Smell This

Have you ever smelled something so bad, you just have to tell the person nearest you to “smell this!”  And they do, and they agree that “ULGH!  That’s awful!”  Then they wonder why you asked them to smell it in the first place, and why they would ever smell it after seeing your horrified expression.

Well, I  finished a book like this last night.

My friend loaned it to me because she’s presenting it for book club  in June.  I felt obligated to read it because:

1- I had to give it back so she could re-read it before book club

and

2- I knew she would ask me how I liked it.

3- I couldn’t stop reading it.

It was awful.  I kept reading bits aloud to Chris as if to say  “smell this!” and he’d cringe and agree that it was indeed a horrible book and ask why I kept reading it.  “It’s like watching a train wreck!” he said.

I’ve never read a book with so many swear words in it!  I felt violated at times while reading!  Chris even hid it from me last Saturday (which is good because it’s really not a book I should read on the Sabbath).

My mom felt the same way when she read Catcher in the Rye.  She, however, had the sense to stop reading.  Knowing me, you’d think I’d do the same, but no, I  kept reading with horrified fascination.

The worst part is, it’s  a true story!

I knew it turned out somewhat OK because the whole thing is a flashback.  The author seemed to have  turned out alright despite her horrible life.  She didn’t mention having to go through therapy or anything, but I’m thinking  I should go through therapy after reading it.

  It was such a relief to get to the end.

Thankfully, another friend loaned me a book that was totally funny.   I’d switch between the two so I wouldn’t get so moody.

I want to tell you all to go smell it, but you’d just wonder why on earth I would do that to you.

So don’t.  Totally.  It really is as bad as it smells.

Sunday dress and hair 5-22-11

 

Even though it’s actually Monday, here is Elle’s dress and hair from yesterday:

 

And here are a couple cute pictures we took last week of Elle and Chris.  Elle is making a Father’s Day gift for Chris in Activity Days, and the pictures will be part of it.

 

 

It was very sunny, so they’re  squinting a bit.

Still sweet though

 

And here is Elle’s Market Day raffle item:

 

She and her friend will be Market Day business partners.

The 4th graders get to make items, then “sell” them to other 4th graders, 2nd graders, 5th graders and parents.  The kids at school earn fake money for different things—being good,  doing their various tasks, etc.  We parents get an endless supply of cash to buy whatever we want.

The students have to think of something to make that costs less than 20 real dollars.  It’s hard to know what to make that will appeal to 2nd graders-adults.  It’s also hard to know how many items to make, and how much to charge for them.  They love it!  It’s like  going to your typical fair where there are hundreds of items and booths (in this case desks)

Elle and her friend are making little bean bags.  They also decided to make bead animals.

For their raffle, they wanted to make a giant bean bag.  I was relieved to find out that “ giant” was only the size pictured above.

I looked on a blog to find out how to make a ball, and it seemed pretty easy.  Just cut some petal shapes, sew them together, then applique a circle on each end to cover up the messy spots.

Well, it didn’t   quite turn out like I thought, so I turned to Chris, knowing that he would most likely come up with a complicated solution.

I was right about the complicated solution, but wrong about the ease of the execution.

First, he looked online for scholarly papers on how to cover a sphere.  Then, after studying the formulas and explanations, he came up with the perfect size panel for the ball.

When the girls sewed it together, it lined up perfectly (or nearly so), and we didn’t need to applique anything on the ends!

That’s my guy!

Happy Mother’s Day

This is for ALL you mothers out there from Elle!

And for Sunday Dress and Hair:

Elle and I were twins today!

(I tell you—Chris really needs to work on his camera skills!)

Testing

 

This week begins a week of TESTING at school.  The poor kids.  Last year, Elle and her fiends were most worried about properly filling in the bubbles.  Apparently the teacher emphasized this point hard.

This year Elle is stressed out about how she’ll do.   She finally believed us when we told her the test wouldn’t affect her grade in any way.  However, that doesn’t make it any less stressful or  grueling.

It’s also Teacher Appreciation Week which ticks off Elle.  After all, they’re the ones giving the test in the first place!  I told her that maybe that’s why it’s this week—so they can focus on how great their teachers are instead of  dwelling on how miserable the students feel.

Elle and I have been reading a book written by a third grade teacher lately.  I think she likes hearing about school from the teacher’s point of view.  I read ahead just to make sure there wasn’t  anything inappropriate.

I came upon one chapter and just laughed!  It perfectly describes this week.  The book is called “32 Third Graders and One Class Bunny” by Philip Done.  The whole book is pretty funny.  You  should check it out!  Even reading the “sneak peaks” listed on Amazon is fun.

 

“Testing”

Thirty-two sharpened number two pencils and a stack of practice  tests just arrived in my box. . .

“Good morning , boys and girls,” I said. “I’m afraid I have some bad news.  I cannot read to you after lunch anymore.  We cannot have any more discussions. . .We have to get ready for the test!”. . .

“You don’t like these tests?” I asked. “You don’t want to do these tests? Don’t you realize that these scores are published in the newspaper and parents and real estate agents everywhere look at these scores?  Don’t you realize that your parent’ property values are affected if you don’t know how to find the diameter of a circle?”. . .

“Boys and girls,” I proclaimed, “you must learn to fill in all the bubbles completely.  You must learn to bubble in anything as fast as you can when the teacher shouts, ‘Ten seconds left!’ You must learn to make dark marks with your pencil so the Scantron machine can read your answer.  You must learn to erase completely if you decide to change your answer.  And you must learn to guess even if you don’t know what bubbles to fill in.”

 

Sound familiar?

Sunday Dresses and Hair

Elle designed her own hair style today!  I wasn’t even going to try today being Fast Sunday and all, but she came in and told me she had dreamed this up!  All I had to do was execute it

Voila!

And, of course, her cute outfit for today:

 

I decided to keep one of the matching Easter dresses I picked out at Old Navy. 

There was a girls’ dress that had the same fabric, but the style was different.  When Elle put it on she kind of looked like Tarzan, so we didn’t keep it.

 

It was so beautiful today,  we walked around the temple after church. (It’s on the same lot as our building)  The tulips were HUGE and in full bloom!   There were all kinds of other flowers around, and  the trees were blossoming as well.

*sigh*

Awhile ago, our Bishop encouraged our ward to get a family picture in front of the temple.   I brought our camera today hoping for a photo opportunity.    There were lots of other people from the ward walking around too so we had someone take our picture. (We took theirs  in return).  I haven’t looked  to see how it came out, so I can’t post it yet.

Now we have a picture of us like our Bishop asked, and we can put one in  every room just like they said in conference!  (two birds, one stone)

 

And now, for something random ,

Here’s Chris doing weird things:

I’m not sure why he was putting his head phones in his mouth and ears, but I thought it was photo-worthy.

Then, he had me take picture after picture of him shooting off Elle’s toy so I could get a cool picture.  I don’t know if this is what he was going for, but it’s the best I could do:

 

Happy Sunday!