DIDN'T COOK FOR THE KIDS

When the kids were here I should have cooked three meals. The first night they went to Heaps. I had a roaring--yes, roaring--toothache and didn't go with them.

Saturday night we ate dinner at our son's house. Tooth continued to roar but I had pain pills which kept it to a dull roar. Recipes soon.

Sunday night we ate dinner at our daughter's house. The yummiest chef salad and hot dogs--seems like an odd combination but it was divine. Watermelon and zucchini brownies, which I will be making soon--I won't be making watermelon, so calm down. Watch for the brownie recipe on my coookbook site, too. Soonish. Soonish is a term that could mean a few days to months. Toothache roared on and off. I popped pills on and off.

I took my camera this time and didn't take it out of my purse. Maybe whatever is wrong with me can be cured. With chocolate. I'm sure of it. And that may be a clue why I have a roaring toothache. I'll try to block it out of my mind.

We called one of our grandson's today and sang "Happy Birthday" to him. Following the singing--and I use the word "singing" loosly here--was much silence on the line. Phil thinks we are torturing the kids with our singing and it may be true. Our grandson wants to go to lunch and a movie but I'm not sure I can sit through Ice Age 3 again, my being scared and all, when we took the six year old. It's humiliating as he wasn't. Scared, that is. So, I hope the eight-year-old picks Harry Potter although Harry scares me too. I'll need chocolate to get through it. Maybe even a pain pill.

I seem to be scared of a lot of things but not my dentist, who cured the roaring toothache. He walks on water, I'm pretty sure of it. Dr. Prince, in Orem, if anyone has a toothache, locally. Well, of course your toothache is going to be locally--locally, right in your mouth. But if you live near Orem/Provo then...you know what I mean.

I should not blog late at night.

THE BIRTHDAY BIKE

It was my birthday, maybe I was eight, maybe I was ten. This isn't the actual picture, my bike was worse. It had more heavy metal on it. The chain guard was made to look like part of a rocket ship, so help me it did. It was supposed to look cool.

Mom and Daddy could hardly contain their excitement, They brought it in the house and put a big bow on it. It took two men to get it up the front steps--just kidding about that part, but not kidding a whole lot. That bike was a beast.

This one weighs 76 pounds and mine did too--at least. It cost a fortune, otherwise why would Mom and Daddy be so proud?

My cousin, Holly had a new bike too. Uncle Bliss and Aunt LaVern were thrifty. He taught Seminary for the entire South Sevier High School. He was also the Stake President for seventeen years--Stake President to at least six little towns. Yes, seventeen years so every person in the Stake who had a son or a daughter get married invited them to the wedding reception. That meant hundreds of gifts to buy. They had to be thrifty.

Holly got a cheap blue bike that weighed five pounds. It did have fenders but that's all the extras it had. I think they were made of aluminum foil, painted blue.

In those days bigger was better and poor Holly had the inferior bike--for about five minutes. Whenever we went anywhere she sailed, I pumped. She lifted her feet up on the handlebars and coasted. I stood up and pumped hard. I hated that bike but Mom and Daddy were so proud, what could I say? I pumped and sweat and lagged behind.

After I grew up that old bike--probably because Mom and Daddy had paid so much for it--never got thrown away. It was in Daddy's shop and every time my nieces and nephews came down they had to ride that bike. They gave it the name: The Clunker.

I probably have inferiority complexes by the dozens from that horrible bike. I'm so happy to finally be able to give a name to the cause. I'm a product of The Clunker. I feel much better now.

BUILD A BEAR, AGAIN, AND A BABY SHOWER

It's Curly Sue's birthday.

She's had her hair straightened, put stick-on bling on her ears and is wearing a Beatles shirt and I hardly recognized her. She picked out a Husky Dog, named Snowy. Snowy has a baby, I forgot to find out the baby's name and Tuesday got a little baby--a leopard, too. Here Tuesday is, with her Daddy.

Here is Curly Sue--with the straight hair-- giving Snowy his name.

Tuesday is keeping Curly Sue's baby Husky safe while Snowy gets registered on the computer.


After Build a Bear we went to the Smith Grandparent's house for a Birthday celebration for Curly Sue and a Baby Shower for Tierney, who is carrying twins. These are the twins that we were worried about and everyone fasted and prayed about. They are now doing fine. They are each about 2 1/2 pounds and will be born in about two months or so. She is so excited.

Here she is, not looking pregnant at all--in the purple--with her sister, Megan and Curly Sue.

Here are four generations. Curly Sue's Great Grandpa, her Grandma Smith, her Aunt Tierney and Curly Sue and Tuesday. I think Megan snuck off.

Another picture because they are all so darn cute.

Here's their Grandpa Smith. I must say that they spoiled Curly Sue and Tierney--and they even spoiled Tuesday, who didn't have a birthday but got a present anyway. I didn't get pictures of the presents because by then everyone was sick of me taking pictures so I backed off...for a few minutes.

Here is Curly Sue's very own little birthday cake.

And Aunt Megan, lighting things on fire. And then Curly Sue blew the candles out so fast that I missed it.

After all the presents and the candle blowing out we had a wonderful lunch. This is Heidi's beautiful kitchen. She is a fabulous cook and is giving me one of her very own published cookbooks. I will ask if I can put a recipe or two of her's on my cookbook blog. Everything she makes is deeelicious.Heidi is the perfect hostess.

It was a wonderful day. Everyone was happy and well fed and the twins even got some friends

THINKING OF MICE (24 years ago)

Women are supposed to sew clothes for their kids. That’s what I thought. I didn’t like to sew. I didn’t want to sew. But I was supposed to sew, especially since Aunt Dorothy had given me a sewing machine a long time ago, a sewing machine that would have been collecting dust if it weren’t tucked neatly into it’s case. In the closet. In the spare room. Behind a closed door.

I decided to make some pajamas for four-year-old Bentley. I bought seersucker fabric in a cute print—it would be cool for summer, I thought. But summer came and they still weren’t made. Bentley slept in large T-shirts. I don’t know why I didn’t think this was okay. I fretted about the pajamas all summer. Because I was supposed to sew.

Mom and Dad came up to see us in late July. “Why don’t you just get in and make them,” she said.

“I don’t know, Mom. You sew all the time. You like it. Every time I sew I end up giving the half finished, awful looking item to DI. I hate it. Why don’t you take the fabric home and make the jammies? You can give them to Bentley for his birthday.”

She thought that was a good idea and so did I. On his birthday there was a soft package wrapped with bright colored curly ribbons dripping off the top. Mom and Dad were anxiously watching him open the gift we all knew he’d love. He took the paper off and stood there. No emotion. Nothing. His eyes looked at the ceiling. I thought maybe he didn’t know what they were.

“They’re jammies,” I said.

The ceiling-looker said nothing.

I took them out of his hands, shook them out of their folded state and said, “See? Jammies,” They looked like they'd fit perfectly.

Nothing.

“Don’t you like them? Grandma made them just for you,” I said.

“I’m thinking of mice,” Bentley said in a quiet voice.

Everyone in the room leaned forward, even the kids, Trent, Taylor and Hillary. “What?” everyone said in unison.

“I’m thinking of mice.”

I looked at Mom. I could tell her feelings were a little bit hurt. “If you don’t like them I know a little boy in Annabella who would love them. Should I take them to him?”

Mother had used this tactic on me all my life. If there were something I didn’t like she threatened to give it away. It worked on me because I was probably selfish but Bentley knew what he liked and what he didn’t and he didn’t like those jammies.

“Okay,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders.

I never did find out what Mom did with the jammies. I didn’t want to remind her that her ungrateful grandson didn’t like her gift so I never mentioned them again.

“I’m thinking of mice,” has become Snyder family code for “I really don’t like this but I’m too polite to say so right to your face.” It hasn’t been used a lot, but enough. I’m thinking of mice right now, as I write this story that I really can’t do justice to.

TODAY IS MY BABY'S BIRTHDAY

It’s my baby’s birthday today. She’s nineteen. Yes, nineteen and yes, she is my baby but I don’t call her that to her face. She will always be my baby because she was my last-born.

I remember “going to town” with Mom to shop. She wanted to hold hands. I was embarassed. I pulled my hand away, knowing I was hurting her feelings but I simply couldn’t help it. I was grown up. Grown up girls didn’t hold their mother’s hands. (I must have been eleven or twelve.)

We met two of Mom’s friends on the sidewalk in front of the dress shop. “This is my baby,” Mom said. The women clucked over me like I was a newborn chick. I wanted to be anywhere else; I was mortified.

“I’m not your baby,” I said with a sassy attitude.

“You will always be my baby,” she said, ignoring my bad manners. “Always.”

We didn’t say “Whatever,” in those days but if we had I would have said it.

We went in and out of shops, Mom visiting with friends she met between racks of dresses, over bolts of cloth, comparing the price of one type of hand lotion against another. I heard it again and again, “This is my baby.”

Why she kept telling people was beyond a mystery because I was not charming. I was bratty. Today I understand. It was because I really was her baby, her precious child; even though I was doing my best to be obnoxious, she knew who I really was. She had years to know the real me. She perhaps knew that one day I would return, would want to hold her hand. Would be proud to be called her baby.

Mom died seventeen months before today’s birthday girl was born. I grieved over her death and then, nine months later, when I found out I was pregnant I was devastated. I needed my mom. When my baby was born I grieved again. I wanted my mom there, fussing over me and fussing over my newborn.

Now this precious little person is off on her own, not living in our house. She never says, “I love you,” unless I drag it out of her. Does she love me? I have no doubt. Will she give me a hug? Fat chance. When I give her one she stands like a wooden soldier unless I make her put her arms around me and then they are not arms, they are noodles.

If I called her “my baby” what would she do? Cringe, but it’s all right. She is, and one day she might, just might be proud to carry the title. Just like I am.