Spring Break 2010!!!

(blog title to be read in the voice of a female 21 year-old college student drinking something alcoholic on a beach somewhere in Mexico)

All winter long I have been looking forward to April 2nd because that was, of course, the start of SPRING BREAK 2010!!! I really needed to do something different than my everyday routine (sleep too late, play at preschool, possibly go to second work, read, hang out with Tera, field a strangely high number of blind date requests, and avoid doing laundry). Now I am not saying that I don't love my everyday life....I absolutely DO LOVE all those things (except maybe the blind date situation). It was just that I needed to do something different....even if it was just for a couple of days. So that is exactly what I did.

For 4 days I went to visit my grandparents in Monticello Utah. I love both of them so much, and I love Monticello almost as much. It seems almost impossible for me to feel overwhelmed or anxious while I'm there....and this visit was no exception. I read books, crocheted baby blankets, ate too many treats, talked with my grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins. I endured a little Fox News Network and Weather Channel (my grandpa's 2 favorite channels). It was also nice to spend 8 hours alone with my mom talking about anything while we drove.

Then I spent a couple days at home, including a trip to the Dinosaur Museum with Pratt, Lindsay, James, Tera, Kim, Jackson, Ellie and Jane. It was so fun to get to do some of the fun things I tend to miss out on since I am always working! Then I got ready for yet another trip.

I spent another 3 1/2 days visiting my friend Jill and George Skouson in (or around) Denver. I absolutely love getting together with Jill (a former roommate) because we have so much fun together. We played games, stayed up late talking, laughing and crafting (I did take some pics but can't figure out how to upload them on my computer so....). I laughed more and laughed harder there than I have in weeks and it was so nice. Still to this day I can remember some joke we laughed at(meow!) and start laughing by myself (as I'm walking through the grocery store....which does make me look like a crazy person). They are so nice, and I really appreciate their letting me escape from my life and crashing in their life for a few days. And I even won 1 whole game!

I had a great week off and returned to the everyday routines more relaxed and able to handle all those things....although I still have a suitcase of laundry to do.

Glitter!

I do love glitter (who doesn't?) Here are the reasons why I love glitter:

1. I am a girl
2. It makes boring stuff un-boring
3. It is sparkly

But today my love of glitter increased because a bubbly little 3-year-old was dancing around me and sang this....

"I love glitter! I love glitter! It makes shit shine!"

I'm pretty sure she was just trying to say "It makes it shine" but the combination of an 's' at the end of the previous word and the 'sh' at the beginning of the next word made it impossible for her not to say shit...I mean it.

Laughable Moments

This week has been full of laughable moments and I'm here to share some of those moments with you, please to enjoy....

On Tuesday afternoon I was driving with my 2-year-old nephew and his most beloved stuffed panda in the car. For a solid 20 minutes Pratt and Panda had a conversation. Below is my favorite excerpt of the conversation: (imagine Panda's voice as a mixture of a squeaky little mouse and a kitten)

Pratt: "Hi Panda!"
Panda: "mew-mew-mew-MEW!"
Pratt: "What doin' Panda?"
Panda: "MEW-mew-MEW-mew-MEW."
Pratt: "Panda wanna snack?"
Panda: "Mew."
Pratt: "What want Panda?"
Panda: "Mew-Mew"
Pratt: "Oh. Panda want candy."
Panda: "Mew."
Pratt: (to me this time) "Dawn! Panda want candy!"
Me: "I don't have any candy."
Pratt: "OH MAN!"
Pratt: (back to Panda) "No candy Panda."
Panda: "MEW-mew-mew-mew-mew."
Pratt: "ok Panda," said in a reassuring tone as he gently cradled and and stroked Panda.

It was so adorable. Pratt doesn't even open his mouth when Panda "talks" so it is all the more believable. I was trying SO hard to not laugh because I didn't want him to be interrupted and stop.

Not long after this Pratt and I picked up his big sister, Emma, at the bus stop. I suggested we drive to the store to buy cupcake supplies and then head home to bake them. Both kids were excited, but as we drove Emma's comments took a turn for the worse:

Emma: "Dawn?"
Me: "Yes?"
Emma: "I need to tell you something."
Me: "Ok. What is it?"
Emma: "It's not me, like I SWEAR it's not me! But.....some people, not me!....but some people think you are really rude."
Me: "Oh really? Who are these people that think I am 'really rude'?"
Emma: "My friends."
Me: "Why do they think I am rude?"
Emma: "Well, they think you are rude 'cause you don't let me do stuff."
Me: "Oh. Well, I guess I'll just have to live with that."

Seriously, where did a 7-year-old learn "I SWEAR!" and when did she learn the 'blame bad things on your friends' bit? (for the record I am actually a really mean auntie and I don't let her do everything she wants to do and can often be heard telling her no, so I do understand that she, I mean some people, think I am really rude.)

In preschool this week I heard these comments:

Joseph: "Chris, can I use that block?"
Chris: "No."
Joseph: "Please?"
Chris: "Sorry no. This block says 'Jo-seph is al-ler-gic to this block' on it. So you can't use it 'cause you are allergic." (he very carefully tracked his finger along the imaginary words as he "read" them.)

Joseph strangely accepted this logic even though there is absolutely no writing on the block.


Sara was playing with the little people and said to the little people boy:

Sara: "Do you want to go to juvee?"
Little People Boy must have answered in her head because then she said, "Well, if you don't want to go to juvee then you need to do what I say."
Me: "What's 'juvee'?"
Sara: "Juvenile Detention. Bad kids go there."

Question: Where did a 5-year-old learn about "juvee"?
Answer: I have no idea and I'm not sure I want to know......


Luke: "Hey girls! Can I play at the kitchen with you?"
Grace: "Yes. You can be the daddy."
Lucy: "Yeah! And we will all be the mommies," gesturing to the three girls playing there.
Grace: "Here daddy, these are all your babies," handing Luke 4 baby dolls.

Do I really think they were playing 'polygamist family'? No, but it sure did sound like it.

A Driveway Moment

This post is dedicated to Eric, who I know secretly reads my blog!

Yesterday afternoon while driving home from running errands I caught the beginning of "This American Life" on NPR. I was immediately hooked and I wanted to hear the end of the hour long piece. So I spent the next 50 minutes sitting in my car listening while I snacked on a muffin and diet coke (luckily I had just been to the store!) When the program was over I got out of the car, now behind on my "To Do" schedule, but glad that I had chosen to listen instead of replying to emails.

And for the rest of the day I couldn't stop thinking about Eric, my older brother who introduced me to "This American Life" on his iPod during a road trip. He also taught me what a "driveway moment" is...which is what I did yesterday afternoon. Being in the car with Eric usually means you can count on listening to only NPR for however long it takes to arrive at your destination. This used to make me want to claw my own skin off.....now I only feel that way during the really boring news parts. In fact, these days, I often find myself changing the radio to the NPR preset to see if there is something interesting on.

I definitely don't listen to as much NPR as Eric does....but I might be slowly converting.....a little bit.....thanks to him.

My Car

Yesterday as I was driving I started to notice a few things about my car....

My cup holders weren't holding beverages because they are full of necklaces and bracelets....I wear my jewelry everyday but then by the evening I am sick of it and I shed it right into the cup holders

My backseat currently serves two purposes (neither of which is allowing people to ride in my car) it is half shoe graveyard and half hanger collection facility.

The floor of my front seat is where all the really important bags of clothes go (I always need a change of clothes handy....just in case) which makes sense since the backseat is already pretty full.

If anyone is in need of bobby pins, clips, or pony-tail holders they need look no further than my stick shift....it just works so well!

And the little dip under the emergency brake is the PERFECT size for my favorite lip glosses...it easily hold 3 to 4.

and I realized...it's really more of a transportable closet than simple car.

Anne (with an 'e') and Me

Once there was a girl named Anne, who was not a boy, and this was a real problem for the people who wanted to adopt a boy but got her instead. So they made a plan to send her back to the orphanage. This upset Anne and she said, to her would-be-adoptive-mother Marilla, "I can't eat! I never can when I'm in the depths of despair!"

Lately I have been feeling like I'm slipping into the depths of despair. Certainly, life is not as bad for me as it was for Anne. I'm not being returned, unloved and unwanted, to an orphanage. The problem is that I can't come up with an easily identifiable reason to explain it all away, in fact I think that it is oh so many little reasons that have just piled up....

I'm heartbroken and angry over the struggles my friends are going through. And completely frustrated over my inability to do anything to help. I'm jealous of some people...but I don't want to be jealous. So I'm also tired all the time from trying to not be jealous (which doesn't really work because I'm still fairly jealous). I feel cranky, but I can't be cranky because I am a preschool teacher and under "job description" the 2nd bullet down says "Cannot Be Cranky." So I spend all day not being cranky with my cute preschoolers (of course it's not their fault) and then, inevitably, all my crankyness explodes all over some innocent (if rather annoying) person that I encounter later in the day. I am entirely out of patience for winter...enough with the cold, precipitation, disgusting air quality and piles of black snow everywhere (people think snow is pretty....this is not always true.) I'm bugged because 2 weeks after my foot injury, my foot is still swollen and bruised and won't fit in my cute boots (yep...still whining about it). I'm stressed about doing my taxes. I hate doing my taxes. I'm sickened by the gray hair I found and plucked out (I AM ONLY 29 YEARS OLD FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE!!!) And also...I'm infuriated that when I'm in the depths of despair I, unlike Anne, want to eat fries and chocolate all day long.

At this point you might be thinking, "That Dawn needs a reality check. She has a pretty great life." Or possibly, "Snap out of it!" And you would be right...I do have a really great life and I know that I am so very lucky to have all the things I have! And I'm trying to "snap" out of it....but how?

Our friend Anne perked right up when she met Gilbert (typical) and spent the next several years flirting with him before he proposed marriage and a future full of diamonds....this is not the solution I'm looking for. But I am looking for a solution....maybe that also lies in all the small things. Playing with Pratt, James and Emma. Going to a movie with friends. Eating In-n-Out cheese fries and chocolate shakes (in moderation). Reading. Planning trips out of Utah (watch out denver and boston!). Watching my huge pile of favorite movies. Buying a new dress. Having a few valentine's day parties in preschool. Blogging my issues for all the world to read and judge. Laughing...talking...and sometimes crying it all out with Tera. I'm already feeling better....

In case you don't know (and shame on you!) Anne never did have to go back to that orphanage and she did marry Gilbert.

I'm Back!

I do realize that it has been quite a long time since I graced the blogging world with my hilarious stories and amazing prose....but not to worry I am back. And for your enjoyment today I have some preschool stories:

A little girl drew a picture of a person with a huge purple mouth, giant red dot cheeks and dark blue circle eyes. She told me "That is you Miss Dawn, with lots of make-up!"
She was so excited and proud of her picture while I became obsessed with my make-up application habits. So truth time all my blog readers...do I wear too much make-up?


In preschool we sing a song called "Once There Was a Snowman" (you know the one where the snowman melts?) well to mix things up a little bit I taught the kids to sing the song backwards...instead of melting, the snowman grows taller in the snow. The other day:

Me: "Everybody stand up and we will sing the snowman song."

Little Girl: Jumping up and down yelled, "Can we do it the AWKWARD way?!?! PLEASE!!"

***I'm not really sure how that would go....although a few "conversations" from my past blind dates might work.


I recently sprained my ankle (you may have heard me whine about it....) I thought I was at the bottom of the staircase, but as it turns out there were still 2 more steps....so my foot was in bad shape.

Little Girl: "Miss Dawn, why are you walking like that?"

Me: "I hurt my foot and it really hurts to walk."

Little Boy: "Why did you hurt your foot? Do you think that was a good choice or a bad choice?"

Me: "Bad choice, I guess. But it was an accident."

Little Boy: "You're right, it was a bad choice. Next time you need to make a good choice."

We obviously talk A LOT about choices, good and bad. And it would appear at least some of it is getting through.


Just this week we were discussing Groundhog Day. I was trying to explain the superstition behind the day.

Me: "A long time ago there weren't TVs with people telling us what the weather would be like, so people had to find other ways to find out about the weather."

Little Boy: "Oh. So they would just check the computer."

Me: (while trying not to laugh because he was so earnest) "Well, no they didn't have computers either."

Little Boy: "No TV and no computer? Wow."

Me: "Yeah...I wouldn't like it either"