A Wild Ride

Hello everyone,

Well, as many of you have heard, Dave finally came home from Singapore. He got home on Monday the 23rd in the early evening. Yes, he finally escaped the too-small face masks, cleanrooms with no chairs, hard floors and unpadded shoes, traffic jams from his hotel to the lab and endless extensions of "just one day more." We were excited to see him and he was excited to be home. We were hard pressed to get the kids to let him eat something before the kids dragged him out on the trampoline to jump.

Tuesday the 24th was my ultrasound. As many of you have heard, we found out we are having a boy!!! We also spent a little bit longer then we expected for the whole ultrasound process. They found an abnormality on the ultrasound, so they immediately sent us to a perinatal expert at a local hospital for a more in-depth 3D ultrasound to double-check the findings.

At first it was kind of like a re-run of Camryn's ultrasound: when we had Camryn's ultrasound they found what looked like it could possibly be an echogenic bowel (which is connected to chromosomal disorders) -- the words of the sonographer were "I don't think this is anything, but I like to be cautious-- so they immediately sent us to a "genetic counselor" so they could explain in great detail exactly what terrible defects she could possibly have as a result of this and then back to our doctor who pressured us to get more testing and an amniocentesis (before the cutoff date for a 2nd trimester "termination") and was absolutely floored when we told her we didn't want them. She brought in another doctor to tell us how terrible we were for not getting the amnio and put more pressure on us. After recovering from the trauma of 5 hours at the hospital, with doctors trying to induce panic and a toddler in tow, we switched doctors, ignored their making a mountain out of a molehill and went on to have a perfectly healthy baby.

Unfortunately this case is not quite so clear cut. The abnormality they found, an enlarged nuchal fold (or thickened skin on the neck)--which was confirmed at the second ultrasound, is much more of a concern that what they found with Camryn. There is a much greater risk that the baby has Down syndrome and there is a lot of reason to be concerned. This obviously is not what we were hoping to hear and we spent several days trying to process this and figure out exactly how worried we should be. The end result is we really don't know... the baby could have a chromosomal disorder or could be perfectly healthy. Luckily we had much better doctors this time around. My OB, the genetic counselor and the specialist we saw didn't try to pressure us into making any specific decision or try to induce panic. They just tried to let us know what the possibilites are and what our options are. For the present, we have decided to not worry about it (as much as that is possible...) since there is really nothing that can be done to change it at this point. So, the downside is that we will have to live with some uncertainty for a while and pray that everything will work out the way it is supposed to. The upside is that we got some really cool 3D pictures of the baby from the second ultrasound. =]

During this last week the kids and I had an unusual cultural experience. They went to "Vacation Bible School" at the Lutheran Preschool that Camryn attends during the year and I volunteered as a group leader. You may ask "How exactly did THAT happen?" I was asking myself the same question throughout the week... =] I had a friend in our ward whose daughter had gone last year and enjoyed it and she had volunteered, so I thought "That sounds like a fun activity for the kids...." and it was free. I was impressed that there were people who were willing to do camp from 9-12 M-F for 200+ kids, to teach kids about the bible for no charge. That seemed like a worthy thing to volunteer for.

So we went to camp.... It had the theme "Avalanche Ranch: A Wild Ride through God's Word" and for the most part it was really cute and fun and the kids had a fun time. Meanwhile I actually survived herding 11 four and five-year-olds from activity to activity for three of the days. Whew! There were just some cultural differences that I was not prepared for. We began with music time in the chapel. I was guess I was expecting something akin to primary, so I was taken aback when they brought up a music video with country/rock songs with video of kids singing along in cowboy outfits and had the kids sing along and do hand motions. On the one hand, the songs were fun and the messages of the songs were positive. On the other hand, I just could not get used to (strong rock beat) "Our God is an awesome God! Our God is an awesome God!", (bopsy beat) "Everybody Pra-ay-ay-ay-ay-aise the Lord!" or (strong country beat) "We're going on a ride through God's Word!" Each day had a "bible point" with an accompanying scripture, like "God is real," "God is strong," or "God is awesome." Again, all good points. I just had a hard time with when (in the chapel) the leader would say "God is awesome!" and we would all lasso our arms and go "WOO HOO!" in response. I do have to say that it was impressive that they would do the camp, all run by volunteers for free. But, yes, it was a new and different cultural experience for me.

On the last day of bible school, we had a friend over in the afternoon and the kids played in the sprinklers and had a good time. But Jared really wanted to go to Safari Sams (like a local Chuck E. Cheese) and I said no. So Jared told me, "It's been a really bad day. Every thing we've done today has made me sad." Me: "Even having Connie over to play, playing in your swimsuits with the hose and going to the hot dog barbecue?" Jared: "Well everything has made me sad except for those three things. There are 10 or 15 sad things that we've done." I guess you just can't win.

Since I refused to spend money to take the kids to Safari Sams, Jared decided to take matters into his own hands. While I was mowing the front lawn that evening, Jared brought down the kids table from his room and set it up in front of the garage with a chair and an umbrella. He then sat in front of our house with 3 cups of milk on the table and a sign that said, "Milk. $1 Plese." He actually sold two cups of his milk to the neighbors, after which he eagerly put the proceeds into his money jar. I figured this was a good time to teach him about tithing, to which Jared responded, "I don't want to give any of my money away." So.... we did some more explaining. After some discussion and after he figured out that he didn't need to give ALL of it, just a little bit back to Heavenly Father, Jared was much more amenable to the concept.

Although I had done a more-admirable-than-usual job of cleaning up the kitchen this week, I unfortunately have the habit of sometimes leaving the kids alone downstairs for too long. I came down one afternoon after checking my email and the counter and surrounding floor was scattered with corn syrup, powdered sugar, sprinkles and some unidentifiable mixture of the above ingredients with something dark like cinnamon. Meanwhile, Camryn was eating a "sandwich" she had made out of bread, corn syrup and sprinkles. ARGGGHH!!!!!

Meanwhile Dave had a typically crazy work week. They told him, "Usually when you get back from a trip like that we give you a few days off to rest, but RIGHT NOW we can't because....." So yes, he spent the week working his usual late hours. The upside is that he should be able to leverage it to get all the days off that he needs to go camping with my family at Sly Park. We spent Saturday doing our typical household cleanup and hanging some things on the walls and then took Jared and Camryn to Safari Sams to play the games. They were absolutely thrilled that they got 200 tickets (between all of us) so they could buy a plastic slinky and a paddle ball game. Then we went to Cold Stone and got some ice cream. [Yes, Jared. We only do sad things in our family.]

I am writing this update from my mom's house in California. She flew up on Sunday night. We spent Monday doing various errands, packing bags and taking the kids on a very brief visit to Safari Sams (two tokens each).

Then Tuesday Mom and I drove to California with the kids. We had a mostly uneventful trip except when we stopped for lunch at Wendy's. I was about to order Jared his usual chicken nugget kids meal when he saw a picture of a triple cheeseburger with bacon. "I want one of those!!!," he said, "but with no cheese." So I got him a junior bacon cheeseburger (with no cheese) and some fries and a lemonade. BUT, when we got our food he realized that Camryn got a TOY and HE DIDN"T (because he didn't get a "kids meal"). This put Jared into tears. I tried to tell him that I just got what he ordered, but he was distraught. He even asked at the counter if he could get a toy and they said no. So Jared spent 20 minutes telling me how much he wanted a toy and how sad he was and how he NEEDED a toy and it JUST WASN"T FAIR. Finally I took him out and gave the option of sitting in the car and talking as much as he wanted about it or coming back in and being quiet. He opted for the latter. I finally took a bite of my hamburger but Jared saw that there was mayonnaise on his hamburger!!!! This was absolutely unacceptable!!!! So I wiped it off. But there was still some there!!!! So finally we discarded the half of his bun that had mayonnaise, threw out the tomato and lettuce and he ate half of a bun with a meat patty and bacon. He didn't want his fries because they were yucky. Good grief!

Once we got into the car Jared still went on and on about his lack of a toy and how unfair it was. I finally told Jared that he needed to stop or he was not going to get any treats that day. He countered with, "Mommy, how would you feel if I had ten toys and you had none?" I answered back, "How you feel if you had no toys and neither did I? That's what we have! Now let it go!!!!"

Later in the car (do you think the kids didn't get enough sleep the night before?) Jared and Camryn got into an argument about a movie, so I put on a different one. Jared started screaming about not wanting the movie, so I handed the movie player to Camryn. Then he started screaming about how he wanted to watch the movie. I told him he could watch as soon as he stopped crying, so he screamed for 20 more minutes. Finally my dad called and I asked if he wanted to talk to Grampa. He did happily for five minutes and then calmly watched the movie with Camryn. Camryn, on the other hand was mostly happy and pleasant during the trip. She entertained herself by throwing carrots and grapes, squirting water through her straw at the window and emptying the stuffing out of her car lap pillow.

But we did eventually make it to Milpitas and get the kids to bed. Today I had a pleasant leisurely morning and then mom took me out to lunch for my birthday. [I will skip over the negotiations with Jared to go someplace other than McDonalds.] Tomorrow my mom and I are flying to Boston to pick up Alisa from her mission. We will be there for a few days and then go to New York City before coming home. Meanwhile the kids will stay at Grama's and play with Marty dog, their aunties, Uncle Nate and Grampa. Hope you all are doing well.

Love,

Karen

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Quotes of the Week:

Jared: "You say no to me all the time, so maybe I'm going to go to a different family." Me: "Well, I guess we'll miss you when we're on our trip to California."

Camryn [after our neighbor Sophie went home]: "I want to play with Sophie until 7:06." Me: "But Camryn, it's past that time already." Camryn: "Oh, well really I want to play until 7:07."

Camryn: "I was in mommy's tummy first." Jared: "No you weren't! I was. If you were, you would be 6 and you would be smarter than me."

Camryn: (some of you may have heard this from my mom already...) I had made a list of things to remember for the trip and I left it out on the counter. My list said: "Pack Camera," "Target," "Cut Kid's Hair." When I came back to the list later, Camryn had made her own additions to the list: "PACUPSUTCAS"... ["Pack Up Suit Case"] and "GOTOGAMOROGRSHS" ["Go To Grama Rogers' House"]

We Found Out....It's A...

It's a BOY!!

When the kids heard the news, Jared cheered, but Camryn burst into tears, crying, "I wanted it to be a girl!!!" After at least two sessions of crying about it, she came up to me later and said happily, "I thought it would be a boy, and it was!" So now she's happy about it. Camryn wants to name the baby "Michael" (after one of her friends).

In less exciting news, we found out during the ultrasound that the baby has an enlarged nuchal fold (the skin on its neck is thicker than it should be). While it doesn't tell us anything definitive, it does mean there is an increased risk that the baby has a chromosomal disorder such as Down's syndrome. While this is definitely cause for concern, in good news, the rest of the baby, including the baby's heart and limbs, looked normal and healthy (often in Down's syndrome babies there is a structural defect, a heart defect or the limbs are shorter than they should be). Next month they will do another in-depth ultrasound and a fetal echocardiogram to check the baby's heart closely. We probably won't know anything for certain until the baby is born-- there could be a problem or the baby could be normal and healthy-- but they will be monitoring the baby carefully during the rest of the pregnancy.

We're hoping for the best, but no matter what happens, we're excited to have a new member of our family on the way.

We love you all and hope you are doing well!

Love,

Karen, Dave and kids

Rain On My Parade

Hello everyone,

Yet another week has flown by.... You can tell we are back in survival mode when my cooking adventures have been along the lines of Hawaiian Haystacks, Spaghetti and Meatballs, Top Ramen, Burritos and chicken nuggets.

After a lonely weekend with Dave in Asia, Susan arrived on Monday, bringing peace, calm and Great Harvest Bread with her. We picked her up at the airport that evening and then went to Sweet Tomatoes on the way home. Between stopping for dinner and the kids using their very best bedtime delay techniques on Grama, it was almost 10:00 pm by the time they got to bed. =] On Tuesday I had an OB appointment-- I scheduled my ultrasound for next Tuesday-- and then the kids rode bikes to the park with Grama while I started getting the master bedroom ready to paint by taping, removing hardware, etc. I finished in time to go to the last hour of hour RS drop-in quilting day, and got there in time to tie two whole stitches in the last quilt before they finished. Oh well!

Wednesday dawned bright and.... rainy???? Wait a second, the rule in Portland is that you can count on it being sunny from July 5th onward. Well apparently that rule was just broken and we had clouds and rain, which unfortunately lasted most of the time that Susan was here. Susan took Camryn out to breakfast by herself (Camryn was so excited to get to do something BEFORE Jared) while I started priming and painting. Then Susan took the kids to a free showing of "VeggieTales: A Jonah Movie" at the movie theater (the things you have to endure being a Grama....) while I finished the first coat of paint.

That afternoon, we set off on Jared's activity of choice: going fishing at "Horning's Hideout," where his kindergarten class had gone for a fishing trip. After driving out into the middle of boonieland and going a mile or two on an unpaved road, we finally came to the place: a beautiful lake with a ramshackle house in the front of it. We went to the house and a lady came out and handed us fishing rods, nets, hook tools and a cup of worms. Then she started explaining... "When you get a fish, you use the net to pull it out of the water, then use the hook tool to slice through it's gills and take the hook out, then you clip it onto this chain. You don't want to put a whole worm on the hook or the fish will just eat around it instead of biting, so just use your fingers to pull off a small piece of worm and put that on the hook. Then when you're done, you come back here and you can use this space for gutting the fish with a knife." Susan and I gave each other looks of disbelief. I never realized until that very moment how much of a city-girl/wimp I am. Where the heck were my latex gloves when I needed them? She wanted us to break off a piece of live worm with our bare fingers??? This was downright barbaric and we hadn't even gotten to gutting the fish.

[Warning: The following contains scenes of graphic violence that may be offensive to some viewers.] Susan and I took all of our fishing equipment and the two kids to the edge of the lake. Then came the getting the worm ready for the hook.... I managed to get myself to touch the worm long enough to brush it out of the cup onto the ground. Then I used a piece of the chain to cut through the worm and break off a small piece, leaving two pieces of worm wriggling frenetically on the ground. I managed to stick the hook into the smaller worm piece without touching much of the worm with my fingers and scoop the bigger piece back into the cup.

Now we were finally ready so we dropped the hook into the lake without tangling too much of the line. Jared informed us impatiently, "No, mom, that's not how you're supposed to do it. You're supposed to cast off." Sure, enough, the other people fishing in the lake were sending the hook and line flying gracefully over their heads into the middle of the lake. After moving the kids sufficiently far enough so they wouldn't get skewered, we gave it a shot. The hook and line flew awkwardly for about 3 feet and then fell into the lake at our feet. We were obviously missing something. After trying unsuccessfully several times and then standing around and feeling utterly incompetent, we went back to the house and ran into a different lady who worked there and asked what we were doing wrong. She instructed us in the art of casting off (there is a piece of the rod you have to move for the line to keep flying) and then directed us to a good spot. We did several extremely elegant looking cast-offs (and quite a few not-so-elegant ones that involved massive tangles of fishing line) and waited with our hooks in the water, but no fish seemed to bite. We did manage to catch a lobster-looking crustacean that fell back in the lake. After spending about two hours with no luck, we finally gave up. Jared was disappointed that we didn't catch trout for dinner, but he bore it well. As for my part, I wasn't exactly broken-hearted that I missed out on the chance to gut my first fish. Some firsts can wait for another time.

We drove back to civilization and the kids went to Safari Sams with Grama for jungle gym and mini-golf while I went to a meeting. After I came back, we had some pizza together and negotiated exactly what prizes you could buy with 11 tickets (3 army men or a plastic bracelet and a mini-koosh-looking ball, in case you were wondering). Then we went home and put the kids to bed.

Thursday morning I painted the final coat of my bedroom while Susan took Jared to breakfast. I finished just in time to go to my cooking group, where we assembled over 40 freezer meals in 2 1/2 hours. Whew. We spent the afternoon swimming at the YMCA. Susan accomplished the astounding feat of swimming for 45 minutes with her camera in her hand and not getting it wet. I kid you not. It was quite impressive. Then we went to Burgerville and completely ruined our appetite for dinner by getting a fresh raspberry milkshake and a huge (not semi-huge) order of Walla Walla Onion Rings. Yes, it was a fine day. We spent the evening less pleasantly engaged in trying to put my bedroom back together. It would have been fine except that we encountered EXTREME difficulty getting up the hardware for the window blinds. Despite my confidence in wielding an electric and cordless drill and my sheer brute strength at turning a screwdriver manually, we had a dickens of a time trying to get the hardware back in. We spent over an hour and a half standing on bar stools struggling with screwdrivers before we finally got the blinds up again.

Friday morning we set off to go berry picking, hoping to get some raspberries for Susan to take home to Grampa Bruce. We were out picking for about five minutes when it started to rain. Yes, in July. Jared left his post of trying to get everyone to dump their berries into his bucket and went to the car for the umbrella. Susan and I put on coats and kept picking berries while Jared and Camryn argued over who got to hold the umbrella. At least we didn't have to worry about sunscreen.... After we got home, the rain got worse, so we went to the YMCA to play "basketball" on the sport court. We stopped by Rose's Deli to pick out a special cookie for the kids and pastry for the adults, then we went home and got ready for Susan to leave.... =[

Despite the fact that we left at 3:00, we hit horrendous rush hour traffic. We got Susan to the airport 40 minutes before her flight. Miraculously, she still made her flight. I decided to burn some time to avoid traffic, so the kids and I stopped by a bakery in Portland to pick up a loaf of handmade artisan bread. The kids saw a store called "Saint Cupcake" (sometimes you wish your child couldn't read...), so we had to go in and let them pick out a cupcake. Then we braved the freeway. The traffic was horrible. By the time we got back within 20 minutes of our house it was already 6:30, so I decided it would be a good time to go out for dinner. I was thinking of getting some pasta or driving through Wendy's, but when I started to list options to the kids, Jared protested, "No, mom! I don't want to go there. I want to go to the Thai place that we go to with daddy and get the sweet pork." Camryn chimed in, "YEAH!! And I want to get the yummy noodles." I was shocked, really. The kids were lobbying to go someplace besides McDonald's? They wanted to go to the Thai place?? Despite the fact that I didn't really feel like Thai food at the moment, I thought it was so cute that they wanted to go there (or maybe it was sentiment because that's "where they go with daddy"), that I said, "OK. Why not?" Major lapse in judgment.

We went to the Thai place. I ordered the yummy pork and the sweet noodles, as requested. I was going to get a stir fry with peanut sauce, but Jared said "No. I don't want that." I asked him if garlic sauce was better, so we got broccoli beef with garlic sauce. When our food came, sure enough, Jared gobbled down the pork, but he wouldn't touch the noodles (which he usually eats). He wouldn't eat the broccoli beef either-- which I had ordered in the hopes of the kids liking-- because it had sauce on it and he doesn't like broccoli with sauce. When I made him try a bite (in order to get his cupcake for dessert), he gagged like he was eating fried larvae in worm sauce. Camryn ate very slowly as usual, coming over to my seat in between each bite to give me a huge hug with sticky hands just as I was about to take a bite. The final insult was that because I got the extra (untouched) broccoli dish so we would have a vegetable, the bill came to $30 with the tip. I can't believe I threw away $30 on a dinner that I didn't feel like eating just because the kids "wanted it" and then half of it didn't even get touched. OK, that was downright stupidity--- and that's the last time I let the kids pick where we go to dinner.

Meanwhile, Dave is in Korea. He flew to Korea to help with the installation of a new tool for a customer (he worked on this tool before he got transferred to his current project). After spending several 12+ hour days in the Samsung cleanroom (with no-padding shoes, steel floors and not a chair to be seen), he flew to Singapore for a customer meeting. He had been in Singapore for a whole two hours when he got a call from his boss telling him that they had a serious problem with the Samsung installation and he needed to go back to Korea. So as soon as he finished the presentation he got on the next red-eye flight to Korea. Back in Korea there were big problems, plus, while they were trying to fix it, every so often the local team would interrupt them so they could precision-tune the machine flow. Flow is important, but not if half your machine is in pieces on the floor. As Dave put it, it's kind of like scrubbing the baseboards over and over while your kitchen is piled with dirty dishes and dead rats. Priorities anyone?? Then once they got the machine put together, working and a good baseline for the film, Samsung decided that they didn't like the film layer and wanted one with totally different properties... in 24 hours. Yes, it's been a fun trip for Dave. Last week when I took Camryn to a friend's birthday party, the dad asked me, "So, I hear your husband is going to Korea and Singapore. Does he really enjoy the chance to travel?" I didn't really know how to answer that.... "Well, it's not exactly a pleasure trip..." I said. That's the understatement of the year. What am I supposed to say? "He really loves cleanrooms with flat shoes, no chairs and too-small face masks." Or maybe "It's given him the chance to see lots of Korea: from the airport to his hotel, from his hotel to Samsung and the inside of the Samsung cleanroom." At least he's gotten to eat at Mr. Pizza, "The only pizza designed specifically for women." Yes, I'm not making that up.

Today we went to the parade for the Sherwood Robin Hood Festival. Despite ominous clouds, it didn't rain while we watched the parade. The kids were ecstatic because each got a lunch bag full of candy. We went home for lunch and then went to the festival itself. As soon as we got in the car to go it started pouring. (Did I mention it's July????) It let up a bit once we got there but then poured again and sprinkled at intervals. We made good use of our umbrella, got snow cones and Robin Hood hats for the kids and had a good time despite the rain.

Now we are anxiously awaiting news of when Dave will come home. The Taiwan part of his trip was cancelled, so hopefully it will be soon!!! Hope you are doing well.

Karen

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Quotes of the Week:

Camryn: "If we walked-ed to Bountiful it would take 100 days and 100 nights. Well, it's easier to use a car."

Jared: "Camryn, do you want a China Chip?" (handing her a tortilla chip sprinkled with ramen seasoning)

Jared: "Do you know what I want to be when I grow up? A race car driver. So, I'll have to save these [referring to his Hot Wheels sunglasses]. [putting the sunglasses on] How cool do I look?"

[please pardon this one, it is a direct quote] Me: "Are you excited to find out if the baby is a boy or a girl?" Jared: "Yeah. I want it to be a boy." Camryn: "I want it to be a girl. If the baby is a girl it will have the same bottom that I have; if the baby is a boy, it will have the same bottom that Jared has."

At the Thai restaurant, there was a sign that said, "Pregnancy and Alcohol don't mix." From the drawing next to Jared he made the following deduction: "Mom, that sign says if you have a baby in your tummy, you shouldn't stand and carry a drink."

The Condensed Version of "Rain On My Parade"

The brief summary of the update for Chris and other time-challenged parties... =]

Paragraph 1-2: After being in survival mode for several days, Susan arrived on Monday to rescue us.
Paragraph 2-3: I started painting my room. Grama took Camryn to breakfast and kids to a movie. It rained. Hard. In July.
Paragraph: 4-6: A detailed description of our squeamish introduction to fishing, including our savage attack of a worm.
Paragraph 7-8: Safari Sams with Grama. I finish painting. We swim at YMCA, get Burgerville shakes and onion rings, and spend two hours putting up window blind hardware.
Paragraph 9: Berry picking. In the rain. Played basketball at YMCA and got a cookie.
Paragraph 10-11: Susan makes her flight after being stuck in traffic. The kids and I get bread and cupcakes in Portland, then sit in traffic. I waste $30 taking the kids out to Thai food which they hardly ate because they asked for it and I thought it was cute.
Paragraph 12: Dave's wild trip to Korea and Singapore-- and back to Korea.
Paragraph 13: Robin Hood Festival and Parade. In the rain.

The End

Karen

The Condensed Version of "Rain.."

The brief summary of the update for Chris and other time-challenged parties... =]

Paragraph 1-2: After being in survival mode for several days, Susan arrived on Monday to rescue us.
Paragraph 2-3: I started painting my room. Grama took Camryn to breakfast and kids to a movie. It rained. Hard. In July.
Paragraph: 4-6: A detailed description of our squeamish introduction to fishing, including our savage attack of a worm.
Paragraph 7-8: Safari Sams with Grama. I finish painting. We swim at YMCA, get Burgerville shakes and onion rings, and spend two hours putting up window blind hardware.
Paragraph 9: Berry picking. In the rain. Played basketball at YMCA and got a cookie.
Paragraph 10-11: Susan makes her flight after being stuck in traffic. The kids and I get bread and cupcakes in Portland, then sit in traffic. I waste $30 taking the kids out to Thai food which they hardly ate because they asked for it and I thought it was cute.
Paragraph 12: Dave's wild trip to Korea and Singapore-- and back to Korea.
Paragraph 13: Robin Hood Festival and Parade. In the rain.

The End

Karen

Rain on My Parade

Hello everyone,

Yet another week has flown by.... You can tell we are back in survival mode when my cooking adventures have been along the lines of Hawaiian Haystacks, Spaghetti and Meatballs, Top Ramen, Burritos and chicken nuggets.

After a lonely weekend with Dave in Asia, Susan arrived on Monday, bringing peace, calm and Great Harvest Bread with her. We picked her up at the airport that evening and then went to Sweet Tomatoes on the way home. Between stopping for dinner and the kids using their very best bedtime delay techniques on Grama, it was almost 10:00 pm by the time they got to bed. =] On Tuesday I had an OB appointment-- I scheduled my ultrasound for next Tuesday-- and then the kids rode bikes to the park with Grama while I started getting the master bedroom ready to paint by taping, removing hardware, etc. I finished in time to go to the last hour of hour RS drop-in quilting day, and got there in time to tie two whole stitches in the last quilt before they finished. Oh well!

Wednesday dawned bright and.... rainy???? Wait a second, the rule in Portland is that you can count on it being sunny from July 5th onward. Well apparently that rule was just broken and we had clouds and rain, which unfortunately lasted most of the time that Susan was here. Susan took Camryn out to breakfast by herself (Camryn was so excited to get to do something BEFORE Jared) while I started priming and painting. Then Susan took the kids to a free showing of "VeggieTales: A Jonah Movie" at the movie theater (the things you have to endure being a Grama....) while I finished the first coat of paint.

That afternoon, we set off on Jared's activity of choice: going fishing at "Horning's Hideout," where his kindergarten class had gone for a fishing trip. After driving out into the middle of boonieland and going a mile or two on an unpaved road, we finally came to the place: a beautiful lake with a ramshackle house in the front of it. We went to the house and a lady came out and handed us fishing rods, nets, hook tools and a cup of worms. Then she started explaining... "When you get a fish, you use the net to pull it out of the water, then use the hook tool to slice through it's gills and take the hook out, then you clip it onto this chain. You don't want to put a whole worm on the hook or the fish will just eat around it instead of biting, so just use your fingers to pull off a small piece of worm and put that on the hook. Then when you're done, you come back here and you can use this space for gutting the fish with a knife." Susan and I gave each other looks of disbelief. I never realized until that very moment how much of a city-girl/wimp I am. Where the heck were my latex gloves when I needed them? She wanted us to break off a piece of live worm with our bare fingers??? This was downright barbaric and we hadn't even gotten to gutting the fish.

[Warning: The following contains scenes of graphic violence that may be offensive to some viewers.] Susan and I took all of our fishing equipment and the two kids to the edge of the lake. Then came the getting the worm ready for the hook.... I managed to get myself to touch the worm long enough to brush it out of the cup onto the ground. Then I used a piece of the chain to cut through the worm and break off a small piece, leaving two pieces of worm wriggling frenetically on the ground. I managed to stick the hook into the smaller worm piece without touching much of the worm with my fingers and scoop the bigger piece back into the cup.

Now we were finally ready so we dropped the hook into the lake without tangling too much of the line. Jared informed us impatiently, "No, mom, that's not how you're supposed to do it. You're supposed to cast off." Sure, enough, the other people fishing in the lake were sending the hook and line flying gracefully over their heads into the middle of the lake. After moving the kids sufficiently far enough so they wouldn't get skewered, we gave it a shot. The hook and line flew awkwardly for about 3 feet and then fell into the lake at our feet. We were obviously missing something. After trying unsuccessfully several times and then standing around and feeling utterly incompetent, we went back to the house and ran into a different lady who worked there and asked what we were doing wrong. She instructed us in the art of casting off (there is a piece of the rod you have to move for the line to keep flying) and then directed us to a good spot. We did several extremely elegant looking cast-offs (and quite a few not-so-elegant ones that involved massive tangles of fishing line) and waited with our hooks in the water, but no fish seemed to bite. We did manage to catch a lobster-looking crustacean that fell back in the lake. After spending about two hours with no luck, we finally gave up. Jared was disappointed that we didn't catch trout for dinner, but he bore it well. As for my part, I wasn't exactly broken-hearted that I missed out on the chance to gut my first fish. Some firsts can wait for another time.

We drove back to civilization and the kids went to Safari Sams with Grama for jungle gym and mini-golf while I went to a meeting. After I came back, we had some pizza together and negotiated exactly what prizes you could buy with 11 tickets (3 army men or a plastic bracelet and a mini-koosh-looking ball, in case you were wondering). Then we went home and put the kids to bed.

Thursday morning I painted the final coat of my bedroom while Susan took Jared to breakfast. I finished just in time to go to my cooking group, where we assembled over 40 freezer meals in 2 1/2 hours. Whew. We spent the afternoon swimming at the YMCA. Susan accomplished the astounding feat of swimming for 45 minutes with her camera in her hand and not getting it wet. I kid you not. It was quite impressive. Then we went to Burgerville and completely ruined our appetite for dinner by getting a fresh raspberry milkshake and a huge (not semi-huge) order of Walla Walla Onion Rings. Yes, it was a fine day. We spent the evening less pleasantly engaged in trying to put my bedroom back together. It would have been fine except that we encountered EXTREME difficulty getting up the hardware for the window blinds. Despite my confidence in wielding an electric and cordless drill and my sheer brute strength at turning a screwdriver manually, we had a dickens of a time trying to get the hardware back in. We spent over an hour and a half standing on bar stools struggling with screwdrivers before we finally got the blinds up again.

Friday morning we set off to go berry picking, hoping to get some raspberries for Susan to take home to Grampa Bruce. We were out picking for about five minutes when it started to rain. Yes, in July. Jared left his post of trying to get everyone to dump their berries into his bucket and went to the car for the umbrella. Susan and I put on coats and kept picking berries while Jared and Camryn argued over who got to hold the umbrella. At least we didn't have to worry about sunscreen.... After we got home, the rain got worse, so we went to the YMCA to play "basketball" on the sport court. We stopped by Rose's Deli to pick out a special cookie for the kids and pastry for the adults, then we went home and got ready for Susan to leave.... =[

Despite the fact that we left at 3:00, we hit horrendous rush hour traffic. We got Susan to the airport 40 minutes before her flight. Miraculously, she still made her flight. I decided to burn some time to avoid traffic, so the kids and I stopped by a bakery in Portland to pick up a loaf of handmade artisan bread. The kids saw a store called "Saint Cupcake" (sometimes you wish your child couldn't read...), so we had to go in and let them pick out a cupcake. Then we braved the freeway. The traffic was horrible. By the time we got back within 20 minutes of our house it was already 6:30, so I decided it would be a good time to go out for dinner. I was thinking of getting some pasta or driving through Wendy's, but when I started to list options to the kids, Jared protested, "No, mom! I don't want to go there. I want to go to the Thai place that we go to with daddy and get the sweet pork." Camryn chimed in, "YEAH!! And I want to get the yummy noodles." I was shocked, really. The kids were lobbying to go someplace besides McDonald's? They wanted to go to the Thai place?? Despite the fact that I didn't really feel like Thai food at the moment, I thought it was so cute that they wanted to go there (or maybe it was sentiment because that's "where they go with daddy"), that I said, "OK. Why not?" Major lapse in judgment.

We went to the Thai place. I ordered the yummy pork and the sweet noodles, as requested. I was going to get a stir fry with peanut sauce, but Jared said "No. I don't want that." I asked him if garlic sauce was better, so we got broccoli beef with garlic sauce. When our food came, sure enough, Jared gobbled down the pork, but he wouldn't touch the noodles (which he usually eats). He wouldn't eat the broccoli beef either-- which I had ordered in the hopes of the kids liking-- because it had sauce on it and he doesn't like broccoli with sauce. When I made him try a bite (in order to get his cupcake for dessert), he gagged like he was eating fried larvae in worm sauce. Camryn ate very slowly as usual, coming over to my seat in between each bite to give me a huge hug with sticky hands just as I was about to take a bite. The final insult was that because I got the extra (untouched) broccoli dish so we would have a vegetable, the bill came to $30 with the tip. I can't believe I threw away $30 on a dinner that I didn't feel like eating just because the kids "wanted it" and then half of it didn't even get touched. OK, that was downright stupidity--- and that's the last time I let the kids pick where we go to dinner.

Meanwhile, Dave is in Korea. He flew to Korea to help with the installation of a new tool for a customer (he worked on this tool before he got transferred to his current project). After spending several 12+ hour days in the Samsung cleanroom (with no-padding shoes, steel floors and not a chair to be seen), he flew to Singapore for a customer meeting. He had been in Singapore for a whole two hours when he got a call from his boss telling him that they had a serious problem with the Samsung installation and he needed to go back to Korea. So as soon as he finished the presentation he got on the next red-eye flight to Korea. Back in Korea there were big problems, plus, while they were trying to fix it, every so often the local team would interrupt them so they could precision-tune the machine flow. Flow is important, but not if half your machine is in pieces on the floor. As Dave put it, it's kind of like scrubbing the baseboards over and over while your kitchen is piled with dirty dishes and dead rats. Priorities anyone?? Then once they got the machine put together, working and a good baseline for the film, Samsung decided that they didn't like the film layer and wanted one with totally different properties... in 24 hours. Yes, it's been a fun trip for Dave. Last week when I took Camryn to a friend's birthday party, the dad asked me, "So, I hear your husband is going to Korea and Singapore. Does he really enjoy the chance to travel?" I didn't really know how to answer that.... "Well, it's not exactly a pleasure trip..." I said. That's the understatement of the year. What am I supposed to say? "He really loves cleanrooms with flat shoes, no chairs and too-small face masks." Or maybe "It's given him the chance to see lots of Korea: from the airport to his hotel, from his hotel to Samsung and the inside of the Samsung cleanroom." At least he's gotten to eat at Mr. Pizza, "The only pizza designed specifically for women." Yes, I'm not making that up.

Today we went to the parade for the Sherwood Robin Hood Festival. Despite ominous clouds, it didn't rain while we watched the parade. The kids were ecstatic because each got a lunch bag full of candy. We went home for lunch and then went to the festival itself. As soon as we got in the car to go it started pouring. (Did I mention it's July????) It let up a bit once we got there but then poured again and sprinkled at intervals. We made good use of our umbrella, got snow cones and Robin Hood hats for the kids and had a good time despite the rain.

Now we are anxiously awaiting news of when Dave will come home. The Taiwan part of his trip was cancelled, so hopefully it will be soon!!! Hope you are doing well.

Karen

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Quotes of the Week:

Camryn: "If we walked-ed to Bountiful it would take 100 days and 100 nights. Well, it's easier to use a car."

Jared: "Camryn, do you want a China Chip?" (handing her a tortilla chip sprinkled with ramen seasoning)

Jared: "Do you know what I want to be when I grow up? A race car driver. So, I'll have to save these [referring to his Hot Wheels sunglasses]. [putting the sunglasses on] How cool do I look?"

[please pardon this one, it is a direct quote] Me: "Are you excited to find out if the baby is a boy or a girl?" Jared: "Yeah. I want it to be a boy." Camryn: "I want it to be a girl. If the baby is a girl it will have the same bottom that I have; if the baby is a boy, it will have the same bottom that Jared has."

At the Thai restaurant, there was a sign that said, "Pregnancy and Alcohol don't mix." From the drawing next to Jared he made the following deduction: "Mom, that sign says if you have a baby in your tummy, you shouldn't stand and carry a drink."

A Guide For Chris (to Hitting.. or Missing the Target)

As requested, a synopsis of the update:

Paragraph 1: Establishing Portland's superiority to Utah in summer climate, despite heat wave.
Paragraph 2-3: A detailed description of a 2 hour trip to Target to choose cookies for Utah trip. Moral of the story- be a dictator and don't give your kids choices.
Paragraph 4-5: Had a good family reunion. Dave and I left on time despite our indecision.
Paragraph 6-7: An account of a 3 1/2 hour shopping trip to Costco and Winco, complete with two trips to the restroom in 30 minutes.
Paragraph 7-8: I did Quicken and called credit card customer service, during which Camryn nearly flooded the kitchen cleaning the floor to make it "sparkle."
Paragraph 9: Dave left for Asia. We went berry picking, swimming and to Sweet Tomatoes, amid unsuccessful attempts to clean.
Paragraph 10: My belly has popped (not literally)

The end.

Karen

P.S. Is this supposed to be an exercise in embarrassment at how little useful information is included in my multiple pages? =]