Awkward Family Photos

I just spent way too long looking at my favorite new site. I couldn't tear myself away. Click HERE to see some wonderful awkward family photos that made me laugh so hard I had tears. You will see little gems like these below.

Good Thing Someone was wearing his seatbelt.

Lovely

I think someone needs to go potty.

Nice tan lines

Just a little too far to look casual.

I think my treadmill is broken...

As I was on the treadmill this morning I could swear that the last 10 seconds of the hardest stretch lasted 30 seconds!

Gonna Go Back in Time!

Just for a little fun I thought I'd take a trip down memory lane and post some pictures of me from the past.


This first picture is of me from 1950! Yes hard to believe. Seems like it was just yesterday that I was going to the sock hops just to see my heart throb Jimmy. One January night we went on a walk and he gave me his Letter sweater because it was a cool night. I was on cloud nine.

This next picture is only 2 years later, 1952. One of my favorite things to do was practice the hula hoop. I was a bit of a spaz, so I didn't like to do it in front of many people. All the pepper shakers in school did it so it was the thing to do. One time Jimmy wanted to try the hula hoop. I said, "Go ahead, Razz my berries." It was a big tickle because he was worse than I was.

The next picture is from 1954. Jimmy jacketed me that year. It was very fun going steady. He was a greaser with a jacked up car. We mainly liked to hang and watch tv.

This is from 1958. I had moved on from Jimmy when this picture had taken place. (The grease in his hair got really grody.) So I was at another sock hop and I saw an Ivy Leaguer, named Charles. I was real gone when I saw him and his flat top. (No grease to worry about) I hadn't ever seen him before, but I saw him cast me an eyeball. FAT CITY! He made his way over to me and said that a group of friends were going to go see a flick at the passion pit. I love watching movies from the car, so I went too. Besides, he seemed real hip. But it was a real fake out. He turned out to be a real wet rag and during the movie I just piled up the Z's. I guess looks can only go so far.

This next picture is from 1960. Little did I know the changes that this new decade would bring. I still loved to go see flicks when I could. But I had just got a gig teaching school, so I didn't have as much time. I started seeing all the girls wearing mini skirts, but I wasn't quite ready to embrace that yet.
(In all honesty - this picture looks almost too real. I can see my mom in this picture.)

In 1964 I was still teaching at the elementary school that I went to as a child. And I had just started to see Buddy. He was such a groovy character. We had a lot of fun going to dances and I actually started to wear those mini skirts I'd seen other girls start to wear.

In 1966 I was still teaching and loved the new book, "Where the Wild Things Are." It was a great book, and still is. I was a big Elvis fan too. Buddy and I parted ways after he took me to my first protest at the college campus. The protest was crazy, and I realized I didn't really know Buddy as well as I thought I did.

I know there is a huge gap in pictures here. This picture is from 1978. The 70's just weren't good to me fashion-wise. I must admit though, I loved to go to the disco clubs. My boyfriend for most of the 70's was Kip. He was a dancing fool! He could make anyone look like they could dance. We especially loved ABBA (still do). I did go through a bit of a flower child faze. Grew my hair out long and I loved the bell bottoms. But towards the end of the decade I was a big Carpenter's fan and little did I know that I'd look so much like a Charlie's Angel?? Who Knew? Gotta Love that feathered do.

This picture is from 1980. Yes, another decade again. The eighties were good to me. My new guy was, Judd. I always think that's fitting because it's the name of the actor from a great 80's movie, "Breakfast Club." In fact I met him at an aerobics class. He was totally awesome. He was great at the rubiks cube. With my job I got a new computer for my classroom. It was great. I had two large teacher desks in the room. One for me and all my teaching books, supplies, etc. And the other large desk was for my computer. Judd was a computer whiz. We liked to play games on the computer together.

This next picture is from 1982. I was obviously still into the Carpenters. I wanted my hair to look exactly like Karen's. But I was really starting to get into MTV. It was great. Judd and I would watch MTV a lot, and he wanted to be a VJ. I started teaching aerobics on the side of my teaching career. Around the end of the year I noticed that Judd didn't really want to come to my aerobics class. He was still pretty hot stuff in his alligator polo, with the flipped up collar, and his rad high tops. But we just didn't have as much fun together. I think we were drifing away and once he bought a Nintendo, Super Mario Bros. got more time than I did. I guess the relationship just kind of fizzled. At one time I thought about dedicating a Madonna song to him on the radio, but I didn't. I don't think it would have changed anything.

By 1984 I was a huge Madonna fan. My new boyfriend was named, Tyson. He LOVED Madonna. We went to a couple concerts together. He loved to go shopping too. We met one night while we were shopping at the mall and literally bumped into each other as we were looking for the jelly bracelets. You know the ones, that you could mix and match, twist together and have the two circular bracelets intersecting. LOVE IT! He was a great fashion counselor. He always helped me pick out the perfect accessories. He was the one that actually showed me that I didn't have to use a rubber band for my tie at the bottom of my t-shirt. They really sold t-shirt tie holders. You remember the ones. It was a circle with a line going through the center. AWESOME!

In 1986 I was definitely not dating Tyson anymore. I'm sure you can probably figure out why. I was dating a guy named Blaine. I also really liked his name because it always reminded me of the guy from "Pretty in Pink" He was such a stud. He had an awesome mullet. That was hot enough, but he'd perm his hair every couple months so his mullet looked crisp. We liked to go to concerts a lot. We loved The Thompson Twins, Howard Johnson, and Duran Duran. We'd go dancing at clubs a lot too.

In 1988 I was still dating Blaine, but the magic was dying. I found out that he was seeing another girl on the side. I was so ticked off. When I found out for sure that he was two timing me I slashed the tires of his Pinto. So I didn't really have anything to do on Friday night's so I'd just end up watching a lot of TGIF. I also liked watching Family Ties, Cheers, Perfect Strangers. You know, all the good ones. I also got really good at all the best video games. Kind of a sad year for me. That's ok though, good things were still to come.

By 1992 I had definitely recovered from my breakup with Blaine. I was dating a guy, Brady. We usually hung out with our groups of friends. We'd definitely always meet up at someone's house every Saturday night to watch SNL. My favorite was Dana Carvey's church lady. Hillarious. I was getting a little into the grunge scene with music. Pearl Jam, was one of my favorites. I loved getting my hair permed because the higher the hair, the better.

In 1996 I was a huge Friends fan. Maybe that's why I'd still like to just hang out with friends. No, I wasn't still with Brady. I'd moved on. I wasn't really dating anyone, but had lots of friends I'd hang with. We'd go dancing a lot, and go hiking. We also liked to get movies and watch them at each others homes. Good Times.

By the year 2000 I was still looking hot! (See picture below) Life was good. I was still a big "Friend's" fan, but didn't spend as much time watching tv. But there were some new type of shows called "Reality Shows." I did like to watch Survivor. I don't know if I could ever do that. I was dating an amazing guy, Bill. We met at the gym, and he was always so fun to be with.

So there you have it.

OK- I just spent WAY too much time on this silly post. But it was so fun seeing these funny pictures. Amazing what a difference hair makes huh. There are so many that look just like some of my sisters and my mom. CRAZY! Hope you made it through the whole post and if you didn't, I guess I'll never know.
(P.S. yes, all these stories were made up. I never dated a gay guy named, Tyson. :))

Yes, I think I can DANCE!

Ok, so this title is a little misleading. Although, I did take dance lessons for several years when I was younger, I am not even close to being a good dancer. I have rhythm, that's about it. But I absolutely LOVE the show, "So You Think You Can Dance!" Jerry got online at the beginning of the season this summer and applied for tickets. We were lucky enough to get to go to the live taping last Thursday. WOW, it was so much fun. We went to California early that morning and dropped our kids off at my sister-in-law Amy's house. We went with our friends from the ward, Bishop Lindsay and Monta. We had a lot of fun with them. When we got to California we hung out and ate lunch at Johnny Rockets in the Farmer's Market. Then we lined up for the show. We had to line up about 1 1/2 hours early to make sure we got in. We rode the trolly for a whole block! It was fun.

Once we got in through the gates we sat outside the studio in a little waiting area. I guess we don't quite fit the demographic of the show, (not 18, cutesy, and Jerry is a boy) so they didn't casually walk by and ask us to join a certain group - the group that stands right by the stage. No, they ignored us. I honestly was fine with that though. Wow - sore feet to have to stand that whole time. When we finally got in the studio we got to sit in the seats reserved for family and friends. We were sitting right next to Melissa's dad. (She's the ballerina) It was cool talking to him. He says all the dancers live together in a little condo and spend ALL their time dancing. They meet with the choreographer on Friday and have 3 hrs with them, is all. And he thinks they have about 3 hours with them on Sat. too. He was very nice. They taped "The Black Eyed Peas" performance, and it was AWESOME. We had perfect seats too. 2nd row, and right in the center. Then there was about an hour wait till we went on live for the east coast. In that time the "audience warmer" entertains and had a big dance party on the stage. Monta and I almost went down to dance on stage - just to say, "I've been on that stage", but they were just about done, and Jerry noticed that they were starting to turn people away. In that time some people with tickets, (family or friend) came and we got booted out of our seats and moved back. Still good seats, but not so close. Not such a bad deal though because with our move came our television debut. IF you still have the show recorded - I don't know why you'd erase it:) Right as they announced Evan as safe, it cut to his mom and you can see Jerry standing in the upper right corner, and if your tv is wide enough you can barely see me next to him. You can also see both of us when it showed Jason's dad in the audience. We're in the upper center, but a little trickier to spot us. Yeah, we're famous now. Get this, Louis got to sit right next to Marilou Henner (from the tv show Taxi, and she was on the Celebrity Apprentice) We thought for sure they'd do a close up of her and they'd be on tv. And apparently she also thought they'd do a close up, or shout out to her because she was fluffing her hair the entire show, and arranging her wrap/shawl. Louis and Monta said she was very nice though. Monta also ran into Evan's mom in the potty and she gave her some pins for all of us to wear to show our support for Evan. It was just awesome being there, and seeing what it was really like. The studio is much smaller than it appears on tv, and HOLY COW! Cat Deely is even twiggier in person that she appears on tv. Her legs are forever long and tiny little twigs. So, now we've applied for tickets for the season finale, doubt we'll get them, but we can always hope!

We got home late that night, about 1:30 and Amy offered to watch the kids overnight. Can you imagine? Offering to get up a couple times in the night with your baby that isn't sleeping through the night yet! And she said she actually enjoyed it! It was wonderful to get a full night's sleep and wake up at 8:00! I always say to myself, "If I just had a couple hours without any kids I'd actually be able to get my house so clean, clean the toilets/ showers, mop the floors. Get so much accomplished." So what did I do in the couple hours I had until I got my kids back? Hmm, watched tv, played on the computer, had a nice breakfast that I could actually sit and eat uninterruped. It was wonderful. It was a great way to end the fun day in California!

Want to Gobble Her Up!!

What a doll!! I could just eat her up. Sydney just turned 5 months old last week and she is so fun. She's mastered rolling and can easily get across the room to reach all the toys that Hayden and Rebecca don't want her sucking on. What a cutie.

All three of my darlings

My Cool Cuties

A Word of Warning!

It is good to be thrifty. It is good to do things on your own rather than paying others to do it. It is NOT good to wash your own car with the cold water from the hose when it is about 110 degrees outside. Doing so might result in a huge crack down the front windshield. What joy! I'm glad we saved $4.00 on our own car wash so that it can go towards the repair. So much for being thrifty!