I worked so hard for that title

Well, one day I'll post some pictures of our happenings, but at least I am back on the blog. Here is a clever political ad from California. It's by a Hollywood director who now regrets having supported Senator Barbara Boxer. I don't know much about her, although what I do know isn't necessarily good. Actually though, the overall message is what I like most about the video. Get over the titles! To quote Brett's grandpa (or great-grandpa), "You're just as good as everyone else, but not one bit better!"

Call Me Senator from RightChange on Vimeo.

P.S. Thanks for all the great feedback on the hair question. I am not sure I am brave enough to try it, but I would be lying if I said it didn't intrigue me.

No Product Hair Washing?

Has anyone read about and / or attempted to ditch all their hair products and just rinse with hot water, thoroughly massage the scalp and brush with a boar bristle brush to maintain healthy hair? I am all about going back in time to find some kernels of wisdom we've lost with our mad cultural rush to make everything better. We are now discovering that a lot of the chemicals, treatments, etc. that our ever experimental culture told us would make us healthier, cleaner, better are actually quite harmful in the long-term either to ourselves or our environment at large. I am sure many hair products could fall into that category.

So, when I read an article on Yahoo today about middle-aged women having long hair that just happened to briefly mention the no-product hair maintenance method, I had to google a little further. I have read snippets here and there about such a phenomenon, but have not attempted it. I don't particularly like having greasy, dirty hair. However, it seems there is some good, at least anecdotal, evidence that would suggest it might be something worth trying, if you can stand to have about a 6 week period of greasy hair while your scalp's oils readjust.

What you do y'all think of this? Is it worth a try? It sure sounds natural, safe and cheap.

Gotta Love C.S. Lewis

I have totally fallen of the blogging wagon. I just read this quote out of Mere Christianity and it is worth sharing. Maybe actually logging into blogger and putting a post out there will help motivate me to finish blogging about the rest of our summer, and well, some of fall since we are well into that season now too. Anyway, on to C.S. Lewis. He has made some profound observations, that man:

"No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness. They have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because he was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means--the only complete realist." (CS Lewis, Mere Christianity, Chapter 11.)

Heaven, I Mean Island Park

Warning: Travelogue! I don't even know how to make this remotely entertaining, just doing it for recording purposes, so feel free to scroll to the pictures. You probably do anyway. I know I often do if I don't have much time to read.

Boy, I love Island Park! I had never been there until I met Brett, but we have had many a wonderful vacation there. This was a quick trip, but, as always, a good one. We visited Quake Lake, which was rather cold and windy, but beautiful. We then attempted to stop at a picnic table off the side of the road for lunch but the bugs were rampant, or was it the rain? I can't remember, but our outing for that day was cut a little short. The next day, we had to take a trip through Yellowstone. It's only about an hour's drive from the cabin and then saw "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" that night at the Playmill. The next day was spent hanging out around the cabin until Brett, the kids and I had to pack up and head back because Brett had a plane to catch that night. Dang work anyway!

Quake Lake on a cold, windy day. I think we spent about 5 minutes here. We're getting to be wimps getting used to the heat of Arizona.


We spent a great day in Yellowstone, minus all the traffic. We didn't get to stop at nearly as much as we wanted to, but as evidenced by Adie's sleeping picture, we still managed to do enough to wear the kids out.

This is an awesome wood swing hung between two trees in front of the cabin. Adie had it made swinging with her cousin, Amberlee, surrounded by wild flowers.

The Birthday Con't

Well, I continue to struggle documenting mine and my family's lives. It's always been a weakness of mine. Pretty much every journal entry I have ever written begins with an apology that I haven't been keeping up-to-date. It seems our blog is turning into that too. No excuses. I just get bored with the idea of blogging sometimes.

Anyway, to pick up where we left off, which was two months ago already, we celebrated Brett's birthday and the 4th of July a day early with the rest of the Mormondom. However, we did save Brett's present-opening for his actual birthday. This man is difficult to buy for, but if has something to do with BYU, it's usually a pretty good bet, so the kids and I made a trip to the BYU bookstore a week earlier to get some goods.

A new BYU hat - I have never seen Brett wear any other type of hat. He gets a new one just about every year, so he's getting quite the collection these days.

The obnoxious BYU tie - I was going for something a little more muted, but Adie wanted to pick it out and this is the one she liked best. I think Brett likes it too (or, at least, pretends to).

After church, we headed up to beautiful Island Park to spend time at Brett's family's cabin. I wish there were a feasible way to live in Island Park, or a place like unto it. There just don't seem to be a lot of job opportunities for engineers within any sort of reasonable distance :( Oh well, we make the best of it by visiting whenever we can (which isn't so often anymore considering the distance).

Chilling at the cabin

Nothing says we're at a cabin like wearing 'coon skin hats.

Independence Day

We had a busy 4th of July weekend (doesn't pretty much everyone?). We started it off by going to my family's annual 4th of July breakfast. We hadn't been for many years and it was so nice to see some of my Savage side again. We only got one pic of the event though (lame). Then we strapped the kids in the car and drove up to Idaho. Nothing like getting back in the car for another long car ride. Actually, the kids have been subjected to so much travel they are really great travelers now and we don't even own a portable DVD player!

We spent the evening of the 3rd with Brett's family, catching up with his cousins and their kids. We had a great dinner in the backyard. How I long to have a spot of land like the one Brett grew up on. Brett's mom also made him a birthday cake so we could celebrate a day early when so much of the family was around. It was so great to see everyone. Even Brett's cousin who had had a baby only a few days before came with her kids. I love Brett's family and we had so much fun enjoying a beautiful Idaho evening before heading off to watch the fireworks in Idaho Falls.

Here is Chase playing ball with some of his Savage second cousins. These boys were awesome. They had so much fun playing with him and Chase loves being around other boys. They had a blast.

Ok, I am now officially a fan of the collage (I eat all my former words / thoughts about them). There were too many great photos to make you scroll through, but here's a smattering of our fun 4th (3rd) of July dinner with Brett's family.

And, here's the old man himself, blowing out 28 birthday candles.

Grandpa Time

These kids love their grandparents and we tried to fit in as much time with them as we could. We went with my dad one morning to a local park. How nice it was that the temperature is cool enough in Utah at 10 am, even in the summer, that we could spend some time there.