Called to Serve

After weeks of waiting (and conjecture: "Maybe they don't want us to go." "Perhaps the call letter is being delivered by handcart." "Or, maybe the mailman tried to drive BUT THERE WAS NO ENGINE IN THE CAR!"), the large, white manilla envelope came. As one of two witnesses to The Opening (I will address the second witness later), I will recount, to the best of my ability, and for my nine siblings, what what down on T. Lane that afternoon.

Me (upon opening the front door): "Hey! Let's open it!! I got Rachel on the phone."
Mom (gingerly holding the envelope in both hands): "I'm too nervous. I can't open it.
Me: "Oh, we are not doing this. Just like a band-aid - RIGHT OFF!!"
Rachel (in a plaintive whine): "What's going on? Where are they going? I have to go to work in like twenty minutes!"

I finally hustled Dad, Mom, and the other witness into kitchen.

Me (egging Mom on): "Just do it. C'mon...."
Mom (looking in Dad's direction): "Why don't you do it?!"
Dad (putting up his hands in defense): "No, no, no. You do it."

ARGH.

TWO HOURS LATER .... *note - time may have been exaggerated due to the anxious state of those involved*

Mom (gently tearing at the envelope, the way Grandma tore at Christmas wrapping paper: "We can save it for next year."): "Um..... Minnesota! MINNESOTA!!"
Me (yelling into the phone): "Dude, Rachel! Minneapolis!!
Rachel (laughing): "Yay!!" *pause* "Does Mom realize how much snow they get?!"

Sister Randall's copy.

Dad (looking at his copy of the letter): "Hey, mine says a different mission!?"

Steely eyed look from Mom.

Dad (quickly backpedaling): "You doing okay? You like this call?"
Mom (laughing): "Yes! Let's call all of our children. Right now."

I think this should be the photo that goes on their missionary plaque. 

Dad making the calls.

Looking through the packet - especially enjoying the pictures of "appropriate senior missionary attire" and the box of Rice Krispies that was sent along with the call.

And I was left with the one other person in the room who saw the whole thing first hand.

From the kitchen floor.

In her diaper.

And the furrowed brow of concern.

Are you going to pick me up or what?

And this last photo leads me into the second part of this blog post, which I have lovingly entitled "Grandma vs. Avery".

With her parents and older siblings gone galavanting through the highly chlorinated water spray of Great Wolf Lodge, Avery was left in the care of her grandmother. Oh, I helped ... ease the building tension between mother and granddaughter.

Mom (stressed): "She spit up again today. TWICE!"
I glanced at Avery - a sly smile appeared on her lips. Yes, she was thinking. I got to finally put on the outfit I really wanted.

Mom (exhausted after a sleepless night): "She is so talkative - and runs that pacifier up and down her crib like it was an instrument."
I glanced at Avery - again, that secret smile. They'll think twice about leaving me without a pacifier all day, she muses.

Mom (yelling, slightly panicked): "Where is she? Is she crawling toward the stairs?"
I follow the sound of the "swish, swish" of her crawl and see her at the bottom of the stairs, her climb to the top blocked by a baby gate. Disappointment fills her gaze and she silently asks "Don't you trust me?"

Of course, Mom handled the babysitting gig with the upmost aplomb - and for the umpteenth time in my life, I saw how she and Dad could raise ten children.

And now they can take their skills and keep the Minnesota Minneapolis missionaries in line.

Holy May!

Avery/ Aves/ Aves May/ Newblett/ Newbers/ Newbs = One Year Old

Just like the ones Mom used to wear!!!

Cameron/ CamCam/ Buddy/ Little Eric = Four Years Old

This was Cameron's birthday pose. And the longest time he stood in one place.

One eight year old + one seven year old + one six year old + one five year old + one four year old + one (almost) three yard old + one one year old + CUPCAKES & ICE CREAM & THE EXCITEMENT OF BEAUTIFULLY WRAPPED GOODS = fuzzy photos taken by the Professional Aunt No Kids (of her own)

I love Natalie. Just like her mom -hates getting her picture taken.

I asked to take her picture and she stopped what she was doing (which was explaining how ants have thorax's - what!!) and posed.

Love. Her. Smile. And her little leggings.

Subtract: Sleep (from the parents) and peace of mind (from grandparents wondering where in the world is their mission call (not to mention Carmen Sandiego).

Reese, serving her mom and grandparents.

"Someone to waaaatch over me."

"Aunt Joanna, you can't drink juice boxes. You're an adult."

"Anyone care for a little treat?"

"We're making memories, kids! MAKING MEMORIES!"

Elizabeth showing the tough love - complete with battle bruises.

Like moths to a flame. Grandchildren to Grandma.

"Something to read with your morning oatmeal..."

Obama the invisible

By JOHN PODHORETZ

Last Updated: 3:50 AM, March 16, 2011

Posted: 11:48 PM, March 15, 2011

Where is the president? The world is beset. Moammar Khadafy is moving relentlessly to crush the Libyan revolt that once promised the overthrow of one of the world's most despicable regimes.
So where is the president?
Japan may be on the verge of a disaster that dwarfs any we have yet seen. A self-governing nation like the United States needs its leader to take full measure of his position at times of crises when the path forward is no longer clear.
This is not a time for leadership; this is the time for leadership.
So where is Barack Obama?
The moment demands that he rise to the challenge of showing America and the world that he is taking the reins. How leaders act in times of unanticipated crisis, in which they do not have a formulated game plan and must instead navigate in treacherous waters, defines them.
Obama is defining himself in a way that will destroy him.
It is not merely that he isn't rising to the challenge. He is avoiding the challenge. He is Bartleby the President. He would prefer not to.
He has access to a microphone 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If he tells the broadcast networks in the middle of the day that he has a major address to deliver on an unprecedented world situation, they will cancel their programming for him.
And yet, since Friday and a press conference in which he managed to leave the American position on Libya more muddled than it was before, we have not heard his voice. Except in a radio address -- he talked about education legislation.
And he appeared at a fund-raiser in DC. And sat down with ESPN to reveal his NCAA picks.
He cannot go on like this. Niall Ferguson, the very pessimistic economic historian, wrote the other day that the best we can now hope for is that Obama leaves the country in the same kind of shape that Jimmy Carter left it in.
That doesn't do Obama justice. Despite how disastrously he has handled the crises of the past two months, he can still turn his presidency around on a dime.
For Obama to save himself, he should be thinking about the example of an unlikely Republican predecessor: Richard Nixon.
The multifarious crises the president now faces are eerily similar to the kinds of calamities that greeted Richard Nixon in his first term from 1969-1972. Then, as now, the world was on fire. Wars erupted between China and the Soviet Union, India and Pakistan, even El Salvador and Honduras.
Jordan was nearly taken over from within by the Palestine Liberation Organization. There were humanitarian disasters in Biafra (the result of civil war), Bangladesh (due to flooding) and Nicaragua (deadly earthquake).
There was more, much more -- including a war he inherited in Vietnam, just as Obama has the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. You get the point.
Nixon in 1968, unlike Obama 2008, was elected as a minority president with only 43 percent of the vote. Yet, in 1972, he won what, in some measures, was the most lopsided election in American history with 61 percent.
Nixon achieved it, in large measure, because he appeared to be a serious man grappling in deadly earnest with the serious problems presented to him by a world careening out of control.
He demonstrated high competency when it came to matters on the world stage. He and his team (primarily Henry Kissinger) developed coherent policies and strategies for coping with the world. There was no question, to friend or foe, that he was fully engaged, paying attention, deeply involved.
Nixon was an awful president in many ways, including in some of his foreign-policy choices. But he left no doubt that foreign policy and America's leadership in the world outside its borders was of paramount importance to him.
All this had the effect of elevating Nixon during his time in office, so that when it came to running against George McGovern in 1972, Nixon seemed like a Titan and McGovern a pipsqueak.
How Nixon conducted himself in office in times of crises made possible his triumphant re-election. Right now, how Obama is conducting himself in a time of crisis is having the opposite effect.
He began his presidency as a potential colossus -- but if he doesn't change, he will finish it as a pipsqueak. Pipsqueaks don't win second terms.

Two Videos

One because it is Sunday.
One because "dachshunds are the most perfect life form".

Sunday

Dachshunds

unbearable sweetness

it is so good, i cannot not eat it. my tongue may be raw from all that saccharine but my heart is full. and my blood sugar soaring.


on a completely different note, the following conversation may or may not have taken place within the last twenty-four hours.

mother: "you should come with us to hear "insert-current-favorite-returned-missionary-here" speak on sunday."
me: "i have church."
mother: "no. this ward meets at eleven."
me: "i have my meeting."
mother: "you can skip it."
me *sensing another purpose afoot*: "what?"

*prolonged silence*

me: "mom!?"
mother: "well, you never know who you might meet....."
me *flabbergasted - yes, flabbergasted*: "AHEM. WHAT?"
mother: "you never know."

*prolonged laughter on my part*

mother: "i am just saying!!"
me *a soft whinny of laughter escapes my mouth as i collapse on the floor in a heap*


twenty four hours later. snorts and guffaws still come out at the mention of "sunday morning". and for no apparent reason, i am inserting the following picture:

while the parents were out: week 1

the parents are off galavanting in utah. playing grandparents to lily and two white dogs. meanwhile, i hold down the south road plantation, coordinating real estate showings, dog pick ups and drop offs, and complete control of the remote AND thermostat.

i bumped up the heat to 72. mom would have died. dad would have shed his sweater.


seth and christina came over and we watched THE GAME. i had to leave. it was too intense. this prompted seth to quote mom, circa early 1990's blazer game playoffs, "i can't handle it!!" *runs from tv room*

friend came over. the dogs freaked out. two minutes later, the pizza guy came. dogs freaked out. i left a big tip.




i drove my car until the the gas gauge rested on empty.
i commended driving dad's car. until the gas
gauge rested on empty.

again- mom would have died. dad would remark "that's what i do!"


spent quality time with maddox, griffin, reese, AND angus.
reese in polka dots=epitome of adorability.
griffin showing off how strong he was by lifting his nerf gun over his head over and over again=i want a bunch of little griffins one day.
maddox cheering at the end of the chronicles of narnia when the battle was won=me cheering along as well and yelling "yay! aslan!"
angus dry heaving in the quiet of the night=me almost calling aaron, who was in the middle of a movie theatre.

31 steps. my good friend moved to a new apartment that was 31 steps up. it was okay though. we didn't get hot. there was a downpour the entire time. then she bought us lunch. i love her.

watched incpetion with a friend ("see? it's a dream within a dream within a dream within...."). said friend fixed the abnormally loud bass on our tv. i cheered and then was chagrined when he showed me how easy it was to fix.

mom will finally be happy.

"it's not going to be a big christmas...."

but it sure was a quotable one. following are bits and pieces of dialogue and snapshots of moments heard and seen throughout the last week at the south road homestead.

eric (imitating the monotone Rite-Aid checkout woman): "you would like to try blistex? only $1.99."

*i wonder if that will work* what seth and joanna were thinking as they stood idly by, watching griffin preparing to see if his suctioned tipped nerf arrows would stick to maddox's glasses. after being fired from two inches away.

aaron: "really? you guys were just going to watch?" *aaron breaking up the above mentioned experiment before arrow was launched.*

reese in gray skinny jeans.

cameron, in a tiny fit of anger: "you're not invited to by birthday party!" *note: he was born in may*

maddox in harry potter glasses.

rachel: "...and then the nurse hit the gag reflex and all this stuff came up...." (eric and seth's face turn an ashen color)

mom: "we agreed on no presents!"
dad: "it's not from me! look! austin. and gretchen."
joanna: "wasn't that wrapping paper used on a present we opened last night."
dad (feigning innocence): "i have no idea what you are referring to."

seth (coming up with his own song lyrics): "dear diary, dear diary!!"

tony randall: "THE HIDDEN DOOR!?!"

joanna and rachel: "that was number four." (counting the number of times mom referenced a certain someone to settle down)

all of the baby jesus' in the house wrapped in red poinsettia leaves.

elizabeth: "natalie woke me up at 4 a.m., saying she heard the reindeer bells and couldn't go back to sleep."

mom: "everybody only gets one roll."
eric: "uh oh. roll rations have begun."

ella and natalie both eating four rolls.

avery responding to both her given name and the nickname of "newblett".

barb: "so, is this a christmas movie?"
jenn: "no. i don't think so."
joanna: "we just watch it a lot."
*film referenced: pillow talk*

seth holding the stolen bread above his head christmas morning and yelling in triumph.

griffin shooting dad in the backside with the nerf gun. also shooting the doors, the floor, various backsides and feet of aunts and uncles, and once trying it on his own face.

merry birthday - card from the astorian randalls to mom.

joanna: "happy birthday mom! what is it? 68?"
mom (with a withering look at her beloved 9th child): "I'm 67!!"
*pause*
joanna: "yeah, but remember that one year we all thought grandma was 93 and she was really only 92?!"

random guy at the century theatre: "i love that it's a wonderful life. have you seen that? amazing piece of work. what kills me every time is how much jimmy stewart is sweating and it's snowing. snowing!! those are potato flakes coming down. potato!" *note: see seth or rachel for pitch perfect imitation/reenactment*


merry christmas.


p.s. overheard in the composing of this blog:

dad: "i don't know what you're talking about."
mom: "that's because you weren't listening."

mom: "i smell popcorn!"

dad (in reference to a romance fiction on the couch): "rachel, can i read this book? the pages seem pretty steamy."
rachel: "it's FINE."

mom: "is it too early to go to bed?"


and to all a good night.