I Never Took a Nap Today, So This Is What You Get

Today, I woke up at two o'clock in the morning.  Well, woke up isn't exactly the right way to put it.  You see, I went to bed at seven last night, but couldn't really sleep no matter how hard I tried.  Then, two o'clock came around, and I had to get up.  Yes, I had to get up.  I had to be on a movie set at five in the morning, in a place about an hour and fourty-five minutes from my home, and pick up two other people along the way.  One was my sister Emily, the other was Drew.  She's an actress in the movie, too.  She's really nice.  She told me I look like I'm twenty-five.
Any way, I got up, got ready, and left fifteen minutes late because I worked out for fifteen minutes on the treadmill to help me wake up.  I only walked.  Then I drove to pick up Emily.  Then on to Drew's and on to the set.  I was fourteen minutes early, so I guess I didn't need to worry about leaving fifteen minutes late.  The set was a really great restraunt in Provo, Utah.  It's called Mama Chus.  It's Mexican.  If you ever have the chance to go, I think you should.  I had the chicken enchilladas.  I didn't try the refried beans, though.  I don't really like refried beans.
We went to the set so early because we had to be done shooting and out of the restraunt by eleven o'clock in the morning when it opened.  Yay!  Love getting pretty much no sleep.  At least I tried.  Emily, the crazy girl, didn't go to sleep at all.  The star of the show was about a half an hour late.  That really wasn't surprising, though.  He was late to rehearsals too. 
Let me tell you about the script.  It's about a guy named Eric.  He can snap his fingers and correct your past mistakes.  Pretty scary.  Then there's me.  I played Katie.  She works in the restaurant Eric sits in and snaps his fingers.  She thinks he's cute.  He likes her back, but doesn't really realize it yet.  Then there's Angela.  She's the restraunt manager and doesn't like Eric because all he ever orders is ice.  Two other characters come in.  They are guys Eric helps.  I can't tell you any more.  It would give the story away. 
So we filmed at five in the morning so we could fake the night time in the last scene when Eric finally figures out he likes Katie.  It's a great ending.  Totally sweet.  Then I had to go change my costume into my waitress outfit.  While that was going on, they filmed another scene that I wasn't in.  I'm in it a lot.  It's pretty awesome.  The whole movie is a studen project that is about ten minutes long.  The amazing thing, is that we actually shot the whole movie in half a day.  It takes time to rehearse the camera moves, rehearse the action, and do a few takes (especially one scene the director wanted to be all one take).  The director was really nervous, but I told him not to worry because I am brilliant.  I'm hillarious, I know.  I love my job.
But now, I get to go back to the world of the unemployed actor.  Sadness and joy all in one day.  What an emotional roller coaster I can't seem to get off.  Nor do I wish to.  Bliss. :)
I have no pictures.  I forgot my freaking camera.  I forgot my hairspray, too.  But I remembered everything else!  Oh yeah, but where is my script now?  It never made it home.  Bummer.  Maybe the director has it.

The Luck O' the Irish!

I love holidays that don't really seem to have much purpose other than they are fun.  Like St. Patrick's Day.  I love it.  I'm not Irish (or am I?), but who cares?  For one day, I can have fun pinching people who don't wear green.  What  more could a girl ask for? 
So, to celebrate, I yelled at my kids to remember to wear green, walked on the treadmill, got ready for the day, looked in my closet, and put on a purple shirt.  Ha!  Yep, I forgot.  But when Zach pinched me, I got to pinch him ten times back because, as luck would have it, the necklace I wear everyday has a green bead on it.  He he he.  Good times.  Then, I made egg salad sandwiches, and dyed the egg salad green for dinner.  Yeah, we go all out at the Jones's house.  We had green koolade to drink, too.  I would have made it, but the luck of the Irish was with me, and someone had already made some yesterday.  Could have been me, but I don't really remember.
Then we went to Arts Night at the elementary school.  The first graders sang a couple songs, then we went to their classrooms and saw them perform some short plays.  They were all so cute.  Then, we went back to the lunch room and watched Zach perform with the third graders.  We missed the first song because Riley's overlapped, but he doesn't know that.  Shhh!  It will be our secret!  Then we went to his classroom, and watched him perform the book report he has been working on for so long.  He had to read a historical fiction book, pick a part of it to act out, and dress like the character.  He had a few problems because his teacher felt it was too short, so we added a couple of sentences (literally), and it was much better.  He was the character Say from the book Pink and Say by Patricia Polacco.  The story is about two boys Pink who is black, and Say who is white who both fought in the Civil War.  I didn't get to read all of it before Zach took it back, but Pink saves Say's life.  Pretty cool.  He was so nervous, but he rocked it!  We are so proud of our boys.  They did great.  And I used the movie setting on my camera, so you can watch the short clips I have.  I wanted to stick them all into one video, but my camera uses QuickTime, and we don't have a mac, so you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.  Cough, cough, Apple sucks, cough, cough.  He he.
Pictures and videos are below:

Green egg salad sandwiches.  Yum!  I like mine on toasted bread. :)

Oh, and I almost forgot.  We had bacon too (well, not me because bacon is gross), so we had green eggs and ham!  Hee hee hee!

The class play was Caps For Sale (remember the book)!  Riley was a monkey.  Here he is after he's stolen the caps from the salesman.  He was really good, but broke the fourth wall quite a bit.

He's such a good monkey!

This is the individual play.  He played Ice Cream.

He had to go first, so I think that added to his nervousness.

Then we came home and made brownines!  But milk chocolate is hard to turn green, so I didn't try.  Hurray for St. Patrick's Day, and Arts Night!

Anemic

Kaleb is going to go to Kindergarden in the fall, so he had to get his vaccinations.  While we were at the doctor's office, we brought up a problem that has been going on for about two and a half to three years.  When we first moved to (oh yeah, I don't want to tell you that), sometimes I would have to go pick Kurtis up from work.  Kurtis works about 30 to 45 minutes away depending on traffic.  So I'd load up the kids in the car and drive to get dad.  They hated it.  It was two hours of their lives when they weren't playing.  Just stuck in a car sitting.  One of those days, we were driving back home when out of nowhere, Kaleb just started screaming.  I mean, painful, wailing.  My first thoughts are, "What did you do to him Zachary?"  "I didn't do anything to him!"  Well, Kaleb, why are you freaking out then?  "My legs hurt!!!  My legs hurt!"  And he screamed the whole rest of the way home in rush hour traffic.  This happened pretty much everytime after that, but we didn't really know what to do or what to tell him, so he would have to scream and we'd try to calm him down when he did.  Now that he is bigger, he doesn't scream any more.  We are really grateful for that, but he tells us constantly, "My legs hurt."  The pain usually peaks when he has to do something he doesn't want to, like eat dinner or clean his room.  But he also claims, "My legs always hurt."  Which indicates to me, that they never stop hurting.  But I am not him, so I have no idea what is going on.
At his last appointment, our doctor decided to run some tests.  She prescribed an x-ray, and a blood test.  Yesterday, we went to the hospital to have that done.  He was quite good for the x-ray, even though he seemed pretty uncomfortable.  Then the blood draw.  He sat on Kurtis's lap, so he could hold him down, and I suggested he not let Kaleb see the needle (he freaks out).  But Kurtis doesn't really have a lot of experience taking our kids to the doctor, and Kaleb didn't like having him cover his eyes.  Needless to say, he freaked out.  Two phlobotomists, and his parents drew his blood.  One to hold his arm still, Kurtis to hold his other arm and keep him from squirming, me to hold his legs to keep him from kicking the pholbotomist, and one to actually get the blood out.  He did really well though.  I didn't have to hold his legs very hard.  I mostly just tried to help him relax.
The doctor called me with the results while I was in the shower this moring.  She left a message.  As I predicted, all of his test are normal, but he's a little anemic.  Shocker.  So he needs to eat foods with more iron in them.  That will be fine.  I can make that stuff, but actually getting him to put it in his mouth, chew, and swallow?  Well, we'll just see how that goes, won't we?

My Old Man

I just realized I never blogged about Monday!  With all this stuff going on around me, (the most important is the major cleaning job I am attempting on my house because I host bunko tomorrow - eek!) I have been preoccupied.  But Monday was Mr. Jones' birthday!  My honey turned 36!  Crazy.  He's so old!  Hee hee.  No he isn't, but he's older than me, so I get to tease him.  For his birthday celebration, we went out to dinner.  We ate at Boston's and then went to (our favorite) Nielson's Frozen Custard.  If you have never tried this stuff, you absolutely have to.  No more excuses.  It's hands down better than ice cream.  And a little bit better for you, too.  But only a small amount because it's still junk food.  Any way.  He had a great day, and got Microsoft 7 and a new hard drive for his computer.  It's what he wanted.  I wanted to get him theater tickets to see Legally Blonde, but that would have been something more appropriate for myself I suppose.  I thought about Muse tickets, too, but he said no to that too.  Oh well.  I love my geeky husband.  He's so sweet to me.  Spoils me, really.  Then he's a great dad.  He's so much better at it than me. Oh, yeah.  I'm not a dad.  He he.  Sorry.  That was lame.  I'm just a lucky girl I suppose.  He's my McDreamy. :D

I think he has gorgeous eyes.

He loved the card, Michele! :)

The card I made him.  It says, "You take the cake!"

It's just what I wanted!  Oh, yeah, I helped you order it...

Balloon from Grandma S.

Another present!?

Snip, Snip, Buzz!

Today, my baby sister and I bonded in a way that not many sisters bond.  I gave her a very, very short buzz.  A few days ago, she posted on her Facebook page that she wanted to shave her head, and asked her friends to comment.  Oh my, were there ever comments.  So we chatted, and I told her I could probably borrow my sister-in-law's clippers and do it for her if she was really serious, and thought, oh, she's not serious.  She'll put it off, and get over this strange feeling that has come over her.  She told me she was, and that she wanted to do it this weekend.  Well, okay, then.  She also told me she wanted to donate her locks to charity.  I didn't think they would be long enough.  I was right, but you can still donate them.  I read on Locks of Love's web site that they will just sell them to help off-set their costs.  She said she could deal with that, after asking her if she really wanted to do this.  "Are you sure?" came out of my mouth a few times.  Kristie told me that if she changed her mind after I cut her braids she would fix it for her, but no.  Emily is one weird chick.  And I say that with all the love in my heart because when I cut six inches off my hair, I cried.  She's just not the same as me, and that's okay.  I love it.  Any way, a couple of her friends were over as well, and I made sure they took lots of pictures.  Let me share them with you now:

Here is the before shot.

Another before.  She's so excited! Just so you know, I had no idea Emily's friend was putting me in the picture too, or I would have had a better expression on my face.

First cut.

Here is Emily, feeling her buzz, and deciding she likes the way it feels, so she's not going to go completely bald.  Sigh of relief.

So much hair!

The after shot.  Her hair turned out okay.  Surpisingly.

I have a unique family.  But I had a lot of fun.  I'd never buzzed any one before.  Many people asked my why she was doing this.  She said lots of reasons, and keeps most of them to herself.  Many people told me I should try to talk her out of it.  But it's not my decision to make.  Why would I talk her out of doing something she wanted to do?  She has nothing to regret here.  This is what she wanted.  What I want is irrelevant.  The good thing about when you cut your hair, it grows back.

A Taste of Spring

These are for my sister who lives in Minnesota.  She is begining to tire of winter, and according to her, nothing grows utnil Mother's Day.  Well, here, we get tired of winter in January, so you've made it further than us.  I say good job.  Right now, we are having a thunderstorm.  I love the sound of thunder.  It gives me a thrill and makes me feel alive.  I don't know why.  There's just something about it.  I looked out the window and it is begining to hail.  I had to hurry inside after taking these shots so my camera didn't get wet because it was starting to rain.  Lovely.  March is coming in like a lion after all.  Our weather is having a hard time deciding what it wants right now.  It was sunny this morning.  This happened yesterday, too only without the hail.

I saw these when I came outside the other day.  It was a pleasent surprise as I hadn't noticed them coming up at all.

These will be baby daffodils.

And these are my tulips coming up.  I am excited for April.  They are splendid when they are full.

Love your guts, Sista!  Hope is all around you.

Another Audition...

I'm begining to think that the person I see when I look in the mirror is completely different from what other people see when they look at me.  I think of myself as this fat, old (emphasis on the old and the fat) woman.  And those aren't necessarily bad things.  I think I'm pretty.  I just have an area I would like to work on - my stomache.  I had an audition Saturday.  I thought I would be auditioning for the part of the woman who was decribed as "20's to 30's", and the restaurant manager.  But when I got there, the director told me he wanted me to audition for the ingenue.  I was taken aback.  The director had described her as being in her 20's.  I am  no longer in my 20's, and usually the love interest in a story is skinny and pretty, or pretty skinny depending on how you want to look at it. He he he.  It makes me wonder how old do I look?  Why do I look so young?  Maybe I think I am fatter than I am.  Maybe Hollywood has warped my self-image a little.  I have a goal to loose 40 pounds now, but what if I don't obtain that?  The camera adds 20 pounds, so as an actress, I feel I have to be skinny, but do I really have to be?  Is Hollywood changing?  It's confusing, and hard to figure out what one person wants from the other.  This post is confusing, too.  Sorry.  But the good news is, I got the part!  It's a student film, and the director is my sister's friend, so I think I got the part because she said she wouldn't be his friend any more, but hey, I'll take it!  You've got to use your connections where you can, right!  I go crazy when I'm not acting.  A friend said, it was good to have a break, but I took a break at Christmas time, so now I am ready to go!  Horray for me and my awesomeness!  Maybe I will change the title of this blog to "Me and My Awesomeness!" (No, I won't but that would be funny!)