Which brings us to the nostril hair...

Once, when I was laboring away as a missionary in South Royalton, Vermont, the temperature didn't top ten degrees for the entire month of January. It was so frigid that my nostril hairs (yes, I have them, let's try to be adults here) froze and when I pinched my nose they made a little crunching sound. Gross, but true. Moral of the story: Don't live in Vermont. Or have nostril hairs. Or pinch your nose. Or any combination of the preceding.

Why am I relating tales of frozen nostril hair, you ask? No reason. It just came to my mind. I've been thinking a lot about spiritual things** lately. Naturally, when I am waxing spiritual, I have thoughts of my mission. Which brings us to the nostril hair.

Thank you for joining me today.


**I've been thinking a lot about the pride cycle in the Book of Mormon, and how DJ and I are experiencing it first hand. From what I've gathered thus far, it is infinitely more enjoyable to be on the "flocks and herds and gold and silver and precious things" end of the cycle than it is to be on the "death, terror, famine, and pestilence" end. Just an observation. I am going to try to remember to be humble instead of prideful next time. Maybe I'll get to stay on the "flocks and herds" end a little longer (here's me wink-winking heavenward).

Bull. HONKY.

I would like to take a moment to address the people who built the house that I live in. Actually, I only have one thing to say to you: I will see you in hell. Because surely that is where all builders go who put carpet in a bathroom. They convene there with other builders--the ones who decided to position the A/C filter at the top of a vaulted ceiling.

(You may be wondering what I will be doing in H-E-double hockey sticks. As I was scrubbing the entire tube of toothpaste that DJ squoze* onto my bathroom carpet out of my carpet, I unleashed a string of profanities that would make Ralphie's dad proud. I'm not excited about going to hell, but it will be worth it when I get a chance to slap that builder in the face.)

Also, a note to those of you who told me that boys are easier to raise than girls: bull. HONKY.

On the bright side, my house smells minty fresh!

*Squoze is a word. I dare you to challenge me on this today.

Not a fingah!

We cut down a Christmas tree this weekend. It's a pinion pine and I think it's either an alcoholic or has inner ear problems because it keeps falling over. Yesterday morning it fell down twice. The first time it fell down my back was turned and this is what I heard:

CRackPOP!KsshPOP!"AAAahhhh!Mommmmy!POP!Aaaaaah!

(Chancho was under the tree when it came down. Suspicious? As Macey would say--I think, YES. It was actually the second time the tree fell on little DJ.)

I yelled for big DJ to come help me wrestle the tree off of our two-year-old. I was truly relieved to find that the ornament that my mom gave me when I went into the MTC had not shattered. Whew. That little glass ball had made it through two cross-continent flights, three transfers, and SIX MOVES without breaking. Oh, and Chancho was okay. We brushed the glass and pine needles off of him and he seemed fine.

DJ and I mopped up the tree water, swept up the needles and ornament shards, and went back to our Frosted Mini Spooners, when what to our wondering ears did we hear?

CRackPOP!KssshhPOP!CRACCK!POP!

That's right. It fell again, without DJ's help this time. And my MTC ornament finally shattered. Also, in a moment of perfect irony, my Christmas Story leg lamp ornament broke. (Did I forget to mention how classy my decorations are? I also have a sombrero-wearing snowman.) I've never felt a stronger inclination to yell, "Not a fingah!" than I did in this moment, with my Christmas tree lying on the tile, my MTC ornament shattered, and my leg lamp ornament broken in half.

And that, ladies, is the perfect excuse to dump your soggy Mini Spooners down the drain and eat pumpkin pie for breakfast.

(In case you were looking for one.)

(You don't need one. Pumpkin pie is healthy.)

P.S. For those of you who are concerned about my son's safety, DJ secured the tree to our house using a complex system involving fishing line and screws and that will require some post-holiday spackling. But what doesn't?

P.P.S. Here's a cute picture of Tess:

My Lucky Charm

If you have any respect for me--or if you have a sensitive gag relfex--you should stop reading and continue to think of me as the charming, refined, hygienically diligent person that I appear to be. For those of you who have no respect for me, enjoy. I present, for your reading enjoyment slash disgust...

My Lucky Charm

On Friday night I remembered this ad I saw for the Turkey Trot 5k which is held annually at the Seegmiller Historical Farm to benefit the Dixie Care and Share. So I said to DJ, "Hey DJ, whaddya say we do the Turkey Trot 5k tomorrow? There's no entrance fee, we just have to donate canned food." After applying a bit of the aforementioned charm, I talked DJ into walking the mile with my kids in the stroller while I ran the 5k.

We woke up bright and early Saturday morning, filled an old Walmart bag with nonperishable, tuna packed in oil that I bought on accident-type items, and drove to Washington. And I (really, you can stop reading any time) didn't shave my legs. And it had been quite a while since I had shaved, to be totally honest. And I wore shorts. (Aaaaand there goes my last shred of dignity.)

Where was I? Oh yeah, running. So I ran the race and it was great, but that's not where the lucky charm comes in. After the race they have a little raffle thing where they give away massages and t-shirts and frozen turkeys and things of that nature. Get this-- DJ and I totally won a 12 piece meal with a 1/2 gallon of A&W root beer from Kentucky Fried Chicken! A thirty dollar value! I know. AMAZING.

As we sat at under the gazebo at the park snarfing our fried chicken and cole slaw I was feeling very grateful, so, clutching the bucket of chicken, I stood and made the following speech:

"I have so many people to thank for this award. DJ, who snores away while I go running every morning and yet is very supportive. My children, for providing me with the baby fat that inspires me to run. And especially, my leg hair. I usually hide you under pants. However, today you have proven to be my lucky charm and I will no longer be ashamed of you! Thank you! Thank you!"

I bowed and waved to the crowd that had assembled. And then I had to go find my children, who were off trying to pretend that they belonged to a different family.

JewwDUSS!

Yay! I got tagged for one of those games where you post a random picture and (WHEW!) it's not an embarrassing picture! Let the fun begin! The rules are...

*Open your first photo folder.

*Scroll down to the 10th picture. (if you dont have 10 in that one, then go to the next folder that does).

*Post that photo and the story behind that photo on your blog.

*Tag 5 friends to do the same

It's Chancho when he was five months old. I think I took this picture because it was the first time I put gel in his hair but you can't tell because his hair is translucent. Trust me, it was cute.

I'm not going to tag five friends. Instead I've decided to do this: "HEY! FIVE OF YOU! POST A PICTURE OF YOURSELF!" Now we'll see who responds the fastest. What fun.

I'm feeling so special this week! Not just because I was tagged in a fun picture game but because I was asked to participate in a CDC survey about birth defects. I know, right? How could I not feel special? It was actually really cool. If your definition of 'cool' includes doing an hour long phone survey about your eating habits from June 2008 through May 2009. Cool, huh? Nothing spells humiliation like someone asking you how many servings of chocolate you eat in a week, on average. And then having to answer honestly. I had to tell her about my Marshmallow Mateys addiction in horrifying detail! She actually asked about my cold cereal habits and the specific brands I ate. And how many times I ate them per week. Good thing she didn't ask about the size of bowl I used.

Participating in that painfully embarrassing survey reminded me of high school. I took this statistics class my senior year and we learned all about surveys and what makes them meaningful and margin of error and correlation and blah blah blah... But what I remember most from the class was this guy, Richard, who sat behind me the whole year. He had this bizarre habit of saying, "JUDAS!" whenever something irritated him. You know... Judas. Only he said it, "JewwDUSS!" with a heavy St. George accent. Like Mr. Ward would give us a lot of homework and I'd hear Richard behind me: "JewwDUSS!" Or the power would go out: "JewwDUSS!" Or the air conditioner would kick on: "JewwDUSS!" You get the idea. All year long.

So all through the survey I could hear Richard in the back of my head.

Survey lady: "Ms. Haynes, in the three months prior to becoming pregnant and the first three months of your pregnancy how many times would you say that you ate Marshmallow Mateys cereal? Once a month, once a week, more than once a week, twice a week, three times a week, four times a week, five times a week, six times a week, once a day, or more than once a day?"

Me: (thinking) "JewwDUSS!"

Me: (responding) "Umm...at least once a day."

It went on that way for an hour. On the bright side, they are giving me twenty bucks for participating. You know me, there's not a lot I won't do for twenty bucks.

Throw out your dead!

When DJ and I entered into this bwessed awaingement six years ago, I never EVER would have envisioned the following scene:

The curtain goes up and we see the Haynes living room. Swine Flu, Day Nine. All six members of the family are crowded and sprawled out onto two couches, their hair matted to their heads. Tissue wads and and used dishes are everywhere, Baby Einstein is on the TV on repeat.

DJ: "Macey! Quit digging your toes into my back!"
Elise: "Why does it smell like feet in here?!"
Macey: "Can I do Barbie dot com? Can I do Barbie dot com?" (Repeat 400 times.)
Olivia: "UhhhhuuUUUUuuuuhhhhhh............" (That's Olivia melting.)
Chancho: "Happy birtday, Mommy." (He's still celebrating my birthday, sweet boy.)
Tess: "............" (Tess screamed herself hoarse on Day Seven.)
Elise: (thinking) "Why is everyone BREATHING so LOUDLY?! And it still smells like feet!"
DJ: (thinking) "Maybe I should open a fishing lodge in Alaska...YEAH! I should!"
Elise: (hearing DJ's thoughts) "No, you shouldn't!"
Chancho: "Happy birtday, Mommy."

I am so DONE with this flu. We had bacon and Halloween candy for dinner the other night. And if I have to watch Baby Einstein one more time, so help me, I will rip my own eyeballs out with a rusty fork.

The End.

Or is it?

P.S. I promise, this is my last flu-related complainy post--cross my heart, hope to die. No, really. HOPE to DIE. See ya next time!

Do you think...

Do you think if I made fun of a billionaire that I'd wake up tomorrow morning with a box full of money on my front porch?

Do you think if I made fun of George Clooney that I'd wake up tomorrow with him on my front porch?

Do you think if I made fun of a big gooey cinnamon roll with tons of frosting that one would magically appear?

Probably not, right?

However, that seems to be the case with swine flu.

I made fun of it.

I got it.

Alanis Morrisette was right. It IS ironic.

---UPDATE TIME!---
A special thank you to my wonderful neighbor, Tawny, who has made all of my gooey cinnamon roll dreams come true. I found a nice pan of thickly-frosted cinnamon rolls on my porch with a note that read, "Because sometimes when you make fun of it, it happens. Feel better soon!" Don't I have rad neighbors? Anyway, if anyone wants to follow Tawny's lead I'm still hoping for a box of money and George Clooney. Anyone? Anyone?

H1N1: The Truth Exposed

When infected with swine flu you will experience fever, sore throat, runny nose, fatigue, and perhaps the following:

You can sleep for hours and hours without your wife shoving you off of the bed.

You can smell like you desperately need a shower (sorry, DJ).

You may experience the desire to watch idiotic hunting videos on YouTube.

You can eat a Big Ed and drip melted ice cream all over your shirt.

Your wife may bring you a warm bowl of alphabet soup and a big hospital mug, left over from one of four c-section hospitalizations, of ice cold water.

At least, these are the symptoms that I've observed in DJ who, according to the doctor, is 'suffering' from H1N1. Don't misunderstand me, it doesn't look pleasant. However, from what the news programs have described I was expecting something a little more Black Plague-ish. This Swine Flu has been grossly disappointing. What a lame pandemic.

I have quarantined DJ to our bedroom with the instructions to stay in bed and try not to touch anything. (This is mostly for my benefit. Having him home during the day has totally thrown off my groove.) I'm also trying to keep him a safe distance from Tess. I don't know why. Tess has pretty much been living the H1N1 lifestyle from day one--laying around, fussing, being fed on demand. Maybe I'll try to catch the swine flu.

29 Gumwads of Wisdom

I was going to call this "29 Pearls of Wisdom", but pearls of wisdom are (as their name implies) small and yet valuable. My bits of wisdom are small and yet...small. So here we have, for your consideration,

29 Gumwads of Wisdom

by Elise Haynes

In honor of my 29th birthday

1. When making brownies, do not use a rubber spatula to transfer the batter to the pan. It hardly leaves any batter in the bowl for you to lick out.

2. Air Supply sounds like two women singing, but it's guys. Trust me.

3. You can relate everything in life to an episode of Seinfeld and it makes life funnier.

4. Here's some wisdom for the holidays: keep an eye on your candied yams when you put them under the broiler to toast the marshmallows. I nearly burned my house down one year.

5. When your husband gets pulled over twice in one day (10/16/09) try not to rub it in, no matter how impossible the task may seem.

6. Don't play Scrabble with Elise because she will walk all over you. Unless you're Elise's mom.

7. Dogs are cute. Don't get one solely for that reason.

8. DJs are cute. Don't get one solely for that reason.

9. Things at Target are cute. Don't buy them solely for that reason.

10. On the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland, watch for the pirate whose muddy foot is dangling over the boats. He freaked me out when I was a kid.

11. Man, I want to go to Disneyland.

12. Always keep a diaper in your glove box.

13. Flip flops: comfortable, $3, last forever, and give you a really neat foot tan line.

14. Try not to have a two-year-old who drops important things into your sink disposal. Retrieving items from the disposal is terrifying and disgusting, even with a mask and yellow gloves and copious amounts of bleach.

15. When shopping for birthday cake mix, don't forget the candles.

16. Our phone number when I was six-years-old: (714) 947-8931. Can I remember my pin number? No.

17. Tea Leoni's real last name: Pantaleoni. Good move, Tea.

18. The perfect temperature for making quesadillas on my skillet is 375. Your skillet might be different, though. That's the funny thing about skillets.

19. High heels are ridiculous. I don't care what people say.

20. How to tell the difference between Vermont and New Hampshire on a map: Vermont is kind of shaped like a 'V' and you can sort of fit a little 'h' in New Hampshire. Oklahoma is a skillet, Louisianna is an Ugg (careful on that one, Minnesota is kind of an Ugg, too), Wisconsin is a muffin. Call me with any other geography questions.

21. Keep a book in your glove box for when you're in the car waiting for DJ, or whoever you're married to. I read 75% of Jane Eyre that way.

22. Just a review, in your glove box: Jane Eyre and diapers. If you're DJ, keep your registration and proof of insurance in a holster.

23. If you are ever hospitalized at Dixie Regional Medical Center try the Turkey Special sandwich. Yummy.

24. Great Value brand dishwasher detergent is the worst, the worst, Jerry! (see #3)

25. The Little Debbie people should make really huge Swiss Rolls, like the size of a Cafe Rio burrito.

26. If you're on the phone with DJ and it sounds really echo-y, it's because he's in the bathroom. Yeah, I know.

27. Thesauruses are wonderful but it's a tricky word to pluralize.

28. Almost there!

29. From a fortune cookie I got when I was a teenager: "Beauty is in your heart. Let it out, let it beat, give yourself a treat."

What Happens in Ironwood...

Here is a random sampling of what we have been up to the past few weeks:

Line dancing. I LOVE line dancing. This falls under the category of "Things That I Enjoy That Require Little or No Skill, Like Tubing". My neighborhood had a bring-your-own-food-and-come-eat-it-in-the-street-and-then-line-dance block party last night. It was fun. Macey raided the dessert buffet, DJ talked to other guys about work, and I line danced with the other moms. You know how in movies the people get drunk and then they wake up the next morning and they're all, "WHY did I DO THAT last night?!" That was my morning this morning, sans the hangover. Did I seriously line dance in front of my neighbors last night? Holy CRAP, I line danced in front of my neighbors last night. (burying head in hands) Let us hope that Ironwood Subdivision has a "what happens in Ironwood, stays in Ironwood" policy, like Las Vegas.


Writing a novel. It was Sunday afternoon and DJ and I were very, very bored. So I said, "hey DJ, let's write a book. You talk, I'll type." And thus it began. Macey threw in her two cents periodically. Actually, the epilogue is 100% Macey's. If you would like me to e-mail a copy of the manuscript to you, I will for a small fee (a donut). However, please do not circulate my novel around the internet like Midnight Sun. Honor system here, folks. One valuable thing I learned from this exercise is that if you start out writing a love story with your husband he will turn it into a fishing story within two or three paragraphs. Here's an excerpt:

"It was a dark night. Stormy outside. The air hung heavily. The pungent aroma of creosote from the desert blew in from the west. Penelope Peree sat--she hated her name. She loathed it. All of her friends called her Pen. She had spent one too many nights like this, alone. Hopelessly alone.
Hearing rustling noises outside, Pen was scared that there might be a pervert. She wished that her boyfriend was there so that he could scratch her back and tell her everything was going to be okay. Every night was the same ever since Johnny left her to find answers to unanswered questions. Both of Johnny's parents had died and he didn't have answers. He liked answers. Pen decided to turn on her favorite track on repeat to keep her company.
"Here's a little song I wrote," Bobby McFerrin sang, "might wanna sing it note for note..."
Penelope nearly jumps out of her skin as somebody knocks on the door..."

Aren't you just dying for more? I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. Maybe you had to be there. I love how she's scared that there might be a pervert. (Admit it, when you're home alone you're scared that there might be a pervert.)


Driving home from Logan. My sister Carrie and I drove to Logan, Utah to visit my new nephew Gabriel last weekend. We left St. George at 3:00 Saturday morning and left Logan to return home at 1:30 Sunday afternoon. Because my car was possessed by Satan it took us almost nine hours to get home from Logan. The whole weekend is a big blur, like one of those dreams where you wake up and only remember random details. Here are the random details of our weekend in Logan:
-Eating. A LOT. Chilean food, pumpkin pie, pot roast, donuts, Happy Cola, these little truffles that might have been doggie treats (I'm still not sure). You name it, we ate it.
-Cruising the streets of Logan at 11:30 at night trying to get Tess to fall asleep, or at least stop screaming her guts out.
-Seeing baby Gabriel, shown here. Isn't he a cutie?