Singing a New Song

Today I was released as the Stake Music Chair (except it has some newfangled title which I can't remember--never mind. It ought to be "chair" since chairs figure large in the calling). This calling (that I didn't want) was the conduit for so many blessings in my life and today it was just a little sad saying goodbye.

The drive from my house to the Stake Center takes 12.5 minutes. I have driven it coming home from 6 am Stake Council meetings, praying fervently for all 12.5 minutes that somehow the children had awakened and gotten themselves ready for church since Tom was already at WARD council meeting and I needed to load up and get to our building in time to play the organ for a sacrament meeting that was starting right away. That particular experience was too painful to blog. I have driven it while overcome with the spirit, driven it while overcome with gratitude, driven it in apprehension and exhilaration, while filled with chagrin, amusement, and exhaustion. I have driven it--often--while listening to the combined BYU choirs singing "Redeemer of Israel" (I can definitely carry the alto part while driving). I have driven it at 6 am Easter morning while praying that somehow the members of the Stake would wake up and get themselves to the sunrise service--and I have realized, in a way deeper than words, that though they might not, even if we had prepared only for the Lord and for ourselves, the preparation was justified, and sanctified. I have driven it while practicing something I intended to say, while singing something I needed to (somehow) play, while weeping over musical beauty I hadn't imagined could exist among a little group of rank amateurs, myself included.

And I drove it again today, 12.5 minutes home from Stake Conference, singing along with the BYU choirs and realizing, incredibly, that this whole experience, this four years of what I often considered challenging service, was really, in fact, for me. I was the one all along. These four years were not my gift to the Lord. They were the Lord's gift to me.

Explosive

Nigel finally learned how to blow his nose. It was just one of those things I could never get him to understand. I've done everything--jumped up and down, involved supernatural animals (Be like a dragon! Blow up the kleenex!), the neighbors (Blast me all the way to Jackie's house!), the brothers, myself (this is a little like smelling dirty clothes--you forget what a bad idea it is until after you have emphatically blown mucous all over your face). Every method worked once or twice, but then lost its effectiveness before the cold was gone. He just didn't like the feeling of blowing his nose, and he couldn't or wouldn't do it consistently.

It was one of life's minor frustrations--the downside to my lovely o/c child who washes his own hands, wipes up spills on the floor, and changes out of dirty shirts. I was getting ready to train him on the bulb aspirator when a miracle happened.

Seen the TV show "Mythbusters" yet? It's pop science on steroids. The hosts set out to bust age old myths and urban legends using a combination of fast-talking entertainment-world smarts and uber-handyman building skills.

They're not scientists, but they think they are. They know all. They doubt the veracity of everyone's assumptions but their own, which can make the two of them a little hard to take. For me. Not for my boys. The boys love, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this show. Mostly because of the explosives.

If Jamie and Adam (we're on a first name basis) can work it in, and they usually can, most myths will at some time or another require explosive force to be used. One day Nigel was watching the show while J & A were attempting to bust the myth that you can paint with explosives. I still think you might be able to, but they couldn't build a contraption to get it done (therefore proving that no one can). The myth busting required a lot of big bangs. A few hours later, I found myself holding a kleenex to Nigel's nose. "Blast me," I suggested automatically.

"Uh, wif explosuvs?" he asked in astonishment. "Like dhe myfbusters?"

My eyes lit up. "YES! YES! LIKE EXPLOSIVES!" I yelled.

"Fire in dhe hole!" he yelled back cheerfully. And blew his nose.

It's been more than a week, but the novelty hasn't worn off. He blows his nose regularly and explosively. No questions asked.

And I...well, the boys were out in the snowy back yard today (another topic, 8 missed days of school, summer starts July 6 now) doing a "science experiment" involving diet coke and mentos. Thanks to the popularity of this explosive experiment with all boys everywhere, the manufacturer of Mentos has doubled--DOUBLED--its US sales. Diet coke and mentos are the new black powder. Let me tell you, boys do not have to be urged to science when it involves explosions. It's one of those things I just don't get--the joy, the thrill, the power of the blast. It leaves me mostly thinking about cleaning up the mess. But I've decided that the side effects are worth it. Clean noses forever! Fire in the hole!

Elementary

It has snowed again in Bellingham--a scant three inches, but enough to cancel school. Our final day for the year is now in July. Bummer.

Yesterday morning there was just a skiff of snow and thankfully school was held as usual. My kids with difficulty found adequate snow gear and got themselves out to the bus stop at the end of the driveway in good time. About four minutes later, however, Alex came bursting into the house yelling something about Tim's footwear at the top of his lungs. I raced out of the house and got to Tim just as the bus came over the top of the hill (this is referred to as "seeing the bus in its full splendor" in the ritualized and super-competitive points game the boys play every morning).

Tim was wearing aqua sox (black, women's size 8) over bare feet to combat the snow. I dragged him into the house, him wailing all the way about missing the bus. After I'd calmed him down some, he explained that one of his every day shoes had a hole and the snow was getting in. I asked if the water shoes were working better.

"Worked fine for me," he said defiantly.

I asked if he had ever seen ANOTHER child at school wearing aqua sox. He admitted that he had not. I asked him why he thought he hadn't. He replied with a remark denigrating parents, their knowledge, and their open-mindedness. I asked what might prompt parents to ban the aqua sox in cold weather.

He replied, "Mom, if you're going somewhere with this, could you please just take us there, because I don't have any idea what you're trying to say."

We've discovered with Tim that either he's thought too much about something (the aqua sox) or not enough (the day after I switched some dresser drawers around, he came down dressed in Nigel's clothes. He hadn't noticed a problem.)

And then there are the pure Timmy world moments, like last week when he came upstairs to discover that I had popped open a tube of ready made biscuits just a moment before. We almost never have popping tubes, so he was extremely disappointed. He stood holding the empty tube for a few minutes, and finally said, "Mom, why do they make these things, anyway? To entertain tired old ladies?"

I guess I know what I am!

We are rich with joy. Christmas was packed full of it. We especially loved having all 22 Mumfords (plus three dogs!) who could make it here for New Years Eve. That was a great celebration. Everyone left on New Years Day at almost the same time. Within ten minutes, I walked into my room and discovered Nigel thoroughly asleep on my bed. He slept for five hours!

It was a great way to start 2007.

Flooded

Okay. I realize three blogs in three days is just excessive. But I finally have stuff to say.

Tom was listening to 1776 this morning and feeling kinship with George Washington, who apparently was so discouraged at one point during the Revolutionary War that he wanted to disappear to a wigwam in the wilderness.

Our basement flooded, meaning that late last night Tom and I were wading around in rubber boots ripping up carpet and padding while pondering the injustice of the world.

I went and rented a dehumidifier and blower from Master Rentals this morning. On the way back, I started thinking, perhaps inevitably, about that old incident with Grandpa Campbell. How clearly it comes back to me! The sheer frustration of wet vac-ing the carpet over and over again for hours, drawing out about a teaspoon of water each time, but never being able to stop because I could always get SOMETHING out.

How cathartic it was last night to pull up the carpet and rip out that sopping wet pad. I felt vindicated 24 years later. You really can't dry out a carpet pad with a wet vac. Of course, Grandpa was pretty much right, too. Utah in the summer is so dry and hot that my endless vacuuming plus evaporation got the job done, and nobody had to retack the carpet.

As I thought about that in the car, it came to me suddenly that had he been here, I might have had to put in longer hours on the wet vac, but then he would have been out in my back yard with a backhoe and a large work crew of conscripted teenage relatives, digging out a new drainage system to make sure the carpet STAYED dry.

How much I miss him, his wisdom and his love--how much I miss all my grandparents. I wish I'd done a lot more listening when I could.

Home

Remember the camper?

Probably not. We aren't going to be allowed to forget it, though. Tom bought it from a homeless, slightly crazy woman who had posted a sign in the window that said: "$300 by 3 pm." She was taking off for Alaska and needed to sell her domicile before she left.

Tom's heart, always very soft towards homeless people, led him to not only purchase the camper and transfer the title, but to take the woman to an ATM, get her cash so she could make her plane to Alaska, and put her on a bus to get her there in time. Then he prepared to salvage the 60's era camper.

When you opened the door and put your full weight on the driver's seat, the camper would tilt dangerously. Starting it was a smoke-filled adventure, and driving it...well, Tom only ever drove it distances measured in yards, mostly to avoid having it towed before he could sell it.

Actually, I take that back. He did take it on one road trip...to the dump. He backed in and just started shoveling out the interior. After a few minutes, though, he noticed mementoes and documents surfacing--school and family pictures, things written by children, birth certificates. So he slowed down and saved out what he thought might be important.

Later I spent an entire morning boxing the stuff up and shipping it off to Alaska.

I thought we would never get rid of the truck, but we did. Sort of. Tom sold it to a homeless man, who was SO happy to have it! Tom filed the bill of sale, and we thought that was that.

Not so fast. First of all the boxes came back from Alaska. We had to send them again. Then, we started getting parking ticket fines in the mail. We called the city and explained that we didn't own the truck anymore.

Then there was a brief respite. Just yesterday, the ghost of the truck came back in the form of a nasty letter from a collection agency. "Our" unpaid traffic tickets are past due. We must immediately remit $67 a piece or risk permanaent damage to our credit report and time in debtors prison.

I started calling people this morning. Turns out that, unbeknownst to us, the state DOL declared our report of sale invalid because we failed to report the address of the buyer. This meant the city kicked the fines back into the collections process (without telling us, of course).

I called the DOL to explain that we couldn't report the address of the buyer because he was homeless. There was a long pause. "I don't think you need to talk to me, honey," the employee said. "I don't know who you need to talk to." Then she put me on hold, where I was finally told by a mechanical voice that "call volume is unexpectedly high right now. Please call back later." Click.

Think how much we could have saved--time, money, psychic energy--if Tom had just GIVEN the lady $300 without taking the camper. Sigh. But then she wouldn't have her children's birth certificates and baby pictures, and a homeless man wouldn't have a place to call his own. I remember Tom saying (when attempting to justify the whole experience) that when he saw the lady with her camper he felt like he was the one--one of the few people who might have come along who had the cash, the skill to get the title transferred quickly, and the streak of insanity necessary to help--really help--a complete stranger.

For his birthday, his partners and paralegals gave him a picture of the truck sitting in a parking lot with its "$300 by 3 pm" sign visible in the window. There was lots of laughing over the gift, but I wonder if they knew how truly that camper represents him.

Loud Speaker

You know what they said about Italy under Il Duce. The trains ran on time.

I hate to compare myself to Mussolini, but I have to admit that I've given in to the craving for law and order. Totalitarianism has been born in the Mumford household.

You know how it is...you just need a little propaganda tool. A little happy music and some well-chosen incentives to create cheerful workers for the state. Sounds creepy, but it's working for us.

Back in mid-80's China, one of the things I found most bizarre was the loudspeaker mounted on every pole. All speakers were definitely tuned to the same frequency. At 6 am every morning they started blasting "Dong Fang Hong." We all rose from our beds, beaming, and reflected that Mao Ze Dong was indeed our sun rising red in the east...I think. I never got what came after that and eventually I stopped wondering.

Until now.

A few weeks ago we stayed with the Dixons and discovered the most incredible tool for child mind control. It's called Children's Miracle Music. You just pop in the CD, press play, and suddenly...lunches in 3.26 minutes! Beds made in 1.59 minutes! Clothes on, teeth brushed, breakfast eaten, hair combed, EVERYTHING GETS DONE! If Mao can use this concept to get a billion subjects ready every day, where's the challenge in motivating four boys?

It really works because the Miracle Music lady has the sweetest, sweetest Utah drawl. I think Zach is hearing his old teacher from SLC. And the music is very, very well chosen. No matter how you feel about it aesthetically, bodies move when it starts to play.

Tom is not on board. He never wanted the trains to run on time. He didn't even want a schedule. He wants RESULTS!! But without structure. I understand this, but the reality of seminary + his incredible 80 hour work weeks is...I NEED THE MIRACLE. I've gone over to the dark side. Anyone wishing to liberate my children can make an amphibious landing through the large puddle in the back yard. You have to promise to brush everyone's teeth afterward, though.

Hyperactive

Next weekend our various stake and ward organizations are sponsoring the following: 7 pm Friday night--Family History Night for the ward where the young women will share brief vignettes about bizarre or famous twigs on the family trees in the ward forest. 9 am Saturday Morning, and I am not joking about this, the Elders Quorum will have a "tie exchange." First elders quorum activity ever not involving some form of barbecue. Tom says he's only going if he can sneak in a basketball and HE'S an elder who could stand to exchange a few ties. Someone's wife is definitely at the bottom of this one. Unspecified time Saturday: building cleaning. Our ward has decided to assign that by organization, so the Elders Quorum, Relief Society, Primary, and Youth each take turns. Maybe in theory the whole organization is supposed to gather at the church and experience camraderie while they learn industrial cleaning skills. In practice it means that each week the harried organization head runs through the phone list, hitting the likeliest targets, until they find someone home and willing. I have recently discovered that this family has somehow infiltrated every ward organization, so our turn has been coming around quite regularly. At 1 pm is the Stake Relief Society conference, theme "You're Not Alone," which should be subtitled "But You Are Exhausted." Church as usual on Sunday, I assume, with a Stake Priesthood meeting that night.
Can you remember where I was going with that? I can't, except maybe to bed.

Ahh...Winter at Last

It's just a perfect Sunday afternoon in October. Daylight savings time, so it's nice and dark at 5:30 pm. Chilly, grey, and rainy outside. Inside, we've got a great fire going, and I'm curled up by it in the big reading chair. Everyone is supposed to be writing letters to Grandma right now.
I've discovered by watching my slightly older friends that kids who don't know how to write letters when they leave home do not discover this skill in the MTC. They have no phone, you get no information--just one side of 5 x 8 sheet torn off a mini legal pad and covered with cliches. A kid who has avoided writing his whole life is not going to start writing just because the little white book says he should. Unfortunately, the joy of writing letters is communication. Nobody writes letters anymore, so the kids don't get the whole feeling. But I'm banking on the Grandmas eventually responding. Letter quality is low right now, but I'm trying to get production going before I address quality.
Alex wrote the letter right after lunch. He's going to be a great missionary letter writer. He's now curled up in the other chair reading the New Era. Nigel dictates, so he's also done. Zach is trying to procrastinate by sitting at the piano picking out "Captain Vegetable." Tim is half way done but has been distracted by the nerf six shooter and is standing in the kitchen firing off rounds of suction cup darts at the white board. With every hit, he sucks air in between his teeth, shakes his head in amazement, and says "Whooooah!" It's all very peaceful. I love it.
It occurred to me this week that Tim has a date with the WASL at the end of next year. They're not going to like each other. He brought home a math paper this week that emphasized the problem of evaluating Tim using a standardized test. The assignment was about tally marks. The upper half of the page was a data set shown in tally marks. Then there were five or six questions about the data. Every question was marked wrong. None of the questions required difficult reasoning--all subtraction and addition. I sat down with Tim to try to figure out what went wrong.
"Well, Mom," he said earnestly, "I have curly hair and so I wish that more kids were like me. I don't like all the kids to have straight." I looked back at the data set, and sure enough, the two categories were "Straight" and "Curly." And now I also saw that a number of tally marks had been added in pencil to the "curly" column. I soon discovered that Tim had rectified the anti-curly bias by evening up the numbers. Then he went on and did the problems based on the corrected data. The final question asked the student to consider whether the interviewer would get the same data if he came back and recounted in a month.
Tim's answer? "No. Egzapl. I hv crlee hr normule but I cut it swt [short]."
Sigh. I talked to his teacher about the worksheet and she smiled. "Yes, I know that's what he did, but I'm trying to help him realize that sometimes he just has to work according to the rules."
Other Timmy moments: he was a dementor for the church trunk or treat. He had a hooded cape, which I told him he couldn't pull over his face.
"Why not?" he asked.
"Because. No masks at church."
"But this isn't a mask," he pointed out.
"Yeah. But still," I told him.
He thought for a minute, then said, "I'll wear a nametag. Will that help?"
Another night we were bashing through yet another wrong math paper, this one a story problem. It was a clock problem with hours being added to hours as a whole day was described. He just kept getting confused, and finally I had him circle the important parts of the problem. He kept circling unimportant details, and I said about 15 times, "NO, Tim. What kind of ice cream they got is NOT important!" and he would answer, "Well, it's important to me!" Finally he caved in, circled the number details, and easily solved the problem. He looked at me thoughtfully and said, "It wasn't my mistake of misunderstanding the clock. It was just my mistake of getting too interested in the story."
Final random Timmy moment. As I was cooking dinner, he came up and asked me (out of the blue) "How do dinosaurs fit into God's plan?

The Program

People love the primary program. They love the singing. They love the little four year old girl who has every word of her scripture memorized. They love the sweet little voices and the songs. And, let's face it, they love Tim. When he stands up and begins to approach the microphone, you can sense the anticipation.

The lips on the microphone thing doesn't have anything to do with overall Tim syndrome. It's hereditary. You can see where it comes from if you ever let Tom get his hands on one of those FRS walkie talkies. He immediately begins channeling BJ and the Bear with the walkie talkie pressed to his lips. Anyway. At least you can HEAR Tim, and believe me, the entire congregation WANTS to hear him.

This year he did a beautiful job. He had his talk memorized and he delivered it beautifully, right up to the part in the story where he says, "I went to find my shoes. When I came back..." loo--oo--oo--oo--oo--ng pause..."the car..." pause... "was GONE." What a ham. Everyone laughed, but I'm happy to say that he didn't lose his cool and he finished the talk under control. Even a year ago, that much laughter response would have sent him straight to monkey.

We did best, worst, and weirdest for the wedding weekend (bwwww) at dinner today. Tom's best was the Cougar football game. Tim's best was the return of the Rollens Club. (Tim's worst was (no words used) pie in face motion with sound effects. This incident won't soon be forgotten.) Zach's best was game cube with Uncle Nigel. Baby Nigel's best was playing "wif all the kids who are my cousins." Alex's best was hanging out with Seth and Jared. We all had a great weekend. Thanks everybody.

ThirTEEN

Saturday was Zach's birthday party, and I gained a lot of useful information.

1) Just barely teenaged boys don't eat as much as just barely teenaged girls, BUT they like it either full of sugar or covered with orange fake cheese powder.

2) Standard seventh grade type gift: cash or gift certificate. Only kid toting actual object was a sixth grader playing up.

3) There is a gene for playing pro sports. One kid at the party flies all over the country playing competitive tennis and is projected to go pro within 2 years. No other tennis players in the family, but dad played defensive end for the Atlanta Falcons and brother is probably going to play PGA golf.

The tennis star situation made me nervous, because we threw a big liability party: jumping on the (three) trampolines, biking through the trees and over the bmx dirt jumps, skateboarding on the driveway. In the end, thank goodness, no-one even got road rash.

The kids all had a great time, and I had fun meeting them. Nice kids. They did eat a 6x batch of homemade oreos, 2 pounds of doritos, 3 pizzas, and 36 pops. The ruffles and the bowl of apple slices remained virtually untouched.

All I Want for Christmas

We had hot dogs for dinner tonight--all beef, Zach's favorite. Something about the hot dogs reminded the kids about little smokies and they started getting reminiscent. Here's what Tim said:

"Christmas is the best time of the year, because we get to eat all those special foods that are so expensive. Like little smokies and Baby Bells." Long pause while he contemplates how lovely it would be if only Christmas were coming this week.

"Mom, all I want for Christmas is a whole pack of little smokies just for myself."

Zach: "I want a whole pack of bacon!"

Tim: "Oh, yeah. A whole pack of bacon. And some bear meat."

He had such a terrific week this week--reverent in Primary last week, working hard at school all week, finally checked out Harry Potter 4 from the school library (our home copy is MIA. The regular librarian wouldn't let him take a copy out from the school library because she thought it "would take him too long to read it." With typical Timmy determination, he kept sneaking back into the library until at last Mrs. Vanderpol, the aide, was manning the check out counter, and, as he confided," Y'know, mom, she doesn't pay too good attention, so..." big grin.) On Saturday he played an unbelievably heads up game of soccer.

Then today in primary, inexplicably, HE WAS TERRIBLE!!! He blurted out answers, sang random songs while he was supposed to be quiet, was quiet when he should have been singing, terrorized a little five year old in the row just ahead of him, tried to bribe Isaac (who according to his parents was just as inexplicably having the most reverent and attentive primary of his life) into using a livestrong band to flip his neighbor, hid behind the chalkboard when he failed to get a match in the memory game, and I have no idea what else after he left sharing time!!! Arghh.

Uncle Nigel (baby Nigel insists that Nigel is HIS name and if we want to refer to that other guy, we better use his WHOLE name which starts with an Uncle) taught the boys, all four of them, to play goal line stand. As they were dragging and whacking each other all over the living room he also informed them that once, in the course of the game, Uncle Scott dragged Uncle Stu down the stairs. Good hustle, Stu. Way to hang in there. I'm pondering whether or not the services of a full time ref are in the budget. Do you think Porter could be trained to do it?

Looking Sideways at the World

Everyone is at church right now, and I am sitting here looking at the computer at an angle. My body has, for mysterious reasons, frozen into this position and if I move at all I feel acute pain. This happens to me about once every year or so, though more frequently since I thought unkind thoughts about a friend whose long running and vividly recounted struggles with back pain began to irritate me. If what I often thought of her is also true of me, I am suffering today from unresolved anger issues and instead of ranting about my aching back, I should be sucking it up and leading the music in primary.

Instead, I have just spent an unexpectedly pleasant 20 minutes being surprised that almost everyone (Tamsin! Colin! The Wackers! Kersten!) posted this week. Please note: I also love Nigel and Scott's regular and very enjoyable posts. I love the blogs. I love reading about people's lives and thoughts. And so, I will stay here in my weirdly contorted position and blog aimlessly about my life. Feel free to read or not and know that this is the only way I can think of to say THANK YOU for posting.

Fall weather is here in Bellingham. Slightly chilly, grey, rainy. It decended almost exactly with the start of school. The schedule marches on. Tom is teaching seminary. ("Yes, Tom, this is an assignment. Please take it. Your family will be blessed.") Thank goodness. Teaching seminary has already (over the course of the first four days) turned out to be an incredible blessing in itself. We've also been blessed--Tom at work, me at home.

Something I still find surprising is that over the last six months or so, bedtimes have gone from tough to easy. Tom is not usually around to help me get the guys in bed, but I just don't care anymore. Weird. This week I had a great bed time moment--with Tim of course. It's really poignant and spiritual, so I feel a little funny sharing it, but Cecily asked me, "Do you ALWAYS have to be funny on your blog?" I think the answer is no, so here goes.

I played the piano at my little student Sophie's baptism. As I was getting ready to leave (Zach was babysitting), I told the kids where I was going and Tim said, "Hey! That's my friend! I want to go to her baptism!" What can you say to that?

Well, he had to sit by himself while I played, so I don't really know what he was doing or thinking during the service, but that night after prayers as he was lying in bed and I was tucking him in, he said (with utter Tim sincerity), "Mom, I want to preach the gospel at school, but I just don't feel ready."

Images of Tim standing on a soapbox during recess immediately came to mind. I gently tried to suggest that the best way to preach the gospel AT SCHOOL is by example, with chances to follow up on a friend-by-friend basis as we invite kids to our home and get to know their families.

"But Mom," he said, "I have to get started now. Because grown ups are pretty set up in their religion and it's not easy for them to change. But kids it's easier to try new things and make a change. So I have to tell them while they're young. I wonder if I could take some Book of Mormons in my backpack?"

We talked for a while about that, and I explained that our stake president encouraged us to open our homes and invite our friends and their families to just be with us. He promised us that when our friends felt the spirit as they were around us, they would want to know what we had that brought the spirit into our lives. I explained that this was how the Stake President was converted. Tim was delighted by the idea that the Stake President was a convert to the church. "That just shows that your friend you know could be getting ready to be something big like the Stake President!"

As we talked, I realized that perhaps Tim had felt the spirit at the baptism (it was a wonderful baptism) and that he was perhaps feeling that bursting full feeling that leads us all to want to share the gospel. I asked him if he had felt the Holy Ghost at the baptism. He looked thoughtful and said, "No. I don't think so. I didn't hear anything." I was getting ready to explain more when suddenly his eyes grew big and he said excitedly, "Mom! I get it! The Holy Ghost is a feeling!! I always thought he was like a ghost that floated up behind you and said, 'Tiiiiiiiiiim.... You need to doooooo something....' But he gives you a FEELING! I felt the Holy Ghost, Mom!" He sighed and laid back on his pillow with shining eyes. "Oh mom," he said, "I wish *I* could get baptised tomorrow. I want to be baptised and get the Holy Ghost right away."

Last week I was asked to give a talk in Sacrament Meeting about building testimonies at home. I said lots of stuff that seemed relevant at the time, but I suppose that the real answer is that we have to do what we should--read our scriptures, pray, serve faithfully wherever and whenever we're called--and the testimony building experiences are just gifts, blessings from the Lord.

Well, I'm going to try a different position now--lying down, standing up, something. I hope Tom is doing well in singing time. Isn't he a terrific husband? Still YM president, seminary teacher too, and now...Primary Chorister? He's the best.

How Tom Sabotaged Alex's First Day of School

Yesterday was the first day of school. Hooray! The best part about it is new everything--new school supplies, new teachers, new clothes, new shoes--anything is possible, ANYTHING! This is the year Tim will learn to form his letters. Zach will be challenged and will rise to that challenge! Alex...
Well, okay. New teacher this year for Alex but the rest of his pristine new day was destroyed by Dad.

The kids were ready for school at about 5 am yesterday morning and did a lot of standing around with their backpacks on. Tom had resolved to stick around for the "delivery to classrooms" moment, and so all the boys eventually found themselves standing out on the driveway with nothing to do. "Hey, Alex," said Tom, "Show me how you take that jump on your scooter."

"Oh, sure, Dad," responded Alex, tossing the backpack aside and grabbing the scooter.

Now, as we all know, when something leaves the physical posession of any male, it is instantly forgotten and will not be remembered until needed again. This leads to comments which infuriate mothers everywhere, such as, "My coat? Did I wear a coat?" Anyway, although you will not forget about the backpack, Alex and Tom instantly did.
About a half an hour later, Tom got tired of waiting and decided to kiss the boys at the door of the house rather than the door of the classroom. He took off for work, not noticing the slight bu-bump made by his rear tire running over the backpack.
I picked up the backpack and gave it to Alex as we left for school.

Cut to 5 seconds after the dropoff at the classroom door. Alex races back out, yells for me, and holds up his lunchbag, now reduced to about half an inch thickness and oozing smashed peach. I went into the classroom to help him out, and... Well, let's just say that Alex's school supplies were no longer pristine and new. They did not promise a fresh new start. They were, in fact, sticky and covered with peach.

How Alex recovered and went on to have a great first day is another story. The only thing I know for sure is that this experience will have absolutely no effect on where he chooses to deposit his backpack.

Dreaming

The firefighters and police officers in B'ham have "trading cards" to hand out to kids on the playground. On the back, each card has a brief summary of the officer's vitae and family status, along with a "tip" for the kids. The cards float around the house and pile up like dead leaves on the floor of the playroom. Usually they end up in the trash, but some go into the kids' "special things drawers."

Tonight as I was putting Nigel and Tim to bed, Tim found a card in his drawer and started examining it. As I read Nigel a story, helped him pray, and tucked him in, I heard Tim in the background:

"Hmmm....a chief!"

Long pause.

"Oh. Great tip. Listen, Mom: 'There is a power in your dreams. Use it to make them come true.'"

A few minutes later, I turned around to help Tim pray and found him lying on his bed, gazing up at the ceiling. "Mom," he said thoughtfully, "It just makes me want to ask him, 'Bill, what IS the power in our dreams?'"

Ten Things I Learned at the Organ Workshop

1. I need to perfect the bench slide.
The pros just drop the shoulder and do an all out dive onto the bench, gliding smoothly to the center and ending poised and ready to play. The amateurs like me hop up, shove/scoot, shove/scoot, shove/scoot, and then stand (furtively, on the pedals, to straighten out the skirt) sit, settle, and glance at the feet. It’s graceless. I’ve gotta change.

2. Hymns rock!
Or at least they do at the Organ Workshop. Tonight’s hymn sing was terrific, especially when the Vocal Beauty Bootcamp folks came in on the descants. The organist, Daniel Kerr from BYU-I, was incredible. Over the week Tams and I have become used to the wild free improvisations on the “unison” verses, but one of the Vocal Beauty Bootcamp people sitting directly in front of us found some of Dr. Kerr’s wilder pyrotechnic episodes shocking.

3. Dave Chabot may have been the original co-founder of the organ workshop.
I’ve heard nearly every one of his amazing techniques described in detail this week. He could have been the poster child for our “Creative Hymn Playing” class, except that I think we were told ten times to clear our stylistic choices with the priesthood authority before playing. His stylistic choices were never cleared in advance and always seemed to come straight out of left field and THWAP Brother McCann in the side of the head.

4. Organists tend to be tactful.
Even when you miss five out of the six notes in a playing exercise. Or ask stupid questions in theory class. Or fall from your tandem bike for no discernable reason whatsoever.

5. BYU is on top of a hill.

6. All the good restaurants are at the bottom of that hill.

7. Many calories consumed in tasty but overly-indulgent dinners can be burned off on the ride home.

8. Ice Cream is a drug in Utah.
This isn’t really something I learned…it’s something I remembered when I saw our cute BYU Creamery assistant devoutly assembling our hot fudge sundae. It had nearly a half-gallon of ice cream, a quart of hot fudge, artistically applied whipped cream, pralines, and three cherries. Both of T and I together couldn’t finish it off. It was billed as having “two scoops.”

9. There is no Temple access from Wymount Terrace.
But you can get over the fire gate and pass a tandem bike (FZI: candy apple red Diamondback) over the fence to your waiting sister if you’re really determined to bike around the Temple grounds.

10. I love the organ. It’s my instrument. No news here I guess, but this week has been a chocolate mint brownie to a dessert starved soul.

Bits and Pieces

Just checked my Primary Choristers Group emails--I love that group. I get lots of great ideas from them. I'm also periodically astounded by such stunners as a woman who made 30 fake buffalo chips from spray insulation and painted them brown as just PART of her plan to teach "Pioneer Children Sang as they Walked" ("I hid them around the room and the kids loved looking for them and putting them in their baskets!").

Okay, okay! I admit! I thought about trying it! But just for a minute.

New topic. Boys and knives. There's a relevant incident I could relate to get this topic rolling, but I think I might still be sworn to secrecy. Suffice it to say that I learned nearly thirty years ago that a boy in posession of a sharp knife is about five minutes away from doing something incredibly stupid. My nine year old boy who found himself in posession of a sharp kitchen knife used his five minutes to decide to cut up popsicle sticks. And when he got cut up himself, he discovered that he could reduce the pain in his finger by shaking it around violently while screaming his head off. By the time I got to the kitchen, it looked like the scene of a massacre. I immediately noticed the spattered blood all over the walls, floor, stairs, sink, cupboards, countertops, chairs, and table. Gradually I discovered that there was also blood on the whiteboard, desk, phone, phonebook, calendar, front door, doormats, stair railings, dog dish, mixer, refrigerator, doorbell, etc. The only blood-free items were, of course, the knife and the popsicle stick. It was a minor cut. Thank goodness for bandaids.

I also spent about a half an hour out on the deck with my five boys plus the dog. They were using the giant tennis ball slingshot (it's called "The Hyperdog") to shoot tennis balls as far up into the stratosphere as they possibly could. They all wanted a turn, but even more, they all wanted to just watch the balls go way, way up and come down. That's the problem with being the only female member of the Mumford Testosterone Club. I'm invited to the party, but I'll never really understand.

Still, there are benefits, and one of them--Cub Camp--starts tomorrow. I can't wait. It's all the fun of girls camp minus the drama and plus the sleep. It's one of those moments when I look around at the boys and think, "I bet I DID choose this. I'm SURE I did."

Take the Long Way Home

There are two categories of travelers. The first category, to which my wife Julia belongs, believe that the best way to deal with the fact that you have a long (and possibly hot) drive ahead of you is to load the car with water bottles, books on tape, and meals and put your head down, pedal to the metal and NO STOPPING (except for gas) until you get to your destination. In an even more extreme version of this mode of traveling, a receptacle for urine known as a nenu jar can be used to avoid even otherwise necessary bathroom stops.

The benefits of this mode of travel are obvious -- you reach your destination quickly, are able to spend more time with the people you are going to visit and when you are on the road you have a clear sense of purpose and a solitary objective. Roughly 95% of the people I know are category 1 travelers.

The remaining 5% of us believe that life is a journey -- not a destination. We stop a fruit stands. If we are hot and are driving along a river, we pull off onto the shoulder, change into our swim suits and take a swim. If we want a snack (and we frequently do) we forego the Chevron at the rest stop for the donut shop on the old downtown business loop. We pull over to take pictures of a scenic overlooks. We scout campgrounds for future reference. We have lunch with the locals.

This past week, Julia flew back from Boise to go to girls camp and the three oldest boys stayed with the cousins in Emmet. Nigel and I could have driven home in about 10 hours up the interstate. Instead, we decided to go through McCall, along the salmon river, up White Bird pass and spend the night in Pullman. We had a very nice visit with Judy, Gillian and Jonathan and enjoyed seeing Wackerburg. I'm sure that it will be featured in some future publication -- very unique. I really liked it, but I do worry about how you will get the groceries up to the second story, since right now the only way up is a long spiral staircase.

Nigel and I then left Pullman for Bellingham via Wenatchee. We sang songs, talked about how things work and practiced our counting and ABCs. In Wenatchee we stopped to meet with a great local lawyer, Bob Parlette, whose fearless and tireless efforts resulted in a national class action settlement against Household Finance Corporation worth 484 million dollars for deceptive mortgage lending practices. Bob did not charge his clients a contingency fee and in the end was only paid for half of the time he put into the case. I have worked with him on one of my cases but had never met him, so Nigel and I stopped by and collected some documents. I thought I could keep Nigel quiet by giving him a lollipop, but in the end I had to go get several wet paper towels with which to wipe up Bob's desk.

We could have made it home in three hours, but we chose to head north and take the Cascade Loop through North Cascades National Park. We went through Chelan, and it was so hot and the water looked so cool and blue that we couldn't resist stopping for a swim. This brought back fond memories of our trip there with Brett and Alison when our kids were tiny.


We then headed north and passed through Twisp, Winthrop, and Marblemount stopping for some cold chicken and peaches and some cherries from a family cherry orchard. We again sang, talked and enjoyed the beautiful scenery. I was so busy taking a picture of the general store in Winthrop while driving that I took a wrong turn and several miles later we ended up in a camp which had been hastily set up for firefighters battling a forest fire in the mountains. Although the detour set us back in time, we discovered a beautiful valley which I hope to visit later with the family for a camping trip.



We wound our way down the pass. Nigel fell asleep as the sun went down and I admired the brilliant blue of Ross Lake, promising myself that we would return there someday soon. I reminisced about the last time I drove that road 8 years ago when Zach and Alex were very young and how I had also made the same resolution at that time -- life just flies by so fast.

We finally pulled into our driveway about 12 hours after we left Pullman. Pullman to Bellingham is usually a 6 hour drive. My only complaint was that it didn't last longer.

Ziploc Bags

What is it about the Ziploc bag that makes mankind feel so secure? Something about the act of squeezing the air out and zipping the top together gives the bagger a sense of control. Yes, you're sending your barely adolecent child off to Korea for two weeks, but control your nervousness. Just pack everything--EVERYTHING--in ziploc bags and squeeze the air out. Use a vacuum! Think of the space efficiency, the organized sterility, the perfect neatness of your son's duffel full of ziploc-ed clothes!

And the rain gear. The outdoorsy-looking rain pants and rain jacket make me laugh. How well I remember the Elder who tried to wear that in Taiwan. Imagine dousing yourself with pop, wrapping yourself in black garbage bags, and going to sit in a closed car on a hot summer day. He nearly suffocated. True, you can't wear nothing. The rain comes down in cliches--it pours, it dumps, in buckets, torrents, deluges. But VENTILATION! VENTILATION is the key!! He needs a poncho, very heavy duty, with a billed hood that channels water away from the face so he can see to dodge cars and motorcycles.

Will he wear the poncho? Can I find one on ebay? (Don't they have an ad about that?) Should I just get the standard rain gear so he can fit in and be uncomfortable like everyone else? Should I vacuum pack his clothing in ziploc bags even though he doesn't know how to use ziplocs and will, once he's ripped out the clothing items inside, no doubt leave them blowing about South Korea? Or should I let him pack his own bags, choose his own rain gear, and suffer the consequences?

One thing I learned at Grandpa's funeral. He really got the whole adolescent boy thing. He understood that "be prepared" applied even more to the scoutmaster. We grownups seem to swerve unpredictably between the extremes--taking over and giving up. One moment, we're jumping in ziploc-ing everything in the poor kid's suitcase. Control! Control! The next minute, we're tossing the whole job onto the kid, watching in some amusement as he tries to survive a weekend on one pair of socks and three cans of tuna. But Grandpa was different. He cared about that little scout, huddled in his sleeping bag with cold feet. Then he planned ahead. Every scout that brought a towel got a hot rock. A little responsibility, a lot of backup. The most excruciating way possible to raise a child. And, I think, perhaps the most successful.

Broken Necklaces

There’s a necklace lying here on Cecily’s desk. The string has broken, and the necklace is here, coiled up carefully with all the escaped beads tucked in close. It’s waiting to be repaired.

I think it will wait a long time. This house is quiet and clean right now, but in a house bulging with 10 cousins, such moments are expectant, rather than peaceful. This one is longing to explode into hot, sweaty children and evolving adventure. I will resist for the big things—feeding, washing the important things, finding the library books, a little structure for the body and the brain—but then I’ll just let go and float along with the current of the summer, which becomes the rhythm of the year, and then before I have realized it, the events and excitement of a whole life.

I found more than one broken necklace, carefully coiled together with its stray beads, tucked into little nooks and crannies around Grandma’s house yesterday. They were tucked in alongside unwritten explanations—a tiny sea shell, a piece of smooth stone, a card, a note. The house was not untidy, but it was carefully folded full, and it said in every drawer and on every shelf, “I lived.” They left very little undone, our grandparents. The house seemed to me a museum of their full and generous lives. But they did leave a few broken necklaces.

Tim Gets Hip

I went downstairs at 8 am this morning to find Tim sitting cross legged on the bathroom floor cutting his hair. One second after my inevitable reaction, I wondered (not for the first time) what it must be like to constantly have people yelling your name in exasperation. Every time I yell, I promise myself that I'm going to think of a more constructive, loving way of dealing with the problem the next time. Then he decides to cut his own hair.

Why?

The following conversation is a word-for-word quote. I COULDN'T make this up. No-one could. "Mom, now that I'm seven, it's time for me to do some experiments about things I've always wanted to know, like what does it feel like to cut your own hair." I can't help myself. I say his name again, more gently but still with the inflection of a slide whistle.

"Mom," he says earnestly, "I've always wanted a mullett. I want to reshape my hair because what I have is a backwards mullett." I look at his hair and the undeniable truth of this observation makes me start laughing.

"Tim, why do you want a mullett?" I ask.

He looks at me, mildly surprised by my failure to see the obvious. "Y'know. MacGyver."

Today also I made him an omlette and asked him if he'd like avocado in it.

He paused for a minute. "There are some voices in my head. One is saying, 'She poisoned the avocado,' but all the others are saying, 'It's your mom! You can trust her!' so go ahead, put some on."