Sometimes Being a Groovy Grandma is Hard

I spent the morning with my beautiful daughter and her amazing husband in the hospital today. She had surgery to remove some polyps from her uterus to get them one step closer to conceiving a baby.

Their second anniversary is this Sunday and already they have gone through infertility treatments. My daughter was a little older when she married and desperately wants a family, so they started trying right away. About a year ago they started wondering if there were any physical reasons they weren’t pregnant yet.

They were very proactive because they would love to have several children and knew that every passing year was one more they might not be able to have a child.

                         

Initially they worked with a regular obstetrician who tried Clomid treatments. No luck. They started researching doctors specializing in infertility and have now found one they love that is taking their desire for a baby very seriously. Thus, today’s surgery.

I hate watching my children suffer and not being able to do one thing about it. The emotional toll on this sweet couple has been trying to say the least. But they have been brave and faithful and very public in their journey with their own blog. I am proud of how they are choosing to handle this experience.

              

Yes, I would love to be able to make it all better, yet all I can do is love and support them and pray to the One who knows all things. And I do know that He is mindful of them and will provide. But sometimes being a groovy grandma is just plain hard.

That's Disgusting

My granddaughter has a strong personality. There, I said it. I love her to bits and wouldn't change her for the world, but you never have to wonder where you stand with this cute girl.

                     

Her stubborn streak runs so deep that she was over four before she was completely potty trained. No physical reason. She just wanted to show her Mama who was boss.

Sometimes stubbornness is a good thing. Hopefully she will grow up and be very stubborn about making good choices and standing up for her principles, but as a little girl she knows how to push her parents’ buttons.

One day when she was barely three years old, my husband was holding her on his lap. She looked at him and with all the spunk she could muster, asked him “What is THAT?!” pointing to his unibrow. He calmly told her it was his eyebrow. (Note the singular.)

                         

She scrunched up her little face and replied, “Well that’s disgusting! You need to get rid of it!”

Yup, that’s what she said. Precocious little imp, isn't she? Thank goodness her grandpa still thinks she is perfect (because we only get her in small doses). Gotta love the honesty of kids.     

                                

                       

8 Reasons I am Ditching My Scales Forever

                         
I finally decided I need to do something about the 35 pounds I have gained since last fall. I had lost about 40 pounds without even trying, and then I found out that my blood sugar and cholesterol was WAY out of control. It was so bad that I had to go to a specialist the very next day. Thanks to modern medicine, now my blood sugar and cholesterol are great, but the pounds have come back on. Why can't I just have the best of both worlds??

So with the semester just ending and a less hectic summer school schedule, I knew I wanted to take action. But how? Then I got this email from a friend about the "Feel Great in Eight" program she developed and runs. It was the perfect kick start I needed to become more healthy physically, spiritually, and mentally. This post of hers really convinced me to do it. I have been thinking about all of these things for many years and she put in into words perfectly. I share it with her permission. Thanks Tiffany Rudd!

PS I am starting this challenge today. Here is the link to her blog: http://www.feelgreatin8.com/feelgreatblog/
                         

At the beginning of the year I made a big change and decided to stop weighing myself completely. I was feeling incredibly frustrated and discouraged because I was eating healthy and exercising and the scale wasn’t budging even an ounce. I was complaining to my husband one day when he stopped me to ask why in the world I was letting that stupid number affect me so much. He was completely right. I was letting a “stupid number” determine my happiness and I needed to stop.

It’s been 3 months and I can’t even tell you what a fantastic change it has been. I can almost guarantee that I’ve lost weight in that time, but even if I haven’t it really doesn’t matter because I feel healthy. I’ve gotten stronger, my clothes fit better, I have more energy, and I am a happier person now that I have stopped letting that number control me.

                         

8 Reasons You’ll Lose Weight When You Ditch The Scale:

1. Your Scale Lies: The number on your scale is affected by so many things that are completely out of your control – time of day, what you’ve had to eat/drink recently, and hormones are just a few of them. We seem to think it is the ultimate indicator of our success or failure and that just isn’t true.

2. Muscle Weighs More Than Fat: Actually, that’s not true. One pound of fat weighs the same as 1 pound of muscle, but muscle is more dense than fat. So, if you replaced 10 pounds of fat with 10 pounds of muscle you would weight the same, but look much leaner and feel much better. Again, the scale is lying to you.

3. Weight Loss is a Poor Motivator: Because your scale lies to you (see above), it ends up being a terrible motivator. When the scale shows what we want it to we are motivated to continue eating healthy and exercising, but when it doesn’t we are tempted to throw in the towel or resort to unhealthy habits like skipping meals and over exercise. When we rely on it for our motivation from day to day or week to week we are opening ourselves up to disappointment and discouragement.

4. You’ll Learn to Rely on Better Indicators of Health: When you ditch the scale, you are free to focus on much better indicators of health. The most important indicator, in my opinion, is how you are feeling. The scale won’t tell you if you have more energy or less aches and pains. It won’t tell you if your clothes are fitting better or if you are feeling more confident. These are the things you can rely on to keep you motivated.

5. You’ll Feel Happier: If you are anything like me, the wrong number on the scale can turn a great week into a terrible one. It’s silly, but I could literally be feeling fantastic about my success and progress until the moment I got on the scale. I am healthier mentally and spiritually when I don’t give the scale that power over me.

6. You’ll Avoid the “All or Nothing” Mentality: I think many of us have the tendency to either be in weight loss/diet mode or not. Hopefully, getting rid of the scale will help you avoid this. When you aren’t eating healthy and exercising to loose weight, but instead doing it to feel great you’ll be more likely to just generally care for yourself. Not perfect and not terrible, just good. Perfect isn’t sustainable longterm, but good is.

7. You’ll Naturally Find Your Healthy Weight: For some reason many of us have a number in our head that is our perfect weight. The funny thing is, usually it isn’t really based on health. Your healthy weight is going to look different than everyone else’s and it will be different at different times in your life. If you continue to eat a generally healthy diet (not perfect, but good) and stay active your body will find it’s happy place. You’ll want your healthy weight to be a place you can maintain longterm, not something you have to kill yourself to keep the scale at. It may not look exactly like the number in your head, but I bet it will feel better.

8. It’ll Help Stop Comparisons: You may have seen this pin floating around pinterest that shows what 150 pounds can look like on different women…

The fact of the matter is that our bodies are all so different in so many ways. Again, your healthy weight will not be the same as anyone else’s. And, since the scale lies and muscle weighs more than fat (see above) it really isn’t even fair to compare your current weight to your past weight. Focus on how healthy you feel and work to improve that instead.

So, here is your added challenge: I challenge you to hide your scale and don’t step on it for at least the next 8 weeks. Instead use these questions as you scale:

* How do I feel? Do I feel healthy? Do I have more energy?
* Am I regularly moving my body and doing exercise I enjoy? Is my strength and endurance improving?
* Am I generally choosing foods that nourish my body and make me feel good? Am I listening to my body’s hunger cues?
* How do my clothes fit? Am I remembering to love my body exactly as it is?

Sadistic Statistics

When I decided to complete my Bachelor’s degree at the age of 53 and after 33 years of not attending college, I thought I wouldn’t need to take any more math. I had already gotten my Associates degree and the credits transferred to the university I attend without a hitch. General Education complete – check.

But NOOOOO! I soon discovered that I would have to take two preparatory math classes before I could even register for the one I needed to graduate – Introduction to Statistics. Oh joy.

                         

                              

That first semester, my professor had such a thick accent I knew I was in trouble the first week. I thought I must have missed an important concept when she kept referring to “this ‘dum’ and this ‘dum’ equals this ‘dum’”. I bravely raised my hand and asked her what a ‘dum’ was. She replied, “T-E-R-M. Dum”. This was not good.

Thankfully I had an AMAZING professor the next semester – the best Math teacher I have ever had. I worked my guts out, but I got a good grade because of him. Thanks Mr. Gedeborg.

Enter the aptly nicknamed “Sadistics”. It didn’t help that the teacher was the most disorganized human being I have ever known. He actually forgot to bring his daily quiz four times in the first few classes. Instead of not worrying about it, he left class for 15 minutes to go make the copies. Crazy.

The real cherry on top was that part of each test he gave was a take home portion. Rather than have it open book, like every normal teacher, we could only use ONE page of notes. Just one. So…which one should I chose from my pile? I could either rewrite them in miniscule print or put them on a poster size paper. That is one page, right?

                           

My Statistics grade isn’t one I am proud of, but at least I passed. And I NEVER have to take another Math class in my life.  So if you see me walking down the street anytime soon, I will probably be doing my happy dance and chanting my new mantra, “C’s get degrees! C’s get degrees”. 

                                    

The Terrible Things I Will Resort to With No Place to Park

I try to be an honest person, so I actually pay the money required for an annual parking pass – unlike many students I know. There are those who figure the price of a couple of tickets throughout the year would cost them less than the eighty bucks for the pass. It is a risk they are willing to take.

Then I am the one who gets the ticket...

for parking in a specified UVU license plate space. Yup. Me. The honest woman who actually paid to park on campus. I only found the ticket by accident, and that was three days after it was issued. It was crammed way down under my hood so it wouldn’t blow away unless the entire car did.

Oh, you’d better believe I contested that one. They even showed me the picture of my vehicle with my license plate and the sign saying the space was reserved for UVU license plate cars only. Well, I sure didn’t see that posted as I rushed to find a parking place. I was just thrilled to finally see that one had opened up. Thankfully, after my whining and pleas for mercy, they excused the ticket - just this once.

               

 I have heard it said that UVU doesn’t have a parking problem – we have a walking problem. What is that supposed to mean? That we are lazy? For me it is just a time management issue.

Supposedly there are a minimum of twenty empty parking places available on campus at any given time. The same someone that thinks we have a walking problem must have figured out that there are twenty cars simultaneously backing out of a stall somewhere on campus. My theory is that person forgot to take into account there are multiple drivers ready to pounce on each stall as soon as it is vacated

.

Like all statistics, you can make the numbers say anything you want.

And what about those days when there are expos or public events being held on campus? Students aren’t even allowed to park in entire lots on those days. Does that mean we have a negative number of parking spots available then? Like that’s gonna work.

                           

Our parking garage has provided one solution – for those who can afford to park there. It only costs $750 per year. Personally, I don’t know many students that can swing that much

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I bet the twenty empty parking places are in there, and that’s why I can’t find them.

UVU is considered a commuter school because there is no on-campus housing. That means almost everyone has to drive to school, thus we have a lot of cars. And try finding another student with the same schedule to carpool with. Good luck with that.

                 

Personally, I just might be willing to cut down a few trees and sacrifice some grass to have more student parking available. Just don’t give me another ticket when I do it. Right now I am late for class - because I couldn't find anywhere to park. 

                         

Disabled? Not This Inspiring Guy

There are a lot of famous Simons in the world. Take Simon Cowell, Paul Simon, Simon Baker, and even “Simon Says”. But none of them have as many awards as Simon Stonebraker possesses. This Simon has “thousands” of medals he keeps in his drawer at home, all from his experiences competing in Special Olympics. And we are lucky enough to have him working right here at Utah Valley University.

Simon is 40 years old and describes himself as a “Down Syndrome boy”. His colossal smile, tremendous attitude, and enthusiastic outlook on life make instant admirers of everyone he meets.  Simon is employed with North Eastern Services (NES), a local company which provides housing and jobs for many disabled adults across Utah. The goal is to assist them in achieving independence, building their self-esteem, and living a full quality life. Simon is a great example of the valuable work they do.                                                                                        

Stonebraker lives in Chrysalis group home in Provo with roommates and a 24-hour staff.  He works as a dishwasher for the UVU cafeteria and loves earning his own money. NES provides a case worker to help him reach his goals – like registering for classes at Utah Valley University.

Simon plans on taking a Ballroom Dance class in the fall, and with his credentials he is a shoe in. He is currently taking a dance class every Friday night in Springville, and he already earned 2^nd place in a BYU dance contest for disabled adults. Add that to his myriad of medals.

But dancing isn’t the only thing he is good at. Simon also enjoys writing poetry and stories, and has even published a book of his works. He loves singing, biking, and NASCAR as well. One of Simon’s prize possessions is his Jeff Gordon coat, with #24 on the back and the Pepsi logo on the front.

The variety of the Special Olympic medals he has earned conveys the athletic talents Simon has in swimming and baseball. He particularly excels in Track and Field, where the standing long jump is his event of choice.

Raised in American Fork, Simon says he always knew he was special because his mother taught him so. He attended Dan Peterson School there, but later went to Provo High where he was enrolled in Special Education classes. Simon claims he didn’t really have a problem with being bullied there because he asked the students he liked to “have my back”, and they did.  

Simon is a faithful member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He is in charge of planning and executing “Family Home Evenings” for other disabled adults in his congregation, and he is a District Leader that checks to make sure everyone gets visited by their home teachers each month. Simon also loves to attend the LDS temple as often as possible. He isn’t able to visit his family on the weekends very often because he is determined to perform his Church callings to the best of his ability every Sunday.

But that doesn’t mean he isn’t a family man. Simon is very proud of his “real sister, real brother, step sister, brother-in-law, and sister-in-law.” When asked how many nieces and nephews he has, his immediate response is “A Lot!” Simon’s father passed away several years ago, but he remains very close to his mother. Like every good son, he calls her each night just to talk to her.

Simon is very outgoing and friendly, which is the big reason he has “lots of friends”. He is confident and proud of his accomplishments. North Eastern Services has definitely watched this guy live a full quality life. Indeed, Simon Stonebraker is a man of many talents, interests, and abilities. In fact, I wouldn’t consider Simon “dis-abled” at all.

My Four Year Old Daughter's Shocking Confession

When my kids were little we lived in northern California for about five years. I was pregnant with my fourth child and teaching a women's group at church. The topic of the lesson this particular month was, "Teaching Children About the Power of Procreation". My husband and I decided it was a good time to begin explaining things to our little ones on a child's level, so we had a special Family Night lesson about it. I found a wonderful children's book on the subject at the library with just the appropriate level of information for our four, five, and six year old kids.

                         
The book sweetly explained how flowers are pollinated and how dogs have puppies by using plain language and precious drawings. On the last page it had a cute sketch of a Mommy and Daddy laying under the covers in their bed. The book very delicately described that this was how babies come into Mommies' tummies. We wanted to keep it simple, but also use this as a teaching moment to explain that sex is something we only do AFTER we are married because it is so special. We felt good about how the children reacted and were sure we had taught them well.

                         

The next week, my four year old daughter had a little boy over to play. They were the same age, knew each other from church, and always got along perfectly. One of their favorite things was to play house using a little tent-like covering over our card table.They had a great time. After a couple of hours, we took her buddy home and immediately I could tell something was bothering my sweet girl. She didn't want to talk about it at first, but when her solemn behavior continued, I questioned her again. Looking up into my eyes, this little angel started to cry and suddenly sobbed,
"I HAD SEX!"

Once I started breathing again, I sat down and put her on my lap.

                         
I tried to remain calm and find out exactly what had happened. Apparently my husband and I had missed a couple of crucial details, because she thought she and her friend had sex when they laid down together under a blanket! WHEW!! Never a dull moment. And it sure made for a great story all these years.