Mud Season

When I learned the seasons in school, I was only taught four, spring, summer, fall, and winter.  I believe this is because the majority of my schooling was done in Utah, where they actually have four seasons.  Had I gone to more than just kindergarten in Wyoming, I would have learned the truth.  There are five seasons.  Spring, summer, fall, winter, and mud.  Mud season is most prevalent in the country, where there is a lot of snow and dirt roads.  I happen to have both.  I live at the a mile of dirt roads.  Mud season starts whenever the temperatures reach high enough to melt the snow.  When this happens, everything turns to mud.

This year is especially bad, because we have the pleasure of welcoming new neighbors who are  building a new house next door and they dug up the road. The gravel is gone and the road has turned into mud slide. The cars are caked in mud, the animals are caked in mud, all of the shoes are caked in mud.  When my nine year old came in yesterday, she left two little piles of mud on the front step, they were her shoes.  When kids get caked in that much mud, the only solution, is to pull out the hose and hose them down.  This solves the immediate problem, but it creates a much larger one.  Once the hoses are back on the spickest after their long winters nap, and the water starts flowing guess what this means…more mud. 

A lot of people say that spring is their favorite season.  The whole renewal of the earth thing.  For me, this is a to close to the mud season and it is ruined for me.  Maybe there is something to be said for living in the concrete jungle especially when new neighbors only bring MUD.

Rules of being a kid

I know we think back on our childhood as carefree, but thinking back on my own childhood, I realize that the opposite was true.  I remember looking at the adults around me and wishing I had their freedom to boss people around.  It was the truth, this is what makes kids lives so difficult, adults are bossy, this is were the rules of being a kid come into play.

As a kid dealing with bossy adults you learn that the more rules you figure out the better off you are. 

A good rule  was, if you are outside playing, don’t go in.  Outside is a safe zone, if you go in for any reason, you could get stuck there.  This rule was especially true in the winter time.  Don’t go in, if you were freezing, just wait, you would get a good numb going soon and couldn’t feel anything.  If you went in for any reason you could get caught in the chores trap, (out of parental sight, out of mind), or   you would thaw, get wet and begin to feel how cold you actually were.  Once you were wet you were in, the clothes came off and everything had to dry again before you were let out again, this could take hours.  

Usually, the only reason you would go inside, was for a potty break.  This usually came after too much waiting and the potty dance while stripping off six layers of sopping wet clothes ensued.  The memory is still vivid in my mind. 

My younger siblings actually beat the potty problem and the poo crew was born, but that is a story for another time.  Lets just say, when they sold the vacant house next door, it needed more than just paint.

Another good rule was be careful when, and on whom you tattled.  Usually tattling occurred when you were all doing something you weren’t supposed to.  I found that I screamed for a parent after I had slugged a sibling and they were about to slug me back.  I learned quickly that this didn’t work, because when you tell on someone, if they are crying and you are not, guess who got into trouble.    

There are just a couple of examples of how tough is was to be a kid.  Every once in a while, when I find myself bossing my kids around, which is by the way, as fun as I thought it would be as a child, I have flashbacks to my childhood, and I actually have pity on the poor things. 

Childhood memories are awesome, especially when you forget about how tough it can be being a kid.

The Olympics are here!

The Olympics are here and for the first time since we shut off the T.V. I am sorry.  I am an Olympics junkie.  If I could, I would settle myself down and do nothing but watch them from the opening ceremony, to the closing.  I don’t know if I like winter or summer better.  I don’t even know when it started, I just know I am hooked.  I have very vivid memories of watching the torch being run through Tacoma Washington while we lived there on it’s way to L.A..  I watched when it ran through Sheridan on it’s way to Salt Lake.  I remember Nadia’s perfect ten, and Mary Lou’s  ten with her injured ankle.  I have seen the Jamaican bob sled team, before the movie, and that English ski jumper that was so bad that they set new standards entry in to the games.  

I know it won’t be the same catching bits and pieces on the internet, so all of you who have television, sit down with a bowl of popcorn and a warm blanket and watch an event for me. 

I love having a nine year old.

I am getting old. I am seriously middle aged. The women who are my age are putting their kids through college. Some of them are empty nesters. I am one of the lucky ones though, I have a nine year old.

Most of the people I work with, spend their time traveling, going on cruises and spending money. My life is a bit more colorful. I still have a child who tried to crawl in bed with me when the wind blows. She came in just last week and woke me from a dead sleep by yelling, “ I can’t sleep, I am totally serious!” I still get to read the Tales of Despereaux and Ramona the Pest as bedtime stories. I still buy tacky Valentine cards each February.

I get to answer questions like,” Why ain’t ain’t a word if people use it.” I get to laugh at knock knock jokes. I make pinkie promises and do knuckles when required. I still get to buy corn dogs and pop sickles. There is a constant noise in the background when she is home that I miss terribly during the day. I get to hear humming and singing and the voices of toys talking to each other.

I am still doing long division and multiplication tables after school. I get to go on field trips and go to orchestra and Christmas concerts. I have to help write talks for primary and am thrilled to get homemade bookmarks and Christmas tree ornaments. I have never regretted the choice I made to forgo a career to have six kids and stay home with them. I am so glad that one of them didn’t come until nine years ago, because I would be totally lost without a wonderful nine year old.