All by myself

Allie's back at BYU-Idaho, Paige and Chris and the little ones are back in South Pasadena, Eric and Tanya are moving on with their lives and I am left to figure out what to do with myself.  Maybe I'm crazy, but I decided to spend a couple of weeks at our house in Wallace, Idaho.  

I told everyone that I would blog every day.  HA!  I think they saw through that one.  However, with my limited technical skills and even more limited photography skills (think camera phone), I have set aside some time today to try to tackle this task.

Gypsy and I went on a walk this morning and I snapped some photos.

Our house is a very, very, very fine house.

It's very cold here.  Can you tell?

The Stardust Hotel sign and the Red Light Garage are two of the most popular photographs that come out of Wallace.  The huckleberry pancakes at the RLG are the best ever.  I thought they must have some special recipe until I saw the owner walking into the cafe with a giant bag of instant pancake mix and frozen huckleberries straight from his trip to the local grocery store.  Oh well.  Everything tastes better when someone else prepares it, right?

The Stardust Motel and the Red Light Garage.  

I've never had the opportunity to eat at this fine establishment, but I'd be very interested to see how Mexican and Chinese food go together.

More random pics.

This church is on my street.  The stained glass windows make me happy.

 Ok, it took way too much brain power to post this blog.  And the photos are crap.   But aren't you proud of me for trying?

Am I crazy?

I've got to be totally crazy.  The holidays are here and I've decided to start a serious DIET.  What am I thinking?  Isn't this the worst possible time to start thinking about eating healthy?  Wouldn't it just be so easy to throw caution to the wind and enjoy all the scrumptious goodies that will be thrown my way over the next two months? Well, it's either keep gaining weight and never get out of my sweatpants, purchase an entirely new wardrobe (and everything's ugly past a certain size), or somehow manage to get a grip on my terrible eating habits.

I've gained and lost and gained and lost and gained and lost the same 20 pounds since we moved to Washington in 1996.  The thing about me is, I'm either 100% off a diet or 100% on.  There's no in-between.  That makes for huge fluctuations as I eat my way out of my clothes and diet my way back into them.  I've tried all sorts of methods to lose weight but I've found the one that works best for me is Weight Watchers.

So yesterday, I dragged my sorry butt down to Weight Watchers and signed up.  Again.  It's so humiliating to admit defeat but it's better than NOT doing anything about it.

I don't want to turn this blog into a weight-loss chronicle.  But it might turn into something like that at times.  A lot of heavy (no pun intended) thinking goes on when you're trying to make a lifestyle change and this could be a good way to sort it all out.

Anyway, for starters, I'll just post this picture of me that was taken exactly a year ago.  I had been exercising and eating well for a few months so that I could join my parents and sister on a cruise through the Panama Canal.  This picture was taken on the first day of the cruise.  I felt so good about myself on this day.  I want to feel this good again.

Wish me luck!!

Here fishy, fishy

A friend once asked me, "If you were stuck on a desert island with only one kind of food, what would that food be?" My answer was immediate and simple. It would be this:

My love for these golden pieces of cheesy, salty goodness runs skin deep. It started when I was about 12 years old when I was waiting by the salad bar at Hardee's waiting for my dad to order our dinner. I was looking at all of the stuff that could make a salad fit to eat when I noticed a bowl full of these funny looking crackers shaped like fish. What I did next was wrong. Against the law, even. I stole one. But I'll never regret it. I was hooked forever and I'm still not sorry I did it.

At the time, these little babies were kind of hard to find. And, because they were hard to find, I thought they must have been very expensive. So I didn't even dare ask my parents to buy them for me. Over the years, however, they have become a food staple the world over. Well, maybe not the WORLD, but definitely in MY house.

Now they come in all sorts of flavors:

And all sorts of sizes. This one is my favorite:

It's the Costco sized 3 pack, no less.

Now I will tell you how to eat them correctly. I promise, I've got this down to an art form. You'll get the maximum amount of satisfaction if you eat them this way: Put them in the right side of your mouth with the salt side against your tongue. Hold it between your teeth vertically and gently bite down--slicing the fish into two whole pieces. Now you have TWO goldfish! What could be better? Now that you have two goldfish, you can go ahead and chomp away at the both of them. Wasn't that great? You can thank me later.

I'm so proud to announce that my soon-to-be 23 year old son has inherited my passion for goldfish. He takes a little baggie of them to work with him every single day. He works at an investment firm in Seattle and must look so cute eating them at his desk, wearing a dress shirt and a tie. His co-workers are jealous, I know.

Thank you for listening to me go on about my food obsession. I will write about my second favorite food soon enough. Here's a hint:

Wallace, Idaho

About a million years ago, like, 15 years ago, we decided to take the family on a little trip to see what we could see. One of the stops we made was in a little town called Wallace, Idaho. The town is famous for it's silver mines that, at one time, produced the most silver than any mine in the world. Some of the mines are still working. This one was open for tourists like us.

We took a little tour of the town of Wallace. The entire town is on the National Historic Register and has kept its turn-of-the-century charm since the beginning.

We've thought about it a lot since then and decided it was time to take another trip. This time, only Allison would accompany us on our strange quest to see what we could see.

We stayed at the luxurious (not really) Stardust Motel. It's within walking distance to the main drag. Actually, everything in Wallace is within walking distance to the main drag.

We ate huckleberry pancakes for breakfast at the Red Light Garage. I highly recommend them.

A view of Bank Street. It's completely full of antique stores and a few saloons, too.

Another view of Bank Street. I love how cute and unspoiled it looks. Although I love Park City, Utah for its mining history, I think it has been completely turned fake by investors and tourism. A tiny little house in Park City is at least $1,000,000. Real estate in Wallace is much more reasonable.

Isn't this a cutie? Allison, AND the house.

I have a feeling we'll be visiting again 'cause I love Wallace. I've already said that, though, haven't I?

The Imelda of Makeup

Some people love shoes. Remember Imelda?

Some people love purses. Add about 25 more purses to this and you'd see both of my daughter's closets.

I have one purse and about four pairs of shoes. That's all. I don't care. I don't need to be a fashion statement. Paige and Allie would testify to that. They'd also say it's very, very sad.

BUT! I do have one big, giant weakness. It is this:

I LOVE MAKEUP! I love it I love it I love it. There. I said it. I am a makeup addict and a makeup junkie. I am a big hoarder of makeup. I absolutely can't resist it. It's like a drug. Sometimes, just the knowledge of having the opportunity to apply my makeup is the only thing that gets me out of bed in the morning. Now THAT'S sad.

After shamelessly spending who knows how much money on department store brands (Lancome, Clinique, Bobbi Brown), I have finally settled in on my favorite eyeshadow. Believe it or not, each one of these palettes costs $5.00 and I got them at Target. No kidding. Some of them were even reduced to $3.00. I wear this kind of eye shadow every day. It's by ELF (Eyes. Lips. Face.)

But when you buy the Lancome sample deals, you get the greatest creams, lotions, makeup remover, dewrinklers and anti-aging solutions on the planet. Keep 'em coming!

The stupid thing is, that no matter what kind of makeup or what shades of shadow I use, I still look exactly the same day in and day out. Oh well.

And how many faces do I have to apply all this junk on? Only ONE. That's why, at the end of the day, this is actually all I need.

I still think shoes and purses are a waste of money. Makeup, on the other hand, is totally worth it.

A gem

I'm cleaning out a corner cabinet that has been neglected for the past, ummm . . . 10 years or so and I ran across this gem. It was taken while Tom and I were dating and before we were even engaged. Notice the leather tie that I bought for him in Florence, Italy.

Aren't we gorgeous together?!

I love Egypt

Last year at this time we were preparing for the trip of a lifetime. My parents treated their daughters, their sons-in-law and one child from each family to a Mediterranean cruise. We visited some amazing places but right now I just want to write about Egypt.

I went to Egypt in February of 1981 when I was on study abroad in Jerusalem. I took four rolls of film (obviously this was before the digital world) and, for some horrible, horrible reason, not one single roll of film worked. The film never advanced in my camera and they were all unexposed.

Well, I'm sure the important things haven't changed much since 1981 and thank goodness for awesome digital cameras.

I've been glued to the news reports about what's been going on in Cairo and Alexandria for the past several days. Thousands of people have been protesting against their government and things are totally out of control. Without going into the details, I will just say that I hope it clears up soon because I want to go back there someday and spend a LOT of time all over that amazing country.

Sorry, but there are lots of photos in this post. How do you narrow hundreds of photos down to just a few for one little blog? You don't!

Here is a shot of the port city of Alexandria. I don't know how many millions of people live there but it was the most crowded city I've ever seen. We spent a day there; half of it in a dirty, filthy, disgusting taxi-cab whose driver totally ripped us off. The air in Alexandria is thick with smoke and exhaust and grime. I remember wishing I could just take one breath of the air from my home back in Redmond. I remember thinking I would give a million dollars for one big breath of fresh air.

We took a day trip to Cairo and crammed everything in that one day as quickly as we could. It didn't make any sense to do Cairo in one day and I don't recommend it to anyone. But, that's why we have (or HAD) big plans to go back one day.

This is a picture of the famous Nile River. Allison was so disappointed because she thought it would be covered with ferns and papyrus like it looked when Moses was found in his little baby basket. But it looks like this for miles and miles.

The drive from Alexandria to Cairo takes three hours. This is how we knew we were there. Imagine seeing this out of your bus window. It honestly took my breath away.

Here are a few random shots of one of the seven wonders of the world.

The Sphinx was amazing. Look at mine and Allie's outfits. You would not BELIEVE the time it took for us to find the absolute perfect outfits for this day. Half the fun of this trip was planning our wardrobes. I know. . . very silly of us.

I love this picture of Allie and the camel guy. I thought he was asking her if she had fun but he was really asking her for more money.

Here's the whole gang.

I love this picture of the cousins. Elizabeth Burnard, James Christiansen, and Allison Taylor. Those lucky kids!

The pyramids are very close to the city of Cairo as you can see. I imagine that they were far, far away from Cairo hundreds of years ago and that the city just grew out to meet them.

We didn't get a good picture of the Egyptian Museum where the fabulous King Tut exhibit resides. It was crowded and hot and we were in a hurry. But I still remember how amazing it was and how beautiful the 3,000 year old artifacts were. Last week, some vandals got into the museum and trashed some of them. Unbelievable.

Here's the last shot--as if you need more. But really, I still can't get over how amazing Egypt is.