See you there?

I'm going to Utah today. Going to the BYU with all the other ladies for the Women's Conference. I'm pretty excited, and not just cause I get a break from kids.

The other reason is I get a break from P90X.
Oh. And all the nice classes they provide are lovely, too.

In the past, my goal has been to eat my way across Utah County, but I am going to admit, this hasn't brought me as much gastrointestinal joy as I had hoped. So I am hoping to take it easy this year. I am only going to eat creamery milkshakes, mint brownies, five courses with four desserts, and pastrami burgers if I feel like it, and not just because it is the right thing to do.

This is what I look like right this minute. If you see me there, say hello to me. I would like to shake your hand.

You double dog dare me?

Hi there again. I'm back because I realized that I like it when bloggers post stuff even if it isn't super interesting, so I'm thinking I should try that for awhile. Because I'm trying new stuff and it's working for me. Just like how I took your advice and got off my treadmill and started P90x and stopped eating buns on my In-n-Out burgers, which always seemed really stupid to me in the past but is actually medium tasty, and now, thanks to you, I've lost 2 pounds! I'm pretty full of myself these days (but sadly, completely empty of delicious bread, cookies, and treats of all sorts, so also pretty cranky) because of my recent success, and so now I have a new and open-minded view of the world; so, if you've secretly always wanted to dare me to do something crazy, this is your chance!

But what's that? You need more information? Like weird stuff I've already done, and gross stuff I absolutely won't do?  Let me help:

I have already eaten snails. Dozens of them. I find them, like everything else in garlic and butter, delicious. Ditto frogs.

I will fer shur doll myself up 1950s style, and start drinking and smoking:

Mad Men party

I won't eat live bugs.
I will consider eating dead bugs which have a heavy milk chocolate coating.

I've already been swimming in the submarine lagoon at Disneyland. This was in the pre-Nemo days. I wanted to wave at the people on the ride (spoiler: you did not really go 20,000 leagues under the sea), but a cranky old lady at the Kodak Special Moments photo opportunity site ratted us out us to a kind Disney employee, who begged us to stop molesting the giant animatronic clams, but didn't kick us out of the park. Even better, nobody contracted Hepatitis!

I will totally wear a coconut bra on my birthday:

Or to the ward Halloween party.
Will I wear a pencil skirt? No. Grass skirt? Yes.

I will not have another baby on a dare.
But if you have a baby, I will go to the hospital and take 200 photos of it within 2 hours of its birth:

Introducing my new nephew, Liam Taylor N., who joined us March 29th

I will not let you lock me in a box with lives scorpions (or snakes). Or even bunnies.

I do not want to be locked in a box.

I think I already tried para sailing. I honestly can't remember if I went, or if I just sat on my cabana chair in Cancun and considered it. That's weird, right? But it was a really good vacation, and I was so relaxed and guacamole-stuffed I was in a low-grade coma, which might explain the amnesia.

I will not get a Brazilian wax.

I will put that Brazilian wax on my hair to make it straight and shiny. (Does this confuse anybody else?)

I will also get my whole family up in western wear, but I will choose to be a 'proper lady', and not a 'naughty madame'.

To sum up, I am willing to try all sorts of new stuff, especially if it involves dressing up and looking ridiculous, "bringing it", photographing it, or wrapping it in lettuce. But I am unwilling to try new stuff involving bugs and reptiles or tight spaces.

So what do you dare me to do next?


What about you? What have you done on a dare? 
(I especially want to hear about the things of which you are ashamed.)

I hate my treadmill. But I love cookies.

So, hello there friends!

It seems like forever since I've been here. That's because time goes very slow when you're not eating cookies. See, to you it probly feels like no time at all has elapsed. You've got a cookie in your fist right now, dontcha? It's peanut butter, isn't it?

So, yeah, it's still Lent, so I'm cookie-free. Except one time, I accidentally ate like half a sleeve of oreos before Jake was like: Hey, aren't those cookies? And I was like, oh yeah, I guess they are. I mean, they are cookies in the way chocolate chips are chocolate. But then I stopped eating the alleged "cookies", and I've been clean ever since.

And since Rice Krispie Treats are clearly TREATS (is in the title), I don't have to tell you about the pan of those I tucked into last night (was lucky myfitnesspal allowed me to enter in my consumption in fractions of the whole pan instead of silly squares. Who has time to count that high?) But really, in general, I have been eating stuff like spinach smoothies and protein treats (not real treats, and definitely not cookies), consuming a measly 1400 calories per day, and riding my treadmill like it was a wild stallion in need of breaking.

That simile was super creepy.

Anyhow, so now's the part when I should tell you that with self-control and hard work, I have achieved FITNESS and baggy pants. But I haven't! I have lost 1 POUND. And even that is questionable. Could be hormones or dehydration. Seriously, people. I got on the treadmill. I watched the Today show like 30 times. (Don't want to ruin shows I actually like with exercise). Was a little like hell.

Fine. I will admit that although I am not any smaller, I do feel like I am a little bit less flobby. Which is helpful when wearing knit maxi dresses, but does not help with my pants that feel like prisons. The bright side, of course, is that it is 85 degrees outside, where I can frolic in knit dresses, the warm sun on my face, and tuck all the offending pants away on my highest closet shelf (need a ladder to access this shelf), safe from view until November.

(Except for Women's Conference in April. Because stupid, cold Utah requires pants. Goodness. Does nothing ever change? I was wrestling with these same stupid pants last year. No, I didn't get new pants. Why should I? I know better than to wear skinny jeans. When this whole skinny jean madness is over, I'll buy new pants.)

Anyhow, we're all good. Jane turned 11, Joey 2. Ross went repelling, Sam is a Bear Scout. Tommy wows us daily with feats of strength, skill, and coolness some of the rest of us lack. Jake decided to keep the 77 Land Cruiser, which is in a bazillion pieces, and restore it. He took the body in to paint it: sky blue. To match my eyes. Nah, to math his eyes. Okay, I don't think anybody's eye color was really a factor in his decision making. My sister is having a baby on Thursday, and I can't wait to get my paws on him. I reminded Jake that we met 20 years ago, on March 14, 1992. (I reminded him on March 22.) We headed down to southern Arizona for Spring Break: Bisbee, Tombstone, and Kartchner Caverns. Was a good time. Photos next time? I planted my garden. 16 tomato plants, plus lots of peppers, squash and zucchini. Okay only 2 squash and zucchini, but is lots. You know how it is. There is only so much zucchini bread a lady can eat.

Okay, tell me some dieting horror stories to cheer me up. Or tell me what I'm doing wrong. (Besides the Rice Krispie Treats.)

I get my news from Facebook. And what I've given up for Lent.

These days, I barely have time to watch Modern Family. I have very little time for the news. (Priorities, people.) But that's okay, because now I get my news from Facebook. I know this should be embarrassing, and I suppose it is. But since I have friends who worship nearly every god in the political pantheon, I'll throw out the hypothesis that my news might be more fair and balanced than most, if not as comprehensive (I'm a little tired of Whitney Houston videos).  Plus, it is peppered with the drama of the car-wreck lives of a few childhood acquaintances. So that's fun. (Although most of you are stable, not mentally ill,  and thus, fairly boring.)

Today, for instance,  I read this article, noting how some Americans' fears of a Mormon theocracy show a resemblance to the old story about Jews trying to take over the world. Well written, and includes interviews with author Orson Scott Card and  my favorite historian, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich.

I recently located a friend I studied with in England, and I'm so thrilled about it. Her status updates on Downton Abbey, including this one about how Highclere Castle is falling into ruin, plus a link to these fantastic paper dolls (including evil accoutrements for Mrs. O'Brian and Thomas, and female empowerment accessories for Sybil), are my absolute favorite. We don't email or anything, but she knows I care because I 'like' her almost daily.

What? You don't think paper cutouts about period dramas count as news? Au contraire, mon frere!

Lastly, I have decided to celebrate Lent this year. Back in college, cousin Melanie would throw a big Mardi Gras party, to which we would invite every attractive boy we knew, stuff them with gumbo and king cake (don't break your tooth on the baby!), and then I wouldn't buy those big pink frosted cookies at the gas station on my way home from class again until Easter. This year, though, I am taking it further: NO COOKIES AT ALL. That's real, people. And it isn't going to be easy. I'm also incorporating a serious scripture study plan, and a goal of at least stepping onto the treadmill every day except Sunday. (I did some research, and in Roman Catholic tradition, they get Sundays off from their Lenten fasts and what not. But I'm going more Eastern Orthodox with my cookie rules: zero tolerance.) It may not be kosher, but I hope my self-imposed period of asceticism isn't seen as sacrilege. I think my heart is in the right place.

Where do you get your news?
Are you giving up anything for Lent?

The food storage lady is back! But who knows for how long? She can't make any promises.

Come on over! We're talking about canning beans, skinny jeans, and Ryan Gosling.

Food Storage Lady

Love,
Kelly

Gearing up for Statehood Day, my singleton baby's twin language, some potential falafel, and the Gin Blossoms, if Jake can be cajoled

So I didn't watch the super bowl because I was too busy eating and also football is boring. I know I should like it but I don't, and since I'm 38 years old, I don't pretend to like stuff anymore. Usually.

But I did sort of see Madonna's halftime show. And ever since, I've been listening to the Evita movie soundtrack in my van. Yesterday, Ross asked: That guy singing? Is that Puss in Boots?

Kids are super entertaining. If you have some, you know. I mean, they are loud and pull each other's hair and don't flush the toilet and sometimes you catch them biting their own toenails, but they are not boring. Two days ago Jane told me she wants to be a tattoo artist when she grows up, but she won't get any tattoos, cuz that's gross. And Joey, at almost two, isn't saying much, and what he does say is in a language of his own making. It's like a twin language, but he hasn't got a twin. He calls any sort of beverage a mimimama (except pop, which is pop) and motorcycles are samomos. We still have hope though, because he can speak Treat fluently: he'll let you know if he wants a sucker, cake, or cookies in the Queen's English.

So tonight I'm going to Pita Jungle with sister Jen and old friend Shireen to eat falafel, if I can find a babysitter. Tomorrow I am going to try to talk Jake into going to the Arizona Centennial celebration over at the Capitol, because I am an Arizona history nerd, even though I'm from California, but also because celebrating Arizona Statehood Day (February 14) was always a nice option for those of us who found ourselves lover-less (and by lover-less I mean heart-shaped-card-less and bereft of chocolate) on Valentine's Day (which I did. But only continuously from 1973-1995), but also because the Gin Blossoms will be there. And it feels very appropriate that the same band to which I would listen, lying on my single-girl dorm room bed with my giant 90s shampoo commercial hair, wallowing in my lover-lessness (most of the Gin Blossoms songs played with the theme of girlfriends leaving them because they were drunk losers, and somehow this resonated deeply with me) would be playing at Arizona's 100th birthday party.

Anyone else in for the Gin Blossoms?
Do you think Puss in Boots had the pipes for Andrew Lloyd Webber?
Do your kids bite their toenails, too?
What do you get at Pita Jungle?


Happy early Arizona Statehood Day!

Love,
Kelly

I'm only mostly dead

Which means, of course, that I am still a little bit alive.
So do not go through my clothes, looking for loose change.

See, you haven't heard from me, but I've been busy, battling the influenza. For nearly two weeks. Whatever I had in my life before and called the flu, wasn't this. This was no getting out of bed for 11 days, with a chaser of sinus and ear infection, and something I can only describe as adult onset asthma. In my spare time, I've been doing a little light reading on the Spanish flu of 1918. (Because I really like disease histories, especially if I am stricken with the disease.) More than half of the millions and millions who died between 1918-1920 from the flu, probably died from pneumonia and other secondary infections that could have been cured by antibiotics.

I love antibiotics. Even more than contact lenses. And that is saying a lot.

Sadly, my dreams of Olympic gold in London this summer have been shattered (cuz now I'm on the 'roids.) But I love the steroids, too. Because I really enjoy breathing.

The highlight of the last two weeks? Sunday nights in bed with Downton Abbey, on Percocet left over from Joey's birth, plus three Advil. I could escape the body aches for a few hours, even though I was worried I would become a drug fiend (I didn't).

Another casualty of the flu: my favorite bra. I neglect her for a couple weeks, and she disappears. So now I have to wear the ones that ride up my back, or have the too-stretchy straps.

And as for flu shots: I am now a zealous convert.  Jake got his, slept next to my hacking, feverish, infected self and is still perfectly well. I only hated him a little bit. Mostly I loved him, cuz he kept doing the dishes and taking care of the children I was neglecting.

Also, in the midst of my pain, my eldest child turned 13. Which makes me an anciently old woman. Luckily, he is pretty much the best kid ever. One consolation for getting old is that you get to see your kids turn into really cool people that you want to hang out with and take to Benihana.

I forgot school started. Plus, photos of Pompeii and Venice, to cheer me up.

 

So I was thinking about starting my diet on Tuesday, but then I got a call from the big kids' school. They wanted to know why Ross and Jane weren't there in class, with the rest of the children. 

That's real, folks. I'm not making it up. We forgot to come back from Christmas break.

They were only like 3.5 hours late. 

Both of them were mildly ill.

Jane might have cried all the way there.

It was moderately stressful.

On the way home, I took the three remaining kids to Sam's Club, where I forgot to remember the diet I was supposed to be starting, I had a hot dog with mustard, onions, relish, and kraut. And some of Tommy's blue Icee. And a soft pretzel. I felt better.

So anyway, all this made me remember that I'm not very good at remembering things. And that I've gained 10 pounds since the above photo was taken 3 months ago. In Pompeii.

So now I'm thinking how it would be nice to be skinny(er) and in Italy again. I think I shall relive those heady days, while I eat some of Jake's leftover birthday cake. You should come along.

Jake at the bakery. They didn't have any doughnuts.

So, Pompeii was really fantastic. Before we left, I spent days researching how we should get there and how long to stay. It would have been better to stay in Sorrento and spend a few nights checking out ruins and the Amalfi coast. But we didn't have the time. So I easily spent thrice as long researching as I actually spent visiting Pompeii. Because it seemed like a day trip that could go terribly wrong.

We took the Eurostar train from Rome to Naples. It is more expensive, but faster, and more comfortable. Then, at the Naples train station, we got a taxi who would take us to Pompeii, wait for a few hours, then bring us back to Naples. (If you want to go cheaper, go downstairs in the station and take the Circumvesuviana train to Pompeii. It costs like 3 euros each way, stops approximately 30 times, and you'll likely lose your wallet, but Jen says it's no worse than the NYC subway. Except that there are entertainers on board who play toy keyboards horribly, right in your ear, and won't stop until you pay them to leave. So you'll need to allow room for that in your budget.) (Jason has never been on the subway, and he was mildly traumatized.)

Mom and Dad

Inside Pompeii, we just used the free Rick Steves audio guide we'd downloaded at home, and bought a cool book inside the bookstore with info and plastic overlays to tell us about each house. It was like 12 euro, and we gave it to the kids when we got home, after I removed the kama sutra-style brothel art frescoes. Plus a couple others. Pompeiians had a funny idea of what made good family room art. (I tucked all my censorious bits (and by bits I mean oversized phalluses) under Jake's pillow, to creep him out.) I think what we did would be fine for 98% of all tourists. But my Dad says he wishes we'd had our own guide and stayed longer than two hours. Maybe next time. I was happy with our taxi chauffeur. He was the nicest driver we had in Italy. 

Back in Naples, we had him drop us off at the famous Da Michele pizzeria. It is supposed to be the best in Naples, which is the best in Italy. I'd read about it in Rick Steves and Eat, Pray, Love. Apparently everyone else had heard about it, too: There were more than 100 people in line. We went across the street to Pizzeria Trianon. It was delicious. Maybe my favorite meal we had in Italy. The sauce was unbelievable. The crust was unbelievable. The line was unbelievable: there wasn't any.

After lunch, we headed to the Archeological Museum. All the best art and artifacts they dug out of Pompeii and Herculaneum in the 1800s was brought here by the Naples' king. And now they reside in the museum that time forgot. It is amazing how these priceless items are just open to the elements (there were windows open and it was raining outside), how the displays have faded typewritten cards and dust inside them. I guess in a country full of treasures, there just isn't enough money to go around. But dust bunnies and all, you can't get a real feel for how life looked in Pompeii, without seeing these incredible mosaics, frescoes, metal and glassware.)

From there we headed back to the train station and hopped a Eurostar back to Termini in Rome. Our taxi driver apologized for all the traffic; but, he told us, there have been many manifestations today. (We think he meant government protesters, and not angelic visitors, but who knows?)

The next morning we hopped the train for Venice.



That's me and my backpack and Jake getting our first glimpse of Venice. We got on a vaporetto bound for St. Mark's Square, where our hotel had a free water shuttle out to the Isola di San Clemente.

The hotel was gorgeous, the service wanting. It was fab if you don't want them to feed you at 3:00 p.m., which they will not, under any circumstances, do. It doesn't matter how hungry you are. Although the concierge was nice. I didn't mind staying outside town a little, either. The boat ride to and from the island was relaxing and made me feel like a fancy-lady. I'd recommend San Clemente Palace Hotel, if you can get as great a deal as we did (off season). It doesn't say this anywhere in the literature, but the hotel was an insane asylum for hundreds of years, and became this HUGE fancy resort hotel only recently. So that's mildly creepy. But if, like me, you don't watch horror movies, you'll be okay.

Doge's Palace

St. Mark's Cathedral. Jake and I never got inside. We slept in. Turns out, insane asylums are very restful and quiet.

On a water taxi, headed to Ca' Rezzonico, a grand canal palazzo turned museum of 18th century Venice

See the table I'm parked on? They make those into a walkway, so tourists don't have to wade through a water-logged St. Mark's square during high tide.

Picnicking. Salami, cheese, fresh basil and oregano, and fluffy bread. Focaccia, maybe?

Outside the best gelato place in Venice.

See the top floor? Synagogue.

We spent an afternoon in the Jewish ghetto (world's first ghetto. Or maybe first place in the world to be called a ghetto). Took a fascinating tour of 4 synagogues. You should go, because it looks like they will fall down at any moment. Boys: they've got lender kippot (yarmulkes) if you don't bring your own.

The ghetto had a big square, which held a big market. If you'd been here about 1500, you could have procured some nice used clothing, full of plague infested lice.

Rialto bridge, on Jake's way out of town. Only like two boats, eight trains, a stroll with a kind and helpful housekeeper on mainland Venice, a wild west-style overnight train with a layover with some petty thieves in Bologna (that's pronounced Baloney, I'm pretty sure), some new Turkish lady friends to protect, two buses, a taxi, two airplanes and 30 hours later, he was home in the warm (100 degrees in October) bosom of Gilbert. And I was in Florence.

Did your kids start school?
Did you forget to take them?
Did you try to start a diet?
Is it working?
Do you have another resolution?
I might need some alternative ideas

New Year's Eve: blogging live from my bed

4:00 This afternoon. Payson Wal-mart with Jake, Joey and Tom to buy junk food and weenie baby pajamas covered in puffy squirrels and monster trucks, since we forgot the bag with all of Joe's clothes at home. I count 11 men with beards 1 foot or longer, 7 of them carrying cases of beer.

5:00 feast begins. Includes chips (both potato and corn), four different sorts of dips, little smokies in BBQ sauce, tiny bagel pizzas and baby quiches (from boxes), fizzy grape juice (red kind), blood orange pop, and bananas for the baby. Who is not really a baby, at 21 months and abnormally large at that, but shhhhhhh. Let's not not speak of it. Is a holiday.

6:00 cards with children. Jake won't play cuz he is reading new Tom Clancy book called Locked On. Try to teach them gin, but sam is trying to multitask. He is kicked out of the game for making duct tape wallets and forgetting rules and his turn. Jane gets frustrated and crabby, and quits soon after. Ross stays on and even lets me try to shoot the moon (we'd moved on to hearts. We always do).

7:00 Joey puts the year to bed early. Jake goes back to Wal-mart to get 9-volt batteries so the smoke alarm won't harass us all the night long. He returns and climbs giant ladder onto dangerous ledge 15 feet in air to replace battery. Changes light bulb while at it.

8:00 children begin to complain of unwell bellies. Tommy writhes around on my bed in his new striped underpants until I get him a bowl to carry around. Apparently they cannot handle their junk food.

9:00 brownie sundaes. Tommy rallied and begged, but was denied. All others begged off voluntarily. Some of them made ramen. Gross.

10:00 tub. With jojoba bath salts and my iPad in a gallon sized ziploc. Re-reading Before Ever After to see if it's appropriate for book club. Can't remember if I skipped over something super-yuck the first time around. It's such an interesting combination of fascinating and not-so-well written. Sort of sucked me in like Twilight (I'm not proud of it, but there it is) but more interesting plot and not as much sexual tension.

11:00 salted caramel hot chocolate. I'm not hungry but I must push through. Coldplay Austin City Limits New Year's show on PBS. It is so good. I love it so much. And all the people in the audience are old and two of the ladies have my same polka-spotted Kate Spade iPhone cover and they are recording Chris Martin while he sings The Scientist. And between the geriatrics and the PBS and how they keep showing Downton Abbey previews, I think I must be old too, and boy do they have my number, those public TV gurus. And I also remember seeing Ke$ha (or however you spell it) on the Ryan Seacrast show last year, and being horrified in the manner of an elderly grandmother, actually saying something like "is this REALLY what the kids are listenng to these days?"

Tickets for Coldplay's Hollywood Bowl shows go on sale next Wednesday. Anybody else coming?

11:35 Jake informs me that South Carlsbad state beach now has free wifi. Who thought they could make San Diego even better? Now they are just showing off.

11:47 us Against the world. Best song on new album.

11:52 okay so now it's time to go get the traditional fizzy white grape juice in the ceramic mugs and welcome a new year. Jake doesn't want to go cuz he's looking at campsites on the beach with the wifi, but I told him he'd better get some cocktails and get back in and kiss me quick.

Jake is currently wearing his "California: you can't afford it" t-shirt, which I find humorous.

11:55 almost there.

Sayonara, 2011.
Aloha, 2012.

12:00 Happy New Year, everybody.
Goodnight from under the duvet.

Hello there friend,

Hi. 

How are you? 

I'll bet you are busy. 

Have you finished your shopping?

Me? 

Nah, I'm in big trouble over here. And now it's too late to shop online, so I'm going to have to go into a real store.

The rain? No, I love it. Keep it coming.

Yeah. I think Joey's got a sinus infection. We are going to the doctor this afternoon. We will probably pick up something new and frightful while we are there. 

What? Don't judge me for not taking him yesterday. I was at Anthropologie with my Mom and Sister. It was cold and wet. It felt a little like we were in New York. But then, we didn't go to Bendel's afterward, or get tea at the Four Seasons. But we did make Mom sit in the backseat with the shopping bags, like we were in a cab. So that was nice.

Oh yeah? You saw me over on Kari's blog? And our pies? We had a pumpkin pie throwdown and Kari won, because her's wasn't a fiasco. They both tasted good, though. I just need to roll my crust thicker, and remember that I cannot fill the food processor with hot liquids and turn it on high.

Well, I wish I could take you to the QT and buy you hot chocolate today. Because you are a kind, attractive, talented and smart lady. We would fill our cups halfway with cocoa, leaving lots of room for whipped cream. I would get three shots of hazelnut. You'd take yours with a little powdered creamer. 

But sadly,  I can't. I need to go bathe my baby, because he smells like boogers.

I hope you have a really nice day, though.

You deserve it.

Love,

Kelly

Basis Schools

So I took a gander at my blog stats the other day, and I noticed that many people came here looking for Basis Chandler. This might be because in that post, I actually had information to share, and put important, googlable words in the post title, instead of my usual inside jokes with myself, and my whiny nonsensical wanderings, talking about tasty food and the resulting tight trousers. I'm not planning to change anything. I have a responsibility to my loyal readership (in the double digits daily, thank you all for coming!) to stay true to my self-involved self.

But still, sometimes I could say something. I'm sure you won't mind.

I read this article about Basis Schools published online yesterday. In it, Global Search for Education blogger C.M. Rubin interviews Basis founder Michael Block.

Two of my kids started attending Basis Chandler in August. I knew it was opening, and that the other Basis schools have long waiting lists, so I thought, if we want to try it, here's our shot. I talked to the kids, read them some articles, told them there would be homework and stiff competition. Jane was in at lockers for 5th graders. Ross was worried it would cut into his Mythbusters and SuperScribblenauts time.

So here we are, 4 months along.

What do we like?

You know, this is surprising, but the thing I am most impressed with is that Basis has given my kids responsibility for their own education, and my kids have taken it! With so many classes and teachers, I knew I wouldn't be able to remind them to take their math homework to school, study for the big test, or bug them about the paper due on Monday. I can look in their planners (required to be detailed and up-to-date, and checked at school) to see what is going on, but the kids are in charge. They are still learning to organize themselves and their time, but I am amazed at how well they are doing.

I like that they have awards assemblies at each grading period, giving awards to kids with average grades above 90%, another award to kids in the top 15% of their classes, and another award to the top 5% of the class. In the first grading period, Ross and Jane both got star balloons for being in the '90s club', and in the second, Ross barely made the cut off for the top 15% with an average of 96% (competition is stiff!), but Jane let her Latin grade slip, so she came home balloonless and bereft this time. (She is a smart girl, I'm not worried).

I like that my fair-skinned children are a minority. I grew up attending magnet schools in Los Angeles, and I think making friends from different cultures is a great education in itself.

I like that the teachers are hired based on subject expertise, and not on whether they have teaching credentials. (I spent 2 years in elementary education classes, and I sort of think that teaching teachers to teach is a waste of time.) Ross' physics teacher was an engineer at Intel for 20 years.

I like the curriculum. These people are not messing around with the math and science. For example, Ross is taking chemistry, biology and physics, plus pre-algebra, English,  history, rhetoric, art, and his favorite class (although he talks too much and ends up washing desks after school), Spanish. Jane takes two years of Latin before she chooses her language in 7th grade (Spanish, French, or Mandarin).

I like the amount of homework. Both kids average less than an hour a day, and they do it without being prompted by me. I find this flabbergasting. And wonderful.


What don't we like?

I don't like that school is twenty minutes away. I get lots of help with driving (thanks Jake and April!), but twice a day is about all we can do, so the kids haven't really been able to join any after school activities yet. Ross was interested in fencing and ping pong, Jane in musical theater. Maybe if we can find two clubs on the same day?

I don't like that they don't go to school with the neighborhood and Church kids. And I know our neighborhood schools are good, so it makes me wonder if I'm nuts to be driving so far. Our neighborhood high school is one of the best in the state. I figure, at that point they are welcome switch if they want! But in the meantime, Jane's best school friend lives in Ahwatukee, which makes getting together outside school a rough business.

I don't like that they don't have Seminary. They will have to attend an A hour program at a different school, but there are very few LDS kids at Basis, so I suppose it makes sense.

Mostly, though, I'm thrilled with Basis so far.

Now, if only they would build one on my block!

Going to my happy place: a post about gelato

Reasons one might need to go to her happy place:

1. She is getting a pap smear
2. Her kids are being super horrible, and she needs something to do while she locks herself in the bathroom and hides from them, but she has forgotten her iPad.
3. She has been dilated 9.5 centimeters for like 45 minutes and she forgot to get an epidural.
4. Sacrament meeting has run too long.

My happy place used to be a cabana chair on the beach at the Ritz Cancun, a book in one hand, a Coca Lite in the other, and nice waiters bringing me $20 bowls of guacamole all the day long. (That's where I was during the aforementioned natural labor*).

But now I've got a new happy place. And thanks to Jake, and his surreptitious photo-taking, I can share it with you:

An intimate moment in Venice between me and my panna cotta gelato.

I don't know exactly what panna cotta gelato is, but it includes caramel, and Venice knows how to do it right. Orvieto doesn't.

The deliciousness of Italian gelato cannot be overstated. It is so good, we ate it three times a day. At least.

We got the best gelato in Venice at La Boutique del Gelato (next to the Hotel Bruno, and somewhere in the maze between St. Mark's Square and the Rialto Bridge). I mean, I can't be certain it was the best in Venice, because we only tried like 15 others. (There is an unconfirmed rumor that Jen may have had 9 scoops of gelato, from three different vendors, plus some hot chocolate, all in one 40 minutes period. The stuff of legends). But best or not, it was remarkably good. It was rough, because maps and GPS were almost useless in Venice, and our legs grew very tired, but we managed to find it three different times. I'd recommend the coconut, the pistachio, and a double scoop of nocciola (hazelnut) with chocolate. The best was the grapefruit sorbet. I can't explain to you why it was the best. But it was so good I might have cried a little.

Honorable mention in the sorbet competition goes to the strawberry at Gelateria Carroze, in Florence, right on the Arno, between the Ponte Vecchio and the Uffizi. You probly won't hate the coconut, either.

And the Tartufo gelato at Tre Scalini in Rome's Piazza Navona was nice, too, in case you were thinking Rome's gelato can't measure up.

Where is your happy place? 
Is there ice cream or guacamole there? 

* To clarify: I did not actually give birth on the cabana chair in Cancun. Was only there in my mind.

I hate my big, fake Christmas tree, Sting sings country, we drink half and half, I reminisce about my cross-dressing days, and our elf is MIA

So, it's that time of year again. The time when I drag my big, fake Christmas tree out, set it up, growl and yell like a toddler when half the lights don't work, then spend $50 and 5 hours buying and applying new lights over the top of the old ones. It is also the time of year when I eat pie three times a day, and when the children whine that we've run out of milk, instead of going to the store, I announce "let them drink cream!" in a nasally accent, as if I were on a balcony at Versailles, instead of under my duvet reading In the Garden of Beasts.

Then the kids whine that all the cream is whipped, in aerosol cans, and gone, since I needed it for all the pie. So then we drink half and half. It is very tasty with Rice Krispies.

I know I should just get a real tree, but that requires strapping things to cars, which is stressful, because I'm always sure whatever is bungeed on is sure to fall off in the street (I am told this is an irrational fear, sort of like my fear of swimming with fish, except that, well, stuff DOES fall off cars, and who knows what that fish is planning? He looks fishy to me) and also because a real tree means EVEN MORE lights to apply (at least in theory). So anyhow, for the past 7 years, I've used the fake one, whilst cursing it. Annually. Here I am kvetching in 2007 about the horrors of 2006.

But Thanksgiving was good. Our friends from Utah came bearing about 15 pounds of chocolate, and we went to a Sting concert. Who knew he had like 3 albums I'd never heard, including at least one that is entirely COUNTRY? Do you know how weird country sounds in a British accent? But he looked and sounded great, and if all the songs had been as fantastic as his acoustic Message in a Bottle encore, I might not have nodded off in the middle, somewhere around a song about a western movie crossed with an old Broadway musical. I think Sting is a little out of touch, just sitting over in his castle next to Stonehenge, making all sorts of love and writing songs about barley and foxes. Sometimes it works (the barley, the sex- I'll have to take his word for it), sometimes it doesn't (the foxes weren't my favorite). Either way, he's still hot and rich, so what's it to him? We also watched a movie called Stardust (a little every night, since I kept falling asleep because I am either old or still jet-lagged), which was very good, and we ate Thanksgiving, where I ate so much I almost threw up, but did not (which means I consumed the perfect amount of Thanksgiving), and we went to SAS fabrics (where I became overstimulated sifting though a vat of old patches, but luckily Kari had some hard candies in her purse she keeps for her toddler, and I was ok again after I sat on the floor for a minute while she examined the rickrack), and got doughnuts on the way home (just found an apple fritter I hid from the kids, but it isn't good anymore, dangit. I hate when my food hoarding backfires), then met more friends (actually, relatives) for dinner at Joe's Farm Grill, and afterward we all retired to our living room, where we drank Martinellis from silver flutes, played some Peter Breinholt on the guitars, and talked about how when we all lived at the Riv over to the BYU, we used to dress like men, but also how I dressed the most like a man of everybody. (Even the men? This wasn't clear).

So now I've got to do something about our elf, who is not on the shelf, but is MIA. He didn't show up after Thanksgiving dinner, like he's supposed to, and the children are starting to riot.

So do you loathe Christmas lights as much as I do? Did you know about Sting's country songs? Did you wear men's clothes in the 90's? If you have an extra elf, can you send him here? Thanks in advance.

Rome wasn't blogged in a day

So, at long last I have accumulated everyone's iphone photos of our trip, and now I shall publish them on the internets, even though in many of them I am wearing very tight, very unflattering pants.

On October 3, we took the overnight British Airways flight from Phoenix to London. This was difficult for me, because although I really like British Airways and the stewardess' retro hats and how they offer you biscuits (that are really just cookies) with their lovely accents, and even how they sometimes serve weird airline curry that stinks everything up for hours, we only had one hour in London. No time for a West End show. No time for even a Cadbury chocolate bar from the Marks & Spencer, or a browse around the Harrod's in the airport, since we were running at top speed for like 4 miles between concourses. And then, to salt the wound, London was sunny and 70, which never happens. But whatever.

So, you probably want to hear about Italy, but first I need to tell you about a miracle. My eyes had been bugging me all night, but about an hour from our destination I decided: INFECTION. So then my Mom produced from her carry-on bag a bottle of prescription antibiotic eye drops. Right there, high above the French Alps! A miracle, I tell you. So then, I didn't have to go see a Roman doctor, or have to look like a 1950s librarian in all my Italy photos (my glasses are horn-rimmed, you'll thank me later). I literally wept with joy (although eyes were also perhaps already moist with infectious ooze).

Bacteria thwarted, we arrived at the Donna Camilla Savelli Hotel. Trastevere is supposed to be gritty and full of real Romans. But the Donna Camilla is also nearby the American John Cabot University, so it is also full of Valley girl accents and even a has place called T-Bone Station that serves (edible but not great) nachos. (I won't tell you how I know this.) Lots of restaurants and enotecas, gelaterias, pizza-by-the-slice type places (I really liked the potato and rosemary pizza).


Via Garibaldi, perhaps 9 p.m. By midnight, when we'd come back from our Rick Steves night walking, the whole street would be full of people, standing outside the restaurants and drinking.


Jake, in the gelato place just outside the hotel. Coconut? Or pistachio?

Some photos I 'borrowed' of the hotel:

Breakfast garden

That's me on the rooftop terrace. This place was built as a convent in the 1640s, and became a hotel two years ago. There are still a few elderly nuns living in one of the wings, who wander around the garden during breakfast, and pray in their impressive chapel just off the lobby entrance. I would have felt bad for taking over their place, but they've got bigger things to worry about, what with rationalizing that vow of poverty with living in a 4 star hotel.

The view from our room:

Anyhow, Rome.
I liked it.

On day two, we hustled over to ground zero: the Forum/Coliseum/Palatine Hill complex. We toured Mamertine Prison (where Peter and maybe Paul were perhaps incarcerated. There is no historical record of them being there written before the 5th century, but pilgrims had already been showing up, and this was the only prison in Rome for a very long time.) They had a super creepy English audio guide that had a lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous voice saying cryptic things about water and tables. Then they made us stand in the dark, before having us watch a weird, equally enigmatic video. Only later, between the Bible and Rick Steves, was I able to figure out what went on there (or didn't).

At Mamertine Prison. Sister Noel and Sister Beeson

Then, we ate some super tasty paninis from a street cart, didn't get food poisoning, then met our tour guide at this little cafe with a great view. Jake is chatting up a waiter.


So here we are in the forum (ancient marketplace turned political and religious center of Rome). I included this photo because my arm looks skinny.


A view of the forum from Palatine Hill. This is where all the ancient Italian movers and shakers lived. They worked down in the Forum. The Curia (Senate house) is the tall building at the top left of the photo. The Vestal Virgins lived in the bottom right. Maybe.

I smell a holiday card

Ryan

So I pretty much loved ancient Rome. It was really hard at first to comprehend how OLD this stuff is. Some of the temples are from the 8th century before Christ. (Although none of the really ancient ones are original, except for the foundations, but have been spruced up or rebuilt, then knocked down again, the new ones only like 2000 years old. Mussolini righted some pillars on the Temple of Vesta. He also built a horrid thoroughfare right down the middle of the Forum, but I think Rome got her (his? Since Rome is probably named for Romulus (Remus' brother) comeuppance with the whole shooting, hanging from a meat hook, stoning thing they did to him in 1945 in near Milan).  800 B.C. That's 1800 years older than Westminster Abbey! 1600 years older than the oldest Pueblo Villages found here in Arizona. 2400 years older than the oldest remaining early American buildings. (Don't look too closely at my maths.)

Tired and hungry, we headed back to Trastevere to change and eat before heading back into town. Jen was hoping to see something that wasn't ruined. She was in luck.

Spanish Steps

Trevi fountain.

Day three began with the Pantheon, built 126 A.D. I'm not sure I've even seen anything in my life cooler than the Pantheon. It was like all the stuff in the Forum, only not sacked by barbarians and looted by medieval Romans.

We met our guide, Jeb, and headed over to the Vatican. Those Catholics have collected and stolen some really great stuff over the past two thousand years.

This huge head, for instance.

The Sistine Chapel didn't do much for me. I wrote that small cuz it's pretty embarrassing. Sure, I appreciate that painting thousands of naked people, contorting and cavorting every which way, all in the throes of something (passion, sin, greed, pain, religious ecstasy, damnation, covetousness) is a tough project, and that until Mike and all his Renaissance posse dug up and copied the Roman copies of the Greek statues, nobody could do that stuff. Maybe I'm a closet pagan, but I found the Pantheon more impressive. 

St. Peter's Basilica was something to see. It was like if you could take another cathedral, say, Notre Dame, and inflate it to like twice or three times the size. It was HUGE. It isn't crammed with graves like Westminster, (only saints or popes on their way to sainthood are in the church, the rest go in the crypt) so it looks cleaner, more beautiful, but maybe not as interesting, nook-and-cranny-wise.

So I think I'm getting pretty tired, because I just wrote "nook-and-cranny-wise," and I am planning to leave it as is, and hit publish. So I should probably quit for today. 

Next stop: more ruins! Pompeii. And the pizza right across the street from the Eat, Pray, Love pizza. (Very tasty, and no line.)