Month: July 2010

Book Review: Leaning Into The Curves


Every day this little old blog of mine gets
hit repeatedly from a certain google search.
Bucket list.
It has to do with this old post of mine.
It seems that everybody has a bucket list.
I know I do.
Funny that one thing I mentioned doing
in that old bucket list post
happened years ago at
The Rose Parade.
I asked a complete stranger for a ride
on the back of his Harley.
Fast Eddie was so sweet to me and graciously obliged.
is one of my fondest memories.
You have to just throw caution to the wind and enjoy life.
It is still on my bucket list to
ride across the country on a motorcycle,
stopping to see all the sites.
Funny that my husband’s bucket list
has the same cross-country trip,
but his chosen choice of transportation is an RV.
Someday our dreams will have to be negotiated.
I know this.
That is why I loved this line from Hank
to his loving wife, Molly, in
“The answers I need are right here.
You and me together.”
Negotiation isn’t a chore
when you have each other.
The jist of the whole book for me was:
when you love someone,
you make it work,
no matter what.
You compromise,
you change,
and communicate,
and you overcome fears,
and choose to trust each other
and love your differences.
Now who can’t use a book like that?
Leaning Into The Curves
felt like a real life love story.
That is much preferred by this realist,
over all that impossible romance rhetoric.
The authors, Anderson and Morris,
are obvious pros at this marriage thing.
While reading the book,
I found myself following along on my
own Honda Gold Wing,
touring with the Temple Riders Association,
on a wonderful adventure,
full of charming life-like characters.
It was an extra bonus
that I was also taken through
some marriage counseling, too.
The authors are not just wise
wives, mothers, and grandmothers,
obviously in touch with an array of life challenges,
but they are witty,
and very stealth with their flawless life coaching
through great story telling.
And I know you can all use some
bonus marriage counseling
and life coaching.
Reading this story
was like sitting at the feet
of a beloved grandmother,
where she is effortlessly telling her life stories,
and everything that she says
is exactly what I needed to hear.
Although there are some
disappointing “for Mormon eyes only” references,
I still think even Non-Mormons could
relate and be entertained.
(But what do I know about writing for a specific audience?)
It was a really light and fun read.
And funny. Did I mention funny?
And I am not just saying that because
they sent me a free copy to review.
I would give it a strong 4 stars.
I rarely give out a 5.
Like maybe 10 adult books in the whole universe.
So buy it.
This would be a great gift for
retired people,
best girl friends you love to walk with,
newly-married people,
motorcycle loving people,
adventurous people,
people with an irrational fear,
people who need to find a hobby,
or people who need to create a bucket list.
And if you are never going to read this book,
do one thing,
get back in touch with your bucket list.
Don’t wait until you are retired to enjoy life a little.
I relearned that important truth in the pages of this book.
Oh, and they nailed the end.
I never love the end.
This one was great.
And I was happy for the closure,
which was somewhere between,
“they lived happily ever after”
and
“they loved each other all along”.

Change
Guess what?
We all screw up.
It’s a fact of life.
The good news is that we can always improve.
We can change.

We fall down.
I’ve learned the hard way
that we shouldn’t focus on the fall.
But, getting back up.
I recently read this quote by
“No one who cannot rejoice in the discovery
of his own mistakes deserves to be called a scholar.”
At church a while back,
my friend Brenda taught me something profound.
I was lamenting about how
I always have so much self improvement to make.
It gets overwhelming.
She said,
“That shouldn’t make you sad or discouraged.
You should be encouraged.
Because the fact that you know
what to improve upon
means that you are
in tune with the voice of God.
He is talking to you.
And you are hearing it.”
How wise.
My favorite quote last week:
“The best way to make
permanent change for good
is to make Jesus Christ
your model
and His teachings
your guide for your life.” ~ Scott
I wrote it on a piece of construction paper.
And tacked it above my computer.
Funny, LG walked by as I tacked.
He questioned,
“Is that for me?”
“No, it’s for me, silly.”
We all need to change.
Embrace it.

Self-Employment

For the past two years,
LeGrand has been running his own law practice.
It is a two years that I would
NEVER want to live over again.
LeGrand has done a great job.
His practice has been successful.
He really did amazing things.
He’s accomplished a lot of his goals.
And he has gotten to know himself
more than ever before.
I bet he has been significantly more successful
than most people who start a practice
right out of school.
But it’s all because of God’s grace.
And it does no good for anyone
to compare themselves to others.
Better than monetary success,
LG has helped a lot of people.
And that makes LeGrand
really happy and proud.
He could keep going,
and we would only get richer.
But, life isn’t about riches all the time.
Sometimes it’s about having some vacation time.
I can’t wait for the day that LG clocks out
and leaves work at work.
I want to be the wife that looks forward to
that summer vacation.
Instead of feeling guilty for asking the man
to take a day off of work.
I couldn’t be happier,
that it’s time for the next adventure.
Because the stress that LG has carried around,
has about killed his wife.
And I am pretty tough.
Thanks be to God
for letting us know
that we can finally move on
from our second two year mission.
Or maybe it’s our third mission.
The first being our literal church missions.
(Where we met by the way)
The second being having all of our children
while finishing college.
And the third being the law practice.
I wonder what the 4th will be?
Here’s to NOT minding your own business.
And going back to working for the man.
I know that LeGrand will find the perfect job.
People would be stupid not to hire him.
He’s a genius.
What does this have to do with church anyway?

Large Families
This is an opinion post.
I just want your opinion.

Here’s a disturbing news story about a lady
who was dead for 18 months
and was only found after her house sold.

There are really great promises about having a big family.

One of those is going to be
that I am not going to die
and not be discovered for 18 months.

My kiddos may send me to a nursing home,
but they aren’t going to forget about me.

Just like I will never forget my parents.
And neither will my 6 siblings.

I would love to be able to handle 7 children,
like my mom.
Sometimes 4 feels like my max.
I am 36.
I could crank out a couple more.
Especially when looking at this.

It feels like 4 children doesn’t really define a large family.
I think that 5 is large.
But, 6 seems to be the magic number for large.
What do you think?

Proud Mothering Moments

When I was a young mother,
I screwed up all the time.
I would like to think that I screwed up
then more often than I do now.
I laugh as new mothers ask me
how I do so well with 4 children.
I laugh because they don’t believe me
when I tell them that there’s a learning curve.
To prove my point, here’s a great story.
One time, LG and I went shopping with Abigail.
Remember, we only had ONE child.
Maybe two, I can’t remember if Sophia was born yet.
We went to Utah’s finest hub for young poor college families:
The Wal-Mart in Orem, UT.
Abigail started whining that she needed
to go to the bathroom.
We cut our shopping short,
and checked out quickly.
LG was assigned to take the things to the car.
And, I took Abigail to the bathroom at the front of the store.
I took her in a stall and got her situated.
When all of the sudden,
a wave of “I need to relieve myself too”
washed over me.
I told Abigail to stay in her stall
and that I was going to run into the stall next to her.
I talked to her as I ran over and the whole time
I was doing my business.
In the middle of this, I see her feet hit the floor.
I adamantly encourage her to wait for me.
I tell her to sit back down.
She took a step.
I tell her to stand still.
She keeps walking.
I see her feet run out of her stall.
I don’t know if she can hear me.
I start raising my voice.
“Abigail, Abigail, mommy is right here.”
“Abigail, come here.”
I notice that she left her pants and her underwear
on the floor of her stall.
I hurry and pull my pants up.
And run.
I don’t even think I flushed the toilet.
Gross.
By the time I got to her,
she had walked out of the store.
With no pants on.
So much for Code Adam.
So much for Wal-Mart greeters
watching for suspicious activity.
And so much for me being
a natural at raising kids from my first.
And I have never EVER tried to go to the bathroom
at the same time as one of my toddlers
ever since that horrifying day at Wal-Mart
back in 2000 or 2001.
And one lesson, after another, and another,
has made me into the amazing mother
that I am today.
And lucky for me,
none of the rest of my lessons,
consisted of me
running after a naked child
in the parking lot
of Wal-Mart.
Did I mention that she had pooped
and hadn’t been wiped?
And the same goes for me.