First of 2012!

We went to AZ for Christmas. It was mostly low-key…watched a lot of movies and Dangerboy played lots of video games. Slept in, etc. PDaniel's family is sweet and laid-back. And generous. We went on a couple of family outings…one to an art museum in Tempe and a gingerbread Whoville, and one to an ostrich farm and Picacho State Park, then out for Mexican food. The kids (especially Cookie-Nut) loved the farm. CN was scared of the ostriches, but she loved feeding the greedy goats and deer. One little donkey became her special friend. There was also a lorikeet aviary where the birds slurped up nectar from little cups we held for them and they perched all over us. DB’s favorite part was a hand-cranked conveyer belt he used to ship food pellets to a pen of goats in a big cherry-picker-type thing. He stayed there for a long time.

The other day we went with the cousins to see the Muppet movie again, which we saw over Thankgiving. It’s pretty funny, and the kids enjoyed seeing it again. The songs are my favorite part…they’re by Brett from Flight of the Conchords, the one and awesomely only parody musical sitcom. Both Muppet movie and Flight of the Conchords (disclaimer--the latter is a solid PG-13) I highly recommend.

It snowed this morning. I went to go pick up our Bountiful Basket (-o-produce) and what should I see but K shoveling the snow off our front stairs. It warmed my heart. (K’s our neighbor kid…one of DB’s older friends. Has a reputation for mischief, but really a good kid.)

Kid quotables:

DB (refusing to get a haircut): “I want to have a beard and be hairy like Uncle L.” (Uncle L has long Jesus-like hair and a beard).

CN, after watching the movie preview for “Tintin”: “That’s a great boy because he has to do a really brave job!”

CN: “But Jesus doesn’t love Santa Claus.” Why not? “Because Christmas is Jesus’s birthday, and he wanted presents.” But did Santa bring Jesus presents? “Yes!” So I’m confused, but somehow the whole birthday/present/Christmas/Santa relationship has her confused too, I think.

We were in the car, talking about a trip to the zoo that she doesn’t remember:

CN: “So you lift me up and I see the elephants?”

Me: “Yes.”

CN: “But I can’t see my eyes.”

Me: “That’s right, we can’t see our eyes, except in the mirror.”

CN: “But I can see your eyes! And I can see all the things that I can see! Anyways, I don’t like the sun.”

Me: “Why don’t you like the sun?”

Clara: “’Cause it’s sunning in my eyes!”

Journal Excerpts

The other night I went to a RS conference at which Claudia Bushman spoke. She really motivated me to keep some sort of journal! Someday I may not remember anything, and it would be nice to be reminded what happened in my life. She focused on recording the truth, no matter how un-pretty. But I want to record plenty of the pretty things too. So, here are some excerpts from the journal I've kept over the last week or two.

...

One thing Claudia Bushman said in her talk last week was something like, “Journaling is a zero-level activity. No matter what you do, it’s better than nothing.” I got to thinking, I worry about not being good enough at music, or writing, or mothering…but maybe all those things are zero-level activities too. Anything I do, any effort I make, is better than nothing; it puts something positive and creative into the world that wasn’t there before. So why not make the effort? Even mothering, which is the hardest…I may not decide to have tons of children, because I don’t think I’d be good at it, but I can do my best with the two I’ve got, right? Of course right.

...

Today we went to a Faded Paper Figures concert at a club called The Mint in LA. We took the kids…it was a short afternoon concert, very family-friendly. The music was a little loud for the kids (Cookie-Nut wouldn’t wear her earplugs), but we all had a blast! The kids danced with their friends the Romney boys and PDaniel and I sang along. It helped that we all knew the music from listening to both albums in the car. The band members (whom I can take credit for introducing to each other) are our friends John Williams and Kael and Heather Alden, who used to be our ward. And now I can actually say that we went to a smoky little club in LA. I admit the whole atmosphere appeals to me. Much better than the overcrowded Dave Matthews Band concert Pete and I went to in AZ. Much more “atmosphere.”

...

PDaniel and I tried for a while to stop watching TV at night so we could do more productive things, but apparently it’s how we reconnect. When we stopped we got kind of depressed.

...

I had a much-needed “day off” yesterday. Now that C-Nut doesn’t take naps any more (and hasn’t for months and months) I really have no alone time. I really need it—it definitely helps me be more sociable when I AM around people. It’s funny—I didn’t want to be an English major because I missed people too much and hated being alone all the time, reading and writing. Piano accompanying was a nice balance, because I had alone time to practice, but the rest of the work was with other people. And music departments can be really nice, supportive communities (like ASU was) so that was great too. Now I am constantly around people—mostly my family, mostly kids—and ache for time alone. And my poor husband is alone all day and aches for together time! So in order for me to be happier together…I need to get away sometimes.

...

So, while PDan took Dangerboy and C-Nut to a primary activity and (when they got home), played with non-Newtonian fluids, I worked on my stories; exercised; tried a new Ramen restaurant for lunch and finished the book Michael K; hit a sale at JCPenney and got a new Easter Dress for Clara (black with white flowers and green trim) and some new sneakers for Caleb. Then we had a nice family evening, ate biscuits and gravy and smoothies, watched some Scooby-Doo; and after the kids went to bed, we watched the Firefly movie Serenity. A good day.

Stars in our Eyes II

On our observatory trip last week, we found ourselves stuck in an intersection in LA. I looked out my window and saw a guy standing at the crosswalk, talking on the phone and waiting for the light to change. It was Michael Cera! I immediately turned to PDaniel and said, "Hey! It's that guy! Look!!" PDaniel also recognized him at once. I tried not to look back again, but I had to before we drove away. He noticed us recognize him, and had leaned up against the pole so we couldn't see his face. Can't blame him. He wouldn't want people taking pictures of him with their phones, and posting about him on their lame blogs, right? Right?

Just kidding, I didn't take this picture. His hair was much shaggier than this.

We enjoyed his characters in Arrested Development and Juno, and I just watched Paper Heart recently, so we were pretty excited. It was my first current-celebrity sighting.

And now for some bush tea...

Since Masterpiece Classic has ended, I've been yearning for something clean and quality and uplifting and fun. And not stupid.

Side note: I had high hopes for Glee, since the pilot was so fun--but the following two episodes have pandered a bit to the fun-music-is-always-about-sex crowd and have left me a little disappointed. Come on, people! "I wanna sex you up" at a PTA meeting?!? That's not even believable! (The Josh Groban bit and the thumb-cake bits were funny though).

Really, though, HBO just released the first season of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency on DVD. Yay! I've been waiting for it to come out, hoping it hadn't been canceled--but apparently it survived a season on HBO, despite the fact that it's not about people who repeatedly make bad life decisions!

Just as important, it's quality stuff. Jill Scott does a lovely job playing Mma Ramotswe in all her warmth and traditionally-built glory, and it's filmed entirely on location in Botswana, a country apparently just as beautiful as author Alexander McCall Smith describes. I've only seen the pilot--I hope they can keep up the quality in future episodes--but even just that was enough. It covered much of the material in the first book, and was about an hour and a half long--feature-film length. Well-cast, gentle humor, a love letter to Botswana with all its beauty and some of its dangers.

Like the books, I don't expect to devour the entire series in one sitting--it would probably be too much of the same. And I was iffy about the accuracy of one scene (I didn't remember her kissing that one guy). And if you see it, don't expect to see a totally accurate depiction of Africa today--I recognize that its image maybe isn't gritty reality. But who wants grit in your popcorn, sitting on your couch on a Sunday night? Not me.

A fish story

(Ok, it occurs to me that this isn't a very good review. But I'm really tired. Just go see it if you can. It's worth it for the opening sequence--but not the music in that scene--and the scene where she runs on the waves, which you can see online but it's way better in the theater.)

Took Dangerboy to see Ponyo yesterday. Hurry, quick, everyone go see this while it is still in theaters! It's so beautiful on the big screen, and the child characters are really cute too. It's a perfect escape from a muggy summer day: immersing yourself in crystal-clear ocean water teeming with life--the fact that the theater is air conditioned helps too! Your kids will like it; no scary parts, really. It's actually the Little Mermaid story, but with more interesting characters.
And more famous people do the voices, if you care about such things.

If you've never seen any Miyazaki films before, this is a pretty good introduction. I'm not a huge fan of anime (Japanimation) but I love this director's films; they're always filled with fabulous creatures and colors and places. A couple of caveats for all these movies: the plots do not conform to any pattern that you'll be used to; also, some of the music is a little too overblown for most American sensibilities. For instance, you may want to run screaming from the theater during the closing credits as Noah Cyrus chirps some hellish ditty about happy little Ponyo. But maybe that's just me.

If you like it, try Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke. But those ones are a little scarier, FYI.

You know you're a grown-up when...

...your favorite thing on TV is Masterpiece Classic. Right now they're doing BBC productions of Charles Dickens stories at 9:00 Sunday evenings. PDaniel and I really enjoyed Oliver Twist (NOT the musical) the last couple of weeks: Nancy and Fagan were awesome, and I liked the funky Celtic-rock-ish soundtrack. Up next is David Copperfield with Ian McKellan, Maggie Smith and a teeny-tiny Daniel Radcliffe. I don't know how many of the productions are new, but they're new to us. Watching Oliver Twist, we couldn't help being reminded of what a genius Dickens was--such believably round characters--such evil villians, such angelic saviors! The whole thing made us want to take a little trip to Dickens World (yes, there is such a place).

I'm just sad I missed Tess and Wuthering Heights in January (before the Dickens theme started)--I love those novels. I'll have to find the BBC versions somewhere.

Here's to Sunday evenings with a literature-loving hubby, a plate or two of warm brownies, and the BBC!

Edit: Looks like David Copperfield is up to local listings for scheduling--and it's not scheduled here for a while. Pity! Guess I'll have to do do something productive instead for the next couple of weeks.

A Day in the Life of...

Today I...

...walked to the Cyber Cafe and put money on my new laundry card.
...practiced for about 45 minutes.
...finally found the Goodwill dropoff and got rid of some junk.
...tried to pick up "Beauty and the Beast" from Blockbuster. Got instead "Beauty and the Beast--Belle's magical world" which is infinitely stupider.
...watched part of said movie with DB and friend Ladybug.
...worked on DB's patchy immunization record.
...did the laundry.
...hung around outside with my fussy children (and some fun moms and their children in varying degrees of fussiness-or-not).
...nursed Cookie Nut seven (or so) times.
...got DB breakfast and lunch.
...tried several times to get CN to sleep.

I did not:
...make dinner: thanks P.! (guacamole burgers and fresh baked sweet potato fries with fruit salad. Yum!)
...watch Caleb for a couple of hours this morning: thanks Brooke!
...buy fruit: thanks Gardener!

Nobody:
,,,did the dishes. Sigh.

One more

Oh yeah, this doesn't make my all-time-favorites list either, but we liked it. Under the same Moon is about a Mexican boy who goes over the border searching for his mom, who is an illegal worker in the US. (It's basically An American Tail, live action, modernized, no production numbers). It's a tear jerker, and yes, the directors have obvious political views. Still, during once scene where cops raid a greenhouse full of migrant workers, it's hard not to ask yourself, "Wait, why are they arresting these people for picking tomatoes?" no matter where you stand.

Movie Night

Well, it's Friday and I wanted to post about movies. Isn't it great when you find a good one? I've decided that there are a few common characteristics to films (and books, for that matter) that I end up really liking: honesty, humor, quirkiness, good acting and direction (of course), and a touch of the supernatural. Let me gush about a couple of my favorites, just in case you missed them:

Millions (because I watched this a couple of weeks ago): a pure-hearted little boy who regularly has visions of various saints ( the Catholic kind) finds a large sum of stolen money in his backyard. He and his (much worldlier) brother try to figure out what to do with the loot. Mormon missionaries make quite a funny appearance in this show that riffs on materialism, religion, the afterlife, economics, and innocence. Sentimental? Of course. The colors/filming are great too.

In America: A grieving family of illegal Irish immigrants moves to a scary neighborhood in New York so the dad can try to make it on Broadway. Told from the perspective of a nine-(?)-year-old daughter, the family tries to deal with the death of the youngest son as they try to adjust to a new place. It sounds boring, but it's really funny and heartbreaking and heart-healing. And the girls are so cute. (Disclaimer--there is one married-sexy scene, but it's important.)

(Is it a coincidence that both of these films feature cute kids with British-ish accents?)

Also, this movie doesn't make my favorites list, but P. and I watched it the other night and liked it: Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day. An unemployed governess masquerades as a social secretary. Amy Adams (from Enchanted) plays the "social" part of that arrangement, and is very funny again. Good date movie. (Disclaimer again: you see a guy's bum in a couple of shots.) (That has nothing to do with it being a good date movie.)

What the?

Have you ever seen synchronized swimming? It's so weird it's almost cool. I think it's an Esther Williams holdover. Here's the lovely Esther:



Anyway, "synchro" reminds me of "water dances" I used to make up in the pool with my friends. And make my parents watch. Here's the Japanese team's routine:

Outlander alert #2

(Attention, minor spoiler alert for Breaking Dawn)

OK, so now that most of us have finished the series (as it stands, whether you love it or think it's so awful you just can't tear your eyes away). And being as the next big event is the movie coming out in November(?), I have a few questions:

1. Who would you play in the movie?

2. Nominations for friends or family to play in the movie?

3. Your vampire superpower?

4. Edward or Jacob? (Or, for guys, do you prefer Bella before or after her "makeover"?

Just a few pictures from our little trip last month...P. and I drove up to Solvang and Santa Barbara for a couple of days, babysitting courtesy of my lovely mother. Everything was beautiful, lovely and green; we spent lots of time in a favorite Solvang bookstore and Cafe Angelica. The next day we ate some delicious pastries and headed for the hills--hiked to a lovely waterfall a few miles outside town. Then we drove down to Santa Barbara, and visited the mission (the skull-and-crossbones door is the mission's door from the church to the graveyard where, incidentally, the main character of Island of the Blue Dolphins is buried. I'd forgotten she was a real person). Then we visited the wharf, caught a movie (Persepolis) and drove home. So pleasant, so relaxing. thanks again, Mom! And thanks, P., for taking time off from exam-reading to enjoying it with me!

Saturday's Warrior X-Files

I was looking for a clip from Saturday's Warrior on Youtube, but all I could find was this. If you grew up watching the video, you might like it...it's a "preview" of Saturday's Warrior recut to look like some kind of cheesy sci-fi thriller, complete with music from, I believe, the movie Signs.

Like a Potty-Mouthed Cowboy

Cowboy: This weekend P. took a much-needed day off and we headed to Irvine Regional Park for a little recreation. We partook of the 30-minute, $2 zoo...hey, bears, mountain lions, and you get to feed goats! No need for a stroller because Dangerboy (who got in for free) could just run around the whole thing. Not a bad deal, I thought. We rode the little train (pricier at $4 a head) and then DB took a $4 ride on a pony, which he liked. He had a similar attitude as the first (and only) time he went sledding: a little solemn, silent, reserving all energy for enjoying the experience, such that he didn't say a word the whole time, then at the end we had to drag him away.

We used as motivation the choosing among free pumpkins. That's right! Because the park was used as firefighters' headquarters during the wildfires recently, the park's (which only just reopened) annual pumpkin patch event flopped. SO they have thousands of free pumpkins, and we took a few home. We mean to experiment with recipes, though they're still rolling around in the trunk of our car...

That night we watched Surf's Up as a family (more or less) and liked it. P. and I laughed too.

Potty-mouth: DBs favorite word lately is, "poo poo," and sometimes "pee pee"; in extreme cases, loudly alternated back and forth between the two. (We think he learned it from an older playmate who shall remain nameless...) It can be annoying, and we're trying to ignore it, but it's hard when you hear sung so sweetly, "Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you...Poo poo!!!" or "He loves us and so you see, we are a happy fami-poo!"

Unrelated yumminess: I finally got to go to Thai Nakorn (in Westminster?) last night, and eat the leftovers today. Soooo good. Got panang chicken, chicken-ginger-pepper-cream soup (dunno what it's really called) and some kind of greens cooked in garlic sauce. And mango sticky rice. I think it's my new favorite-restaurant-that-we-can-actually-afford-to-go-to-occasionally.

Watermovie

P. came home with this film the other night. We really enjoyed it. It's a beautiful story about three women (one is actually a spunky little girl) who live in a widow's tribe--like a convent--in India. They are supposed to live lives of spiritual devotion and poverty, though, unlike most Catholic nuns, they do not enter into the life by choice; the youngest girl is widowed at nine and at first can't understand why she's being sent away; she doesn't even remember being married.

The film is first of all a well-told, well-acted story (subtitled!!) of which a love story is no small element. The filming itself and the music are also great, I thought. But the film also brought some really interesting issues to my attention, one of them being this idea of putting widows away in colonies. Before the film came out, it was heavily protested (by people who had read a false script) for being anti-Hindu; the film's production was even shut down and the director's image burned in effigy.

Anyway, we liked it. Though be forewarned: though much of the film made me smile, it definitely has devastating parts; and though "clean" and not graphic at all, at least one plot element is quite disturbing. But the end made me cry (me!!) in a not-necessarily-sad way, so all in all I recommend it. (I'm trying not to give everything away here...sorry for the vagueness!)

The Realms of the Unreal

Last year, P. and I watched a documentary by the above title about a man named Henry Darger. A quiet, socially backward man, he grew up in orphanages in the first half of the 20th century--the kinds of places where the Miss Hannigans really did hand out knuckle sandwiches and the orphans sure didn't do tap numbers (can you tell I just played for that show?). He had the kind of education one would expect of one diagnosed early on as "feeble minded"; he grew up to be a janitor, for years living alone in the same tiny apartment.

But when he died, neighbors found a novel almost 16,000 pages long, fully illustrated. It details the story of the little Vivian girls, crusaders in the fight against child slavery. The text is not brilliant, though some might argue that the art is; though Darger wasn't trained, he arranged found pictures (often advertisements) and copied or traced them to fit his needs.

I think this is so interesting--that someone ignored by most around him would go so far to create a whole other secret, complex, beautiful world--and do all his living in that world. It's the story of the poor Lady of Shalott all over again. And like the Lady, nobody noticed him until after he died...would he have been as popular had he tried to send his novels to publishers and sell his art on the street?

In Dangerboy news: all (babysitters included) will be happy to hear that one rash is clearing up, though the other one looks still worse. (I'll leave you to decided which is which.) The result is actually a much happier baby, though some of these tantrums appear to be age-related. If anyone has suggestions on how to deal with tantrums, please let me know!

Today DB loved pizza, and giving out kisses (on the lips!), and playing in dirt, and Teletubbies computer games, and snails, and splashing Mommy's glasses, and "vacuuming", and helping Mommy do the dishes, mainly by taking big globs of extra dishbubbles and smearing them on the wall.

Fathers and Daughters

A few nights ago I finished watching the Chinese-language film Eat Drink Man Woman and thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt like I could relate to each of the three daughters in the family: the workaholic, the homebody, the youngster with a crush. And then, the father (though older than mine) reminded me of my own a little--passionate about his career field (in the movie's case, fine cuisine; in my father's case, learning about nature); "strong and silent" but dedicated to his family; physically quite active; and, alas, losing his sense of taste. Seeing a movie like this in a different language reminds me how families have similar experiences cross-culturally; how even though I don't understand what's coming out of their mouths, I know exactly what they're saying. (It also has great images of food, which will leave you craving dishes with names like "Sun Luck Dragon Phoenix.")

Our family has had a busy Easter weekend--Saturday Peter presented a paper at a conference here on campus (and did a very nice job!). Dangerboy went to a no-holds-barred Easter egg hunt, followed by an amazing birthday party thrown for the daughter of our next-door neighbor. There DB discovered the "bouncy house." Ah, the bliss, the euphoria! Today (Easter) DB made it all the way through sacrament meeting. Ah, the bliss, the euphoria! Then we went to an Easter dinner hosted by some friends of ours--what a treat. Between dinner and dessert we even got to take a stroll through the neighborhood, including the community flower garden--don't orange trees smell divine?

DB-ism: a variation on owchies--DB fell and hurt his knee, so I said, "rub it, rub it!" and he took off his hat and rubbed his head. (Usually that's what he's hurt.) I'm not sure that it helped.