I'm smiling; smiling is my favorite.

sneaky sneaky. If I type fast enough, I'll get this post in for November. Why is this important? Cuz I'm a goal-setter fool. My goal for this blog is to have more entries than last year. I'm lagging. I can feel I'll be quite chatty in December.

We just returned from Thanksgiving with the Parents in Utah. It was a great break and no one threw up...this is sometimes difficult when Wilsons get together.

Top Ten

1. Turkey, pie, and family...and garlic mash potatoes
2. Pop pop's brava with the hot chocolate
3. Best car ride ever through the Colorado mountains...Morgan didn't puke and no kids fought.
4. Wrapping up in my parents' posh snuggie. Oh yeah, give in to the power of the snuggie. They have them for dogs now too--ridiculous.
5. Sleeping in till 9a one morning...I forgot what 9a felt like in bed.
6. 2012 baby. This ridiculous thriller was everything it needed to be. two snaps.
7. The Peppermint Place and the park with the kids.
8. "No I'm good."--Morgan's new favorite phrase.
9. Chasing Lauren around on the carpet super charging our socks for shock battle. I won of course.
10. Kiersten and the funnel. This prank works every time.
11. Foosball with Amber. We need a rematch to determine a winner. The score: 1:1.

Bottom Five

1. Last hour of the car ride home...we almost ran out of gas only twenty minutes from home.
2. My heart attack...I mean heart burn. I've never had it so I thought I was a goner.
3. Aaron's uber nostalgia: we went to the BYU bookstore...I told him he's turning into his parents. Gift certs for his stocking.
4. The almost kitten-lick shower...not quite to Tobler standards yet, but close.
5. The missing Granato's and then the closed one.

mercy is for the weak

[a little back story]
After ripping Bryn and Ava off the Primary microphone several times while I was trying to clean up the room for the next ward, I had finally had enough and told both girls they were in timeout as soon as we got home. And of course it snowed five inches, so as we tromped out to the car, Ava is being especially slow and pesty. I finally grabbed her and threw her (not literally) in the car. My nerves are shot, I've got a cold coming on, and the girls are going wild.

Ava begins kicking her feet back and forth in the air throwing snow all over the car.

"Ava, you better cut that out."

She glares at me and I watch her from the rear view mirror. Her eyes narrow and a wicked grin spreads across her face. She kicks again. Harder. Snow sludge hits the back of my head.

"Ava, you want to up the ante? Then we will up the ante!"

Her feet stop kicking. The car is quiet and I turn on some music to drowned out my anger. A few minutes pass.

Then a soft whisper, "Mom, do not up the ante. I do not like the ante. Please, I love you mom."

I smile.

[end scene]

I can't feel the left side of my brain

"Mom, wake up!"

I was driving...fully awake and completely checked out. Thanks Bryn, I needed to check back in. I'm here now but I'm still fighting distraction. I'm on the computer instead of taking the girls to the park...well, now we're going. chow.

Alys sidebar: She had her baby boy this morning! Yahoo. 9 lber. Woo, that's a big boy. Baby is great but Alys went into surgery because she was bleeding. Cross your fingers and your prayers.

this class is ridiculous

I'm struggling to find my voice today...not literally, of course, but in general. My head is pounding with to-do's and I have no time for what I really want...or I'm too tired to make it. And then I thought I was going to get a break on Friday but just kidding, aaron reminded me we have a dinner with some friends. How I spaced it, I don't know?

On a sad note: Lore's teacher (from 1st grade) has two children. A week ago, she put her little 5 yr old to bed and the next morning he was dead. They don't know what caused it; they're waiting for an autopsy to find out. Devastating. As I tucked all my kids into bed tonight, I wondered: would I regret the way I treated them today, if they don't wake up tomorrow? My answer varied with each kid and there were not enough I-love-yous or I'm-so-proud-of-who-you're-becoming. Why is it so easy to be negative and to be neglectful of being positive?

and hooray, my little niece addy does not have a tumor. shew.

If you aren't first, you're last

A hundred years in the making...and now it is finally public. My Dad's company just went public with their infinite transmission technology. Check out the news articles:

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705342187/Provo-company-innovating-engines.html

his website: http://moongears.com/

Go dad.

Help, I'm in a nutshell, I can't get out

This week has been insane: coordinating baptisms, kids, aaron out of town, taking the Cannon kids at 4am because their mom went into labor, kids, shuttling, starting school again, lots and lots of kids, joining nanowrimo, starting a new story, overtired sugar high kids, and barely any sleep. Ich muchte shlafen. Ich bin uber mude.

Cannon sidebar: he's adorable even if he still doesn't have a name...I still like topher.

BYU sidebar: we are officially super cougs. We're going to the football game this weekend in Wyoming with some friends. I might paint the happy helmet blue and put a target on it. One of our friends thinks we're going to get pummeled with beer cans. I say: bring it.

V sidebar: so abc brought back the 80's mega show: V. I loved this show as a child. Seriously, I was in love with Donavon. We watched the new remake last night: lame. Although, I do like Lost-girl. We've been catching random episodes late at night of the 80's V on SciFi channel: lame too. Seriously, why did I love this show? And why did I think Donavon was cool. He's an average looking camera man...turned renegade resistance leader bad ass...maybe he's still cool--but the new preacher isn't.

what does brown do for you?

As a child, my mother burned our breakfast so often it was the family joke that "we eat brownies for breakfast." Now as a mother, I realize that was a horrible thing for my father to teach us and taunt our mother. She wanted us to have a hot breakfast, but 5 kids under 6 compounded by getting us ready for school and everything else that goes wrong in the morning--it blows me away that my mom did it...even if it was a smidge burnt. (Our toast was literally black almost every time she tried...she would mass toast them in the oven on broil and then forget about them. Maybe that's why I prefer my toast darker than most.)

Why do I bring this up? Because to simply my life during the week, my children get these choices for breakfast: cereal, oatmeal (instant of course), or muffins/bread (if I made it the night before). That's it. Occasionally, I'll fry an egg but those are rare mornings.

Then on the weekend we usually make something more elaborate and hot. Last weekend was insane. Great fun but insane. And Halloween was a busy one. I decided to make some delicious apple pancakes for the girls and they were excited. I busted out the grill and flapped the jacks. But after the first batch, my pancakes got darker and darker...I would leave my grill to wipe faces, fill juice demands, cut pancakes, add more syrup, etc. So by the time the girls were finished and I made a short stack for Aaron in bed, I had to flip them upside down because clearly one side looked like a brownie. Despite all my efforts: brownies. And instantly, I could relate to my mother and felt horrible for teasing her about my brownie breakfasts. Thanks mom.