Saturday, September 20, 2008

I Love Soccer Saturdays!

I know you think I'm being sarcastic, and normally I would be, but today I really mean it. After a week of the day-in-and-out grind, it's such a pleasure to spend the day in town, in the sun, among friends, watching our kids kick soccer balls around.

This Saturday was particularly pleasurable because the kids started their tennis season too. Today was the twins first match of their life and I could hardly keep my heart in my chest it was so swollen up with pride. How can I explain how cute they were?

Even the photos can't quite capture it:





It was just so weird to see my babies out there officially smacking that ball around and keeping score. They were so good at it, it almost amazed me.

Garrett played 2nd singles in the 2.5 division and won 8-4. Wyatt played 1st doubles in the 2.5 division and lost in a tie breaker 7-8

Zach played 1st doubles in the 3.0 division and won 8-4.

Tatum played 1st singles and won 8-0. She was outstanding.



(Here's a shout out to our awesome coach and neighbor and follower of this blog, Martha!)

Our schedule today was as fragile as a house of cards. We had to stack 4 tennis matches and 3 soccer games on top of each other just so. This is how we started out.


(We pulled the day off without a hitch, (except, just between you and me, I took a few wrong turns trying to get to Costco to buy pizza for Tatum's team snack, but shhhh. . . there's a certain someone in my family who doesn't know about that).

I got to watch Tatum and Zach play and win their soccer games, and Alan got to watch the twins play and win their game. (Hence no photos of the twins).




In other news: On the movie front, Alan and I saw Ghost Town last night. It was a definite thumbs up. Quite funny in a quirky sort of way, but I will probably be blogging about that on my Crash Test Dummy sight soon, so I'll abstain for now.

And Zach has been working hard on his science project. We were inspired with the idea after Tatum's soccer coach gave her a water vs. Coke study that claimed Coke will eat through a bone and nail in 4 days. Well, don't believe everything you read because it ain't true folks. Classic, Diet, Cherry, Vanilla, Zero, Plus . . . Not a one of them do more than rust the tip.



And for those of you who read my CTD post last week, here's my new computer chair. My back is much happier).

Friday, September 19, 2008

Mommy (by Tatum)

This blog goes out to my mom!!! She forces me to do this, but she has no idea I'm doing this right now!! She loves to write and I'm glad! She's the best mom in the world and I'm sorry for being so mean about the whole weird blogging thing! 

I love you a lot! Thanks for everything!

That's Pretty Much Our Week

This week the Beehives learned beauty secrets. I only know this because I was asked to teach them the secret of inner beauty, (probably because I was always that girl with the nice personality. You know that girl.)

This week Zach taught himself his first song on the trombone by watching Youtube videos, so we've heard every (and I do mean every) rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. He also figured out that the trombone, when manipulated correctly, sounds an awful lot like f-a-r-t-i-n-g. He's been cracking himself up right and left.

Zach was also asked out on a date. Yes, by a girl. An eighth-grade girl. A stupid  eighth-grade girl, according to him. We've probably only got another year before he drops stupid as a modifier for girls and I'm clinging to every second of it. 

I'm also clinging to every second of the twins boyhood. I love love love that they still get a kick out of Gak and Goo and those retractable sticky hands.

Please don't let this feeling end . . . It might not come again . . . (Someone should write a song like that).

That's pretty much our week, plus a bit of extra emotion over 9/11.



(P.S. 15 years later self here: That kid on the left is Alohi Gilman. He became a professional football player for the San Diego Chargers.)


Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Isn't that My Job?

Zach has all A's on his report card, but have I created a monster? 

Zach comes home and instead of me pestering him about his homework he pesters me. 

Isn't that my job?

"Mom, set the timer I'm going to do my times tables." 

"Mom what does acquaintance mean?" 

"Mom, read these three pages of questions for me so I can review for my test. C'mom Mom, I'm ready! 

"Mom! Mom! Mom! Again mom." 

 But you have it memorized word for word. "Again mom!" But . . . 


(This is an unfinished draft I found in the post edit feed. I have no idea how I intended to finish it, but it's a pretty impressive reflection on Zach's conscientiousness, so I am publishing it as is. It made me think about when he was in middle school and I had to pick him up every day and rush him to Varsity basketball practice at the high school. He would call or text me a few times each day to remind me how important it was that I was on time.so he could be on time. Once I was late, and he had to run ladders until he threw up. It still makes me cringe to think that he had to pay for my mistake. He must have been so stressed all the time.)

Saturday, September 13, 2008

The Saddest Thing in the History of the World

I documented the saddest thing in the history of the world (besides terrorism, poverty, world hunger, disease, war and the price of gas. Oh, and possibly hurricane Ike). 

These are the actual basketball rims at our elementary school. (It's more than just a shame, it's a crime, don't you think?)




Friday, September 12, 2008

T.G.I. (aloha) F.

You know you've finally lost your grasp on domestic order when you roll out of bed just in time to shout to your children from your bedroom window, Have a nice day at school!

Only half of that is true. I have lost my grasp on domestic order, but today I was actually up at 5 a.m., as usual, to get Tatum off to Seminary by 6 a.m. My friends think I'm lame because I help her curl or straighten her hair almost every morning. They don't say you're lame, of course, they say, Wow, I could never be such a good mom! which is code for, Get-a-life!

What they don't understand is the mystical power beauticians (and bar tenders) have over the human soul. The only time Tatum talks to me is when I'm doing her hair (or pouring her a drink). I look forward to the daily witching hour, between 5-6 a.m., to catch a peak into my daughter's head.

Around here our mornings are organized into 3 waves. Once Tatum is out the door, Zach pops up, eats, showers, watches ESPN with Alan for 45 minutes, then catches the bus by 7 a.m. Easy Breezy.

Then comes the final wave--the twins. There's no popping up involved in the twin's morning ritual. Garrett requires a piggy back to get down the stairs and Wyatt won't budge unless there's a spray bottle involved and everyone has cleared the room. They also require music to shake them up--mostly Wyatt, as he's only got one speed in the morning: catatonic.

So this morning was just like every other morning, except we made a few candy leis for the Super Citizen assembly. Garrett was voted Super Citizen of the month by his classmates (which, according to Wyatt, doesn't count).

After the assembly I dropped Alan off at work, came home, crawled back into bed and pulled the covers over my head.
 
That's not true either. It was tempting, but it's Friday, and Friday is my day. Before I pay the overdue utilites bill or wash my hair or wipe the spilled frosted flakes off the counter, I will sit down and write. 

First things first, after all! 



Thursday, September 11, 2008

Terrorism 101: Physics for Dummies

Who likes drudging up painful memories?

So let's not drudge them up. Let's talk psychology or philosophy instead. Let's talk physics. How about Newton's third law? To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Cause and effect.

After 9-11 I cringed and ducked every time I saw a low flying plane, I fixated on taking photos of flags, and I bought flour and sugar by the truckload and sealed it up in mylar bags.

I went to candle-light vigils, tossed coins into fountains and prayers into the universe. I even started listening to country music.

Funny what you do when you don't know what to do.

Even Tatum, who was only six years old, went from drawing pictures like this

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To pictures like this.



But then this is Physics for Dummies, because you all know exactly what I'm talking about.

A moment of silence.

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

My Birthday (by Wyatt)

For my birthday my parents threw a family party. Me and garrett got five powerade and two shirts and two pants and they gave us two xbox 360 games and the first game was kungfu panda and they gave us the coolest books ever and they gave us each a rootbeer and we had root beer floats.

Monday, September 8, 2008

My Birthday (by Garrett)

It was my birthday yesterday, Semptber 7th. I got 5 poweraids and my twin brother Wyatt brother got 5 too and we got clothes, cool clothes. Then we made our one cake and cup cakes and we got ice cream and for desert was root beer floats, cake and cup cakes.

Misery Needs Company

Most people get the Sunday night blues. Not me. I'm more of a Saturday night blues kind of girl. I look forward to Sunday nights because that means it's Monday Eve. On Sunday nights I go to sleep with visions of backpacks dancing in my head. Backpacks dancing right out the door to school.

After such a hectic weekend, I was looking particularly forward to Monday. I had big plans to tackle my piles. But Wyatt woke up sick. Birthday Sugar overdose, I imagine. I administered inhalers and liquid elixers and nose sprays and little blue pills. Mom I'm really sick, he said, so I patted him on the back and said You're fine, son. I learned this technique from Alan who believes that if you say something positive like "you're fine, son" it will magically become true. I thought I'd give it a whirl, but the realist in me let out a defeated sigh. Come ere I told him as he walked out the door coughing up a lung and wiping his nose on his shirt sleeve.


We snuggled together watching Deadliest Catch. The crab hunter said somthing that caught my attention. Misery is part of my job. I wonderegld why anyone would want to do a job that included misery, but then it hit me. He loves it! Misery is part of everything we love. I thought of the twins early life, how he and Garrett had underdeveloped lungs which left them vulnerable to every bug and how they were sick every other week for the first two years of their life and were even rushed to the hospital on several occasions. I thought of all those sleepless, night-biter nights. And then I thought of how the things that bring us the most misery is the price we pay for the things that bring us the most joy. And sometimes the things that make us most miserable are the things we love most.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 2023 Me here. I accidentally found this blog a few months ago when I googled my Mother-in-Law's obituary. A family blog that I started for her popped up and this blog, Theframpfamdotcom was on the sidebar. I had forgotten all about it, and was stunned to find it. It took me months of trial and error to figure out the email address I had used to create this blog. When I finally cracked the code, and logged in I could see several unpublished drafts. This was one of them. I began looking publishing the drafts, but before I hit PUBLISH, I had to go back to the original draft date so it would appear in 2008 and not 2023. Clicking backwards through the calendar made me unexpectedly emotional. I was flying through the years, month by month. 15 years of life, chock full of moving and missions and marriages and births and deaths, a whole life lived was whizzing past me in few clicks. All the things that 2008 me couldn't see coming. So innocent in her carefree voice, philosophizing about misery. What a silly goose. I want to give her an approving nod and tell her she's right about misery. And also tell her that she made the right choice to put off her piles and carpe diem by watching Deadliest Catch with her sick 10 year old. Because misery needs company. This post was one of the drafts. She had left things unsaid and sentences unfinished. I felt her reaching for the words, and I handed them to her. 15 years later, from another place and time, she cannot see future me sitting in the dark, finishing her half-baked thoughts. But I can see her, in the thick of things, and I want to reach back and offer her my hand and assure her she has a beautiful life up ahead. A full life. A joyful life, (full of misery and love). And so much growth. In a year she and her little family will be living in Utah. They will buy their first house, and then a dog. And then they will buy another house and these kids that she writes about will grow up and go on missions and go to college and get married and have cute babies. She will teach high school and the dog will die and both of her in-laws will die, and her brother-in-law will die. She will get over all of her fears and heartaches she harbors now. It will all be okay. But then again, maybe she did see me, and this blog was her way of talking to me, and beyond me. I hope in 15 years, 2038 me will reach back and nod approvingly at me, and smile and say, it's will all be okay. All the joy and the misery and the love and the grief. And maybe she will thank you for taking the time to talk to me and tell me what you're thinking and how you're doing. or maybe in 15 years 2038 me will be reaching back to her from Heaven.