Wednesday, August 6, 2008

I suppose I could have wasted more time today than I did, but not much. I made one bad choice after another, up to and including eating ramen noodles and junior mints for dinner. Oh, a few redeeming moments here and there, like I cleaned the bathroom and did a few loads of laundry, made macaroni and cheese for Jack and his friends, and went on a (short) bike ride with Roger in the evening (with crazy wind--it was fun!). But, wow, I mostly watched episodes of Monk and Psych on my dvr, played scrabble on my computer and chatted online with people on Facebook. I think I am a bit paralyzed by how much I have to get done in the next month and how I won't be able to just blow everything off once school starts. But wasting huge chunks of time like I did today is seriously counter productive. No more!

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Up early, but still managed to run late by the time Jack and I needed to head out the door to pick up Carol and Grandma for nephew Eric's wedding. Luckily, we made it with a bit of time to spare. We drove up to Salt Lake City, dropped Jack off to hang out with cousins Brian and Megan (who went to pick up her own wedding dress--she's getting married in a couple of weeks!), then went to the Salt Lake temple for the big event. After family photos, we had a little time before we needed to be at the wedding lunch so we took a short tour of the roof of the LDS conference center, which is landscaped with trees, a meadow, pools of water and even a waterfall! We helped get the wedding lunch organized and enjoyed time with family, especially new family. After a short break, we headed up to the reception high above the city in the lovely backyard of some friends of the bride. While we visited with people, Jack hung out playing with the candles floating in the pool. It felt good to get home and go to bed at the end of the day!

Monday, August 4, 2008

Despite staying up too late I woke up early anyway and had a marathon session working on the art exhibit, which is officially titled "Unbound: Original Picture Book Art by Utah Illustrators." I took two breaks: one to take book orders to the post office and to stop by the grocery store to stock up on macaroni and cheese for Jack and his friends (spiral noodles are now the only way to go) and one to run to the Brookside minimart to get a diet Coke with my friends Barb and Janice. I worked hard all day and don't feel as though I have much to show for it. But I did finally get the last artist on board. I had a heck of a time trying to track her down. And it turns out she moved back to Provo! Hike on the canyon trail this evening and typed up the library board minutes while Jack and Roger shaped pots out of clay (Roger has been obsessed lately with making pit fire pottery and this is the first grand experiment). Highlight of the day: the first ripe tomato from the garden. Mmm.

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Did I actually do anything today? We went to church. I hung out with Roger and Jack, mucked around on my computer, listened to a couple of podcasts (Diane Rehm's Friday news roundup shows), took a late afternoon nap, read a couple of chapters to Jack, then stayed up too late finishing Forever in Blue (the book the new Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movie is based on - I'm a sucker for the whole franchise). A highlight of the day was a lengthy game of paper, rock, scissors with Jack. He's taken to randomly coming up with additional options (like a match to light the paper on fire). I sure like that boy.

Saturday, August 2, 2008

Up early (too much going on in my head to sleep in these days). Good hike on the canyon path before it got hot. Jack slept very late (I think we totally wore him out on our Cedar City trip), then played with a gang of kids all day. We're making a new house rule: the front room has to stay toy (especially Lego) free. We've got to do something to keep from being completely overwhelmed by the whirlwind. I spent the afternoon at the art museum dusting shelves and sprucing up displays at the store. Roger and I had a hot date of dinner and grocery shopping. Roger worked on some projects with Jack and I hung out on my new Mac. Jack and I have been reading Orvis at night.

Friday, August 1, 2008

We packed all sorts of fun things into today. We all woke up in our Cedar City hotel fairly early, in time to drive Roger over to his library meeting at 8:30. Jack and I spent an hour in the pool (I swam laps for 1/2 an hour of it, then heaved Jack into so many front and back flips that his back hurt tonight). After checking out of the hotel, Jack and I went to visit artist Ben Sowards in his studio. His work will be in my children's book exhibit. We picked Roger up, had some lunch, then went to a matinee of Wall-E, which we enjoyed very much. On the way home to Springville, we took a couple of detours to visit Roger's Uncle Don and Aunt Margie in Manti and to attend an opening reception at the Covey Art Center in Provo for our new friend Anne Weber's exhibit. Picked up pizza on the way home.

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Happy 18th anniversary, Roger! We celebrated with a big family outing - an overnight trip to Cedar City. It wasn't all fun and games, at least for Roger, who had meetings at the library here at Southern Utah University. We got up extra early, headed to Jack's school to get him registered. We are thrilled that he has Mrs. Clark for 4th grade, and that Mrs. Nielsen (one of our favorite customers at the Read Leaf) is the new principal. We headed south and got to Cedar City about noon, checked into the hotel, dropped Roger off on campus, then Jack and I headed back to the pool! I am pleased to report that I swam laps for 1/2 an hour--I'm trying really hard to get exercise every day. When Roger finished his meetings, we grabbed some dinner, enjoyed the Greenshow (part of the Shakespeare festival here), and did a tiny bit of shopping (I totally forgot to bring anything to read with me!!! And Jack thought we needed some Lego for our anniversary.). Then we headed back to the hotel and the pool.