church today

cory's sister, melissa, and her family just moved up to raleigh in the last week or two. and we're really excited because they're in our ward now. so that makes three of the barnett siblings in the same ward, so it fun. i have to say that sacrament meeting was a three ring circus. take three 4-year old girls, a 2-year old girl, a 1-year old boy, two toy horses, some dolls and some fruit loops and you have the makings for chaos! not to mention that we were separated two rows apart so there was also some venturing back and forth between rows. to top it all off, the topic for today was reverence! i was mortified! not really, but i did think it was very appropriate for our little group. and actually, the reverence talks were really well done. they were thoughtful, considerate, kind and unique. and by the end i was just hoping everyone was so enthralled with the talks that they didn't notice the wild party going on on our row!

setting the tone

i read this in family circle magazine and thought it was neat.

"Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, found a strong link between speaking a tonal language (such as Mandarin, a form o Chinese), in which the meaning of a word changes depending on the tone, and having perfect pitch (the ability to produce a specific musical note without hearing a reference note). Fewer than 1 in 10,000 Americans and Europeans possesses perfect pitch. They found that 60 percent of Mandarin-speaking students who started music lessons by age 5 demonstrated perfect pitch, compared to 14 percent of English language speakers."

As a side note, Celine Dion & Barbara Streisand both have perfect pitch.

an emergency?

on sunday we came in from church & began preparations for lunch. somewhere in this process, the phone rang. being the non-phone people that we are, we saw the number as something like "city of raleigh". we were kind of thinking, "city of raleigh? on sunday? who could that be?" and didn't answer. then shortly thereafter we got a call from something like government offices or something. still, we did not answer. just as we sat down to lunch cory happened to look out the window and goes, "there's a police car in our driveway!" the doorbell rings...and we did answer that....and the officer asks if we dialed 911. at that point we realized it must have been elise. a few months ago we taught her about emergency things (what to do in a tornado, fire, etc.). as part of that, we also taught her about 911 and stressed the importance of only calling in an emergency. we explained our theory to the officer, and he was really nice about it. then we, again, stressed the gravity of calling 911!

forks

elise brought me a fork today, to eat my spaghetti for lunch. she had stripped down to her skivvys and as she walked across the kitchen she began wiping the fork on her panties. she goes, "now your fork will be extra clean!" hmmm....

And this one from your new house, but it only shows the back yard. I took it from your deck when we were down there at the end of June. 

And this one showing the back view of the first house you lived in when you moved to Raleigh. 

I was trying to find some pictures of your house for Shawn and quickly looked thourgh the ones I had on my computer, and didn't see one right away, but I did find this one of the inside of your Wilmington house.  

my cuties 

another option that looks neat (also with picasa) 

here's a photo i played around with in picasa 

harry potter

yes, i'm totally a part of the harry potter craze. i've read every book & wait anxiously for the next one to come out. while i didn't get to the store for the 12am release of book 6, i did go on saturday and snatch up my copy. i've also finished reading it and loved it! it was a great book, entertaining well-written, gripping...you name it. this book especially appealed to me after book 5, which i was disappointed in. i have enjoyed all the books, but #5 was by far my least favorite. i didn't enjoy the content, harry aggravated me, and i thought there was too much sadness and hurt. there are sad parts in book 6, they are a staple, i think, of the series. while i think the series is ultimately uplifting, every hero must overcome challenges and with those challenges come hardship and heartache. so, i have to say, i give rave reviews to book 6. and i can't wait for the next movie this fall. i think this one will be very intense!

thunderstorms

we had a really bad thunderstorm last night. it had begun lightning as we were going to bed. we woke up sometime during the night with lightning popping all around and loud crashes of thunder. elise woke up afraid and came and got in bed with us. while even strong storms like this one (we even lost power for awhile) don't really bother me--if anything they are sort of calming--elise doesn't seem to care for them. actually, i don't think it was the storm so much as the fact that it was night time. this has done nothing to ease her nighttime fears--she has recently become afraid to sleep by herself b/c of bad dreams. she was very afraid last night--of tornados, she told us--so i think maybe we can add that one to the list.

popcorn kernels

twice yesterday, ian stuck a popcorn kernel up his nose. fortunately, as soon as he did it he realized something was amiss & came to me immediately. i mashed on his "clear" nostril to close it and had him blow out the other one, he was able to expel the kernel from his nose. (were this not such a dangerous thing, the kernel shooting from his nose would have been really funny!) after the second time, i *think* he is convinced of the gravity of the situation. only time will tell!

giants

elise likes the phrase from jack and the beanstalk where the giant says, "fee, fie, fo, fum, i smell the blood of an englishman!" only she gets it all wrong and says, "fee, fie, fo, fum, i smell the giant of the blood!" on several occasions she has belted this phrase out randomly in a public place. we have gotten a few looks!

blech

morning sickness has hit me hard the last few days. i've experienced some up til now, but it seemed easier/less than what i felt with the others. but the last few days have knocked me back. bleeech is about all i can say! it's not puking, just constant nausea. i might have a few good hours & then i'm knocked back down! blech and double blech! but the kids have been troopers & cory is just amazing, so i'm trying to be as positive as i can. i may not be able to do much, but i'll at least try to be cheerful.

word police

the other night cory was telling me about a movie he saw while on this last trip. at one point he said something about it being "stupid". elise looked at him with total sincerity and goes, "we don't say stupid in this family." cory quickly agreed with her and then she continued, "we also don't say 'heck fire'. " *pause* "my mama says that all the time!" we died laughing! the heck fire thing came about sunday morning. as we were getting out at church i was trying to quickly slather some lotion on my legs, when A LOT poured out and covered my legs. as i was trying to rub the lotion into my arms, legs--anything to get it off--i said "heck fire!" elise, of course, heard me and began repeating it about 5 or six times. its amazing how something that i didn't even think about could sound so ugly coming out of a little girl's mouth. so i told her that i shouldn't have said that, that it wasn't nice, and all that stuff. so when elise said that i "say it all the time" i just looked at her and she goes, "well, she doesn't say it all the time, but she does say it sometimes."

sunday

after a good sunday at church, where we got to hear Jared Dickerson speak before leaving on his mission, we went to grandma's house for another good meal. we had turkey, vegetables, bread, macaroni, and our favorite chocolate chip pies for dessert. after lunch, we went down to the cemetary and saw grandpa arnold's grave. elise was so tender as we stood there. she had me lean down to where she could whisper and said, "i bet DD sure misses her husband." i thought it was so touching and thougtful of her. when mama told grandma what she said, grandma said to her, "yes elise, i sure do!" elise and halle were very interested in the whole cemetary concept and wanted me to tell them about each tombstone and who was buried there. my favorite story is that granpa arnold was buried at the back of the cemetary because he always liked to sit in the back pew at church. after we spent some time reminiscing there we went the the granite quarry where grandpa arnold used to work. mama told some stories about how she remembered grandpa taking her out there & about what a dependable and dedicated worker he was. after leaving the quarry we went up to the salem area where grandpa arnold & grandma delia had their first house & where grandpa arnold's parents lived. i never realized that the little house there was where grandma & grandpa used to live. anyway, from there most everyone went to the high school to see it and to throw ball. (i missed the memo on this one, but from what i hear it was a lot of fun.) everyone went back to grandma delia's to visit after touring. at some time, lisa, me, ethan, adam, nate, alayna, logan & daniel all played go-spel. that is one of our favorite games. everyone just enjoyed being together and visiting on our last night together. the company and kinship was really nice and comfortable.

everyone at the cemetary 

grandpa arnold's tombstone 

the quarry