also, happy halloween

my reasons to vote yes on prop 8

see what france discovered here

or the shorter summary, here

MONTREAL, March 20, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In late January, a 30 member parliamentary commission of the French National Assembly published a 453 page Report on the Family and the rights of Children, which rejected same-sex marriage.

this report is based on studies conducted by france on the five countries who have legalized gay marriage. france turned down gay marriage, concluding that it led to higher rates of teen pregnancy, higher levels of domestic violence and impinged on the rights of children.

this is why i'm against gay marriage. kids have a right for a chance at a two gender parent home, but also a need. gay marriage takes away that right.

and that reason has nothing to do with religion.

proposition 8

i have started this entry a million times and have gotten nowhere. a lot of people that i know have written entries concerning proposition 8 and they're feelings about it and i haven't written one (well, one that i've published). i just can't figure out how to put it in writing.

first, let me say this, proposition 8 makes me feel as though someone is holding my heart just a little too tightly. it doesn't hurt, but it makes me ache.

we were at a wave today (a wave is where you stand on a street corner and hold the signs and people honk and then you shout things like, "yes on 8!") and on our same street corner were no on 8 people holding signs and shouting. everyone was so angry! they were rude and emotional. i walked up feeling a little nervous with my little 2-year-old and my brand new baby and they were shouting at us.

"bigots!"

"i'm for equal rights, you're just a bunch of hypocrites!"

one girl used the 'f' word and when i pointed out that ava was standing right next to her she started accusing me of hurting my child.

i felt sick.

you know what? i get that they feel passionately about what they're doing. i get that. and i get that they feel a great injustice is being done. and you may not believe me, but i totally get that. when i see a gay person and i think of how they might want to get married and i'm standing there with a sign telling people to vote against that. my marriage has brought me so much joy and when i think about telling someone they can't have that, my heart begins to feel that hand holding it just a little too tightly.

but in california gay couples have every single right as a married couple, it's just not called marriage. and i consider that to be a compromise: they can have every benefit, every blessing, every right as a married couple, only it's not called marriage. and in return, i can teach my children about homosexuality and marriage and family the way i believe and not have some teacher teach it how they see fit. because marriage isn't a civil right. it's the optimal foundation for family and the optimal foundation of our society.

there has not been one part of this proposition that i have enjoyed. not the walking door to door, not the phone calling, not the letter writing. when i think about why i'm not okay with gay marriage, i have a difficult time getting it out properly. i'm not even getting it out properly right now! but it has been such an emotional journey for me, so much worry and grief and shock. and i haven't written about any of it (I barely talk about it).

tonight people were hateful. this one woman was saying awful things, the anger in her voice made me feel cold. i couldn't believe that anyone would talk to me like that. i had done nothing. i held seth in my arms and i watched her, i even followed her around to hear what she was saying, completely shocked at the amount of anger in her tiny body. i didn't even know her. and you know what? had we met anywhere else--anywhere else she would have walked away my friend. and i hers.

so i walked over with some cookies i'd made for the kids while we stood on the street corner and i offered them to the no on 8 people. because i wasn't mad at them. and i wasn't so hateful. i was mostly really sad that they saw me as such a different individual than i really was. we ate cookies and talked and for a moment no one was angry.

i am not a mindless follower. i am not a hateful person. i am not. and i would never, never talk to anyone the way some of those people were talking tonight. never.

the way i see it, proposition 8 is the closest thing to a compromise that i can find on this issue. we get to keep marriage traditional and they get all of the benefits and rights as a married couple. it's equal--the rights are all the same. but it isn't alike. but you know what? we're not alike. i'm not taking anything from anyone, i'm meeting them in the middle. just because you want something doesn't mean you should have it.

when this is over, i'll be so glad. i want to be able to be friends with people again. i don't want to sit down with a dad at the park and know that if he knew my political stand he'd be angry with me.

H-E-double hockey sticks

My mother: This is the zit from hell.

Ava: ZIT FROM HELL!!

(to be fair, this is not her first swearing moment. i was the cause of her first swear word which was worse than this story. this story is funnier to me because i was there to witness it. and, ava was talking about acne)

Like mother, like daughter

Years ago (many years ago) my dad wrote a letter to his parents and described me as "an incorrigible crybaby". i'd like to take this opportunity now and describe my daughter as the same and hope that one day, like me, she'll grow out of it. and maybe that day will come sooner rather than later.

like tomorrow, maybe.

weekly guy

weekly mouse

eating a whole wheat blueberry eggo waffle with my oven mitt.

53

ryan and seth, october 2008

weekly mouse

she's shaving. her facial hair is probably her best kept secret.

weekly guy

finally caught on camera. do you see that dimple? if he has curly hair all of my boy-child wishes will be fulfilled: blue eyes, dimples and curly hair.
it would be impossible for me to love him more.

also, today he is two months.

birthday weekend

first: i married a man worthy of a modeling career.
but that's not all. concerned about how we would spend my birthday, he did some research and decided that the santa monica pier would be a fun saturday activity. so we packed everyone up and headed down.

we went to the little aquarium they had. ava refused to touch a single item found in the "touch tanks" but she did wave at the crabs and then kiss the glass closest to them. and she was really excited about the sharks. but most of all, it was the jellyfish she loved.
then we rode the carousel. this was my favorite part because it was ava's favorite part. she was so delighted with the whole concept that i couldn't take my eyes off of her. she has me captivated. the first ride ended and she cried. it took both of us to get her off without too much of a scene.
seth stayed in his carrier the entire time. he is such a mobile baby! i love that about him. i fed him in the car when we got there and then in the car again before we left. other than that, he wasn't a problem.
it was a good trip. it's the first time we've done something fun since we started the whole moving process. it felt good. in fact, as i look at these pictures and write these words, i want to do something just for fun again.

i'm going to go eat leftover birthday cake instead.

impressions of idaho

before i went to idaho, my sister blogged about how beautiful it was. in fact, her blog title was idaho is beautiful. so i was excited to get up there, see a whole new landscape (that was beautiful) and take some pictures.

fact: idaho is not really beautiful. also, it is FREEZING!!! (but i'm really glad you like it there, amanda)

because of the temperature, i tried not to go outside, if i could help it. when i dropped my sister off at her apartment, she'd stand by the window and try to cement our next plans. but i wouldn't roll the window down. "call me on your cell phone from inside!" i'd shout through the glass pane.

so i didn't take any pictures. in fact, i pulled my camera out only once and that wasn't to take pictures of my sister, it was to take a picture of my friend hernan (or in english, click here) when he was meeting seth for the first time.

despite the weather and despite my lack of pictures, i had a lot of fun. the trip was short and i felt like i had to squeeze a lot in to such a small amount of time, but it was good to see amanda and it was good to be able to sit down and focus on her. for some reason, i feel like i haven't been able to do that for a long time (i think some reason is named ava). our goal is to have a girls weekend once a year (good luck to us).

my idaho observations:

idaho is flat. after i moved to utah i thought maybe california was flat, but no. it isn't. at all. idaho is.
everyone has a shed. sometimes two. they've got a lot to store in idaho.
it's windy in idaho. that makes it way more cold than it ought to be.
rexburg is where amanda's college is, idaho falls is where we landed. they are thirty minutes apart. and in between them is nothing (well i think it's nothing). but apparently, if you want to have some fun you should have a car because all of the fun is in idaho falls.
they are a museum happy people there. there's an idaho museum, a potato museum, a mud-river museum, a tv museum (because apparently the town of rigby, which could be more accurately described as a village is where tv was invented. it's a good thing, too. what do you do all winter when it's zero degrees outside?) and a bear museum.
there's also a park called bear world where you get on the top of these trucks and they drive you around the park and you look at deer, caribou and perhaps a bear. sounds safe (and fun).
there's a lot of wood piled up everywhere. i don't know.

i'm grateful my sister loves it there. it was awesome to see where she is so happy. i loved seeing her. but i don't want to live in idaho (really, at this point, i only want to live in california).

52

progress report

we are mostly moved in. which, considering the two small children who like to tag team all day long for the attention of their mother, is just like being moved in. so, ladies and gentlemen, i am moved in.

and i worked at it all day yesterday and stayed up later than ryan (HUGE moment in our marriage. sadly, ryan was asleep and was not able to celebrate it with me) and even applied myself today and now the house is mostly clean. and again, with two small children and their monumental attention needs, that is clean. so, on top of being moved in the house is clean.

i am on top of the woman world right now, removing my yellow plastic dish washing gloves, wiping at that determined spot of spit-up marking my entire left shoulder and panting with the effort it took for me to climb up here. the view is fantastic. but i'm also very tired and think i won't be this amazing until christmas is over. because i just have to ask, is it really worth it? ava awoke this morning, had some drinkable yogurt for breakfast and ran to the couch to use it as her napkin. and i'd just wiped the entire thing down last night. i did not lose it on her (it can be whatever you'd like it to be).

anyone who'd like to come over should do so before ava wakes from her nap. who knows what the house will look like once she's moved through it to get a drink of water from her princess sippy cup.

ps

thanks to miss mandy, i have an award.
and, since the rules are to pass it along, i give it to red star mama. funny thing about her: she's married to the brother of one of my very good friends, so i don't really know her. but through our blogs and hambly's countless, "you and jen would be really good friends.", i have come to know her better. she's funny, well-read, well-written and has good taste in music. every entry is a good entry. you should totally read her.

also, tara. one of the wittiest, most intelligent and interesting people i know (really). also, she's hilarious. and gorgeous. and single (forget about it, you're not worthy).

weekly mouse and guy

this picture is in response to the many inquiries as to how ava treats her new sibling. well, as you can see, she loves him. and she shares with him very well. it is the strange and new intolerance of the cat that has me puzzled.

free 2-year-old

i am thisclose to being serious.

idaho

this weekend is mother's weekend at byu-i where my sister "goes" (saying this reminds me of that awful movie "legally blonde" when the blonde girl sees her ex-boyfriend at harvard law school and says, "i totally forgot you go here!" like it's a grocery store instead of harvard law).

anyway, i'm a mother. and so is my mother, so we're going. we're probably going to skip all of the mother weekend activities (which includes a 5k, a dance and a heritage luncheon) and do our own thing (because our own thing is more fun and because all of those activites are lame--the 5k is lame because it is in idaho. in october. in the snow. bad idea).

aside from the fact that i have suddenly acquired a new wicked sore throat which makes me feel as though i have been smoking for so long my trachea has eaten itself, i will go anyway. i'm hardcore.

so wish me luck, my friends! i am excited to see my sister, experience the college where she "goes" and to take a break from mothering and entertaining two small children, unpacking an endless amount of boxes and cleaning a house that will not stay clean (especially with ava around).

weekly guy

weekly mouse

eating m&ms
also, this picture makes me laugh out loud.

a certain level of stress

ryan starts listing the things that we still need to get done and asking me when would be a good time to do that. i can't handle it. the thought makes me wish i could evaporate. ryan sees my look of stressed terror and asks, "what do you need?"

"i need," i pause, considering what actually might make me feel better. "i need for you to stop talking."

ryan says, "for how long?"

it was nice of him to even take my request under consideration, i think. i never would have.

look what he made me throw away!

these shoes were my shoes for five years. i wore them every day. i wore them for a year before i met ryan, i met them when we dated, i wore them when it wasn't too freezing in utah where we lived as newlyweds. i wore away the big toe and the heel and had dirty feet because (let's face it) they were barely shoes at the end of their life. then i kept them because i could hardly bear the thought of them being thrown away.

well, in his packing frenzy, ryan insisted we throw them out (he also tried to throw out the trix box that i'm on. that's right, ladies and gentleman! i am on the back of a trix box. it was my modeling career. when ryan balked at my wanting to keep it, i asked him, "where's your trix box?" he doesn't have one. i'm cooler). and i allowed it because he wanted to put them on the patio with all of our other trash and i figured i could sneak them back in to the house and stow them away in a box somewhere (maybe one ryan marked as "things"). i also insisted we take a picture and had to go put clothes on just for the occasion (excuse the shaggy dog look i'm sporting. i merely do not want ava to feel awkward about hers. clearly, i do not do well with haircuts).

here's to you, flip flops! you were the best flip flops in the world. i'm glad i won't have to miss you because i'll be keeping you in a box in the closet where ryan will never find you (until we move again. then we can just repeat the process).

weekly guy

seth's expression as he watched his father feverishly pack on saturday. ryan was throwing everything not bolted down into boxes with great enthusiasm. i think seth was terrified of being packed and then having his box marked "random".

ps i find his little bald head hilarious. he's like an old little man.

weekly mouse

uncle james is one of her favorite people. this is from a time when uncle james stuck around just to hang out with her and ava wanted to play in her grandparent's bed. she would pull the covers up and announce, "night! night!" and then fling herself backwards against the pillows and squirm around for a moment. then she would pop back up and shriek, "good morning!" this game was repeated. james is a (VERY) good sport.