Fellowwarts

The big event for this week (for me, at least), was the annual fall retreat for Writing Fellows up at Timp Lodge last night--an event that the office staff and I, in a fit of hyper creativity, decided to set in a Harry Potter theme (thus our secretary dubbed it "Fellowwarts School of Tutors and Tutory." Or something like that). Beth Hedengren, the former coordinator, was gracious enough to come back as our keynote speaker. I was reminded as she spoke that I have some pretty big shoes to fill--I don't think I'm nearly as charitable in my teaching (yet) as she was!

Anyway, I spent much of the week leading up to the retreat working on my workshop for the retreat and assembling various food items, etc., for the dinner and other activities. I had forgotten how stressful it can be to be in charge of something so big--not only were we planning on around 60+ people for dinner, simply getting everything together wasn't enough. As the coordinator, I also had to make sure we stayed on schedule, introduce new activities, move things along, etc. Although the evening was a lot of fun, I found myself fairly relieved as I drove back down Provo canyon after the evening was over. It was the first time I'd felt truly relaxed in several days.

Because the evening had a Halloween/Harry Potter theme to it, I got to truly appreciate the creativity of the students I work with. One enterprising couple came as Governor Sarah Palin and Senator John McCain (and she, at least, looked rather like Palin). Another student--who won the award for "scariest" costume--came as the economy, with a relatively simple graph on his chest showing the downward trend of recent months. Another girl, in the spirit of the evening, came as Hermoine Granger and spent at least the first part of the evening in character, down to the British accent and everything. One of my Honors 300 students (that's the class I teach) came with her fiance. Although she didn't appear to be in costume, I think she must have been, since her intended had dark circles around his eyes, unnatural pale skin that glittered, and she introduced him by saying he was "Edward." (Jeni, I thought of you when she said this!). So I presume she was Bella, from Stephanie Meyers' Twighlight series.

But what still has me puzzling, is the fact that one of the costume awards given out for the evening (I put some of the students in charge of the prizes, so I had no idea this was coming) was given for the "best Rosalyn look-alike." My TA for the Honors 300 course won this, by donning a short curly wig, a courdoroy jacket and scarf, and affixing a Penn State logo to his coat and carrying around a dictionary whose jacket cover read "My Dissertation." I'm still not sure how I feel about this! (I'm not used to being important enough to be parodied). What is still more curious: he wasn't the only one dressed as me. Another of the Writing Fellows finally came up to me as the evening was nearing its close to ask: "Have you figured out who I am yet?" Honestly, I had no idea she was even in costume--she was wearing a pretty peasant blouse and a long brown skirt, much like something I would wear. (And that, I think, was the point). She finally had to tell me she was supposed to be *me.* I suppose imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but I was still (and still am) disconcerted!

Other big events of the week: Dan and I both took the van driving course at BYU so that we can be licensed to drive an 8 passenger van down to Vegas later this month. And let me tell you, it was exciting. We took the classes at different times, so I can't speak for Dan's class, but the most exciting part of my class was the big box of gingerbread cookies that our instructor "borrowed" from the office next door (and the secretary had to come back and fetch them because apparently other staff members were upset that the cookies had disappeared). We learned all sorts of useful things, like the fact that you really should wear your seat belt--apparently, just being a good driver or being afraid of wrinkling your clothes are not good excuses not to buckle up. (To be fair, there were a few useful pointers.) Anyway, now we both have licenses that are good for four years.

Saturday morning my siblings (well, except Justin, who lives too far away) and I gathered at our house to celebrate my dad's birthday. We had a pizza lunch with brownies for desert and then the kids presented my dad with presents. The best presents were from Jared's kids, who had scoured the dollar store to find them. My dad got a 60 piece Mickey Mouse puzzle from Joshua (this for a man who used to do 1000+ piece puzzles in short order) and a marshmallow ant farm (which looked disgusting) that the kids begged to try. Andrew was the only one who liked them; the other kids all spit their pieces out. And none of the adults would try them (they really did look gross).

The birthday party came on the heals of Andrew's first swim lesson--a lesson I made the mistake of mentioning to him on Friday; he subsequently brought it up every 20 or 30 minutes for the rest of the day. (We went to campus to get Dan and Andrew said, "We need to go get Daddy so that I can be ready for my school. For my swim lesson.") Anyway, he loved it (even if he was in the "baby" class--he didn't qualify for the next class up because he's not 3 yet, but Dan said he was the oldest by about a year in his class). Dan says he thinks Andrew has a crush on his instructor, since his favorite thing to do was splash her.


We thought we'd bring back my favorite Sunday activity: taking pictures of my baby in her Sunday clothes. Here she is in one of her newest outfits (the apple line from Gymboree that Bubby is using as the basis for our forthcoming family pictures). I have to say I think she looks much better in bright colors than in the pastels that are typical for newborn girls. We're still not sure what color her eyes are, other than dark.


Here's Andrew in his plastic pith helmet. The boy has a fascination with safaris (courtesy, I think, of the Little Einsteins). The other day, he told me, "Mommy, I'm going to miss you!" Curious--because we were heading home and I wasn't in any imminent danger of leaving him--I asked why. "I'm going to miss you guys when I go on safari to Africa." And again just a couple days ago, Andrew asked me when he was going on safari. I had to explain to him that he would have to be considerably older before he could go, but that hasn't noticeably dampened his enthusiasm for going on safari.