Are you smarter than a three year old?

My knee has still be bothering me and on Monday night I did not sleep very well. I determined that my lack of sleep did not make me safe to drive into work on Tuesday so I opted to work from home, which allowed me to pick up Mark from pre-school. Mark goes to pre-school on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I drop him off before I go to work but I rarely get to pick him up. I had finished my work early so I thought it might be a good time to spend some one on one time with Mark. Mark loves to run errands with me and I needed to go to Walmart because I was getting low on a few essentials such as diaper wipes, and bottle liners. I also needed to go to Costso. I gave Mark the choice of which store to go to first and he picked Walmart. We pulled into the parking lot and I got out of the car. I opened Mark's door to unbuckle him and he said "I'm going to stay in the car." I said "Mark you wanted to go to Walmart and here we are lets go inside." To which he responded "No I am staying in the car." Again I said "Come one let's go inside." Again he said "I want to stay in the car." For those of you who know Mark he is stubborn, and I was weighing my options. I figured I could:

1. Leave Mark in the car and lock the door. Potential outcome being either Mark figures out how to unlock the door and then who knows where he would go, or I could become one of those mothers I used to prosecute for leaving their children unattended in the car. (By the way I have a lot more sympathy for those mothers these days!)
2. I could return home. Potential outcome, I would not get my errands done, and have to make a return trip to Walmart, which I was really wanting an afternoon nap due to my lack of sleep the night before.
3. Opt for some type of bribery.

I am a horrible parent, I selected number three. I said "Mark did you know there is a McDonalds inside this Walmart." He responded "I want a cheese burger, lets go inside." Problem solved. For today I am smarter than a three year old, or am I?????

Postscript: Somewhere in the Universe my mother is taking a perverse delight in all of this.

An accident looking for a place to happen.

Last week was an expensive week for my health insurance company. It began on Wednesday with my knee surgery. Last December, shortly before a dinner party that Rick & I were hosting for his office, Mark pooped his pants. I had to quickly clean him up and air out my house. I took his pull-up to the trash can outside and in the process slipped on the ice. I bruised my ribs, and also injured my knee, however because my ribs hurt so bad, I did not realize the extent of my knee injury. I further injured my knee when I bumped it into a coffee table, not once, but twice, when we were in Idaho in late December for my Grandpa Ison's funeral. I began to really notice the pain at the end of January. I took it easy, but still my knee did not improve. My neighbor/bishop is a orthopedic surgeon, so he looked at it and ordered an MRI. The MRI revealed that I had a tear in my cartilage, along with a sprain, hence surgery was scheduled to put me back together. When the doctor got inside he also discovered that my ACL tendon was hanging by a thread, so while he was in there he fixed that too. The post-op was not bad. I had a similar surgery done in 1991 on my other knee, ironically by either this doctor or his twin brother I'm not sure which, and that surgery was really bad. I was very sick to my stomach after the surgery, and spent 12 hours throwing up. I informed the doctor of this prior to my current surgery, and he made sure that I was well drugged with anti-nausea medication. I spent most of Wednesday sleeping, and practically all of Thursday lying on the couch. The real fun began Thursday night.


Shortly before dinner Mark and Lauren went outside to play. When it was time for dinner, I opened the door to call them in. I saw Mark on the sports court, down on his hands and knees, so I assumed he had tripped and fell, which he is very prone to do. He was crying so I called for him to come inside. When he got inside I tried to comfort him, however all he wanted was his blanket and a nap. The next thing I knew he was on the couch asleep. Lauren reported that he had fallen while playing with the soccer ball. We decided to let him sleep through dinner. After dinner we got him semi-awake and then Rick and I had to leave for a parent-teacher conference. When we returned from the conference he was asleep again, and this time when we woke him he wailed. The next thing I knew he was throwing up all over Rick. I stripped both of their clothes off and they headed for the shower. While in the shower Mark continued to wail, and was not making any sense. I called a neighbor whose husband is a brain surgeon and she suggested that we get him down to the emergency room as quickly as possible, and called her husband who was still at the hospital, just finishing surgery. (My goal last week was to see every doctor in my ward in a professional capacity. I hit 50%, not bad!) I questioned Lauren again about his fall and she said he was trying to stand on the soccer ball and fell backwards, smacking the back of his head against the concrete of the sports court.


We rushed to the emergency room, and while in route Mark would not answer questions or speak and threw up again. They got him in quickly and he was still unresponsive. Finally he said a sentence, albeit an illogical one. They did CT scan of his head to make sure that there was not any bleeding on his brain. He had to be restrained for the CT scan, which as you can imagine he did not like. Rick held him down. The scan did not show any bleeding and he was starting to come around. They determined that he had a concussion, and then the debate began as to whether or not to keep him overnight in the hospital.

Mark in the emergency room

scan and agreed that it did not show any thing unusual. He suggested that we take him home bMy neighbor's husband finished his surgery up and came down to see us. He had seen the CT ecause he would be more comfortable there, but we would need to watch him carefully all night, waking him every hour and checking his pupils to make sure they were responsive. He said Mark would be cranky and irritable for the next few weeks, to which I responded "well then he will be acting normal." Rick and I took him home and I took the first shift watching him until 2:00 a.m. and Rick took the second shift. The next day his head was sore and he told Matt that he broke every bone in his body, then later changed his mind and told Matt that he broke his head.

I figure between my surgery and Mark's visit to the ER I probably cost the insurance company a good $8,000 last week. The sad thing is the was not Mark's first visit to the ER, it was his 4th, and he is not even four yet. Like papa says "an accident looking for a place to happen."

I will hate my mother for this when I am a teenager!

This morning we woke up to four inches of snow on the ground. It did not look or feel much different than December. So in order to prented it was spring I dressed Katie up in a green floral dress, and put a head band on with the most enormous green flower you have seen. She looked like a picture of spring, despite the weather.

When we walked into church we got a lot of "ooo" and "awe," she was quite a hit.

The headband lasted through about 2/3 of Sacrament meeting before Katie was done with and and refused to wear it any longer.

I was amazed I got these pictures before she, either fell of the counter or grabbed the camera.

Though hard to you this journey may appear....

This week our primary had a Saturday activity called "Journey through the Scriptures." The kids were to come to the activity dressed up as either a pioneer or a biblical character. I thought dressing as a pioneer would be much easier than a biblical character, plus I would not have to destroy good sheets! Now I had a number of cowboy hats that Mark could have worn, however I decided that since this is Mark we were talking about, I was a little uncertain of the condition that hat would return home in. So I elected to purchase an inexpensive hat at Partyland. I purchased the hat on Friday for the Saturday event. I really had low expectations that Mark would wear the hat and dress up for the activity. When I brought it home he was really excited for his "pioneer" hat and wore it around for several hours. For Lauren I purchased a yard of calico fabric and made a simple elastic waist skirt. I had a really cool pattern for a bonnet that turns into an apron that I got from Arianne several years ago, but I organized it too well and now I cannot find it. Linda told me that Deseret Book sold bonnets, so problem resolved. It was inexpensive and I figured that the likelihood of future pioneer events was high.

At 4:00 a.m. on Saturday morning Mark woke up sick, as in I had to totally strip his bed and give him a bath. I got him back to sleep, but by breakfast it had returned. I was not planning on taking him to the Primary party, however when he saw Lauren dressed up he insisted that he be able to go. I gave him a large dose of Pepto-Bismol and hoped for the best. He lasted 20 minutes at the activity before we had to go home. However that was enough that he did not feel cheated. He spent the rest of the day trying to "sleep it off" Around 4:00 p.m. Grandma took some Sprite up to his room which he drank and stated "Grandma I want another round" I guess you cannot take the cowboy out of the boy.

Hey did I say you could take my picture????

This weekend Grandpa Hales came to visit for a few days.

He wanted to take home some cute pictures of Katie to show

Grandma Hales, but Katie was not exactly on board with that idea.

Eventually she got a little more friendly

Finally he was able to take this one, but she sure was giving him the stare down.

We had a nice visit with Grandpa, and he enjoyed seeing the kids
in their natural habitat, including Mark, who did not disappoint with several temper tantrums.

"Eggs"actly what you do on Easter.

The original plan was to decorate Easter eggs on Saturday, however with all of our fun Easter activities, we simply ran out of time. So on Sunday after church we rounded up the "usual suspects" and commenced the decorating of eggs.

Grandma purchased the egg dye kit, and the eggs, Grandpa boiled the eggs, and Brian put the color kit together.

Courtney & Lauren decorating their first eggs.

Brian making his blue egg yellow, or rather a lovely shade of green after they were mixed.

Lauren blowing her egg dry.

Orange is a delightful color! Its very in vogue right now!

The "usual suspects" with their finished products. The down side: Within the next 24 hours these works of art will meet their demise with the demand for deviled eggs.

Keeping the dream alive.

In order to stay in the good graces of my mother, I feel a certain obligation to make the kids dress in matching clothes at Easter and then pose for the obligatory picture. This year was no exception. As you can see from the group photo Mark is delighted to be a part of this tradition. I believe there are several pictures of Jeron with a similar look on his face!

Lauren: "It's so hard to be the responsible older sister."

Mark: "When will the torment end????"

Katie: "Let the party begin!"

On the Hunt.

When we returned home from the farm, (see prior post) we discovered that the Easter bunny had hidden eggs. This year due to the cold weather, he left the eggs inside the house instead of outside. Lauren was the first one to notice when we came home. She immediately wanted to start collecting eggs. Mark found an egg on his train table and wanted to eat the candy rather than gather eggs. It took a little prodding, but finally he joined in the fun and both ended up with a basket full of eggs.

Lauren & Mark with their baskets ready to hunt eggs.

Lauren discovered a $1 bill in an egg. This is something new the Easter bunny left this year. A select few eggs had $1 bills instead of candy. Final total: Lauren $7, Mark $5.

Mark and his eggs stash.

Katie spent her Easter egg hunt watching he sister and brother run around like wild dogs in search of eggs. I am quite sure that next year she will be hunting for her own eggs!

The Easter bunny did leave one egg on Katie's highchair so she would not be completely left out. Lauren gave her the egg and she managed to open it up and discover the three foil wrapped chocolate Hershey's eggs contained inside. Before I knew it she had a whole chocolate egg in her mouth, foil included, and chocolate was dripping down her chin. I had to fish it out, much to her dismay, before she choked on the egg.

Green Acres is the place to be......

The Saturday before Easter, Lauren, Mark and Katie were invited by their cousins, Addy and MacKenzie, to join them for Easter fun at the Young Living Lavender Farm, which is owned by the company that Uncle Mike works for. Before we left all Mark could talk about was going to the farm, and Lauren was very excited to play with Addy, one of her favorite cousins. One of the first things we did when we arrived was ride ponys, because MacKenzie wanted to ride a "nay nay."

Mark on his pony

Lauren on her pony

Katie bundled up. Katie did not join in any of the action, but did enjoy being wheeled around in her stroller watching everything. The weather was around 55 degrees, but the wind was blowing so it felt a lot colder.

MacKenzie, Addy, Mark & Lauren petting the "nay nay" with a llama in the background!
We walked all over the farm and went to an area where the kids saw, deer, a "Zeedog" which we believe is a zebra donkey mix, sheep, buffalo, and camels. Mark got near the fence where the buffalo was and for some reason it was upsetting to the buffalo who then gave Mark and the rest of us "the stink eye." We walked away quickly before he became more enraged.

Grandma and Grandpa also joined us on this adventure. Grandma is helping Mark pet a baby goat, in the petting zoo.

Lauren petting the baby goat.

There were lots of ponds and streams at the farm. Mark's favorite activity was throwing rocks into the pond. After 15 minutes of rock throwing I had to drag him away, and every time I looked around he was heading to another pond, or stream to throw more rocks. MacKenzie was not far behind. These two could be trouble together.

I have to say this was one of my favorite things at the farm, at last Mark was contained. Do you think they sell these for private use at home? I'm thinking this would be a great time out place! As you can imagine Mark immediately wanted out.

Lauren had to have her turn too!

Start spreading the news, I'm leaving today....

To relieve his guilt from taking an 11 day trip to Europe in January, Rick sent me to New York City for a shopping trip with my friend Julie. We went with a tour group of like minded women and hit all the key spots, and had TONS of fun.

DAY #1: Began with a trip to see a taping of "THE VIEW." These tickets can be difficult to obtain, but one of our tour guides was Alicia Richmond, who works for ABC-4 in Utah and does a weekly segment on fashion on a locally produced show entitled "Good Things Utah." Alicia scored us the tickets, however the catch was were guests of ABC, and could not accept any audience gift they gave which had a value of more than $75. The guests on the show that day were Snoop Dog, and John Stossel from ABC 20/20. There was also a spring fashion show courtesy of Macy's. The audience received two gifts, a $100 Macy's gift card, which of course we did not get, and the new Snoop Dog CD which I did get. Not being a Snoop fan I am open to suggestions for what I should do with my CD. Any takers?

Julie and & sitting in the audience waiting for "The View" to begin.

John Stossel talking with the ladies of "The View."

After the taping of "The View" it was off to Macy's or as I like to call it, "The Mother Ship."

Me standing outside "The Mother Ship."

Julie & I inside Macy's at the NYC display.

Also in the neighborhood of Macy's is Steve & Barry's a great discount store, which opened a store in Utah last year.

That evening the group had tickets for the Broadway play Mary Poppins. Julie and & I saw Mary Poppins last year when we went to NYC with our girls so we got tickets for Wicked, which is one of the best Broadway productions I have ever seen.

I want to be a part of it, New York, New York....

DAY #2: Lower Manhattan

The goal that Julie and I had for the second day was to obtain knockoff purses. We started early, right outside our hotel. Julie found a cute Coach for one of her daughters. This was enough to get the adrenalin running to wheel and deal for more purses. The scheduled agenda that day started with a trip to Century 21, a Department store, similar to TJ Maxx. The store was located only a few blocks from Battery park and right across the street from the World Trade Center site. Several in the group wanted to go down to Battery Park to look across at the Statute of Liberty. Julie & I wanted to go to Battery Park for PURSES! We always see different stuff at Battery Park than we see in China town. The bus let some people off at Century 21, and then continued on to Battery Park. As soon as we got off the bus at Battery Park we could see the purse guys.


*For those of you who have never experienced the purse guys in Battery Park, they have very large cardboard boxes, like the size a large TV would come in. On top of the boxes they have a sheet, which you can see has objects inside it. It is tied in a knot at the top. They wheel their box around with a furniture dolly. Buying a purse from them is pretty much like doing a drug deal. They are on the lookout for the cops because selling knockoff purses is illegal. When you tell them you are interested in a purse, they have you follow them off to a side street, where they take the wrapped up sheet off the top of the box so you can see the purses inside the box, then they untie the sheet so you can see the purses inside the sheet. You pick out the purse or purses you want and then the fun begins. They usually want around $80 for a purse and you dicker back and forth with them, usually getting the purse for somewhere between $20-40 depending on the purse.

Julie and & purchased several purses and returned to the bus to deposit our stash. Sensing that Julie and I were "Jonesing" for purses, the purse guys came up to the bus and wanted to sell their wears. There were several of our tour group members who were on the bus and quite unfamiliar with the buying and selling of knockoff purses. We told them to watch and learn. We exited the bus and began the process of purchasing a purse, while they watched from the window. The bus door was also open so they could hear what we were doing. They were quite impressed with our knockoff purse buying skills.

We decided we had enough of purses in Battery Park, knowing that we would be going to China town in the afternoon, which makes purse buying in Battery Park look like Kindergarten. We did go to Century 21, and I found great stuff for the kids, including "7" brand jeans for Lauren.

Julie & I in China town.

Next it was on to China town. By now the entire tour group had returned to the bus and were quite amazed at the purses we had acquired. We gave a brief lesson in purse buying in China town, complete with secret rooms, dark alleys and negotiating. We had no idea what stories they would return with. Last year when Julie and I were in China town they would not let us in any of the secret rooms, I presume because we had our kids with us, so purse buying in China town was challenging last year. This year was a different story. We had no problem getting into secret rooms.

*For those of you not in the know, most of the stores in China town have a secret room where they have to knockoff stuff. Its just like a murder mystery with a secret passage. It looks to be one wall, but a button is pushed and the wall opens up allowing entry into the secret room. Before you can leave the secret room they radio outside to see if it is clear so the cops do not see individuals exiting the secret room. The advantage of the secret room as opposed to Battery Park is that you can look for a long time, in Battery Park they want you to hurry and pick a purse because they are out in the open and afraid of a cop walking around the corner. The selection in the secret room is significantly larger than the purse guys at Battery Park. Also in China town they have individuals who stand on the corners and ask if you are interested in a purse. Those individuals will then take you down alleys, into buildings, and sometimes down into basements. Those make me a little more nervous than the secret room, but I have done in twice. I was able to locate purses and knock off Chanel sunglasses for myself, my mother-in-law Linda and my sister-in-law Courtney.

My knockoff purses!

Final Total: Julie =9, Tiffany = 10

When returned to the bus our tour mates had wild tales to tell of purse buying in China town. One mother daughter team got shoved into a van and locked inside while selecting purses. Two ladies from our tour ended up in locked in a jewelry shop with the store keeper wanting them to buy a $4000 ring. They escaped with money still in tacked and no new jewelry. Still others in our tour could not manage to locate any knockoffs and wanted to know where they were. There is nothing like China town in NYC.

After China town it was on to SoHo. In my three prior trips to NYC I have never made it to SoHo. Its a great shopping area. I loved all the boutique stores and window shopping. My only regret, not enough time.

Every day we returned to the hotel around 4:25 p.m. because our bus turned into a pumpkin at 4:30 p.m. With the exception of the first evening when we saw the Broadway show, we were free to do what ever we wanted. I still had not had enough time at "The Mother Ship" so Julie agreed to return to Macy's with me. I spent two and one half more hours in Macy's. I managed to do something that had eluded me in my three prior trips to NYC, make it though the entire plus size section of Macy's. I did minor damage to my Macy's card, and came home with about 10 new articles of clothing all for ME.

The view of Times Square from our hotel balcony.

And if I can make it there, I'm gonna make in anywhere...

DAY #3: 5th Avenue

A trip to NYC is not complete without a trip to 5th Ave. We started out at the trendy H&M and loaded up on cool accessories. Next it was on to Brooks Brothers for sharp looking ties for Rick, who spent his spring break watching the kids, while I was in NYC. On to FAO Schwarz in search of Thomas the Tank Engine for Mark, only to discover that FAO Schwarz no longer carries Thomas the Tank Engine. Finally you can not depart neither 5th Ave or NYC without a visit to the American Girl store. I was under strict instructions from Lauren to return to Utah with American Girl merchandise in hand.

Julie and I sipping "Frozen Hot Chocolate"

After shopping on 5th Avenue we met up with our tour group for lunch at Serendipity. Serendipity is famous for its "Frozen Hot Chocolate" as well as being a haunt of Oprah's. For those of you interested Frozen Hot Chocolate is basically hot chocolate mix made with milk and then finely crushed ice added in, with whip cream on the top. It is a tasty treat and I highly recommend it.

Question: Where can you go to find street preachers, telling of doom and destruction, drunk teachers, sciencetologist's hawking stress tests, vivid smells, germs galore, and a 30 year old claiming to be a high school wrestler hawking M&M's for $1.00 to support his wrestling team? If you guess the NYC subway you would be correct.

Me on the subway. Look I even coordinate with the emergency sign!

After lunch Julie and I hopped on the subway to head downtown to Battery Park. I decided that after I bought cute Chanel sunglasses for Courtney and Linda the day before, that I needed a pair for myself. Problem solved within 3 minutes of arrival at Battery Park. Then it was back on the subway and we headed to 34th street, to do some shopping at stores other than "The Mother Ship." I located an H&M that had kids clothes. Last fall in San Francisco, I discovered that some H&M's carry kids clothes and they are adorable. I found some really cute summer outfits for Katie. I called Alicia Richmond and she came down and joined Julie and me and found cute stuff for her kids!

Its up to you New York, New York!

DAY #4: Central Park

Neither Julie or I had ever been to Tavern on the Green, so on Sunday morning Julie treated me to Brunch at the famous Tavern on the Green. The food was great, Julie had french toast and I had a club sandwich. It was very much a "chick" restaurant, and had a 1920's style decor.

Julie and Me at Tavern on the Green

After brunch Julie and I walked through Central Park and took in the sites. We walked through about half of the park and ended up on the 5th Avenue side of the park, in a very residential area. We walked through the high rise apartments admiring the architecture and wondering how much it must cost to live in one of those apartments. Then we window shopped on Madison Avenue and gawked at all the high end fashion and wondered who would pay those kind of prices.

By 3:30p.m. it was time to go to the airport. I brought an empty duffel bag in my suitcase for taking home my stash. When we got to the airport all my tour mates were impressed. They were busy rearranging their suitcases to meet the 50 pound weight limit. They were shocked when I put my duffel bag on the scale and I came in significantly under weight. They thought for sure I would be over. Final total: Duffel= 40.5 lbs, Suitcase=45 lbs. I had room to spare, I still had 15 more pounds of stuff I could have purchased! Its amazing how much just and empty suit case weighs, that's why I pack a duffel, to save my weight for shopping finds.

*For those of you who want to know I went to Cabela's and purchased the largest duffel bag they had. It is approximately 36 inches long, and 18 inches wide and 24 inches tall. It holds a lot of shiz. The cost was around $50. I had a duffel bag that I was going to use, because it is really large, it holds a stroller and a car seat, but on my last trip the Delta airlines felt the need to tear several large holes in it. Julie purchased a Coleman camping duffel bag, which was around $30 and it was 48 inches long, 12 inches wide and 18 inches tall.

The flight was delayed leaving JFK so it was very late/early (3:00 a.m.) when I got home. Glad to be back, and I can't wait to show off my NYC fashion finds!

Girl Fun!

One of my responsibilities as second counselor in the Relief Society Presidency is to oversee Enrichment. On March 11, 2008 we had our Relief Society Birthday Dinner. Here are a few highlights. Our theme was "Make us one" and we used purses to illustrate the theme.


This was the box the invitation came in.

This was the invitation. It was a little paper purse, with a candy purse handle. When you opened up the invitation all the information about the event was inside. We told sisters to bring their purses. To entice the sisters to be on time we had a drawing for two TOTALLY cute purses that were given to us by a man in our Ward who designs all the bags for Franklin Covey. At exactly 6:31 p.m. we cut off the chance to enter the drawing. Our motivation worked and we had about 50 people who arrived on time.

We invited the Young Women to join us so we set up for 72 and filled every chair, much to our surprise. Each table had a different theme associated with purses, such as one table had little purses, like a teenage girl would carry, another table had big mom purses, another table had church bags. In total we had 9 table with different purse themes.

We served dinner and talked and visited. Then we played games. One game we played that was really fun was a game where everyone at the table pulled items out of their purse that started with the letter "r." From our table we chose the person who had the most random item starting with "r" and they had to go up front. The whole audience voted on who had the most random item, and the winner was a sister with a Roman coin (a reproduction of course) in her purse. A close second was a recipe box.

After the games I gave a short presentation about notable past Relief Society sisters and showed what type of a bag they might have carried. My favorite was a pink purse filled with big curlers and Aqua Net hairspray to represent the bag of former general Relief Society president Barbara B. Smith. To conclude we asked five sisters who were at different states of their lives to show the purse they carry and talk about the value of Relief Society. It was a great evening and I was home by 8:45 p.m. thanks to a wonderful committee!