Friday, January 30, 2009

25 Random Things About Erika

I love these little games that get passed along on Facebook and Email... if you are reading this, consider yourself tagged, too. I'd love to hear 25 random things about you!

So, here it is...25 random things about me (I probably could have spent ALL of last night coming up with random facts about me, because in fact I AM VERY random and often do remember odd and trivial things at odd and trivial times.

For example:
Everything with you is better, we've got it good, as long as we're together! Anything we do, whatever...Everything is better with you! (Kara, that 8th grade nugget is for you!)

8th grade- Spring, 1989
Friends Musical (I'm in the green shirt and blue pants)

1. My towels are folded longways, in half, and in half again and then they are color-coordinated in my linen closets. If they are not appropriately matched, I practically have to use a paper bag to get myself through! My dishes and clothes are also arranged in a color coordinated way.

2. I hate folding whites because I always have really dry hands and they get caught on my dry skin!

3. I love, love, love homeschooling!

4. I really do enjoy watching the Backyardigans with my boys!

5. If it were sanely possible, I would have a dozen kiddos or more.

6. I almost died last February 6th after giving birth to Zane.
Our first day back home

7. Almost all of the dinners I make are thanks to wonderful friends and family and their delightfully easy and quick recipes.

8. I have lived in Utah, Indiana, Minnesota, Michigan and Wyoming.

9. If my life had a soundtrack, these would be on it...
Who's gonna ride your wild horses... U2
I need wide open spaces, room to make some big mistakes...Dixie Chicks
It's a great day to be alive, sun's still shining when I close my eyes... not sure who sings it!
It's good to be alive...Steven Curtis Chapman
She's gone Country...Alan Jackson

10. I love Country music!

11. My favorite job ever (aside from being a mother) was being camp counselor at Bear River Bible Camp. I learned so much from that one summer (plus a couple of weeks in 1993) and useful things still come into my mind on a regular basis such as... never being able to use a kitchen prong without calling it a "butt poker", realizing the tremendous value of a life jacket in river run-off season, and knowing the excitement and scary delight of night walks amongst beaver chips and moose breath!
1993
Traci and Erika leading a bit of song and dance!


1995
Washing our hair at Bear River Bible Camp!


12. My worst job ever was working as a drafter in an architect firm. I was completely un-qualified and therefore in a constant state of guilty stress at wasting their time. I don't know why they kept me on... oh, yes I do...because God had allowed me to have that job for learning all kinds of stuff and for the health insurance that we ended up needing during that long winter in 1999/2000.

13. I love teaching. But, I absolutely detest substitute teaching. It holds none of the charm in my book, only hassles and putting out fires! In the elementary grades, you have the "that's not how our teacher does it", in the middle school/ jr. high, you have the outright defiance, the "I dare you to tell me what to do.", in the high school, you have the calm indifferance... the "I am completely glazed over while you are speaking this pointless gibber to me; how many more minutes is it until the bell rings out my freedom." Teaching, though, is exciting. What a neat thing to explain something in a way that finally opens up understanding and possibilities to a student. I am so thankful that I have gotten to enjoy many of those precious moments with my own children...like seeing them learn to read and write their letters and understand the concepts of carrying and borrowing, etc. What fun. (I also love teaching piano and coaching volleyball and soccer).

14. I became a Christian while on a missions trip in Mexico, on July 25, 1991. I was going into my junior year of high school...wow, I'm getting old!
15. I broke several piano strings while practicing songs in the Carruth Music Hall in college.

1996
A little Keith Green with Ellen ...that's one of the pianos!

16. I won the girls arm wrestling championship in high school!

17. My goal this year is to bake until our freezer is full and can until our shelves are bursting!

18. I love theater, musicals and dancing. They make this little joyful bubble inside of me that can hardly stay inside! Someday I'd like to get involved again.

19. I love taking pictures, but I cannot figure out how to get them onto the computer in the right file. I have been told and shown many, many times, but I have a mental block!
20. Habbakuk 3:17-19 is my life verse and prayer:
"Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior. The Sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to go on the heights."

21. I love blogging...come and visit my blog at windypicnics@blogspot.com!

22. I was a candy striper in the ER at Cottonwood Hospital, SLC, throughout high school and saw some really incredible things that I will never forget...hands being stitched up, legs with bite chunks out of them, overdose pumping, urinalysis and catheders, heart attack victims and even a tiny, tiny, tiny miscarried baby. The doctors and nurses were so kind and really doted on me (I did bring them snacks, though!). I thought for sure that I was going to go into emergency medicine... until I started fainting...which kind of put a damper on things!

23. Some of my favorite games are UNO, Blokus, Pit, Aggravation (the card game), Taboo and Catch Phrase.

24. I love banana milkshakes.

25. I could be considered, umm...wordy.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Yay For...

January 8, 2009
Yay for Christmas helper elves in January!

January 10, 2009
Yay for Spaghettios, corn, green beans and pretzels...yay for canned food during flu season!


No more green beans! More corn! Yay for Corn! Now! Ummm....please!



January 12, 2009
Yay for Hamburger Helper boxes to play with in the kitchen!

January 16, 2009
Yay for Daddy! Yay for Birthdays! Yay for Black Forest Cherry and Peanut Butter Pie! Yay for friends and lots and lots of Blokus!

January 23, 2009
Yay for books to read!

January 23, 2009
Yay for cute little 3 year olds!

January 23, 2009
Yay for playdough! Yay for brothers! Yay for cold, snowy days!



Monday, January 26, 2009

Isn't She Lovely...

last year...

and this year...

Sunday, January 25, 2009

The Best Thing About It!

I loved having the flu, bug, virus, salmonella poisoning, or whatever 2+ week "thingy" was hanging out in me from the end of December to the middle of January! No...I'm serious! (Ok, there were some gruesome bits about it and I lost a lot of weight...no worries, I've since reclaimed it!)

The best part about being "actively" sick, was being "actively" sick at the same time as Scott! It was kind of like a spontaneous marriage retreat... Picture in your mind, the chapter from the Little House On the Prairie book, where Ma and Pa are so sick with "fever 'n' ague"...

and the whole family is dragging themselves about on the ground trying to attend to everyone's needs (finally Laura, heroically, makes it to the refrigerator and pours a dipper full of gatorade to bring back to the bedside!).


And then, picture the two sets of Grandparents from "Charlie And The Chocolate Factory" that never got out of bed! We were those two combined...and in a very "sick" way, it was really funny!

All we could do...besides rushing in the needed directions every 5 minutes, was laugh at our pathetic, sleep-deprived, chilled and fevered selves, who were allowing our children to rule themselves in a somewhat "Lord of the Flies" way...

We had no energy or desire to read or watch television or roust about on the computer. We just laid there in the depths of despair and "disgusting-ness"... together, laughing, talking and being sick...together!

And so... therefore... in conclusion... I will always look at the opening weeks of 2009 as a favorite terrible memory of mine, because I got to be disgustingly sick with my favorite husband and spend a good portion of two weeks laughing weakly together!

Friday, December 26, 2008

The Middle of the Story...

What a pleasure to share Isaac's Christmas service with Grandpa and Grandma Balyo on Wednesday, December 17th.

Isaac could hardly contain his excitement for the evening and wanted to make sure we left Scotty's Pizza Restaurant in time to make it to his classroom at 6:00 pm! Phew! We made it with plenty of time left over! He was so proud to have learned both a Latin song and a German song.


Isaac, with some of the other 1st and 2nd graders

It was really neat to participate with the students, in the Liturgical service. Although I wasn't familiar with all of the songs they sang, and there was a lot of kiddie background noise, it was very reverant.


Sometimes during the Christmas "season", I feel like we (or at least, I) get stuck thinking only about the sweet human baby part of Jesus and forget that the baby Jesus is still God, Almighty! And the plan of Jesus coming to earth as a human baby was not even the beginning of the end of our miraculous salvation, but more like the middle highlight!

I always imagine that since God is not limited by Time and Space, He sees all of earth's happenings like a big collage, whereas we see events on a timeline. I find it fascinating and awe-inspiring that Jesus was not an afterthought (an "oops, the kiddos down on earth messed up...didn't expect that!") but this plan of God's Salvation (baby Jesus, that is) was in the works from the beginning!

Adam and Eve's sin didn't surprise God; God didn't have to come up with something new to fix the situation; the end result that He is Ultimately THE King of Kings and THE Lord of Lords has always been the plan. He has always had our well-being in his merciful and yes, just, heart!

Jesus, coming as a baby, for the sole purpose of being sacrificed as THE Passover Lamb, is like the glorious middle chapter in a page after page, glory-filled book of Good News. And thanks be to God for his Glorious Gift of Christ Jesus, who for the joy set before him, endured the cross, scorning its shame and is now set down at the right hand, of the throne of God!



Our homemade Christmas contribution was... a good, old-fashioned package of oreos!
Scott (acting as our gracious coat-rack), his mom, Lynn, and Zane.



Friday, December 19

Because of the wild winter weather in the midwest, Scott's parents were able to stay for a couple of extra days and they graciously volunteered to stay and play with Ian, Colby, Zane and Oquirrh so I could spend Friday's Festivities with Isaac. And, I loved it! It was fun to have some one on one with Isaac, driving him and some of his classmates to the senior centers, eating lunch with him at the school afterwards, and even enjoying some of his class party and "puppy chow".

Isaac was a big hit with the ladies!

After singing at two senior centers, we returned for lunch, recess, and a Christmas party. Goodies included (but were not limited to) a huge pile of "puppy chow", a huge, frosted cookie from "Eileen's Colossal Cookies", a cupcake with a huge mountain of frosting and a juicebox! What a fun celebration of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ's birth...the middle of the story!


Wednesday, December 24, 2008

A Happy Birthday From A Chef In The Making!

God has given Isaac extreme creativity. You can almost see it oozing out of him! Yesterday (December 23), he had it in his head that he wanted to make something all by himself for us to eat, so he wrote out a recipe (see below) and worked it out for the most part by himself. I wasn't sure what it was going to be, but it turned out to be like what we imagine the hard tack sailors, pioneers and explorers carried.


Isaac was thrilled with the results and said, "I can't believe that my recipe turned out to be a success! Now we can make it and take it hiking and you can make it all the time, if you want!"

December 23

This morning (December 24) for my birthday, Isaac made me a very special "breakfast in bed" featuring his very unique recipe. He woke up at approximately 3:00 am, made a coffee for me, and perused the other breakfast options. He is still sick with croup so, understandably, he went back to bed for a couple of hours and then got up to finish a special breakfast plate for me. On my plate he had arranged a waffle that he found in the refrigerator, one of his "dough bread" stars and one of Zane's biter biscuits (He also brought the coffee he had made (at 3:00 am) all by himself to me!). Isaac, Ian, Colby and I enjoyed this very thoughtful and delicious breakfast together while Scott also enjoyed his own complimentary cup of coffee made earlier by our little chef in the making!

Monday, December 22, 2008

Mini Architects

We were so glad that Scott's parents were able to fly out from snowy Michigan to windy Wyoming for some pre-Christmas fun this year...

December 14, 2008

The boys had a grand time making a gingerbread house with Grandpa and Grandma...

Three super-excited and proud Balyo architects, full of gumdrops, frosting and peanut m&m's...no problem going to sleep tonight!

December 16, 2008

We waited and waited and waited (for 2 very long days!) to eat this delicious looking sculpture...

And now, it's a bit of yummy memory...