"Play Play"

The twins love to play! Seth lunges and screams if I pass by the playroom without taking him there and setting him down. It may have something to do with the fact that the playroom is on the way to the bedroom, and they're not such good nappers anymore.

Seth loves a box of toys. He's just starting to move around -- a funny crawl that involves kicking and sliding across the floor on his forehead. He seems so proud of himself. He's been watching Logan getting around for weeks now. The first day he figured it out, I found him tearing into the dvds. I let him pull every last one off the shelf in celebration! Here's Logan's new trick -- cruising furniture. He's a wild man now and he's into everything. He can even climb the stairs!!! Some of his favorite discoveries: the insides of trash cans, coffee table books, tiny bits of floor food. Joe says we should attach a Swiffer pad to his tummy and let him clean up. He's still fastest scooting around on his belly.
Yes, that's a number four buzz cut. Today I buzzed all three boys. Once Seth got his helmet off we realized there were some pretty scary growth patterns... and Logan's mullet was getting out of control. They look a little grown-up, but I love my boys with short hair.

We don't need no stinkin' lid

My mom and I are constantly bored, so we decided to make and bottle homemade applesauce. First we ordered apples from Utah for too much money, then realized they were so old they're probably from last year... No worries, we'll make sauce! Except, we don't have an apple miller (handy-dandy device that grinds up the apples and separates the peels and seeds from the sauce).


"That's okay," says Sherry. "We'll do it by hand. I like chunky sauce anyhow."


9:00 am We start cutting and peeling apples.


11:20 am We're halfway through one box (there are two), and we want to throw all the apples away.


12:30 pm We decide to use Sherry's Vitamix to pulverise the apples. "I don't see why we need this lid," are the last words she utters before the photos. Bits of apple cling to my 2-month-old cupboards, floors and ceilings. Logan is creating the soundtrack for the event, wailing because he hates loud noises and I forgot to feed him a real meal all day (we wouldn't realize this until about 5:30 pm when Grandpa came to the rescue with bottled food).

1:00 pm I call a local kitchen store and ask if they have an apple miller in stock. They do for the BARGAIN price of $79.95.

1:30 pm Hop in the car with three kids heading for kitchen store. Buy apple miller. Skim copy of "Applesauce Making for Dummies." Ahhhh, that's how it works.

3:00 pm Begin making applesauce the "dummie" way. It's not so dumb.

7:00 pm We finish with 20 quarts of sweet, yummy, healthy apple sauce. The kitchen is a wreck, I spend an hour trying to scrub burned sugar off the stove, and realize we now own an apple miller and a steam canner so there's a good chance we'll be repeating this next year!

The Pearl behind Mini Pearls

Okay... I have to come clean. Mini Pearls is actually a tribute to a nickname my mom used to (still does) call me -- Minnie Pearl, then just Pearl. Now you may think Pearl is a bizarre nickname for Melanie, but it's actually one of the better ones. Some of the precursors were Bernard, Bernadette, Melissa (?). I know there were others, but I can't remember anymore. Maybe someone can comment with more (Mom?). And don't think I was the only one to grow up with crazy nicknames -- you should talk to my brothers... or my children, Caller-ID, Tatertot, Logs and Setherball. And here's a little-known fact: there are similar nicknames for all of Sherry's grandchildren... go ahead, ask Sherry your child's nickname, if you don't know it already. :)

So much pressure

And I'm not talking about oysters and pearls here...

It really seems that one's first blog must be tremendously profound, witty, or at the very least informative.

The obvious question from you, my friends and family, must be: Why now? Blogging is practically passe. Well, guilt is a powerful motivator in my life. I call myself a writer by trade (albeit retired), and have nothing to show for it these past few years. My journal collects dust; my scrapbook is paused at my first-born's 6-month mark (he'll be 7 years next month); and I'm afraid of forgetting the beautiful experiences with my children.

Besides record-keeping, I find writing terribly cathartic. In the tradition of my super cool s-i-l and fellow mother of twins, Hailey, I long to deposit all my trials and frustrations in a somewhat funny forum for all to enjoy.

After all, a pearl is made whenever an oyster doesn't have sufficient strength to expel foreign matter stuck inside it. It's been awhile, and these are my pearls.

(I know some people in my family who are going to take that the wrong way and really have a good time with it....)

There is also a law, irrevocably decreed, that I shall do nothing significant in my life until cousin Kelly does it first. Kelly has now entered the blog world at http://diversifiedbeeson.blogspot.com. She wanted me to comment. In order to do so, I had to register. Once I registered, a prompt asked me if I wanted to start my own blog -- it was only a matter of time before the powerful forces of guilt and Kelly finally pushed me to it.