Or would it be phenomena?

What is it about blog tags that make it okay for us to talk about personal and dull factoids that, were we to bring up in conversation around adults in any other circumstance we would be thought socially inept?

I guess either we like seeing pictures of other people’s refrigerators or else we are so narcissitic that we love to share 4, 6 or 8 quirks about ourselves under the guise of being “tagged”.

“Well, since Bridget tagged me, I guess I’ll enlighten my readers to my inner workings.”

I am going to embrace my vanity and invent my own tag. The dull factoid I want to share I will call “A Moment, Most Disappointing.” In fact, to really help my tagees get their wheels turning, I’ll share two.

A Moment, Most Disappointing
(Someone please help me with my poor punctuation use.)

Our shower has a glitch. Periodically, I’d say every few weeks or so, it produces no hot water. Perhaps the glitch lies with the water heater. But sadly it always seems to happen on mornings when I am chilly and especially looking forward to a hot shower to warm me. The other evening, I was preparing for bed and dreading the cold sheets. In the summer, cool sheets are delightful. But as the cold nights have descended the cool sheets are misery. I decided a hot bath would be just the fix. But regrettably, that night the bath was not going to produce hot water. It is not cold water that comes in these tragic times, but luke-warm water. Resulting in me being most disappointed.

Second moment, involved a trip to the craft store. Running an errand is no small thing for a mother of two toddlers who lives in Kuna. In fact it requires some effort.
“Get your shoes on Cameron.” Shoes for Eli…found them. “Cam, put your shoes on. :)” (The smile indicates my cheery voice, he responds better to cheery voice.) Jacket for Eli…found it. “Are your shoes on bud?” Jacket for Cameron…finding Cameron… “Tiger you need to get your shoes on it’s time to go.” Cheer quickly diminishing from voice…

Load the boys, boys are in car, car is driving, 11 miles to store. Unload Cameron. “Cameron wait for mom.” Unload Eli. “Cameron watch for cars!!!!” Enter store. Looking, looking, looking. Cameron running here and there. Where are the wiggle eyes for the preschool project… Eli begging to get out of cart. No wiggle eyes. “Cameron stay by mommy if you want a treat.” Asking salesgirl about wiggle eyes. Eli screaming. Salesgirl says the store has no wiggle eyes. Where is Cameron? Mommy is mad. Takes it out on poor toddlers. “Cameron let’s go!” “But my treat!” “No treat, you did not stay by mommy.”

No wiggle eyes.

Most disappointing.

To really get the ball rolling on my invented tag I am tagging a whole lot of ya! By golly it’s gonna be all over blogland. Let’s hear your most disappointing moment.

Christina, Kim, Lindsay, Dani, Krista, Laura, Kristi, SarahAnne, Michelle, Marisa, Liberty, Anne, Julie, Brenna, Stephanie, Natalie, Sara and Jessica.

And anyone else who wants to participate. But I’ve noticed that as much as we like to share about ourselves, we only do it when specifically asked. So I had to name some names.

Lori called last night and offered to provide evening company. (I’m always looking for evening company when Richard is out of town.) I thought we had missed our chance for carving pumpkins this year, but thankfully Lori’s fall cheer brought us to the kitchen table for carving and painting. Sean is one of Cameron’s best buds. He’ll be such a good dad. Cameron wanted me to take a picture of them.

Then Cameron wanted to do the picture taking. Lori and Sean were making their best effort to actually be in the picture.

And the pumpkins-
I dedicate my pumpkin to Richard. Go broncos!

If a picture says a thousand words, I guess these are worth posting. Even if my mediocre pictures only say 800 words. And I really don’t like when people make excuses anyway so I’ll post them proudly. Besides, someone asked where I was in the pictures and I really do like to get into a picture with my boys once in awhile.

Being friends with someone who for all intents and purposes is a professional photographer definitely has its advantages. But when hanging out with said friend, I feel a little inadequate pulling out my “point and shoot” archaic camera. Yes it is digital, I’m somewhat with the times, but it doesn’t exactly fit in an Altoid tin if you know what I mean.

But thankfully, Krista is very thoughtful and took pictures for me. Here are a few, but to really capture the event check out Krista’s blog. It will make an autumn lover out of you in no time. And if you are already an autumn lover, her pictures will confirm and deepen your autumn affection.

We went to an apple orchard and picked apples, then took a hayride to a pumpkin patch and the boys each picked a pumpkin. Cameron loved the apples. Eli took a bite out of several apples, but my little Eli is a bit clumsy and the apple inevitably found its way to the dirt before he could finish it.

Around here, we all seem to have a love-hate relationship with Misha. Well except for with Richard, subtract the love part. And we don’t ever hate her, we just get frustrated. I love her because I feel safer with her here when Richard is gone. I love her because she jogs with me. And I love her because she is a beautiful and loyal dog. I dislike her when she chews, digs and acts like the puppy that she is. (And I’m still grossed out by her large canine bowel products.)

Cameron loves her when she plays with him and sometimes when she licks him. And Eli loves her through a glass door. But they both get knocked over sometimes by her over-zealous efforts at affection, resulting in some tension in the relationship.

This video is from a few weeks ago but I forgot about it until today when Cameron and Misha were playing this game again. It goes on for over a minute (I try to use one minute as my time limit for a blog video) but for Richard and grandparent’s who can’t get enough of their posterity, enjoy!

Wow peeps! Way awesome comments!

No really, I was never a fan of the virtual {{hugs}} but I can’t think of anything better to express my thanks.

So {{hugs}} to you all.

It was so fun to read the comments and learn that some of you have blogs I didn’t even know about. For shame! And maybe I am just blessed with great blogger friends, but I want all to know that I have never had a comment I didn’t appreciate.

So throw those inhibitions out the window and keep them coming. I promise to do the same for you.

This has been on my mind of late, but I had to make sure I had the right intentions before I put it out there. The wrong intentions were my own selfishness and insecurity and need for verbal reassurance. That is if commenting on a blog counts as “verbal”.

I argued to my family that blogging created some kind of, well, social network. Albeit superficial at times, nonetheless it brought people together. We were communicating.

We were communicating.

I don’t mind sending my thoughts to the cosmic void. That sort of goes back to my original “to blog or not to blog” self struggle. I write my thoughts sometimes for my own pleasure and this is the most enjoyable forum.

But it would be self-deceit if I claimed I wrote them only for myself. I like to know that they are contributing in some way to someone else. Or contributing in some way to the relationships I share with my fellow bloggers. For example, through blogging I have better maintained relationships with people I otherwise might have lost contact with. I have also “met” new individuals and developed new relationships. I like to think that our relationships outside of blogging are strengthened by blogging.

But all this is based on a two-way street. Takes two to tango, and I am feeling a little like I have been deserted. We all have the counters, we all keep a watchful eye on how many visitors we receive. Our hearts all sink when no one responds to our carefully constructed posting.

Here is my rally cry! Don’t let blogging be mindless entertainment. I will gladly step out and say that I am guilty of scrolling down through the google reader, scanning the blogs of my friends and the blogs of strangers, letting them all blur together. But this isn’t the kind of blog world I ardently defended to the critics.

You don’t have to patronize me with obligatory praise. Just let me know how you relate. Let me know you stopped by. Let the post evoke some kind of thought, take time to notice it, and then share it.

This is very corny. But it is sincere. I made sure of that before I let myself say it.

Don’t make me do a give away to pull all the commenters out of the woodwork…

(Yes, the music is my attempt at comic relief.)

The 8 Things Tag

8 TV shows I love to watch:
I don’t watch much tv these days so I’ll include some old favorites
1. ER
2. Wonder Years
3. Growing Pains
4. Felicity
5. Biggest Loser
6. Smallville
7. Design on Dime
8. Wheel of Fortune

8 Favorite Restaurants
1. Pita Pit
2. Carrabbas
3. Fresh off the Hook
4. PF Changs
5. el Gallo Giro
6. Applebees (I’m not ashamed to admit it!)
7. Cheesecake Factory (pretty much just for the cheesecake)
8. The Metropolitan (once in a lifetime visit)

8 Things that happened today
1. Cameron said to me “Excellent point Mommy”…Wha?
2. I drove almost to Marsing for apples that are making my van smell very good
3. We missed music & movement at the library because of said drive
4. I cut 2x4s into 3-4″ blocks
5. The third and final (thank goodness!) presidential debate
6. I mowed the lawn
7. Cleaned out the wilted and withered garden
8. Had good company for lunch

8 things that I look forward to
1. $2.97 for Gas (this is what I payed in Wells, NV on Monday)
2. A 5:30pm flight from Spokane on Friday
3. My next newborn (not an announcement)
4. Christmas-time
5. Bryan coming home
6. BYU v. Utah (assuming things go well and both teams come into it undefeated)
7. no more potty mishaps
8. Misha chewing on the right things

8 Things on my wish list:
1. a KitchenAid mixer
2. new jogging shoes
3. new blinds in my kitchen and living room
4. a sewing machine
5. a quality chef’s knife
6. an Italian vacation
7. ballet shoes
8. maybe I should be wishing to be less of a consumer?

8 People I tag:
1. Krista
2. Tisha (hope you see this…)
3. Lacie
4. Melanie
5. Jill
6. Brooke
7. Brit
8. Kim

Of course Cameron really didn’t play the slots. Because apparently there is a $5,000 fine for children in the gaming areas. Which surprises me because the gaming areas are strategically placed between the parking garage and the desired exhibit of any given casino. This particular casino was the MGM Grand which has a lion display that Cameron and Eli really enjoyed. (The pictures of the lions didn’t turn out.)

But interestingly, in life there are often situations, movies, places that don’t bother you or don’t seem uncomfortable. That is until you change the company you are with and all of the sudden it feels awkward or inappropriate. That is how the Vegas strip is. We have been there many times but this time we took a 3 year old and an 18 month old. All of the sudden the nudity and language seemed louder and more evil. We determined that the strip is no place for kids. (Or maybe even for us for that matter, but I won’t get into that.)

We did get to watch a fountain show at the Bellagio which never gets old for me. I love it every time. Here are Lori and Sean loving it.

And luckily for me, Las Vegas (or technically Henderson) has a redeeming quality. It is home to these four people. The reason we drove 784 miles.
My sister Adri just had a baby. It is always a pleasure to visit the Daines’s and especially when a newborn is involved. This is Antonia. The first grand-daughter on both sides. Cameron has one cousin, (well two now I guess) and they seem to have more fun together each time they get together. Charlie is delightful.
The weather was nice, especially compared to what I hear it was like in Boise over the weekend. But still cool enough for jackets. If you are thinking the grass looks perfect, calm your troubled mind because it isn’t real grass. It is actually much better than real grass. On Saturday we really wanted to take the boys to do something fun. Adri suggested this carousel and the whole family came along. You can’t really see how much fun Cameron was having in the first picture, but a little bit better in the second.

Something about palm trees really helps you feel like you are on vacation. But it’s good to be home.