Ambitious, no?

This morning I woke up with an excess of energy. Don't know about anybody else, but I definitely go through peaks and chasms of efficiency. Right now I'm coming into a peak period after a much-too-long visit in the chasm. It feels good to be responsible. I find that I really, really enjoy the work of a homemaker: all the day-to-day stuff I thought I would dread is actually a great way to spend my day. I hate doing dishes, but Chris volunteered to do them when we got married, so I feel my work never gets too awful. I like organizing and maintaining a home. It may not be the most intellectually stimulating work, but there's a part of me that is very satisfied in making sure things run well, that we have what we need and a little extra to share with others.

I've been a big couponer for a while now, and I'm finding I can do an excellent job of providing essentials for my family at a fraction of the full price. But all of this couponing takes a level of organization I think I will never fully achieve. However, in an attempt to better ascertain the needs/wants of my little family, I have undertaken a new task: a spreadsheet of all our household items. I've spent my few free moments today compiling a list of all the things we regularly use to keep our lives moving forward. So far there are 99 items on that list that I'm responsible for; making sure we always have some on hand, and knowing when we're running low well enough in advance that I can buy it on sale. The big money-saving trick behind couponing is buying in bulk when you can pair coupons with sales (you can save at least 75% off the full price most of the time on a good sale). So you stock up at a really good price--meaning that you have enough on hand until another really great sale comes around again. That way you, as the consumer, decide what you're willing to pay for an item, and you're not at the mercy of what the retailer decides to sell it for.

I'm hoping this spread sheet helps me better decide what items are on my 'priority list' for my week's shopping budget. It just helps me keep track of what I already have in bulk (for example, I now know I have purchased so much soap and body wash I literally won't need to buy more for about 3 years, and I didn't pay full price for any of it!) and what I really, really need (ink cartridges, mopping solution, yikes!). Then I wait for sales. And as soon as my priority item is on sale, I can stock up. Maybe there will be a day when I'll have a full inventory of everything (cue angel choir) and I can blow my weekly grocery budget on something really frivolous... like potato chips and magazines.

What to Think?

So most of you know I've been an avid LOST fan, and last night was the series finale. For those who don't watch, my obsession probably sounds unfounded (it is, in fact, just a TV show), but I really think there has never been a more intelligent hour of TV. Without LOST, I never would have bothered to educate myself on many subjects, like modern physics or the wonder that is Stephen Hawking. I wouldn't have bothered to brush up on philosophers like Locke, Rousseau and Hume just to name a few. I never would have read Watership Down (a must-read for LOST fans) or tried to read Our Mutual Friend only to realize that maybe I'm not a Dickens fan, after all. In short, this show has enriched my intellectual life considerably.

And, at the risk of sentimentality, it has enriched my emotional life as well. The characters represented in the show were realistic people. All of them at times full of fear, courage, understanding, cluelessness, hope, despair, shame, pride, love, selfishness, humanity. I found myself connecting with each at times. Probably at some time or another, they have ALL been my favorite (even Juliet...but I guess not Michael, Anthony Cooper or Radzinsky--good riddance!).

In the end, I think the most important question that LOST raises is: What is born of the wreckage? Is it possible that the worst thing that ever happened to you (or the worst thing you ever did) could turn out to be the best? I think, for me, this is the biggest message LOST has to offer. What do you do with your stumbling blocks? Do they make you turn around and abandon your hopes, or do you use them to step up and move on?

LOST is the story of many survivors, literally and figuratively. Most of them were able to take the experience of the plane crash and use it to survive the lives they'd been living before. The island gave them a place to start themselves over. A place to change, improve.

And after mulling a little while over the finale, I think what the writers were really trying to say with that episode is that, after everything, the people you share your life with are going to be the most meaningful part of your life. They're what you're going to care about--not all the questions you couldn't answer or the mysteries you couldn't solve. I've come to think of it this way: If I die and get to Heaven and I get my chance to ask God just one question, I probably won't ask him, "OK, so the socks that get lost in the dryer... WHERE DID THEY GO?" It'll almost certainly be, "Where is my family? Who else is here with me?"

Which is not to say that I thought the finale was just peachy. I am infinitely more interested in these characters' lives than their deaths or hereafter. The fact that we were watching these people's after-lives for the last season seems to me somewhat irrelevant. It's nice to know they're all going to be together forever, but I don't think that message merited an entire season's worth of flashes sideways. Maybe the last few episodes. I would have much rather seen how they lived out the rest of their lives. I guess it's safe to conjecture that none of them went on to experience anything as important to them as what happened on the island. If Kate or Sawyer ever loved anyone else after leaving the island, I guess it never equalled what they'd found on the island so maybe these kinds of speculations are irrelevant as well. In the end, when it came to moving on to the other side, everyone from the crash chose to move on with the people they'd found there. No other experience in their mortal lives triumphed that. Surprising to me is that my favorite moment was when Juliet and Sawyer got back together. I spent most of the show really really disliking Juliet--only to like her very much a few episodes before she died. Her and Sawyer's reunion, as well and Claire's and Charlie's were the most important to me. I'm glad Jack was a hero (well they all were, I guess). I'm glad Hurley got the island. I'm very glad Ben found some sort of peace. I'm very happy that Richard will be able to die and get back to his wife as well. I'm glad Miles didn't get killed in the crossfire. I feel like I SHOULD be very satisfied, and yet there's something wanting. I wanted to see the rest of these people's lives. Not the REST of their lives, ya know?

But as I mentioned above, I think the end was really to drive home the message that the point is WHO, not what. So the finale itself may have been somewhat disappointing, but it doesn't change the general theme of the series as a whole, so it doesn't bother me too much. I've been sumptuously entertained, moved, enlightened by my allegiance to the show, and I'm really grateful for the things I'm taking away from it.

Because He's Just That Amazing!

So my husband is awesome, for many reasons, not the least of which is this:

He never gives himself the credit he deserves. He thinks they just hand out cash awards like this to just anybody for the asking. Of course, it couldn't have anything to do with his stellar GPA from LDSBC, his leadership experience, hard work, or for being an all-around great person.

Also, he planned the best Mother's Day ever. Seriously the best day I've had in a long time. He got Will up and made me breakfast while I read the newspaper IN BED!!! He also didn't have his priesthood leadership meetings, so he was able to help get me and Will out the door for church, which is a struggle every single week. He made me this super-cute card:

Also, our recipe of the week this week is Shepherd's Pie. Check it out!

It's a New Feature, Dahling

So, a while ago, blogspot came out with a new feature, "pages," and it's exactly like it sounds: you get to add multiple pages to your blog. So, I've decided to have a recipe page. I haven't given up on Charlynn and her quest to cook yummy things for her husband, but I've been struggling to come up with recipes that are my originals, that I feel OK about posting. So. You'll see to the right of this post in the side bar is the new slideshow. And directly beneath that, it says "pages" and underneath that, "Home" and "What's Cookin', Good Lookin'?" So, there you go. Check it out to find what I've been cooking lately. Which leads me to believe I'm going to have to start taking pictures of what I cook. So... let's hope I make really pretty food. :)