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for Ossine Shoes

I have been looking for a good pair of walking/running shoes. For a few weeks now. Because I want to make good use of my Fitness Center pass. And because I get terrible shin splints if I just walk from my van to Wal-Mart. Really!

So here's me, at the Fitness Center: I check out the treadmill for 20 minutes, trying to figure it out. Finally I've got it, and I hop on and set it for 15 minutes. I don't have the greatest lung stamina in the world, but I figured I could handle 15 minutes. So I'm walking along and doing pretty well—for about 8 minutes. And then I feel this terrible burning; not in my lungs, my heart is not racing. But my shins are burning up. I look at the timer; 7 minutes 45 seconds left. I tell myself, "I'm halfway done. I can go to the end." And I look up at the excessively boring and soundless television screens overhead, to keep my mind off my shins. I glance back at my timer when I think I might die from the pain in my legs. Four minutes left. I tell myself, "It's only four minutes—I can do that." And then I find myself checking the timer every 30 to 45 seconds.
"Two minutes left—I can do that."
"30 seconds—I can do that."

When my agonizing 15 minutes is done I stretch my legs as well as I can and then go in for another 15 minutes of torture. And that's all I can do. I hobble out to my car and drive home. It's really aggravating because I want to keep going; get my heart beating; work up a sweat. But my legs just won't do it.

Well, I've tried taking a several-day break, I've tried doing all kinds of leg-stretches, I've tried all kinds of lower-leg exercises. To no avail. Every little walk I take causes my shins and the tops of my feet pain. I began to suspect my shoes, which were bought at that nation-wide seller of cheap shoes. My friend, Kim, echoed this suspicion. She said, "Get yourself a good pair of shoes!"

So the quest for good shoes started. I went to sporting-goods stores and to athletic-shoe stores, and a few others. They would measure my feet—at a 6 1/2 to maybe a 7—and point me toward my size. If I asked a question like, "What's the difference between walking shoes and running shoes?" I didn't get very satisfactory answers.

Today I went to Ossine shoes.

Bruce and I discovered Ossine Shoes when we were first married (maybe even when we were dating), and the store was a little hole-in-the-wall in a strip-mall. It is a family operation, run by a nice Korean man, who sold his shoes for amazing-good prices. We were happy for them when they grew enough to move into their own building.

Well, today a salesman greeted me and asked what I was looking for. I told him my sad story: I need good walking shoes because I get horrible shin-splints and I know nothing about shoes, my experience being limited to Payless Shoe Store.

And he says, "Take off your socks and shoes and show me your legs." No. That's not what he really said. (He's twenty years younger than me; he doesn't really want to see my legs.) He really said to take off my socks and shoes and roll my pant legs up to my knees. That was different; this might be an exciting trip after all. Then he had me do these crazy things that no other shoe-salesperson did; things like stand there, and walk across the floor while he knelt down and watched my feet. And then he measured my feet and said I should wear a 7 1/2 shoe—which kind of surprised me. But, guess what? He was right! He picked out a few pairs which would keep my feet in the right position when I walk, and they all felt fabulous! It was a tough decision, but I finally did choose one and took it home with me. It was far more pricey than Payless shoes—about three times more; but they feel about a thousand times better. (And the price was comparable, or even less, than Foot Locker.)

Yes, I am now the happy owner of some well-fitted, comfortable shoes with arch support and everything! Hooray!

And tomorrow it's back to the gym. Wish me luck!


And if you're looking for good shoes and excellent service, visit Ossine Shoes and Gifts at 7576 South Redwood Road.

Pedals for Hope 2009

I'm not super fond of school assemblies; I figure they are really meant for the kids. Let me clarify: I am the kind of person who gets teary-eyed when I see kids singing or reciting the things they've learned (I get that from my dad), but other school assemblies don't do much for me. But Friday morning I attended the best school assembly ever: the 2009 Pedals for Hope Celebration.

Entheos Academy (my kids' school—yea!) just finished their Pedals for Hope fundraiser this year. Last year only the sixth grade participated in this bike tour, raising $5,411.56 for cancer research at the Huntsman Institute. This year the entire middle school (7th through 9th grades) took part in the bike tour. The kids were determined to raise more this year than last, and set a goal to earn $9500. Miss Millar said she had to bite her tongue when she heard that goal; it seemed way too high. [pardon the fuzzy pics; I was at the back of the room with only my phone camera . :-( above: the bike heroes on stage]

The kids learned about bikes, riding and maintenance, and had to practice riding at home for several weeks to log in exercise hours before the bike tour. They also contacted businesses to sponsor them and make donations, as well as asking family and friends for donations.

The bike tour was divided into four phases: On Monday a group biked ten miles; Tuesday's group did 20 miles; on Wednesday, 30 miles. That same week ten students had gone to Washington DC; they arrived home Wednesday night and on Thursday nine of those kids rode ten miles, giving a double meaning to their name, The DC Ten. The last group to ride, the Thursday group, rode 40 miles (one of the DC Ten actually went on the 40-mile ride). This year Lindsey rode with the 20-mile group and Jason rode with the 4-T group, or "The Team That Triumphs!" The 40-milers. Each day when the riders arrived back to school the entire school was out on the school grounds to greet them, and high-five them.

The entire school was at the assembly on Friday to find out how much money they actually raised, and to cheer for the bike-riding heroes. And boy, did they cheer! Any highschool would be green with envy over the Entheos school spirit.

Entheos students made pins and gave them
to guests who attended the assembly

But although the bike-ride comprised the biggest part of the fundraiser, there was more. The entire school participated in a Penny War, competing to see which grade could bring in the most change to add to the cancer funds. This year the Kindergarten won by a landslide: one set of grandparents had been collecting change for 31 years, and when they heard of the Penny Wars for cancer research they thought that it was a very worthy cause to donate their "loose change" to. The total brought in from the Penny Wars was $817.28 (two five-gallon jugs full of change). Of that, the Kindergarten alone brought in $400 worth of pennies. When they announced that, you should have heard the students!

Last year a few girls cut their long hair, donating it to Locks of Love. One young man, Zandon, thought that Locks of Love was such a cool idea that he grew his hair out for an entire year just so he could donate it this year.

He and five other volunteers had their hair cut at the assembly so they could make their personal donations for cancer patients. Each time a ponytail was cut off and held up to view the kids burst out cheering. Two more boys, Jonathon and Donovan, said that if the school reached their $9500 goal they would shave their heads. They were also on the stage last Friday, losing their hair to shouts of, "Jon-a-thon!" and "Don-o-van!" [photo: Locks of Love]

But the culminating event was the unveiling of the grand total that the kids had raised, something that was kept secret from the student body until the Friday Celebration. The students stomped out a "drum roll" while two of the teachers, Miss Millar and Miss Amy, unrolled a giant roll of paper with the grand total printed on it. It opened up from back to front, and as the students got to see the number growing and growing, the cheering increased and increased. When we saw the total of $10,001.54 the room exploded in deafening shrieks and whistles, cheers and applause.

The students presented a giant check to a representative from the Huntsman Institute, who told them that their money would go to research that would not only help their own friends and neighbors, and people from Utah, but people all over the world. [photo: a big check]

It was a great assembly, celebrating a great event. Those kids keep raising the bar. What will their goal be for next year?

Pedals for Hope 2009

Abbi and the Parakeet

Friday evening Bruce brought home a bird cage—borrowed from my nephew, Ben. And we got a cup of bird seed from our neighbor, who has a cockatoo. The little parakeet is much happier now—she even chirps and sings sometimes.

But Abbi is living in torment. She spent all of Friday evening staring at the parakeet, and trying to get a little closer. We put the cage on top of our tall bookcase for the night, and this is where I found Abbi first thing Saturday morning:

I don't think she slept all night; just stared at the bird.

Does this look Tweety and Sylvester-ish?

Well, soon (if we ever have a free minute) we will take Parakeet to live at Melanie's house. Then all the animals will be more at ease.

More Birdie Adventures

Yesterday, when I went out back to grill up some zucchini for lunch (yum!), I saw a magpie chasing a bit of fluttering paper around. But as I looked closer, I realized it looked more like a little, white bird than a paper. And then a second magpie came and they were both picking at it. I was barefoot, and they were in the neighbor's yard, so I called Bruce out to look. He went over and scared the magpies away and, sure enough, they had been tormenting a little parakeet!

Bruce stood guard while I went in the house to get my shoes on and grab something to put the bird in. I also grabbed my garden gloves—you know, so I could handle it like a falconer would, and the scary parakeet wouldn't hurt me. ;-)
No! I'm not really afraid of a little parakeet tearing me up. But I didn't want to just hold it in my bare hand if it was bleeding or anything.

I picked it up pretty easily and the first thing it did was bite my finger and flutter away. But it didn't get far (I think it's wings are clipped), and I caught it a second time. This time it was holding on to my glove with it's beak and it's little claws, and it was kind of hard to get it disentangled and into the box. But we did, and we took it into our house.

I felt sorry for it being in a dark shoebox, but I was able to give it some light by taking the lid off of the shoebox and covering it with a thin piece of plexi-glass instead. I weighted it down with a few apples.
[the parakeet says, "Now what?"]
Now it could have light, and it couldn't escape, but this arrangement would make it pretty easy for Abbi to get the little bird. Did I save it from the magpies just so my cat could have it? Well, no. Fortunately she was doing the lazy-cat-thing when we found the parakeet so she didn't know of it's existence. Yet. But Bruce and I both had to leave the house later, and Abbi just might wake up and decide to do a little hunting. So I put Abbi in the boys' room and put the little birdie box into my room and shut my bedreoom doors. Jessica thought we should close the other bedroom door on Abbi, but I was pretty sure she couldn't open my bedroom door. The little birdie was safe.

Unfortunately, Bruce had left the house before I locked the bird up, and he also got home before I did. He didn't know about the pet arrangements I'd made, and he went into our room and left the door open. Abbi loves our bedroom so she went right on in. And then things happened! She knocked over the box and chased the bird around. Jason was able to grab Abbi and he threw her outside so that Bruce, Michael and Jason could try to catch little parakeet again and make him safe. Parakeet was fluttering all around our room and into the hallway trying to get away from all the scary creatures. He was having a really bad day yesterday.

Jessica admires our new friend (in the safety of a locked bathroom)

Well, he's "safe" in his plexi-glass, apple-covered box again. I looked online to find out what I could feed him, gave him a little dish of water, and there he is. In my bedroom. I have no intentions of keeping a bird—they are so messy! But we have no idea who this birdie belongs to. Last evening my kids even went door-to-door on our street to see if anyone was missing a little, yellow parakeet. Nope.

Now what?

Mother Nature Wins

OK. Normally I am not a quitter; I don't like quitters. Normally I try and try and try again until I get exactly what I want. But I am tired of the whole garden thing.

This is what I've accomplished after three days of working by myself with a shovel. The next two pictures show what's left to do.

That pile of weeds will fill up a kitchen trash bag. I've already filled four of those.

My back hurts, my legs hurt and my feet hurt from using all my weight to jump on the shovel in my every-day sneakers. My hands itch with hives, even though I've been using gloves. (Fortunately they are not long-lasting hives.)

Now I'm not normally a wimp physically either (remember, ballet training, eight babies . . . ) In fact it really annoys me when I get tired out or even injured; often those things just motivate me to push harder and accomplish what I want anyway.

But I look at this garden-business and here's what I see: It took me three days (yes, only during the cooler hours) to clear about 1/5 of the entire garden. So in another twelve days I could have the rest done. Well that's kind of stinky considering that we should have already planted by now, and when you consider that during those twelve days the weeds will start popping back up in the space I've already cleared. And then, assuming the garden ever gets planted, who do you think will get to do all the weeding, etc?

No, I just won't do it; I quit!

Instead I'll try out my own girly nature. I am talking about using my wicked, womanly wiles on Bruce to get him to do the work. (And, in turn, he can get the boys to help him.) But I wonder, can I actually produce tears over this? I don't think so. I'll have to come up with something else.

Nature Girl

I hate gardening! Well, I can't really say I hate hate it, because I do like a few things about it. I like seeing my little plants get big and flower and, best of all, produce food for me to eat. I really like that! It's just everything else about it that I don't like. At all.

Last night I decided that if we're going to grow a garden this year, then I'd really better get busy on it. I have talked about it in the presence of my family (hint, hint) for weeks; but I've had no takers. So at about 7:30 p.m. I went out and looked around at our garden spot. We had some really nice rain a couple weeks ago, and the weeds really have appreciated this. They were a couple feet high. Unfortunately this means they were probably also a couple feet deep into the ground too. Work, work, ugly work.

I'm not normally against working; I think it's a good thing. But here's why this particular work is ugly:

1. I hate trying to get a shovel in under the roots of the weeds. I'm not strong enough to just shove it down in there. No, each scoop takes me about five minutes, I swear. Because I have to use all of my weight and strength to dig up the ground, and then I have to squat or stoop to finish pulling the weed and shake the dirt off of it's roots. Once or twice is OK, but not for a couple hours straight.

2. I hate trying to find the real root of the problem. Our local weeds have roots that reach all the way down to . . . Hades. And if you chop them off, they just sprout back stronger than ever. No, you have to get the entire root out.

3. I HATE bugs! I don't mind spiders and praying mantises if they don't touch me (since they eat other bugs); and the bumblebee that was hanging around last night was really cool. But I hate, despise, detest, abhor the crawly, shiny bugs that live in the dirt. The very dirt that I'm plunging my hands into so I can attempt to destroy the weeds. Eeew! And worms! This morning I unearthed a 6-inch worm that was as fat as my finger. Then I discovered that actually I chopped him in half, so there were two 6-inch worm pieces crawling around where I was working. Gross. I've often seen my dad pick these guys up and toss them aside, but no way am I going to do that—no, not even with gloves on!

4. I hate that I'm slightly allergic to our indigenous weeds. I come in sneezing and covered with a rash each time I weed the garden.

5. I don't really like being in the sun all that much. Although 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. aren't so bad.

6. I hate that it takes me two hours to clear about eight square feet of garden, when I'm perfectly aware that it took Bruce, Michael and Jason two hours to clear the entire garden last year.

I confess, I do like admiring any good work that I've done—and getting everyone else to admire it. But I'd be happy to admire someone else's work in this case.

I suppose the real problem is that I am a feminist. Not the "anything a man can do, I can do better" kind that you're thinking of. No, I am a true feminist: the kind that believes in classic femininity. The kind that believes that men really are bigger and stronger than I am, and that they can do some things better than I can—like digging up the garden and preparing the soil. And so I believe that if I have three strong, capable men in the house, then they should do the gardening. At least the yucky part of it. (In Jason's defense, he did help me last night. And Bruce was working. But Michael . . . Do you feel guilty yet?)

Some women, like my mother-in-law, my mother, and my sister Melanie, actually like gardening! Go figure! Margaret (my mother-in-law) assures me that when I am less busy with little kids I will start to like this task. No. I don't think I'll ever like the back-breaking part of it. Putting the cute little plants or seeds into the ground, watching them grow, seeing the flowers, eating the fruit; yes. I already do like those. If that's all there was to gardening I would love it!

This is me holding up my trophy-weed; one that's nearly as big as I am. Unfortunately, it got away: the broken end of the root I'm holding is as big around as my thumb
—that means there's still a lot more of it down in the ground. >:-( And, just to clarify, the smile is for the guy behind the camera—not for the sheer joy of pulling weeds.

All Partied Out

I love throwing parties. I love cooking for people, and entertaining, and visiting with them. I even like just sitting back and watching them enjoy themselves. If everyone leaves happy, I am pleased with my success.

Last night I helped my ward Relief Society have another successful party: our Mother-Daughter Night. We had a pasta bar with salad and breadsticks; and for dessert: chocolate cake with strawberries and cream. We had a short, but cute program: The younger girls did a short, little dance, and then there was an equally short fashion show followed by a very short spoken program. We had crafty-things to do: making bracelets and bath salts. Some of the ladies came in dress-ups. There was a lot of mingling and visiting—among about 70 people, and I think everyone really enjoyed themselves. It was a nice night.

But the planning of it, even though I was working with other people (or maybe because I was), was . . . mildly stressful. Planning began immediately after Easter (party one in this series). Then, the Mother-Daughter thing followed hard on the heels of Mother's Day (party two). And now I'm planning a birthday party for Kaylie this weekend (three) and a baby shower for my sister-in-law Becky for next weekend (four). I get a one-week break, and then it will be Kaylie's baptism (five) the following week, on June 6. I will get a short breather before the three parties of Father's Day weekend—Lindsey's birthday is on Father's Day, and Rachel's is the next day.

Yes, I do love planning and throwing parties. And I am still looking forward to the upcoming parties. Truly! But I think maybe, with so much happening in such a short time, I—yes, even I—will be getting just a little partied out.

Mother's Day Surprise!

Last night Bruce said, "I have a goal to get all the Christmas decorations down before Mother's Day."

We have had a large wreath, with a big, red bow, hanging over our garage door since November 25 last year. The bow has been blown by the wind and weather and was getting a little scraggly-looking. The neighbors have noticed: Brother Bennett told Jason, "The next time I come to your house, that wreath had better be down." And Sister Thompson told Lindsey, "Your house is easy to find—it's the one with the Christmas wreath on the garage!"

Neighbors' comments aside, it seemed kind of dumb to still have our Christmas wreath up on the house. So I thought Bruce's goal was terrific! He went out to take care of it, and I got to work in the kitchen and promptly forgot about what he was doing.

After a little while, Bruce came back in the house and said, "Guess what I found?" Something about his countenance made me think it might not be good—I thought maybe he'd found some long-lost, and now moldy or rotten, former treasure in the garage. So I warily asked, "What?"

He found, after he took down the wreath, that there was a nest with two or three baby birds in it! Oh dear. "What should we do?" he asked. Well, we both knew the only thing to do was to put the wreath back up and hope the mother bird would go back to her babies. But before he did that I wanted to go out and see the nest and the babies. (I also figured that before we put the wreath back, I would at least cut the scraggly bow off of it.) As I was going out the front door I saw Abbi slowly moving, in stalking mode. "Abbi!" I said in a menacing voice, and she ran away (and then avoided me for the rest of the night). Bruce held up the wreath for me to see our babies: little, tiny birds with their grown-up feathers coming in. Awwwww!


Then Bruce went back up the ladder to hang up our Mother's Day wreath. Will mama bird come back and keep caring for her babies? Oh, I hope so!

Tee-Hee!

Yesterday, just as Bruce was about to set the table for dinner, Ryan said, "Dad, will you play a game of Simon Says with us?"

That's pretty cute, and Bruce figured he could take a few minutes to play Simon Says with his four youngest kids. So he goes down to the living room, and I hear Ryan say, "Simon says sit on the couch." Bruce and the little girls all sat on the couch. Then Ryan says, "Everybody tickle dad!" And they all pounced on him.

That cracked me up, and Bruce nearly died laughing. The kids all love it when they can dog-pile Dad and tickle him, but this was pretty darn sneaky!

Funny kids!