Work Observations

I am on the phone at work pretty much all day. I call people who have applied to be truck drivers. Here are some things about calling on these applications that I have noticed over the last 6 months

1. I dont like calling people who have first names for their surname. Is this Mr. Frederick Michael, or Mr. Michael Frederick? I worry each time I call someone that I have the name backwards and they think I am an idiot.

2. People have some interesting names and interesting spelling. Take for example the following name: D'vorac. Now I would say that da vor zjack, like the composer of my favorite symphony. But who wants to take a stab at how it is really pronounced? Well I will let you all mull on that for a while and submit your guesses. And if anyone actually gets it right, I will give you a special surprise treat.

3. Before starting to work here, I had never spent much time talking to anyone from the South, but I talk to a lot of Southerners now days and there is one phrase that I hear at least 10 times a day that I had never heard before...."Have a blessed day." I love that. I do feel extra blessed after being told so many times each day.

Well, that is all for now. I know it wasnt especially funny or clever, but at least it was something to read.

A Bloggy Change

So, since starting my blog, I have always felt that I had to have something extra interesting and exciting going on in our lives in order to blog about it, and I needed to have accompanying pictures. Well, there is plenty exciting going on in our lives, but since I am at work for some of it, and my poor memory neglects to remember to bring my camera for the rest, I have not been a very consistent blogger.

Today I am instituting a change. I think I have some of the funniest, cleverest friends in the world, and I enjoy reading their blogs so much, even if they dont have pictures, or revolve around an event which is "mother of the year" quality. So, I am going to try to reciprocate by dusting off some of the old funny and clever that I know resides somewhere deep inside me, and blogging with more frequency. You might not always get a breathtaking photo, or interesting travelog, and to be quite honest, you might not even always get funny or clever, but at least the qauntity may increase. I thought I can just sit at my desk and jot down some random thoughts on truck drivers, or phone etiquette, or my coworkers, or whatever.

I thank you in advance for your well-wishes and support, and hope that you will be rewarded with some entertainment.

But not today....maybe I'll start tomorrow.

Happy Birthday Logan

Logan had a birthday on Nov. 30. The big 8....how exciting. She and I had a fun girls' day at the mall together. I surprised her by letting her get her ears pierced. She was ultra brave. We had lunch at Panda Express and she got to pick out an outfit.

Logan has been such a wonderful spirit in our home. She is just so pleasant and happy 95% of the time. She is super loving and kind and is a terrific big sister. We are so grateful that she is a part of our family.

We love you Logan!!

Is this thing even on?

So it's been a while, but hey nothing exciting happened any way, so nobody missed anything.

Well one fun thing happened. This past weekend, I went to California and hung out with my sisters (all but one), my mom, my aunts, and my cousin. We sure had a good time. We did Disneyland without the kids and got to ride on all the scary rides (which I decided I dont really like) and skip all the slow-moving line rides, like Dumbo. We got to walk all day and not take any naps, and not a single one of us threw a tantrum when we didnt get to buy the $80 hat we saw in the window. If any of you have not visited Disney as an adult without kids, you should give it a try. It is a whole different experience. I must say that I felt just a bit guilty about having all that kid-type fun without my cute kids. But I quickly got over it.

We also did some shopping, and of course dining, and my two sisters and I went to see a play. I got to sleep in and not clean up after anyone and I only had to worry about what I was going to wear. On the airplane, I read the entire time and not once did I need to clean up a spilled soda or try to keep a child from kicking the seat in front of him. Ah what a beautiful break it was. I came home and the kids and Rollin had cleaned the house and everyone was bathed and they were all so happy to see me....it was good to be home.

There really is nothing like a long, relaxing weekend with the girls to help you feel rejuvenated and remind you just how much you love your little family of trouble makers.

Miss Mya Grace

In keeping with my recent bloggy slacker-ness, I would today like to post about my beautiful youngest girl, who turned 3 last Monday. Little Mya has brought such joy to our family and our home. She has the entire clan wrapped around her little finger, exactly where she wants us. But, dangit, she is so cute at least 60% of the time, we just can't help but be bamboozled into doing just what she wants. Boy, we all love that girl.

My darling baby girl, I am so glad that Heavenly Father chose me to be your mom. Your smile and your laugh are such special parts of my day. I enjoy watching you learn and grow each day and you are already turning into such a kind, loving, smart girl. You make me so proud every day. Happy Birthday Princess Mya. I love you!

The first final pirate blog

Well, after much dilly-dallying and a day of furiously feverish painting, I can finally, proudly annouce the competion of one Wall Story Pirate Treasure Mural. Last Saturday, I really decided it was time to fulfill my promise to the lovely people at Magic Mural Factory, and complete our friend Roger the jolly pirate. I went to Roberts for one more bag of DecoArt Americana paint and a couple of new brushes (which, to my everlasting joy because I love a bargain, were 75% off) and came home to get down to some business.

First I added a second coat to the lighter colors and painted in some of the darker colors. I think that really made the mural come to life.

And here it is....the finished result.

Isn't he looking good? Turns out I am pretty awesome at this painting stuff.

Yeah it was hard work, but it was fun and nice to challenge myself to try something new.

And I am so impressed that it ..... what? I did what? Nuh uh, it is perfect. No? Not perfect?

Apparently this will NOT be my last post about the mural. Shortly after I left the boys' room in sweaty triumph at my successful completion of the task at hand, Sam called me back in to show me the mistakes I had made. Count on your kids to give you a nice poke in the head when it gets a little too puffed up. It looks like I have a little work to do. Excuse me while I slump, humbly, back to my task and try again.

Sugar Rush

An Ode to Candy Corn

by Jennifer J Skinner

Yellow, orange, and white

You are a sugar lover's delight.

When fall comes in, you come out

You are something to shout about.

My joy is full, my tummy too

and even though summer's through,

I enter the fall with a smile on my face.

No other candy can take your place.

Thanks to the man who found a way

to put you together in that adorable way

And make my life a dream come true.

Candy corn, I love you!!

I love fall and I love fall candy. I went to WalMart today and made a special trip to the waaayyyy back of the store just to get a nice big bag of candy corn. Yummm. I might have to take tomorrow off because I will be in a sugar coma, but I am enjoying it now. That is because it is so delicious.

Here are some delicious candy corn facts to enlighten your mind and start your mouth watering:

• The average person consumes 5.73 pounds of candy corn per year


• October 30th is national candy corn day


• Halloween accounts for 75% of annual candy corn production


• Candy corn was first produced in 1880


• More than 35 million pounds of candy corn will be produced this year. That equates to nearly 9 billion pieces -- enough to circle the moon nearly four times if laid end-to-end.


• According to the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry, candy corn is no different than a slice of bread, bowl of cereal or a cracker when it comes to causing tooth decay

So there you go. Candy corn basically makes the world a better place. Go out and get some today! And if you arent going to eat your 5+ pounds this year, please feel free to bring it over here.

Grandparents Day

Last Friday was Grandparent's Day in Logan's 2nd grade class. She got to call and invite Grandma and Grandpa Amussen to join her for some fun and some yummy school lunch. To prepare for the day, Logan got to interview gma and gpa and ask them some questions about their lives when they were her age. Boy how times have changed! I am glad Logan had a chance to get to know them better and spend some special time with them.

Logan sure has some young looking grandparents. I think they look like the youngest ones there. I just hope some of those genes got passed on to their lovely daughter, and me too.

It seems like it was a pretty exciting day for everyone. Thanks Mom and Dad for moving close enough that Logan could have you there.

Please Don't Hurt 'Em, Hammer

Please indulge me while I reminisce.

I was thinking this past week about bands I have seen in concert. I was remembering the good old days of Park West concerts. Those were some good times up there. Sitting in the general admission seats, watching people urinate in public along the fence, smelling the mary jane, watching the lesbians make out. Good times.

That got me thinking of other bands I was able to see in concert.
My first concert, I was 11 and the neighbors had an extra ticket to see Chicago at the Salt Palace. We were pretty far up in the stands, and I didn't really know the songs, but I remember being there.

Some friends and I went to see the Hammer when we were in high school. That was so awesome! It was my first introduction to some of the more suggestive dance moves that were popular in the late 80's.

Anyway, we don't need to go into all the gory details. I made a new playlist of songs from those great concerts I got to see. Now, before you start judging me and laughing, some of these bands or people were VERY popular back in the day when I went to see them....yes, even Michael Bolton.

Why dont you all tell me a little about some fun concerts you have been to? That would be fun, huh?

Notes from an uncool mom

I have been neglecting my blog lately. I have gained a whole new appreciation for the working moms of the world. This working full-time gig is hard! By the time I get home, cook dinner, and clean up the house a bit, all I want to do is stare mindlessly at TV for an hour and then go to bed. It is good that nothing too exciting has been going on, so the blog hasn't really missed out on anything. Here is an update, none the less.

We have been getting ready for school to start next week. Jackson is going to be in 7th grade this year which means we have a middle schooler in the house. I've said this before, but I still can't believe he has grown up so fast. On Wednesday, he and I went to his new school for their open house thing. They did not have as much information as I would have liked regarding Jackson's first day of school, for example: where his first class is to be held, where he should go to be told where his first class is to be held, or who his home room teacher will be. I was uncomfortable with just plopping him down in a new school with no real information so I offered to take him that first day and help him out. He said that would be too embarrassing and he would do fine on his own. Yep, the day has finally come that my kids are too embarrassed to be seen with me. I think this has to be one of the worst days in every mom's life.

I have been plugging away little by little on our pirate mural. I have managed to do it without any requests for help from little hands, but they all like to come sit in the room and watch me paint. The painting process is slow going, and much more detail oriented than I imagined it would be. I think I got the completely wrong paint brushes because I have to work so hard to stay in the lines with the brushes I have. Another trip to Roberts for some new brushes is probably in the near future. The paint that our builder put on our walls must be some sort of super-duper-resistant-to-new-paint type because, like any other time we have tried to repaint in this house, the paint just doesn't go on very well. As a result, my mural might require a second coat of paint. Despite all the struggles, it is looking pretty good. I love the idea that I can appear to be quite a skilled artist, when in actuality I am only a skilled tracer. Check out the progress.

Contest Winners

Well there was a pretty overwhelmingly small response to my name that 80s movie soundtrack contest. I guess all my bloggy buddies, with a few notable exceptions, are just too young to have lived the 80s. Even still, I can't believe that none of you knew the song from Xanadu. That movie is sooo cool. I have posted the answers on the side bar of the page.

Congratulations to my lovely sister Patty for naming the most movies with 21 correct answers.
Congratulations to the beautiful and talented Katie Roberts for her noble attempt and 17 correct answers.
And Congratulations to the amazing Becca Sanchez--oh I mean Devenport--for surprising me with her 80s knowledge and coming up with 7.5 correct answers.

No one knew the bonus question. Lessons in Love was from the movie Hot Pursuit, a mid-career non-winner for John Cusack.

Patty, look for your prize some time in the next 6-8 weeks. Of course, you rarely ever read my blog so maybe I will insist that you respond to this post before I send you anything.

Next contest coming soon. Or late depending on my energy and creativity level.

Yo ho me hearties

Here is the progress so far of our pirate wall mural. I think this was the easy part. And boy was it ever easy. I wiped down the boys' wall with some water and a magic eraser (those things are sooo cool) to get off all the boy dirt. Now, witness my amazing camera skills and take a gander at the wall. How boring...let's spruce it up a bit.

We (the boys and I) taped the transfer paper to the backside of the mural pattern, and then taped them both to the wall. I wanted to make the mural just a bit bigger since the boys are getting big and the wall is so bare, so I split the mural and lengthened the pole part of the picture. Easy enough. We used some left over painter's tape so we wouldnt pull off any of the wall.

Then we got to tracing. Look how intensely the boys were concentrating. It really took no time at all, about 15 minutes from start to finish. Now our pirate skeleton head is just waiting for our painting skills to give him a bit of color.

So Saturday will be the next session. See the numbers on the picture? That is so color and design challenged folks like me can't mess it up too badly. I think the painting part might take a bit more time and skill and I am hesitant to let the kids help, even though I think they will want to. I guess it is their room, but is it mean of me to want to do it myself so I can insure that it looks good? That is assuming that I don't mess it up. But this mural seems pretty mess-up-proof. At least that's what I'm hoping.

We will keep you posted.

Oh, I also just wanted to take a minute to mention that in the past week, my email account has informed me that I have won the British lottery 12 times, the Irish lottery 9 times, and Donald Trump's personal lottery twice. My amazing luck continues!

My Scout

Well, it has been a pretty crazy week around here.

Jackson was at Scout camp this past week. It was really weird not having him around. We really missed him. This is his first week long overnight camp and I was a little worried about him wandering off into the wilderness or being eaten by a bear. He came home safely though. If fun is to be measured by the amount of dirt accumulated on a person's body, I would say he had the time of his life. I don't think I have ever seen a dirtier person walk through my door. He came home with a whole mess of bug bites, a very severe case of chapped lips and a little sunburn, but overall he was no worse for the wear.

My cute sister Laura, her husband Darren, and their 3 beautiful kids came to visit this week. Laura joined me at Bunco, and we had dinner with them and my parents on Sunday. We had so much fun seeing them, and because we love them so much, we passed along our family sickness to them. Poor Riley and Laura both got the pukies from us. Sorry girls.

Also this past week, I started working full time. It has been a challenge getting up early again and leaving the kids all day, but overall it has been a good experience. I am working at CR England trucking in their recruiting department. You sure get to talk to some interesting people when you are trying to hire truck drivers. I have had to study up on my southern so I can understand some of the people who call in. There are some thick accents out there!

Lastly, I received my Pirate Mural kit this week. We are all excited to tackle the project starting Saturday (when I say we, I do mean everyone except my non-crafting husband.) I was looking at the instructions and was very pleased to find out that it just requires acrylic craft paint. I was so worried that I would have to go buy ten 1 quart cans of latex paint and that would cost me a fortune. Now, I can just go down to Robert's craft and get ten $1.00 bottles of acrylic craft paint. That, I can afford. Stay tuned!

Oh and one more thing....today I stopped by Smith's and saw that they are having their great cereal sale this week. When you buy 10 Kelloggs cereals, you get them for $10. Can't beat that deal. We stocked up and got 20 boxes. I love saving money!!

A Great Opportunity

So, you all have heard lately about my thirst for swag from bloggy contests. Well, one day in my searchings for fantastic contests, I ran across one that peaked my interest. It was a contest and an assignment rolled into one, but I was up for the challenge. Here was the deal. The winner would receive a paint by number wall mural kit for free, and in return he or she had to agree to blog about the painting process. The murals were totally cute, so I entered.

And do you guys even need me to tell you if I won or not? Of course I won! So get ready in future entries to see the process as I, a pathetically unartistic woman, attempt to liven up my darling boys' room with a really great pirate wall mural.

Thanks to Wall Story for the great product and for choosing me and my blog to give it a whirl.

If you are also unartistic and would like to liven up a space in your home, check out their site.

http://www.magic-mural-factory.com/Level_1/introducing_wallstory.htm

My Sammy

This past Sunday was Sam's 10th birthday. I can't believe he is in double digits now too. He is such a good boy. I am so lucky to be his mom.

Things I love about Sam:

He gets so excited when he hears a new random fact on TV. "Mom, did you know that an ant can carry 8 billion times its own weight?"

He is the only other person in our family who has a temper like mine.

He is so quietly shy and he hides a little when attention is drawn to him. That is so cute.

He is soooo ticklish and when you really tickle him good, his laugh is so contagious.

He is an occasional daredevil and proudly bears the scars that prove it.

He doesn't like to be called Sammy, but he lets me.

He is such a prefectionist and gets so frustrated when he can't do something.

He is just so darn cute.

He is just so darn good.

I love you Sam! Happy Birthday!

We love the 80s

The other day I was driving in my car and heard "Lessons in Love" by level 42. What a great song! Anyway, it got me thinking about a movie which has the song on its soundtrack. That got me thinking about other awesome 80s movies that had amazing soundtracks. Rollin and I were talking about it later that night and decided there are a lot of great 80s movies we haven't seen in a while which we should revisit. We also thought, maybe we will write up a nice little review here on our blog so our friends can get some suggestions for great 80s movies to watch.

We are very happy subscribers to Netflix, so that night we spent like 2 hours reminiscing about movies we loved as kids and adding them to our Netflix queue. We received our first 2 yesterday and watched Karate Kid with the kids last night.
I am sure that some of you are far too young to remember Karate Kid, but I sure have some fond memories. It is such a nice little family movie with such a good message. And that message is: if you rub your hands together really fast, you can heal most minor injuries!! No, really the message we got from Karate Kid can best be summed up in the words of Mr. Miyagi "Walk right side of road, fine. Walk left side of road, fine. Walk middle of road, (squishing sound.) You have to decide, Karate yes, karate no, but not karate maybe." We are constantly trying to pound that message into our kids' heads: whatever you decide to do, you need to give it 100%. Half an effort is not good enough.


We would highly recommend Karate Kid to those who have never seen it and to those who haven't seen it in a while.


Our next movie: Tron. How cool is that? Stay tuned for the review.

If there are any 80s movies you would like The Skinner Movie Show to review, please let us know.

Also, my playlist is now totally populated with songs from movies of the 80s. Since our last music contest was so successful (congratulations Heather!!!) how about another one? Name the movies that had these songs on their soundtracks. The person who can name the most will win a totally tubular prize. You can email me your entries to the address on the right side bar, better not leave a comment or else people can steal your answers. (Extra special bonus prize if anyone knows the movie that had Lessons in Love, which started this whole mess, in it....it's a hard one.) No cheating by looking them up on the internet, act like it's still the 80s and just try to use the computer in your brain! Let Mr. Miyagi be your inspiration.

In hindsight, comments were not a good idea so I removed a couple comments with some answers, but never fear Becca and Katie, I have saved them and calculated your scores.

Update

A large box of 100% free, no strings attached, enivronmentally friendly laundry detergent arrived via UPS at my home this afternoon! Thanks Dropps Laundry Detergent for proving my hubby wrong and restoring my faith in online giveaways.

WOOOO HOOOO

Winner, winner, chicken dinner

Oh yeah. Guess who just won a Prince tennis racquet and balls?

Yup, I did. And this is just how good I will look when I use it, too.


I am sitting back thinking I am one lucky son of a gun and Rollin has to burst my bubble by suggesting that perhaps my winning has nothing to do with luck, but is instead an elaborate fishing scam to gather my personal information and steal my identity. He is such a kill joy.

We'll just wait and see who's right when my stuff starts arriving at our front door! (Or when my credit score goes down the toilet.) I choose optimism.

Our Weekend

Hurray for holiday weekends! We had lots of fun. So many things to do!

Thursday night, Rollin and I went out for my birthday celebration. We saw the movie "Get Smart." I thought it was pretty funny. We went to Red Robin for dinner. It was our first time visiting that establishment and we found it to be pretty good for a burger joint.

Friday morning, our wonderful neighbors invited us to watch the West Jordan 4th of July parade with them. There were about 6 families from the ward who all sat together to view the parade. Terry brought donuts (thanks so much) Brynn brought juice and milk (and to you too) and we all just had a blast. The West Jordan parade is no Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, that's for sure, but boy do they throw out a ton of candy! The kids had a great time running into the street to collect the booty. We came home with about a pound of salt water taffy, a frisbee, and quite a few fliers. The only bad part of the morning was that Rollin and I made some poor choices on our route to take to get there, and we ended up on a road that was closed for the staging of the floats. We parked and walked a long, long way to our spot when it turns out we could have taken a different road and parked about 30 feet from our watching spot. If I had called sooner to ask, this mess could also have been avoided, as Rollin quite enjoys reminding me.

Friday night, we lit some fireworks in our front yard. We bought a bunch of fireworks last year and for reasons I don't remember we never used them. So this year there they were ready to be enjoyed! This was Mya's first year of really being awake for the fireworks and she is a big fan. She said "Oh that's beautiful", "Dad, do that again", and best of all "That's fantastic!" She is such a crack up.

On Saturday we got up and took the kids to the zoo. We rode the train and the new carousel. We saw the much anticipated albino crocodile and the amazing bird show. The crowds were very light for a Saturday and the weather was quite nice.

Lucky Old Girl

Hey you should all come over and rub my head, because I am one lucky girl this week!

I just won another contest! This one is for a year's supply of laundry detergent. Woo hoo. Now I will have hot lips AND clean clothes.

Not a bad way to end my 35th year of life.

Yeah, I turn 35 tomorrow. I think that after about year 25, I have dreaded adding another year to my age. This one hurts more than usual though. Maybe it's because this is a multiple of 5 year or something. Maybe it's thinking about all the things I am now just too old to do, like be an olympic gymnast. Maybe it's the ever increasing number of wrinkles I see every day. Maybe it's because the average age of ladies in my ward is like 19. Maybe it's because I am now on the inevitable down hill slide toward 40. Oh that hurts just to type.

I will try to accept my age with grace and style though. Let's look at the positive aspects, shall we? Are there positives? I don't look or feel 35, do I? That's something I guess. I would not want to go back and do my 20s again. They were hard. Having really young kids is harder than older kids (but probably easier than it will be in 5 years when I have 3 teenagers.) I don't embarrass myself nearly as easily now as I did when I was younger, so I guess I have gained some wisdom in my old age. That's also nice.

Ok, 35 isn't so bad. Not that being sad about it is going to keep those years from marching by anyway, so I will just accept my fate. But then again I might start lying about it and trying to pass for 29.

See? I haven't changed at all!

Bloggy Winner!

Hey, look at me! I won a contest on a blog.

http://thebeautycounter.blogspot.com/2008/06/armour-beauty-review-giveaway.html

Last Saturday, in my oh so extreme boredom, I went to some blog giveaway sites and entered about 50 blog giveaway contests. I just felt in my bones that at least one of these contests would yield some great little bit of swag for me, and I was right! Some of the contests aren't over yet, so you never know, I could win more! If you want to be a winner too, check out some of the links on the left hand side of my blog.

I feel like I'm queen of the world!!! And man are my lips going to look hot!

Things I love about being a mom:

My kids say the cutest things, especially when they are little. Sam has a little freckle on his neck and when he first noticed it, he thought it was a drop of syrup he had spilled on himself and it just wasn't coming off. He was convinced it was syrup for at least a year. We let him think it because it was so cute.

My kids do such cute things. One of Mya's favorite games is to put her dolls to sleep. She wraps them all up and tucks them in with a blanket. I find sleeping dolls all over the house. The other day, I found Mya making this lovely mess in the family room.

Here is the funny part.

This is a barbie that the dog has made her own. Petunia loves to grab this doll by the hair and shake it around. As a result, there is not much hair left and the head has been ripped almost in half. Although ugly and chewed up, Mya still took the time to put her to sleep. How cute.

I love watching my kids become friends.

I love watching my kids become good people.

Things I don't love about being a mom:

Germs. I am so tired of being sick all the time. My home is like some kind of petri dish with each kid bringing home a strange variety of germs each time we leave the house. And then they get sick and then I get sick. I am currently on my 2nd cold in as many weeks. I suppose the upside is that someday I will have an inpenetrable immunity system, but for now I just don't like it.

Messes. Do they ever end? It seems like they don't. Now I admit I am not the world's most diligent housekeeper, but even if I were, there would be no rest from trying to keep up with the messes my kids make. One prime example is toothpaste. I s it just me, or do other moms find toothpaste all over the house? Giant globs on the wall of the bathroom, small globs in the carpet of a bedroom, smears on the mirror. It's everywhere! And it's not easy to clean either.

It looks like the goods outnumber the bads. I guess I won't sell my kids to the gypsies just yet, but the teenage years are looming in the not too distant future and the balance might shift. For now though, I sure am glad that Heavenly Father chose me to be the mom of these 4 amazing kids.

Logan's Recital

Sweet little Logan had her last dance recital of the year last night. She has really enjoyed her dance class and has learned a lot. The dancers learned interpretive dance for this recital. Her recital was up Big Cottonwood canyon in the storm mountain ampitheater. It was an interesting place to have a dance recital and it took FOREVER to get up there for a 6:30 start time what with all the traffic and the accident on the freeway, but it was nice and cool after the long day. We took a picnic dinner and had a grand old time. Grandma and grandpa were great to drive up from Salem to watch. Logan was so cute and did an awesome job. We are so proud of her.

An Homage

Not much has been going on around here lately. That is mostly my fault because I have been totally wrapped up in reading. I have always been a fan of the fantasy genre and there are times when a good Juvenile Fiction read is just up my alley. So this week I have been captivated by this book:

It is akin to Harry Potter (though in my opinion nothing will ever match HP) with the magic and magical creatures and bad guys and such. I am currently reading the 2nd book in the series and loving it.

I was also thinking today about 80s Hair Band Music. During the 80s, I was not a big fan, but as time went by, I came to appreciate it. Lately, the appearance of several hair band alumni on the reality TV scene has just amped up my regard for hair bands. (I mean who can help but get sucked in to Tommy Lee trying to make it at college, or Brett Michaels trying to find true love with 1 of 20 random skanky women?)

Everything about the whole 80s hair band scene was just wonderful: the glamour, the makeup, the heroin-chic thinness, the videos with the buxom women, and of course the hair. But what gets me, what really just cements these amazing bands in my mind is the beautiful, thought-provoking, timeless lyrics they came up with.

Just listen to this:

An' here I go again on my own

Goin' down the only road I've ever known,

Like a hobo I was born to walk alone

An' I've made up my mind

I ain't wasting no more time

Can't you just see that Hobo walking down the road, all by himself. Brings tears to my eyes.

Here's another one:

So you say I've got a funny face, I got no worries

And I don't know why

I don't know why

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all have such a great attitude about our physical limitations?

How about these words?

Love is like a bomb, baby, c'mon get it on

Livin' like a lover with a radar phone

Lookin' like a tramp, like a video vamp

Demolition woman, can I be your man?

Now, I don't necessarily know what those words mean, but are they powerful or what? I wish I had a radar phone!

As an homage to the great song writers of the 80s hair band era, I have changed my playlist this month to be exclusively theirs. Next month, I might try something new because music is awesome and until we really explore it, it can't touch our lives.

Amen.

(Prizes to the first people to identify the hair bands in these pictures. Immediate family members not eligible.)

Girls will be girls

What am I going to do with these two girls? They are such, well, girls. They both love dress ups and makeup and princesses.

They are very serious about their makeup application.

They are just so cute, I guess I will keep them and hope they get over this girly phase before they are teenagers.