"there's a snake mommy"

Calvin was playing outside in the dirt today when, all of a sudden, he came running up to me urgently saying "I saw a snake mommy...dere's a snake". Multiple thoughts ran through my head.

No.1 being: "I'm such a terrible mother. How could I have not scanned my yard for snakes today?"
No.2: horror at the thought of a snake biting Calvin.
No.3: absolute curiosity to see a colorful snake in my very own backyard(at least in my mind it was colorful).

I grabbed Calvin's hand, told Finn to stand back, and asked Calvin to show me where the snake was. We rounded the corner of the deck and I fully expected that this "colorful" snake had slithered away. But lo and behold, Calvin pointed his finger and said "see it right dere?"

A close-up of Calvin's *snake*

In case you could not tell, it was a worm. Oh Calvin, can't you stay 2 forever? Well, that was the excitement of our day.

like tommy

Remember Tommy, the virtual drum instructor from a few posts ago? Little did I know what an impression he would make on my little boys. Finn intently studies his every move. Since Tommy wears jeans and a t-shirt, Finn now wants to wear jeans and a t-shirt(mind you me, it used to be a fight to get Finn to wear pants). No detail in the DVD is lost on Finn, down to the black background and the spotlights. Finn turned off all the lights in the house and convinced me to hang a flashlight from the armoir. Somehow, my guitar buddy Calvin has also been swept away by the world of drummers(how did I not see that coming?). Tommy wears a watch therefore Finn and Calvin made some watches.

Tommy wears a bracelet, hence Calvin wears a bracelet.

Tommy's drum pedal

Calvin raids the kitchen for his drum pedal

Tommy's drum brush(I've never heard of a drum brush either)

Finn's drum brush(also from a kitchen raid)

I went shopping at the mall the other day and the salesman was showing me a little shirt that had an authentic fender guitar pick on it, and we got to talking about instruments. Turns out he's a drummer, with lots of beautiful, colorful tatoos. I'm glad the boys weren't with me. Knowing how impressionable they are right now, they would quickly be drawing tatoos on each other with permanent markers and pens. I bet you Calvin's would be a bright yellow sunshine smiley face. I can just see it now, the two of them with their tatoos, walking their little stuffed kitties down the street.

It's on the House!

John got an extra side job teaching at CSUN on monday nights. Since I was stuck at home all night, Lorie and Ellie were kind enough to keep me company. I decided to make a knock-off of my favorite Starbucks iced coffe mocha slush...or whatever they call it. I always have to explain it to them in great detail, lest they botch my exquisite $3.50 order.

I got out my blender and filled it 3/4 of the way with coffee and some ice, with Ellie and Lorie scoffing my apparent ignorance. I guess my coffee ratio was disproportionately high, and so they made me dump most of it out. I had no clue that blended drinks had only a few shots of coffee. I then added coffeemate creamer and lots of hershey's syrup, with Lorie egging me on to put in vanilla ice cream. Lots of it. At one point, Ellie handed me a brownie to throw in and it actually gave it a nice speckly gourmet appearance. Add some whip cream and voila!

Did I mention the mocking of Lorie and Ellie the whole time?

It came out surprisingly good. Ellie said so.

As if this mocha concoction did not have quite enough calories:

only the finest for my customers

We stayed up till midnight and I never ever wanted them to leave. The next morning I think we were all positively ill. Perhaps a curfew is in order?

Next time you are at hotel Davi, order the mocha slush--I won't even charge you $3.50. It's on the house! And I will try not to keep you up so late:)

Davi Unplugged

I never in a million years thought I'd be serenading ya'll tonight(with John as my backup singer), but I figured, what the heck!

If you listen closely, at the end you can hear Calvin mumbling "do twinkle wittle star". Unfortunately, I am not that advanced yet, because it requires 3 notes: g, c AND d. John just taught me the d chord tonight, but it is a little more involved, so I will just save it for this weekend. I did manage to get Calvin singing a portion of "row row row your boat" in the following snippit, but since he's so easily distracted, you only get a tidbit of his little songbird voice.

Shock

I walked into my 4:00 hair appointment yesterday without any game plan for my hair. My hair guy Mark looked up at me and asked "the usual?" I said "Probably. I eventually want to do something different, but I'm too chicken today." I guess that was all the prompting he needed and before I knew it, they were mixing up some concoction and applying it to my unsuspecting head. I've been going to Mark for a few years now, and it was like he couldn't wait to do this to me. When they rinsed me out and spun me around to the mirror, there is only one word to describe my reaction.

****Shock****

It was very hard getting an accurate picture. In some lighting I like it, but in other lighting I'm ready to run out the door to get some highlights/lowlights, ASAP.

Here is a picture taken in completely different lighting. It's much darker in real life, but it may eventually fade to this. Who knows. Sorry Jess, I did my best to take some accurate pictures!

At dinner last night Finn said that my new hair color was brown and that his hair color was tan. When I told him that I was not too sure about my new color, he suggested that I go back to Mark and get my hair painted tan like his. Hm. Maybe if I'm tired of being a raven after a month, I might just go back and request some tan hair:)

Guitar Lessons

A few years ago, I asked John to teach me to play the guitar. If you've ever attempted music lessons from your husband, you might know what I'm talking about. It did not go well, to say the least. Our lessons would go something like this:
Me: So, how do I play the g chord?
John: Well, how do you think you should play the g chord?
Me: Well, I DON"T KNOW. That's why I'm asking YOU.
(Yeah I know, I was a pain)
To make matters worse, I refused to chop my nails off. Despite these setbacks, John still managed to teach me Amazing Grace, which I see now was fitting. Now that I'm a little older and much more patient, I decided to give it another whirl. We started off much the same as before, with John talking WAAAAY over my head. It took a while, but I finally convinced him that I was not the musical genius that he thought I was. He got out a crayon and drew some guitar tablature to teach me the g chord and c chord.
A dozen questions later, and I finally understood how this trixy tablature related to the actual strings on my guitar. Poor John. However, my new found patience(and his) helped a lot and I can now play 2 chords on the g-tar. Yee Haw!

I even got out the nail clippers and chopped my nails off. Long nails are only good for scratching backs anyway, so I will not miss them. I must say though, my fingertips were a little sore from the tight guitar strings. John says it will take some time for them to toughen up. So, guitars hurt your fingers, drums hurt everyone else's ears and horns involve way too much spit. The piano is the only instrument that does not seem to inflict pain or gross-ness. With my 2 chords, I can now play row-row-row-your boat. My goal is to eventually play Edelweiss and Princess Bride's Storybook Love. My little buddies are happy that I can play with them.

Hey Lorie, check out this shot taken by my 2nd shooter, Finn!

mini-trip

We ended up going out of town after all. We took a walk on the wild side, gambled with the weather and won. John even got interviewed by a newscaster when we stopped for gas at the Flying J. She asked how the weather was traveling through the passes. Seriously, can you believe all the fuss over a little snow?
When we got to my folk's house, we had some yummy oreo cake to celebrate dad's birthday. Afterwards, John and I watched The Gladiator. Eddie Grover showed a short clip at the BBI last week and so we had to see it again(BTW, Eddie did a FABULOUS job). I was a little shell-shocked by some of the violence, since I am accustomed to the likes of Clifford these days. However, I give two thumbs up for Maximus and the barbarian hoard.
The next day we went to Barbara Ellen's bridal shower. The highlight for me was when we got to interrogate Barb with a *nosy* question when she opened our present.

Barbara Ellen, the beaming bride to be

Brittanie, Barb and Jennifer

We then rushed back to mom's house so I could meet Lindsay's boyfriend Jim. He's perfect! A total doll! I then got summoned outside by Finn to see his latest production.

No backyard is complete without a drumset.

Everything, including the kitchen sink, was used to make this drumset(actually it was a bathroom sink). Dad is remodeling Lindsay's bathroom, so that explains the sink in the backyard... and a mirror:)

Auntie Lindsay with Ollie

Lindsay and Jim, the cute little couple.

Calvin had fun climbing some funky metal steps.

I wanted to take them home with me.

I could have stayed outside all day--mom and dad live by the mountains. However, mom made us leave by 3:30 sharp so we did not get stuck in another storm. We crammed so much in, it's hard to believe we were there for less than 24 hours. And now, I must unpack:(