I Like My Clothes Baked, Not Tossed or Smoked

                When we first moved to our house in Tri City, Roland set up a clothesline between two trees.  Initially, he tried the pulley thing so that I could hang the clothes from one position.  It didn't work to our expectations and I spent that first summer walking up and down the line hanging and removing laundry.

          I like having the sun dry the clothes and I especially like how it can brighten the whites.  A light breeze will make it dry faster, but a strong wind will make the fabric stiff.  The towels feel like sandpaper either way, so generally, I just toss those in the dryer and add will add clothes that have been on the line but don't seem wearable.  Also, I don't enjoy ironing and would rather have the dryer remove the wrinkles for me.

          Roland did put in a new line so I don't even have to leave the porch.  Might appear tacky, but it really is nice to hang clothes that way.  And the lines are quite long and I have not filled them both.  That's quite wonderful also.

          I believed the temperature was starting to cool off as we were told high today would be 78 and low at 54.  But then it started going over 80 again, almost 90.  What???  Don't like that.  Especially when it appears to be overcast and doesn't rain at all.  Yesterday I realized that it wasn't even clouds that gave the gray appearance to the sky, but rather smoke from surrounding fires - though not as bad as California - or the fires that existed last year.  Not powerful enough to my nose that I can smell it. Still - enough smoke to give me a headache. 

          I don't guess I'll be hanging my clothes up for a while.  I mean, what's the point of washing them if I'm just going to dry them in the smoky air.  Gosh, darn fires.  I'm so grateful to all the firefighters.  May God bless and protect each one of them and their families.

Magic Hands

        I remember someone posting this cartoon to facebook. 

I laughed as I read it as I relate, both to having been the child and now the mother.  But it isn't just a relationship with mothers and children when this sort of magic happens.  It happens among husbands and wives as well - at least in our family.

        I remember many times mom would used to say to dad, "There is something wrong with the car"  and so he would take the problematic car to work and of course it would ride smoothly for him and give absolutely no indication of ever having any kind of behavior problem.  It seemed that way with all appliances - and it wasn't because my dad was mechanical minded.  I think electronics and mechanics just have a way of playing pranks on the female mind.

        Take my computer for instance - the pop-ups, the constant threats,

of course my computer is well behaved whenever Roland sits down to it.  After a month (or more) of not being able to pull up Yahoo on my PC, it appears just fine for him.  I didn't even need to give him the latest password that I had changed it too.  What????

        I am so not motivated to do any class work right now.  Frustrated that my husband and dad seem to have magic hands - unbeknownst to them.  I want magic hands!!!

Back Off!

            Roland comes off as a domineering parent sometimes.  Jenna absolutely hates it when she is told to comb her hair or wear a coat or dress nicely or what have you.  The more he makes suggestions or "harps" on the subject, the more rebellious she is about it.

            I will admit that I am not as observant.  For three and a half years I have tried fixing her hair and seeing it wreck before we get to school.  I stopped fighting.  Richard has only begun.  Although he has been a teenager, he's never been a girl.  We have hormones.  There seem to be chemical imbalance just before that time of the month.  Let it go.

            The rain in Oregon is different from rain in Utah.  Desert rain is wet.  It soaks you.  Oregon rain - even when it falls hard - feels more like a mist.  It hasn't soaked me the way Utah rain has.  We purchased a coat for Jenna.  Cute coat, but she refuses to wear it.  She doesn't like being told what to do and what not to do.  I've been there.  I get it.  I've told Roland that he needs to back off as she is rebelling and an accessory in her hair or a warm jacket has to be her idea, and if he's always harping, she is never going to come up with the idea on her own.  In fact, she'll do the opposite.

            Her zipper's broken (that child is HARD on zippers.  I don't know what she does, but she has not owned a coat or backpack yet in which the zipper hasn't broken) and because it was raining outside, Roland threw a rain poncho over whatever she was wearing.  She was crying and claimed she looked like a condom.  I've never heard anyone compare themselves to a condom before, and started laughing - which brought even more tears to her eyes.  That's silly.

            I noticed that Jenna removed the poncho between the driveway and the street.  She stuffed in near the bushes.  I know she will learn if Roland will just back off and give her some breathing room.  I think he's overcompensating - not having had the opportunity to raise his oldest two girls and being gone so much from knowing the boys - although I recall his harping on them too. 

            We learn at our  own pace.  We're not all equal.  I think Roland needs to realize we're not all him.