatrician is warning me that I could potentially have negative effects on my child’s development? But no one’s perfect. Unfortunately, all parents have negative effects on their children. That is a reality we all must accept.

I am a good mother. I may not be the best mother for someone else’s child, but I believe there is a reason this child was put in my care. We have a strong connection and a purpose as a spiritually and physically formed family.

Besides, I think it’s okay that I’m not an entertaining or clowny mom. I’m more reserved, more thoughtful, more pensive, and I don’t think those are bad traits to instill in a child. Life is not all about being entertained. There is more depth to the experience than that. Sam is enough entertainment for all of us, and there is a balance between our personalities

The moment I even opened that application in my e-mail, I was immediately overcome by this dizzying feeling of anxiety. Logically, as you can see, I can intellectually justify going to work full-time from just about every angle. But the thought fills me with a bad feeling. Even last night as I left L with a sitter while I was at work, I was antsy and anxious to get off work and pick him up. Even though he had fun with the sitter and did fine without me, I didn’t like the thought that he wasn’t with me or Sam, that he was set aside so I could make a few dollars and get away. I love working and getting out sometimes, but I am always uncomfortable finding a sitter if Sam isn’t available. I don’t mind doing it now and again, but I can’t imagine doing it every day.

It is too bad we don’t live in a culture where babies are allowed in every setting. If I could bring L to work and just let him play while I work, how wonderful would that be? How perfect? Work and being in the company of children aren’t mutually exclusive (as we can see in the church).

It is definitely possible for me to do more at home, and perhaps I ought to. I think if I don’t take this job, I should definitely make concrete plans to write more and work on a book. I think I would like that more than putting strings on violins all day. And now that it’s summer and not raining constantly, L and I can go out more. There is much to experience.

I’ve had an overwhelming feeling of anxiety and guilt as I’ve considered doing something both unnecessary and somewhat selfish. The fact that work and intellectual stimulation contribute to my mental health is true, but having that in my life doesn’t necessarily mean I need to go get a job or work for the man. There is much that L and I could do. There is volunteer work, there are places for us to go where children can be present while I contribute to the community. There are places we can be where both of us could socialize more. And there are projects that I dream of accomplishing (like writing that book) that would be even harder to accomplish if I sold my time and energy to someone else’s agenda.

But no matter how much I logically work out the pros and cons in my mind, it’s coming back to a feeling. It’s like the feeling I got when Sam wanted to take the job in Orange County and it almost made me sick with anxiety. I knew it made sense to take that job, but I had the feeling our future in that scenario wouldn’t be as promising as we could only imagine in the present. Little did we know the recession would hit and that company would rescind all its offers. We would have been left jobless.

So it is now: I have the feeling that my idealization of this potential job will not be as perfect as I imagine it to be. Most of my employment opportunities don’t pan out to be as fulfilling as I hope them to be, except for my current job in clothing retail, which has exceeded my initial expectations tremendously. I love my job there. That surprises me still. I shouldn’t hesitate to admit how much I love working there. I think all women should have a chance to work in a designer clothing store; there is so much to learn about dressing well and with confidence that is so uplifting and even refining.

I probably wouldn’t have the same relationship with my coworkers the way I do with my coworkers at my current job. The work will probably be in small enclosed room or office where I won’t see the sun and will be doing the same monotonous work day after day. Rather than occasionally doing repetitive, somewhat monotonous work a couple times a week (folding the same clothes over and over—although there’s a really fun social element and energy there), I would being doing the same monotonous activity (the same setup on violin after violin after violin after violin) for even more hours every day, five days a week. I wouldn’t have the flexibility I have now to get a week off here and there to go on vacation, or trade shifts with a coworker last minute.

I have made a covenant to my family. A promise to put their needs before my own. As I thought about this possible commitment to a full-time job, I realized it would influence our vision of family greatly. It might take one or two children out of the equation—one or two lives! If I took the job, I would probably put off having another child. L would get older without a sibling close in age. While we’d like a good number of children, if I went back to work, I can see that number being cut in half. Multiple lives set aside for a measly paycheck and “intellectual stimulation” that might not even be stimulating at all? There’s a reason people get paid to work; it’s often drudgery—you lose your freedom to do what you want with your time. You pretty much sell your soul to someone for so many hours per week. I have never been a fan of the man.

Truth of the matter is, I chose to be a mother. I knew that choice would require sacrifice and a very long-term commitment. I also understand that working during the day at the expense of childcare while L is in his infancy may not being a good idea. On the other hand, if I have a little patience, when our kids are in school during the day, I can find a day job (if there were even one that could even entice me—very unlikely). And frankly, I feel like I already threw my opportunities for thriving career development when I chose my major.

Besides, I want to be a writer. And look what I’m doing right now because I don’t have a day job! Writing! L has been playing next to me this whole time. Writing and caring for a baby are definitely doable.

I haven’t been a mother for even eight months yet. It’s too early to give up because of a handful of depressing days mixed in with a much greater number of beautiful, rich, and fulfilling moments in the company of a growing and glowing soul. The learning and development I gain in the company of L to become a better mother, wife, and person are invaluable compared to learning a few luthier skills. I have already become a more mature and compassionate person as a result of investing in motherhood. I have learned first-hand the value of selfless service and sacrifice. I have felt empowered and confident as a result of the choice I made to become a mother. It is a marathon of sorts, being a parent day after day and year after year for the rest of one’s life, but it is the most worthwhile task of a lifetime.

For the past few days, I’ve been absolutely on edge with anxiety as all of my thoughts have revolved around the question “What if I did this?” But last night, the anxiety and guilt continued to mount and as I picked up L from his babysitters, wondering what it would be like to pick him up every day from a sitter and asking how he did, if he ate enough, if he laughed, if he cried, if he had any dirty diapers, etc.

By the time I got home, I switched the question to, “What if I didn’t do this?” And would you guess what happened?

IMMEDIATE AND HUGE SENSE OF RELIEF.

Ahhhh. Yes, that wonderful, sweet sigh of relief. I realized that no one is forcing me to go back to work. I don’t have to. I don’t even want to. I would regret missing so much of L’s growth and development. I’m sure I could get used to being away from him and leaving him with a sitter each day. But even if I got used to it, I don’t think I would like it. And here’s the thing, I don’t want to get used to it.

My son is a part of me. He and I are one—like Sam and I are. We are a family. I’m not ready to give up on motherhood just because it’s occasionally challenging or there are a few dull days (mostly as a result of my sleeping in or being too lazy to go out or do something productive, which is completely my fault, not the baby’s).

I know I’ve had a tendency to be a quitter in the past, making fast and rash decisions thinking they will remedy my occasional blues, which they never do. But it’s only been seven and a half months being a stay at home mom. I’ve rarely lasted seven and a half months in a full-time job without going nuts. I barely made it a year with my office job while Sam was finishing school. Working for the clothing store is one of the only jobs I’ve had for more than I year that I still love. That says something. That’s not something worth giving up at the drop of a hat.

Last night while I was working, I started wondering too what it would be like to leave my current job, and it made me very sad. I’m so good there. It’s taken me a year to become all stylish, build up a wardrobe perfect for that job, and really learn the ins and outs of my job. It’s actually very energizing to work there. I mean, it’d be so pointless to dress up, accessorize, and do my hair to sit in a windowless room with a pile of violins. What a waste of all the learning I’ve gained in the fashion industry in this past year, learning that has surprisingly enriched my life greatly.

Besides, I don’t even play the violin.

So there you have it. I think I have made up my mind.

[P.S. If you, the employer, are reading this, I won’t be offended if you don’t call me for an interview. I might miss your call anyway while I’m busy playing with my beautiful son. But truly, thank you for your consideration. It means a lot to me.]

Helplessness Blues

2011-06-18T01:11:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder if I will go through the whole of my life feeling lost. I do not know the future, I do not know what will happen to me or the ones I love. All I know is that I have a choice.

I turned 25 and I started feeling confident and beautiful and sure of myself. And now, with these decisions looming, I feel small again; I wonder what I will do, and who can tell me, but it is only a choice I can make.

I was raised up believing I was somehow unique
Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes
Unique in each way you can see

And now after some thinking
I'd say I'd rather be a functioning cog
In some great machinery
Serving something beyond me

But I don't, I don't know what that will be
I'll get back to you someday soon
You will see

What's my name, what's my station
Oh, just tell me what I should do

. . . And I don't, I don't know who to believe
I'll get back to you someday
Soon you will see

- from the Fleet Foxes'
"Helplessness Blues"

But I think I know what to do. And even that surprises me.

I Wouldn't Do It Unless It Were "Perfect"

2011-06-16T11:23:00.000-07:00

Thank you so much for your responses so far!

So, to address a few points, I am currently working part-time (anywhere from 3 to 20 hours a week) at a designer clothing store, and I love it. I love getting out of the house, interacting with people, making some pocket money, feeling like I'm making a difference in the community, feeling like I have something to offer, feeling like I'm helping people. But I also realize I have specific skills and talents (especially in the arts and music) that I want to employ more. Clothing retail is fun and social, but it isn't very intellectually stimulating, and I'm not using my degree.

I do, however, freelance as a bass performer whenever the opportunity presents itself. But, as many musicians know, it is VERY hard to find full-time or even substantial part-time work performing. These are occasional weekend gigs maybe once a month if I'm lucky. But when I do participate in music in the community, I love love love doing what I'm good at, what is a part of me, and what contributes to the betterment of my community. When I'm involved in classical music, I feel like I'm returning to a very important and familiar room within the house of myself.

I also noticed that I'm much happier the more I'm working. When I don't get a lot of shifts at work or don't have many gigs/students, I get very blue at home. I admit I have a long history with the blues, which has been a challenge in our family even before having a baby. I've always been an overachiever with a lot on my plate, so when I don't have a lot on my plate I tend to go a little nuts--I don't know what to do with myself. At the same time, having too much on my plate is also no good.

In talking with my pediatrician (he's LDS, if that's even relevant) recently, he mentioned that my being sad, tired, blue, and reclusive at home can have negative effects on my child's development and encouraged me to find some kind of remedy. In so many ways, I feel like other people (more experienced mothers or childcare pros) could offer better stimulation, activity, and socialization than I can in the state I get at home, at least for L at this age. I don't think anyone could be a better mother for him than me, especially in the long run, but I don't think offering L his own intellectual stimulation during the day would be replacing me as a mom. I can see myself being more energized as a stay-at-home mom with more than one child, but the fact that L is SO easy and chill, he doesn't have a lot of needs to keep me very busy.

I haven't even mentioned it to Sam because he is in another country. So we'll have something to talk about when he gets back!

I would not work full time unless I were doing something just right for me (and our family) or something that I would love doing. And the reason this came up is that as I was freelancing recently with a couple local orchestras, I met a musician who was very excited to connect me with the owner of a local violin shop who is looking for someone to work for him as a copywriter for his website and/or an employee at the shop--I could potentially be doing what I did for years at the Instrument Office at BYU, learning more luthier skills and using the knowledge I have as a string "specialist." Given that I love visual arts as well as music, I have long dreamed of becoming a luthier or at least doing more with instrument woodwork and setup. I LOVE doing that. I love taking care of instruments, and I love working with people, and I love classical music. Win win win win win... only if I got the job.

It also occurred to me that my working evenings and weekends is hard on my family in another way. I get to go out to work and fulfill my needs, coming home happier and more energized, but Sam and I are often like strangers passing in the night. He often gets home just in time for me to pass off L to him so I can jet to work or rehearsal. I've come home sometimes to both Sam and L sleeping, and I feel like I'm missing something. So it occured to me, what if Sam and I worked at the same time, and then we were all home at the same time to spend together as a family, instead of having piece-meal family time every once and while? We could actually have dinner together every day and have the weekends fully devoted to family. It sounds kind of nice, to regularly be home at the same time, instead of occasionally finding the three of us together when our evenings aren't booked.

But if it were some non-Liz-satisfying full-time job, like flipping burgers (done that) or sitting at a desk staring at a computer for 8 hours straight (done that), I would definitely choose staying home, knitting, and hanging with L over that.

I wouldn't take a full-time job unless it were something "perfect." I mean, I know perfection doesn't exist, but I do believe that work (no matter what kind) is good for the soul. Too bad I have such an easy baby who doesn't make me work! All he wants to do is sit around and smile at me!

A Serious Moral Dilemma

2011-06-15T21:27:00.000-07:00

I'm looking for thoughts because I feel like the devil and the angel on my shoulders are fighting and stealing each others' costumes. What if I worked full time?
Would I be abandoning my son?
Would I be letting my family down?
Would I be shirking my God-given calling?
Would I be being selfish?
Could I even do it?
Would I be ruining the development of my child?
Would I put him in daycare?
Would I find a nanny?
Would we lose the bond that we have?
Would our home fall apart?
Would God curse me if I worked and hired childcare for my baby?
Would it be a sin to go back to work full-time if I had a good opportunity?
Would I crack at some point in the future if I never used the skills, education, and talents I have?
Is the time I waste at home staring at the walls, playing on the internet, and sleeping an even greater sin?
Are these even sins?
What is sin?
Is it bad that I don't like being home all day every day?
Isn't it okay for mothers to work?
Isn't it okay for me to want to work?
Isn't it okay that I want to work, not for the money, but for the stimulation and health of my mind?

Thoughts are much encouraged because I am very confused. I know the world's perspective on this and I know the cultural Mormon perspective on this, but I don't know my own perpective on this for myself, or the truth of the matter.

A Good Half-Season’s Repertoire

2011-06-15T15:13:00.000-07:00

I used to save programs from my own concerts, as if I would really go back and look at them to see which pieces I’ve played over the years. That did nothing for me but contribute to mounds of memorabilia in unorganized boxes, most of which I threw away during the last pre-move purgation.

But, the internet doesn’t take up any space (at least not in our place; just in places like the thousands of Facebook servers in Prineville, Oregon), so I can make a little note of what I’ve played since Bean was born and not chuck it in the recycling bin fifteen years down the road.

Manfred Overture, Schumann
Zigeunerweisen, Sarasate
Piano Concerto #1 in G minor, Mendelssohn
Concertino for Clarinet in C minor/E flat major, von Weber
Sleeping Beauty Suite, Tchaikovsky
Brahms Symphony No. 1
Gwendoline Overture, Chabrier
Schumann Piano Concerto
Serenade for Strings, Elgar
Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, Vaughn Williams
Serenade No. 1 in D, Brahms

With whom do I play, you may wonder? After my "maternity leave" I've started filling in and subbing with local community orchestras again. Since moving here, I think I've played with all of the community and semi-professional orchestras in the Portland area now (excluding the Oregon Symphony): Columbia, Vancouver, Sunnyside, Beaverton, Clark College, and Southwest Washington.

It’s been a treat to meet local musicians and support the arts in my local community. I know well-trained players who won’t condescend to the level of community orchestras, but I thought about the “If you don’t do it, who will?” principle and realized that if I get too snooty with my demands for high-paying gigs only (if “high”-paying gigs exist at all), our noble community arts programs will suffer that much more for the lack of willing contributors. That’s the last thing we need right now in an economy that not only won’t, but fiscally can’t support the arts or keep them from disappearing altogether.

So, let me toot my horn: support your local arts community! Whether you’re performing, attending, donating, or participating, your life will be richer as a result. Pinky promise.

If You Don’t Do It, Who Will?

2011-06-14T18:22:00.000-07:00

It’s a basic concept that applies to every area of your life. For example:

• If you don’t prepare your own food, who will?

Let’s break it down. What do you do when
- you’re starving
- you haven’t gone grocery shopping
- you don’t have time to cook
- you don’t know how to cook
- you’re traveling
- you didn’t pack a lunch
- nothing you have sounds (or is) edible

Naturally, someone else does the work. And the big question is, WHO do you want to do that work? There’s not necessarily a right answer. But here’s the reality of it. If you don’t prepare your food, here are the people (and “things”) who will:

- immigrants behind the fast food counter
- your wife, husband, friends, or children
- middle-class restaurant chefs
- high-class gourmet chefs
- bakers
- assembly line workers
- food-processing machines

It’s not a bad thing to not prepare all of your food from scratch. The reality is, if you were to grow and make all your food from scratch, it would consume your livelihood. And not only that, there are people who are not only willing to prepare your food, but want to because it supports their livelihood as well as yours. Everyone needs to eat! And even these people won’t eat if you don’t eat the food they make (whether that food will contribute to your demise or your better health).

The necessities in life don’t take care of themselves. This includes the basic upkeep of your physical health, emotional/spiritual wellbeing, wardrobe, living space, family, bank account, etc. Becoming an adult means becoming self-reliant and taking care of every area of your life.

The problem is, it’s really, really hard (and impossible, perhaps) to do everything. No man is an island. There is a reason that humans, since the beginning of time, have assembled themselves into commercial societies. Basically, goods and services are offered from one individual to another, being mutually beneficial for everyone involved (that is, if proper labor laws are instituted and observed, which often they are not).

So this is the basic principle: if you don’t do it, somebody else will—but they won’t do it without a cost. Even if your wife or an immigrant cooks for you, there is a cost. Time, energy, and money are never limitless. Everything has a price.

Here's another:
Q. If you don’t clean your home, who will?
A. No one, your spouse, your roommate, a cleaning service, your maid, your mom, your children.

[I'm actually not one who’d feel guilty or indulgent to hire someone to do my cleaning. If I could work that into our budget or if I lived in a space larger than I could clean on my own (which would be impractical in so many ways), I would hire someone in a heartbeat. Say the cleaning gal needs money for college or her family or to pay her son’s bail, while I need a clean home. Can we say win win? Any sponsors?]

And a few more:

• If you don’t support the arts in your local community, who will?
• If you don’t raise responsible and moral children, who will?
• If you don't make a dentist appointment, who will?
• If you don't set a good example, who will?
• If you don’t take care of the environment, who will?
• If you don’t take care of the sick and afflicted, who will?
• If you don’t take care of your emotional and spiritual needs, who will?
• If you don’t put the bread away after you make a PB&J, who will?
• If you don’t watch what you put in/do to your body, who will?
• If you don’t manage your money, who will?

I know, sometimes it sucks to be accountable. But somebody’s got to be. Like, look at me. I am totally accountable for the dozen Voodoo doughnuts that are no longer in their box. Look how responsible I am.

The Little Book of Encouragement

2011-06-12T15:59:00.000-07:00

Today's lesson for the young women I teach was "Overcoming Opposition." I came up with this diagram (and experimented with the Paint program for the first time since I was, oh, nine) to illustrate my main point:In essence, the experiences we have in this life can either draw us closer to God/Truth/Light or push us away from God/Truth/Light, depending on our reaction to our circumstances. Everyone faces challenges in this life, big or small. As they say, "the rain falls on the just and the unjust." So whether you are a righteous or unrighteous individual, you will be handed your fair share of trials. Some trials we bring upon ourselves as the consequences of our poor choices/sin. Others we suffer "just because," despite our say in the matter.

There must be opposition in all things. Such is life. What you become as a result of those tests, however, is up to you.

As I was preparing for this lesson to teach the girls, I saw in the supplement to the manual four recommended talks. I ended up compiling them into a little book, which I printed at Office Depot last night. (Little did I know I had done the math wrong. Of course printing a little book for 25 girls would be more than 45 pages of material. Try 450 pages. When the gal helping me pushed the print button and I watched what seemed like reams of paper piling up before my eyes, I started sweating and wondering what I'd gotten myself into.)

Anyway, I stayed up late putting together enough books for my small class, and I'm glad I did it. The girls seemed receptive of the book and asked for extra copies to give to their sisters, etc. I guess it's a worthwhile project after all. I'll assemble the rest to hand out next Sunday to the Laurels and Mia Maids.

Here are the four talks, and they're really quite good:

1. “Be of Good Cheer” by Thomas S. Monson, Ensign, May 2009, 81-82.

2. “Adversity” by Henry B. Eyering, Ensign, May 2009, 23-27.

3. “Hope Ya Know, We Had a Hard Time” by Quentin L. Cook,” Ensign, November 2008, 102-6.

4. “Never, Never, Never Give Up!” by Mary N. Cook, Ensign, May 2010, 117-19.

Boo in Hysterics/Goodbye Sam

2011-06-10T00:11:00.000-07:00

Booboo and I are lucky to have someone in our lives who makes us laugh alllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll the time. That would be Mr. Sam, dad/hub extraordinaire.

Today, Sam made Booboo laugh like we've never heard him before. And the sad thing is 1) I've never been able to make Boo laugh much (i.e. I'm not funny), and 2) I wasn't even home to see it!

Luckily, there is proof:

Today was a sad day. Booboo and I drove Sam to the airport and bid him farewell for ten days. He's off to Honduras on a humanitarian aid trip with his company.

Thus we are all alone, left to our own devices . . .

. . . and our frozen burritos.
Cup o' Noodle.
Totino's Pizza.
Spaghettios.
"Envelopes made of themselves." - Stephen Colbert

Well. I won't really subject myself to the hot life of a single male college student. But things might deteriorate that way. Me and my laptop, some munchies, the occasional movie, the George Foreman, perhaps some Mario Kart . . . the days will run into the nights. I'll have no reason to shave my legs or even shower for that matter. Will life even be worth living without him??? Will we survive????? Oh, the horror of it all!!! AHHHHHH!

Luckily, Gogo is coming to visit for a few days to break up the monotony! And I have a concert this weekend. And work. And Booboo and I will have each other. We'll always have each other. What a pleasing-as-punch pleasure that is. A cute face to brighten up my daily days.

Decorating the Nursery

2011-06-07T23:49:00.000-07:00

I love a good homemaking project. Here's the finished nursery!

We were originally inspired by Mr. Piet Mondrian:

But instead of ordering a print of one of his paintings, we decided to frame the bird puzzle we got for Christmas, Charley Harper's Mystery of the Missing Migrants (1990).

I love puzzles. In high school, I covered my bedroom walls with artwork puzzles glued together. My dad usually gave me a puzzle for Christmas, so I was stoked to get one this last Christmas, and another for my birthday by the same artist. What I especially love about this bird puzzle is that it came with a key on the back of the box to identify the species of birds; now we can teach Boo to be a bird watcher like his pop.

We started by painting the walls the bright yellow-orange shade. (These pictures aren't doing the colors justice; neither is the weak Northwestern "sun"-light.) And then I made a few trips to IKEA, where I'd never bought furniture before. I got two unfinished dressers for $30 a piece, a little $15 bookshelf/nightstand to hold board books, and the frame for the puzzle. I didn't realize furniture assembly was such a long process.

And to make the process even longer, I picked out a shade of midnight blue spray paint and watched Sam sand and paint and sand and paint and sand and paint enough coats until they looked like this:

And while Sam did that, I painted all the knobs with white acrylic and colored and clear nail polish. I wanted to buy cute hardware from Anthro, but if I bought six knobs at $10.00 per knob, the knobs alone would cost twice as much as the dresser itself. So, instead, I painted the original wooden knobs and made them shiny so we can all pretend they're ceramic. I picked a bird from the puzzle to paint on them. They're kind of messy looking up close, but from a distance they'll fool you. And isn't knob such a silly word?

Now Boo has his own bright space in which to play. I'm trying to remember when we moved him out of our room and into his own. I think it was around five months. And now that he sits up, I set him in his crib with some toys and classical Baby Einstein music to play while I shower and get all dolled up in the morning.

We're just starting to get into the routines I imagine "good" parents doing. Just in the past week we started a nightime routine that involves bathtime, a bedtime story, and an early bedtime (8:00-8:30pm-ish). From the start, Boo went to bed when we went to bed, and all of a sudden we're baffled by this concept of having a couple hours to ourselves in the evenings.

Here's the reading corner. The Diaper Genie is behind the chair, out of sight like I prefer it to be. Maybe it's the trash-can-under-the-sink habit manifesting itself via hidden diaper pail.

It's nothing spectacular, but we had a really good time as a family putting it all together. Hurrah!

Our Family Does Stuff

2011-06-05T23:01:00.000-07:00

Thumbs up for camping!

Since I rarely write about what we’re actually up to, writing about my thoughts instead (luh-ame!), here’s a standard family blog post with some photos of this weekend’s spontaneous camping trip.

Look at us, the charming nuclear family on a little outing! Destination: Silver Falls.

We camped Friday night and hiked the 3.5-hour loop in the morning, getting back just in time for me to grab some lunch, shower, and go to work to spend another five hours on my feet (in 4” heels (why???)). Needless to say, we were one tired family today and my legs feel like jello. Thank you, Sabbath, for a day of rest!

Behind the South Falls. Lewis is on Sam's back in an awesome baby hiking pack we borrowed from our neighbor-friends.

South Falls
(You can see some little people walking behind it.)

Dinnertime with Daddy's amazing MSR Whisperlite camp stove. There's a little advertising for you.

We hadn't taken Boo camping since he was four months old. Now he's seven months, and in a way it was more challenging because he doesn't sleep swaddled anymore, so he had cold hands and pulled his hat off. But it was also much warmer than on his first camping trip. All in all, the boys slept more than I did. There's something about the shape of female hips on hard ground that is kind of uncomfortable.

The trail leads you from fall to fall.

This is %100 nuts: Sam found a four-leaf clover!

What does it mean??? It's almost a five-leaf clover! What does it mean . . . [sob sob]
Seriously, neither of us have ever seen one in our lives. I know we've all made a four-leaf clover by ripping the leaves on a three-leaf. It's a genetic mutation or something, right? I could not believe he spotted one in such a huge patch of clovers.

Poor Booboo. Bobblehead Booboo. Backpacks aren't very friendly to nappers.

Okay, all of this is gorgeous, right? But the funny thing is, even after almost two years in Oregon, it's just all too . . . green and wet. As awesome as it is to even have a state park as our backyard, I miss the desert and sage brush and red rocks and sand and Indian paintbrushes. I'm not a very experienced hiker, but my favorite hikes have been in Goblin Valley and Zion in Southern Utah.

But Silver Falls is very beautiful and Oregon has so much to offer in its lush outdoors. I think we'll be taking advantage of it more this summer. After all, I am married to a Scoutmaster.

The Best Kind of Sacrifice

2011-06-03T17:07:00.000-07:00

I’m trying something new today: I’m out sitting by the pool with the baby monitor . . . and no baby. It feels strange to take a moment for myself to soak up the rarity of a ray of sunshine.

As you can probably tell, I’ve been pondering more about the nature and necessity of sacrifice in this life. Oddly enough, I feel closer to being adult because I’m learning to embrace this one principle. Motherhood has pushed me out of the bubble of selfishness and into the expansive world of giving.

I definitely have my selfish interests and my days when I dream of doing more for myself. But motherhood is definitely a crash course in Selflessness 101.

Here’s how it starts. First, you’re pregnant and you can’t

• eat whatever you want
• drink or smoke (not a big sacrifice for the Mormons)
• sleep whenever you want, or well when you do
• use your body in the ways you’re used to
• see your toes beyond your massive stomach
• go very long without running to the bathroom
• enjoy your girlish figure
• keep your food down, if you’re morning sick

[My poolside reverie came to an abrupt end; I forgot I had sweet potatoes rapidly boiling over on the stove. Hours later, I return to my thoughts after making a fresh batch of baby food and feeding Boo.]

Then you have a baby, and at first you find it difficult to

• sleep at all
• get used to the tortures of nursing
• find a moment to go to the bathroom
• make time for a shower
• stay in touch with friends
• set aside some money for baby needs
• leave the house
• cook or eat meals
• enjoy your girlish figure
• find a 34F nursing bra
• fit into your old clothes
• remember what life was like before

Then you get used to some things, but if you stay home with the baby, you don’t always have the means to

• go back to school
• go back to work full-time
• focus on your career
• have hobbies
• hang out as much with your friends or spouse

Sure, there are some sacrifices to be made. And the thing about sacrifice is that it requires you to give up something you want, need, or are used to having. Sometimes sacrifice even requires giving up your happiness and dreams, perhaps for the sake of joy in the long run. But even then, there’s no guarantee that things will work out how you’d like them in this life--no matter how much you do sacrifice. Heck, you might still die young, bankrupt, and loathed by your children.

That would be very sad.

But, still, would there be some measure of satisfaction, some measure of peace in knowing that you lived a life in the service of others?

Today though, as I thought really hard about all the various sacrifices I could list in this entry, I got a little distracted. I got distracted as I walked by the nursery and peeked through the crack in the door. I saw a little baby wiggling around, cooing and babbling in the crib. He had scooted up so his head was stuck in the corner and was waving his skinny arms around and talking to himself.

And I forgot about all the sacrifices I was going to put on my list, and I forgot about what I was thinking about. I forgot what I was going to accomplish right then. I forgot about my dreams and my agenda and my opinions, and that I was even in a body. I just watched my little son, playing in his crib, making happy sounds and fiddling with his blanket. I forgot about myself for a moment.

And I thought, it’s so worth it. It’s worth any sacrifice.

I Don’t Want to Lose Any More Weight

2011-06-02T12:33:00.000-07:00

Fast Food Nation. Supersize Me. The End of Overeating. The Evolution of Obesity.

Nobody wants to be fat.

Okay, so America (overall) is overweight and unhealthy. But the cultural pressure to be skinny, as if being sickly skinny is a good thing, is just as (if not more) unhealthy, in my mind.

I have recently become so disturbed by the carnivorous market motivated by greed, gain, and vanity that capitalizes on and takes advantage of individuals who want to lose weight. The ponzi/pyramid schemes, pop diets, literature, pills, drinks, pre-packaged foods, magazines, advertisements, programs, and exercise plans promising unrealistic results to unsuspecting, desperate, and otherwise innocent people is just so . . . creepy. Some may have value. But the underlying message that you are “less than if you weigh more than” is just so wrong!

I’m one who has been desperate at times to lose weight. I’ve always struggle with my weight, especially in middle school when I weighed 20 pounds more than I do now. I remember wearing a cow-spotted sweatshirt to school once and people laughing at me, like I was a cow dressed like a cow. So it was no surprise that while I was pregnant I had a panic attack during my second trimester freaking out and repeatedly saying, “I cannot get fat!” whilst hyperventilating, imagining myself morphing into the acne-ridden, piggish, Dorito-inhaling adolescent I once was. Well, when you get pregnant, you naturally put on a few pounds.

Turns out that’s a good thing.

Nursing and the life change of having a baby have changed my eating habits quite a bit, as well as my figure. I shed my pregnancy weight gain very quickly—almost too quickly, which I worried about, expressing some concern to my doctor. And now I’m about 20 pounds lower than my prepregnancy weight, and I WANT IT TO STOP.

This is the first time in my life that I don’t want to lose any more weight. It’s affecting my nursing, my energy levels, and my appetite. I worry that Boo isn’t getting as much nutrition as he needs from me. I’m so grateful that he’s eating more solids now and filling out a little. It’s a catch 22 because on one hand, I love my new body, but on the other hand, I do not feel healthy. I feel emaciated, like I’ve had the life sucked out of me.

My perspective about so many things has changed so much now that I’m a mother, and one is the perspective on my body. While I’m so flattered by friends, coworkers, and clients who tell me I’m so skinny, I have great legs, I look like a model, I can’t believe you just had a baby, etc., those compliments that I’ve longed for my whole life have egged me on to not eat as much as I should, especially while nursing.

No good. No bueno.

I have a new understanding of my body as a cafeteria. While I was pregnant, I definitely felt like a restaurant—everything I ate was being consumed by this ravenous fetus in my belly. Now, everything I eat is being consumed by this ravenous baby in my arms. Welcome to Mama’s Café! Have a milkshake!

Anyway, my point is that the body is a beautiful and amazing gift. It needs to be properly cared for, fed, and exercised. Whether you eat too much or eat too little or never exercise or exercise too much or whatever, I hope that 1) you find a healthy balance, 2) you appreciate your body for what it is, and 3) you don’t let evil influences dictate what type of body you should have.

Between being a thick mama or a hot mama (or both!), I’m now thinking, for baby’s sake, being a thick mama is a good thing. We don’t want this cafeteria running out of goods!

Against the Aggrandizing Self

2011-06-01T17:34:00.000-07:00

Perhaps it's because I joined the club of parents recently that I have become a rather intense advocate of "purposeful" families. In other words, having and raising children on purpose and leaving behind a life revolving around SELF. My initial decision to become a mother was challenging, mostly because of fear of the unknown, fear of sacrificing many of my own dreams and pursuits, and fear of failure.

But now that I am a mother, I am even more determined to dedicate all the intellectual, spiritual, and physical energy I can muster towards creating and sustaining a strong, moral family unit.

Today I read two articles with similar themes: this life is not about self. This life is not about satisfying our egos and selfish pursuits. It is not about constant entertainment, money-making, or even the pursuit of happiness. This life is about giving.

It can be said in religious terms, such as Christ's plea, "If you love me, feed my sheep." It can be said at Christmastime by the ring of a bell outside the automatic sliding doors of Safeway. It can be said in a Sunday school class, like during my class a few days ago when I instructed the 12- and 13-year-old girls to reflect upon the scripture, "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall save it" (Mark 8:35).

It can also be said just as well in secular, psychological, intellectual, or even economical terms, such as in David Brooks' article, "It's Not About You," in the New York Times. Brooks encourages recent graduates to disregard the token phrases preached in commencement speeches to "follow your passion, chart your own course, march to the beat of your own drummer, follow your dreams and find yourself."

Instead, he offers these thoughts (emphasis added): "Today’s grads enter a cultural climate that preaches the self as the center of a life. But, of course, as they age, they’ll discover that the tasks of a life are at the center. Fulfillment is a byproduct of how people engage their tasks, and can’t be pursued directly. Most of us are egotistical and most are self-concerned most of the time, but it’s nonetheless true that life comes to a point only in those moments when the self dissolves into some task. The purpose in life is not to find yourself. It’s to lose yourself."

He says it so well.

The second article I read today with the same message was one preached from the pulpit at a BYU conference and published in the most recent Ensign: "Defending the Family in a Troubled World," by Elder Bruce D. Porter.

These quotations rang very true to me:

"One consequence of family disintegration has been a rising generation among whom many no longer seek to perpetuate the cycle of family formation that is at the heart of human existence, and for that matter, at the heart of eternal life. Many young people across our nation, who in the natural course of life should grow up, marry, and rear children, are instead trapped in a world where sexual intimacy is casual, responsibility and long-term commitments are denigrated, and children are viewed as a burden, a distraction from the pursuit of happiness and personal fulfillment. They have lost connection with the divine purpose of mortal life, arriving instead at the sterile apex of the me generation."

"The disintegration of millions of families has taken place in part because popular media and culture have glorified the pursuit of self: of the wholly autonomous individual unconnected with social or moral obligations, free to pursue whatever ends he or she chooses so long as it does not cause direct physical harm to other aggrandizing selves."

Maybe I'm preaching to the choir. Maybe not. The necessity of strong families as the basis of strong societies is no new concept. But maybe you're one who hasn't yet felt how important and essential the prospect and responsibility of becoming a purposeful parent is. Maybe it's not yet your time or you don't have the opportunity. Not all of us will or can. Be even if we are not all parents, we are all children. Sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, cousins, and even friends. We have the opportunity to be advocates of strong families built upon moral foundations, and I urge you to take the challenge.

A Letter to Ellen Knell

2011-05-28T07:28:00.000-07:00

While I'm on a serious trend, I thought I'd be brave and share a letter I wrote earlier this year. This is a letter to Ellen Knell in response to the manuscript of her book, Letters to Erica. Ellen wrote these letters to her daughter, Erica Trudy Knell, after her tragic death in a car accident in early September of 2008. Erica was 17 when she passed away. (Her obituary can be found here.)

The Knells are close friends of the Lambson family, and I had the opportunity to meet the Knell family, including Erica, at the annual multi-family trip to Lake Powell. I didn't get to know Erica very well, but could tell she was a remarkable, talented, and kind individual. She helped me feel welcome as a newcomer at Lake Powell. Later, I was honored to play the guitar and sing at her funeral by the request of the family; I'd given Erica a copy of my album and she had loved it.

Ellen went on to build a school in Ecuador with four other mothers from Park City High School on behalf of their children who passed away that year. Their efforts to raise money and build the school through the Park City 5 organization were featured recently in People Magazine.

It's a long letter, but I'll put it all in one post as letters are meant to be read in one sitting. For me, some of my best writing happens when I'm writing a letter. Instead of writing to the vast abyss of the www or to no one (or myself) in my journals, something good happens when there is honest communication between two people, and especially when that communication is written from the heart with pen on paper. There is a subject in mind, an individual to care for, someone you know will read and feel and even respond.

Especially if you have experienced the loss of a family member, I hope you might get something out of this letter. There are too many sorrows hidden, too many mourners holding on alone. We shouldn't have to pay people to listen to us and to bear our burdens. We need each other. And thankfully, we have each other.

_____________________

Dear Ellen,

How are you? Cheri forwarded me your e-mail saying you are looking for responses to your Letters to Erica. I hope to send you another note with my objective thoughts about the piece as a book, but to start here are my personal feelings and experience with your beautiful collection of letters.

I was unable to put down your manuscript. The more I read, the more I felt connected to you and filled with thoughts to share with you. I tried to stay up all night and finish the letters, but was too distracted by thoughts of what I might share in my own letter to you.

There are two main reasons why I felt so drawn to your letters: one is a question, and the other is the answer.

First, the question. I began asking myself the question when I picked up the bound copy of your letters from the computer desk in the Lambson's study while staying with them over the Christmas holidays. Looking freshly printed and unread, I assumed the spiral-bound manuscript must have been given to Cheri at the Hong Kong Christmas party we all attended.

I flipped it open to a random page, seeing the name "Lewis" all over that page and wondering if it were some kind of sign--I'm always looking for signs. Lewis is the name of our 2 1/2-month-old son, a name that holds a lot of significance to us as the name of both the legendary pioneer who discovered Oregon and the Christian intellectual, the man you were referring to, C.S. Lewis.

That's when I realized, after scanning one page, that I needed to read the entire book. I began reading the letters the following morning as I was home alone with Mallory and Lewis. The rest of the family had gone tubing at Soldier Hollow, but I had opted to stay home and have a date with my baby. After the frenzy of taking Lewis all over the state for what seemed like endless engagements, I was excited to put away his bottle and carseat and spend some quiet time with him just nursing, napping, and reading your letters. Those were my only plans for the day.

When evening came, the family returned, chilled to the bone with clothes dripping with thawing ice from the day's blizzard. They stormed in, bringing the snow in with them, as I was curled up by the fire with my baby sleeping in one arm and your words in the other. I had been in a state of reverie, enraptured by the beauty of both treasures: the soft breathing of the baby and the eloquence, spirit, depth, and hopefulness of your writing. All of it combined to bring me such a great sense of peace and sanctuary.

I awoke from my dreamstate as everyone bustled in from the cold. As Chuck and Cheri took turns sitting down at the fireplace, I asked each of them if they had read your letters, and both of them told me they had read only a few pages and found they couldn't. They said it was just too hard. Too sad, too much. It inspired too many tears.

And that's when I asked myself the question: How is it that I could be so drawn to those grieving words and not find them overwhelming? Shed no tears? Was something wrong with me--do I have no heart? Am I desensitized to sorrow or loss?

It took me about 60 pages of reading to realize the answer, and the second reason why I feel so connected to your thoughts and understanding of loss and grief: you are a mother who has lost a child, and I am a child who has lost a mother.

Somehow, although the relationship is inverse, I navigated the description of your feelings and they seemed so familiar to me. My loss has been different because my mother may in fact still be living, and this, I believe, is the reason why I don't often cry when loved ones disappear. I assume they are still living--somewhere. If not on this earth, surely in the next.

When I was ten years old, my mother left our family, returning to her native home and family in Korea. I have never seen her or spoken to her since. She never left a return address, a phone number, or a hint of where to find her--only a few letters and a Christmas package with candies, clothes, and trinkets during the first year she was away. But after that year and those infrequent letters, I would never hear from her again.

I have never met anyone who has lost a family member the way that I have. I have never found the club of daughters whose mothers have abandoned them this way. My mother didn't die; rather, she chose to leave me, and the sense of abandonment, the depression, the loneliness, and grief associated with her loss became a way of life for me during the first ten years of her absence.

It took ten years for me to become an adult and recognize the reality of my loss and its effects on every facet of my existence. And only when I was old enough to recognize the culmination of so many moments of sorrow that I was broken and shattered in a great moment of both understanding and acceptance. That happened when I was 19, turning 20. My life fell apart and I finally grieved my losses in a way that seemed to kill me from the inside out. I can't explain it, but somehow ten years of sorrow culminated in a breaking point I thought I wouldn't survive.

I traced much of the grief and emotional pain I have experienced in my life back to the loss of my mother. Sadly, she did not die or leave my by accident. She chose to leave me, her daughter.

You write of becoming a member of a club of parents who have lost children. While I sometimes imagine the sorrow of losing a child and can't fathom it (especially now that I have a child of my own), I feel some measure of understanding as one who has lost a member of her family. Perhaps we are members of a larger, less-exclusive club of those who have lost loved ones.

It seems that everyone, eventually, must become a part of this club--none of us live forever, and in this way I feel your book is so important as a piece of empathy for everyone who will inevitably become a member of that larger club: the club of humanity, the group of individuals who must, by necessity, experience both life and death in the ultimate journey to self-realization. No one can escape the reality of death, and unless you live a life void of love, you will very likely lose someone you love during your lifetime.

But I also believe there is something irreplaceable and significant in the bond between mother and child. When the bond is broken, there is no replacing it. I feel, like you, that there is a hole in my life that will never be filled. Who can replace a child? Who can replace a mother? No one. And in that, if I can use the cliche phrase, I feel some of your pain.

When I was very young and my mother had gone, I was told she would return from a visit with her family after a few months. The months became years. I only asked once when she might come back. "Maybe before you start seventh grade," I was told. That didn't happen, and it became clear to me that she wasn't coming back.

I counted the days and months that passed since the day she left. Those months turned into years--one, two, five, eight, ten, and almost fifteen now. Now I have lived the majority of my life without her. Can you imagine that you have lived the majority of your life without Erica, and yet, those years she was with you are infinitely irreplaceable? That's how I feel. My mother is in my blood, and her life with me and without me are so integrated into who I am.

No amount of time passing will be enough to erase the bond between a mother and child. People are oblivious to my loss, especially after so much time has passed. But even though I am okay now--I have overcome the hopeless feelings of abandonment and found hope in the creation of my own family--I can never forget. I don't want to forget, as tempting as it is.

I read your words and felt such strong empathy. I didn't find myself crying with tears of sympathy or sorrow. Instead, I felt the comfort of understanding as the familiarity of loss touched me and made me feel that I finally found someone, a member of that club, who has and is navigating the paths of grief and the confusion of such inexplicable traumas.

It's ironic to me that I am one of those many individuals who runs into you (not often, unfortunately, as we live so far away), at an annual party or trip to Lake Powell and doesn't know what to say to you because you have lost your daughter. I'm one who will awkwardly talk about the weather. (I'm not very good at talking, but I'm pretty good at writing, so here you are.) Even at the funeral, I had no idea what to say, even though I was part of the program. I never knew Erica very well and am simply the wife and daughter-in-law of family friends.

But I understand that life-changing events such as the loss of a family member can't be glossed over or forgotten and shouldn't be. You can't just move on and forget. It seems that I know I have a true friend or someone really knows me if I've shared with them at least the fact (and even, perhaps, my feelings about the fact) that I "lost" my mother as a child and still don't know where she is or if she's alive. It comes up when people ask me about my family or what I'm doing for the holidays. When I got married, a few people noticed my mother was not involved or even seen at the ceremony or events. When I had my baby two months ago, I again felt her absence as I finished the nine month journey without my own mother to share the experience with. Luckily, my life is filled with loving family and friends.

But the point is, even as often as I may try, I cannot forget and want others to know that the loss of my mother is a very important, albeit sad, part of my life.

But despite the sadness, there is beauty in the growth of the heart and the gift of "new eyes," as you wrote about. My new eyes maybe aren't so new anymore; they are simply my everyday eyes. I hope you never lose yours and I don't think you will. A broken heart can heal over time, even becoming larger, even with the cracks and sutures and even holes. There can be more love, more empathy, more vivid memories, more understanding, more wisdom, more maturity. This is the culminating lesson in your book. One can't read it without gaining new eyes of their own by absorbing the wisdom you both gain and share across the year of letter-writing.

What a raw but necessary deal it is to experience opposition in all things or to suffer pain in order to have wisdom or true joy in the end. I hate that I had to grow up so quickly when my mother left, struggling to teach myself how to become a woman and navigate the terrors of adolescence. But at the same time, I am so grateful for it. I learned to be independent, to cook, to take care of a home, and even to write. I was often lonely, and when I felt I had no friends or family with whom I could share my thoughts and feelings, I turned to an empty notebook.

Like your letters to Erica, I found great solace in writing, if not to my mother, to someone--myself, God, my future children, or even no one. I have filled a cedar chest with almost 10,000 pages of my thoughts, thoughts on paper that have helped me sort out my feelings and learn lessons that I couldn't have learned without a pen in hand. There is something miraculous about the written word, and I find clarity and amazing insight in your letters.

As I read your letters, I felt a soft sorrow, not an overwhelming pain. I got misty-eyed, especially when I thought about what it would be like to lose my baby boy, who I've only had the immense pleasure of being with for almost three months--not yet seventeen years.

As I read and pondered over the fact that others felt incapable of reading your letters, perhaps out of fear or perhaps to avoid feeling such pain or shedding so many inevitable tears, I thought about this odd tendency of mine to immerse myself in melancholy. I love sad songs and sad movies and sad books. I like to cry because I rarely do over everyday emotions. I think I have been so drained in the past, sobbing for countless long hours alone--in the car, in my bed, out in nature--that my tears don't come easily anymore, and sometimes I long to feel with such intensity and heart as one does when grieving. But it's exhausting and impossible to grieve constantly or forever.

Maybe tragedies are beautiful to me because they remind me that sorrow couldn't be felt if it weren't prefaced by love. You loved your daughter, that's why you miss her. I loved my mother, despite the drama and hurt that is often part of the mother-daughter relationship. Even though I felt a sense of relief when she left because of our rocky relationship, I missed terribly the necessity of a mother in my life and in our home.

I am a convert to the LDS faith and the primary doctrine that drew me to the Church was the belief in the whole, eternal family. That is what I wanted and what I have created with Sam. I learned in my experience as a youth that a mother is essential to the family. I admire the strength and boundless love I see you have for your daughter. This is what I want to provide for my budding family, my first child, and my children to come.

Like you, I 'm a bit of a night owl. My husband and my baby are asleep. It's late now, and I wrap up my thoughts. I hope you don't mind my sharing so much with you. Mostly, I'd just like to thank you for sharing. To me, the letters are not something I'm afraid or overwhelmed to read. But then again, I only knew Erica distantly--but I feel I know her now through you. I embrace your letters and rejoice in catharsis, healing, and wisdom shared. I feel so inspired and uplifted by the hopefulness and insight in your words. You write beautifully and are an inspiration to me.

Thank you for giving me an excuse to write to you. And most of all, thank you for sharing Erica with all of us. She truly will never be forgotten.

Sincerely,

Liz Lambson

Whose Responsibility Is It to Change the World?

2011-05-24T22:45:00.000-07:00

I have a chance to help someone I don’t know, and I want to take it. No one has asked me to, it could potentially be a heavy burden to carry. But if I don’t step in, who will? Whose responsibility is it to change the world?

I have a son, and I know that while we aren’t perfect parents, we have a lot to offer him. He is in a safe home in a safe (even affluent) community, with all his basic needs met and many people who love him. His parents are college educated, committed to each other, and completely dedicated to raising a family based on principles of morality, hard work, and service to others. Not only are his basic needs met, but he will have opportunities to travel, participate in sports and the arts, receive gifts, give back to his community, and go to college: luxuries that many children in this world do not have.

I spend a lot of time thinking about how many children are brought into this world unintentionally who are so limited in their opportunities to have a healthy, stable childhood and access to a good education. Those are all things we have been blessed with, and now that is what I want to give back to my posterity.

It seems so, so unfair to me that so many children in this world don’t have those basic needs met: two loving parents in the home, healthcare, a good education, proper nourishment, shelter, and clothing.

Not only are the numbers of accidental children in less-than-ideal situations rising, but the number of responsible, educated, and upstanding young adults willing to marry and have intentional children is declining. This means that the potential parents most likely to raise productive citizens in society are the same ones who complain that the population is rising and it would be irresponsible to bring children into the world. They spout research from articles and dissertations proving how irresponsible it is to have children. They are the ones who are educated enough to intellectually talk themselves out of having a family.

So they stand by, scoffing at the less-educated and less-fortunate young adults who choose to have families out of love anyway, or who are teenaged, pregnant, and less likely to provide their children with a stable upbringing.

Basically, this means that the numbers of productive, educated citizens in the world will continue to decline as the number of underprivileged and often troubled youth will continue to rise. What does this mean for the future of our world?

Is it responsible NOT to raise children if you have the means to properly raise and educate them? When we are old and can no longer run the world, who will be left to continue the traditions of morality, education, and good citizenship? Who will take on the responsibilities we have shirked? The elite? The select few? The only ones brave and willing enough to take a chance and change the world for good?

The Quarantine

2011-05-21T15:46:00.000-07:00

Image by Karsten Schneider/Science Photo Library

Spreading potentially lethal pathogens, influenza virus particles (brown) invade cilia (blue) in the airways of the human lung.

I am a pile of disease. Sickface.

I don't know if I've ever been this sick in my life. Three days of miserable bedrest and confinement to my quarantine on the same three days I'm scheduled a bunch of hours at work and have a weekend concert. I called into work three days in a row to say I couldn't make it. Seriously, who does that? I feel like I'm on my deathbed. Sam asks what I need. I say, "More soup, Sprite with ice, and a death certificate."

I don't have some sorry excuse of an illness. This isn't the sniffles, that's the thing. I'm no weakling. I don't often get sick. I'm not just calling into work to get out of work. I'm calling because I can hardly stand up, I'm so pathetically, mind-numbingly, achingly, feverishly, head splittingly sick.

I have the flu. I want to say it's the swine flu so I'll be taken more seriously, like a good hypochondriac does. Here's something I've never understood. When people throw up, they think they have the flu. But throwing up, probably 99% of the time, from my understanding, has nothing to do with the flu. It probably has something to with food poisoning or something you ate or a virus completely unrelated to the flu. I don't even think the "stomach flu" exists in proper terms. I think that's some phrase coined by some mom who thought influenza and the stomach flu were somehow related, which they are not. Here's a wikipedia fact because wiki never lies:

"Gastroenteritis (also known as gastric flu, stomach flu, and stomach virus, although unrelated to influenza) is marked by severe inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract involving both the stomach and small intestine resulting in acute diarrhea and vomiting. It can be transferred by contact with contaminated food and water."

NOTHING to do with influenza. Actual influenza symptoms are more along the lines of high fever, achiness, headache, sore throat, etc. Influenza is what causes pandemics and plagues and kills people and keeps them home from work for several days.

I have the plague!!!!! Ahhhhh!

The influenza virus.

The interesting thing about this bout of disease is that normally when I get a fever, I'll be all achey and cold and shivering and suffering and sad, and then the fever will break, I'll get all sweaty, and it's finally over.

What's interesting this time around is that the fever rises and rises, breaks, I'm pouring with sweat dripping down my face, my neck--even my legs are sweaty. I pretty much need a change of clothes because it's like I just ran five miles and am soaked. But then it starts all over again. The fever doesn't make it all the way down. It breaks, but it starts rising again. It's this cycle that has been going on for three days straight with no end in sight. It's like my body can't beat the disease. It keeps trying to cook the enemy, but it doesn't work, so it lets me have a break and tries again.

This is accompanied by the most ridiculous sore throat in the world. A sore throat is literally my LEAST favorite feeling on earth. I would rather throw up than have a sore throat. I would rather give birth unmedicated than have a sore throat. Totally serious. I used to get these awful sore throats when I was a kid, and the doctors always toyed with the idea of taking my tonsils out, but they never did. Why? Why??? Why didn't they take them out? Why must I suffer this misery, this pain? I can't even swallow my own spit. It's too painful.

The tiny remains of the academic within me, though, combine with the hypochondriac to provide an opportunity for learning. I have the Medscape app on my phone, and everytime I'm the least bit interested, I sit down and read medical articles. Today I read a lot about how antibodies work. Y-shaped protein immunoglobulins attaching and neutralizing antigens and all that. Facts-inating.

Well. Thanks for letting me whine. Stay away from me or you'll be sorry. If you want to live, don't come near me for the next several days. I'll even spare you and I won't go to church tomorrow. I already feel sorry for the people who come to the store where I work on Monday. I have to be there, but they won't even know they're talking with the face of death.

A Year for Change: 2) Video Games

2011-05-19T16:27:00.000-07:00

"Someone has been pissing on my Game Cube and I'm about to close the case."

- Titembay, Garden State

I don't know yet how this will affect our life or if it will at all. Maybe we'll forget about it and never use it, but Sam picked up a Game Cube from a garage sale for $10. It didn't come with controllers. We ordered some on Amazon and are waiting for them, and we're kind of excited about the prospect.

I read somewhere, probably in a magazine, that video games are a good activity for married couples. Unlike watching movies or TV together, it's a way you can both relax in each others' company but actually interact. Sometimes going out or eating out or taking a trip just sounds too exhausting after a long workweek. So, how about some Mario Cart?

Growing up, we played a lot of computer games. I admit it. Nerdy, maybe, but awesome. These were some of our household standards. I wish I could remember more, but it's, you know, ancient history:

• Bats
• Wolfenstein (I can't believe this game exists)
• Oregon Trail
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
• Number Munchers
• Sim City
• Where in the World is Carmen San Diego
• Jill of the Jungle
• After Burner
• Chinese Checkers
• Hexxagon
• Jetpack
• Lamborghini: American Challenge

I found some of these in the DOS Games Archive.

So what are the good games you remember? And what are the good games to play now? Should we someday invest in a better system? The Wii? The Kinect? It's a brand new world for us.

A Year for Change: 1) The Smart Phone

2011-05-17T16:55:00.000-07:00

When New Year's Day came around this year, I felt the same way about 2011 as I did about turning 25: apathetic and prematurely disappointed. Like I mentioned in my birth story, I have a thing for "good" and "bad" digits, and 2011, being the prime number it is, didn't sit well with me.

So what could possibly make 2011 a meaningful year? Make it a year for change.

Not all of these changes happened on purpose or with any intention whatsoever. I don't know if these changes are necessarily "good" or "bad," like the aforementioned numbers. But our lifestyle has changed quite a bit this year, and much of that is due to (can you believe it) technology.

No. 1) The Smart Phone
Sam's company has a deal with Verizon. We were planning to switch over to Verizon once my lame-o Sprint contract was up, which happened at the end of 2010. Around Christmas they had an offer for a free DroidX if you signed up for a new contract. So with a corporate Verizon discount and the free smart phone at our fingertips, it seemed like a good time to take advantage of it.

I have always been very wary of addictive technologies, which is one of the reasons we don't have "cable" television (we have a VCR, DVD player, and Netflix, though). (And do you even call it cable anymore? What I mean is we have a TV, but no channels to watch on it). I really didn't want a smart phone because I knew how addicted I'd likely become. But Sam got it for me without consulting me, explaining that as he has a career in the field of technology, it's important to keep up with the latest doodads to stay on top of things, on the crest of the wave as you might say. I agree with that. I'm okay with that.

Getting the Droid was something like getting our newsed car with doors and functionality in tact. Suddenly you realize what life can be like without a long list of "inconveniences," like the trunk falling on your head when you're unloading groceries or the seat belt not buckling.

Here are a few ways the smartphone has changed my life.

• I can say, "Hey comma Sam exclamation point how's your day going question mark" and it will send him a text saying, "Hey, Sam! How's your day going?" One thing I like about the Droid vs. iPhone (although I don't know about the newest iPhone) is that the text-to-speech feature isn't an app, it's included in the functionality the phone's touch-screen keyboard. That means I can (although I don't) blog from my phone on the go, uploading photos and talking to my phone. I don't do that, but I could, which is wild.

• Facebook. Everywhere. I don't think this is all that healthy, but in a way, I feel better reading a status update in 30 seconds on the go instead of sitting on my butt in front of the computer, stalking people for hours on end. (Now I can stalk people for hours on end anywhere I want!)

• Angry Birds. Enough said.

• Apps. Millions of apps. The ones I use the most are Medscape (a huge huge medical reference collection--I love reading about medicine and diseases, being somewhat of a hypochondriac), the Gospel Library (scriptures and hymns in my pocket? Nice!), Gmail, the Mormon Channel (I'm trying to read the Book of Mormon for my Personal Progress as a YW leader, and listening to the BofM helps me get through it a little faster), Maps (it has a GPS, but I haven't used it yet), Google Reader (to keep up on my friends' blogs), LDS Tools (the ward directory, phone numbers I can click to call, and addresses that link to the maps feature), Wells Fargo, Yelp, and Flood-it. There are so many amazing apps I could probably benefit from, but I'm already a little overwhelmed.

• The camera and video recorder. I've never had a phone with a camera before. It's kinda fun. We record a lot of videos of the baby with it.

• Internet access on the go. Very convenient.

Big BUT
BUT, like most technologies, the smart phone can be used for good and for ill. I like this article by David Carr featured the New York Times, "Keep Your Thumbs Still While I'm Talking to You." Sure, the smart phone is an amazing resource and connection to people and information, especially on the go, but it's also one more gadget that interferes with polite and personal human interaction.

Cell Phone Etiquette
Here's some cell phone etiquette from John Bridge's book, How to Be a Gentleman: A Timely Guide to Timeless Manners (I shared some of this with the youth last year at Etiquette Night):

• Use your cell phone in the most unobtrusive manner possible.
• There is no reason to be obnoxious when using a cell phone.
• Don't flaunt your newest gadgets in hopes of impressing others with social or professional status, especially among strangers. [And here I am, blogging about my smart phone. Yes, I'm being lame.]
• Incessant use of the cell phone/gadget indicates value of the gadget more highly than value of the person in your company.
• Do not force others to listen to or give attention to your phone conversations or phone play.
• If you must receive a call, be indiscreet and don't be a nuisance to others. Places not to talk on the phone? Checkout lines (places people are trapped as witnesses to your conversation), behind the wheel, church services, theaters, restaurant tables (fast food or sit-down), doctors' waiting rooms, etc.
• Don't play with your phone when someone is talking to you.

I admit my phone is definitely addicting, but I make a conscious effort to put it away when I'm with people, and especially if I'm with my giggly baby. Playing with the baby, in my mind, should always take precidence over playing with my phone. Of course, given that I spend all day with Boo, I don't play with him 24/7; I do get on Facebook and play with my phone in his company. But I try to keep my priorities in line.

And if I get a call when I'm with someone (even my husband), I always say, "Do you mind if I take [or make] this call?" if I think the call is important. Otherwise, I dismiss the call without answering. I don't even pick it up to say, "Can I call you back?" because I'm not very good at stopping a conversation once it starts.

Today, at Blast Burger, I was a little distracted though. I couldn't help taking a picture of our faces blown up on the Blast Burger wall and posting it on Facebook while I was with my neighbor, Samantha. I certainly have my weaknesses.

But it's my blog, so I just don't tell you what they are.

What are your thoughts? Does it bother you when people use their phones around you? Do you mind using your phone around others?

Writing Tools

2011-05-16T16:29:00.000-07:00

How does a writer write?

1) Pen and Paper
2) Laptop/Typewriter

If you're wondering what happened to that gift card, it went towards my new little friend: a little netbook primarily for writing. I've been hesitating to get my own laptop, thinking it would be very expensive. This little gadget was $250--affordable, as far as laptops go. Not a bad investment, I think, towards my dream career as a writer.
Last night I returned to one of my favorite activities, typing in bed. I ended up with about 14 single-spaced pages in just over an hour (and, okay, a few of those pages were pasted in from something else). But as much as I love handwriting in my notebooks, I just can't record as much as fast as I'd like to with pen on paper.

And if I could write that much every day in some kind of organized fashion, couldn't I end up with a book? That's the dream. The someday dream. For now, I'm just getting back on the saddle, retraining myself to write fluently, honestly, and in abundance.

I'm also switching gears from my personal hand-written habits and trying out a new system: typing and saving my thoughts in individual documents by date and projects as separate files. Nothing novel. Ha ha. Novel. Get it?

Blogger Crashed?!

2011-05-13T22:36:00.000-07:00

Can you believe Blogger was down for 20.5 hours? Google failed? The entire system was inoperable for almost an entire day? All posts by anyone on Blogger who published since Wednesday were removed and are in the process of being restored?

Fascinating. This probably wouldn't interest me in the least if I hadn't married a tech guru and just watched The Social Network, in which the conversation went as follows:

MARK: Do you realize that you just jeopordized the entire company? Do you realize that your actions could have permanently destroyed everything I've been working on?

EDUARDO: We've been working on.

MARK: Without money, the site can't function. Let me tell you the difference between Facebook and everybody else: WE DON'T CRASH EVER! If the servers are down for even a day, our entire reputation is irreversibly destroyed. Users are fickle.

Here's the scoop according to Blogger.

Forever Plaid

2011-05-13T13:17:00.001-07:00

When I was 18, the summer after my freshman year at BYU, I lived on my own for the first time in Cedar City, playing bass for the Utah Shakespeare Festival in Forever Plaid and in the pit for My Fair Lady. It was something like 75 shows throughout the course of the summer. I just added it to my "100 Things I've Done Before Turning 25" list as something worth remembering.

There I am, a little dot in the background with Daryl on the piano. We didn't have any lines, but played all the backup music for the quartet and got to interact with them a little--make surprised faces and confused faces and smiley faces. At one point, one of the actors came and hid by my feet, and he would tickle my ankles in the middle of the show and I did not know what to do.

And in one of the shows, one of the techies was goofing off and almost dropped this giant moon on my head. What a great time.

For my only acting skills being a Shakespeare play in high school, I felt so cool to be on stage with these pros. Since I was the only girl in this show, I got to share the huge dressing room suite with the lead in My Fair Lady. Her wardrobe was, you know, a little more elaborate.

My dad drove me to the festival and helped me move into my apartment. I lived with a girl on the tech crew and a girl in costuming. I was measured for my wardrobe when I got there, which was simply a pair of black pants, a black turtleneck, and a beret. They wanted me to look like a simple, bass-playing beatnik.

So after every show they laundered my wardrobe and had it waiting for me in my room. I did my own makeup, and since my costuming was so simple, I remember doing a situp and pushup routine every night before I got dressed just to do something useful with all that time. Since the shows were usually at night, all I did during the day was scrapbook, read, jog into the canyon, ride my bike, eat, and practice my bass for a couple hours in the morning.

What was cool is that even though I was just in the background on the set, I got to schmooze with the actors at special parties with high profile people backstage and enjoy the same perks the actors did. And people in the area started recognizing me from the show. Like I was hiking through Zion National Park with some friends, and some random guy popped out of the forest and was like, "Hey, are you the bass player from Forever Plaid? You were so great!" There's nothing so flattering as a stranger in the woods giving you such a complement.

Between that and Motab tours and performances, those were my few minutes of "fame." Not really a big thing, but something fun. Something worth remembering.

Please Vote for Fictionist

2011-05-13T12:16:00.000-07:00

Today is the last day to vote for my friends' band, Fictionist, to get on the cover of Rolling Stone, play at Bonnaroo, and get a recording contract with Atlantic.

All you have to do is rate them with five stars, like them on FB, and tweet about them if you can.

I could give you a hundred reasons why to vote for them and why it's so important to me that you do, but in a nutshell, here's why:

The best kind of friends are those who believe in you, who believe you can reach your dreams. Sounds cheesy, but true. Stuart has been one of those good friends to me, encouraging me to live with a purpose, take chances, and have faith in myself. About five years ago he taught me not only how to play the guitar and write songs, but believe in myself, my ability to achieve, and my potential.

He helped me work on songs and learn how to finger pick. He offered me real encouragement when I was down and out. He helped me and Aaron Hatch when I made my album, Red and Yellow. He encouraged me to keep falling in love with my future husband.

Not only is Stuart super cool and genuine, so are the others. Aaron, the drummer, is so talented. We played in a jazz band together and he is such an incredible musician and such a nice guy. Jacob, on the keyboard, is so awesome and so chill and so groovy. We were all in the music program at BYU. Now they're conquering the world!!!

_________________________

This is picture and a flier from my very first performance of my own music where I got to open for them. It was so, so scary, I remember, to take such personal music that I wrote and start sharing it with people. But it was magical, and making my own music that year was life saving in so many ways.

I even got to sing backup vocals with them, my favorite band!!! (Maxfield!!!!), which has become Fictionist.

And lovely people came to eat hot dogs and sit on our lawn.

It was so cool, to open for Maxfield four times at small concerts. Sometimes I was so embarrassed by my performances, and other times I felt like a real rock and roll star. Over time I stopped writing songs and playing the guitar very much. Maybe I didn't need to anymore. I think it was something that kept me alive that year, during a hard time of growing up, something that kept my afloat. It was a great escape. Now I play the guitar once in a blue moon, like at the ward talent show last week and in my living room on occasion.

But I'd like to keep making music and things and prose and art. Creating has always been a staple element of my existence. Recently, we created a child. Now he is creating his own sounds, movements, and expressions. In addition to helping him create his life now, I hope to always pursue my own creative pursuits. Right now, I have time for the occasional blog post, some sewing, a few orchestra gigs, and some writing on my own. I have my dreams to write books, make more music, and paint. I think those things will happen.

They wouldn't happen though without the people who inspire me. Fictionist is one of those inspirations in my life, and I hope they are in yours too. If anyone deserves to succeed on the merits of hard work and a true love for what they do, it's them.

Vote!

"Stop Trying to Prove Something"

2011-05-13T12:14:00.000-07:00

In response to the last post, a little wisdom from our late prophet's wife, Marjorie Pay Hinckley, in her book Small and Simple Things:

"Fifty was my favorite age. It takes about that long to learn to quit competing--to be yourself and settle down to living. It is the age I would like to be through all eternity."

"I decided that if I lived to be eighty-five I would stop counting calories and eat anything I wanted to eat. And I do! I would make my mother's lemon pie, but I have quit cooking too!"

"We women have a lot to learn about simplifying our lives. We have to decide what is important and then move along at a pace that is comfortable for us. We have to develop the maturity to stop trying to prove something. We have to learn to be content with what we are."

"The trick is to enjoy life. Don't wish away your days, waiting for better ones ahead. The grand and the simple. They are equally wonderful."

100 Things I've Done Before Turning 25

2011-05-13T12:00:00.001-07:00

I turned 25.

I wasn't very excited about it.

For years I've applauded the age of 24 as the "pinnacle of youth," the age of peak intellectual and physical power. So many great writers, artists, and innovators have accomplished their greatest feats before or around the age of 24: Newton, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Einstein, da Vinci, Prokofiev, Liszt, Keats. The list goes on.

Now that I'm 25, I feel like my prime has passed. If I haven't established myself as a young genius or child prodigy, my time is over. I am now in the ranks of the "average adult." None of my future accomplishments will appear extraordinary--if anything, they will be long overdue. It is a little depressing.

Sam mentioned, of course, that in the 18th century the life expectancy was 35 years, so most of these greats were practically on their deathbed. Look how much life I have left to live! Look at the great potential I have to do and become!

I always felt, though, that I needed to accomplish something completely outlandish by the age of 25. I'm not famous, I haven't published a successful book, I haven't completed a doctorate program, and I'm sitting here feeling rather normal. Not superhuman at all. Maybe it's time, at 25, to recognize that I am just one person like every other. And maybe, more than that, it's time to recognize how fruitful and fulfilling my life has been thus far, and expect to find even more fulfillment and joy in the life I have yet to live.

But to make myself feel better, here's what I've done so far in my 25 years of life. I always wanted to live my life so that in case I died young, I could still say I made the most of it. And although I may not have won the Pulitzer yet, at least I can check a few things off my list. Some are simple, some are grand. Some sound pretentious, some seem mundane. But these are things that have made my life worth living for the last quarter of a century (in no particular order of significance).

I have:

1. married in the temple
2. born a son
3. written and recorded a folk album (and how it came to pass)
4. performed in the Sydney Opera House
5. traveled to the following countries: Canada, Mexico, Germany, Austria, Italy, France, England, Scotland, the Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Luxembourg, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Korea, Australia, and New Zealand.
6. gone to Disneyworld and Disneyland (thanks, Dad!)
7. caught a fish
8. read the Bible from cover to cover
9. owned a cat, a beagle, mice, and fish
10. lived in a trailer park
11. lived in an apartment
12. lived in a house
13. gone to the ER
14. slept in a snowcave
15. hiked to Havasupai
16. visited a concentration camp
17. played on movie soundtracks (mostly unheard of movies. The new Joseph Smith movie and Forever Strong, most notably)
18. lived in Georgia, Germany, Colorado Springs, Provo, Cedar City, Orange County, and Lake Oswego
19. cross-country skiied
20. snorkeled in the Great Barrier Reef
21. graduated from BYU with a BA in Music with an English minor
22. been the editor of and written articles for a university magazine
23. worked at McDonald's
24. made a quilt from start to finish
25. won a few art contests
26. kissed seven boys (I wish I could say just one. Now I just kiss one boy. And one baby.)
27. been published in the New Era magazine
28. taken magic lessons
29. learned to play the bass, guitar, and clarinet
30. gone on three tours and recorded a few albums with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir
31. performed with the following artists: Gladys Knight, Michael Martin Murphy, Sissel, Peter Cetera, Maxfield (now Fictionist), Renee Fleming, Aaron Hatch (Fresh Big Mouf, Eyes Lips Eyes) (P.S. do you like I how I use you to leverage my coolness), and Audra McDonald.
32. traveled all over the U.S.
33. slept in a tent by myself in the snow
34. survived a nervous breakdown
35. learned to cook
36. dyed two boys' hair
37. converted to Mormonism
38. performed as a jazz singer
39. written approximately 10,000 pages in personal journals (now in a cedar chest in the hall)
40. composed a hymn
41. seen Bach's grave
42. had sex (hence the baby)
43. eaten shark, caviar, cold octopus legs, anchovies, foie gras, and a lot of unidentifiable foods
44. watched a meteor shower from my convertible at night
45. walked on (and fallen into) a frozen lake
46. run a 5K
47. had my own dressing room at the Utah Shakespeare Festival
48. gone to Space Camp
49. seen Bill Cosby
50. met three of the current apostles
51. been smiled at by President Hinckley
52. had my portrait drawn
53. learned Spanish
54. made homemade root beer
55. attended a session of congress
56. been in love
57. pulled several all nighters
58. danced (partnerless) at a gay club
59. taught many music students
60. tuned many, many autoharps
61. won a Spanish children's book contest
62. flown in a plane
63. sang solo in front of an audience
64. asked a boy on a date
65. been asked on a date
66. driven the PCH
67. borrowed a stranger's unlocked bike and returned it
68. grown a garden
69. had psychotherapy
70. given a public speech
71. been president of the National Honor Society
72. owned a convertible
73. been to a Blink 182 concert
74. gone golfing
75. had pedicures and massages
76. face painted and had my face painted
77. ridden a horse
78. tried surfing
79. swam in the ocean
80. gained and lost the weight I gained
81. skipped 4th grade
82. been a nanny
83. climbed a tree
84. changed a diaper (and a few more)
85. laughed until I cried (many times with Sam)
86. quit a job I didn't like
87. been a National Achievement Scholar
88. milked a cow
89. had a plaster cast made of my face (thanks, Maria)
90. pretended to be British when meeting a stranger
91. taken my grandma on a road trip
92. learned karate and yoga
93. had my legs waxed
94. missed a credit card payment
95. taken watercolor classes
96. ridden on a motorcycle
97. fired a gun
98. skipped class
99. busked at farmers markets
100. lived to tell the tale

Will I have a new list this long between 25 and 50? 50 and 75? Maybe. Maybe not. I think it's time though, to base my quality of life on who I am and not the things I do. Not to say the things you do don't spice up your life. But they aren't what matters most.

Now, maybe it's time to switch gears and help my children live their lives to the fullest. After all, I believe I've had my fair share.

But, au contraire, is there anything I can personally look forward to now that I'm 25? If you're older than 25, I'd really like to know.

Remembering Mother's Day

2011-05-09T23:43:00.000-07:00

I usually don't celebrate Mother's Day. It passes by. I send a card to my grandmother sometimes. I think about my mom a little bit, and wonder what other people are up to. Brunch? Dinner out? Flowers? Or maybe it's just another day like every other day.

Sometimes I forget what my mom looks like. You know, like the details. Smiles, facial expressions, the way the eyebrows go up and down. I honestly own like five photos of her, so I thought I'd scan three that I rummaged up.

She's very pretty, I think. I don't remember exactly what her voice sounds like, but I know it's sing-songy. She had a beautiful voice and sang a lot at home. I don't remember many of her mannerisms. Over the years I've found myself remembering less and less of her. Mother's Day is a good time to remember.

1983. I have and still wear the sweater she's wearing in this picture. It's the warmest sweater I own. I don't know why I hold onto some of her clothes: a few t-shirts, a dress, a couple sweaters. They're some of the few things I can't get rid of, like some of the only proof I have of her.

I think this is sweet. My mom when she became a mother. I found this picture a couple years ago.

I like this picture because she looks like fun, and like she's having fun. She was so creative at home, very crafty, very energetic, always extravagant in her meal and party preparations. I don't have many memories of her really having a good old time. She took things very seriously, like me, I think. Sometimes I have trouble relaxing and having a good time. I'm glad I married Sam because he teaches me to laugh, to enjoy life, to let go a little.

And here's me as a mom now. Yesterday was my first Mother's Day, and it was nice. I didn't have any overwhelming or profound thoughts or emotions about motherhood. I was sick, but pulled myself out of bed to meet Sam at church. Sam was sweet and got up early to pick up the house before a meeting with the Deacon's Quorum Presidency. If there's anything I appreciate so much, it's a clean home and a meal I didn't have to cook. Sam made me a hot dinner as well. I loved it.

Motherhood is wonderful, and I suspect I'll have a greater understanding of what it means to be a mother as more time passes. In the meantime, I am so enamored by our son. I stare at him all day; I can't understand how someone can be so adorable, so irresistible to hold and be with. He is a calm, smiley baby. He smiles for everyone, knowing how to make people feel good about themselves. He is a strong influence for good in my life, giving me a great sense of purpose. I need to sacrifice to feel fulfilled, and I do.

It feels good to have a purpose. I always want to feel useful, loved, loving, giving, and important, and being a mother makes me feel that way. It's a real role to take on, not an act.

I'm still learning what it means. All I know is that motherhood is powerful stuff. It lasts forever. It's in your blood.

My Running Wishlist

2011-05-09T15:59:00.000-07:00

In the back of my journal or the notepad I keep in my purse, I usually jot down items on my running wishlist. For Mother's Day, I got one of those VISA gift cards with about $50 to spend on anything I'd like, and I'm racking my little brain trying to decide what to get. Like if you want to play a nice trick on me, send me a gift card to a stationary store and watch me walk in circles for hours and hours and hours.

So here are some things that I want, and I need a little help deciding. What should I get???

• Makeup
I never budget for makeup, but of course I buy it. I never leave home without putting on Clinique's Really Black eyeliner. It stays on really well. I've never worn mascara because my eyelashes are so short and practically nonexistent, so eyeliner is my must-have. Maybe I should stock up?

• Clothing
With a %50 discount at the designer clothing store where I work part-time, this seems like a no brainer. I've now worked there for over a year and even though it is tempting to spend my paycheck on clothes every week, I feel good about the fact that I've resisted that temptation and used maybe half of that money for more practical things.

Don't get me wrong though, my wardrobe is slowly being taken over by my employing brand, and I do buy clothes all the time. I'm slowly weeding out the clothing items still lingering in my closet from my high school days, replacing them with better quality wardrobe essentials.

BUT, I buy clothes all the time now. Shouldn't I treat myself to something different for a change? Or should I get some summer clothes and get the most bang for my buck?

• Shampoo
The only shampoo I like and have used for years is Back to Basics Coconut Mango Shampoo for course, dry hair. Since I usually wash my hair once or twice a week, I don't mind spending on salon shampoo since it takes me, literally, like a year to get through a big bottle. Funny thing, I went to Trade Secret, the only place where I could find this shampoo, to get another big bottle, and the clerk said "Um, we discontinued Back to Basics about a year ago." So, that goes to show that I really don't buy shampoo very often. So, maybe I should order more online with my gift card.

• A Retro Coffee Table
I got our current coffee table at the Goodwill Outlet where you buy things buy the pound. It's nice-looking, but it's broken in so many places (glued together by Sam). But another leg broke off last week and I think I want a more modern coffee table to go with the coogly couch I'm obsessed with. Maybe I could find one for $50 at one of Portland's vintage shops?

• An NPR/OPB Membership
The membership drive is going on right now and they're very convincing. Maybe I should give them all my money and enjoy an OPB waterbottle?

• A Used Laptop
I love to write, and I love to write in bed. Unfortunately, I dropped our laptop almost two years ago and haven't been able to do one of my favorite things (type in bed) for a long time. I've been thinking about getting a used laptop on Craiglist and use some of my pocket money from my gigs/part-time work for it. But I can't use my gift card on Craigslist.

Nautilus Lamp

• Lighting

Even though it's May, it's still dark and gray and I've had the lights on during the day today. We've been meaning to get more lamps/lighting for our living space. I've been thinking about getting a hanging lamp/lighting solution/funky chandelier for the dark corner of our living room. Lamps are expensive, so I've been putting it off for a long time. And I feel like our living space is cluttered, so that makes me hesitate too. But light is good. It's important in this gloomy place. Would that be a good investment?

• A Rocker Recliner
Probably unrealistic with a gift card (but realistic on Craigslist, perhaps)?

• A New Soft Bass Case
Zippers and straps are broken. Maybe it's time?

• Food
A nice meal out? $50 worth of salmon?

• A Massage
I LOVE massages and haven't had one in years. It's something so frivolous and fleeting, so I never feel like I can splurge on such an intangible pleasure. Would it be worth it?

The $250 Rowenta Professional Ironing Board

• A Nice, Sturdy Ironing Board
Now that I do Monday Cleaning and actually iron every week, I feel ready to ditch the wobbly $5 Target ironing board for a real woman's ironing board. Maybe that's a dorky thing to wish for. Dorky, but true.

• A Quiet, Powerful Vacuum Cleaner
Boo is afraid of the vacuum cleaner all of a sudden. He really loses it when I turn on the vacuum. I'm not a big fan of our cheap Dirt Devil anyway--I kinda blows as much dust around as it sucks up. When I worked at the quilt shop I would vacuum the shop with the most amazing, quiet, and extremely powerful vacuum cleaner. I wanted to take it home with me. Someday, when we have more than 800 square feet to vacuum, this might be a more realistic investment.

• Tomato Garden Supplies
There really may be nothing I love more than real, meaty, red, sweet, homegrown tomatoes. This would be one of those gifts that keeps on giving. I could go for that.