A Symphony of Horror

Do you like scary movies and books?

I don't.
And I'm definitely not into vampires.
I've never read any of the Twilight series or seen the movies.

But thanks to my sweet husband, our extended family
had a great time last night at Copley Hall
watching the world's first Dracula movie!

It was a silent movie first shown in Germany in 1922
and because it was an unauthorized version of Bram Stoker's Dracula
they changed the name to
"Nosferatu."

This vampire was definitely not the handsome type.
In fact he was pretty creepy.
He reminded me of a rat with his big ears, skinny teeth and claw-like hands.

But one aspect of Nosferatu was gorgeous-- the music!
The San Diego Symphony accompanied the movie.
The conductor and arranger spent 8 months reconstructing the score from the original musical accompaniment. And the results were awesome!

I thoroughly enjoyed the performance, but Bram
Stoker's widow didn't feel quite the same way.
She was upset that the movie producers had "borrowed" her husband's story and she successfully sued for copyright infringement. She didn't receive monetary damages, but instead had the negatives and all copies of the film destroyed. Fortunately, a few copies survived.

Interestingly, Mrs. Stoker wanted to "clean up" the hairy, evil monster of her husband's book and the film version. In future stage and screen productions, Florence Stoker authorized a santitized, well bred, gentlemanlike Dracula.

Ah, now we now who to thank for Twilight!

My New Best Friend

This morning I got dressed in black jeans and a white shirt. When my husband told me he had a sore throat and wasn't feeling well, I had the perfect remedy! I offered to make him a blueberry smoothie. I even brought the glass upstairs to him. But during the hand-off, I managed to drip smoothie all over the front of my shirt.

So I quickly grabbed another white shirt, only to find it was all wrinkled. I ran downstairs to add it to a small load Marianne had in the drier. A few minutes later it was nice and crisp, so I slipped it on and went on my way. Thank goodness I didn't actually leave the house because, as my children pointed out to me, I had failed to notice that my shirt was covered with greasy pink spots. A quick investigation proved that a tube of pink chapstick had found its way into the drier--and all over my shirt.

I headed back to my closet for my 3rd shirt of the day, only this time I chose a black and grey print!

Evolution of a Mom

I've been a mom for 20 years now and I'm sure that my parenting style has changed over time--hopefully for the better. Maybe it's just wishful thinking. Here's an example, so you can decide for yourself!

THEN - 2002

I decided my kids should study birds, so I bought a science kit and planned everything. My sister and I even ordered owl pellets for the children to dissect. My friend who lived in a rural area offered me some for free. I refused, claiming I didn't want to bother her, but secretly I was disgusted at the idea. The own pellets I had ordered were sanitized and wrapped in foil and we used tweezers and other tools that came with the kit to remove and identify the bones. My kids enjoyed it, but when we finished they were done with their study of owls.

NOW - 2010

Evan has been really into birds for at least two months. With my older kids I would have called it a "unit study" in our homeschool. Several weeks ago during my morning walk, I noticed something on the sidewalk. I recognized it as an owl pellet and excitedly told Evan about it. He brought it home and we sat on the patio while he dissected it. He was thrilled to find the vertebrae, a ball and socket joint and identify the femur, tibia, fibula etc.


He has also:

• drawn, painted and sculpted lots of birds
• read several bird books
• identified birds using the field guide
• spent hours on bird websites
• caught (and released) wild birds (in that rusty old trap behind him in the photo)
• put up a bird feeder to observe more birds
  
• trained and cared for his pet parakeet "Scott"
• watched Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds
• found a forgotten science kit and completed several lessons on birds and flight
• dissected an even larger owl pellet he found down the street

Even more impressively, he convinced me to let his bird sit on my head. This may not sound like a big deal to you, but I have issues with birds. I freak out when seagulls swoop down looking for a snack at the beach. As a toddler, I was repeatedly attacked by nest-building bluejays who wanted my hair. And do you remember the name of that poor girl who is nearly pecked to death in The Birds? That's right--her name is Melanie!

One thing's for sure. I definitely have way more gray hair now!

Happy May!

May is always a busy month for us. This year we even missed May Day, but maybe we can play catchup for Family Home Evening tonight. Here are a few of the exciting events coming up this month:

• May 13 - Aaron turns 18
• May 19 - Our granddaughter is scheduled to arrive!

• May 21 & 22 - Performance of Shakespeare's As You Like It. I'm directing and Marianne is "Celia".
  
• May 30 - Aaron's Eagle Court of Honor & our 23rd wedding anniversary
  

Chips From He!!

Actually, the chips are good. It's the bag I hate!

Last night Evan and I went to see a fun production of You're A
Good Man Charlie Brown. On the way there, we stopped at Target to pick up a few things and I told Evan he could get a snack to munch on during the play. When we got out to the car, I was startled by a horrible rustling noise. Evan explained that Sun Chips now come in a "green" bag. The bag even has a little warning label: "Louder because it's compostable!"
And believe me, they're not kidding.

Evan loved the noisiness of the bag and took great glee in tormenting me on the way to the show. But when got there, even he admitted, "Mom, I can't take this bag inside. There's no way I can get a chip out without the bag crackling."
He solved the problem by dumping his chips into a plastic (non-compostable, but very quiet) Target bag.

Today after church he went around the house annoying his sister and me with the empty and now even LOUDER bag. I finally told him to get rid of it.
And because we aren't currently composting,
he threw it in the trash.

I'm all for going "green"
but not at the price of my sanity!

Easter Fail!

I love the Easter season and I've always tried to make it a special time at our house. I want our family to find ways to focus on the life and resurrection of our Savior, but I also love celebrating with eggs, Easter baskets and candy. The way I see it, all those "fun" things are just symbols of something even more joyful and exciting.

The Easter bunny always hides the kids' baskets and they have to search all over the house. This year the bunny had especially good taste and included books along with the ridiculous amounts of candy. Here are links for some great Easter books. Choose your category: Nephite, Restoration, First Easter, Isaiah, Easter ideas

Sorry, for going off on a book tangent. I just couldn't resist!

We also had a great time trying some of Martha Stewart's egg dying techniques. Here is a "cracked" egg I made. It gave me a good chance to develop my patience as I cut a jagged edge out of sticky electrical tape using little tiny scissors.

Another new project this year was making a garden tomb. Marianne has more wonderful pictures on her blog and a link to the creative friends who inspired us. It was exciting to get up on Easter morning and find the stone rolled away. The next day, the little buds you see just above the stone, surprised us by bursting into bloom. Special thanks to my sister who forgave us for visiting their yard while they were gone and digging up some moss for our garden.

Now for our Easter disaster. . .

I really wanted to have a seder dinner with my family this year. My younger kids can hardly remember the last time, so I decided to celebrate Passover during Family Home Evening the day after Easter. Unfortunately, I had trouble with my grocery list.

Grape juice - check!
Green herbs - check!
Roasted eggs - hey we can use the ones we dyed!
Lamb bone - umm, why don't we just use a breadstick
Matzah - totally forgot

I am embarrassed to admit that instead of kosher unleavened bread, we used ritz crackers. Without the lamb bone and the Matzah I probably should have abandoned the whole idea, but I persevered. I got out my almonds, apples and cinnamon and set to work making the haroset. My blender gave me a bit of trouble, but it was finally finished. A quick taste confirmed it was delicious!


As our Passover dinner proceeded, things were going well. We lit the candles, recited scriptures and sang songs. We sampled the haroset and herbs. Then I noticed that the haroset looked a bit gray. Upon closer inspection I found that there seemed to be little gray things rising to the top the of bowl. What was going on?!

When Aaron spit out pieces of rubber, I suddenly realized why my blender hadn't worked very well.. The rubber sealing ring at the base had gotten caught on one of the blades and was chopped up along with the haroset.

Uggghh! I guess it's a good thing we're not Jewish.

April Fool's

As a child, I LOVED April 1st. Mainly because it gave me permission to play jokes on my brother Scott. I was a very rules-oriented kid. I wasn't a practical joker because that usually involved lying or breaking some kind of rule. But on April Fool's Day, it was okay. In fact, you were SUPPOSED to fool people.

So, I spent every March 31st planning a prank. One year I "sent" him a package from Hawaii with nothing but bricks inside. Another year I fooled with his favorite condiment, cinnamon sugar. I planned to add pepper to the mix, but the pepper spilled all over me and I ended up sneezing for about 20 minutes! One year we had friends visiting and we planned an elaborate hoax on our moms. Our story was that one of the kids had been climbing on the swing set and fell from the top. We had the "injured" child scream and then lay down "unconscious" on the ground. The rest of us acted really upset and someone ran to get the moms. We considered using fake blood as ketchup, but decided against it. Our trick was a huge success, except for the fact that our mothers didn't quite see the humor in it.

A few years ago, I made meatloaf cupcakes and pound cake "cheese" sandwiches. It was fun, but it didn't really fool anyone. One year Marianne put a raisin in the toothpaste tube and it was quite a "gross out" to Evan. My brother Jason once sent us an ultrasound picture announcing that they were pregnant. We were all impressed with his mad photoshop skills, but none of really believed him.

I guess I need to plan ahead and come up with something to make next April Fool's Day really memorable. Any ideas?

What is your favorite April Fool's trick?