Happy Birthday Harry Potter

Okay, okay, so Harry's birthday isn't until the 31st of July, but we had our celebration a little early this year so that Kj could be a part of it. Let me just say, it was epic.

We had a lot of fun decorating.  Kj is a master!  We put up banners and signs and the like.  The house became "the burrow" and was the center of all the madness.

Floating candles in the entryway 

Magical candy that can help fight off the dark arts

There were also puking pastils and licorice wands

A few weeks before the party, Soren, Anne, and I took some wooden dowels and transformed them into colorful wands.  The first 20 or so guests were able to select a wand (or rather, the wand selected them).

There were surprises all over the place.

When people first arrived, we tested their Harry Potter knowledge with some tricky trivia (written by yours truly).  We also had some gnome tossing action going on in the back yard.

The first real event of the evening was Quidditch.  Soren and Alan made the hoops out of sticks, hula-hoops, and PVC pipe. The morning before the party, Soren and I sprayed the lawn to mark out the field.  This was muggle Quidditch, so there weren't any brooms or flying involved.  The Bludgers were water balloons (thrown by the beaters), the snitch was a person (who had to be caught by the seekers), and the chasers could only take three steps once they had the Quaffle.  It was so much fun.  The first round ended pretty quickly, but the next two rounds were long because it took the seekers so long to find the snitch.

After Quidditch we ate...and there was a lot of good food to be had.  Aebleskivers made for golden snitch pancakes, we had meatballs, bread, beans, butterbeer, and lots of yummy fruit.

Check out the totally legit cauldron!

After Quidditch/during dinner, people tried out the zip line.  It really is so much fun, but we did have one friend biff it pretty good on her way down.  We gave her a special prize for her injuries. This next video is me going down the zip line with the camera to give you an idea of how epic it is.  Warning: it's a little shaky.

The next event was diving in the pond.  Soren and I attached 6 rocks to pool floaties and spread them out throughout the pond.  One of them was spray painted gold, but you couldn't tell which because they were wrapped in rags.  The swimmers had to pick a floaty and hope it was the right one.  I got out on the pond in the canoe and was able to watch the action from the water.  The winner was our friend Tom from South Pacific.  He was pretty stoked.

The third event was probably my favorite.  Soren mowed a maze in the field next to the Barker's house.  My first time through it took me about 6 minutes...so it was pretty hard.  We sent people in at intervals while we timed them from the road.  The fastest time was under 2 minutes.  WOW.  He was fast.

The evening concluded with the award ceremony, where prizes were given to those who won events.  The prizes were all awesome.  There was a Marauders Map, Time Turners, a pocket watch with the deathly hallows on it, head boy and head girl pins, etc.  Then, to end with a bang, we set off some fireworks.  And not the little sissy fireworks, the big rock 'em pop 'em sock 'em fireworks that shoot way into the air.

In the end, a good time was had by all.  It was so fun to get together with our friends to embrace our nerdiness.

Work and Play

What a blast Soren and I have been having here in Maine!  The tourist season has finally picked up, which means that our work schedules have finally picked up.  Soren spends his days taking people fishing, or sailing, or out to Monhegan Island, or on tours around the Harbor.  I spend my days housekeeping at the Welch House Bed and Breakfast.  I've also been lesson planning like crazy in hopes to be ready for this next school year.

This is the Welch House.  My parents stayed there when they came out for our wedding open house.  

Here's Soren on the dock where he works.  His favorite ship is the sail boat "Bay Lady"

The past few weeks we've been participating in the Boothbay Playhouse's production of South Pacific.  We have pretty small parts, so we basically get to go over and hang out all night...and occasionally sing and dance.  It's a fun show, but not one of my favorites.  Soren and I decided we'd probably rearrange some of the scenes and give more to some characters and less to others.  Still, gotta love that Rogers and Hammerstein music. 

We have a good time backstage with our new friends

Me in my "official" nurse uniform

On June 21st, we went down to Boston for our friend Maddie's wedding.  We went to a temple session in the morning, wandered around town during the day, and went to the reception in the evening.  It was a lovely day.

In front of the Boston Temple

We've also been enjoying having Kj and Arianna around.  It'll be fun when Ivan gets here because then we'll have the whole crew!  But in the meantime, we're finishing up the preparations for our epic Harry Potter party on July 14th.  (We already have the Quidditch pitch set up in the back field--oh yeah, it's going to be amazing).  

Jurassic Park

I am afraid of dinosaurs.  Many of you already know this.  I recently read Jurassic Park in preparation for the upcoming school year.  It was a great book.  Loved it.  Had nightmares for several nights, during and after the reading process.  Why am I telling you this?  I think we all need to take a few moments and thank Heavenly Father for making sure Velociraptors were extinct before placing us on this earth.  Thank you Heavenly Father.  Well played.  Now if you could just get rid of mosquitoes...

Pictures of Maine

Soren's been out here for over a month, and I've been here about a week now.  

It's been an adventure already.  We've cooked live lobsters, I caught a snake in our bedroom, I rode a bike down to the harbor and back, we've begun rehearsals for South Pacific, and so forth. 

It is so gorgeous in Boothbay, I thought I'd post a few pictures: 

This is Soren's favorite ship.  It's not quite ready to sail yet which is why I only photographed part of it. 

Looking down a public dock

Harbor Island.

A wider view of the harbor

Lobster boat (see the traps in the back)

Soren the sailor assisting me on my harbor tour

This is a fairy house I built.  Fairy house building is a tradition here, and I'm super excited about building more now that the fireflies are out :)

Free Writes

Every Friday is journal day in my English Class.  Since we're pretty much done with the school year, I let them do a free write for their last journal.  When I make my students write, I try to write as well, so I told them they could assign me something to write on since I'd been assigning them what to write all year.  They came out to be pretty fun.

Here's first period (the prompt they gave me was "turtle"): 

They dropped me out of one container into another.  My eyes searched for an escape.  Must be an escape, must be an escape.  My wings hummed as I sped off in one direction.   I slammed into an invisible wall.  Ouch.  I shot off in another direction.  I smacked into another invisible wall.  What the?  I did it again, and again.  Invisible walls all around me! And a lid on top!  They can’t do this to me!  I need to be free!  To fly across the wide world.  I only have 24 hours to live! 

                I land on a little leaf to rest, and rub my front arms together.  At least there were a lot of plants in here.  But why would the humans put me in a cage?  They don’t find us very interesting…in fact, usually they try to swat us with large plastic death machines.  I couldn’t trust the humans. Still, it was nice to rest for a moment.

                Just then, I felt a presence behind me.  Whatever it was, it was a slow mover.  But it was big. Not as big as a human, but still a threat.  A shadow fell over me.  I needed to move.  I zipped out of the way, just as two jaws clamped shut where I had been not a second before.  Buzzing around the air, I looked down at my enemy.

                He was large, green, and was covered in some sort of protective armor.  His head moved in and out of the armor, and his eyes watched me, greedily.  I remembered as a maggot being told about these creatures.  Tur-tles, there were called.  Well, surely I could outsmart a turtle.  From what I remembered of the stories, they were stupid creatures and could not match our speed and cunning.

                I began to dart to and fro, across the cage, trying to make it dizzy.  It didn’t move.  I laughed to myself.  “What a stupid animal!”  I began to fly closer and closer to it, taunting it.  It couldn’t catch me in a million years!  I came in for my lowest swoop yet.  But this time the turtle did move, and it…

                “Hey Mom, you were right,”  little Timmy said, “the turtle did catch the fly.”

                “Yum.” Thought the turtle.

Here's second period (they wanted me to write about them):

                They were savages, coming into my classroom like a hurricane.  Their faces were covered in colors of what I hoped was chalk, laughing like hyenas.  I was afraid.  One by one, they burst in. First came Carsen, the destroyer. Tate, the troublemaker soon followed.  I began to feel outnumbered as Cayden, the demolisher and Alex the inquirer thundered in.  Braxton entered, brimming with energy, with mischievous Vincent not far behind. Taylor and the Bailiees entered with beaming smiles.  They are so sweet, but so good at distracting me from my lessons.  Macoll is there to keep things in balance, but she is outweighed by Carter’s devious plans to keep me off topic. 

                Soon everyone is in the room and I remember that although I am afraid, I do love these students, even with their tenancies to distract me. Chandler patiently waits for my instructions while Marissa smiles quietly.  I notice Shaniqua has hurt herself somehow…I’m always sad when my students are injured.  The ever curious Shawn asks me about my awesome red jacket (which is epically awesome…I bought it in China….long story), and I struggle to get the class to focus.  Poor Parker’s face is coated in red chalk, making it look as though he got a gnarly sunburn.  Makaylee has green in her hair.  What a colorful class I have!  Bianca, who recently told me she’s a Peruvian (which makes her my favorite Peruvian), sits quietly by Lauren…who is obsessed with Costa Vida. 

                “Pull yourself together Emily!”  I tell myself.  Get these students on task!  Sydney, who I sometimes call Squidney, sits attentively, although I can tell she’d love to be out playing some kind of sport.  Sara has already started to write, she’s a super fun writer, while Josh and Chevin just want to get started so it can be over with (which is how I used to do a lot of school work).  Levi is probably planning on writing something Zelda themed, and I can’t wait to see what Mason writes about because I never know what he’s thinking.  Sweet Abby and Lilianna are ready to begin…they’re always prepared, which is nice for a teacher.

                I finally get them quieted down and they begin writing.  I gaze across the classroom at the trees Aurora brought for The Tempest.  Happily I realize…I have an awesome 2^nd period.

And last but not least, 7th period (they also wanted me to write about them, but only about 11 of them were in my class at the time): 

                The end of the day.  The students file in, noisy, as usual.  I sigh, in exhaustion.  It’s been a long day…a fun day…but long.  I’m ready to go home and eat Chex Mix…or maybe some popcorn…possibly some graham crackers with frosting on them.  But I couldn’t afford to think about that now.  The students were getting ready for the class activity, if I lost focus now, they would walk all over me.  They’d get me off the day’s topic and have me talking about cheese…or something even worse.  No…I had to put on my game face.  I could handle one more class period.

                I just about had everything in order, when it happened:  Mr. Jackman came in the room, asking for students who needed to make up testing.  BLAST!  Over half my students in 7^th period needed to make up their end of level testing.  I stared, dejected, as most of my students followed the assistant principal out of the room. I looked around the room and counted those who remained.  There were eleven.  Keegan: the troublesome one.  Jaycie( with an “I” ‘E”): the gentle one.  Other Jaycee: the sassy one. Tyson: the one who gave me a sucker. Mary: the enthusiastic one.  Jessie: the athletic one.  Bailey: the sweet one.  Layla: the kind one. Jimmy: the mischievous one. Brighton: the diligent one.  Anika: the bright one.  The odds were in their favor.

                They tried to convince me to play improv games, but I’m not sucker (even though I was eating one).  I set them to writing their Journal assignment.  This was English class after all…we don’t fool around!  I put them in two rows, with pencils and paper in hand.  Eyeing them with suspicion, I told them to get to work.  At first they gave in to their impulses and talked with each other…but that was no way to run a writing session.  I dinged my bell of doom, bringing down the silence.  Portable 6 was my dominion, my realm, my dukedom.  No student would overthrow my reign!  Unless, you know, they asked nicely, or had a firearm.

                I told them that they could give me a prompt to write on.  Since I was making them write, it was only fair that they give me something to write.  They told me to write about them. So, I sat down at my computer, opened a word document and began:

                “The end of the day.  The students file in, noisy, as usual.  I sigh, in exhaustion.  It’s been a long day…” 

Remember that time the SWAT team kicked us out of our apartment?

It was our last day living at our apartment.  We'd been steadily moving out all week and we'd reserved that day to completely clear it out and clean.  Living in South Salt Lake, you're used to seeing cops around because you know at least a few of your neighbors are doing something shady, so when Soren started hauling boxes that morning and saw four cops walking our way, he wasn't too alarmed.  His next trip of boxes, he noticed the cops were pulling out fire arms and one was loading a large shotgun.  I was stuffing things in boxes in the apartment when Soren stuck his head through the door in awe and excitement:

"Em, something's going DOWN!  There are four cops out there with big guns!"

I was in moving mode, and I was living in South Salt Lake, so I shrugged my shoulders and said, "Huh. I wonder who it is?"  Secretly, I wanted it to be our next door neighbor in Apartment X because of his smoking habit and how he stunk up the whole building (which was a non-smoking building, I'll have you know), but it wasn't.

Soren headed back out with another load.  He was gone a long time.  I figured he was chatting up some of the neighbors, and continued with my packing frenzy.  A few minutes later my phone started to ring.  I looked at it and thought, "Really Soren?  You'll calling me from the parking lot?  Is this what cell phones have reduced us to?"  But I picked it up anyway because I love him.

"What's up?"

"Hey, you need to close the front door, turn off the ipod, and climb out the window."

"What?"

"Where are you in the apartment?  I can't see you right now.  I'm looking through the bedroom window."

"I'm in the living room."

"Okay, well shut the front door, turn off the ipod, and come climb out the window."

"Oh...okay."

I trembled a little as I walked to the front door to close and lock it.  I expected some wild criminal to come running through our apartment, waving a gun around his head.  This did not happen.  My heart was pounding a little as I moved from the front door to turn off the ipod.  Soren helped me shimmy through the window where I saw Juliet O'Hara standing by with her firearm.  She escorted us around the building.

--- this is Soren typing now. ;)
When I came out with my last load I was greeted by four policemen leveling their guns at my head. I'd never had a loaded gun pointed at me before. It was an interesting experience. It was kind of like the experience having the principle's office call me out of class. "Did I do something wrong? Maybe I did do something... What was it?..." But instead of having those thoughts go through my head while walking down the hall, they were concentrated into a split second.  They quickly realized I was not "their man," they lowered their weapons, and motioned for me to get out of the way.  They asked if anyone was still in the apartment, and told me to call Emily and have her climb out the window.

(Back to Emily)

Following this bit of excitement, we went and got lunch.  So here's what was going on:  the man in the apartment directly across from us, Apartment Y, was resisting arrest, and had locked himself up in his apartment, and the cops were trying to get him out.  We hoped the affair would conclude quickly so that we could get back to moving.

After eating some delicious Iceberg french fries and one of their giant shakes, we went back to the apartment.  The police were still staking it out, so we decided to stake them out.  We sat in the back seat of my dad's truck, Soren was studying for his final, and I was trying to over hear what the police were saying.  One of the cops was on the phone, and was meandering about as he talked.  As he neared us, we silenced ourselves and listened:

"Listen, I'm a man just like you are a man.  No...yeah...I understand that...I understand that.... I want to believe you, but I can't unless you come out here and talk to me.  You do know what I'm talking about.  I can't tell if you're lying to me unless I can look you in the face...."

Soren and I looked at each other:  we were totally listening to a police negotiator.  It was a long conversation and eventually Soren had to leave to go take his last final.  I sat around in the truck, hoping to catch some more action.  It was pretty quiet though, and after a while, they let me climb back through the window into our apartment to continue packing.

I was able to get a decent amount done and then Soren came and joined me, but pretty soon the police approached him again and said they were starting to evacuate the area so that they could "do what they gotta do."

We took a trip to the storage unit, and were kind of bummed about it because we figured we would probably miss the big show down.  After all that build up, we wanted to see the police take the guy down.  But as we rounded the corner to go back to the apartment, we realized we hadn't missed anything.

There were 5 or six more cop cars, an ambulance, a fire truck, two RVs, a SWAT team, K-9 units, and all the other bells and whistles.  The entire complex had been evacuated and taped off.  Talking to one of our cop-buddies, we were finally able to learn what had happened.

So tenant of Apartment Y had attempted to rape one of the tenants upstairs.  He had also supposedly threatened another tenant with a knife.  He had then locked himself in his apartment, and had threatened to kill people.  It was a pretty serious situation.  We decided we couldn't do any more moving that day.

What ended up happening was they bombed his door, went in and pulled him out.  When we went back to our apartment the next day, we saw that Apartment Y's door was covered with a big piece of plywood and we discovered that our door was substantially damaged by the shrapnel.

I guess this is why we're getting out of South Salt Lake.

Here's more info if you'd like it: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/57840244-78/amp-lake-salt-keller.html.csp

The Napkin on the Beans...A Story of My Childhood

There are 3 things you have to understand:

1.  I am not a picky eater.  I was a good child.  I ate my vegetables.  I ate my meat.  I ate my starch.  Most children at my delicate age took one look at the mass of spinach on their plate and turned up their noses, as if to say "Mother!  How darest thou place such wretched filth upon mine plate?" But not I.  True, I did not like onions, cucumbers, peppers, and a few other measly items, but for the most part I ate what was put in front of me.

2. Casey.  Casey was the delightful blonde boy next door.  Like me, he was quite grown up (nearly 4 years old) and he was handsome and charming as could be.  He and I had many adventures together that we spoke of in hushed tones: leaping off the Unopolis's porch, rolling in the dead grass in my father's trailer, and meeting Barney (yes, the purple dinosaur himself), just to name a few.  I longed for the next opportunity to frolic in the backyard with him, and whenever that next opportunity came, I seized it.

3. Rachel.  My older sister.  Rachel was already a teenager, so she was practically a million years old.  She was older, wiser, cooler, and nicer than practically anyone else in the world.  But she also had an iron fist, and could dominate us younger siblings with said fist.

Now that you understand these 3 things, I can proceed with the story.

It was a lovely summer evening...or spring...possibly autumn...it didn't really matter as long as I could romp in the yard.  Rachel had been given the arduous task of looking after me.  I used all of my 4-year old wiles to make her see me as the perfect little sister I was to ensure I could do as I wished later in the evening. Such wiles included: making adorable comments, letting her play with my luscious blond hair, smiling a lot, and eating all of my dinner.  My plan was going perfectly...until I looked out the window.

There was Casey...playing in the back yard.  He laugh, he giggled, he smiled.  He was calling me from the prison of the kitchen to the great outdoors.  I was practically done with my dinner...I only really had my lima beans left...but who has time for lima beans?

"Raaaaaaaayyyyyyyy?" I batted my blonde eyelashes.  "Can I pleeeeeeaaaaaasssssseeeee go outside and play with Casey?"

The iron fist came down. "You have to finish your lima beans first."

My soul was crushed.  FINISH MY LIMA BEANS!  I had, like, 17 whole lima beans on my plate!  Who knew if Casey would still be in the backyard 17 lima beans later?  I hung my head in shame and disappointment.  "Okay." I mumbled.

I stabbed one lima bean with my fork...a little violent, I know, but the lima bean deserved it.  My little hand guided the fork to my mouth. The bean squished between my teeth.  In a rolling motion I ground the lima bean to bits and shoved it down my throat with my tongue.

I had to take a rest.  That took forever.  16 more lima beans to go?  Casey was on the swings now.  I wanted to be on the swings.

Then, the miracle came. Rachel suddenly excused herself from the table.  As she meandered down the hallway, away from the kitchen, a little light sparked in my brain.  An idea!  A plan!  Rachel would have no idea what hit her.  Glancing from one side to the other, making sure no one was near to witness my genius, I picked up my napkin.  With the precision of a surgeon, I placed the napkin on top of the lima beans.

Perfect!  She would never know!  There was absolutely nothing suspicious about the delicately placed napkin on my plate.  Before Rachel got back I slid out of my chair, threw open the back door, and bounded down the steps.

Casey greeted me and immediately we began to play.  During the first few minutes of our revels, my stomach clenched uneasily.  Would I be found out?  Would she suspect?  Would I be called back in to finish the villainous lima beans?

I paused a moment to look in the window.  Rachel stood by my plate.  I gulped and braced myself for the iron fist.  But she didn't look up at me, she didn't even frown. Instead it looked like she was...laughing.  Laughing?  Laughing at what?  She must have been fooled, and in seeing how wonderful her little sister was for finishing her lima beans, she couldn't contain her joy!  Oh Rachel!  Your poor, weak, grown-up mind, falling prey to my ingenious 4-year-old trap.  I smiled and turned back to the swings.

My parents came home, and still no mention of the lima beans.  Success.

Casey and I played into the evening...and all was right in the neighborhood.