The Most Wonderful time of the Year.

Whew.  The whirlwind has begun.  The days are flying by so fast and I am so busy its hard to believe!  I am happy to say that I have almost finished Christmas shopping & the wrapping of presents!  I have 1 nephew and neighbor gifts left to get.  Its pretty sweet to get to this point.  I have discovered that when you buy only 25% of the gifts you usually do, it only takes you 25% of the time.  At first it was bothering me having a small Christmas, but now I am actually getting really excited.  I have bought just enough stuff to make it fun and exciting, but not enough to lose the focus and the spirit of Christmas.  A mistake I have made the last 3 years.  Now I can just sit back and enjoy the season. The food, movies, family, and especially the music. It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Drill Seargent Mama

There is one day a year when I turn into a complete drill seargent. This is not to say that I don't have other days when I am bossy, but on this day I take it up to a professional level.  When a command is given it will be obeyed, quickly and without complaints. This transformation always occures on the day after Thanksgiving. 

This is when I like all of the Christmas decorations to go up inside the house. Of course to get that done you need 2 things.  The first thing you need is for the entire house to be cleaned from top to bottom.  The second thing you need is minions. Now in years past I have had very faithful and obedient minions, one adult and one child.  This year I should have had one faithful adult minion, one somewhat handy and overly curios little minion, and one cute but very non helpful minion.  Something went awry this year and my faithful and obedient adult minion managed to escape to the hills midmorning to terrorize fuzzy little bunnies. This was not before the entire house had been cleaned and he had received hundreds of commands.  The absense of my large minion caused caos in the ranks.  Usually large minion is responsible for bringing me all of the boxes, setting up the trees, putting lights on the outside of the house (if not already done), and keeping the little minions as far away as possible. Trying to set up 2 Christmas trees and boxes and boxes of decorations by myself was almost more than I could handle. Somehow even with all of the help from my little minions and the fact that half of the lights had burned out I managed to get it done.  Here's some proof.

This tree is our glass tree which the kids can't touch unless they want to be in BIG trouble.

Sadly this tree only had about half as many lights as usual. I am a Christmas light addict in regard to the trees.  You can never have too many.

This tree is the minions' tree which they helped decorate. That explains why 80% of the decorations are on the bottom third. I am sure it will get redecorated countless times before Christmas.

The minions went crazy over the toy train when it got set up.
 Minion #2 was in complete awe and minion #1 became the conductor/troll under the bridge.

The lights still aren't up on the outside of the house because large minion didn't take my "advice" to do it last week when it was unseasonably warm.  Now its so cold that your nose feels like it will fall off if you are outside for more thank a few minutes.  This means that large minion is on shaky ground with the seargent.  If the Christmas lights don't get up this year, its not going to be pretty come this time next year.

I am thinking I may need to throw in a few more drill seargent days in the year to give my troops more training.  Maybe Cinco De Mayo and Earth Day.  We'll see. 

Yesterday I aslo had to finish getting ready to go to a boutique in which I was attempting to sell some children's puzzles and things.  Unfortunantly we didn't get very many shoppers, but that is just how it goes sometimes.  I still had a nice day. The best part of my day was coming home to William who seemed to miss me more than anyone else.  He brought a blankie and sat and cuddled with me for a long time.  That was worth all of the money I could have made today. If anyone knows William you know that him cuddling is a miracle.  He never cuddles, but after tonight I have a glimmer of hope inside of me that maybe, just maybe he will learn to enjoy it.

Happy Thanksgiving

Well it's the close of another Thanksgiving.  I just got Isabelle to bed and William has been out like a light for a couple of hours.  This year for dinner we had mom and dad, Daniel and his kids, Soung-Jo and Jee Hoon, and the four of us.  I ate until I felt sick and then I ate a little bit more.  The rest of the family came over in the evening and we played games and had lots and lots of dessert. It is a fact that when you let that many kids run wild in your house for that long, it will look like a bomb went off.  Despite the fact that it will probably take me the better part of tomorrow recovering from today, it was a wonderful day today.

Thanksgiving has been my favorite holiday probably since I was an early teen. Of course I think Halloween is fun and who doesn't love Christmas? But there is just something about Thanksgiving that is so special. I wished that at this time of year I could slow down time. Thanksgiving seems to get overlooked more and more each year. I hope that the importance of this day could somehow find its way again in to our culture.

While we are grateful for the many, many conveniences in our lives I feel like this holiday is much more simple than that.  It is gratitude for life itself.  It is gratitude for the chance to learn of God and to follow Him. It is gratitude for the possibility to dream.  It is gratitude for the freedom to work hard.  And it is gratitude for those who choose to walk by our sides in life. I think those were the real things the pilgrims were thankful at the time of the first Thanksgiving. Everything else is just a bonus. I suppose I could make a list of everything I am grateful for, but it would be really long and just seem forced. When you start putting your love for your family in the same list as your love for hot chocolate it undermines the truly important things.  I realize that is somewhat cynical, but its how I feel. I need to give credit where it is due on this most important day.

I need to say to my Heavenly Father and My Saviour Jesus Christ, Thank you.  Thank you for allowing me to live and to do so with good health.  Thank you for sending me to a country where I have the freedom to dream and the freedom to achieve those dreams. Thank you for putting me in places to meet wonderful and supportive friends. Thank you for giving me good parents who sacrificed and loved me.  For giving me brothers and sisters to learn with and from. For sending me a loving and kind husband, and for trusting me enough to give me two of the most beautiful and loving children on Earth. And most of all, thank you for  giving me the gospel and for the Saviours eternal sacrifice for me. I don't say it enough, but from the bottom of my heart...THANK YOU.

Thanksgiving Arts & Crafts

I am using the word art in the MOST liberal sense!  I am not a gifted artist.  Yes I have fantasies about being a great artist, they run right behind my fantasies of being a great singer.  I am very subpar when it come to creative thinking and execution.  I think Isabelle might end up much more successful than her mom in both subjects, at least I am keeping my fingers crossed for her!

Here she is with her Thanksgiving art projects.

It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without an Indian hat. 

Although Isabelle thought it should be a turkey hat since it was made with "turkey" feathers.

She was in heaven when I turned her loose with the glue stick and the tape. 

 Another step in independence.

And as Vanna is so beautifully showing here are leaves of thanks. 

There are many more blessings in our lives, I just didn't want to cut out any more leaves.

We had so much fun doing our little projects I had better

come up with more excuses to do things like this.

Crafts

Last night I went over to a friends and they taught me how to make

some flower bows for headbands and clips.

I am really branching out this week!

I made the green one last night and had so much fun that I have been making more for hours today!

Here are some of my favorites!

It's nice to have creative friends that can teach you new things.

And apparently you can teach an old Gabrielle new tricks!

I have burns on my fingers from the hot glue gun. 

Just like I am a messy cook, I am a messy glue gun operator!

But it was all worth it.

The Aftermath.

Here's what the world looked like the morning after the peaceful, snowy evening.

I don't know how many inches that is,

but it is a very wet and heavy snow!

This  poor tree almost broke with the weight!

This tree didn't make it. 

 Its very sad, because it was beautiful and unlike most

of our other trees this one had a perfect shape!

We will be making firewood out of it tomorrow.

Someone is still happy about the snow though!

It has begun snowing once again. 

I think we are going to see loads and

loads of the white stuff this week!

A Peaceful, Snowy Evening

 It's a beautiful snowy night tonight. 

I am saying its the first "real" snow of the year. 

Technically we already had one snowstorm in October,
but I am not counting that one. 

 It didn't have the same feeling. 

This snow has the feeling of newness,
everything is clean, still, peaceful.

I think it will keep silently coming thru the night.

There is something special about the 1st snow of the year.

It makes life seem more real.  It makes time stand still. 

It connects generations of people.

We only have an inch or two in our front yard right now.

Its a perfect blanket that I am sure will have many little boot prints in it come morning.

There will be attempts at snowmen and snow angels.

But preceeding that there will be a frenzied attempt to find the

 snow gloves before it all melts.  

It is ushering in the Thanksgiving holiday.  Making it better. 

Tonight I am thankful for the beauty of snow.

That will not be the case come January,
but tonight, I am thankful.

Amuck In My Mind

It's only 9 a.m. but I have been up for a while now.  I have had alot of unimportant things running around my mind this morning.  Thats not why I woke up early.  I woke up early because Soung-Sik decided to go shooting with dad and Nathaniel.  He got up a little before 6:30 and thats when my thoughts began. So here's a dip into my early morning brain.
I wonder why men think its fun to get up really early and go shooting.  I wonder why Soung-Sik left the closet light on when he left the room.  I love you to honey, but you have already told me you were leaving twice. Man its really windy.  Don't the bullets get blown way off course if there are hurricane force winds?   It looks like it might snow or at least rain, is it still fun to go shooting?  Do men go shooting because it's in their "hunter/gatherer" genes and they are going thru withdrawals?  Oh no, I think I heard a kid.  If I lay here and don't move or breath I wonder if he will go back to sleep.  I don't think its working.  Is there something wrong with the last 2 bites of yogurt? Oh no, the other kid is up and she wants me to pretend.  Doesn't she know my limited imagination doesn't turn on until 11:00? I wonder if she will want to eat too. She just got sucked into the tv - maybe she'll forget about food for a few minutes, or better yet she'll forget she wants me to pretend. I don't think those cups should qualify as "tippy cups".  There should be a law that if they haven't tested a cup by actually tipping it and seeing if it leaks, then they shouldn't be able to sell it as a tippy cup. I am just going to pretend that Liam isn't walking around eating a day old cookie that he just found (I guess I can pretend this early in the mornig afterall).  Its really only half a day old, and its making him so happy.  The cookie kid is stinky, I wish his daddy was here.  I bet his daddy wishes he was here too, it freezing outside!  I wonder if its not too windy to go shooting, but its way too windy to put up Christmas lights?  Why didn't I check the milk level last night? 
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm 
Sorry, I just checked out there for a minute.  I love hot cocoa. I also love hot baths, but I think I'll have to settle for the cocoa this morning.  I wish I would have gone to bed before 1:30 last night.  I can't believe how bad my english/spelling has gotten since I left school.  Is it thru or through? I think I will educate myself today.  I can't believe Isabelle is watching a cooking show, how long will this last? I wonder if she wants to learn how to change a stinky diaper.  This blanket is so warm.
I better go wake up and try to accompish something today. Here's to hoping my mind will land on something concrete, not literally of course, that woud really hurt!  I am so glad its Saturday!



BOOK REVIEW: PRINCE CASPIAN

Prince Caspian
Written by: C.S. Lewis
Number 4 of 7 in the Narnia Series
Number of pages: 223
Number of stars I'm giving: 4

This book, like all I have read so far in the Narnia series has been very enjoyable!  Aslan played a bigger role in this book than in a couple of the previous stories.
The thing that strikes me in the books as compared to the movies is that the children are much more mature, kind, and loving with each other in the books.  They make the hard choices, and with the exception of Susan they do the hard things happily.  Susan, who makes me crazy in the movies, continues to annoy in the books.  I worry that I may be a little like Susan when the going gets rough, I will have to try harder to be more optimistic in hard times!
Prince Caspian the book is much different than the movie.  While the movie strayed from the book, I think they made mostly wise choices in when to stray in order to keep up the pace in the movie.  There were 2 areas in particular where I wished they woud have stayed true to the book.  First, Alsan was in the book alot towards the end - much more than in the movie.  Everyone saw Aslan in the book.  Also I wished they hadn't put the romance in between Prince Caspian and Susan.  There was nothing even eluding to this in the book, and it puts pressure for children to grow up too fast and become romantically involved.  In the books, though the children are brave, they still retain their childlike qualities and innosence.
A very entertaining story.  I am getting a little sad, becasue now I am over the "hump" in the series.  Only 3 more books to go.  They will be finished before I am ready for them to be!

No more whines now...I mean it!

That was the theme of the day today.  I must have told Isabelle 8,000 times and William 4,000 times to stop whining today.  I think I might have even told Soung-Sik to stop whining once or twice.  There must have been a meeting last night after I went to bed where they all decided to gang up on me today.  Or the fact that I woke up at 5 a.m. and couldn't go back to sleep may have made me ultra sensitive.  Either way there were horribly annoying sounds coming from my house all day.  The only reason why both of my children were not in bed at 6:00 tonight was because we weren't home then.

Soung-Siks' excuse is that he is married to me and probably has to listen to me whine more than he would like to.  I am pretty sure that "when whinning and when not whinning" was in our wedding vows.

Liams' excuse is he is still a little sick.  He has also just figured out how to fake cry and he is very proud of his new talent.  I don't think it would be fair of me to squash it out without letting him perfect it a little longer. 
We aren't quitters in this house, no sir!

Isabelle on the other hand was not involved in the wedding ceremony and has long out grown the need to practice her talent of fake crying.  No I have a very real concern with Isabelle's whinning.  I think she might be getting the dreaded 5 year old attitude.  I heard about the terrible 2's, but I LOVE 2 year olds, they are my favorites.  I have heard 3 year olds are awful, but we just seemed to breeze through those as well.  4 has almost been a dream, I am her hero and she tries her best everyday to please mom & dad.  Lately in between our perfect 4 year old days a body snatcher is taking away my daughter every now and again.  One minute happy the next minute so emotional over who knows what.  I have heard the phrase "but mommm, it isn't fair" , more than I would like to think about today.  She knows that she can't slam her door but that hasn't stopped her from shutting it softly and then moping and grunting right behind it in hopes of guilting me out of something.  I am not ready for my baby to become a kid with opinions and her own plans. While reading her a bedtime story with her laying on my lap tonight I wondered if all of the whining had just been a bad dream.  Hopefully when the day starts tomorrow the body snatcher will have moved on to another house and found some other poor mother's 5 year old. 

Because tomorrow there will be no more whines now...

I mean it...

I think I want a peanut!

A Day in the Life of Isabelle

I figured her day had to be more exciting than mine.  It turns out it was!  I don't really know what time Isabelle woke up, because she colored for a while before she came in and woke us up at about 8:30!



Here we are watching cartoons. 
Sadly most days in our house start out this way.
Not Sundays of course, we are late enough for church without TV.

 

After the TV wore off we thought we'd make some banana bread.

First peel the bananas like so...

Then make sure you get all of the dough off the mixer.

You better get a sample, all great chefs do.
 I can't stand banana bread dough, but Isabelle loves it.
Cookie dough, cake batter and brownie dough on the other hand - YUM! 
Have no fears if you eat food from my house, that spatuala did not touch the food again!



Finished product - just perfect.

Now its time for school.
She got 100% on her spelling test today.
cats, pigs, beds, bugs, tops, and best!

Time for some food.
Too bad the only thing she would eat was kimchi.

Piano practice went great.

She also had her piano class this morning.

Isabelle is so excited for her performance next month!

All work and no play make Isabelle a cranky girl.

Play away :)

Off to TKD. 

She loves it when she gets to be the leader.

I wonder where she gets that from???

But seriously, her TKD instructor is sooo good looking.

I bet he has a totally awesome wife back at home!

Good form kiddo! 

Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up.

Ahhhhh.  Thats much better!

Reading is becoming a daily habit.

I am so glad she has started enjoying it.

Finally, eating her banana bread and watching a bedtime movie.

She is a great big sister, most kids would freak out if their little brother was stealing their snack.

Throw in about 20 potty breaks, carrying her brother around, chasing the cats,

and visiting with Grandma...I don't know about Isabelle,

 but I am ready for bed!

If we didn't have Isabelle in our lives it would be

pretty boring around here!

BOOK REVIEW: THE HORSE AND HIS BOY

The Horse and His Boy
Written by C.S. Lewis
Number 3 of 7 in the Narnia Series
Number of pages: 224
Number of stars I'm giving: 4

I loved this book.  It was a very quick and fun read.  If you don't have any children interrupting you every ten minutes it will only take one day to read.  If you have children but ignore them from time to time it will take two days to read.  If you have children and are a perfect mom it will probably take you 3 days to read.  In my case it took two days to read.
The reasons I didn't give this book 5 stars was because I didn't feel like it was as much of a pull between good and evil like "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" was; also it didn't make me want to be a better person like "Les Miserables" does. 
In this book you fall in love with the little hero Shasta. All of the trials he has to go thru in life make your heart strings pull for him.  You will laugh, be excited, and if you are a baby like me you will probably cry just a little too.  My favorite part is when Shasta is speaking to Aslan.  When you understand the symbolism there I don't know how you could not cry.  The fact that the Savior is there for us whenever we need Him, even if we don't realize it, is an amazing gift.  Also I loved the way this book shows the Saviors mercy and His justice.  It also teaches us that we should always choose to be merciful.
I can't wait for a couple more years when Isabelle and I can read it again together.  Prince Caspian: Here I come!

Haircut for William

Here's William after his haircut. 

 Please note the alligator tear by his eye that may still be there. 

People say that a picture says a thousand words,

but I think a tear can too.

Today was NOT the day I should have given him a haircut. 

My entire day has just been "off".  Not bad per say, just "off".

And poor little Liam has a fever and is trying to finish the rest of his teething.  

I could no longer stand the hair in his eyes or the fact that I could do a cute ponytail in back if I really wanted too.  In fact yesterday Isabelle suggested we put a bow in his hair and today Soungsik suggested the same thing.  That was it, I had to at least do a little trim on him.  Thats really all he got, but calling it "just a trim" does not give me the justice I deserve.  Now I am not a hairstylist, nor have I ever claimed to be.  Of course I have never been accused of it either, I would probably have to do something cute with my hair every once in a while for that to happen. 

Anyways, back on track...I am pretty sure that cutting William's hair is akin to, I don't know shaving an angry cat.  Which by the way I have done, and I know first hand is not easy.  He was not thrilled at all with my idea, and refused to hold still for even a minute.  Also just as a side note, hair sticks to tears really, really well.  We survived it and I even forced him to get his fingernails trimmed afterwards. He really hated that idea too.  I am not saying its the best haircut, heck I am not even saying its a good haircut, but we both survived and he is taking a recovery nap at this very moment.

I guess I could splurge 20 bucks on a haircut for him but that just seems crazy to me for his age.  Also why would I pay someone to have that amazing bonding experience when I can do it all over again next time?

It helps ALOT to have a beautiful assistant who can dance around the chair and sing while holding the comb you need. 

Magicians have the right idea!

BOOK REVIEW: THE HOST

The Host written by Stephanie Meyer
Number of pages: 619
Number of pages it should have been: 325
Number of stars I am giving it: 2

I was a little late getting on the "Host" bandwagon.  The reason for that is I have started this book about 5 times.  Everytime I just couldn't get into it.  This time I just made myself a firm committment that I would finish it, and finish it fast so that I could say I had. The concept behind this book is pretty cool, and I wanted to like it.  Many of my friends loved it, so maybe I am the weird one. There are two reasons I am giving it 2 stars instead of 1.  The first reason is that it does start to get interesting in the last 25% of the book which helped me to finish it, and the other reason it gets 2 stars is because it does have a "happy" ending.
The book starts out in a very confusing way where you don't even know who is talking.  It stays this way for at least a hundred pages.  It also starts out very BORING.  She goes over and over and over the same emotions.  And just when you think your eyes will fall out from boredom she goes over and over and over the same emotions AGAIN.  Just when you are about to give up something actually starts to happen.  Don't get your hopes up though.  With a change of scenery in the book the writer can now go over and over and over and over what the scenery looks like.  I get it already its a cave, the dirt is purple, its a cave, its dark, of course its dark, ITS A CAVE! And then she talks about the food they eat over and over and over again.  How many times does a person need bread explained to them?  I have seen bread, I have even eaten bread myself so I don't need it explained 400 times.  The amount of time she spends on food, people eating food, people thinking about food, people preparing food, people getting food, people getting food for other people, people getting drinks, people thinking about getting drinks...its amazing.
The weirdest thing in the book is the relationship between Jared and Melanie. They are suppossed to have this beyond amazing relationship, but in the whole book it isn't believable and just comes across as really strange and based out of desperation and lust.  I couldn't have cared one way or the other if their relationship lasted. The other relationship between Wanda and Ian is much more believabe and seems to be based on more than just lust, so of course this relationship takes on less importance.
I don't like that she portrays the human race as being almost competely hate filled and selfish.  The last 25% of the book, while more enjoyable, was filled with more holes than a block of swiss cheese. 
So there are only about 25 humans left and they only managed to get 1 gun?  Really, I guess my husband or brothers didn't make it then.  They were suppossed to be fanatical survivalists, 1 gun, I don't think so.
Their plan to abduct 1 alien at a time and change them back to humans...hows that going to work when there are 3 billion people on Earth?  And of course they can't kill the aliens, they have to ship them off to space so that there is no violence.  The only problem with that is they are using the aliens to ship the other aliens back, how are the shipper aliens going to get back?  At some point aren't the aliens going to fight back seeing as they are much more advanced?  Also a large percentage of the people that had their minds taken over were small children and infants.  After you take the alien controlling their brain out what memories will they have exactly?  I could go on and on and on...just not as long as Stephanie Meyers can.
I really enjoyed the Twilight series, not that they were great books, they were simply enjoyable.  I would give the Twilight series 3 stars.  Much more worth your time.  Will I ever read The Host again? No.  Will I ever go to a movie made after The Host? No.  Do I hope Stephanie Meyers writes another book?  I really coudn't care.  Sorry for the negative review. My blog, my opinion.  I really feel cheated out of the last 3 days of my life :)

My Roller Coaster Moment.

I've got  a bad feeling in my stomach.  There's nothing I can do about it now.  I have never enjoyed roller coasters or anything else that takes the control away from me.  But that is the exact feeling I have right now.  Only 6 Sundays left in the year and there's nothing you can do about it!  Not 6 Sundays 'till Christmas, 6 Sundays left in 2010.
In a moment of desperation, after my pirmary class was finished, I thought to myself  "How many more weeks do I have my little dears for?"  I teach Isabelle's CTR 4 class, and with the exception of a couple of short breaks have taught her since she 1st went into nursery.  Today we had our Primary program, and all of our kids did great...until of course the program was over and we got back into actual primary.  Whew, there were literally kids bouncing off the walls, a couple of them were in our class. 1 of them was 15 month old William but after about 30 minutes with him I surrendered and took him into Soungsik's class, I didn't say anything, why would you in a prisoner exchange?  I just dropped him off and ran out the door as fast as I could, before Soungsik could realize what I was doing do him. 
As far as primary goes I don't think I have seen anything like it before.  I know I wasn't alone in my feelings, because 1 person even broke down crying because she had worked so hard on her awesome sharing time and the kids were well...naughty.  The naughtiness didn't decrease when we took our 7 kids and crammed them into a small room.  Fortunantly by this point my expectations of getting a proper lesson in had completely flown out the window.  I think that happened when we opened the window to let in the perfect fall breeze.  We put the chairs away and took off our shoes.  My plan was to read stories about service to them while having a cookie party.  Luckily for the kids I remembered my huge bag of cookies.  Unluckily for me, I forgot most of my lesson at home.  With the help of a water break, head shoulders knees and toes, do as I'm doing, and my amazingly patient partner (Angie Geigle) we survived the day.  Isabelle almost didn't make it as she had a complete breakdown and began sobbing for no reason about 10 minutes before class was over.  I asked her what was wrong she said "I don't know".  I think it was a shared feeling for many. Those are the events that occured to get me thinking about the number of Sundays left in the year.
Now that I have had a hearty lunch and a 2 hour nap I have a much better outlook. I love the kids in my primary class it has been amazing watching them turn from little people learning to walk, to big kids who can read, have humor, show great love, and have understanding in complex life lessons. It is very bitter sweet when I think I may be losing my "litte dears" in just 6 weeks.
However, I am still feeling very overwhelmed like I have just been enjoying the roller coaster ride, not realizing that we have been steadily climbing a large hill and I now sit at the front of the coaster on top of the biggest hill.  The view of the fall leaves and the clear sky might be nice, but it will inevitaby come to an end.  We have Thanksgiving, Christamas, New Years and all that goes along with them rushing to our sides.  It would help if I was at all prepared, but this year preparation just hasn't happened yet, and may not happen.  I chose to get on the ride, and I have enjoyed the twists and turns so far.  I may be screaming for the rest of it, but things are coming now if I want them to or not, if I am prepared or not.  And my instincts tell me that once the year rushes to a close I will step off the roller coaster and shout "That was AWESOME, lets do it again!!!"  And we will!



Cardinal Rules

I probably shouldn't be typing this right now as it is midnight and we just finished game night - my brain is mush.  Oh well, I will give it a shot!

I have had a few cardinal rules since I was a kid such as: never eat yellow snow, always examine your zipper, don't talk to strangers - unless they are family, don't let your teacher catch you with gum, never give in when your mom is trying to make you eat tomatoes...

Of course I added a few rules when I was a teenager like:  don't get caught when speeding or skipping class (I said rules not morals), don't forget to check for your keys when getting out of the car, when the gasoline thingy points to E - it means it, don't do doughnuts in a church parking lot while speeding and skipping class (or your mom will tow your car and scare the daylights out of you by telling you police impounded it), don't get too serious about 1 boy in high school...

Now that I have gotten just slightly older I have added a few more:  don't make a promise you can't or won't keep, don't make threats you can't or won't keep, don't watch infomercials really late at night, never judge yourself for eating too much chocolate at certain girlie times, also never make any major life decisions at certain girlie times, never give your kids a nap after 5:00 pm,  but one of my biggest is never, never, never ask a woman if she is pregnant unless she is clearly 9 months pregnant with triplets...

That being said I guess rules are made to be broken and I just HAD to ask the tiny framed woman wearing the overly large empire waste shirt if she was pregnant...and of course she wasn't.  Now after having been pregnant 2 times I know that when I apologized and she said it was "okay" that deep down she was trying to decide if she could run me over in the parking lot and get away with it. 

It is one thing if a little child asks you they really don't know any better.  If a man asks you, especially if he has kids you can think that he is a little on the dumb side for about 5 minutes until you realize that, like my husband, he probably means it as some kind of twisted compliment and/or he was totally unaware of the bodily changes during his own wife's pregnancy.  But when a woman who has had children recently asks you, the only recourse is to shoot laser beems from your eyes and melt her brain. 

I am going to go back to sticking to all of my cardinal rules, I have put them there for a reason.  There's a saying that curiosity killed the cat, well I am confident that the stupid, stupid cat was asking a lady if she was pregnant...and you can guess the answer as well as I can!