Esquire Coffinberry's Great-Grand-Niece

Sometimes, you just have to decide, you know? Standing there in Home Depot, in front of the Behr color selector, with samples of the wood, carpet, flooring in hand, trying to decide what color to use to paint the walls and the trim and everything else in the upstairs half of the house... so many to choose from! Sigh. Time to be bold! Two gallons of Semi-Gloss interior in Clair de Lune, and a quart of the same in Calm Air, please. Clair de Lune for the inside of the kitchen cabinets (they were a worn-out fake walnut stain sprayed on particle board... which the helpful but overzealous 14 year old did a pretty good job of gouging when he was removing shelf paper with me), and test it on the other walls while I'm at it. Calm Air is for changing the color on the trim around the light fixtures, to diminish their presence. Nearly 12 hours later, the paint has been applied, two coats inside the cupboards, at that. It looks pretty good. And I do think Clair de Lune will work for the walls a...

Remember those paper things you folded, colored, and came up with your best 'Magic 8 Ball' sayings to write inside? You ask a yes-no question, pick a color, pick three numbers, then open under the third number to read the message. They called them Cootie Catchers when I was a kid, but I don't know what they call them now... Fortunetellers maybe? I had a bored little girl on my hands, so between supper and bedtime, I taught her how to make one. And she's been having a ball, asking it questions as I fold clothes: Will mommy read me a story? (Later) Do I have to take a bath tonight? (No Way... which is true, since she prefers showers). Here's what mine told me: Will I get Professor Hill for Property? I picked "Purple"... "4"..."5"..."6". And the answer is... "Sorry, no answer now."

That laryngitis... it just seems weird to only mouth the words during the hymns at church. I was, fortunately, well enough to run the 11-year-old Scout Camp on Friday and Saturday. The rain was gentle on Friday evening, the campfire cozy and lively. We learned a new - and easier - way to make 'smores, using fudge-stripe cookies instead of graham crackers and chocolate bars. The next day, bright and sunny, after cooking their own breakfasts the boys worked on orienteering and the proper use/care of knives, saws, and axes. Then we reviewed the rules for Safe Swimming, and they had a blast swimming. The weeks of prep and planning paid off when I heard a boy ask his dad as they were leaving: "That was great! Can we do this again?"

Much to my children's delight, my new laptop arrived today (so they no longer have to give up their computer when I wish to log on and check the blogs...). And I do like this Vaio. Itsy bitsy, but big enough. Comfy keyboarding. Fits in the laptop backpack I already have. My cold is starting to subside, thankfully. I've got a scout campout I'm the responsible person for tomorrow night.

Opening disclaimer: my first post-college job was in a survey-taking operation. Lots of radio surveys, Sara Lee product surveys, Pennzoil oil surveys, and as it was the '88 election season, lots and lots of political surveys. So I don't mind answering tedious questions, because I remember what it was like being on the other end of the wire. It's almost fun, pretending that my opinion means anything to anyone. Tonight I participated in a strange one: 'Just three or four minutes of your time, ma'am,' he said. Ok, go for it. (I'm whispering, because I've got laryngitis.... ) Tell me your opinion of the following persons or groups in your community - Highly Positive, Somewhat Positive, Neutral, Somewhat Negative, Highly Negative: Xcel Energy People who live in Jamestown People who have houses and property in the mountains ( by now I'm thinking " huh?" ) People who have suffered damage from wildfires Next, the inquisitor related two sides of ...

I pull the pile of stuff out of the mailbox, and peeking out of one corner is the return-address I've been watching for. My heart pounds, and as I put the pile on the dining room table, I tell myself "open it slowly, slowly." I feel it. Not very thick. Does that mean good news or bad news? I peel back a corner of the flap, and slit the top with my finger. Three sheets of paper, two white, one green.... and a check! Oh my goodness! My heart pounds as I unfold the letter. "Award of Merit," it says. One of my musical compositions won second place. Cool.

The master bath shower will finally be useable this afternoon, which is good, because I expect my beloved and our two oldest to return from scout camp today, dirty stinky and tired (are those adjectives or are those names... maybe both!). I am still picking bits of silicone caulk off my skin, though. All books, AV, art and bric-a-brac have been removed from the living room, dining room, and master bedroom, and all that's left in the rooms now are the basic furniture. It helped that my husband finished the built-in bookshelves in the basement last weekend; most books found a new home. (Though about 6 boxes of books are going to make their way to some donation center... lots of Readers' Digest condensed books I inherited from my grandma, and all the undergrad/MBA texts we've been toting around since heaven-knows-when.)There are now only 7 boxes of stuff from those rooms waiting for putting back in place when the painting/carpeting is done. My littlest one has been sick this w...

It's been a busy (though rainy) summer so far. I've apparently decided to (mostly) heed advice, and leave the pre-law reading list alone. Instead, I've embarked on a cleaning/remodeling journey, one that's been seriously overdue (carpet, paint, countertops, cabinetry are all original to this 1978 house - can you say Burnt Orange?). So I've got grout and tile to finish today. Painting every room in the main floor is ahead, followed by a removal of EVERYTHING from the kitchen so the resurfacers can do their thing, followed by new carpet. Along the way, there's been a lot of sorting, discarding, and donating (making long lists of items... taxes are going to be such fun next January). Then we're getting a service to come in twice monthly to keep things nice (and thus we now see the economic value of my unpaid labor over the last many years). The computer issue was settled in favor of a Vaio, just waiting for it to arrive.

Seventeen years ago today, likewise on a Friday afternoon, my husband was on campus in an Advanced Differential Equations class. It was just a week or so before finals, his last term before graduation. I was at home (our tiny, basement apartment... o! for the days of $150/month rent!), passing time playing games on the Amiga 500, feeling tired and huge and just not very comfortable. Then the uncomfortable got worse. I looked at the clock... an hour before class would be out. I paced the room: "Do I interrupt class, or not?" Pretty soon, I didn't care what happened to the class. My husband needed to get home NOW! So I called the department offices (this was pre-cell-phone days). And a secretary went running through the building, slip of paper in hand, burst into the classroom, panting: "Mr. _____! Mr. ______! You need to go home now! Your wife is in labor!" (Ok, this was BYU, and such interruptions were commonplace in upper-division courses.) Pretty soon, I see m...

Remember this one? School's out! School's out! Teacher let the monkeys out! That was going through my head yesterday, as I helped the elementary school serve 750 McDonald's hamburgers (two cookies, a handful of chips/cheese puffs, one napkin, one soda) to students and family members who came to say goodbye. And then I had a houseful of kids the rest of the day. Welcome, summer. ***** Somewhere along the way, I forgot to mourn the fact that life does a complete change from here on out. When they go back to school in the fall, so will I. No more automatic assumed availability in crisis, no pencil-whipping the field-trip chaperone line. No more sending young'uns off to school and revelling in a day completely under my own control. I didn't even think about it until there was only half-an-hour of that last school day left. Guess it's not that big a deal. ***** On tap for the summer... new carpet (current carpet is original to the house, 27+ years, and boy is it due!...