Bedtime Stories

I recently found out, to my shock and horror, that Jacob had never read the classic children's story Goodnight Moon. So yesterday we went to the library and I checked the book out and read it to him.

If your childhood was similarly deprived, the book is [SPOILER ALERT!] about a little bunny who says goodnight to the various objects in his/her bedroom. It incorporates quaint rhymes like "goodnight kittens and goodnight mittens."

I enjoyed this book as a child well enough, but the real joy came when I was a teenager.

You see, when my sister Heather and I shared a room back in the day, she would often ask me to tell her a bedtime story. And I would invariably pattern such stories after Goodnight Moon.

You, too, can make your own Goodnight Moon story with very little thought involved! Just follow this formula:

Each stanza contains four lines. The first line is always "Goodnight moon." The rest of the lines are "Goodnight ________." On the third line, the blank should be filled in with an object in the bedroom. (The second and fourth lines may also include bedroom objects, but a little more leeway is given. Also, the fourth line can be somewhat unconventional/creepy/scandalous.) The second and fourth lines must rhyme. (Or, if you want a throwback to high school English, each stanza has an abcb rhyme scheme.) At the conclusion of the story, it ends simply with "Goodnight moon."

For example, this is a similar story to what I told Jacob last night while we were trying to fall asleep:

Goodnight moon,
Goodnight stars,
Goodnight closet,
Goodnight cars.

Goodnight moon,
Goodnight fan,
Goodnight carpet,
Goodnight creepy white van.

Goodnight moon,
Goodnight clothes,
Goodnight dresser,
Goodnight garden hose. (When I was telling the story last night, I had to insert "garden" lest Jacob interpret it as a different kind of hose.)

Goodnight moon,
Goodnight bed,
Goodnight lamp,
Goodnight head.

Goodnight moon.

Isn't that just precious? After laying awake for a few more minutes, I asked Jacob to tell me a bedtime story. He interpreted the rules a little differently. This was his version:

Goodnight belly button,
Goodnight tongue,
Goodnight LICK JENNIFER ALL OVER!

At that point I had to launch myself away from him, lest he carry out the threat. So he never finished his story.

Alas.

Photo Dump, or Summer Adventures!

As far as months go, July was a pretty good one. But enough of these words! On to the pictures!

We tossed a football around before watching the fireworks on the 4th of July.

On the three-year anniversary of the day we met, we went to Lagoon (an amusement park in Utah) because tickets were relatively cheap and Jacob had the day off work.

Jacob is a very intense driver. And he took his road rage out on unsuspecting victims while cackling diabolically*.

I insisted we ride the merry-go-round because it was "quaint."

We repeated a "Christmas in July" date we did two years ago, this time with my sister and brother-in-law. We put Dustin to work on making Christmas cookies. 

But let's be real, Heather and I did most of the work.

Jacob pretended to read a Christmas story for the photo, and then promptly handed the book of to me. And then we watched A Muppet Christmas Carol, much to the delight of all.

My parents and little sister Emily came up to Utah for a family reunion! As part of it, we visited some relatives' grave sites. (This bench is not one of them. We just thought it was somewhat cool/creepy to have a bench as a grave marker.)

Jacob's dreams came true when he became the owner of an official Sudweeks Family Reunion t-shirt.

The Sudweeks clan. And this isn't even all of them. Photo credit goes to Josh Sudweeks.

My mom organized a series of "Minute to Win It" games for one of the evening activities. Heather and I participated in a game that required two people to unwind an entire roll of toilet paper around one of the contestants. She ended up holding the roll and I ended up spinning in place until the roll ended and I promptly fell over. Photo credit to Kim Aldrich

We went boating with the family. I tried my hand at a little wake boarding, and  we rode the tube together. And then I was sore for a week.

Most of my immediate family came to our apartment to watch the Olympics Opening Ceremony  and celebrate with food. Namely, fish and chips, Olympic onion rings, and Olympic ice cream cone torches. With some healthy stuff provided by my parents.

And here they are! They're pretty much the best.

 They say a picture is worth a thousand words. And I just gave you over a dozen, not to mention the captions. So basically I just wrote the essay of a lifetime. You're welcome.

*He may or may not have actually cackled. I could possibly just be taking artistic liberty.

Scumbag brain.

ME, last night: Well, it's 11:15! I guess it's time for bed!

BRAIN: Actually, I think this would be a prime time to think about every single thing ever.

ME: Really, brain? Couldn't you have thought all these things like twelve hours ago?

BRAIN: Nope!

ME: Curses.

BRAIN: Also, I think we should compose an email we've been meaning to write for the last few days. And we'll mentally rewrite it over and over, changing one little word at a time.

ME: Is that really necess--

BRAIN: Over and over.

ME: But I really should--

BRAIN: OVER AND OVER!

ME: You know what, how about I just get up and write the stinkin' email right now?

BRAIN: Suit yourself.

ME: Fine. I will. But I'm not going to send it yet!

BLADDER: While you're up, would you mind relieving me? You really shouldn't have consumed a quart of liquid before going to bed.

ME: Sigh. If I must.

BRAIN: Now that it's 2:30 in the morning, I'm wide awake!

ME: Don't you have an "off switch" or something?

STOMACH: Feed me!

ME: What? No! It isn't time for breakfast yet.

STOMACH: FEED ME!

ME: Quiet, you! You will wait at least until the sun comes up!

STOMACH: Fine. But I will continue to make my displeasure known by growling unpleasantly.

ME: I think I'm going to try some relaxation techniques to help me fall asleep. First I'll focus on my breathing.

BRAIN: I have a better idea! How about I sing you to sleep? I'll start with all the songs from A Muppet Christmas Carol.

ME: In with the good air, out with the bad. In with the good air, out with the bad.

BRAIN: We're Marley and Marley, WHOOOOOAAA!*

ME: Maybe I'll focus all my thoughts towards the sensations in my big toe on my left foot. And I'll gradually work my way up to my head.

BRAIN: There goes Mr. Humbag, there goes Mr. Grim! If they gave a prize for being mean, the winner would be him!**

ME: Brain, I love you, but I hate you.

And that's how I didn't fall asleep until well after 3:30. And of course I was awake by 7:45. Sigh.

*Educate yourself.

**Can you believe Jacob saw this movie for the first time just this past Saturday?

"I don't drink gum."

So there I was, washing my hair and thinking to myself, "Dang, girl, you are shedding a TON today!" Naturally, my next thought was, "How can I make a blog post out of this?" 

I decided I would be really clever and take a picture of the shower wall, coated with my recently-departed hair and make a guessing game out of it. "Guess how many hairs I shed!", my post would proclaim. "The contestant who makes the closest guess will win a special prize!"

And then I would confess, "Just kidding! I've counted all of my shed hairs before. Never again. Never, never again."

And that would be that.

However, I hit a bit of a snag when it came to photographing the evidence. You see, when I took the first photo, you couldn't see the hair very well because it was spread out so much. I took the liberty of creating a representation in Paint:

So then I moved the hair to a more central location, with most ends meeting in a nucleus of sorts:

Finally, I wrapped the hair into a Giant Hairball of Mass Destruction:

At that point, I nearly tossed my cookies myself. So you can thank me for not posting the actual photos here. (Thanks are accepted both in verbal praise and in baked goods. Preferably baked goods.)

Lady, there's a hole in the doughnut, too.

Last Saturday, Heather and I volunteered at the Utah Tour de Donut. What's that, you ask? Why, it's nothing more than a 21-mile bike race, where participants cram as many doughnuts down their gullets as possible after the 7th and the 14th mile in a quest for a reduced adjusted time and everlasting glory. For every doughnut consumed, the rider takes three minutes off their total time. According to legend, one year the "King Donut" ate 28 glazed rings of fried dough.

Sounds pretty great, no? (Except for the eating 28 doughnuts part. That sounds slightly vomitous.)

As volunteers, we were promised free t-shirts and free access to any leftover doughnuts at the end of the race. Naturally, these were our main incentives.  Unfortunately, the t-shirts turned out to be a "traffic cone orange" color instead of hot pink or lime green or neon blue (or pretty much any other color besides orange). I suppose beggars can't be choosers.

To go along with our fashionable outfits, Heather and I were also bestowed highlighter yellow safety vests, as we were in charge of directing traffic along the course. And of course, we couldn't direct traffic without incredibly legit stop signs!

Not pictured: super attractive, extra large safety vests.

For some reason, the race coordinators didn't want two volunteers at the same turn on the course, so Heather and I were separated by several miles for the duration of the race. Fortunately, we had our cell phones and could text each other when we hit a slow stretch.

Things went great for the first hour and a half or so, with the small exception that we didn't have any shade or seating and our arms got really tired (try pointing to your right with your arm extended for 15 minutes nonstop and you'll see what I mean). Many of the riders expressed their appreciation by thanking us every time they rode by (they had to complete a 7-mile course three times to finish). Several participants wore tutus and inflatable doughnut hats. Others rode tandem bicycles or, surprisingly, traveled on roller blades. It was all well and good.

And then we hit the last half hour of the timed race. Most of the cyclists had finished by then, so there were long stretches where we were just standing there doing nothing (except texting!). A lady in a car who happened to drive behind a fairly large clump of riders rolled down her window and yelled at me because they were riding in the middle of the street instead of on the side. Um, sorry? They were riding in the middle before they got to my turn, so I'm not sure how she expected me to enforce them sticking to the side of the road. I told Heather about this lady and she told me, "You should cut her!" Tempting. Very tempting.

Then, a little while later, I was several feet inside the right lane and held up my stop sign so a father and his son could cross safely. The truck I was trying to stop was not having any of that. It kept barreling towards me, and once it was five feet away or so and I realized it had no intention to stop, I leaped out of the way! The man referred to my stop sign and said, "I guess those are just a suggestion. . . ." Indeed.

Anyway, after an eternity of standing around and exchanging increasingly desperate texts with Heather ("I'm wilting!" "I think my left ankle is sunburned." "If they don't have any leftover doughnuts I may shed a thousand tears", and so forth) we were finally picked up in a blessed chariot of fire. By which I mean a van with air conditioning.

And we were just in time to eat the very last two doughnuts.

The Mush Pot

In general, I am not a very sappy person. At least, that's what I like to think.

Back in high school, I was vehemently vocal about my strong dislike for pet names among couples. When my dating friends called each other "muffin" or "cookie" (shout out if you're reading this!), I would either a) visibly shudder, b) tell them to stop being so mushy, or c) pretend to vomit.

I know, I was so mature.

I would say that I'm still not such a huge fan of pet names, but Jacob and I have a plethora of nicknames we call each other. Allow me to share a few.

By and large, the number one name we call each other -- even above our own given names -- is Charlie. And this must be said in a British accent, like this:

Variations: Charlie Brown, Charlie Bucket.

Another way we address each other is by filling in the blank: "Oh, my little ____________", with one of the following:

- pony
- squankee/squankinator (a million bonus points to you if you know what this is from and you aren't my sister)
- Honey Bunches of Oats
- petunias/flufflunias
- stinkerpuff/stinkerpants

And yes, we have even succumbed to jokingly calling each other food names, such as Peaches, Pears, and (Jacob's absolute favorite) Plums.

So, what do you think? Have I weakened my resolve against pet names or are these still significantly less mushy than most?

Songs that are not about pickles

Today, as Jacob was getting ready for work, I decided to treat him to a little song and a jig. I broke into dance and started singing an old Spice Girls song -- well, the 20 words of it I remembered, anyway, complete with mumbling in between phrases.

He looked at me and said, "My wife is weeiiird."

Harrumph! See if I serenade you ever again!

* * *

As a child, my mother taught us girls a song called "The Mexican Woodpecker." It goes like this:

The Mexican woodpecker high in the tree,

Peck-peck-peck-pecked all the day.

He grew so ambitious he wore off his beak,

Now you can hear him say:

Oh my beak! Oh my beak!

What a sad day when I lost it.

Hear me sigh, hear me cry.

What a sorry sight to see -- poor me!

One of my unnamed older sisters hated this song. Hated it. She thought it was so sad that the woodpecker lost his beak. My other unnamed older sister delighted in chasing the aforementioned sister around the house, singing this song at the top of her lungs, just to torment her*.

Throughout our two and a half years of marriage, I must have sung this song a number of times, because lately Jacob has started singing "Oh my beak!" at random occasions. It brings joy to my soul. 

*At least, this is what I remember happening. If either sister wants to chime in and set the story straight, be my guest.