The New Edition

I know it really should be "The New Addition" instead of "The New Edition" because we are adding another member to the family not just editing and re-releasing a currently existent one...but sometimes it certainly feels like a do over. Like a Claire redux or something similar. Especially when you are awake in the middle of the night waiting for your kid to poo so they (and then you) can fall asleep and your like "oh yeah, this does stink." (no pun intended...well maybe it was intended...).

On the flip side though there really is nothing more wondrous than a newborn. Especially when they smile at you.

Avery Lyn Smith was born Nov. 25th she weighed 8lbs 10oz and was 21 1/4 inches.

Halloween

October is over. Seems like it just got here and now it is already a week gone. Who knew. Well I have included pictures of Claire in her Halloween costume and playing dress up at the end. Assuming you haven't already, you may now stop reading and skip to the pictures.

Claire loved Halloween. Her preschool had a party, the ward had a party and our apartment complex had a party. She now loves parties. However, her fear of the witch in Snow White is now forever cemented in her psyche. Let me explain.

So, for whatever reason, Claire has always been terrified of the old lady in Snow White who gives Ms.White the apple. I say "for whatever reason" like there isn't a good reason for her to be afraid of the old hag. This is obviously false. Anyone who has seen Snow White, especially recently, recognizes that the old witch in Snow White is pretty much the face of fear. She still unnerves me. (I say "unnerves" like it means something other than scares. Obviously this is false.) Anyway, the point is Claire has watched Snow White once, and has strenuously objected to watching it again. Grounds for her objections shortly following her first viewing go like this:

Me: "do you want to watch a movie?"

Claire: "I sure do. But not the old lady movie"  (she calls the witch the old lady)

Me, pretending like all good dads do that I don't know what she is talking about in order to tease her a little then says: "Do you want to watch Snow White?"

Claire: "Snow White is just nice. But not the old lady." (She is always very careful to distinguish that Snow White is nice and the Old Lady is not.) 

Me, still feigning fatherly ignorance: So do you want to watch Snow White?

Claire: Uhm. No. I just don't.

It's been over a year since she saw Snow White but she still flatly refuses to see it. She simply states: "The Old Lady is too scary." She has no problem with any of the other villains in her movies, Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty (who I think is just as "unnerving" if not more so than the Old Lady on Snow White), Jafar from Aladdin, Scar or the Hyenas from the Lion King, Mother Gothel from Tangled, That Voodo guy from The Princess and the Frog, none of them really scare her. She just says "they're not nice." But the old Lady from Snow White. That's serious business. Point is, of all the things in her world she is probably the most afraid of that Old Lady from Snow White. 

So, we go to our ward party. And guess who sits down across from us. Yep. you guessed it. The Old Lady from Snow White. A couple in our ward had dressed up as Snow White (her) and the Old Lady complete with an apple (him). But he wasn't just dressed up. Oh no, these are serious Halloween folks, he had the full make up. He really looked like the witch. Long chin, long nose, wart, the whole nine yards. Claire was terrified. She got one look at him when he sat down and froze. Petrified. Literally. We tried to explain to her that it wasn't really the Old Lady and that it was just Mason's dad (Mason is their little boy who is Claire's age) but she wasn't buying it. Then, seeing she was so scared, the guy tried to reassure Claire and started to talk to her saying, he wasn't really the Old Lady and that his apple wasn't really poisoned. 

I'm pretty sure all Claire heard was "Old Lady" and "poisoned apple," because she started to tremble visibly. 

After a few minuets we finally convinced her that she didn't need to be scared. But when her friend came over to say hi the first thing Claire said was: "Mason's dad is the Old Lady. You should stay away. Don't eat his apple." And she made sure to give him a wide berth as she walked around the gym.

She talked about it for the next week. When we went trick or treating she wouldn't go to their apartment. 

In other news. Claire also had her first atomic fire ball. It was pretty much everything you would imagine it to be. 

I told her not to. She did it anyway. She freaked out. Spit it into her hand. Tried to convince me to eat it. Then threw it away. It really was hilarious. But mostly it was her facial expressions that sealed the deal. Where is instant movie when you need it?

Well hope everyone else had a great Halloween! We are looking forward to Thanksgiving. Hopefully we will have our new baby by then as well. (I can't imagine what it will be like if we haven't she is due on the 20th...)

Claire sporting her dress ups from Aunt Rachel 

Dresses ups from Granny.

Claire the Bee.

Some Things and Such

So here we are. October is upon us in all of its fall glory. Claire is excited for Halloween (she is going to be a bee) and I am excited that the humidity has largely passed...and for candy. Let's not kid ourselves. Halloween is all about guilt free candy. We have to get candy because it's for the kids - and then we have to help them eat their candy because it isn't healthy for them to eat all that candy themselves...so, again - for the kids. It's beautiful.

Claire started preschool last month. She just LOVED it. and yes that needed to be capitalized and the superfluousness period needed to be added, because that is exactly how she said it. After her first day I picked her up and said "did you like preschool?" She replied: "I just LOVED it." And that is pretty much been the state of things since. She goes Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 12:30 to 2:30. Everyday that is not a school day is, by her judgment, dismal. A necessary evil that must be endured until the joyous freedom of school returns.

Ok. That is not an entirely accurate rendering of the situation. She feels the same way about nursery as she does about preschool. So, any day that doesn't include school or nursery is by default bound to be destitute of joy. Let me illustrate.

Typical Monday, Friday, or Saturday morning conversation with Claire. This is pretty much exactly what happens every time. It's automatic. Constant. Unchangeable in its regularity. Like morning in general - you know when you happen to wake up 10 or so minutes earlier than usual and you start wishing desperately that morning will not come today and you can just luxuriate in your sheets instead. But, alas, your hope is wasted against powers beyond your control - it will happen and your luxuriating quickly turns to languishing.

It is 7:06am and she bounds into our room. She goes to Hillary's side of the bed which is farthest from the door. She has learned not to come to my side of the bed first thing in the morning for reasons we shall not discuss at this particular time. She announces her first words of the day: "I need to go potty." This statement is about 98% certain. 60-70% of the time Hillary usually says something like "go ahead and go then sweetie" or "do you need help?" or some other caring phrase. It's hard to know for certain though because she is usually drowned out by my boisterous and possibly semi-critical/sarcastic retort which, while varies in the precise language, usually goes something to the tune of: "well, don't just stand there, GO!" This statement is about 65% certain. It often interchanges with statements like "well, GO!" "GO THEN" and other such phrases.

She then goes potty. Usually in the toilet.

Then she washes her hands. Then she starts doing who knows what in the bathroom but it usually involves running water in the sink, splashing noises, singing, laughing, little exclamations of "oopsies" or uh-oh" and finally comes to climatic crescendo with a boisterous rumbling by me of "Claire, stop messing around and get the heck out of the bathroom." This statement is 100% certain.

She then comes back into our room and announces: "It's morning-time sleepy heads!" "It's time for school!"
To which I say: "It's (insert appropriate day of Monday, Fri, or Sat) you don't have school today."
Claire, absolutely dismayed at the prospect of a day of no school: Awhhhh. But I just want to go to school.
Grumpy morning Will: Too bad.
Hillary: It's ok Claire, you can go to school tomorrow.
Cliare, in the tones of one whose only joy in life has just been dashed upon the rocky shore of reality: Awhh. I just want to go today.
Hillary: Do you want breakfast?
Claire, resigned to her eternal state of misery and woe: No, just school.
Hillary: How about cheerios?
Claire, suddenly cured of her endless sorrow and exulting in the light of a new dawn: I can have cheerios? OK!

Anyway, she likes school and seems to be doing fairly well. I'm sure there will be more posts about her and school in the future.

In other news. One of the women Hillary goes to school with had a party for their one year old son a week or two back and rented out a family farm fun center thing. Basically it is a farm that has a bunch of fun things for kids to do...as if seeing the animals wasn't exciting enough. They give donkey rides, hay rides, do face painting have a little corn maze, a haunted forest and a little playground area. It was fun. Claire loved the hay ride and the donkey ride.

Other stuff has happened and I was going to write about those things - most notably I changed the rotors and brakes on the jeep (which was a joyous occasion for all...as only someone who has worked with a Smith male when things aren't going "the way they should" can truly appreciate)- but I think I will sleep instead.

Here are some pictures of Claire from the last month:

Claire's first day of school! I actually remembered to take a picture.

Claire riding the donkey at the kid farm. 

Claire enjoying her Ice Cream cone after her and I took a walk one day.

More ice cream.

The Last Three Months

Wow. Is it really already almost the end of August? I swear it was just the first part of June a couple of weeks ago. Well I guess the old saying is true “time flies when you’re having fun.” A lot has happened since I wrote last. Since you know it was May or something…when I last wrote…but that really isn’t important. What is important is that since then lots of things have happened. And I mean lots…I mean right? Sheesh, almost three month’s worth of stuff.

Regrettably, however, most of those things are quite droll and boring.

Stuff like sleeping which probably accounted for at least 20% of the time since the last time I wrote. Eating/sitting around/talking probably covered another 15% not to mention all the movies/TV/Books I read which probably covers another 10-15% which brings us right up to about 50% of the time that has passed. Then there is all other mundane things…brushing my teeth, getting dressed, taking Claire potty, taking myself potty, taking out the trash…you know all that stuff. So, I figure after you factor in all that - we are only looking at about 30% of the time in which something truly remarkable could happen. And don’t you worry plenty of things did happen. I’m just only going to talk about two. Not because other things didn’t happen, (because they did, you know stuff like traveling back in time for eight minute periods to save Chicago from a nuclear terrorist attack and saving hundreds of people on a commuter train, and stuff…(if you are thinking…hey that sounds like the movie Source Code…well they had to get the idea from somewhere. Right? Well I’m just sayin’.)

The first thing that happened to us over the last three months that is worthy of mention is that we went to Bojangles. Now, if you are like me the first thing you think of when you hear Bojangles is the old Nitty Gritty Dirt Band remake of the song Mr. Bojangles about Bill Bojangles the tap dancer in the 30’s….you know…let me clear me throat…

“I knew a man Bojangles who danced for you in worn out shoes…he jumped so high, jumped so high and he lightly touched down …Mr. Bojangles, Mr. Bojangles …dance”

Or something like that.

Anyway, obviously we are not talking about that particular Bojangles we are talking about the “Famous Chicken and Biscuits” fast food Bojangles with the catchy TV commercial slogan “Hey, Its Bo Time.” Apparently, Bojangles is like the Mecca of fried chicken and biscuits here in the south. Well maybe not THE Mecca, I mean not only is that politically incorrect to say it isn’t entirely accurate as there is technically only one Mecca and there are lots, (like over 500, I just checked on Wikipedia) of Bojangles…so probably more like the Southern Baptist Church of fried chicken…just to be fair. Anyway. It’s a big deal here. An example of how big a deal. Well let’s just say Hillary mentioned at school once that she hadn’t been to Bojangles before and people stopped talking to her for a week. Literally. It is that huge of a deal. (ok they didn’t stop talking to her for a week but they did look at her like she was from another planet (aka the mountain west)). When people did start talking to her again (which was really only about 5 seconds later) she was informed that she HAD to go to Bojangels. To which Hillary responded “isn’t it just like KFC?” And that is actually when everyone stopped talking to her for a week.

Well we went. Finally. Back in may. And well it was truly a noteworthy experience. And here, like they say down here in the south “is ow it ’ll ent dwn.” (how it all went down).

Well we pull up. I think, “hum this looks like a KFC to me…the sell Fried Chicken in a Bucket and it’s fast food…yep…pretty much KFC. However, as soon as we walk in the door I immediately realize that this place is definitely not a KFC. How do I know? No white people. When we walked in, the way the heads whipped around in there -whoosh- it was like the most curious/strangest looking thing in the world had just walked in the door. We might as well have been Sarah Palin. Everyone looked at us with this sort of expectant “well, looky here, look what the cat dragged in, lets watch and see what crazy thing they are going to do next” sort of look. Well we went up to the counter to order. That’s what we did.

As we approach the counter we try to read the menu, but mostly we are trying to overcome our obvious and decidedly un-cool western whiteness. When we get to the cashier the lady behind the counter finds us such a curios and amusing sight that she actually lets out a little laugh while she says “what y’all want?”

We have no idea. We have never been here before. And we are still trying to overcome our whiteness. So, Hillary, trying to by a few more moments for us “to look at the menu” says “well, we’ve never been here before…what all do you have?” At this point the cashier looks at us, tries to hold back her laughter. Fails. Laughs, does a half eye roll that says “white people” then says “uhm, CHICKEN.” Hillary, trying to remain calm, says “right, but I mean what’s good? Can you suggest something?” The cashier is just flabbergasted by this question starts laughing and calls out to her manager, and says: “hey, these people want to know what is good here” but her tone means: “hey, you gotta come check these clueless white folks out..They are hilarious”

So he wanders over looks at us. Looks at the cashier that is now laughing outright, tries to hide an amused smirk and says “most people get the chicken and biscuits.” I say we will get two of those and a kids chicken strips meal with milk. The cashier who is still laughing says “white or chocolate” I say, and I’m fully self conscious of the irony here, “white.”

Laughing Cashier (LC): What sides do you want?

Hillary: What do you have?

Disbelieving LC that is obviously thinking to herself did this white girl really just ask me that again: Fries, and whatever else is listed on the sign up there.

Hillary Clam as a summer morning: Well I don’t know, what do you think Will?

Totally Self Aware of his whiteness and flustered Will: I don’t care, who cares, just say something. We’ll get the fries.

Cashier: That’ll be $15.47

I pay and we move down the counter. Meanwhile the manager is getting our meals ready and putting them on the tray. He fills up two large drinks and puts them on the tray and I say to Hillary “I don’t remember telling anyone what we wanted to drink.”

Hillary replies, “that’s because we didn’t”

Frantically I look at the menu again, and sure enough it says “Free Ice Tea with every meal order.” Oh great I think here we go again.

Will to Hillary: “They gave us tea”

Hillary: “hum, that’s not going to work”

Hillary to manager: “excuse me sir, hum, can we get different drinks?”

Manager with bemused look on his face: “hum, I guess…what do you want?”

Hillary: “do you have lemonade?”

Manager: “Nope”

Hillary: “Water is fine then.”

Manager, with totally entertained cashier now listening in: “No water either. Just Tea and soda”

Will: “how about Sprite”

Manager: “hum, no…”

Hillary: “What do you have?”

Insert burst of laughter from eavesdropping cashier.

Manager barely containing his mirth: “Sierra Mist”

Will: “Perfect. We’ll take it”

We get our food. And go to the napkins and condiment table. No ketchup. There is hot sauce, but no ketchup. I look around. Other people have ketchup. But I can’t see any on the condiment table. So I say to Hillary “hey, where is the ketchup?”

Hillary: “I don’t know, other people have ketchup should I go ask?”

Will: “nope. Let’s not give them any more amusement then we need to. Let’s just go sit down.”

We sit down. Everyone is looking at us out of the corner of their eye. I start softly singing the song from Sesame Street “one of these is not like the other; one of these doesn’t belong…”

Hillary: “It’s Bo Time!”

The other thing that we did over the last three months that was noteworthy is we went to Idaho/Utah to visit friends and family. As always it was a blast. There are actually too many fun things to list but aside from just seeing and talking to everyone which we always enjoy here are a few highlights more or less in the order they occurred:

Brooklyn’s birthday party

The “Treehouse” in ogden

Playing “NBA Jam” with Derek and Amy and later Lael and Elise

Going to see “Rio”

Camping with the Griffins at “the property”

Being scared of the two moose (moosen? Meese? Moxen? Mooses?) that came within 10 yards of our campfire while at “the property.”

Keeping Mom and Dad Griffin up past their bedtimes

The Farm (aka the Taylor’s)

Hamburgers with the Plicka’s

Teasing Ericka and Peter

Bowling with the Petersons

Seeing Mack and Lacey's ridiculously awesome backyard. oh yeah, and talking to Mack while there :)

Going to West Yellowstone and seeing “Dirty rotten scoundrels”

Jordan’s water party

Seeing Tyler and Tashie

Going to Yellowstone Park with Granny and Papa

Visiting with Travis and Brandi…Kambrie is huge! And adorable!

Talking with/Teasing Robert

Fireworks at the Marquits for the 24^th

Breakfast with Lael and Elise

Wackie Six

Camping at Redfish with Smiths and Great Grandpa Baird

Fishing (Claire caught her first Fish)

Going to Great Grandma Smith’s on Sunday

There were actually a lot of other things as well but since I have been writing this post for over an hour now, I think I am going to stop with what I have listed. I will only add that we are extremely grateful to all those that hosted us, let us eat your food, made us meals, gave us everything we needed and generally ensured that we had a smashing good time.

Bunch of random Pics and stuff from last three months:

This one is of Claire and her Friend dancing at a blue grass show we went to last week

So It's Been Awhile

Well we finally went to the lake this past week. I say finally, but really we have already been to the lake already this season. We went about three weeks ago, but we went in the late afternoon and only Claire got in the water. Personally, I would count that as "full outing." However, I was informed that to be counted as a "full outing" all members of the party need to get in the water. Thus, we finally went to the lake. It was fun.

We got there at 12:27pm on Friday, which, honestly is the perfect time to get to a lake. This is because 12:27 pm is right when the early "mommy" crowd and all the loud bedlamites that accompany them are leaving (so they can get home home for lunches and naps) but still before the later "single" crowd and all the swagger and flapdoodle that accompanies them start arriving.

But rather it is the time when all the grand people are arriving. And so you get to share the lake beach with pleasant grandparent type folks who all coo and smile at your daughter and look at your little family with that look of "ah what a sweet little family..." and you feel like all of a sudden you just time warped to the 1950's when women still wore one piece bathing suits and men still wore a shirt unless they were actually in the water (or looked like Sean Connery). And since everyone knows the 50's where the golden age of America - well, it's perfect.

Or perhaps it is the fact that I don't have to get out of bed early to get there by 12:27pm that makes it enjoyable for me...then again it is also very probable that I enjoy arriving at that time because there are simply less people in general there and thus less people to witness the unveiling of the brilliant whiteness or "second sun" AKA "the other white meat" that is my upper body when I go swimming. Who knows. It could be a myriad of sundry reasons, but the fact remains that 12:27 pm on a Friday is the perfect time to arrive at a Lake beach.

Anyway, we had a grand time. Claire played in the water, we cooked some hotdogs, I sat on the beach, Hillary got to swim, Claire and I dug a mini lake in the sand, I made a huge sand mountain which Claire throughly enjoyed destroying and ultimately even I jumped in the water for a time, (thus fulfilling the requirement for a "full outing.")

We even saw a snake. Personally, I do not like snakes. I wouldn't say I was afraid of them because this is a public blog and such an admission might be wrongly interpreted as "unmanly" and let's face it, I spend most of my days watching dora the explorer, playing with dolls and having tea parties with Disney princesses so I can't just go loosing "manly" points on something like being afraid of snakes...I don't have enough to spare. Anyway, it wasn't that big of a snake...3ft at most...and it was just swimming on by... no closer than two feet...just close enough for you to go "oh my, that's a snake" and calmly pick your daughter up and get out of the water.

Certainly nothing that would cause your heart to suddenly thump hard against your chest and instigate a semi-frantic uncoordinated lunge from the water yanking your daughter with you so hard that she later says "Dada that wasn't nice." No certainly nothing like that. Although if such a scenario did happen to have occurred one could not be blamed for such a reaction because there is a large concentration of copperheads in the area and any such reaction would have surely stemmed from concern rather than fear. Certainly.

In other news we all got sun burned. Well I say "all" but really I mean me. Since Hillary doesn't burn and Claire had sunscreen. But I have been burning for as long as I can remember so no biggie there...just business as usual.

Anyway, Hillary started her internship (which is actually technically called an externship, for reason of which I am unsure) with a Judge on the State Court of Appeals in Raleigh. So far she is really enjoying the work. She is partial to research and writing and that is most of what her position entails, so it follows that she would enjoy it. She commutes to Raleigh everyday so she is gone from about 7am till 6:30pm everyday which makes for long days but she gets Fridays off so that helps make up for the longer days. I am getting ready for the LSAT, only two weeks to go. I wouldn't say I am getting nervous because, again, that would be "unmanly," but let's just say that I am anxiously engaged in preparing.

Well, that is about it for the last little few weeks here. Sorry no pictures this time. I'm a lameo. I know, your thinking, for "realsies?" "no pictures?" like we really care about you going to the beach, we just want to see pictures of Claire! But alas it is true, no pictures. I will do better next time.

Hillary and Claire Pick some Berries. Yo.

Hillary and Claire went to pick some strawberries at a local farm this morning and Hillary wanted to blog about it so here it is the first blog of hopefully many from Hillary:

This morning Claire and I ventured out to a berry farm here in Chapel Hill to pick strawberries. Though apparently there are several in the area, we went to the Waller family farm http://www.wallerfamilyfarm.com. You can buy pre-picked strawberries by the quart or by the gallon or you can pick them yourself for $1.45 a lb. Of course, the reason you drive out there is for the exquisite taste of fresh strawberries that you have picked yourself (yes, they do taste better)-- so you pick them. We got our mud shoes on (there has been a lot of rain here lately) and ventured out for a real agricultural experience. It was soo fun! It totally reminded me of home. It reminded me of all those mornings out picking beans in the garden. The bending over for long periods of time and checking under the leaves to make sure you haven’t missed any. Thank you mom and dad for having a garden when we were young! Those are such great memories, and we cultivated more than vegetables in our backyard. It was good honest hard work, and delicious food too!

I’m really glad I went. It was therapeutic. Especially in all the hustle and bustle, all the stress and hurry of modern life, it felt great to get back to the land. I know that’s cliché, but it’s still true. Sure, it was only for 20 minutes or so, but it was really fun. And yes, I am aware that my experience was very tailored to the benefits of that lifestyle, but I came away a believer. It was so free and easy out there. Just you, the plants and the dirt ---and the dirt doesn’t judge.

Needless to say, I got carried away. In all those bean-picking years, I have really perfected my technique and in 20 minutes I had picked a quarter of a row (they were long rows) and a little over 5 lbs. for our small family. We’ll likely be having a lot of smoothies to use them all. 

Claire was excited about being there for the “berries”, but wasn’t too keen on actually helping pick them, so I picked and she put them in the box. I briefly considered requiring her help in the picking, but she is still probably too young for that. Besides, I didn’t mind. I was having a ball.

Below is a picture of Claire and our haul. Hope everyone out there is doing great!

(This is Claire.)(No that is not Hillary's butt ...'er I mean "bum" in the background)

So we did a little Easter egg hunt with Claire yesterday you can see some clips below. But what I didn’t get in the clips are some of Claire’s best quotes from the week. So let me share them with you in the form of a short Easter Day Three Act Play.

Disclaimer: The events in the following are loosely interpreted from my memory. Some happened exactly as written. Some are a blending of multiple experiences. Others are laced with pure fiction to help give the quotes background. All of Claire’s words are exact and all quotes from me and Hillary are also exact (at least according to my memory). I am doing this as sort of a writing exercise, you know for that book I’m going to write sometime in the undefined future.

Act the First. In this one the conversation happened as written but the events surrounding it are blurred in my memory so I’ve inserted the conversation into a real occurrence but separate event...

Claire wakes up. Claire comes into our room and does her ritual “happy time” morning dance. She calls the morning “Happy Time” I have no idea why she does this but she does. Anyway, Hillary tells her to go to the bathroom (she still forgets in the morning to go because she is so excited about “Happy Time” that she just can’t think about anything else…and yes I am being serious). Claire exits.

Claire returns after about 10 secs. (absolutely no way she went to the bathroom in that amount of time) Hillary says: “did you go?”

Claire: “yep.”

Hillary: “I don’t think you went are you sure?”

Claire: “Cross my heart?”

Hillary: “What?”

Claire: “Cross my heart”

Hillary: “Where did you learn that? Who said that?”

Claire: “Claire did”

Hillary (slightly exasperated): “I know, but who said it before you?” Did dad say it?

Claire (also slightly exasperated): “No, just Claire.”

Hillary (now, fully exasperated): But where did you hear it? Did one of the kids at the park say it?

Claire (also now, fully exasperated): No just me.

Hillary (extremely exasperated): No, you didn’t make it up, you heard it somewhere, where was it?

Claire (also, extremely exasperated): NO, JUST ME.

At this point I enter the quickly escalating conversation:

Will (beyond exasperated): It’s from Robin Hood. You know when they shoot the arrow over the wall and the little rabbits and turtle are going to get it and the rabbit says you have to take an oath not to tell and goes “spiders, snakes and a lizards tongue cross my heart and hope to die, if I tattle I’ll die till I’m dead” and then the little turtle says “but I don’t want to die..”

Silence.

Claire and Hillary look at me.

Faint tinkling sound like a tiny brook or stream.

Claire: “I need to go potty.”

Act the Second. Hillary, Claire and Will are in the front room. Will is eating breakfast at the table; Claire is frolicking in the front room chasing the sunlight, exuding a sort of empyreal exuberance of which only a three year old experiencing her “Happy Time” in the morning is capable.

Hillary: Claire are you ready for Easter?

Claire: Yes!

Hillary: Should we look for some Easter eggs?

Claire: No bones about it.

Hillary: What?

Claire: Mom, just no bones about it.

Hillary: Where do you get this stuff kiddo?

Claire: There’s just no bones mom.

Will: Yeah, no bones about it mom, let’s just look for some Easter Eggs.

They look for eggs.

Act the Third. The next day. Claire wakes up. Enter Claire into Will and Hillary’s room to do her ritual morning “Happy Time” dance. Will groans and pretends he is still asleep.

Claire: “Good morning everybody. It’s happy time!”

Hillary: “Good morning Claire!”

Claire: “Mommydaddy (said as one word) are you awake?”

Hillary: “Yep. Are you ready for breakfast?”

Will: (no response)

Claire: Is daddy awake?

Hillary: Not yet.

Claire (in lowered whispered voice): Mommy’s just awake but Daddy’s just grouchy.

Hillary: Yep.

Claire: Can I have treats for brefest?

Hillary: How about oatmeal.

Exit Hillary and Claire.

Enter Hillary and Claire into kitchen/front room. Claire has a blow of oatmeal in front of her and is singing to/ eating her breakfast.

Hillary: Finish your oatmeal. I’m going to take a shower. Stay here until you are done.

Exit Hillary. Shower water starts in the background.

Claire puts down her spoon. Looks around. Climbs down out of her chair at the table. Cautiously glances down the hall to where the bathroom door and Will and Hillary’s bedroom door is. She enters the kitchen quietly. Deftly climbs the cupboards with practiced easy onto the counter top. Crosses over the stove, climbs on top of the microwave and reaches her Easter basket filled with candy filled eggs on top of the refrigerator. Quickly and quietly retraces her steps and sits on the couch in the front room to enjoy her spoils.

Stop Shower water.

Enter Hillary.

Claire blissfully eating jellybeans: Hi Mom!

Hillary (somewhat impressed by Claire’s tenacity and resourcefulness): UH,Hi Claire. What do you think you are doing?

Enter Will quietly in the background. Looking grouchy.

Claire (matter of factly): Just eating treats.

Hillary: Sheesh kid. You are a candyaholic.

Calire: No, just a treataholic.

Hillary: No bones about it Claire.

Will (from the kitchen): No bones about it.

Claire (to Hillary): Hey, where did you learn that from?

Hillary (laughing): Magic School Bus.

Claire (to Will): Hey, dad, who told you that?

Will: Claire did!

Claire: No just Robin Hood.

Curtain.

Notes on historical accuracy. The first act is already explained in the body. The second act happened exactly as written. The third act is actually two separate events that did happen on the same day but not right after each other. The morning is exactly correct up to the conversation between Claire and Hillary starting with you’re a candyaholic. This conversation happened exactly as written but it actually occurred later in the afternoon after lunch rather than after breakfast.

New Website Project

Well after shutting down the furniture website I took a few months off from e-commerce website building. But I have started working on a new project the past month and finally have a landing page up and running. It is a motorsports accessories e-store. Why motorsports? well that is just the way it worked out. Anyway here is the link if you feel like checking it out www.cycleandsledshop.com

Claire's 3rd Birthday

Claire turned three on Friday! Mostly all I have to say about that is wow! Time flies. We had a pretty fun day. Hillary took the day off form school, (she only has one class on Fridays anyway) and we went and just had some fun.

Here are some vids from the Claire extravaganza.

This is from the Life and Science museum in Durham

Also from the Life and Science. Claire notices at the end that I am recording her and trys to take the camera....

This is inside the North Gate mall. She loves this mall...for obvious reasons.

Also inside the North Gate mall. You can't see it in the video very well. Because I'm a lousy camera man but she has the cutest/shyest smile and way in this one.

Blowing out the candles.

Sping Break and D.C.

Well, this past week was spring break for Hillary. She studied and went to school all day for the first three days and Claire and had fun playing outside and watching Grandpa Griffin's puppet shows on his blogs and YouTube Claire LOVES watching him tell stories especially the three little pigs. But then on Thursday we took a much needed break and drove to Washington D.C. to spend a few days with Sarah and Rich and so I could “see the sights” (I have never been to D.C.). Let me just say here before going on that the Bindrups rock. It is really that simple. They Rock.

We got to D.C. early in the afternoon on Thursday, and other than a slight misdirection on our GPS (it wanted me to flip a U turn in the middle of a 12 lane freeway) we arrived without too much trouble. In fact we drove right into downtown D.C. and were able to park right in front of the Washington monument. This was probably due to the fact that it was 2:30pm on a Thursday and it was raining, but nonetheless it was a great stroke of luck. So we looked at the Washington monument and then went to the Museum of American History for about an hour. It was pretty neat to look around…they had all sorts of interesting stuff from Rick Flaire’s blue shiny cape and boots to Violins made by the Stadivari and Amati families to Lincoln’s top hat. Claire, in particular enjoyed the Dumbo car and looking at the original Jim Henson Muppets.

At about 3:30/4:00 we loaded back up and drove out to the Bindrup’s place. We arrived with only a minor incident. We are on our merry little way when, as is common here in the east, especially around big cities, we encounter a toll road. As with most toll roads they have various lanes you can pass through there are the “E-Z pass” lanes, the “exact change” lanes, the “cash only” lanes and the “full service” lanes. Well we don’t have an E-Z pass and we don’t have any coins or cash on us so we get in the “full service” lane so we can pay with our credit card. Well, we get up to the window and I go to hand the lady my card. She just looks at me like “What is that?” and after a brief moment of uncomfortable silence she briskly says “we don’t take cards…” and then with a slightly slower enunciation and a heavier emphasis provides the clarification of “cash only” followed with the raised-one-eyebrow-and-slightly-pursed-and-downturned-lip-expression that says: “you moron.”

So I respond with the verbal expression “oh” followed with the slower explanation of “well, we don’t have any cash” accompanied with the double-raised-eyebrow-slight-head-tilt-with-slightly-parted-lips expression that says: “which is why we are in the FULL SERVICE lane” and “you’re the moron; thank you very much.”

To which she responds with the audible sigh of “huhhh” accompanied with a half eye roll. And hands me a bill which I “have to mail in with payment within 10 days or they will asses a $25 fee and possibly impound my vehicle.” I say “ok, thank you,” drive through the gate and then turn and roll my eyes to Hillary and say “Full Service my bum.” (We are trying to stop using the word butt/arse because Claire is starting to repeat things we say and when I say “we” I mean “me” since I’m the only one who has used those words previously). The toll was a $1.25.

We get to the Bindrups and are greeted by Sarah. Again let me reiterate that the Bindrups Rock. Claire was hesitant at first but once Sarah pulled out some toys from the closet and gave her a little bottle of nail polish Claire was an instant Sarah fan. Sarah had cooked us a fantastic Smith style meal – meat, potatoes, roles and other stuff like salad. It was delicious, hearty and completely satisfying. Rich cleared our plates and did the dishes and then to Claire’s great enjoyment found and watched TWO episodes of the Dora the Explorer with her on Netfilx. This pretty much ensured that Rich is Claire favorite. In fact she has already said she wants to go back to Cousin Sarah and Rich’s house. I can’t blame her. Hillary and I particularly enjoyed our conversations with the Bindrups.

Friday we spent exploring D.C. we went to the National Zoo (Claire loved the Zoo) and then we rode the Metro to downtown (Claire loved the metro too) where we saw the White House, the Lincoln memorial, the Smithsonian Castle, the National Gallery of Art and a bunch of other things in-between (Claire fell asleep in her stroller). We went to the National Catherdral the next day and then we came home.

We didn’t get to see everything, obviously, there is a ton of stuff, but it was fun to see what we did see and it is always fun to see family and talk and reminisces about things. Among other things we still need to see the Shakespeare library and the National Archives and the Library of Congress…all things which I wanted to see but just ran out of time this go-around. But, that just means we get to go back.

Of course we forgot our camera but here are a few pics I took on my phone:

Stuff. (Which is really unimportant but I wrote anyway (you may skip ahead to the actual post).

Well. To state the obvious I have failed miserably at keeping a weekly blog….and to be honest it is extremely likely that this will continue to be the case. I know you are all terribly disappointed – devastated even. But alas, such is the truth of the matter and I am sure that we will all find a way to survive. So instead of trying for the ideal of once a week I will content myself with shooting for once a month. Which is really probably just setting myself up. What I should do is make no promises and then just let what happens happen, and then anything I wrote would be a positive. But apparently goals and such are “en vogue” now and striving builds character and who knows what else….so let us say tentatively, for now, at least until it becomes inconvenient, or I forget, that I will post something once a month.

The Actual Post

First, lets give a shout out to the Dirt Diva (so dubbed by me and Hillary) Adrienne! If you are looking to grow a garden or anything that has to do with dirt or plants check out her Blog: Playing in Dirt it is fantastic and vibrant...opposed to grey and semi-satirical like this one....

Well the last couple of weeks have just flown by. Here it is already the end of February and time to do home teaching again… (and yes that is how I mark my months…home teaching…it is just so consistent much more reliable than counting days or weeks…I mean some months have 30 days some 31 others 28 or 29 even the amount of weeks in a month fluctuate month to month - but home teaching always remains reliable, constant, never changes, month after month it is always there waiting for you).

Yep, time just seems to fly by these days. Anyway, here are a couple of little anecdotes from our lives over the last few weeks.

Anecdote First

This took place about two weeks ago. I was sitting in the front room reading the Autobiography of Mark Twain as I frequently do these days (great book, very long…) when it occurred to me that I could no longer hear Claire playing in her room. Right now, anyone of you that currently have or have had little kids already knows this is trouble. Silence, when raising small children, although extremely rare and to be cherished, is almost always an indication that someone is doing something they are not supposed to be doing…either that or they are asleep or if you have multiple children, someone or someones is/are unconscious and the victor(s) is enjoying their spoils. Of course rendering your siblings unconscious is typically classed in the “not supposed to be doing category”...unless you prescribe to the "Tiger Mom" method, in which case you should berate the victor(s) for their sloppy technique; berated the unconscious for being unconscious; then berate all of them together for wasting their time hitting each other instead of practicing for their concert at Carnegie Hall or studying for their entrance exams to Yale.

However, since Claire is going to be going to Harvard I knew that I should stop reading immediately and go see what mischief she was up to. But alas, I was lured into the blissfulness of the silence and remained a moment longer than was prudent perusing the pages of my book. Thus, by the time I actually went to investigate what damage had been done, Claire had successfully climbed the bathroom counter, got the nail polish and other makeup out of the bathroom cabinet and applied it “artistically” to her face. And hands. And feet. And clothes. And mirror. And sink counter top. And just about everything within a 1.5 ft radius (which coincidently is about the same length as her arm span…). I have included a picture below that only captures a part of the true artistic beauty she employed.

Anecdote Second

Last week we went to see the Duke campus. It is impressive to say the least. There are many very architecturally beautiful buildings to see. Specifically, however, I wanted to visit the Duke Chapel and that was my primary objective in going. After arriving on campus and then driving around for about an hour looking for somewhere to park (there was a Duke basketball game that day as well) I finally just parked in a “no parking towing strictly enforced” area close to the Chapel figuring we would only be 15-20 minutes. However, when we returned to our vehicle it was still there with no ticket. Haha, you only thought you knew where this story was going. There is a twist; the story isn’t about the parking.

But we did park in a “no parking towing strictly enforced” area got out and started toward the chapel. As we walked I fairly quickly noticed that people kept looking at us, and me in particular, in a strange and in some cases almost hostile manner. At first I thought “sheesh apparently they take their no parking zones pretty serious here…” finally, when it was apparent that there was no way the group of rowdy guys carrying the 56pk of beer who just stared at me like they wanted to harm me could have seen where I parked I realized I was wearing my UNC Tar Heels cap. Suddenly, things were a lot clearer. I quickly removed the hat and stuck it in my coat pocket. The hate stares stopped, but I still got some weird looks from people due to my marvelously disheveled hat hair.

The Chapel was great, very interesting and very beautiful…well if you are in to that sort of thing anyway. They have“real” catacombs in the basement and still bury people in the floor (of course you have to be famous and influential to make it into the Duke Chapel floor though…and a Duke graduate…I probably should have said a Duke graduate first and then the other stuff…) There are pictures of the organ pipes from the Chapel below.

Anecdote Third

This one relates to Anecdote First in that it deals with Claire and makeup, specifically nail polish, which I understand from the ladies in Play group is not strictly considered a “makeup” article but rather an accessorizing or ornamental article…makeups being restricted solely to items applied to the facial area…But, anyway, the story begins with a trip to the temple.

Hillary and I had just dropped Claire off at some friends and were on our way to attend a session at the temple when it occurred to me that I had forgot to wear my white socks. I typically just put my white socks on when getting dressed for the temple rather than changing them when I get to the temple but this time I had forgot to put them on. Not really a big problem at this point since I keep a spare pair of white socks in my temple bag specifically for times like this. As we drive though I begin to think that not only have I used my backup socks I didn’t replace them…still not a big concern I’ll just get some at the temple from the clothes counter.

So we arrive. I ask about clothes, they don’t have clothes at this temple. Which upon reflection I already should have known since it is one of the smaller style temples, but I had failed to think about. At this point I just think “oh well, I guess I just won’t wear socks. Not a big deal it’s not like forgetting pants or a shirt.” So I get in my stall and proceed to change my clothes. This is when the story gets interesting. As I take my socks off I realize that I have purple toenails. I had let Claire paint them a few days earlier. I let her do this from time to time because she enjoys it so much and it keeps her busy while I can just sit on the couch and read. She also wants to paint my fingernails…but that isn’t happening. The line has to be drawn somewhere.

So there I am in the temple with these purple toenails staring up at me and it occurs to me that at one point I am going to have to remove my slippers during the ceremony and most likely there will be an elderly Brethren sitting next to me when I do so. Panic sets in. I immediately have a flash image in my mind in which I can see this brother leaning over as he sees my toenails and muttering something like “are you sure you are supposed to be here son?” “Maybe you should go talk to your bishop about a few things…” And then me trying to stammer something about my daughter and such all while he looks at me with one of those sympathetic elderly Brethren smiles on his lips that says all to clearly “you poor lost confused little boy, what has happened to the world…don’t people still teach their kids how to be MEN”

Then the flash is over. Oh well I think, nothing for it now, It’s a two-hour round trip drive and I’m not going to not go in to the session now. So I go.

When I enter the room I head for the back hoping that the room ill fill up from the front and maybe just maybe no one will sit on my row. Hillary is already sitting down in the room so as I pass her I lean over and whisper “I have no socks. And purple toenails.” She chuckles. I go and take my seat on the back row in the farthest corner.

Then as I am sitting there with panic stirring in my stomach that someone will sit by me and discover my secret, from her seat 4 rows up and on the other side of the room Hillary lets out an audible laugh. Obviously, she has just had the same flash image about the Elderly Brethren sitting by me that I had earlier. I smile. And swallow a small burst of laughter in a forced yawn. Hillary, leaks another small laugh and this time as I watch the other people in the room turn to look at her it is too much and I puncture the silence with my own choked laughter.

Then the moment is over. We both regain our composure the rest of the people file in. No one sits in my row. I am safe.

Christmas Vacation

Well. Obviously I have missed a few weeks. I guess that means I have failed in the blogging world as a dedicated blogger and have once again become a lazy lame loser. The good news is that it is a new year so I get a fresh shot at it. The bad (or rather sad) news is that I actually seem to care. So here is a rundown of what has happened over the last few weeks:

We went on Christmas vacation. Which means we visited family and friends at their homes, ate lots of good food, stayed up late, played an obscene amount of board and card games, slept as much as possible, and generally lolled around. It was fabulous.

However, it didn’t start out that fabulous. And thus it comes….the stereotypical Christmas traveling fiasco. Everyone has one. And this is ours:

Imagine if you will that it is 5:00am (3:00am if you are in UT or ID). Your alarm sounds. Already, this is a bad day. It is pretty much a standard fact that any day that starts before 6:00am is going to be dreadful. But, your plane leaves at 6:45 and the airport is about a 30 min drive and your taxi is arriving at 5:30 so there is no avoiding it - you have to actually get up when your alarm sounds. No snooze button. (Not being able to hit your snooze button is also an indication that things are bound to go badly, which is why I actually set my alarm to go off at 4:53am so I could hit snooze once…which I did, so really when I said imagine your alarm sounding at 5am it really is 5:03 and it is the second time it has gone off having once already hit snooze…but it is still before 6:00am and that is all that really matters).

So, you roll out of bed. This is the true roll. I think we are all familiar with it. It is when you are laying in bed and really don’t want to get up because you where up till around midnight packing your bags and you are seriously considering missing your flight but then realize that you can’t miss your flight because that would cost you money because you booked you flight through an online booking agency that although got you a great deal, also made it impossible to change your tickets, so if you miss your flight you aren’t going anywhere because you certainly can’t afford to buy new tickets for a flight you already paid for once. So your half awakened mind blitzes through this line of reasoning and of course seizes on the part that wasn’t actually thought but was subconsciously implied: “PAY FOR THE SAME TRIP TWICE” which, since you are pitifully broke, sends you into a panic. A panic which signals your body to sit up AND get out of bed at the same time, thus prompting a half crouched semi falling quasi sort of part roll resulting in you being out of bed, on your feet and stumbling your way to the bathroom (since it is common knowledge that the bathroom is the first places everyone goes). Unless of course your feet get caught in the sheets. Then you end up on the floor. Or still in bed. Both have happened to me. I prefer the bed. In this particular instance, however, the roll was successful and I was off to the races.

So we race around grabbing bags, stuffing last minute items into our luggage, waking our daughter up (any time you have to wake a sleeping child is also a portent of a bad day), trying to eat something, and attempting to be out to the curbside at 5:30 for our taxi to arrive. Miraculously, we make it to the curb at 5:25am. But of course since we are on time the taxi is 10 mins late. This translates into 10 mins to worry about stuff we might be forgetting…or thinking about the pancakes we could have made with those extra ten minutes instead of eating cold oatmeal without milk.

Anyway, we get to the airport; get through security and the new “body scanners” (which really aren’t a big deal, you don’t really even notice them) make it to our gate just as they start boarding and are on the plane at 6:40am. Maybe things aren’t going to be that bad after all you think. But then the pilot gets on the intercom and says “we have a small problem, we aren’t sure what it is but it shouldn’t take long” uhoh, you can feel the panic start to set in. Everyone knows that the phrase “shouldn’t take long” in the airline industry actually really means “a really long time” in normal people’s terms. But then the pilot gets on and says “We have a leak in one of the oxygen masks up front, but the good news is that it should only take 10-15mins to fix.” Now you’re just freaked. 10-15mins?!? Are you kidding me? 10-15mins in airport lingo really means “FOREVER” in real time. And so after two hours of sitting in our seats with our seat belts we finally take off. At which point our 2yr old says “yeaaahh mommy, we’re there!”

Well to make a long story shorter (mostly because I’m tired of typing) we missed both our connections and had to be re routed. So instead of arriving in SLC at 1:45pm we got there at 4:45pm which doesn’t seem like a huge difference but when you put the whole thing in MST time it means we got up at 3:00 am (well 3:03am) where at the airport at 4:00am and then spent the next 12 and a half hours in planes and airports arriving in SLC at 4:45pm. Which, with a 2yr old who missed her nap, feels like forever. But, on the bright side, 12hrs is a lot faster than the 3-4 days it would take if we drove…so although it is sort of a fun story to tell it really wasn’t that big of a deal, just slightly inconvenient.

Anyway, we got to SLC on the 18^th and stayed with Mom and Dad Griffin, who, as always, were exceptional hosts. It was a blast. Some highlights included Zach’s birthday party at Derek’s, game night with the Plickas, a visit to the Taylor ranch, seeing Drew and Deanna, talking to Lael and Elise, teasing Ericka about Lord Luc, teasing Peter about his smile (aka “ladykiller”), playing around with the three Js, and of course Christmas eve dinner with everyone and then Christmas morning at Mom and Dad Griffin’s. We then traveled up to Idaho Falls on the afternoon of the 26^th (Insert a large thank you to Derek for letting us use his truck) and went to a large Smith family white elephant gift exchange which several of my aunts, uncles and cousins attended. This was particularly enjoyable for me as it reminded me of my childhood Christmases when all the extended family would get together. It also was enjoyable for me because it allowed me to visit with several extended family members I don’t get to see very often anymore.

We then spent the remainder of the evening with my immediate family at my parent’s house. It was fun to have all the siblings there for Sunday evening. It is a rare occurrence that we all get together anymore and it was refreshing to see everyone if some of them only briefly.

We went to Logan on the 30^th and had dinner with my best friends Tyler and Travis. We got to see Travis and Brandi’s baby girl Kambrie. She is a doll. Big eyes. Sweet smile. It was fun to see Travis as a dad. He is as smitten by his girl as I am by mine. Darn kids. After dinner we went back to Tyler and Tashie’s (which was where we were staying) and stayed up talking to Tashie till midnight or so (Tyler works nights till 2am). For our part we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Up till then we haven’t had the opportunity to talk to Tashie very much. She is a delightful person and a brilliant host. Tyler, thanks for the bacon. I love bacon.

To wrap things up quickly, not because I don’t have a lot more to say, but because as mentioned I am tired of typing, we also enjoyed Lindsey’s wedding, playing Wii with papa, visiting with Lori and Trevor (Travis and Tyler's Mom and Brother respectively) (also insert a quick congrats to Trevor and his fiancée!) seeing Great Grandma Smith and basically thoroughly enjoyed seeing and talking with everyone on our trip. People are what make up the best and worst in life and we got to see all the best people in our lives on this trip and so it was as Nacho Libre says "the bessst."

We honestly had a blast. Thank you all for making memories with us year after year. And I do mean that last bit - even as cheesy as it sounds.

Claire Chasing the chickens at the Taylor Ranch...she actually catches one....but then tries to choke it...

Claire and one of her presents from Christmas. (Disney princess chap-sticks)

Claire and her cousin Jordan

Claire getting ready to go sledding at Granny and Papa's (she loved it) thanks to Rachel and Miranda for taking her!