Cup of sugar?

I am always thinking of stuff that I "need." Then, of course, I realize that usually these are things I will use occasionally and then have to store for the 340 days per year that I'm not using it. The other day, I heard a story on NPR about a sort of social network that hooks you up with neighbors who are willing to lend some of their things. It sounded like such a neat idea!

You can listen to the story:

What do you think? What would you be willing to lend to your neighbors? Anything you'd look to borrow?

"Up in Here!"

My senior year of high school I joined the Spanish Club. I took Spanish all four years of high school, but I never got around to joining the club until the final year when it dawned on me that I really should beef up my extra-curricular activities since I dropped band/color guard that year.

Basically every club designed a new t-shirt every year. My Spanish teacher, Mrs. Taylor, requested in every class that students submit their designs for the t-shirt so that the Spanish Club could vote. There were not very many submissions, and soon Mrs. Taylor began very strongly encouraging us to submit our designs.

The day of the deadline my friend, Shane, and I decided to come up with the most absurd t-shirt designs ever and submit them to Mrs. Taylor. Of course, we did this during AP Biology, also known as the class wherein we held piggy back ride races and played "the color game" and didn't ever learn anything.

(From left to right, front row: Shane, Tayo, Roberto, Natalie. Back Row: Jennifer, Me (Sherry), Ms. Baron,B'Ann, Shauna)

Now, it's important to note that I attended a rather ethnically diverse school. About 40% of the student body were white, 30% were Hispanic, and 30% were black. (This diversity is not clearly displayed in the photo because you are looking at an honors course. That's why there are two Indians, who actually fit into the "other" category and made up less than 1% of the student body.) In high school, I frequently referred to my school as "ghetto." Because seriously.

When you walked down the hall, people shouted out their year of graduation, almost chanting it. "Oh-One! Oh-One! Oh-One!" Words and phrases like "girl, shoot!," "crunk" and "don't hate" were used abundantly - not by me.

First of all, I was white, and I knew that those things were not for me to say. But also because I thought they sounded stupid, and I imagine that even if I hadn't been white, I would not have been saying, "Girl, shoot! Why you gotta be hatin'? This backpack be crunk!"

Which is precisely why I created a Spanish Club t-shirt design that said, "Don't hate! Conjugate!" I found it rather hilarious. (If you know me at all you know that I am more likely to laugh endlessly at my own jokes than anybody else's.) Shane and I also created shirts that said, "Shane Alexander is Awesome!" and "El Club-o Del Spanish-O." At the conclusion of AP Bio, Shane and I rushed upstairs to D-Hall and proudly submitted our t-shirt designs. We didn't have time to wait for Mrs. Taylor's reaction, but we knew she would be amused.

When it came time to vote on the t-shirt designs, Mrs. Taylor (and whoever the other Spanish Club sponsor was) weeded through the various entries to get rid of any inappropriate and completely ridiculous ones. Only, somehow, my "Don't hate! Conjugate!" design remained. And it won.

I had totally forgotten about this until I was looking through my Senior Book and I read about it. I only wish I still had the t-shirt or at least a photo of it.

And just for kicks and giggles, here is a photo of Shane and me sumo wrestling during the senior party at the end of the year. I teased Shane mercilessly, and he occasionally teased me back. I think this photo is really indicative of what our friendship was like.

Vases

On Pioneer Day we spent a lot of time with Eric's aunts and uncles. On Saturday morning we walked over to Eric's aunt and uncle's new apartment that was just along the parade route. While we watched the parade there was quite a bit of mingling with the relatives and friends who had come to watch. I was sitting between two of Eric's aunts and near Eric's grandma when one of Eric's aunts said basically the funniest thing I had heard in a long time.

The aunts were talking about settling into new homes and making a home your own. One aunt was relating that when trying to sell a house a few years ago things just weren't going as well as she'd hoped. The real estate agent suggested she take down her Spanish vases from her fireplace mantel. Sharon told the real estate agent as seriously as you can imagine, "My mother is in one of those vases."

The other aunt, Grandma and I laughed so hard I thought we might cry. Then Grandma (allegedly in one of those vases) said, "I wouldn't fit in just one vase." To which Sharon replied, "My mother is in all those vases!"

If only I were so quick-witted.

Sunday Preparations

Yesterday in Primary we were learning the song "Saturday." The song is about how Saturday is special because it is a day we can use to help us be ready for Sunday. When we use Saturday properly, we can keep the Sabbath a holy day.

I always liked this song as a kid because it has a fun melody, and there are lots of actions you can do with it. As we sung it today, though, I realized that it is pretty dated. The lyrics:

Saturday is a special day.
It's the day we get ready for Sunday.
We clean the house, and we shop at the store.
So we don't have to work until Monday.

We brush our clothes and we shine our shoes,
And we call it our get-the-work-done day.
Then we trim our nails and we shampoo our hair,
So we can be ready for Sunday.

I'm down with the shopping and the cleaning. In fact, we did both of those things on Saturday. I think trimming our nails is a worthwhile endeavor, though I don't know if it necessarily must be done on Saturday. We should also take time to shampoo our hair, but in my mind at least, shampooing our hair is done more than once a week. And now let's talk about brushing our clothes. Certainly I wear clean clothes to church, but because I live in the twenty-first century that just means I wash them and iron them if necessary. No brushing involved. Clean shoes are also nice, but does anybody shine their shoes these days? I don't think I own a pair that require shining, and although Eric may, they certainly don't need shining EVERY Saturday.

I want to change these lyrics. Suggestions?

Favicon Favo(u)r

I have been neglectful in thanking somebody for a very kind favo(u)r. My friend, Ange, made me a favicon. You probably don't know what a favicon is - I didn't until Ange started giving them away. It's the little icon to the left of your address bar. Most professional websites have them. Most blogs just have the default icon for whichever blog service they use. Now I have a custom-made one, and it is awesome. You can get in on the custom-made favicon action by regularly reading and commenting on Ange's blog. She gives one away each Friday. I don't know how long this will last, so you may want to get in on the action soon.

Project

Long before my grandpa died he started giving his stuff away. There were not a great deal of things that I wanted that belonged to him, but there were a few things. I took my grandmother's complete set of Shakespseare. Eric took the Winston Churchill series about World War II. We took a set of Japanese tile painting thingies. And we took these two needlework pictures.

Both of the pictures are done with really beautiful needlework. My pictures (of course) do not do them justice. I have a more detailed one below, and hopefully that can give you a better view of how cool these pictures are.

My grandpa served (in the army) in post-war Japan. Then he married my grandma. Then he served in the Korean war. While he was in Korea my grandma came to visit him, and they went to Japan together. These pictures are one of the things they brought back. They hung in my grandparents' formal living room, but they weren't the centerpiece of the room by any means. In fact, I had never bothered to notice how really stunning they were and what the medium was for them until I was about 15.

I've had them hung in our various apartments for a while, and I've been wanting to re-frame them all this time. I finally got around to it a couple of weeks ago while Eric was canoeing 540 miles down the Yellowstone River. (I never mentioned that, but yeah, long trip.)

I bought some stain to re-stain the wood frames. I wanted to go with something a little more red since I have red curtains in my living room. I also wanted to do something with the matting that wasn't so garish. When I took the pictures into a store to get new matting, the employee was really helpful. She asked about the color of my walls and the color of the frames. Then we went through a handful of different colored mats searching for the one that was the best. I was really pleased with how helpful she was and with what a good eye she had. I quite appreciated her good eye, in particular, because I do not really have an artistic eye. Going in, I didn't expect that a bronze colored mat would look the best, but it really was the best option when looking at both pictures.

Here are the before and after shots. Again, neither shot is great, but you at least have an idea of how they turned out. And below is a shot of my no-longer-bare wall.