7 Quick Takes about Conquering the Deathly Cold, Viral Awesomeness, and Carrots of Questionable Moral Character

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?

—1—

Probably the most unusual thing that happened this week is that Phillip, who is a leader for the boy scout troop at our church, took the boys on an overnight campout.

This is unusual because it's February in New England and the weather forecast looked like this:

Apparently someone missed the memo that normal people who live here are supposed to just hide inside until spring comes.

—2—

In addition to the single digit temperatures on the campout, there was also a -40 degree windchill on the mountain. I can imagine this made it feel slightly colder.

Allow me to paint a picture for you: To avoid having their water freeze during the night, each person had to sleep with their water bottle tucked inside their shirts. True story.

Surprisingly, the report was that the leaders and the boys all had fun. And despite my predictions to the contrary, each of them also survived.

Did not win the 2015 Darwin Awards.

—3—

Because of all the snow we've gotten lately, most of our neighbors have also had a visit from the ice dam fairy. The ones with money lying around are hiring ice dam removal companies to shovel off their roof.

It's funny how you can get used to things. At first my kids were excited to see guys walking around with shovels on a rooftop, but now they don't even look twice. It's old news.

—4—

This has been an interesting week on the old blog. My piece "Why I Make My Kids Go To Church" has been getting shared like hotcakes on Facebook and was also picked up by the Deseret News, a Utah-based faith and family newspaper and news site.

Click me. Read me. Love me.

If you're one of the people tweeting, pinning, or sharing, thanks a lot! If you aren't, I still like you, but maybe slightly less than the other guys.

—5—

At heart I think I'll always be a technophobe, but you can't really be a blogger without social media. So I bit the bullet and started accounts for the blog, first on Facebook and this week, on Twitter.

To those of you who've taken pity on me and offered kind words of encouragement as I've ventured into the world of social media about 15 years late, I appreciate it.

All I ask is that you not be offended if I don't respond to your messages (I probably don't even know I have a 'messages' section,) and don't assume that I know what a re-tweet is or how to do it.

—6—

My 3-year-old has a bad habit of leaving her coat in the car, creating intense panic when we're heading out the door and can't find it. Since I like asking 3-year-olds "why" (I find it always yields such well thought-out and logical answers,) I asked why she did that.

In response she smiled at me, shrugged her teeny little shoulders, and said cheerfully, "I'm just a bad girl!"

Now, how do you argue with that?

—7—

Ummm... I don't know exactly what to say about this because I was made aware recently that minors are reading my blog, but... what is up with these carrots?

My usual brand of carrots, never looked at the label until now.

And here I was, thinking I shopped at a family-friendly grocery store.


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Why I 'Like' My Facebook-Free Life

One Wednesday about a year ago, I sat in a circle with the other moms at playgroup, listening to them talk about a mutual friend who'd (surprise!) had her baby that morning. They knew the birth stats, how the labor went, and had even seen pictures of the umbilical cord, which had somehow gotten itself tied in a knot. They'd gotten a play-by-play on Facebook, of course, and I'd been clueless.

My blog may be on Facebook, but don't let that fool you. I don't have a personal account.

That's right: I don't have a Facebook account. People usually react to this news as if I'd mentioned not having running water in my thatched-roof mud hut, but it's true.

Even though it means I find myself hopelessly out of the loop sometimes, here's why I'm not on Facebook and I 'like' it:

photo by mkhmarketing

1. In real life, it's easier to decide who's my "friend." 

Friendship gets complicated on Facebook. I'm aware that if I sign up for Facebook, I'll soon start getting friend requests from people I talked to one time in the hallway in high school 20 years ago. And I'm not quite sure what I'd do about that.

Would my not-quite-acquaintances be offended if I don't friend them on Facebook? Should I friend them? Are they my friend? What's a friend, anyway? Gah! I can't deal with all these existential questions! 

2. My life is overwhelming enough as it is.

A running stream of the thoughts and happenings of everyone I've ever met (because, let's face it, I'd end up accepting those friend requests from random people I vaguely know) sounds like my worst nightmare. I can't even remember all the things I'm supposed to about my own life, letalone everything about everyone else's.

I already have a long list of books to read and projects to do that I wouldn't complete even if I lived to be 500. Keeping tabs on everyone via Facebook seems like a ridiculously impossible item to tack on to my to-do list.

3. I don't really want to know everything about everyone. 

I've gotten to be on friendly terms with the UPS delivery guy (our house runs on deliveries from Amazon, after all,) but it would be pretty awkward if next time we chatted about the weather I secretly knew all about him, his hobbies, his family, what he had for breakfast that morning, and had casually perused his Cancun vacation photos and his extensive selfie library.

And vice versa. I'm perfectly happy to leave some mystery between me and my casual acquaintances. How else am I going to convince anyone that I'm normal?

4. I already spend too much time online.

From what I gather, Facebook is apparently a black hole from which there is no escape. I hear people talking all the time about "quitting Facebook," while everyone around them just rolls their eyes and says, "You'll be back."

My kids already refer to the computer desk chair as "mommy's chair." If I signed up for a personal Facebook account, I'd probably never make eye contact with any member of my family again.

That being said, there are times I do think it'd be nice to have a Facebook account. I miss out because Facebook is the only channel for a lot of people when it comes to sharing birth announcements, showing off baby pictures, and keeping in touch with friends who move away (because sending an email is, like, so 1997.)

Right now these are the reasons for my Facebook-free life, but you never know: maybe one day I'll be the person you kinda sorta know from your past sending you a friend request (Hey, remember me? I borrowed your pencil once in chemistry in the 10th grade?)


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Just Call Me @thatevanslady

I don't even know what to say here, guys, but the impossible has happened. 


I've joined Twitter. 

If you've just recently stumbled upon this blog, you may not know why this is a remarkable event. But if you've known me for a long time, especially pre-blog, you're probably wiping up the drink that you just snorted out your nose. (You also may have had a similar reaction when I got on Facebook.)

I'm more resistant to adapting to new technology than your average 90-year-old man with glaucoma and a colostomy bag.

I used to laughingly call myself a technophobe; I guess now I have to say I'm a recovering technophobe.

So follow @thatevanslady for more Unremarkable Files hilarity. For the first couple of weeks while I'm still learning the ropes, you might feel a little like gawker traffic on the highway passing a car accident — but it'll get better. I'm confident I'll become fluent at tweeting soon.
Follow @thatevanslady
But no matter what, I solemnly promise never to do that "hashtag" thing with my hands when I talk.


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Why I Can't Keep Up with Current Events

photo by Ben Reynal

I know it's important to be an informed citizen. I know I should be well-versed about the economy, current political hot topics, and what the heck is going on in the Middle East.

I should know the names of the leaders of major European countries and our current U.S. Senate majority and minority leaders.

Unfortunately, I'm terrible at keeping up with current events.

Every few months, I'll resolve that today is the day I will start becoming a more enlightened citizen of the world, so I tune into the news and end up getting splashed in the face with headlines like this:

• 3-year-old found frozen to death in shirt, diaper
• Hear the chilling 'Slenderman' interrogation tapes
• Extreme road rage caught on camera

And inexplicably, this:

• Kim Jong Un debuts new hairdo

(Yes, these were all real headlines on the CNN.com homepage when I checked in on Friday night.)

Okay, so I was curious about the hairdo.

But really, how is any of this supposed to better me as a person?

I can't hold every individual case of murder, assault, abuse, and just plain creepiness in my head. There are 7 billion people in the world. 

I start out intending to stay up to date, but the "news" just feeds me a steady diet of shock-and-outrage pieces about mothers who drowned their kids in a bathtub or police who discovered the remains of babies in a mentally ill woman's closet. And I don't want to know.

After a couple of days, the relentlessness of it gets to me (even if I don't click on the articles, just seeing the headlines is enough,) and I give up on the whole "becoming literate in current events" thing. 

I know those things happen, but what good does knowing all about every one of them do me?

Right now, I can guarantee you that I don't want to see the shocking footage, listen to the chilling 911 tapes, or read all the gory details. If something horrible happened involving a baby, an old person, or an animal, please keep it to yourself.

Tell me about foreign policy. Tell me about politics. Just don't overwhelm me with sensational stories that just end up making me feel sick. That kind of "news" is the reason I don't read the news.

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A Full House Is a Messy House, Apparently

Here in New England, we have a mysterious week of vacation from school in the middle of February. It's appropriately (if not creatively) named "February break."

Think of it like spring break, only completely miserable and boring because it's 5 degrees outside.

I don't know why it exists, I think our superintendent just likes to ski.

It'd be great if we did too, but seeing as we don't have the money, time, or talent, we have to find a backup plan.

Indoor attractions during February break are packed fuller than subway trains in Tokyo on a Japanese holiday, so that's out. Meaning that except for an outing to the public library (which was crawling with people) and a trip to the grocery store, we've been in the house a whole lot this week.

On the one hand, it's been nice spending time together. The kids play together more, and I'm enjoying the chance to do something with them other than herding them into the car for basketball practice (if we hurry, we'll only be 10 minutes late!) That part is nice.

But... with all 6 of us at home 24/7 for a week, our house looks like it's going to be featured on an episode of Hoarders.

There are American Girl doll clothes scattered down the length of the stairs. Someone's filled the baby's crib with stuffed animals.

I don't even know what I'm looking at right now.

Mismatched shoes are littered randomly throughout the house, and don't even get me started on the stray socks. I'm just pretending not to see them at this point.

I've never seen this American Girl doll horse not lying on its side just looking generally creepy.

The entire first floor is coated with a thin film of markers and Legos, and I don't even want to know what's upstairs.

Why choose markers from the bin one at a time as needed when you can just dump all 100 of them on the floor?

The kids are having fun going out in the snow to play every afternoon, which means that the mudroom is a quagmire of dripping snowpants and soggy mittens. And I spend about an hour a day wiping up puddles of water trailing between the front door and the bathroom (because it's just not as fun to pee before you put on all your snow gear and play outside for 20 seconds.)

The sad, deflated pink "Happy Valentine's Day" balloon in the middle really says everything there is to say about our week.

Our "no eating in the living room" rule has obviously gone out the window. I say that because it looks like someone emptied a box of Ritz crackers on the couch and rolled around in them.

Forget snack times twice a day: the kids now want food every 6 or 7 minutes. The fridge is always open and I think there's a warm gallon of milk on the table right now, along with 10,000 scattered Rainbow Loom bands that no one will admit to dumping out.

My daughter decided that my bed looked like a good place to start an elaborate craft.
Probably because the table was covered in Rainbow Looms and old milk.

Our life right now reads like a scene from Lord of the Flies, but I promise that normally, we're organized, responsible people with rules and a schedule. I run a tight ship during the school week.

The kids have gone a little insane during this free-wheeling February break, but I know that on Monday they'll be back in school and the house will return to its usual quasi-clean state — and then I'll miss having them home all day.

Motherhood's funny like that.

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7 Quick Takes about Fancy Pizzas, the Wrong Way to Wear Underwear, and a Preschooler Having a Midlife Crisis

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday!

(If you're new here, you might want to follow Unremarkable Files on Bloglovin so you don't miss any of the random hilarity.)

—1—

In our house, I cook on the weeknights but Phillip is our special occasion cook (in other words, he's Emeril Lagasse and I'm the haggard junior high cafeteria lady). So our Valentine's Day dinner was all about his pizzas.

True to food snob form, Phillip couldn't just throw some cheese and pepperoni on a crust. One pizza was brussels sprouts and smoked pancetta; the other was mushrooms, sausage, and kale.

It was tasty enough that the kids didn't complain about the lack of pepperoni, and that's saying something.

—2—

Unfortunately I don't keep kale in the fridge at all times (I'm still trying to get over the kale phobia I developed when we got a CSA last summer and received about 10,000 bunches of it in 3 months,) so I had to make a run to the grocery store just before dinner to make said pizzas.

The benefit of going grocery shopping on Valentine's Day in the late afternoon is that an employee will come over and give your kids some of the slightly deflated "Happy Valentine's Day" mylar balloons just to be nice. And your kids will react like she just gave each one their own unicorn and their weight in candy.

—3—

We also celebrated Valentine's Day by going to a friend's wedding. As we were waiting for the ceremony to start Phillip was a little quiet, so I asked why.

"Just thinking about what it would be like to have your anniversary on Valentine's Day," he said.

"Too much pressure?" I asked.

"No!" He said, "I think it's efficient. The only thing that would be better is if your wife also had her birthday on Valentine's Day."

Now that's thinking like an engineer for you.

—4—

This weekend we got another foot of snow, but what else is new? 

By now, we have something like 3 feet of snow on the ground, and it's all this soft, fluffy stuff. So to my kids, the yard is basically a bounce house where you wear snowpants: do whatever you want, slide around like a penguin, jump off the deck railing, you won't get hurt.

Phillip also built this ker-azy sledding track for them over the deck. You climb a stepladder to get to the top, and then rocket down into the backyard. It's insane.

—5—

I don't know who told her about layering, but my 3-year-old's fashion sense has gotten a lot more interesting since the discovery. My personal favorite outfit this week was black tights underneath plaid shorts, a flower T-shirt, and a neon yellow-and-gray fleece pullover. 

It wasn't until she was putting on her leopard-print hat to leave that I noticed a pair of balled-up Elmo underwear inexplicably caught in the hood.

Yes, she went out in public like this (minus the underwear in the hoodie.)

No word yet on whether the undies were dirty or clean.

—6—

This week is February vacation week from school (which I don't ever remember having growing up in the Midwest, but hey, it's New England rules here,) and I think I made it about 4 hours in before freaking out over the pigsty that the house had become.

Having all the older kids home from school 24/7 has taken the level of messy in this house to a new height.

—7—

In keeping with our general lack of structure during this break from school, we've skipped a few naps and gone to bed late a few nights watching movies. The kids are doing reasonably well, with maybe the exception of my 3-year-old. 

Getting ready for bed last night, she had a full-blown crisis that resembled a middle-aged woman having a nervous breakdown. 

When I suggested that she brush her teeth, she draped herself dramatically across the bathroom counter wailing, "I don't want to spend my time doing that!" Then when I deferred her request for a second bedtime story, telling her we could read it tomorrow, she moaned, "But that's wasting my time!" and collapsed in a puddle of tears on her bed.

Apparently I don't understand how demanding and rigorous a preschooler's schedule can be. I'll try to be more sensitive from now on.

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What's In a Name?

This is Phillip, my wonderful husband of 11 years.

Yes, he is riding a kiddie roller coaster in this picture.
What a good dad.

He was named after his mom's dad Phillip Gordon, who was a captain in the Army Signal Corps and a really great guy.

Grandpa Gordon in his uniform.

“Phillip” is what you'll see written on my husband's birth certificate, and his family has never called him anything other than Phillip. He's never gone by anything else in his life.

His name has 2 syllables in it: Phil-lip. You can clap it out if you want to. 

However, the world in general is absolutely convinced that his name is 'Phil.' Whenever we meet someone new, here's how the conversation goes:

“Nice to meet you, I'm Phillip."

“You too, Phil.”

Every. Time.

It's like some vast Truman Show-style conspiracy, where everyone seems to be in on it except for us. 

Thinking about getting 500 of these printed.
Too much?

But we've lived in far too many places for them all to be conspiring against us together: Minnesota, Utah, Ohio, and now here in New England.

Everywhere, he gets called 'Phil.' Even the emcee at our wedding reception called him Phil (and now that I'm thinking about it, I'm wondering why we paid that guy full price. I mean, shouldn't there be at least a discount for calling the groom by the wrong name?)

Now, I have nothing against the name Phil. In fact, I've known several Phils in my life and they've all been nice guys. 

It's just not Phillip's name.

We've moved around a fair amount in our married life, but we plan to stay put here in New England. We're putting down roots.

Which is why I was so concerned when Phillip came home from his first day at his new job here and casually mentioned that the plaque on his office door read "Phil Evans."

"You have to get that changed!" I cried. "Right now, before all your co-workers think you go by Phil and that becomes your name for the next 40 years! It might already be too late!"

(You can see that I take this somewhat more seriously than he does.)

So off he went to Human Resources and asked for a new plaque that said "Phillip Evans." 

The next morning, he showed up at work to find that they'd gone overboard and put this up on his door instead:

Not the real thing, just an artistic representation. Phillip's company has a strict no-pictures-at-work policy because of the government contracts they work on.

So thanks to me, he's not 'Phil' at work anymore. He's now the snobby guy who has to have his educational title and middle initial listed with his full name at all times.

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Why I Make My Kids Go to Church

If you visit the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for a Sunday service, the first thing you'll probably notice is the mid-level roar of all the child noise going on in the pews.

Children and families are a central part of our beliefs, which you can see (and especially hear) on Sundays at church. We don't have the kids leave for a separate "children's sermon" or spend the hour playing in a nursery. We all sit as families in church, together.

Some days I don't hear much of what's said or I join the unofficial "parents' club" in the foyer because my kids are being rowdy, but I'd never dream of not attending church as a family.

I take my kids to church because out of all the things I want them to know, this is the most important. It's okay if you disagree, but I think it has the greatest potential for lasting happiness of anything I could teach them.

More and more, studies are showing that young families are disappearing from American churches at large, and that children and teens aren't participating in religious life.

Most perplexing of all to me, I've heard parents say that they don't want to "make" their kids attend church or "force" their beliefs on them.

When I hear those arguments, I think, but isn't that part of my job as a parent?

I "force" beliefs on my kids all the time when I think something is truly important: you need to go to school, you need to wear a seat belt, you need to help out with household chores, you need to get immunizations, you need to brush your teeth.

If my kids were capable of always choosing what was best for them, it'd be one thing. But they're kids — especially when they're little, they choose what's fun and immediately rewarding.

Not necessarily what's best in the long run, and that's where Mom and Dad (the old killjoys) come in, making them eat their vegetables and do their homework and go to bed at a decent hour. And, in our house, get up and dressed for church on Sunday morning.

I understand not wanting to brainwash a child, but I worry that in the name of letting their kids choose, well-intentioned parents out there are really giving their kids no choice at all. 

Taking my daughter to a restaurant and saying, "You can order whatever you want" without giving her any clue as to what's on the menu, or even whether we're in a steakhouse or a Chinese buffet, isn't giving her very much of a choice.

Flying my family to Europe and saying to my son as the plane lands, "The choice is yours — what are we doing on this trip?" isn't going to work out. If he wants to choose what to see, he first needs to know what there is to see. And even then, he'll need a parent to help him work out all the logistics. He simply doesn't have the life experience to do what I'd be asking him to do.

If kids could hardly be expected to order dinner or plan a trip all on their own, how are they supposed to develop a worldview from scratch without parental guidance?

Parents have a moral obligation to teach their children whatever belief system they think is right. Of course kids can tweak the framework they're given as they get older according to their emerging values (I ended up in a different church than my parents,) but they need to start with something.

Years ago, I wrote an article called "Entertaining Young Children at Church" for an online magazine. I received a comment from one person who said that when a little kid doesn't like church, the parents shouldn't push him but just take turns staying home with him until he's older.

Well, aside from the fact that I'd much rather be at church than home watching Calliou every other Sunday, I thought that comment was pretty short-sighted.

Sure, I could do that.

I could also let my kids who dislike brushing their teeth wait until they're older, but it's not like the habit will get easier to establish later on, and I think it's too important to wait, anyway. So I'll enforce it now, even on days when they don't particularly want to do it.

Maybe my younger kids would rather stay home playing than attend church, but that doesn't mean they should. The benefit of church isn't in just the one church service, but in the entire pattern of gospel learning and living that it's a part of.

They won't see that until they're older, and I'm alright with that. While they're still young, part of my job is to supply them with the long-term vision they aren't quite mature enough to grasp yet. 

One day, they'll have the maturity and life experience they were lacking when I made so many of their daily decisions for them, including whether to go to church.

When that day comes, I hope they continue to choose the path I've set them on, but sure enough they'll choose for themselves. And I won't regret for one minute the years I spent "making" them come to church with me.

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7 Quick Takes about Super Vegetables, Potluck Futility, and Dams that Beavers Didn't Build

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday!

—1—

As a result of Phillip's latest unusual food experiments, I can now say that I've eaten cheesy breadsticks made out of... cauliflower.

I guess during the good old Atkins days, tons of recipes substituted cauliflower in carb-heavy dishes, so maybe it's not news to anyone but me that you can do that. 

Regardless, I can't help being impressed at a vegetable that can be a side dish, a bowl of rice, a pizza crust, a chocolate cake, or mac and cheese. I hear it can also power your house, walk your dog, and solve global poverty.

—2—

My 3-year-old brought this drawing out of her Sunday school class at church:

I asked what the green circle was, and she said, "A deep, deep hole."

"So... it says 'Jesus will help me a deep, deep hole'?"

"Yes. With a ladder in it."

Alrighty then.

(I later learned that her teacher told a story about someone who fell in a hole and was helped out with a ladder, so it turns out that my daughter isn't completely insane.)

—3—

A couple of times a year, we have a potluck lunch after church on Sunday (after 3 hours of church, you'd better bet I deserve some free dessert!)

As always, I look forward to the food and the chance to socialize. But I don't know why I do that, because what really happens is:

• It takes 20 minutes to make sure each child gets through the line and gets food on their plate
• They decide they don't like any of it and just eat bread
• I don't eat anything OR talk to anyone because I'm cleaning up spilled water, feeding the baby, and fetching napkins and spoons the entire time

Then we forget the crockpot lid at the church and go home, where everyone announces that they're hungry.

—4—

So I don't mean for 7 Quick Takes to turn into The Weather Channel, but there was another snowstorm this week. The governor called a state of emergency again and the kids' schools were canceled again... this is starting to get ridiculous.

There must be someone in my town who is making God really mad, because every time we look at AccuWeather we see our house surrounded by the worst-colored circle.

It's either me or my neighbors, but somebody's on Mother Nature's bad side.

—5—

Meanwhile, in the driveway...

We ended up getting another 12" on Monday. Which isn't a big deal after Winter Storm Juno a few weeks ago, but it had the added bonus of... ice dams!

An ice dam happens when snow on the roof melts, trickles down to the eaves, and refreezes into an impassable chunk of ice that traps all the melting water. With nowhere else to go, it leaks onto your bathroom ceiling:

Two huge water stains. It's like tie dye! Groovy!

Phillip spent the day on the roof with a ladder clearing snow and removing ice dams.

Phillip is thrilled to have me taking his picture right now, I assure you.

—6—

How do you remove an ice dam, you ask? Well, you fill pantyhose with ice melt and put them on the roof to melt channels in the ice for the water.


There are some times when I'd really like to read the mind of the cashier at CVS when he scans your purchase. Because Phillip isn't really a guy who looks like he has an urgent need for 10 pairs of pantyhose.

  —7—

I'm not all that fashion-conscious, which was pretty clear when my son's speech therapist came over and was showing him pictures of objects that he had to name. 

When she reached the card with the picture of a hairdryer, he had no idea what it was. He looked at it for a long time and then guessed, "Sewing machine?"

I guess that doesn't speak well of my mad seamstress skills, either.

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