The Barracuda

I was probably about 10 years old, and I lived in Ogden, Utah. My best friend in the whole world was Karie Hadley. Karie did all kinds of cool things, things I thought were great but really didn't care if I did them or not. She played all kinds of sports, had an after school paper route, could ride a ten speed bike, all kinds of stuff. She was so cool, and we were best friends. Most of the cool things I did were because I was with her. I did play on a soccer team for one season, I went skating with her, I accompanied her on her paper route sometimes, that kind of thing. (In all fairness, though, she did a lot of cool things by association with me, too. My parents did 4-H for us for a couple of years, meaning we learned how to do all kinds of things, including decorate cakes--which we entered in the fair and everything--and we went camping A LOT. We climbed the tree in my front yard and had a spot on the roof where we hid and talked). Anyway, she knew how to have fun, I was a big chicken. For years she had tried to get me to go on the roller coaster at Lagoon (Utah amusement park) but I refused. I just didn't see how something like that could possibly be fun. One of the cool things I did with Karie was go to the water slides. I remember there were 3 slides to choose from, ranging from the minnow (my style) to the barracuda (the one Karie always tried to get me to go on). I don't remember what the middle one was called, maybe the shark or something. The point is, one day after many failed attempts at getting me to go down the barracuda, she told me she'd give me a dollar if I did it. (Talk about peer pressure)! Well, I could definitely be bought, and although I thought I was going to die, I agreed. I oh so reluctantly went down the baracuda. And suddenly a whole new world opened to me. I realized how much I had been missing out on! I got my dollar, but she never had to bribe me again.

At that time in my life, the experience didn't teach me any profound lessons or anything, all it did was help me have more fun. But as I look back on that experience, I realize that there is a definite lesson there. In life there are many barracudas--things that may seem scary at first, but once you try them out you realize how much they can add to life, and how thankful you are for them. I guess the point is, we shouldn't be afraid to take risks. We should be smart about the risks we take, for sure. But sometimes you've just gotta throw caution to the wind--get out of your comfort zone and look beyond your daily patterns. And maybe, just maybe, you'll discover new things about life and about yourself. There are sure to be baracudas out there that, upon trying, will prove to be undesirable. But at least then you know. And they are worth all the barracudas of life that become amazing, eye opening discoveries.

Stake Lagoon Day

When I was little, my family lived in Ogden, Utah. In fact, we moved there half way through my Kindergarten year, and moved away after I finished 5^th grade. So essentially, all of my elementary years were spent in Ogden.

Aah, Utah life. Utah is full of Mormons. Being as young as I was, I didn’t really realize there was anything different about living there than anywhere else. At any rate, the big theme park in Utah is Lagoon, located in Farmington. Back then—and maybe still? I really don’t know—Lagoon would have these Stake Lagoon Days. When our stake had Stake Lagoon Day, we could get free (or discounted?) ride tickets, and our family would pile in the car and head on over. It was fun. My favorite ride there was the Scrambler. I’m positive I couldn’t handle a ride like that today. I was an incredible wimp though, and would never go on the roller coaster. Everyone said it was super fun, but I was not having it. But everyone has their price, I guess, and somebody offered me a dollar if I would ride the roller coaster. A dollar! I did it for a dollar. And strangely enough, I loved it. It was exhilarating! And that was the end of my roller coaster phobia. You couldn’t get me to go on the Collasses, with its two loops, where you actually went upside down. I do think that eventually I tried Collasses, but it’s possible that my loop experience was later on at Magic Mountain in California. Can’t remember. All I know is, I learned to love the roller coaster at Lagoon, on Stake Lagoon Day.

Let's Get Together

One of our favorite movies growing up was The Parent Trap. Good ol' Hayley Mills. It wasn't just a great movie, it was a movie we watched over and over and over again. And we studied it, looking for that subtle little line down the screen when both the twins were facing forward at the same time...that was truly great stuff. My best friend Karie liked to watch it with us, too. There was a time when we probably had the entire movie memorized.

And there were definitely our favorite parts..."My name is, Miss Inch. Uh, yes, Miss Inch." She really had to check the paper twice to make sure she got her own name right? Then there was the part during the dance where the guy caught a cake and then tried to catch the punch bowl. Even funnier was when Miss Inch tried to save a cake by raising it in the air only to have it stick to a beak on the totem pole and then come down, splat, right on to her face. There were lines we would say over and over again..."Where did you hear about her?" We just loved the way Verbina said "her." And "Oh honey, don't you play with the big girls, you'll be in way over your het." Yes, she said it like that. We laughed and laughed when the girls got Vicky to bang sticks together and rub sugar water all over herself. Or when Mitch fell into the pool. We also thought it was funny when Maggie said Vicky had "electric hips."

So one day, Karie and I climbed the tree in front of our house, got on the roof, and walked over to the roof over the carport. There we could hide in under the triangle part of the house roof. We liked to sit there and talk and talk and plan and plan. And one day, we planned a camping trip. See, we used to go camping a lot when I was a kid. Sometimes in the afternoon Dad would get home from work and would ask who wanted to go camping. Were we really that spontaneous? Maybe they were like me and planned it ahead but waited to tell us until it was time, to avoid our disappointment if something came up at the last minute. But it always seemed like we went on spontaneous camping trips. And most of the time Karie or some other friends would join us for the fun. We all piled in the car and drove up in to the mountains. We popped popcorn in the fire and sang silly songs and just had a great time.

So yeah. Karie and I got up this little scheme, that day on the roof, to take a camping trip, just the two of us and Mom. But how would we convince Mom that we should do it--that we should just up and leave everyone else out of the fun? We got our heads together and delivered the following presentation to my mom (using little puppets to do the talking, if I remember correctly):

"We've decided we're getting gypped."
"Yeah, gypped."
"We've decided we want to have our campout together."

Okay, so I can't remember all we said, but we had a great time using that scene from Parent Trap to present our idea.

It must have been good, because it worked. Either that or my parents were just super cool and really validated us and our ideas. (They were really good at that, I think). So we did it. We went camping, just the three of us.

How funny is it that what I really remember is our scheming to go, rather than the actual camping trip itself?

Oh, and I remember the triangle popsicles...remember that, Mom?

Camping

Living in Ogden, we were very close to the mountains. That made it really easy for us to go camping, a lot. Maybe we started going to complete some things for 4H, or maybe we just started going because camping is fun.


I remember packing up our things, piling in the car, and heading up the mountain. Most of the time, if not all, Mom would make up a big bowl of Birdseed. It wasn't real birdseed, it was a trail mix type snack that we just loved because it had things like peanuts, froot loops, m&ms, and raisins in it. She would fill the biggest Tupperware bowl, and we would all chow down on that yumminess. But we only got it when we went camping.


Sometimes our friends would come along, another reason why I think it may have started because of 4H. My parents have always been kid people, so the more kids the merrier.


It was so easy for us to go camping, that I remember one night I was out in the back yard playing in the sand box, when my dad, just home from work, came out and asked if I wanted to go camping. We were all going on a completely spontaneous campout. We were able to decide to go and pull ourselves together at dinner time, and make it up the mountain with enough time to enjoy our night, even though we had started so late in the day.


Pretty awesome, I'd say!


One night I remember we were making popcorn over the fire, and a dud kernel popped out of the fire and right onto the bottom of Celeste's night gown and burned a hole in it. Random memory!

Shenanigans

It was while living in this house that we had all kinds of crazy fun. Some of our Shenanigans included:


1) Toilet Papering. These days you can get sent to jail for it. Back then, when the concept was new, it was a fun prank that you played on people you loved. And then you went back in the morning and helped them clean it up. At least, that's the way we always saw it. In fact, my mom herself is the one who provided the toilet paper, and even took us out and helped throw the rolls around! We had a lot of fun. We went toilet papering every time we had sleep overs. Like I said, we always showed up in the morning to help clean it up. Then one day, somehow my mom found out that it was against the law, or at least a very socially unacceptable, hooliganish thing to do, so that was the end of that. Because we really didn't mean for it to be rude.


2) We had this tree in front of our house that was great for climbing. The coolest thing about it was that you could climb right up and onto the roof. I don't remember doing that a lot, but definitely a handful of times. One day my best friend Karie and I climbed up, and walked over to the top of the carport, which was lower and allowed us to hide under the eave of the roof to the house. We went there to talk and plan, and to be away from all our siblings while we were at it. (Karie lived at the other end of Meadow Drive, so we always had siblings around, no matter whose house we went to). This rooftop spot is where we planned our Parent Trap campout, and various other sleep overs, that always included movie rentals and junk food.


3) This one is a not so funny shenanigan. One day this girl came over when my parents weren't home. I don't remember at all who she was. She could have been a neighbor kid that I didn't really ever play with, or she could have been a girl that followed me home from school or something. Either way, we had not made plans to play, and my parents weren't home so I did not let her in. Well, somehow she got in, and I didn't know it until crazy things started happening. I heard noise from my parents' bedroom, whooping and hollering, so I ran in there. When I got there, I saw raw egg running down the wall, and broken shells on the floor, but no sign of anyone. Then I'd hear a noise from somewhere else, and find a similar situation. Finally I guess she left, but I really had no idea what in the world was going on or how it was even happening, because I never actually saw her in my house. It was pretty bad business when my parents got home. I think that they believed me that I hadn't done it, and helped me piece together what had happened. I was so glad to not be the kind of kid that people would believe capable of that kind of mischief.


4) Not that I was perfect or anything. There was that time our parents weren't home and someone dared me to see if butter would stick to the ceiling. I'm pretty sure it was Sam, but I can't say for sure because I honestly don't remember. I didn't think it would, because butter is greasy. Looking back, it's unbelievable how it just absolutely didn't occur to me that throwing butter at the ceiling was a bad idea. Ugh! So I threw it. And it stuck. Let's just say that Mom and Dad were not happy with the situation. What made it worse is that it was one of those popcorn ceilings, so when my mom wiped the butter off, it took the popcorn with it, so we had a couple of glaring smooth spots on a ceiling that was not supposed to be smooth. Smooth and greasy spots.


5) This story goes that one day, when Dawn was really small, she climbed up the shelves of the pantry and found a number 10 can full of honey. For some reason, there was no lid on the can, but it was higher than her, so how did she know? Plus, she was little enough to not really care about a lid anyway. She ended up grabbing the can with both hands, and turning it upside down to see what was inside. Boy oh boy, did she see what was inside! Not only did she see it, she wore it!


6) Last but not least, this was Utah, so it would get cold and snowy in the winter. In our front yard, we had these hedges that  bordered the front where the yard met the street. Oh, the number of things that got tossed into the hedges and lost forever more! In the winter, the snow would fill the hedges, and it would all freeze. So, great adventurers that we were, we would climb up and walk all along the hedges. It was awesome, because it felt like every winter we got to get the best of those darned sticker bushes!

Throwing Papers

My best friend Karie had an after school paper route. I think she only delivered them once a week, I don't think it was an every day thing. She would take the stack of papers, fold them, put a rubber band around each one, load them into her paper carrying bag, and hang the bag onto her bike. Then she would ride around tossing the papers onto people's porches.


Every once in a while, she would have to go to the doors of the people she took papers to, and collect payment for their subscription. This was called "going collecting."


I took my bike and went with her a few times, tossing papers. Once I went collecting with her. Nothing earth shattering, just something I remember doing.

Fifth Grade Class

Here is my 5th Grade Class. Let's see whose names I remember...

There is Mr. Grant on one side, Mrs. Nishimoto on the other side.

Top Row: Lana, ?, ?, Nestor, ? Noelle

Third Row: ?, ?, Karie Hadley, Brandon, ?, Brian, Me

Second Row: ?, Alisha, ?, ?, Carma, David, ?

First Row: Jacquelyn, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?

There are a lot of question marks, but I think I did fairly well remembering some of these random kids! =)

Ten Things About T.O. Smith School

When I moved to Ogden, one quarter or so into  my Kindergarten year, I started going to a school called T.O. Smith. (The T stood for Thomas, no idea about the O). The school was within walking distance of our house, and about halfway between the two was the meetinghouse where we went to church, so we usually cut through the parking lot. We had two spots along the walk where we had a crossing guard. Here are the tidbits I can remember about going to school at T.O. Smith.


1) Teachers. Kindergarten: I can't remember her name, but I do remember that every time she introduced a new letter of the alphabet, she had an inflatable character she would bring out, who had a name that started with that letter. I remember how I loved that, I always looked forward to seeing who in the world the next character would be. Ha ha!  First Grade: Miss Binney. I remember learning about fish. Maybe because for a long time, even into my adulthood, there was a book about fish that I had made in first grade, that my mom had kept. Miss Binney was pretty old, with short, curly grey hair and a very tiny nose. (We really do remember the strangest things!) Second Grade: Mrs. Gunnarson. She was also older, but younger than Miss Binney. I liked Mrs. Gunnarson, and that is the only thing at all that I remember about second grade. Unless it was in her class that we did the Pac Man reading challenge. Hmmm. Third Grade: Mrs. Rhode (pronounced road-ee). Oh, I adored her. She had a ukulele and she taught us all kinds of songs. I can still see her standing there playing the ukulele, and all of us singing, "Kukabura sits on the old gum tree..." She also drilled us on multiplication. I guess in her mind, the 7s were the hardest (maybe that's what most of us struggled with) so we spent extra time on those. Ever since then I have been a speed counter of the 7s, and they are my easiest multiplication facts. (After 0s, 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s, of course). Fourth Grade: Mrs. Layton. In her class we studied the State of Utah, and we spent weeks making this cumulative book that had all the facts about Utah. You know, state flower, state bird, state song, founders and people in Utah history who made a difference, trappers and fur traders, all the counties, all that kind of stuff. It was a huge deal! I also remember that one day I whispered in Mrs. Layton's ear that I had memorized all the Articles of Faith, and I was so thrilled that she knew exactly what I was talking about, and she told me good job. Fifth Grade: Mrs. Nishimoto. She taught us how to sing Silent Night in Japaneses, and she ran out of time at the end of the year to make us learn all the states and capitals, so I never did ever learn them. And all my friends who had had a different 5th grade teacher could spout them off like rock stars. And our principal was Mr. Grant. I can still picture his face, but that's as far as it goes. So there you have it!


2) While I was in 4th grade, my mom had learned how to make a really cool Christmas tree by hot gluing baby food jars together, spraying them with fake snow, and working colored Christmas lights into the jars. They were really cool! And then she came to  my class and taught us how to make them.


3) One year we all (as in, probably the 4th and 5th grades) learned how to do Bamboo dancing. For the life of me I can't remember what it was called, but we used these really long bamboo sticks. There were two sticks, and one person sat at each end of the sticks, and held one stick in each hand. Then they had to clap the sticks together and then on the floor to a certain rhythm, while people danced in and out of the moving poles. I actually had a LOT of fun with this.


4) At this school they wanted us to climb the rope and touch the ceiling. I never was able to do it.


5) Our school cafeteria had real, honest to goodness, made right there in the kitchen food. I remember seeing gigantic mixing bowls where they would make mashed potatoes, huge ovens, giant pots on giant stoves. Our cafeteria ladies were fantastic. Every week, they would choose two students (4th or 5th graders only) to help prepare and serve food. It was fun. We had to wear hair nets, and then we to use big scoops to put the food on the trays. There were no choices. What they were serving is what you got, and you didn't get to refuse anything. And then other cafeteria ladies would walk around making sure you took at least one bite of each thing. (The big trick was to use your spoon to make a hole in your pile of green beans, or whatever it was you didn't want to have a bite of, so it looked like you took a bite). At the end of the week, if you had been a cafeteria helper, you got to go down to the cafeteria after lunch was all said and done, to pull taffy. And then, as payment for your services, you got to take home a long rope of twisted, pulled taffy. It was the coolest thing in the entire world.


6) We had a spelling bee in 5th grade. Typical spelling bee--lots of pages of words to study, and all that. I was smart. But other people were smart, too. My best friend Karie Hadley was smart, and probably the smartest kid of all was Jeremy Richards. We were all in the same primary class, and we were all in the 5th grade at T.O. Smith. One day Karie told me that a bunch of people were saying that it didn't matter how many people were in the spelling bee, it was really only down to two people. Her, and Jeremy. I didn't really understand what she was getting at, but I didn't really care. I didn't stress about the spelling test, and I don't think I really studied for it. I was never really the studying kind of girl. But the day of the bee came, and kid after kid was eliminated. Finally there were only three of us left up on the stage--me, Karie, and Jeremy. I ended up getting 3rd place, Karie got 2nd, and Jeremy got 1st. I don't think it really mattered to me. Honestly, I had  no concept of competition back then. It sounds crazy, maybe, but it was years before I realized that it really did end up being between Karie and Jeremy. I had a lot of fun with that spelling bee, and I think it was the only spelling bee any of my schools ever had.


7) Pac Man Reading. I don't know if it was just my class, or if it was the whole school, but each student got a Pac Man with our name on it, and they all hung in the hall. We had to take home these reading logs and record what we read. I don't remember if they tracked it by pages or books, but every time you read to the milestone marker, you got a ghost to hang on your Pac Man. Different colored ghosts represented different numbers of books (or pages, whatever it was). I had a lot of fun with that. I don't know where I ranked among the super readers, but I read my little heart out. It was something I loved to do and it was so fun to watch my string of ghosts get longer, and longer, and longer.


8) Out in the back there was an obstacle course that we got to run at recess if we wanted. We probably also used it during PE sometimes, but I don't remember that. There was a big field where we used to play Steal the Flag (which is now called Capture the Flag). But my favorite thing of all was the tetherball. I was so, so so so good at tetherball. I couldn't run super fast, and I couldn't climb the rope, but I could play tetherball like a champ. I played tetherball all recess, every recess. I loved it so much that at one point, my mom and dad bought me a tetherball for the back yard and it was the best present I ever got.


9) I was in 3rd grade when I decided I wanted to change my name to Katie. But not yet being strong in the conventions of spelling, I spelled it Kattie. (Because I thought two ts looks way better than one t). I was adamant that people call me Katie. Mrs. Rhode was so understanding and kind, that she did it. Even to t he point that when I got a certificate for something in class, she wrote my name as Katie Chandler. (I don't think I had ever mentioned how I was spelling it in my mind, LOL). I'll never forget what a kind thing it was for my teacher to be so understanding of the notions that can come into kids' heads sometimes. It wasn't too long before I got over that, and just went back to being Nyla.


10) Like any good elementary school, in 4th grade they started teaching us the recorder. We had music class on the stage, with the curtains closed off so we couldn't see the gym. I have no idea if our classroom teacher taught us music, or if there was a specific music teacher for the job. I do know that we played recorder for our school, and probably for our parents at one point. One time, when we were all there on the risers, someone in the back fainted from having had locked her knees. That was so crazy to me, I had never heard fainting because of locking your knees. In fact, I had no idea what locking your knees even meant.

Sooooooookeeeeeee

Our neighbors had this cat named Sookie. (Pronounced sue-key). Every night at dark, their mom would go to the back door and call, "Sooooooookeeeeeeeeeee" out into the night, in the attempt to get the cat to come back  home from wherever it had wandered. I can still hear her voice to this day. "Soooooooookeeeeeeeeeee!"

It Happened One Night

One night we were all in our house hanging out, maybe watching a movie, I really don't know, when there was a knock at the door. When it was opened, there was a scary looking lady standing there. She started talking to one or both of my parents, and they told us to go to our rooms. We had really no idea what was going on, and it was very mysterious to us. Of course we were in our rooms dying of curiosity! She was there for a while, and I could hear her throw up. Then someone else came. A policeman, or somebody, I don't know. They talked to my parents for a while, and then they took the woman with them and left. And we got to come out of our rooms. Nobody really explained to us what happened. Knowing my mom and dad, they did give us some explanation, but not the full version reserved for grown up people. From snatches of whispered conversations between adults over the next couple of days, I pieced together that she had been a battered woman, who had fled and was looking for help. I'm glad she came to our house, because my parents have always been great at helping people in need.

Snow Forts

We loved getting visits from our aunts and uncles who were going to college out in Utah and Idaho. I remember playing with them in the snow, building snow forts, throwing snow balls, running around, laughing--it was a great time.

Sam and I are on the snow pile. I think that is Tom's foot sticking out of the fort. He's probably in there digging. I have no idea who the kid leaning against the hedge is. I also have no idea in the world why we are out there in t-shirts and no coats. We're crazy! That other kid is probably a neighbor kid, judging by the difference in wardrobe. Ha ha!

There's that kid again, and me on top of the fort, and Sam and Tom inside.

Crazy Uncle Tom! He really was crazy, and so much fun! He was great to snowball fight with, and he did donuts in the parking lot with his car. (Ha ha)

Those Darn Spokes

One day I was going to the Utah State Fair with my dad. I'm guessing he maybe had to go for work, because sometimes he did that, to run the radio station's booth. Or maybe we were just going for our own fun, because sometimes we did that, too. I'm guessing that our car wasn't running at the time, because my dad was giving me a ride on his bike. We would never get away with it these days, because I doubt either of us had helmets, and I was sitting on the horizontal bar of his ten speed, holding my feet up. It was nothing new, we had ridden like this plenty of times. I guess this ride was longer than usual, though, because it got hard to hold my legs up, and before I knew it, my foot had dropped and got stuck in the spokes of the front wheel.


Oh, my poor dad. My poor, poor dad. =( The front wheel stopped, and the bike flipped over. I remember my dad shooting over my head and landing somewhere down the road from where I laid, with my mangled foot still stuck in those darn spokes. I'm sure that wreck wasn't a quiet one, and some of the people in the neighborhood came running out of their houses to help. I remember someone holding my bleeding foot on a wet washcloth in their hands. But even though I had a mangled up foot, and I'm sure I had bleeding scrapes and cuts, my dad by far got the worse end of the deal. He skidded on the road, and his arms and legs were totally eaten up. I'm sure he probably had cuts on his face and head, too. I don't remember super clearly. But I felt so bad! To this day I cringe when I think about it, not because of my foot, but because I hurt my Daddy.

Wild Waters

Sometimes in the summer, we would go up to Ogden High School and go swimming in their pool. They also had a water slide, so it was really cool. I vaguely remember maybe having briefly taken swimming lessons there.


But my most fun water memory from Ogden was going to Wild Waters. We may have only gone once, for all I know, but we went, and it was amazing. I'm pretty sure this was after the Baracuda experience, because when I was at Wild Waters, I loved the waterslides. I'm pretty sure that my dad got free passes for making a commercial for him at his radio stations.


(We also got free donuts once, from Jolly Rogers donuts, because my dad had made a commercial for them. Radio was just a cool job).

Walk-a-Thon

At some point while living in Ogden, I participated in a March of Dimes Walk-a-Thon. I went door to door, because you could do that back then, and got people to pledge so much money per mile, and then when the big day came, I walked. I'm sure the rest of my family was in on it, too. I really don't know how or why it came about that we got involved in that, but we did and it was pretty cool. I got a lot of pledges, and I walked, and walked, and walked! It went all through downtown Ogden. I think I remember that there were rest stations along the way where we could get water and snacks, but don't quote me on that. The walk-a-thon took all day long, and it was exhausting. And then when it was over, I got to go back to those who had pledged, collect the money, and turn it in to the March of Dimes. I'm pretty glad I did that!

Blue Ribbon Cakes

As part of our 4H group, we learned how to decorate cakes, and decided we should enter some cakes in the county fair. There were different skill levels, and we stuck with the bottom level--decorating with candy. I made a house out of an upside down heart shape. Karie also made a cake, and so did our friend Jacqueline. Probably some of the other girls did, too, I just really don't remember. My cake and Karie's cake got blue ribbons! Sam made a triangle cake look like a slice of pizza, and his cake made it to state. I'm not sure what award he got at state, it's just really cool that it went! Fun, fun with cakes.

Easter Basket

One Easter, I noticed that my part of the handle on my plastic Easter basket was melted. It was one of those handles that is made of two strands of plastic twisted together, and there was a part of the handle on mine that looked like it had melted flat. The two strands were fused together and kind of flattened, and then it had cooled. And that was that.

I remember noticing it. I don’t know why I just kind of shrugged it off. Nowadays in our house, we would say “little deal.” Because it really wasn’t that big of a deal. I think I was a little disappointed, I mean, I really have this idealist perfectionist personality trait. But yeah, I just shrugged it off, and forgot about it.

Later my mom was talking to me, and she pointed out that when they bought the baskets, they put them in the back of the car while they finished the rest of the shopping. Apparently part of the handle on one of the baskets was resting on something metal in the trunk, and it got hot and melted the handle. When she saw it she felt so bad, and didn’t know what to do. She decided to give that basket to me, because she thought I would handle it in a mature way and not freak out about it. (I don’t think back then people used the term “freak out” on a regular basis, so I’m not sure what her exact words were, but that’s the gist).

I remember being so relieved that I had not made a big deal out of it! And I felt proud of myself for handling it well. Believe it or not, every once in a while I remember that basket, and it reminds me to not get all bent out of shape when things really are a “little deal.” I’m glad my mom took the time to share how the whole melted handle thing came about, and to let me know she was proud of me.

4-H

Yep, I was a 4-H kid. Nope, it had nothing to do with animals. (Are you kidding? I don't do animals, as you probably already know. I hope I never touch a horse. Or a cow. Or a chicken. I have before, but I'm seriously OCD about ever touching any living animal that is not human. If you see me and want to throw a rotten tomato at me for that, I will totally understand. I don't know why I'm so averse to animals).

Anyway, the point is, I was in 4-H as a kid. Not only was I in 4-H, my parents were the leaders of our group. We had such fun! Me and my brother and sister and my friends. My parents were the coolest, ours was the house where all the neighbor kids came to play because my parents welcomed them and loved kids and didn't worry about how messy it would make the house or how loud and annoying we were. And I'm sure we were. But anyway, I mentioned before about how we went camping a lot, and a lot of those camping trips were 4-H camping trips.

The biggest thing I remember from 4-H is that we did cake decorating. Most of us never got to tips, we just frosted and used candy to decorate. But oh how awesome it was. One year (was it only one? can't remember) we entered our cakes into the county fair. My brother Sam's cake that was decorated like a slice of pizza made it to state, and the rest of us got blue ribbons--at least most of us did, but it's fuzzy so I can't remember if everyone did. Still, it was totally fun.

Years later, when I heard people talking about 4-H as mostly about agriculture and animals, I didn't believe them. Didn't they know that 4-H was for decorating cakes and going camping? Silly people.

Micro-Teaching

When my dad was going to Weber State College for his teaching degree, they needed kids to practice teaching on. There were a few times I got to go to night class with my dad, and he or other students would teach me things. For me, it was fun. It was like playing school. They either video taped the lessons, or they were being observed by a professor, I don’t remember. I just remember I thought it was a lot of fun to go to college with my dad and play school.

Radio Kid

Okay, so I wasn't a radio kid, but during the first 11 or so years of my life, my dad was a full time DJ. When we lived in Utah he worked at KZAN, a country station. That was when country was a bit different than it is these days. I think that's the real reason I was so into country, because that was my dad's station. Every day I'd call him to see if he was going to play my song, and he'd tell me what time it was scheduled to come on. I don't even remember what song it was. But we did a lot of things because of his radio job. When I was really little, I got to help make a bandaid commercial. My line was, "Mommy, I hurt." That was it, but it was enough for such a little kid. When I was a bit older I helped with a bowling commercial--"Hey Dad! Let's go bowling!" A lot of times the companies my dad made commercials for would give us stuff. We got free passes to Wild Waters, a water park, we got free donuts from Jolly Rogers, and all kinds of things. I remember once he and my mom took me to an Alabama concert. I think that was where I saw Lee Greenwood, the opening act. I heard him sing "God Bless the USA" before it was the big hit it is now. (It has been for a long time, too--I'm so old.) And we got to hang out with him at the radio station's booth at the fair sometimes. Those were good days. I had fun being a radio kid! Thanks, Dad.

Mopping

I remember Mom telling us to get on our bathing suits, because it was time to mop the floor. Honestly, I don’t know how many moms out there would handle mopping this way. As a mom, I’m not nearly fun enough to let my kids mop the floor the way we sometimes did. Ha ha!

Mom would throw some water on the floor, and squirt some dish soap down, and then we were let loose! We would slide all over the floor, over and over again. It was great fun for us!

Now that I think about it, I might have to let my kids mop my floor for me once in a while. ;)