Popsicle heaven....

Liv has a new love. It's what we call the timeless summer classic...popsicles. Whoever invented them was a summer genius.I visualized me holding it and her gingerly licking it like a timid deer. False. What happened is that as soon as she grasped the popsicle, she was in love. Complete love. If only I could appreciate food as much Liv appreciates popsicles. 

The stick was irrelevant. What was relevant was shoving that juicy melting sugary mess into her mouth as fast as possible while squealing with utter delight.

It was so delicious she had to close her eyes to enjoy.

We're off to a great summer start. She doesn't even know about otter pops yet. She has no idea what's coming....

Awesome. Pure awesomeness.

Let me tell you about one of the most NOT awesome diseases your child can contract.  It's called hand foot and mouth.  It infects your stomach, ears and eyes. I'm kidding. It is just as awesome as it sounds.  Cool little pustules and dots all over your hands, feet and mouth.  It's especially awesome for children who can't even talk because who wants to eat or communicate when you have blisters on your tongue?  Let's just say it was not our best 3 days.

Poor Liv was not loving her life, her hands, feet, or mouth.  We lived off of juice, reading pokey little puppy, watching Baby Einstein on repeat (she should be genius level after this week) and sucking on Popsicles.  Popsicle introduction was one of the only highlights of this week....

Primary days...

Last week I taught the primary class with kids ages 8-11.  Before we walked in, one of the members of the primary presidency said, "Are you ready to meet the cannibals?  That's what they are you know."  I was expecting them to be screaming like the boy above.  I thought I would not love it and feel like I was having to babysit kids in ties and tights for free.  I was so wrong. I haven't laughed so hard at church in months.  They are ridiculously teachable and so full of love.    In sharing time the teacher was talking about the word of wisdom and held up a picture of cigarettes.  There was an audible gasp through the crowd and a boy on the front yelled out, "Those are cancer sticks! If you use those, your legs will fall off." Ha. I always wondered why some people were missing their legs... 

After the cancer sticks moment, it was time to separate into classes.   The second I walked in the room and sat my chair down they instantly scooted all their chairs around me so tight that the chairs were overlapping and  I could smell their not so fresh breath. I loved it because they still think the opposite gender is repulsive, they can still entertain themselves by playing with the hymn books and their hands with their vivid imaginations and are not old enough to know how to be bratty or disobedient. I felt like a celebrity and I hadn't even pulled out the MnMs.
 The lesson was on prayer and I asked if any of them had a prayer answered before.  Every single one of their hands shot up like a NASA rocket off a launch pad in Florida (back when NASA employees were not getting unemployment).   David started to tell his story in such a somber voice I felt like even his 23423 freckles were looking serious.  He recounted the following:

"I went upstairs with my favorite stuffed animals, the first is named brown bunny and he is a bunny, and Froggy who is a frog and Pumpkin who is a dog (I was trying not to laugh at these exceptionally creative names and thankful he was clarifying their phylum in case anyone was lost, I was just curious how Pumpkin got an actual name and escaped being "doggy").  My brothers and I were launching them from the top upstairs window into the field below.  (Sidenote: David lives on 80 acres with cows and land that looks as undeveloped as the day Pocohontas and John Smith discovered it on their honeymoon, I digress.)
After we launched them we ran outside to the field and we couldn't find them anywhere.  We looked and looked and looked for a long time, I mean a real long time and we couldn't find any of them.  We said a prayer and after we found Brown Bunny, Froggy and Pumpkin at the same time so I know that Heavenly Father knew where they were and helped us find them".

That simple example made me think.  Does Heavenly Father really stinking care about Brown bunny, Froggy and Pumpkin? In all his cosmic creating, economic crises and starving war ravaged children in 3rd world countires, did He really just happen to have a few spare minutes and was in the neighborhood of bluefield helping freckle face find his stuffed dog named Pumpkin?  The best part about it is that He did.  I'm always in awe by all that Heavenly Father creates and is.  How the heck did He think of black holes? Seahorses? Antartica? Parting entire seas?  It's mind boggling.  Even more boggeling to me than how infinite He is, is how intimately aware He is.

I remember in my glory days of 8th grade when I had bangs that looked like someone glued a large brown cauliflower to my forehead and I wore a braided black belt and zits with my teen spirit deodorant that I diligently applied to fight the fatal puberty effects.  I had a blue glitter retainer that had a glow in the dark moon. My dad explained very clearly to me that if I lost it I would owe $175 dollars to replace it.  I could think of a thillion things I would rather buy if I ever even had 17 bucks so I was determined not to lose it.  Well, I lost it.  I was sick to my stomach.  When you can't even drive, your options are to sell millions of cups of lemonade or work for under child labor law wages doing chores at the house. I knew I had to find it.  I went in the bathroom and prayed like crazy.  I felt like I should go in the auditorium where we had an assembly that day. I did and there under some of the seats was the glitter blue moon retainer in all its glory.  I was stunned.  I was stunned not by the fact that I had found it, but by the fact that if Heavenly Father helped me find that retainer, that means He knew were Canyonview Jr. High, was, He knew that had braces, He knew that I had a crush on Robbie Blake and didn't wear my retainer in front of him. If he knew where my retainer was, what else could He know about me?  The obvious answer was everything.  It was a very big 8th grade epiphany to realize that the same God who created worlds without number and obviously wasn't bored,  had time to help me find my retainer.  Somehow, since that day, it was always been easier to pray to a God who I know, knows me. Everything about me, including the fact that I worse a blue glitter glow in the dark moon retainer.

A horse lesson in attitude...

It was a long day yesterday. The kind of day that feels like 4 days in one but not 4 days at Disneyland. More like 4 days straight at the dentist with no laughing gas and nothing is funny.

G was working a long day, Liv was sick and had been up at least 6 times in the night and I was just feeling bugged. The kind of day where you feel like your insides have lice and you just feel frustrated even if nothing wrong is happening.  I shattered my favorite goblet while trying to put it away (yes, I have a favorite goblet that I like to drink juice out of) and the shards flew into the cake I had just baked so dessert turned into a throat shredding danger booby trap dessert.  Liv was consistently whining for the entire day and I was not feeling Mother Teresa like patience with anything.  I was feeling mega stressed about moving because I stink at organizing and moving, we don't even have any boxes and we leave in 2 weeks. Not to mention my stomach jiggles, and I was just feeling like sometimes being a stay at home mom is the same fate as when Edmond Dante was sent to solitary confinement at the Chateu D'If including the need to scrape tally marks for each day of successful motherhood completed (ok, this is a little extreme but you get the point).

 By the time G finally got home I was ready to throw the whole day in the trash with Liv's putrid smelling diapers and my pieces of smashed glass cake.  G of course came home as pleasant as a songbird even though he had been up since 5 and asked what I wanted to do. I replied with dragon smoke coming out of my nostrils, snarling,

"I want to go to bed."
He said, "Ok, that's great, it's only 6:30 though, are you tired?"
"No I'm not tired. I'm just tired of this day. Some days are just so lame it's like a horse with a broken leg, there's nothing left to do but just take it out back and shoot it. That's what I need to do with today. There's no point in letting it just limp along in misery, I'm taking this take out back and putting it down by going to sleep because the sooner I sleep, the sooner there will be a new day.  It's too late to salvage, this is a day like a horse with 4 broken legs and needs to be put down."

G's response is reason 6 thillion and 2 why Garrett Seibold is the perfect person for me.  Instead of over reacting about my over reacting, he just nodded and said, "I see. But I don't think that the answer is always to shoot the horse or the day.  You just sit right there for a minute. I have a little something for you to watch."
He went over to the DVD's and put on "Seabiscuit" which I had never seen. I starting rolling my eyes. Watching some cheesy horse show was not really want I had in mind for a consolation to my caustic mood but it was humorous to me that rather than feed into my mood, he chose a horse movie. He went to a specific scene where there is a horse with a broken leg and some old guy is fixing it and says, "Just because a horse gets banged up, doesn't mean you always need to take it's whole life."

Ha. I was laughing at G using Seabiscuit as a teaching moment for his cantankerous negative virus spreading wife. The funniest part is that after the cheesy scene, I decided to keep watching.  It's basically a cross between "Mighty Ducks 2" and "Black Stallion" with some feel good music and moral at the end but I actually really liked it.

 After it was done, I apologized for my attitude and how I was acting that day. I asked what would be a sufficient compensation and he said, "Chel, let me explain to you a little concept about marriage that I don't think you quite grasp.  There's no need for compensation. Sometimes you get grumpy. Sometimes I get grumpy. Sometimes it's on the same day, sometimes we pick different days.  Sometimes there is a reason and sometimes there is no reason at all.  It doesn't change a single thing. It doesn't change our love, it doesn't change what we have, it doesn't mean things are going to be bad permanently, it just is a rough day. That's it. One day. Everything will work out. Everything is great."

You know. I think he's on to something.  Sometimes I think a bad day transforms in my mind as the marital apocalypse, that eternity is forever horrendously ruined, that all the negative thoughts and feelings are preserved in formaldehyde and will never improve or disappear, and the day is evidence that I am the worlds lamest human being breathing on the planet but the truth is that all of that is false.  Sometimes it's ok to go to bed early to put a day out of its misery, and sometimes it's even better to watch a scene from sea biscuit, realize that the day was crappy and be excited that tomorrow is a brand spanking new start to it all. Thank you G and Seabiscuit for that little lesson.

Thought of the day...

“You are good. But it is not enough just to be good. You must be good for something. You must contribute good to the world. The world must be a better place for your presence. And the good that is in you must be spread to others… In this world so filled with problems, so constantly threatened by dark and evil challenges, you can and must rise above mediocrity, above indifference. You can become involved and speak with a strong voice for that which is right.”   -Gordon B. Hinckley

Liv's .75 cent adoption...

If you are creeped out by the dolls' eyes on the left, you are not alone.  Liv however, is the opposite of creeped.  She sees the the doll for its inner beauty and her infant mother instincts suddenly blossomed full force. On the way home from the fair there was a garage sale.  I love garage sales. Love. At the sale they were selling 2 babies for .75 cents.  I brought the new additions home and disinfected them and then added them to her other babe.  I had no idea the reaction they would have.  Liv turned into a mother hen and I started to believe the dolls were real by how she took care of them.  Anywhere she crawled, she would drag 2 and then go back for the third so that they were surrounded under her protective care at all times.

She would put them on a circuit of feeding them her bottle and then burp each one.  When one was done, she would set it down next to her and then pick up the next one and do the same thing.  I was fascinated.  I felt like I was watching Naitonal Geographic.  How the heck did she know to burp her babies?  Who is teaching her these mothering skills? She doesn't even walk and is not even graduated for over a month from the suckling child nursing club.

When I tried to take a baby, she would put them in a pile and then lay on top of them and kiss them.  All three of their plastic heads were dripping with drool.

I know you are probably sick of these but I've never seen her so excited about any toy. Ever.  It proves the theory that women have a natural nurturing that is innate...I just had no idea how early on it developed!

She insisted on dragging them all over to the car seat that we were cleaning and sitting with them for a good 15 minutes. 

I would say that was the best .75 cents I have spent in a long time....  

A day the fair...WV style

I know you're wondering why Liv is wearing overalls. I will tell you. Saturday G was working all day (like the previous 7 and the next consecutive 14) and so Liv and I decided to go to the county fair. It was 82 degrees and a perfect sunny fair like day.  I did not know what to anticipate at a West Virginia fair, but I knew that I would not be disappointed.  Since you most likely missed the fair this year, I will post my personal favorites high lights:

One dollar goes a long way.  There are multiple things to buy with a dollar but a fried bologna sandwich is not at the top of my list.  They probably didn't have any left anyway because the line was so long. I'm not joking.  Welcome to West Virginia.

I don't know why we don't add a little face painting in with our scripture study. What a great incentive to read the bible...(I'm joking).

After they finished their song the white haired sax player in the middle said, "Now it's time for some heathen music!"  Who knew that senior citizens had such a rebellious streak here.  You would have thought everyone was a jr. high girl at a Justin Beiber concert the way everyone was packed around this band. I had a good chuckle outloud.  The only tragedy is that this picture doesn't come with audio.

I have never understood the point of owning cars that you don't drive but there were plenty for the ey to behold. I personally think Liv's toes are the best part if this pic.

Apparently we aren't the only church with a prayer roll...

This is not a set from a 1920's movie.  This is the real downtown. I'm saying that nice pink and blue optical shop is still in operation. I honestly feel like I transported myself in a time machine whenever I go downtown.

I personally won't be visiting the restaurant to the left, or the church to the right but I'd be happy to take you on a tour of either if you're interested...

Liv was sweating in her overalls and very contemplative after our fair excursion. There was plenty more treasures to see but it will have to wait for another year....

I hate sweating. In every way.

Liv inherited the Seibold red face gene.  I think she has extra sweat glands on her head because every time she wakes up from a nap her hair looks like she just finished a triathlon, specifically the swimming portion.  I never have to wonder if she's hot because even if it's slightly warm or I don't have the air conditioning on full blast, she instantly turns a deep Valentines Day pink.  She is like Veruca Salt on Willy Wonka except for red instead of blue and she's not spoiled.

I don't like sweating. I think it's gross. Mega gross. Whenever I sweat it usually indicates that I am doing something not fun or I'm uncomfortable (ie in our taurus with no air conditioning or on a miserable hike where I feel like licking a cactus to get it over with and end my misery)  I also think I don't like to mentally or emotionally sweat, meaning I don't like things that require exertion or make me uncomfortable.  I like things to be fun...all the time. G sometimes has to remind me that this is not possible. I think it should be possible.

 I would have been the worst pioneer alive. I would have stuck my neck under the first wagon wheel at Rocky Ridge.  Let me remind you that I got an epidural before I was even in labor because the thought of even one contraction is one contraction too many, why? Because labor didn't sound fun.  See my problem?  I wouldn't have cut off my own arm like that guy trapped by a rock in Southern Utah, I probably would have just bashed my head purposefully on the rock to put myself out of my misery.  I always pay extra for laughing gas at the dentist, I wait way too long to rip off my bandaids and thought pulling out a loose tooth as a child was a death sentence. I like bum warmers and air conditioning in cars, a down comforter on my bed, and the Glide brand of floss because it leaves a good minty flavor instead of the cheaper western family waxed floss because that has the potential to get stuck between my teeth and could possibly be uncomfortable.
 
It's embarrassing but true.  I would have lasted about .00004 seconds in a concentration camp or any other survival situation.   Liv and I babysat on Wednesday for a family that has 3 severely autistic children and when I came home I felt that there is honestly no way I could live with that challenge.  So often I look at people with soul stretching trials and think, "Yea right, I could never, would never be able to handle that for even a minute." I feel like people have massive Appalachian sized mountains of opposition in their lives and I start complaining the instant there is a golf ball sized opposition pile in my sandbox.  Yesterday during scripture study I read Elder Eyring's conference talk and it blew my mind when I read this quote:

"There are great challenges ahead of us, giant opportunities to be met.  I welcome that exciting prospect and feel to say to the Lord, humbly, 'Give me this mountain, give me these challenges." -Spencer W. Kimball

I don't know why but the thought of not whining and and fighting against anything that could possible make me sweat or be hard was mind boggling. I realized as my West Virginia bondage is coming to an end, that I had the complete wrong perspective.  Instead of seeing something hard as an opportunity to grow and become a little more refined, I just became very sarcastic and complained about living in the middle of nowhere, hush puppies and accents I can't understand. I wrote the quote on a index card and taped it by the sink because it is an attitude that I I want to have.  Most likely I will not feel that way until I'm around 87 but it's a good thought. 

Habits shmabits...

Everyone says that it takes 21 days to make a habit. People also still think Tupac is alive. I find both of those statements ridiculous. I would like to meet whoever did that study because I don't know where they got their information.  I would like to talk about the habit of getting up early.  I always want to get up early. I even set my alarm with the intention to get up early. That's about as far as it goes because as soon as my alarm goes off I immediately wonder why a sound is interrupting something as important as sleeping.  I woke up every day at 6:30 on my mission. Every day for a year and half adds up to a lot more than 21 days.  I hated it the last day of my mission as much as the first.  I don't comprehend what is so refreshing about peeling your warm body that is cemented to the sheets up in the dark.  G gets up at 5:30 to read scriptures and exercise.  I support him from the covers because I can't even get my mind to wake up at that hour enough to process what he is doing.

2 mornings ago I woke up at 6:30. By myself. I couldn't go back to sleep. It was bizarre. I went through all my options until finally I realized that I could possibly get up.  I decided to do it not because I'm motivated and a ball of morning sunshine, but by default because I was bored lying in bed.  I hurried and exercised before my brain had time to turn on and then had sincere morning prayer, read scriptures and just had time to be still before the Liv alarm went off at 8.  It was the craziest thing because it was one of the best days I've had.  I felt like my mind was clear, that I had an extra tank of patience, and was more in tune with the spirit than I had been for months.  Maybe it has to do with what Joseph Fielding Smith said:

"People die in bed, and so does ambition."

Don't worry, it's not a permanent thing or even close to a habit. I still have a bad case of bed gravity and have a very hard time waking up, but it did make me think that there is something to the morning. I still think the people who made up the 21 day thing are full of baloney, but for one morning, I was loving it. Maybe just because something isn't fun and you don't like it doesn't mean its not a habit, it just means you consistently want something bad enough to make the sacrifice on a daily basis.

Thought of the day: 

"One of the keys to an enduring faith is to judge correctly the curing time required.
That curing does not come automatically through the passage of time, but it does take time. Getting older does not do it alone. It is serving God and others persistently with full heart and soul that turns testimony of truth into unbreakable spiritual strength." –Henry B. Eyring CR April 2012

Happy Birthday Doctor Dog...

It's true. June 4th is something you should have celebrated because it's the day Casey Doggett was born. It was a big day for planet Earth. They invited us over for a delicious Boston cream pie cake.

After the candles were removed, Levi took advantage of the situation and was very proactive in his cake consuming.  Why wait for unnecessary annoyances like plates and forks when you can achieve the goal?  Thank you Levi Doggett for this important life lesson.  I'd like to point out his left nostril which was completely clogged with cake immediately following his cake attack:

 Liv and Levi shared a first sippie cup (intermittent with shrieks and whining).  They often share germs but since they are betrothed, it's not that big of a deal. Germs don't matter when you're in love.

We're so glad Casey Dog was born, mostly because his cake was so good but also because he's a quality human being.

Bad day...But not that bad.

I'd like to think I have Pollyanna tendencies and always seek out the positive with the nickname chipper cheerful canary Chel but let's be honest. I don't.  In fact, lots of times, I can be a contagious blob of negative caustic being.  I try to settle for my baseline of somewhere in the middle but sometimes days are so lame you just want to throw them in a garbage bag and not even donate it to Goodwill because you don't want anyone else to feel how you feel, it would be like donating your puke.  Well, I was having one of those days where I felt just ready to get back in bed and it was only 10 am.  I wasn't tired, I just wanted to day to be over.  It was gray rainy "blah" weather, my cinnamon life for breakfast was stale, my contact had a slight tear that making my eyes water, Liv was already on her 4th outfit, my oil was past due for a change,  and even though nothing was really bad, vacuuming and doing laundry didn't seem to glorious and I just wasn't feeling thrilled and excited for the day's itinerary.  I was on my way to the auto place and stopped at a red light when I looked to the left and saw that I was at a historic monument. Since the light was long, I decided to read what Andrew Davidson did to deserve a sign.

Well, suddenly my cinnamon life cereal wasn't so bad.  Talk about a bad day...this poor guy came home to less than the welcome party he was dreaming off.  Suddenly I realized that it's all about perspective and that Andrew Davidson probably may have been whining about having to get his oil changed in his car, except for he didn't even have a car because he probably rode a horse which smells horrible and hurts your bum.  That's right. I have a car. That's a fairly big deal. The probability of G getting tomahawked or our apartment burning down when returned home were fairly slim.  I was feeling better by the second. Let's just say I didn't feel as grumpy as I walked in to get my oil changed.  Thank you Andrew Davidson for the paradigm spanking.  It's all about perspective. The next time I feel grumpy, I'm just going to drive past this monument.  If you're having a bad day, I'd be happy to take you on a tour, it might help you as well...

My new flexibility idea...

Today commemorates one week of working out. I have a confession. I always skip the warm up. I don't like to be swinging my arms with Jillian's "wind mill" visual and trying to act like I know yoga while everyone on the workout DVD is wrapping their arms 7 times around their feet with their head flat on their knees like they are some type of Zen master on the top of a mountain with incense burning.  The whole thing just make me feel very inflexible.  I checked on Liv a couple nights ago and thought maybe she's on to something....why not stretch in your sleep?  Liv apparently does the splits as she sleeps so she wakes up extra limber each morning.  It's worth a try...

Better Bag Ideas...

Out of the $20 and the rabbit Liv got from Grandma on her birthday, she prefers the rabbit.  
We packed our first box. Correction, Gar packed our first box.  What can I say? It's one of his gifts. The king of order and organization.  We decided for family night that we were going to watch a conference talk for our lesson  http://www.lds.org/general-conference/sessions/2012/04?lang=eng,  eat apple pie and ice cream for dessert and then pack and watch "America's got Talent" for activity.  When G suggested we do our books I thought that would take around 10 minutes.  Then I forgot about G style organization and now our books are in such impeccable order we could pass out a library card because every box is categorized into their specific category.  I love that my husband is so organized.  Especially since disorganization has been a perma-weakness of mine for oh let's see, the last 29 years.  Packing is also a weakness or rather something I like to do about as much smelling a pet store, pulling out a sliver, and eating cold eggs. Perhaps I would be a little more excited about the activity if the boxes weren't so boring looking.  While we're on the topic, bags are pretty  boring in America too compared to these bags in Europe. I think they are on to something besides Lindt chocolate balls, this is a simply fantastic idea that needs to happen from sea to shining sea:

The Seibold family combined weight: 389 pounds.

Bodies are so much effort. We just got the oil changed in the car and that is the kind of maintenance I can handle...every 3,000 miles you stop in and smell rubber tires while watching men with greasy  black hands do manly things saying words you have no idea what they mean like carburetor and then give them $25 bucks with a coupon and you're good to go.  Taking care of a body is far more complex. You feed it at least three times a day and if you don't feed it the right things you start to jiggle.  If you don't give it enough sleep you want to bite everyone's head off and transform into an unpleasant cranky version of yourself.  I love to eat but this whole daily exercise thing really gets to me.  I think I lack the gene of all the people I see outside in florescent sports bras jogging with their 6 pack glistening in the sun.  Those are the same people weird me out every time I go to the gym because they  are pumping iron and breathing like they are having contractions in the last stage of labor. 

 My favorite part of the gym is the water fountain. I make sure to get a drink every few minutes because it's the only thing there is to look forward to.  G and I decided to motivate our flabby selves to see who could lose 5 pounds first with a grand prize offering.  Let me tell you about the golden period of weight loss.  It's the few days before you actually start weight loss but you have decided you will so all the guilt is erased of anything you are eating because you are "going to be starting in a few days" so you feast like it's going to be nothing but fast Sunday for the next year.

So the golden period ended, I even bought some water bottles and pulled out my old friend Jillian Michaels with her 30 day shred. We wrote our current weights on the mirror in the bathroom with our goal weights even larger next to them.

 Since the challenge began I have gained 2 pounds and Gar has gained 3.  The only thing this fitness challenge has done is made us more aware of our weight gain.

We are not giving up but I wonder if I will ever love the gym or enjoy sweating while Jillian yells at me from the TV.  I want to be one of those people who checks labels on food for things like "riboflavin, transaturated suicide fat", etc and knows the difference, one of those people who has the hard core calorie counter strapped to your bulging bicep as you run at 5 am and has a "workout" mix on your ipod.  I don't know if it's possible but I'm open to suggestions....