Anderson Reunion, day 1 (Thursday, Oct. 14)

We spent the past few days at Zion National Park for a family reunion on Andrew’s side of the family. I went up a day earlier than Andrew and I was very glad I did. I was afraid it would be a little awkward because there are a few people in Andrew’s family that I hadn’t ever met (there are still a few left, actually, that I’ve yet to meet, even after the reunion). I had already met almost everyone there, though, and the ones I was introduced to were very nice.

Go figure.

Andrew’s cousin Ashley apparently follows our blog (hi, Ashley!) and knew so much about us that it made me feel famous...so it was especially fun to meet her! She had her mom, Aunt Therena, bring down a big bag of yarn for me (that she was planning on giving away anyway) because she knew that I crocheted. It was so sweet.

Rachel was in “friend” heaven. There were so many 2, 3, and 4 year-olds running around it was hard to keep them straight. Rachel was especially fond of Adrian and Barrett. She called them her '”boy-friends.” I tried to convince her they were her cousins but she didn’t believe me.

“How come I’ve never met them if they’re my cousins?”

“Well…because we’ve been living in Egypt…and they’re really your dad’s cousins’ children so they are your second cousins.”

“Mom, we’re just friends, okay?”

Whatever.

She was really open to the idea of having so many new aunts and uncles, though.

We didn’t do much on Thursday but settle into camp. Some families brought RVs. The rest stayed in the hotel adjacent to the RV park. We were part of “the rest” and it was the most comfortable camping experience I’ve ever had.

Rachel spent quite a while with Grandpa down by the river. I think it’s the Virgin River but it might not be. The Virgin River flows through the canyon, I know…so it would only go to figure…but I could be wrong. She was really nervous about the fish in the water, particularly the “peanut-butter fish.” When we were packing up at home Grandpa told her there would be a river so she started asking if there would be jellyfish in the water because she hates jellyfish and wouldn’t want to go swimming if there were jellyfish in the water.

Grandpa gets all smart and said, “There are no jellyfish in the water…but there are peanut-butter fish.”

“They stick to the roof of your mouth,” I added.

“So be sure not to try to eat them,” warned Grandpa.

Rachel was as nervous as she could be at the river, worrying about the peanut-butter fish that “stick to the roof of your house.” Even though we told her over and over again that we were joking she remained genuinely terrified and screamed hysterically every time Grandpa threatened to take her closer to the water.

Miriam was less melodramatic.

Later, after Grandpa went to sit up by Aunt Therena and Uncle John’s RV, Rachel got brave enough to play by the water and pretended to fish for a while. She was trying to catch her a nice peanut-butter fish.

Looking at that water started giving her ideas and soon she asked if she could go swimming. I told her that we could go swimming together but that there was no way I was going to swim with her in the river. I heard that it was 50°F (10°C) but it felt much colder than that. I tried standing in it and my feet started aching and screaming to get out.

Unfortunately, the pool wasn’t much warmer, but I got in the pool anyway because I’m a nice, dedicated mother (you can thank me when you’re older, Rachel). She insisted that the water was fine but did so while her teeth were a-chattering and her skin was turning blue and breaking out in goose bumps. I didn’t get in past my waist.

Uncle Clark, though? He dove right in.

“Come on in, the water’s fine!” he yelled happily to his grandkids. Then he turned to me and whispered, “This pool is flippin’ cold!”

We stayed in until Rachel was shivering uncontrollably. Then we went to rest in the last rays of sunshine before it disappeared behind the 3,800 foot cliffs surrounding us.

At home, before we left, I told Andrew to be sure to pack his swimming stuff so that, if the pool was still open, we could go swimming. But I couldn’t say this out loud because Rachel was around and if she heard there was a pool at the hotel and then there wasn’t…well, we would have had a major crisis on our hands. So instead of saying anything simple like, “Remember to pack your swimsuit,” I said, “Remember to pack attire for the P-O-O-L.”

“What for?” Andrew asked.

“Well, unless you want to S-W-I-M naked you’re going to need something…”

“Oh, that…” he laughed, “I thought you meant ‘a tire,’ like for a car.”

“No. I meant ‘attire,’ like for you.”

I told Grandpa this story while we were walking from the river to the pool and Rachel was there and overheard it.

“We don’t bring tires to the pool. Like, some people use them, but I like to leave my wheels on the car. Did you see the people in the wheels in the river? We aren’t going to do that at the pool because you can’t take a tire to the pool.”

She was talking about the people we saw tubing down the river (the crazies! The water was like 50-stinkin’-degrees!) but the funny part was that she had the same thought her dad had. Attire=a tire.

Either she’s a really smart for her age or her father thinks like a three-year-old…

Just kidding—I think the man’s brilliant, obviously!

Calamitously, like most brilliant people, he’s also a little scatterbrained. And thus he forgot his swimming attire. So every time Rachel wanted to go swimming in the frigid pool (which was probably only about 5 degrees warmer than the river) guess who had to take her? Me.

*sigh*shiver*sigh*

I never got in past my waist and spent as much time as I could hogging the sun. Uncle Clark  made like he was going to splash me once and I said, “Oh, don’t you dare!”

Either a) I’ve perfected my evil look, b) Clark was afraid to offend the newbie (I was the newest in-law in attendence, I think), or c) Clark’s just a compassionate person because he didn’t splash me and didn’t even fake like he was going to again. Truthfully I didn’t want him to splash me but I would have been fine if he had because I was towing Rachel around while she kicked her legs to practice “swimming” and got thoroughly splashed, anyway.

After swimming we had supper and a family meeting before retiring to our room for bed. Rachel played “musical beds.” She fell asleep with Auntie Sarah, then I took her to bed with me when I went to bed, and then at five in the morning she wound up in bed with Grandma and Grandpa. It was kind of funny…but I think I’m getting into day #2 now and I’m not ready to do that, really, because I’m exhausted and need to go to bed.

I miss looking out the window and seeing this, though:

It was such a beautiful weekend!

Monkeys in Zion

This morning we took a trail to Lower Emerald Pool in Zion National Park--we're at a family reunion right now and technically I am supposed to be working right now while the children are falling asleep but this story is too funny not to share so instead I'm blogging. Work-shmerk.

I grabbed a Lil' Junior Ranger worksheet for Rachel to complete and part of it was a Bingo/I-Spy/Scavenger-Hunt game.Zion National Park is home to a dazzling display of fauna and boasts upwards of 800 different species of flora (which apparently is more than you find in Hawaii) so there was a lot to see. We were supposed to be looking for yucca, wild turkeys, raven, spider webs, cactus, mule deer, beetles, bighorn sheep, rock squirrels, frogs, and lizards, among other things. It was our first hike of the day and Rachel was rather excited to "hunt" some animals down.

At the beginning of the trail a sign was posted warning us that there was some construction being done along the trail, so I wasn't surprised to find a little cement truck on the walk a little ways up the path with a few Mexican workers squatting to the side of the trail in the shade of a tree, eating lunch. I can read, after all. Rachel can't. She was certainly surprized to come across the scene.

"Ooooooh, loooooook!" she pointed at the men and yelled (yes, yelled), "MONKEYS!"

That? Was not on the list. Also, it was really, really embarassing. I started looking around for a hole to jump in or a bear to swallow me up.

In her defense, the men were all (yes, all) wearing earth-toned hoodies with the hoods pulled up and were squatting under a tree and their skin was of a darker complexion and kind of matched their hoodies. If you looked quick, then maybe...

Things only got better when she realized her mistake and started laughing about it while trying to explain her error, "Hahaha, Mom! Those aren't monkeys! Those are hoo-mans! Haha! I thought they were monkeys but they were humans! Silly me! But they look like monkeys! I wonder if we'll see a real monkey!"

"Okay, okay," I told her, "Just keep hiking."

Meanwhile I was silently praying: "Please don't let them speak English, please don't let them speak English, please don't let them speak English..."

Oh, what a day, what a day...

Today I'm Thankful

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!

I didn't really do much to celebrate today. It's hard to continue celebrating holidays outside of the country of origin. For example, on October 6th Andrew had me try to guess what holiday it was.

"What day is it?" he asked.

"Ummm...October 6th..." I said.

"But what holiday is it?"

"I don't know."

"It's the 6th of October!"

Silly me. How could I have forgotten? Perhaps because here it's just another day of school and work with no parades or fireworks or late-night neighbourhood parties. So today was Thanksgiving and there was no turkey, no family gatherings, no long weekend.

Zing! You've been pwned!

A few nights ago Emily was over and somehow my cookie-baking skills came up. I tell you--some things never die! I don't remember how the topic of cookies surfaced, but Emily was sure to remind me that my cookies are hard and insinuated that perhaps cookies should not be so.

"Well," Rachel said matter-of-factly, "Cookies are hard."

"Rachel, you just don't know any differently," said Grandpa. (*zing!*)

Today I…

• Ran approximately 7 miles (11.25 km) from Bridal Veil Falls to my house. And didn’t even die.
• Got bonked in the mouth by the head of a very excited Miriam (she was still asleep when I left to go running and thus hadn’t nursed yet) and spent the next ten minutes or so spitting blood out of my mouth.
• Nursed Miriam.
• Showered.
• Worked the remainder of my 10 required hours and wondered if I could possibly take another part-time job and not go crazy.
• Played witch and vampire with Rachel for a little while.
• Went to the temple with Andrew while the girls played at my parents’ house.
• Made peanut butter cookies with Rachel’s help while Miriam destroyed everything in the kitchen waist-height and below.
• Did the dishes.
• Bathed the girls and braided Rachel’s hair.
• Read stories to the girls and sang lullabies.
• Blogged.
• Read the scriptures. Not all of them. Just some.

I read somewhere that you should never put more than 10 things on your list-of-things to do. If the to-do list gets too long then I start feeling overwhelmed and when I feel overwhelmed I cope by napping. That doesn’t really help get things done. My life is also rather unpredictable. Getting bonked in the face wasn’t on my list of to-dos for today…and sometimes washing mountains of sheets that have been vomited in the night doesn’t get put on my list the night before, either. (Not that this has happened recently).

I used to not bother with making to-do lists at all but have been making an effort to be more…purposefully productive…I don’t know if it is actually working but I’m definitely limiting my list of to-dos to only ten items and I rarely accomplish them all, which reminds me…I need to wash whites before tomorrow.

All about Rachel

Right in the middle of a peaceful dinner conversation, Rachel stood up on her bench and announced:

“Excuse me, please! I have a favourite letter and it is R…and 2. I have a favourite animal and it is a pig. I have a favourite princess and it is Sleeping Beauty. I have a favourite colour and it is pink. Thank you!”

Then she attempted a curtsey, sat down and started eating again. I did all I could to stifle my laughter. This child can be so…random.

For example, we were walking to church a few weeks ago when someone sneezed. I think it was Daddy.

“Bless you!” I said.

“Sneeze you!” Rachel said, “I like to say ‘Sneeze you!’ instead of ‘Bless you!’ because when someone sneezes it makes more sense to say sneeze instead of bless.”

All about Meme

I know Miriam’s birthday is only a few weeks away but I’m afraid that if I wait any longer I’ll forget all the cute things she does. No, really. My mind is like a sieve.

Tonight at dinner she was so sleepy. She’s been sleepy before, of course, but we’ve only gotten to the point of sucking-thumb-while-resting-head-on-table.

Today she went all the way.

A day on the town

The girls and I spent the day on the town—Provo, that is, more specifically within a two-mile radius of BYU.

Just Half

On October 30th I'll be running "The Halloween Half," a half-marathon (13.2 miles or 21.25 km) down the Provo Canyon. I've been running fairly consistently since July and recently found a new running partner who also wants to be a quasi-serious runner. We go running a couple of times a week at the track and on Saturday morning we'll be doing our first "long run."

I've never actually trained for a big race before, so it's nice to be paired up with someone who has a little more experience. Brother Gillespie set us up. He just ran the St. George Marathon, coming in at 3:51:36. He was a little miffed that he didn't run it in under 3:35:00. That's the qualifying time for the Boston Marathon for his age bracket--he ran the Boston Marathon while we were in Egypt, so either last year or the year before that--and I imagine it's something he'd like to do again. Anyway, he knew that we both wanted to run and that we both needed to work our running times around our motherly duties, so he introduced us saying, "Nancy, this is Wendy. Wendy likes to run. Wendy, this is Nancy. Nancy likes to run, too."

We've been running together ever since. She'll be running the half-marathon with me. More exactly, she'll be running the half-marathon with her husband and I'll be tagging along as the third wheel.

I decided to run for a cause to help me keep going, to make every footstep mean something more than just me...running down a canyon...for "fun." My inspiration for this came from my friends Amy, who also runs for causes, and Tamsin, who is always doing amazing service projects and is simply a service-oriented person, and a dear anonymous friend, who recently was diagnosed with bladder cancer but I haven't asked her if I could disclose her name so she'll remain anonymous.

I've started a campaign at charity:water to earn money for water. My goal is to earn $2,500 by October 30th. $2,500 is enough money to fund half a well that will bring fresh, clean water to 300 people.

Clean water is very important to me--things have a way of becoming more important to you when you have to do without them. In Egypt we carted drinking water to our house week after week after week. It's back-breaking and tiresome work. Our water, though, was bottled water from clean springs in desert oases, not the contaminated water many of the locals were drinking. We saw people swimming in the Nile, drinking from the Nile, fishing in the Nile. We, on the other hand, were afraid to get a drop of non-treated river water on us. The Nile is polluted and snails harboring a parasite called Schistosoma run rampant in the murky water. These parasites cause a disease called Schistosomiasis, which causes an array of complications, most notably bladder cancer, the most prominent cancer in men in Egypt.

Bladder cancer aside, Schistosoma is a terrible disease to contract. According to Wikipedia, "among human parasitic diseases, schistosomiasis (sometimes called bilharziasis) ranks second behind malaria in terms of socio-economic and public health importance in tropical and subtropical areas" and puts and estimated 600 million people worldwide at risk; the disease is endemic to Egypt and approximately 70 other developing countries.

Water free from contamination for drinking, bathing, and cooking is crucial for villages hoping to eradicate schistosomiasis outbreaks as complete avoidance of the parasite is the only way to prevent contracting the disease. (While controlling the schistosoma population is possible, through the introduction of crayfish, for example, that seems to cause another set of problems).

Anyway, that's my rant on clean drinking water. To sum up, I'm hoping to raise $2,500 by October 30th.

I realize I'm starting a bit late starting this whole thing considering it's already October 5th. I fully intended to begin campaigning on October 1st but my plans changed when I was stricken with the stomach flu. I'm finally back in full-force, though, and went running yesterday for the first time since being sick. I think I should be good to go by the end of the month. Plus all campaigns are automatically given a 3-month window so you'll have until December 30th to donate in case you forget.

Go to http://mycharitywater.org/halloweenhalf to donate now. Have your friends and family donate, too!

Emily and Morgan sitting in a tree...

This weekend we were all feeling a little listless. Luckily it was a wonderfully relaxed General Conference weekend. We just took turns sleeping, throwing up, and getting engaged. Actually...only Auntie Em got engaged.

Morgan came down from Idaho this weekend, collected the ring from Karen--a family heirloom given to Karen by her mother instead of the necklace she was intended to receive because Grandma Anderson didn't believe that "Reid would ever buy [her] diamonds;" he's stayed true to that prophecy on principle and hasn't ever purchased a diamond ring for Karen--and presented it to Emily on Saturday afternoon. They went up into the canyon for a drive and got out to walk by the river. That's where he popped the question. She came home absolutely beaming. 

Emily said she couldn't be happier with the ring. I'm happy that tribute to Grandma Anderson will always be displayed on Emily's finger--it was the perfect fit, looks dazzling, and Emily is already thoroughly relishing the sentimentality of it. I think it's special that the ring has gone through three generations of women and hope that Emily can pass the legacy to a daughter of her own in the future.

I took a few pictures of the cute couple late this afternoon. Unfortunately not many of them turned out--Andrew is much more skilled with the camera but he was dozing away the afternoon in a fever-induced stupor--but a couple of them were really cute, I thought. These two are giddy with joy.

 

I suppose that was the main excitement of the weekend. We got to spend a lot of happy time visiting with family...when we weren't, you know, spending time visiting with the toilet.

The date is (almost) set for December 21st, which might seem quick, especially since we feel like we just met the boy, but Morgan and Emily have known each other since May and are both sure about this. Plus, we just spent the whole weekend with Morgan and think he's great...and probably destined to catch the stomach flu. (Sorry, Morgan, and anyone Morgan comes in contact with in the near future).