Reepicheep is my Hero!!!!!!

Time is short this Sunday since it's Daniel's b-day, so this'll probably be short... we just had a lovely meal of melanesa and we're preparing for the treasure hunt and carrot cake and I really need to finish my b-day card for my brother... anyway...

Monday evening for FHE we went and saw the new Narina movie which my brothers were ecstatic about... you'd think all they had to eat the whole day was sugar from the way they behaved! It was pretty good, but I didn't like how they kind of made it into an adolescence movie. Peter spends to much of the movie trying to prove that he's the High King over Caspian (just like a teen) and that's not in the book. It doesn't even make sense, since he already went through adolescence once before (he grew up in Narnia and then became a kid when he went back to our world) and would have learned his lesson. Same with Susan. She's not the inexperienced young teen they make her out to be, with a first crush on Caspian... she was almost engaged before for heavens sakes! Plus, Caspian should have been about 12 years old instead of more like 18.

Anyway, after that rant there were still parts I really liked... Reepicheep for example was amazing!!! I love his gallantry and his exploits, he's just what I imagined he would be. Of course, it's also C.S. Lewis, and even though it's not exactly the way I imagined there are so many cool parts about the story... I really hope you've read the Narnia Chronicles. They're amazing! One of the lines that stuck out to me in this movie was when Lucy remarks that Aslan has grown, and he tells her he always will grow with her. If you compare Aslan to Christ that's kind of how it works in our lives... as we grow older and mature, our comprehension of God's greatness increases. Anyway, we enjoyed discussing all of this over ice cream and brownies, and I went into way to much detail...

Okay. So Monday I also got a letter from BYU saying that I had made the Dean's list for the college of humanities because my GPA for the winter semester had been in the top 5% of all the humanities students, so now I'm invited to a reception some time this September when I get back from school. Just a little happy side note...

Tuesday was pretty uneventful except for some babysitting at the end of the day... it was the cutest little 1 year old girl ever and she was so good for me! I just played with her for a while showing her the wonders of a keyboard and talking on her plastic cell phone before it was time for bed. After she was in her crib I sat on the comfy couch and read the Count of Monte Cristo... for some reason I had never gotten around to it before even though it's one of the classics. That was enough to fascinate me till Camilla's parents arrived...

Thursday evening Mom was taking Laura and Daniel to a voice lesson so we (John, Aaron and I) hitched a ride to the library. On our way I saw my first triple rainbow, which needless to say took my breath away. At least I know there won't be a flood around here any time soon! We were joking about finding three pots of gold when we climbed out of the car. After selecting a movie (Pirates of the Caribbean) the boys and I ran almost all the way home... as we were running down the hills John and I went kind of crazy laughing and running at the same time... the setting sun and playful warm wind were intoxicating. Anyway, we had a fun movie night...

Friday everyone had off, and it was declared a family work day. Laura and I spent the morning thoroughly vacuuming and washing the cars; later I planted some tomatoes in the front garden and made a taco salad for lunch. That afternoon I measured the windows for curtains and made a double batch of chocolate chip cookies for the tired workers who had been weeding the garden or fixing bikes (sometimes it's not bad to be extremely sensitive to the poison ivy in our back yard). Putting a few fresh cookies on a flowery paper plate I drove to Camille's house for her birthday celebration. It was the first grill of the season w/ delicious hamburgers and a home made cake and ice cream for dessert. To top it off we watched a movie and enjoyed my cookies... mmmmmmmm.

Saturday we took a quick trip to King of Prussia mall to buy the curtains I found... Laura and I tried to find birthday gifts for Daniel and some shoes, but only Laura was successful with the shoes and neither of us could find something for our dear brother, so it'll be an 'I owe you' I guess. When we got back Dad had a picnic ready and we all went to the park, enjoyed some swings, sandwiches and frisbee...

Okay, that wasn't short, and I've really got to go, so...
Hope you had an awesome week and also to hear from you soon!!
Love,
Margaret

Cinnamon Rolls, Blueberry Muffins, Service and Shoulder Torture

Wow, it has been a long week! Let me see...

Monday I filled out a couple of job applications and gave a lesson for FHE on education, with an emphasis on academic standards required to get into BYU. That night I stayed up really late making cinnamon rolls as a surprise for Brother Brown and the seminary class. He was really an amazing seminary teacher, and I felt like I hadn't thanked him enough. He's been teaching for three years now, and he's being released, so this was like my last chance. I got up really early Tuesday morning to bake the rolls and smother them in frosting... their beautiful aroma filled the house and the car on the way there. It was so neat to see Brother Brown's face when I walked in w/ 2 9x13 " pans full of fresh cinnamon rolls. It was totally worth it!

Later I took advantage of the beautiful sunshine and rested in the garden reading more mythology. So far I enjoyed the Cupid and Psyche myth the best, because the gods forgive Psyche in the end for her curiosity, and forgiveness is almost never a part of the myths. Although she makes mistakes she can repent and be raised to the status of a goddess with Cupid. The names make the story very symbolic, Cupid (love) uniting with Psyche (the soul). It is so true that these two are inseparable; I believe that love is part of what souls are made of, and as I've been studying German literature we've talked about how love is what can encourage us to be better and come closer to God.

Wednesday my beautiful break ended after I got home from a refreshing jog. Maddie from the temp agency called and said she had a short term data entry position open. I immediately agreed to take it. Although it is better than no job at all, it really isn't fun to type over 1000 people's demographic information into a computer. The worst part of it all was the ache it produced in my shoulders. For some odd reason I tensed up really really bad every day and came home with huge knots in my neck and back. Wednesday after work I took the bus home and went in the wrong direction for a full 25 minutes or so before I realized that something was wrong... it took me an hour longer than planned to finally make it back.

Thursday I just worked all day really and came home exhausted. I can't even remember what happened. Friday just wasn't my day. It rained the entire time for one, and it couldn't have picked a worse day to do it. On my way to work I attempted to get into the bus, but managed to drop 2 of my quarters on the ground and collapse right along with them... one of those delightful moments where even I was impressed with my "grace". The bus home was extremely late, so I was standing on the bus stop for a full 40 minutes with my umbrella, slightly shivering with cold. Then I got to walk the mile home too since Laura had the car (she was taking it to one of her lessons, although I can't remember which). It did get better after I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies and watched Indiana Jones with my siblings for the first time.

Saturday was actually pretty fun... I'm still in the baking mode for some reason, so I got up early and made some blueberry muffins for the family's breakfast. Turned out great, but we kind of had a hurried breakfast because we were supposed to go over to a sister's house to do some service. The whole family got into the car and somehow Mom managed not to get lost (yay Mom!!). I enjoyed cleaning and lining cabinets, while Daniel and Dad took care of the lawn and Mom did some serious vacuuming. It looked awesome after we were done, and it just felt so good to see what we had accomplished (it's so scary how I'm starting to sound exactly like my Mom!!). Later the house was empty except for John and I, so I decided to show him the wonders of Audacity, a sound editing program. I half regret it now... he's pretty obsessed with recording his voice and my voice and any one else's voice that he can get a hold of and raising the pitch so everyone sounds like chipmunks. It just gets old pretty fast I guess...

Anyway, that was my week! Hope you are doing well and hope to hear from you soon!!
Love,
Margaret

Cooking week

Monday we had a really fun family home evening... ultimate frisbee in the park! On the way home Mom and I wanted to stop and take some pictures of the gorgeous flowering trees on our way home. This was answered by groans of despair, until Daniel pointed out that "Mom never asks us to do what she wants okay! Can you ever think of a time where she wanted to do something she thought would be fun and she's dragged us into it?" That procured a silence :-). We topped the evening off with some apple pie (my own creation)... ahhhh, life was good.

Well, my celebrity body wraps adventure came to an abrupt end on Tuesday... after a long and trying day on the phone with a million people scheduling over 25 appointments and answering 20 questions per phone call, Dionne informed me that one of her previous permanent receptionists was returning to work the following day and she wouldn't need me any more. Can't say I wasn't a little frustrated at the short notice, but I had learned a lot, and Dionne had been so patient with me. I guess it just shows how temporary temp work can be :-).

It was still good in a way, since Mom still isn't feeling 100% and I was free to take trips to the grocery store and occupy my brothers while she got some much-needed rest. I made some really good progress in my summer reading, and I had some amazing opportunities to perfect my housewifely arts, notably culinary skills (apple pie was only the beginning). Friday evening Dan and I had a cooking adventure worth sharing...

First we were going to make chicken parmesan, however, we decided we were going to make the chicken really flavorful so we marinated it in this sauce we threw together. Dan went crazy and added some soy sauce into the Italian dressing with garlic and other stuff; it tasted really good... but not quite right for tomato sauce... so we switched to fried rice. We ended up with a huge sticky mass of welll.... challian. Chinese-Italian stuff. It was so much fun! Dan just added the egg a little early (over top of all the rice instead of cooking it before he added the rice) and there was just so much rice we weren't sure if all of the egg had cooked. Our other siblings were pretty skeptical of our creation, but they said it was okay after they brought themselves to try some (Mom and Dad had gone on a date, ironically to a Chinese restaurant). Dan and I both see a great future for challian... it's going to revolutionize the cooking industry completely! After we've perfected it, that is.

Of course today was the day to let my cooking arts shine :-). Laura and I got up at 5am (pretty late for a Mother's Day actually... it's generally more like 4am), and started to develop our Mother's day surprises. I had purchased a bag of Rolos, Mom's favorite candy, while I was doing the shopping for her on Saturday. Laura made little colorful squares of paper with nice things about Mom on them and we made a path with them and the Rolos from her bedroom door to the beautifully decorated breakfast table... complete with a bouquet of roses I had also purchased the day before. I was busy in the kitchen concocting some batter for crepes. Soon I had a whole plate of them, steaming hot... soooo good! It was a new recipe, and I think this one is my favorite so far (I've tried several). Combined with strawberries, blueberries and whipped cream or applesauce and cinnamon sugar they were absolutely divine! Of course Mom's smile was the best part of all. For linner I tried another new recipe... I don't think the recipe has an official name... it's just pork chops baked in a mushroom sauce. When I brought it out, several of my siblings were skeptical, but everyone liked it :-)!!!! That's the best part of cooking in my opinion... seeing other people enjoy the food... unless it's enjoying it yourself :-).

Wow, that was a lot about food... but I love food! Who doesn't love food??

Hope you have a wonderful Mother's Day today...
Love,
Margaret

Challian

Crepes

Pork chops w/ potatoes, mushroom sauce, salad and a roll... yummy!!!

A Job... A Whole New World.

I did enjoy my little break a lot... Thursday, Friday, the weekend and Monday were really quiet recuperation days. Saturday evening I babysat for a family in our ward... I had forgotten how much fun it is to hang out with kids. We played the shark game which is a clean up game in disguise, and they really enjoyed it :-). Sunday was especially fun... I went to the last hour of the family ward then ventured into the singles branch. I have been trying to decide all week which ward I'm going to attend. I guess it'll end up being the singles branch, but we'll see. After church, we all went to my cousins' house for dinner. It was a delicious meal and lively conversation... it is nice to be back with family. Monday and Tuesday I started reading my mythology book that I'm reading for Professor Kelling, played with my brothers, took advantage of the hammock, and enjoyed talking with my Mom.

So, it wasn't till Tuesday that I actually made it to the temporary staffing agency... I took a typing test, a word and an excel test, and then filled out a ton of paperwork :-(. When I got done though, I talked with Maddie, the lady in charge, and she said she might already have a job for me, but she wasn't sure if I could get it since I hadn't had any experience as a receptionist. She promised to call and let me know about it either that evening or the next day. Much to my surprise Maddie called within a few hours and said I had gotten the job! I was excited, but nervous. I didn't have any experience. I hoped that whoever was in charge of me had a lot of patience... I did the only thing that I knew how to do... learn about it as much as possible before I had to get there and know everything.

I found the website for Celebrity Body wraps and read every page on the site. Basically, they wrap clients in a bandage that's soaked in mineral oils that are supposed to get rid of excess cellulite, environmental toxins and other metabolic excesses that build up over time. The result is a smoothing, tightening, toning, slimming effect. They have a guarantee that if a client doesn't lose at least 6 in. after their first visit, they get a free wrap. I think it's supposed to last for a couple of weeks till everything starts building up again… that's why they're supposed to get multiple wraps till they reach their peek, then get matinence wraps every once in a while. They have different kinds… some to give you more energy, some for fat burning, losing wrinkles, relaxation etc.

So Wednesday morning I got up at 5am to get ready so Mom could take me to work before she had to take the boys to SALT (their homeschooling group: Students Actively Learning Together). I had a while to wait when I got there, so I just walked to the mall, feeling slightly nauseous as I always do when I'm about to enter an unknown. Although nothing in the mall was open, the old ladies and gentlemen that were getting their morning exercise in the halls were quite amusing.

I stood at the fateful door with ten minutes to kill. Finally Dionne appeared, unlocked the door, welcomed me in, had me put my things down, gave me a quick tour of the place, and had me start practicing answering the phone. It was kind of miserable at first. I would stutter a little, and we'd start the whole thing again. Luckily the computer system was easy to figure out. I spent the day scheduling, canceling and confirming appointments, completing transactions, answering the phone, making folders for the clients and such. Of course I had a few of those silly mistakes of the first day of work… the worst was charging someone $9 trillion or something like that, and I have no idea how it happened. Luckily it didn't go through (phew), it was to high.

My coworkers all seem really nice, especially my manager Dionne… she said she was happy with my work at the end of the day, which made me feel better about it…

Anyway... I worked Thursday again, and it just kept getting easier. After work I got to go see Daniel and Laura's one-act plays... they were both entertaining. Laura's was especially funny... it was all about normal every day kids who are secretly power rangers... their mission was to find the evil villain who was changing the endings of the Disney stories so they ended sadly. Belle was illiterate and was falling for Gaston and Cinderella loved to work so she didn't want to go to the ball etc.

Friday I got off, so I went to Joann fabrics to try to find some fabric to start on a dress. Since Mom wasn't with me though, I didn't want to actually buy anything yet. Saturday I was a little nervous about going into work since it was going to be the busiest day yet, but I did fine. I watched a movie with Laura later that evening.

Mom had a mole on her arm that had been hurting all week, but it got a lot worse all of a sudden on Saturday night, swelling up, getting very red with a white circle around it, and becoming very painful. She had the chills as well, but she didn't want to go into the emergency room. I was really worried, and told her she should, but she said she would be okay for now and if it got any worse she would go in. Even Dad agreed with me. She just went to bed anyway. When we woke up in the morning she was in the ER with Dad. Apparently it was an infection, and they were going to treat her with antibiotics. Laura and I got our siblings ready for church, then Laura dove them and I stayed home. I've kind of decided to go to the singles ward, so I don't have church till 1:00. Mom just got home, and she's in bed with some toast and tea, still feeling sick.

Anyway, on that happy note, I hope you have a wonderful Sunday/week!!

Love and miss you and would love to hear from you!!!