Happiness Is...

Malia slept for nine hours last night, which means that I also slept for nine hours last night.

Both of us woke up happy this morning.

This Car Has My Favorite Song!

Yesterday we bought a new car.  In addition to the fact that our five-passenger ’96 Pathfinder could no longer fit our entire family, it was beginning to act squirrelly.  When I spotted wisps of smoke curling out from under the hood as I pulled it into the parking lot of the car dealership that last time, I was good and ready to let that car go.  We have had it for twelve years and it has served us well, but it was time for something bigger…and newer.

I often joke about computers and gadgets thinking they are smarter than I am.  With sixteen computers on board, my new car probably is smarter than I am.  It monitors everything from tire pressure and gas consumption to outside air temperature and road conditions.  This morning the car told me “Ice possible, drive with caution.”  It turns the headlights on for you when it gets dark and turns them off when it gets light again.  It has a lane change blinker that blinks four times and then turns itself off and although I think it is retarded, it is probably handy for the blinker impaired.  You know who I’m talking about: the people who signal to change lanes and 60 miles later are still letting everyone know that they changed lanes half an hour ago.  This car takes so much responsibility off the driver that I wonder if I could just lay the seat back and take a nap while the car drives me to Hobby Lobby…

I still know how to drive, but I really don’t know how to run this car.  There are about two hundred buttons on the console.  And there are versions of this car that are fancier than the one we bought!  I’m actually going to have to read the instruction manual rather than just sitting in the driver’s seat and pushing all the buttons to see what they do.  Although that could be fun to, just as long as I could figure out how to fix anything I screwed up.

And those of you who know Matthew well won’t be surprised that he coined the phrase that I’ve used as the title of this post.  As we were driving the car home for the very first time, Matthew happily buckled into the third row seat, Kev turned on a Rockapella CD and Matthew exclaimed, “This car has my favorite song!”

A New Do

Malia’s hair has gotten long enough that if I comb it down super flat when it is wet, it will actually lay down pretty well.  It makes her look even more like Matthew than she already does, but it also gives me the opportunity to use the itty bitty hair clips I found at the Walmart.  Have you ever noticed that completely ordinary things are infinitely cuter if they are little?  I think the itty bitty hair clips fall into that category.

I don’t think the faux-hawk is a thing of the past, however.  I still think she looks pretty darn cute with her hair sticking straight up.

Living in a House Full of Science Dorks is Fun

It’s cold outside.  Guess how I know?  I just came in from outside where all of us were able to see Jupiter and all four of its moons through Daniel’s telescope.  It was pretty cool!  Daniel was able to see individual craters on the moon as well.  Santa brought this $35 telescope to Daniel last year and Kev and I added some lenses and a finder scope for Daniel’s birthday last year.  It has worked better than I expected it to for the price and it has been totally fun.  This would be one of the few perks about it getting dark so freakin’ early.  Daniel can go out and stargaze and still get to bed on time.

Like Mother, Like Daughter

Today was Malia’s blessing day.  She got to wear the same dress I wore when I was blessed.  It was considerably yellowed due to the fact that I wore it nearly 38 years ago, but a good soak in oxyclean brought it to if not quite white, at least a very respectable ivory.  She’s also sporting the same hairdo I had.

(Shauna 1974)

(Malia 2011)

She was very well behaved during the blessing, not crying at all.  Of course, it probably helped that Kev told all of our priesthood holders not to bounce her like crazy.  And she managed to keep her white dress clean all day which is quite a feat for a two month old.

Malia is a little charmer and has quite a few of us completely wrapped around her finger.  As always, her brothers simply can’t get enough.  Nathan was disappointed that I wouldn’t let him hold Malia as she was being passed around.  I told him that we get her every day so it would be nice if we let everyone else have a turn with her.  I hope he still likes her as much when she is a few years older and following him around…

It was wonderful to have so many of our family members here to celebrate Malia’s special day with us.  We ate good food, had good laughs, enjoyed each other’s company and only had to turn the water to the house back on once.  (There are a lot of little boys in my family and this is not the first time we’ve had to make a dash to the basement to see which knob they’ve turned.)  It seems like these occasions when we all get together don’t happen often enough!

Manmade Thunder

The folks at the nearby National Guard base have been shooting off artillery all day.  From where we are, it sounds like a big, deep rumble.  Matthew is convinced it is thunder.  I tried to tell him it was artillery, but he would not believe me and is convinced a storm is coming.  When Kev got home from work today, the first thing Matthew did was run out to the garage to meet him and tell him about the thunder.  Kev also tried to get him to believe it is artillery.  But Matthew just told him that it is the language of thunder, so it’s thunder and a storm is coming. 

How can we argue with logic like that?

Welcome Winter

Matthew was way excited this morning when he peeked out the window and saw that it was snowing.  He was even more excited when I gave his Buzz Lightyear snow boots back (We had to pry them off his feet and hide them in the top of the closet back in May when the temperatures climbed into the 80’s).  He immediately got his boots, hat, gloves and coat on and went outside to shovel the back porch which was a bit hard to do considering the snow is not sticking.  When he came back in he informed me that we needed to listen to Christmas music because it is a snowy day.  He is way too smart for his own good and he got Tonic Solfa’s Christmas album playing in iTunes.  We are harking to the herald angels as I type.  I guess the snowflake window clings we forgot to take down after Christmas last year can just stay up now…