Barbie girl

When I was about 6 years old, I had a barbie who, I was convinced, grew her hair longer every day and for some reason, it really bothered me. I told my mom and she said if I cut it, it wouldn't grow back. I knew it would, and I didn't want her hair to keep growing unchecked. I'm pretty sure it was a beach barbie, so her locks went to her ankles.

Stubborn as I was, even then, I took matters into my own chubby hands and gave that amazing barbie a bob. I lopped her hair off in one fell swoop of kitchen shears. After I cut her hair, she was not as pretty and I told my mom that my barbie was ruined. She told me it was my own fault for not listening to what she had told me and said it was just tough luck.

A couple days/weeks later, we got new barbies. My sister Sarah got to pick which one she wanted first. I think it was her birthday and the neighbor boys had thrown her barbie onto the roof, but we both got new barbies for some reason. I remember being a little miffed about her picking first, especially since I had such an ugly barbie now, but fair's fair.

Through the years, I have often rediscovered my ruined beach barbie. The barbie with bobbed locks. I remember cutting her hair and instantly regretting it. I remember the paranoia of her monstrously fast hair growth and feeling the need to stop the madness. I felt the need to make things right with the world.

Perhaps that is why I now look at others' haircuts and think about what they could do differently, or what I approve of in their style. I have been going au naturale lately with my hair- ever since my haircut. It has been looking pretty crazy lately, and yet..Charles still loves me. I, who couldn't love my barbie after her bob, met a guy who tells me I'm beautiful even when I go 4 days without a shower. Now a regular occurrence. You're welcome.

Isn't unconditional love wonderful?

Today a telemarketer called our office and right before I transferred him to voicemail, the man asked me "Why is your voice so sweet?" And I was like "Whaaaa? Oh, because I was born with this voice." So then he said it was perhaps because I ate so many almonds and honey. Afterwards, he commenced saying he knew we were based in California and that in India they label their sweet almonds as California almonds now. Then he asked me what my Christmas plans were. I told him I was going to visit my husband's family. Weirdness.

Maybe he thought if we chit chatted he could pitch his service to an actual person instead of our HR person's voice mail. No chance honey man. I've already got somebody who keeps me away from dangerous nuts and buys me expensive honey (the kind with honeycomb in the jar).

I shouldn't be surprised that I get such questions. After all, my little sister Bon has the sweetest little voice you've ever heard and she has Snow White's song down to a T. Go ahead, ask her to sing it for you. Might as well ask about Last Christmas too. I don't know how, but she has all the words down.

This may or not be the kind of caterpillar that made a cocoon above our water bag (used to keep flies away). Our caterpillar is green though, so maybe not? I want to know what kind it is, so if it's bad, I can kill it. Any caterpillar enthusiasts that can tell me if our green caterpiller with grown back spots is good or bad?

Hoots-

I don't have any of my own kids, but I know a lot of kids. Which kind of means I have a lot of kids, since everyone knows if you know a kid, you have a kid. Glad we're clear on that.

Anyway, Charles and I have been teaching the wolves on a weekly basis and they are a riot. Last night we were doing skits and afterwards had the boys explain what they did and what they could have done better.

Luke and Cooper were in one group acting out what you should do if you see a burglar enter your neighbor's house. I almost died laughing when as they explained in short phrases what they were doing, taking turns, Luke clapped Cooper on the shoulder and said "I'll take it from here." Then Cooper waited a couple of seconds and clapped him on the shoulder saying "Ok, I'll take it from here." It was so politely done and we all had a good laugh.

All of the skits were done expertly and we were impressed with their ingenuity and acting prowess. I hope my boys can be so polite and listen with such respect.

Saturday we got our lemon on at home with lemonade and lemon curd. Yesterday I took lemon bars and cinnamon rolls to work as a bribery tactic. We have 170 cards to sign at work and it's always rough to get everyone to sign the monthly birthday cards, much less the mass quantity of Christmas cards. The bribery worked to some extent and we have 17 of 40 signatures. 23 to go.

We have a squash box of them and half have gone to rot and ruin, so I'm trying to save them. I mean, you can only eat so many lemons..and I didn't want to fill the whole fridge, so most of them are still in the open air. Sorry little lemons.

In our back yard, by our shriveled up leaves, is the compost heap. Sadly, it cultivates more gnats than dirt for us. Boo. So bugs have eaten all our leaves and the garden is a sad failure. Also, lots of gnats fly into our house, so we live in a perpetual gnatting hill. Also, I may or may not have broken our kitchen light cover because I was swatting at them. In my defense, it was very easily cracked and almost fell on my head. Bother bother.

Water is the essence of beauty-

You are probably wondering "What in the wide world is that?" Well, we drink lots of water at SMS Masterminds and, since I sit next to the water cooler, people always ask me who drinks the most water. Since that consistent question has started wearing down my patience, I decided to find the definitive answer (I don't have kids yet, so my powers to suppress annoyance at someone asking the same question over and over have not yet developed). So we put up a tally sheet and have been marking tallies of water consumed this week and will continue until the end of next week. The item pictured below is the trophy our bibber will receive. If you won this contest, you would definitely deserve something at least this cool. 

Note: If you decide to do a similar contest, please measure the water in ounces. Due to the competitive nature of the participants here (high achievers), there has been no small discussion of cheating and equal terms for everyone. The latent problem solving skills in me have been stirring. Lesson learned.

I also promised you pictures of the giant framed landscape hanging above our bed. Here it is, a picture of the fridge sized landscape that could kill us any time now. Pictured underneath, in the perfect spot for a good crushing, is Charles Ward, my special angel. Look at that sweet face. 

Also, he made a glider for one of his classes. They were supposed to have a flight contest with fellow classmates tomorrow morning, but it has actually rained here for the second time this year. So we are grateful for the rain and will see the glider contest sometime in January. Woot. Now, take a second to imagine that beautiful ornamental glider hung to the right of the significantly sized landscape on our bedroom wall. That's right, it has been placed just so in anticipation of its first official flight. Definitely my idea.

Geronimo-

Jump out the window! Well, don't, because it's raining outside and you're not likely to bounce in the rain. Usually though, a great idea.

We watched and cared for some cats over the Thanksgiving weekend in exchange for a real bed. One cat was named Lightening and the other Ally. Lightening was older and white. She drooled when petted and shedded comforters worth of hair to boot. Ally was a friendly kitten that loved attention and her little toys. She also loved to torment Lightening, so she was not allowed into Ally's room.

Cat toys- Ally's toys were suspended from what looked like the end of a downsized fishing pole. There were two- one that looked just like a mouse when it was quickly moved back and forth and the other a bird. She could have played with her two fishing poles for hours. Too bad she needed a person to move them for the true effect to go into play. Lightening had not toys, but would meow for you to pet her whenever you entered her room. She reminded me of our barn cats that we loved dearly. Who wouldn't? They ate all the mice. Well, all the ones they could get to.

The mice in the corn/chicken feed were inaccessible to them. Those mice would just run around in the feed bins when we reached in to feed the chickens. That's why we didn't like going into the barn at night- nobody wants their hand bitten off by mice. Blurgh. Shivers.

They were affectionate and delightful cats. However, after four days of scooping poop, I can safely say I will never own an indoor cat. How could I possibly with such a smell wafting past my nose every time I fished their poop out of a bunch of rocks and deposited the clumps into plastic bags. So gross. The only way it could happen, would be if I could potty train my cat to poop into the toilet. Then I might, but that is a strong if. Actually, there is a way to do it- check out Pinterest to see how.

Anyway, besides having to take out the litter, I'm just too lazy to pet a cat and play with it all the time. Plus, half my friends and family are allergic, so they would never come over to visit me. Then, if Charles and I ever wanted to take a trip, we'd have to find someone to care for our cat. It's not so easy as it sounds.

Cats might also eat our baby. Oops, too late. See- no baby. And that's why Charles and I will probably never have animals.

On the other hand, I would like to say Facebook has deviously planted many films of adopted animals that needed good homes and so when Charles gets an outdoor dog, we will probably get one from a shelter. I know, I said we wouldn't, but there are two people here and one of them would rather have a dog than a goat. You don't have to milk dogs.

I feel like there has to be a happy go between- like if I had to milk the goat more than once a month for a year, I would have full reign to sell it like Anne or just to make it unexpectedly into goat burgers. Charles: "Where's Franny?" Me: "Look at the chart. It's filled with tallies. You know what that means. I made her into goat stroganoff. You can enjoy her all week, no hassle." Then we'd be done with it because he would know the triumph of owning a goat, and he would finally get to say he ate goat. Goat for you Charles!

When I was younger, I wanted a dog. Actually, I wanted a puppy. Big difference. Puppies are so cute. Dogs are crazy. Anyway, for Christmas my brother Neal wrapped a round mermaid sled in butcher paper and drew a dog on the outside. He also glued together popsicle sticks and pasted one of his school pictures onto the front, cut in the shape of a dog head. So that Christmas I got two fake dogs. Thanks Neal.

We ended up getting a big dog sometime that year. He was a dog named Major and he was not a nice doggy. He would bark and didn't like to be petted. Then one day he was gone. He ran away from us into the Missouri abyss and we never saw him henceforth. My mom said he ran back home probably, but his family had moved. See Homeward Bound.

If we had a dog, Charles would love it and pet it and rock it to sleep. Too bad we have no room, but sorry dogs of the world, his love is all mine.

Well bury me in your chip bag remnants-

Gross actually, but I usually wonder what to do with the salt accumulated at the bottom of chip bags and cracker boxes. Perhaps some hardy raccoon is licking them up as I write these speculations. Perhaps they just juice together with old trash bags and dry all retired goods into a crust of abundance.

I always think about where I can put this salt to good use. We don't have any horses, so nobody is around to lick all that excess salt up. You can't just drink it. I'm telling you, that was not a question. It's ok really, because we don't eat many chips or crackers- so we don't run into my Depression era sensibilities much with that conundrum. Thank goodness.

Charles is a sweet man who instead of getting mad, gets even. Thanks for being a genius AND patient with me. We crazy people can only get so far on intelligence fumes. Meanwhile, the blue sheets I've mentioned in previous posts could and totally do double for a spider's web, since we always get wrapped up in them and I feel the claustrophobia closing me into the abyss of..wait, I wanted to get those. They were so soft.

Last night I dreamed I was working at McDonald's again- just like during high school. I was late; in my dreams I am always panicking about something. Also, I had quit my current full-time job to make fancy animals. Thanks for encroaching into my dreams Mom.

The tub turkeys have flown the coop and may have dribbled onto our bathroom rug- to the laundry with you, bathroom rug. It happened this morning as Charles was taking the turkeys out of their old bags and putting them into new, dry bags. It hurt me to see all those bags in the trash, but I've been saving my  chip salt, so I'm doing my part. For now.

Table this-

Charles and I have decided to buy a dining room table. Why must we have a dining room table? The same reason we need a couch- to sit at for food time. Currently we have a tiny square table that only fits four people and no food. So we have decided this will be the week to do it. This week's Black Friday after all and we are hoping to find some fresh deals- isn't that the feeling you get from the name Black Friday? I don't know why, but for me it seems to bring feelings of foreboding and death. Why couldn't it be yellow deal Friday? Anyway, who cares? I never shop around on that day.

I'm eating an almond snickers as we speak. Well, you're not speaking. All I hear from your end is radio silence. That's ok. We can always catch up on Facebook later, even though we never do, because Facebook is like a giant grocery store where everyone is always window shopping and never buying anything. Since that's what I usually do at clothing stores, sounds like my kind of place.

Yesterday Charles and I had a cowboy salad for lunch. We couldn't find any cowboys to add, so it's mostly beans and corn. It says to serve it cold in the recipe, but since I love my Mexican food warmed up, it gave me the chills to eat it chilled. Next time, I'm warming it up. Blah. Besides that it was good.

We also finally put the artwork in our bedroom onto the walls. We've only lived here since July. What's 4 months with a giant landscape sitting in the corner of your bedroom? Nothing I say. Actually, Charles might call me a liar on that one, since I was the hassler trying to get the art up onto the walls. I didn't want to do it myself- the art would surely have crushed me during the hanging, thereby breaking me and our bed it was hung above in one massive stroke. I say massive because the painting is easily the size of Maryland...or our refrigerator, but sideways.

I'm also researching what makes something cool. Do you have any suggestions? Here is my current list- I'm trying to stay partly away from hipster trends- too young to be in my state of cool perhaps?

1. Mustaches
2. Mullets
3. Ninjas
4. Toupees
5. Peanut butter
6. Knives
7. Goats- Unfortunately
8. Cats
9. Ugly clothes
10. Mad skills- any kind
11. Puns
12. Friendliness
13. Kindness

Which list actually does not help me in any way to make cool stocking stuffers this Christmas. I will prevail. I will conquer cool this Christmas. 

I know, Thanksgiving is coming up. Don't I know it. I finally get to see all my friends I haven't seen in 4 months and my Kitty Kat- who has completely forgotten me and has already begun to run. How dare she! It just makes me want to see more babies around and have one on hand. You know, just to cuddle. Everybody loves baby cuddles. 

We'll probably also watch some movies over Thanksgiving and eat loads of turkey and other delicious things. How could you not?

Tomorrow Charles is helping with our community Thanksgiving dinner for the homeless. That means today we had 8 turkeys bobbing in our bathtub, thawing out for Tday. What? You don't do that?

Happy Birthday to my niece Sally last week and to Annette this week. It seems like only yesterday they were born and adorable. Now they're getting taller and more beautiful. It's so weird to have such grown up nieces and nephews, but so it goes.

My mom recently asked what our favorite movies/books were. She said to count series' as one book. So I did. These are mine..kind of. It's hard to pick favorites when you watch/read so many. In no particular order:

Books

1. The Blue Castle
2. Poison study series
3. Storm Testament series
4. Jane Eyre
5. Alvin Journeyman series
6. Ender series
7. The lost Gate series
8. A tree grows in Brooklyn
9. Life of Pi
10. The Miracle of Forgiveness
11. Atlas Shrugged

I haven't read Atlas Shrugged since high school though, so it's been a while, but I remember I could hardly put it down.

Movies

1. You've Got Mail
2. Wild Target
3. Pride and Prejudice
4. Anne of Green Gables/Avonlea
5. Wild Hearts can't be Broken
6. Groundhog Day
7. The Scarlet Pimpernel
8. Indiana Jones
9. Deja Vu
10. Robin Hood- the cartoon

Stop judging me because I didn't put Star Wars. There are lots of movies that I like that didn't make the list. It only goes to 10 and I added movies I can watch over and over with a heart full of love, quoting them shamelessly along the way. I also tried thinking of movies that delighted me the first time I watched them and continue to do so.

Pill shaver-

You probably don't even know what a pill shaver is. Well, perhaps I'm not giving you enough credit. What is it?

No, silly. It does not shave the pills you eat. It shaves the tiny balls of lint off your sweaters/sheets that accumulate when you don't want to have to pick them off one by one by one. It's been a long time coming.

Charles would tell you, I'm pretty weird about my covers and sheets. Whenever he gets tucked into the sheets, I reach over and untuck him. When the 5 layers of sheets, comfort, warmth, and style we call our boudoir get into disarray, I smooth them back underneath the pillow nest until our nightly appointed slumber.

Lately, the blue sheets- not the pink cupcake sheets- have gathered together a mutiny of pills by our designated foot area. You may think  "Big deal. Who cares? What's the problem, Boblem? Well I care, and it's been driving me nuts. Pecans not the other kinds, because I'm allergic to some of those. Anyway, I could never pick them off one by one. They're too small and I have tiny arms. I don't think you thought this through. Master. And besides that, I don't have that type of patience. Out of all my projects, have you ever noticed any homemade miniatures for my (whispered) shadowbox? No, it stands empty on our crafting table, taunting me every time I look inside.

So last night, I got all crazy when I changed the cupcake sheets over to the blue set and got out our new...ba da da da!!!!! pill shaver. It worked like a charm. I can't wait to use it on that flesh colored sweater I own that's notorious for pill accumulation. That sweater has a serious drug problem.

Actually, I have to come clean for a second. Our (whispered) shadowbox is not completely empty. It currently has some rings from Ashley's Halloween cupcakes- they were super cute. It also currently displays some mini candy boxes from Jacob and Katie's wedding reception- they're shaped into little groom and bride bodies. Super cute. Perhaps it will become our holiday (whispered) shadowbox.

Tonight we are going to an ice cream social. Unfortunately, I've become a bit of an ice cream snob. In my younger days I loved ice cream. Due to some tifs and misunderstandings between me and ice cream, we have become less easy friends and have become more awkward acquaintances that text every once in a while. I have become more of a connoisseur and less of a gorger. How in the world did I spell connoisseur right on the first try? Let it be recorded I wrote that word correctly the first time. That must be some kind of record. Get this girl some ice cream.

However, let it be Tillimook Mudslide or some such lovely flavor, not Rocky Road or pistachio. I know, those other kinds have nuts, so I shouldn't eat them anyway, but those nuts always seem to stick in one's molars for hours before becoming unceremoniously dislodged by a person's (hopefully) nightly flossing regime.

Charles recently talked a stranger lady into trying TM while looking over her shoulder to see if it was on sale during a recent visit. That one loves ice cream. And I fear, I have also begun passing on the snobbery to him. Woe. Woe to the land of ice cream. Unless ice cream does not like to be eaten, but such is the purpose of food, so it must be in want of consumption. Wot. Otherwise, what would be its purpose and meaning? The meaning of life for ice cream is delight. Not a knife fight. Sticky. I do not like being sticky. Picky. Quite.

And what's the deal between moths and butterflies? Why does the ugly cousin get such a bad rap? You see a butterfly and think "I live in a magical wonderland". You see a moth and thi-SMASH!!! No more moth. I would have to admit that butterflies are majestic and colorful. You never see butterflies in your house, eating your sweaters- with and without pills- and living in old bags of wheat. Bleeh. It just gives me the shivers thinking about moths. The moth pictured below is known as the red velvet moth. Actually, I made that up. But doesn't it remind you of red velvet cake? Yeah, like I said.

Next time I see a moth, I'm going to say "Hey moth, go get butterfly. We love him. Bring him over and you can totally hang with us." Then SMASH. Seriously, you win twice. First, because you have a magical woodland creature flying around you because, for the love, you killed his cousin. Second, you got rid of a pesky moth. What's not to love about this scenario. You even get a fresh batch of glitter out of the deal because everyone knows that's where glitter comes from. Haven't you ever killed a moth? It's a sin to kill butterflies.

On my mission, my companion would kill butterflies. Then she would encase them in clear tape and make them into bookmarks. I would just pick up dead butterflies I saw on the street. Weirdly, instead of picking up coins on my mission from the street- almost never happened- I would find flowers and butterflies and put them into my weekly planner. That's what I did on the road.

These days I don't pick up change in the parking lots and on the ground. For some reason, I feel like money in California is dirtier than Missouri money. Is that Statist of me? Anyway, I will only pick up coins of a nickel or more. Or perhaps, instead of changing areas, it is more a change in my state of mind. I have grown up a little bit. High minded and the like. You know how I do.

Apparently this is a trend evidenced not only by my inability to ignore pills, but also in my ice cream preferences. I enjoy nice things. So sue me. Actually, I've said this before, but don't. I'm not as rich as the ice cream I prefer.