Logitos

This is our relationship with Logan, in a blog post. Transcribed as closely as I can recall what happened 10 minutes ago:

He walks in the room where Stephen and I are.

Logan: Ew. Stop kissing. You guys stop it.

We continue.

Logan: STOP! I said stop! I mean it!

We ignore him. He jumps on Stephen's back. We continue to ignore him and he leaves, adding: "You guys are so weird."

Stephen picks up the guitar and starts singing. "Logan sucks and Logan sucks. Logan sucks, he really sucks."

"STOP!" Logan screams from downstairs.

"Logan sucks at Fun Run 2....." Stephen sings joyfully.

"No I don't, it's you, you're the one who quit!"

Repeat 8 times.

"I'm going to tell Dad, I mean it, stop!" Logan announces.

"Logan sucks -" Stephen exuberantly sings back.

The garage door slams as he goes out to the garage to tell Dad.

Later on, Stephen apologizes.

"Logan, I'm sorry. I just say those things to play with you, because I think it's funny how you react."

Logan sits there motionless. He likes to play dead sometimes.

"I actually think you're really smart," Stephen continues. "You might be a manager at McDonalds one day. That's how smart I think you are."

Nata-loo

We had a birthday (shout hooray) this weekend. My sister-in-law Natalie turned into an adult! Technically, her birthday was on Saturday, but we celebrated today. Would you like to celebrate with us? Good. You can sit there and observe.

While Natalie takes a nap upstairs, the rest of us Mama Shimp arranges the gifts on the kitchen table. Four matching black-and-white chevron bags, 3 matching pink bags, and one blue bag from Stephen and I. Then she sets about the much harder task of gathering everyone in. 

"Logan, Michael, get Heather up." I'm napping on the couch and get a rude awakening when Stephen sticks his tongue in my ear. I'm very emotional in those first waking moments and almost start to cry. 

"Michael! Logan! Stop that. Leave each other alone. Come in here."

They come in and start fighting over a chair. 

"Okay, stop. Michael, would you go get Natalie?"

He goes upstairs. "Mike! Stand up, come on. We all need to be standing around the table."

"Stephen!" (He's studying in the family room.) "Stephen. Come in here, we need to all be standing around the table."

Michael comes back downstairs. 

Mama Shimp fusses over the presents. "Okay, okay! Stephen!"

Stephen makes his way in and pours himself a drink. My face fell asleep during my nap, and while this is all happening, I'm freaking out because I think that a chunk is somehow missing off of my forehead. I wander pathetically over to Stephen and tell him "I need you to pay attention to my face for, seriously, five seconds. There's something that's like, wrong with it. Like, something is wrong. Just look at it, am I okay?" He massages my temples and says I look fine. Natalie does not appear. 

"Michael....where's Natalie? Logan. Will you go get your sister. No, Michael. Michael! Stay here!" 

Logan and Michael both sprint off for the stairs. 

"Mike, stand up. Stephen, over here. Heather. Are you....what are you doing? Are you not feeling well?" 

I'm poking at my forehead, and I feel a little bit like crying. "I think something's really wrong with my face. Like something happened to me. I don't know," I explain. 

"Maybe it fell asleep during your nap? Try putting your head down by your knees, and letting the blood rush to your head."

I try it. It's very good advice and I start to feel better almost immediately. Meanwhile, the boys are back. Michael picks up the lighter and plays with it for about 30 seconds before Mike takes it. Folds his arms. Grips the lighter tightly. Starts playing with it himself. Natalie still hasn't arrived. 

Mama Shimp is starting to get frustrated. "You guys, where is Natalie?! Brandon, will you - no no. Mike. Go upstairs and get Natalie, please. Brandon, stand up!"

"Why are you whispering?" Brandon asks.

"Because, I want it to be a surprise!"

"That's right," Mike jumps in. "She has no idea it's her birthday!" He smiles charismatically all around the table and suddenly Natalie shows up. Acts surprised. (She knows how birthdays work.) Everyone gasps and smiles and "Happy Birthday!"s in a disorganized kind of mumble. 

"Happy birthday!" Mama Shimp says brightly, grabbing Mike by the elbow to make him stand. "You guys, everybody let's sing." She reaches for her camera and we all start to sing. 

Most of us sing like normal people, except me and Logan. I still feel groggy and probably sound like a zombie. Logan still feels like he's not getting enough attention and sounds like he's trying out for the opera. But like, the clown opera. His knees bend unrealistically with each word, and his voice reaches a shrillness only achieved after years of careful study and practice. 

The rest of us kind of trail off until it's only Mama Shimp, trying to sing normally, and Logan, trying to sing abnormally. "I can't wait for him to see this video when he gets older," Stephen says, and we all feel a little better as we consider how wonderful that day will be. 

Everyone scoots in for a picture at Mama Shimp's request. Logan pulls his shirt up, puts it back down, makes a face, gets in trouble. We smile and take the picture.

We suddenly realize that the candles on the Cheesecake Factory cheesecake were never lit. Crisis! This birthday is ruined! Mike flicks the lighter about 50 times; it finally lights and the birthday is saved! All 18 candles are lit and Natalie poses for a string of pictures. By the time she poses for the "I'm blowing out my candles" pictures, the candles have all but melted.

Natalie pulls out a card and starts reading the sweet message inside. Stephen grabs a Sharpie and puts a dot on Michael's neck. Michael flails his arms in protest.

".....Love, Stephanie, Craig, Heather, and Stephen," Natalie finishes.

I frown. "That's not my card," I say. I wrote an actual note to her in a different card.

Natalie laughs: "I know how these cards work," she says. "If you're not here, your name gets signed anyway." She reaches for another card and starts to read that one. Michael and Logan start to pluck the candle stubs out of the cake, one by one, and lick the frosting off of them. It's a race to see who can collect more candles. When they're done, they each choose a candle and poke it back in the frosting for more.

All the cards have been read. Natalie opens the present from Stephen and I first, which makes me feel very honored :) Mama Shimp records me explaining why we got Poo-pourri for the birthday girl.

Natalie starts to open her second present and Michael and Logan poke their heads under her arms. The tissue paper ruffles and then quiets down as Natalie pushes her brothers away. "Okay, stop touching me. Stooooop. Touching me." The boys back off. Stephen follows them sneakily with a Sharpie and starts pretending to write on their necks.

The second present is some beautiful black heels. "I fell in love with these!" Mama Shimp tells her, grabbing one. "And the lady behind me in line loved them too."

"I love these!!" Natalie exclaims. I love them too, in my head.

"But then I realized, you already have like 3 pairs of black heels," Mama Shimp continues.

"That's true, I do have a lot of black heels...."

"So maybe I'll just keep these for me." Pause. "And we can go pick out some different ones for you tomorrow?" Natalie agrees. She already has some shoes in mind that she wants.

Natalie opens a third gift: Vera Wang "Princess" perfume. "Okay now....we kind of have a problem with this, because I got it at Kohl's, and they forgot to take it out of the box. So, Dad's going to have to break into it." Mama Shimp is laughing as she says this, but she's serious. Mike takes the box over to the island and starts sawing at the box with a knife.

Somehow in the midst of this, Michael has ended up on Stephen's shoulder. Brandon is following him around with the lighter.

"No please! Plea-he-he-he-hease!!" Michael cries earnestly.

"Dude, relax," Stephen says comfortingly. Brandon flicks the lighter behind Michael's ear.

"Oh, shoot!" Brandon laughs, pretending that he lit Michael's hair on fire. "No, seriously, dude, hold still." Michael squirms spastically, pummeling Stephen's back with his tiny fists.

"Oh, that's really nice," Mama Shimp says with a disapproving look. "You guys, stop it. We're trying to celebrate your sister's birthday."

Stephen puts Michael back on the ground and Logan calls everyone's attention to the perfume, which is almost free from it's plastic prison. Mike finishes cutting, grabs the warped plastic.....and burns his fingers on it.

Natalie spritzes some of the perfume on her wrist to test it out, sniffs it, and smiles. "Ooooh," she says. "I like it!" Mama Shimp grabs her hand to smell it, too. Brandon meanders over and suddenly snaps his head back in alarm. "Oh, I don't like that," he says firmly.

"Wait, you don't?!" Mama Shimp sniffs again. "Oh no. If a boy doesn't like it....smells are just so hard, you know?" Another whiff. "Do you - Stephen, come smell this. Do you like it?"

Stephen smells Natalie's wrist. "Yeah, I like that," he says.

"No. Oh, no." Mama Shimp is not happy with that response. "This is $35 perfume, if boys just like it, that's not good."

"Mom, it's fine, I like it. That's a good smell," Stephen reassures her.

"Okay but, if you were dating a girl, and she wore that perfume, would you like, think it was okay, or would you want to marry her? Just so you could smell it all the time?"

Stephen looks confused; Natalie looks amused. "Is that what we're going for here?"

Mama Shimp grabs her wrist and smells it again. "We can return it," she decides. "Unless you love it?"

"It's a little mature," Natalie admits. "We can go pick out another one."

Stephen, Michael, and Logan apparently got bored during this crisis, and are now wrestling in the living room. Michael gets a dead leg and rams his head angrily into a chair in response.

Mama Shimp cuts the cheesecake and starts serving it up. Michael and Logan run over and each grab a slice. Brandon isn't ready for dessert yet, so he goes into the living room and tries to flop down on the couch. He somehow ends up rolling around on the ground in pain. We look over at him in confusion. "Dude, I just like....knocked the wind out of myself," he moans, grabbing at his stomach. "Ahhh, man."

The cheesecake is the most beautiful dessert any of us has ever seen. It's all chocolate and peanut butter and Oreo cookies and chocolate chip and heaven all whipped up into a perfectly-layered work of art. Stephen and I share a slice and barely finish half of it.

"Hey stop!" Brandon suddenly says. "Everyone listen."

*Fart*

We all regret stopping to listen.

The birthday comes to an abrupt end when the boys all finish their 3 bites of cheesecake and leave their plates to kill each other again.

"I hate when they get like this," Mama Shimp laments. Then grabs my phone and tries to take a video. 

Random Summer Happenings

So I am one of those people who LOVES year-round school. I also blab about how great it is, to anyone who asks. It is one of my favorite things about my job.

Except in July. July is the part where everyone else is halfway through their summer and halfway through their tan, and I am just starting my summer while also about to end my summer. In my school, teachers get 2 weeks off, then go back to school to set up our classrooms and sit in meetings. Kids come back after the third week.

(Secretly I still kind of like this, because I don't feel like I need a huge long summer if it means fewer breaks throughout the year. But I like it in kind of a hateful way. Like I like it, but I hate it. It's a love-hate kind of a feeling.)

Anywho, here are some random pictures of things I squeezed into my summer:

1. Shimp family reunion! We stayed at the Westgate Hotel in Park City, which was really fun in and of itself, and also put us close to Olympic Park. Our first room was about the size of my living room. (I'm not kidding.) There was one pull-out couch bed, one king-size bed in a private part of the room behind some pocket doors, and a shower that we couldn't figure out how to operate.

Being in such close quarters for 10 minutes made everyone go a litttttle bit crazy. Brandon trapped Logan in the sauna shower. Logan started screaming that he couldn't breathe. Stephen mooned his brothers. Michael commented that at least the view wasn't bad and we all got confused because the window looked out on some cement stairs. Mama Shimp sent us out to the car to bring everything in, and texted us to not forget the  marshmallow sticks so we could roast marshmallows.

When we had cleared out the car and brought everything into the eensy-weensy room, the Shimp parents went downstairs to get a different room and Stephen and I took the kids to the pool. We came back just in time to help move everything to the other room, which was on another floor and in another section of the hotel. This room was awesome!! It had some quirks, but at least we were all able to recover our sanity in here.

The main quirk was the bathroom. It was a huge bathroom, with a double vanity, sauna shower, jacuzzi tub, and obviously a toilet.....and a window looking in on the bathroom from the master suite. When I say window, I don't mean a dinky little thing with frosted glass. I'm talking about a 5'x5' hole in the wall that you could climb through and you'd wind up in the tub. From window to wall, the bathroom was set up like this: tub, shower, toilet. So the toilet tried to hide, but when you took a seat, you'd be staring into the mirror over the double vanity. And whatever that mirror showed also conveniently reflected off the mirror next to the tub, so no one got too much privacy during this trip.

*Pictures soon to come of this anomaly of a bathroom.*

One time, someone - who will remain anonymous - fearlessly tried to take a dump in these conditions. Then some cousins came to visit.

"Wow, it's really nice in here!" they said.
"Look at all this space!" they exclaimed.
"You guys got a cool room!" they said.
"Oh yeah, except the bathroom has a window in it," Logan said. "You guys have got to see this." And he led them back to the bathroom.

Locked. So he led them into the master bedroom to show them the window.

"What??" they said.
"Why would anyone put this here?" they wondered.
"Oh, hi Stephen," they said. And continued to stand there marveling at the bathroom with a window in it.

While we were there, we roasted marshmallows, swam, played ping-pong, went to Olympic Park, had a baby shower for Stephen's aunt who is our age, and went to lots of things for Stephen's cousin's wedding.

We went on the drop tower at Olympic Park in Park City!

My other favorite part about staying in this room was the sleeping arrangement. Stephanie and Craig got back from a different vacation just in time to spend a night in the hotel, and Natalie got back from a student council retreat on the same night, which meant that 3 more people had to fit in. It was quite an adventure trying to find spots for everyone! 

In the end, the parents and Natalie slept in the bed, Stephanie and Craig slept on the worst couch-bed I have ever felt, Stephen and I slept on our sides squished on the couch, and Logan and Michael made beds out of pillows and blankets and slept on the floor. Brandon started out on the padded bench at the kitchen table, but that got old after about 5 minutes, so he came in and started gathering up bits and pieces of Logan and Michael's beds to make one for himself. Obviously that didn't go down too well. At first, Stephen and I didn't have a pillow, and Logan was highly frustrated when Stephen tried to take one of his five, but eventually it all worked out. 

Until someone farted and Logan almost had a meltdown, but then things got quiet again!

Until Brandon started to feel like "dude I'm seriously either about to throw up or poop for like 5 minutes straight dude, I'm not even kidding," and Logan just about lost his Shimp telling him to be quiet.

Okay and then things were pretty much quiet until poor Brandon got uncomfortable again.....and you guys, I don't even know what happened, I'm pretty sure he just ended up sleeping on the floor with no blankets or pillows or anything. 

Through all of this, I could not stop laughing! And Stephen didn't help because I was trying to be considerate by laughing silently into his shoulder (which was jammed in my face anyway because remember we were both trying to sleep on a skinny little couch), but every time I started to calm down, he would start shaking like he was laughing, just to get me to laugh again. It just reminded me so much of that scene in Snow White, where all the dwarves give her their beds, and then they have to find a place to sleep, so they all go in cupboards and tea cups and fireplaces. 

#2. Jackie's wedding. Stephen's cousin Jackie got married at the end of the Shimp family reunion, so a lot of our activities revolved around that. She and Aaron got married in the Bountiful temple, which I had never been to before, but it was beautiful! 

The wedding reception was a lot of fun. It was at my new favorite venue, the Bungalow. The food was good, Jackie's parents danced the legit tango, there was a photo booth, and I had the cutest dance partner in the whole place. 

We love the Bruners!

It is really hard to get a good picture of a photo booth picture.

I guess the only person who didn't have fun was Logitos, when he didn't catch the garter and he had to get under some coattails. 

#3. Studying. Most of our summer was consumed with studying. Stephen was preparing for the DAT, which he's actually not going to take until next spring / summer, and I was preparing for the Praxis, which I didn't think I needed to study for originally but then I got freaked out when I read some stuff online about it the week before my test. So some of our days looked like this:

PS I just got my scores back and I passed :)

#4. Lagoon. Remember when I won something with 97.1 ZHT, and I got to jump in a big....pen kind of thing full of lucky charms with 20 other people, and somebody won Taylor Swift tickets and everyone else won something a little less cool but still cool? Well I won Lagoon tickets that day! Stephen and I went with Natalie and Brandon, and it was so much fun. 

#5. Stephen's birthday! I already blogged about the most interesting part of that, but I also want to share a few pictures here.

In our house, errbody gets to wear a crown on their birthday, even the boys. 

I made him this delicious (kinda yellow) breakfast and was very proud of myself.

Remember the candles I got that were a 2 and a 6? I tried to redeem myself here. 

This "cake" was amazing! It was basically a peanut butter chocolate cheesecake. You can find the recipe here.

#6. We erm......broke our scale.

I literally don't even know how this happened. I just walked in to find it like this. Stephen said he just nudged it and it shattered into a million pieces.....but I mean why?!

#7. Mob. We love Moab because, well, because it is Moab, and also because it was where we took our first mini-vacation together! This time, we went with Stephen's family. We found a cool little lake that I'm assuming was man-made, rented some paddle-boards, hiked to the Delicate Arch, and did a few other mini-hikes.

We were unaffected by the Dad-Bod trend, thankfully. 

#8. Lady A and Hunter Hayes!!! (And Sam Smith but no one really cared about him. #rude? Maybe, sorry.) Caitlin won tickets to all the shows this summer, and even though Stephen meanly rejected her Toby Keith tickets, since he hates country, she was still nice enough to take me to Lady Antebellum. We fangirled it up and I'm now even more obsessed with Hunter Hayes than I was when Stephen picked his song for our first dance.

Um, we were pretty excited.

Sorry that my phone camera is not the best TERRIBLE, but that is Lady A. I thought they were in love, but actually, the girl is just in love with the drummer in the band. And the boy lead singer who is tall and way better-looking than his poor brother that let him live in his basement years ago and came onstage to sing because he LIVES IN UTAH so why not, is actually married to someone else who had fertility struggles but is now pregnant. (Where would we be without Google, amiright.)

And there's Hunter Hayes! Stephen said that if he pulled me onstage and kissed me that would be cheating. So I guess that will never happen. 

Lady A came out into the audience! They were right at the end of our row and it was so great.

#9. Babay shower! So many baby showers. So many, guys. I guess it's just the phase of life I'm in. I love it because baby clothes are fun to buy, especially baby shoes. Ahhhh I die every time!! Anyway, the only one I got a picture at was Christine's.

#10. Back to school!

Here was my first day of school bulletin board! I'm still doing a circus-themed classroom, as you can tell.

And now I'm in Week #2 of my first 3-week break of the school year. We just got back from galavanting around the West coast, and I'm working on those blogs now too. Howwwww was everyone else's summer!?

Bangin' Balloons

There are these ladies who I love, called the Dating Divas. They have this huge (slightly overwhelming) website with oh, I dunno....LITERALLY A BILLION ideas of ways you can be nice to your husband! They have all these creative date nights, cute notes, scavenger hunts, printables, calendars, game nights, etc, for any occasion. Their website is like the Google mecca of dating your husband. 

So when I'm in a bind, I like to pop over there and brainstorm ideas for how to spoil Stephen. This time, I found an idea called "Night of Surprises." Basically, you plan different activities to do at specific times of the day, label a balloon with each time, and then put the activity on a piece of paper in that balloon. When your husband pops the balloon, they'll know what you have planned for right then. 

I started with that idea, but when I was almost done blowing up the balloons, I had a little spark of creativity: why not put something in this balloon?

It was the 8:45 balloon. The balloon that was supposed to come after rock-climbing, and after dinner, and after dessert. Mhmm. That balloon. 

Luckily, if your fancypants underwear is really more skimpy than fancy, you can easily roll it up and stick it in the balloon. And actually you can easily roll up and stick in three, if you want to give your husband options and you don't mind the balloon being a little heavier. 

I was feeling very smug about my creativity at this point as I secured the 8:45 sign on the balloon. 

And then I realized, I could make this surprise even awesomer! I could take the balloon with us to the restaurant. Give it to a waiter. And tell them to bring it out to our table at 8:45. Stephen would be all, Oh another balloon! I've popped 4 of these already. Just a little piece of paper is going to fly out and that's it. 

He would never even suspect! The waiter would never even suspect! And then, amidst a flurry of stretchy balloon plastic and lace, I would capture everyone's hilarious reactions on my little crappy phone camera, and I would have a delightful memory to entertain me for birthdays to come. 

I left Stephen a note on the morning on August 3rd. "Don't pop all the balloons while I'm gone!" I said. 

I'm doing such a great job building the suspense, I thought. 

"They're all for tonight," I added, out loud. "So just wait until I get home, okay?"

"Okay!" said the Birthday Boy. 

Then I got home from school. After thinking about my surprise all day, I was so excited to just put my plan into action. The time had come! I went to gather up all the balloons....and there, on the table, sat a poked balloon with an 8:45 time card. It's contents were littered around it. 

"Yeahhh sorry," Stephen said, looking at me nervously. "I thought it was AM. I was just really excited....so I popped it, and then I saw what was in it and I realized I wasn't supposed to do that!"

I picked up a piece of the balloon and looked at it in dismay.

"But you can fix it, right?" Stephen asked. "Can you just put it in a different balloon?"

"Babe," I said very calmly. "You just ruined your birthday." 

He laughed and gave me a hug and said he was sorry and promised to forget all about it, and asked if I could just put it in a new balloon. 

So I thought, Okay, the surprise isn't toooootally ruined. Maybe he'll forget which balloon it was, and when we're at the restaurant, he'll still be surprised. The waiter will still be funny to watch. This could still work....

I put together a new balloon, again stuffing it with the paper and all my pretty unmentionables. But somehow this balloon had three tiny holes in the top, so air was slowly eeping out. I had already put everything in it, so I just taped it together, ugly, and hoped that the waiter wouldn't be a total dunce and drop the balloon in the deep fryer or anything. 

It would be funny if Stephen popped it and everything flew out onto the table. But how freaking embarrassing would it be if someone popped my balloon on accident in the kitchen, before they were supposed to bring it out at 8:45, and then a group of 8 waiters stood there saying stupid stuff like "Ohhhh, shooooot, duuuuude, we need to get another balloon! What did you do??" I could totally picture this happening, actually. 

But I comforted myself with the thought that if that happened, they would definitely need to give us a free meal, and it would still make for a funny story. 

THEN. (Oh no! It's not over yet!)

We went over to Stephanie and Craig's house to help them out in their basement. "This will mayyyybe take an hour," Stephen said. "And then we can go hike Stewart Falls! And then go to Applebee's." 

*Stewart Falls was not in the plan, but since it was Stephen's birthday, we obviously were going to do whatever he wanted - planned or not. 

Anyway, we ended up staying there until 9pm (after 4 hours had gone by), and not going to Stewart Falls, and not going to Applebee's. Stephen, as it turns out, loves doing handyman stuff when it's not his house and he doesn't need to pay for it or meet any deadlines. He has actually really been enjoying his time in S&C's kitchen. Obviously. Since that's where he chose to spend his birthday. 

We got in the car at about 9 and went to In'N'Out. 

"Can we do the balloons tomorrow?" Stephen asked. "I really am excited about them, is that okay?"

Um, of course it was. Birthday Boys get to make all the rules. 

We invited the fam over for some birthday dessert. And while we sat around saying what we loved about Stephen, his brothers Michael and Logan found the balloons.

And started batting them around. 

And beating each other with them. 

"Hey," Logan observed. "This one's heavier. See look, it falls so much faster." *Drops it* "What's wrong with this balloon?"

And so it went, for 45 minutes. 

"Please don't pop," I thought over and over. "They probably won't," I convinced myself. "It'll be fine." 

"Hey!" Stephen yelled all of a sudden, when he realized what was happening. "There's sex stuff in those balloons!" 

And that's how everyone started laughing and passing the balloon around, and how I died. 

The end. 

Don't ever try to do anything for your husband's birthday. 

When Boys Watch the Bach

They say some funny things. Over the course of this season, the Shimp ladies (and one Lively lady) had gotten to the point where we were a leetle done with those comments, and we were thrilled to just have a girls' night with the finale. We got our root beer floats, popped our popcorn, and set up on the couch 60 minutes after the show started so we could watch with no commercials.

Then......the men trickled in. And the comments began.

When Kaitlyn and Nick were lounging on a boat, on their date: "Are those two married?"

When Shawn showed up after that: "Hold on, is that the same guy?"

When we explained that no, they're not married, and no, they're not the same person, but rather the same girl dating two different guys: "It's a dating show?.....You like, watch people date?.......Sounds pretty dumb."

When Chris Harrison met Kaitlyn at the mansion: "Is he dating her, too?"

Mama Shimp: Alright bye! We know he chooses [Winner's Name], now you can go to your friend's house.
Logan: No wait!
Mama Shimp: Huh? Honey all that's gonna happen is that he'll walk up and talk, then she'll talk, then he'll get down on one knee, and that's it.
Logan: Well I wanna see them kiss. Push play.

When Kaitlyn started crying....you know, one of the times she did. "This is the dumbest show."

When [one of the guys] said: "You took things from me."
Me: What did she take from him?
Mike: His virginity, I think. Is that it?

When the commercial for Bachelor in Paradise comes on after the finale: "Ooookay, we don't watch that. Come on guys, let's....let's take a break. Bachelor, Bachelorette, that's enough. Just those two. Let's keep it simple. Keep it clean. Just that, we don't need Bachelor in Paradise." (I think he was a little worried.)

Don't worry, we're not Bachelors in Paradise kinda people. And, as much as we love them, we wouldn't require our boys to watch it with us anyway :)

Dinnertime Humor

My Facebook exploded this weekend, I don't know about yours.

In discussing this over family dinner on Sunday, I decided to share my favorite status that I read, posted by my cousin. I pulled it up on my phone and read it aloud:

"The American people have been served a great justice this week and we are a stronger people for it. My heart is full and I will proudly tell my children and their children how I lived in a time where wrongs were righted and brave people stood on the right side of history. In short, thank you, Disney, for banning selfie sticks."

I looked up, excited to see everyone's reactions. Logan and Michael had stopped paying attention by the second sentence. Brandon too. Natalie was still waking up. Stephanie and Craig chuckled. Stephen's parents blinked at me.

"Isn't that funny?" I prompted.

"They don't get it," Stephen said. He shook his head. "Read it again."

I did. This time Natalie gave a little laugh.

"So do you get it this time?" Stephen asked his parents, who were still looking blankly at me.

"I just....it's crazy, the way this world is going," Mama Shimp said.

"Okay, but do you get what he was doing, with that status?" Stephen said. He grabbed the phone. "You don't get it, because you probably weren't on Facebook this weekend. But seriously every other status was something like that, but talking about gay marriage."

"Oh, I heard about the new bill, I know that's what you're talking about. I get it." Mama Shimp did not get it.

"No. Diane." Craig tried to jump in to explain and got interrupted by Mike.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute, now I'm going to sound really naive here....but what I don't get is, what is a selfie stick?"

The whole table erupted with forehead smacks, groans, and cries of "A selfie stick?? Oh my gosh, DAD!"

"I know what that is!" Mama Shimp cried excitedly. "Mike! You are old!"

Once everyone knew what a selfie-stick was, we had to then explain that Disney just banned selfie-sticks.

"Okay, but," Mama Shimp frowned, "What does that have to do with gay marriage?

"It's just funny," Stephen said feebly. "It doesn't really have to do with that. He was trying to make it sound like he was talking about gay marriage, but then you get to the end and realize he's talking about selfie sticks at Disney parks, and it's funny."

Jokes aren't usually funnier when you have to explain them. Usually, they just kinda turn lame. But in this case, I think it was the opposite. The joke was much funnier after our half-hour explanation of it.

A Heart, a Circus, and Free Food

At the risk of sounding like a spaz at the start of a blog post.....THIS WEEK has just been so great!! Here were my favorite parts:

Friday - when Alex got a new heart! I walked into school on Friday morning, and Margot walked out of her room and said "Heather? Did you hear about Alex?" I said no, and she said, "He got a heart!" My brain couldn't even figure out what she was saying at first because it was such a big deal and such a surprise! If you don't know who he is, Alex is a boy in my class who was born with half a heart. Last year, he got put on the waiting list for a heart transplant. This whole year he hasn't been able to come to school except for one hour on the first day, and another hour to do his Spotlight, and on Halloween to participate in the parade. He is just about the best little boy I've ever met, and his whole family is like angel people who barely even belong in this world because they are just way too good. They're the kind of people who are so happy and positive and humble and giving and sweet all the time, and you just know that that they are like that with everyone they meet. Anyway, it has been a long time waiting for a heart, and it was a huge celebration in the class on Friday morning!

Top: what was written on his DIBELS test that he obviously wasn't here to take on Monday.
Middle: When I visited him at the hospital.
Bottom: What we wrote in our Shimp Shoutout on Friday!

Saturday - when we went rock-climbing for like 4 hours and I climbed my first 5.11! I am so proud every time I reach a new milestone in climbing.

Monday - when I won a radio contest! Thanks 93.3! In case you were wondering, carrots are the #1 healthy snack food that is consumed more on Super Bowl Sunday than on any other Sunday of the year.

Tuesday - when Julie and Kelly and I went to Zupa's for dinner. Yum and fun!

Wednesday - when we cashed in on my radio contest winnings and went to see THE CIRCUS YOU GUYS! The Jordan World Circus came to Utah, and Stephen, Julie, Michael, Logan and I were all in attendance.

He is so happy to have a wife who wins stuff.

Side note: I feel like I should add that I do not support animal abuse! I was a little sad for these elephants. But the good news is, they mostly just had people acts. 

Also, it is surprisingly difficult to get a picture pretending like you have elephant trunks. I don't know why?? But Stephen kept putting his trunk in front of my face and blocking me!

Like so. 

And then when we finally got ourselves, our trunks blocked the elephant. And I....got pregnant? Whate'er.

Cuties :)

Thursday - when the Consule Generale came to our school! This person is a big deal. I didn't know who she was, but I have been thoroughly educated and now I understand that she is a big deal. If 20 people tell you someone is a big deal I think it's pretty safe to trust that assessment. Margot said she is kind of like the president, or kind of like a diplomat, who lives in San Francisco. There are only 2 French General Consulates living in the USA, and they help out all their French peeps who come over here.

She came to our school to see how the kids are learning French! Everyone was in a tizzy. The lunch ladies came and hugged Margot and wished her good luck, and the librarians almost fell over when I walked in the library later on. "Is she here?" they gabbled. "How did it go?" The secretaries set out water bottles with little paper jackets that said "Fox Hollow Elementary School." My principal wore a suit and probably combed his beard.

We threatened prepped all our kids and practiced our assembly for this important person like 3 times, and in the end, it turned out just fine.

She is such a big deal that I texted this picture to Margot on Wednesday night asking what I should wear.  

I would have been so remiss to not get a picture of the famous person, so here's my first attempt. {I was trying to hide my phone and be discreet.}

It did not go great.

So I gave up and just be'd obvious about it. *Side note - at this point in the program I thought the blonde lady in black was the Consule Generale. Turns out she was not. Oh and when I found out the blonde lady was not her, I next thought it was the lady with the patchwork kinda skirt. She is also not the Consule Generale. The guy with a scarf is the consulate's personal assistant, and my principal is on the far right.

All the kids sang a song for her.

And then finally, I figured out who she is, when they presented her with a gift basket. She is the brunette with the khaki jacket.

Now all the famous people want to come to our school because it went so well! So you know I am happy about that. One of these times it's bound to be a famous person I've heard of.

Friday - when we had PLC after school, per usual on a Friday, and our principal gave us Chili's chips and salsa and French cookies and chocolate.

Moral of the story: Be nice to animals and famous people. And also not-so-famous people. They are important, too.