clarification, anyone?

In her comment on "pocatello, part ii", Shiree wonders:

So, what's happening with your Ogden house and what are your lodging plans in Pocatello? (I didn't quite catch that from the post, I am clueless about water in the living room and everything....)

In the interest of keeping our readership informed (although most of you might already know this), someone is in the process of purchasing our house in Ogden. So by the beginning of October, we should be lodging somewhere in Idaho, though where is a completely other question. At present, your guess is as good as mine. It will, however, be somewhere in the Southeastern portion of the state.

And, yes, about that water in the living room. Around last Thanksgiving, we heard some water dripping in the wall. Yes, I said in the wall. And down the ceiling. And behind the paint. So we did the only sensible thing we could do and put some tarps on the roof to hold off the rain and tore out the ceiling. Hence, water in the living room, pouring from a couple of cracks in our roof (tar and gravel, anyone?), all over the floor. What a mess is right. This is what it looked like.



The next day, I patched what I could and put up some new sheetrock to keep the cold out. And that's how we lived with it until a couple of weeks ago when the rain found its way in again.

Hence the new roof.

I'm sure that will make our buyers happy. I know it sure was fun for us (and all the family members that broke their backs helping us put down new sheeting and rolled roofing. Thanks a million, by the way. We love you all!)

Confusion abated?

another dam day

Near the beginning of August, we ventured out onto Pineview again to celebrate Grandma Ames' birthday. Here's a documentary of our rousing experience. (No pictures of Tyler this time. Tragically, he died when he and Brit's husband, also named Tyler, collided mid-air when the tube flipped and the laws of physics came into full effect. Not really about the whole dying thing though. Both of them came out of it alive, but neither got back out on the water that day. In fact, I might never again...)

brown, brown...

Since starting Kindergarten, Sid's "learned" her colors (she already knew them, but the review is good) and they've started on their letters. I think now they're up to E. My favorite thing about the colors is that her teacher gave them pictures to color that showed a little monster representing the color doing some action that rhymes with the color. (Picture that, if you can.)

Here are some examples:

Red: A fuzzy monster stands next to its smiling head, one hand resting on top of the head. (Macabre, I know. What are they teaching my kid here?!) And the poem:

"Red, Red,
Forgot its head."

Green: A masculine looking fuzzy monster with a crown on its head and ballet slippers on its feet does a ballet move--a pirouette maybe?--in the center of the page. And the poem:

"Green, Green
Is a dancing queen." (I'm not even going to comment on this one!)

Orange: A fuzzy monster eats an orange. And the poem:

"Orange, Orange
Ate an orange."

Brown: (This one is my personal favorite.) A fuzzy monster reaches down to pull up its pants. And the poem:

"Brown, Brown
His pants fell down."

Aren't colors wonderful?

As for the letters, Sid read her first words the other day: sheep, baa, our, and coats (from an animal book). I helped her with the sounds of the letters and then we put them together. She's learning so fast. Pretty soon, she'll be reading heavy stuff, like Nancy Drew or Twilight.

I can't wait...

pocatello, part ii: happy trails

Tyler's double posting again. He just can't get enough of this blogging thing.

Well, so far, not too bad.

I've made it to Pocatello fully clothed and (mostly) prepared for my classes.

We finally (Hallelujah!) have a contract and a new roof on the house. So, if things go according to plan, there will be no more water in the living room and we'll be living somewhere in Idaho's wide expanse at the beginning of next month.

Sid's enjoying kindergarten, although she's sad that we have to leave our house behind. (Believe me, babe, if we could take it with us, we would have moved already!) She actually asked me the other day why we couldn't find a school here for me to go to. I was wondering that myself. I especially wonder why the University of Utah had to reject me twice when I applied there a couple of years ago. I'm still bitter about that. (Go BYU!)

The only thing I'm not crazy about right now (although I'm living with it due to a newly formed reliance on caffeine) is the commute from Ogden to Pocatello. Granted, it is better than, say, the barren drive from Orem to St. George and takes much less time. But that one hour and forty-five minutes on the road is time I'd much rather spend doing something else...like reading or writing or being with my family.

Or sleeping. Sleeping is good. I never get enough of that.

I can't even listen to the radio much, because it turns static-y about halfway there and doesn't really come back until you're right outside of Pocatello. And it's almost not even worth trying to tune something in, especially since there's not really much decent on once the signal gets stronger.

As it now stands, I get a lot of thinking in. Sometimes this is helpful because I can revise or expand the ideas in my head (way too much going on in there!).

Last night, I actually turned my brain off for a few minutes, though, and made some tunes of my own. Nothing radio worthy. In fact, Sid's and Allie's songs are much more substantial and entertaining.

Oh well.

Maybe by the time this commuting business has run its course, I'll be someone akin to Mozart or Beethoven or Shakespeare. Don't expect it though. And when I try to share my commute-developed talents with you, just smile and nod. Eventually the travel lag will wear off and I'll come to my senses. At least I hope I will, anyway.

Until then, wish me/us happy trails.