let's hear it for the boy

Last Saturday, Dave biked 35 miles in El Tour de Tucson.

My in-laws on the tandem

Sam rode too.
Steve's not pictured. That's because he went for the 66-mile course.
Biking isn't really my thing, but after seeing people of all ages and ability levels (Dave said at one point he was passed up by a 9-yr old on a mountain bike), I think I'll give it a go next year.

a less commercial christmas

I subscribe to the CCFC (Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood) Newsletter. They're constantly engaged in the battle to end inappropriate marketing to kids (aka PG-13 movie figurines in Happy Meals, etc.) and they've been taking a lot of credit for Disney's recent Baby Einstein refund (oopsie, we guess our movies aren't so beneficial to infants after all!).

I usually mean to sign some of the petitions they push, then get lazy and hope some other activist will pick up the slack for me...so far that's been working out quite nicely. Anyway, they just came out with a Guide to Commercial-Free Holidays. Good stuff. So, if you find yourself disgusted with store isles' instant transition from Halloween to Christmas, check it out.

family photos

The only photo we have of the four of us was taken the day of Lucy's birth. We're all sitting on the bed. I think I'm wearing one of Dave's t-shirts. Let's just say, it's less than flattering. So we commissioned our friends to knock out some portraits. They did a fabulous job. My favorites are as follows:

looking for books

In a town as small as mine, if you don't do your Christmas shopping early (and online), you're out of luck come Christmas Eve. Because our tiny Target only has so much to go around. My favorite gifts for the girls are books. I like them. They like them. And unlike toys, they're usually made in the USA and will more likely contribute to some sort of intellectual actualization.

My favorite finds of late:
When I was Young in the Mountains, by Cynthia Rylant
Poppleton, by Cynthia Rylant (I adore any book by this woman)
Wild Girl, by Chris Wormell
Each Peach Pear Plum, by Janet and Allan Ahlburg

Penelope's tastes vary. Right now, she's obsessed with Horton Hatches an Egg, which I bought purely out of nostalgia when she was an infant. She's also favoring Gila Monsters Meet You at the Airport--a book she wanted exactly nothing to do with for a year after I bought it. So, you just never can tell. Like veggies, sometimes all you can do with books is leave them out and hope that the kiddos take to them.

And now Santa wants to know: what are your favorite children's books?

balloons

I remember waking up at the crack of dawn to watch a similar balloon festival when I was a kid. We went with my grandparents; it's one of the most vivid memories I have with them.

There's nothing like giant balloons to etch an event into the memory.

hair

You know how in the 50s if a girl got pregnant in her teens, her parents would send her to one of those hidden homes to gestate out of the public eye? I sort of wish they had a house like that for me. For my hair. I've decided to grow it out and it's manifesting itself in extreme stages of hideousness. Right now it's the mullet (known in Utah as the "schmelby"). Ugh. Even with my meager sense of dignity, it's embarrassing.

Random hairstyling note: there's this salon in town called In His Image. And I just don't get it. Plenty of things can be Christian themed. Like churches and schools. And maybe bookstores. But hair parlors?

check it out!

I'm on FMH! They're doing a series called A Mormon Feminist Image and selected a picture I submitted. You've seen this photo on my blog before, but hey, still pretty cool.

keep on truckin'

I'd have to say that one of my favorite jobs was working as a TTY tech like nine years ago. I was the go between for hearing to deaf (and vise-versa) phone conversations. Basically, I got paid to eavesdrop, which, let's be serious, is one of my favorite pastimes.

Coincidentally, I met one of my favorite people at this job. We're like a decade apart in age (not that I'm throwing your age up in your face, girl, I'm just trying to illustrate a point!) but we totally clicked. Like two giddy schoolgirls.

Sadly, we lost touch until a few weeks ago (via facebook--is there even another forum for reconnecting these days?). I was delighted to say the least.

She now travels the country as a (not your typical) truck driver. Still as funny and fantastic as I remembered. Allow me to pass along the delight by introducing her.