::Sicky::

As you know, poor little Max has been sick for the last few days. He's started to feel better on saturday and sunday, but now seems to have had some sort of relapse. It's sad! He hasn't been this sick for a while.
I have mixed feelings about him being sick. Of course I don't want him to feel ill and terrible and to be hurt, but man when he's sick with a fever or something he is SO snuggly. I love that he just lets me hang onto him. It's pretty relaxing. Well, it would be if he wasn't so hot that he burned my lap after sitting on it for 10 minutes.
The first day he was sick, thursday, he was like that. Just really cuddly, tired and sweet. He even said he needed his bed in the afternoon and went straight to sleep when I put him in it.
You may remember this picture from a few days ago. I'm putting it back up here because I think it's so adorable.

Poor little cute snoozer. The best part about this picture is that you can't smell him. OK, that was probably too much information, but it's true, he was a little stinky.
Here he is thursday morning, resting in his chair.

Here he is taking a much protested "nap" on his bed.

yes, he's on his bed, AND in a tent. That's another story for another day.
Anyway, when we got sick when we were little my mom would often make "sick eggs" for us to eat. Ok, it sounds gross now that I'm writing the name down, but it's supposed to mean eggs for when you're sick, not gross eggs.
They consisted of a couple of warm hard boiled eggs sliced up with a little bit of butter and salt and pepper mixed in. To a sick little one it was like heaven.
So I made Max some sick eggs. He appreciated them quite a bit. He was an instant fan.

Have somebody you love make these for you the next time you're sick. I tell you, they're like magic.
So Friday morning we thought he was doing better, although he still wasn't 100% himself by any means.
Max was lying on the couch when Kris left for school. About two minutes after Kris walked out of the door he puked all over everything. Nice timing, huh?
So he earned himself a bath, which took care of the stinkiness I alluded to earlier.
After that he thought he was back to normal, but when I came into the room and found him lying on the floor on top of his sock monkey blanket I knew better.

Here he is trying to pretend he's not the palest thing that ever walked the face of the earth. He didn't fool me. Notice the towel on the couch, strategically placed to catch anything nasty. The couch cushions had to spend some time airing out...yick.

After the cute sweet snuggly sick stage comes the horrible cranky cranky whiny sick stage. This is where he thinks he's well enough to do stuff, but everything he does either hurts him or makes him mad and frustrated. This stage makes up for all the pleasantness in the first stage and is what keeps me from wishing he was sick more often!
Here are some examples of this from sunday:





See what I mean? It's no fun for anybody. This was even after he'd taken a nap.
Today we thought he was feeling better and so he went to school, but when I went to pick him up he was all warm and feverish and looking smushed. So he's doing a little bit more recuperation. Wish us luck getting him better. I know we can do it.
We'll have more happy photos to post here before you know it.

.:.:Strange:.:.

Look at what I was handed this morning when I walked into my first church meeting.

Do you see what I see there?
Why yes, it IS my brother looking out at me from this flyer. Sorry but that is so weird. I almost didn't look at it after I got it, and was about to put it into my bag when I somehow spied Cammon grinning at me from it.
Maybe my inattention can be blamed on the fact that I had to get up today at 5:30 to make it to a ward council meeting. And do keep in mind that with daylight savings that was actually more like 4:30!!
Just in case there's somebody out there that can't pick him out:

Has anybody else gotten this? Does Cammon have any idea he's being handed out all over the country--oh wait maybe all over the world?

I personally think it would've been better like this:

But nobody asked me. Unfortunately.

Mom, you're good to say I'm good!

Mom, you’re good to say I’m good!
Ever since I can remember my dad has always been keen to correct my mom’s unfortunate “Utah” grammar. Well, today I was doing a little reading on the internet and stumbled across some information my mom could have used a long time ago.
According to Grammar Girl at grammar.quickanddirtytips.com it is perfectly acceptable respond “I’m good,” to the question “how are you?” In fact, it might be more appropriate to say “I’m good” rather than “I’m well.”
Since you’re not likely to want to read the whole article I’ll give you the gist of it right here. The classic argument goes: well is an adverb, while good is an adjective. Adverbs modify verbs and adjectives modify nouns. Since am (to be) is a verb it would seem that it must be modified with an adverb and could not be correctly modified with an adjective.

Grammar Girl points out that there are different kinds of verbs: action verbs and linking verbs. Action verbs are words like run, jump, walk, talk, etc. Adverbs modify these verbs. Here’s an example: Sultan runs well, or Max jumps well. Linking verbs on the other hand, are used to link other words together. Examples of these are seem, to be, look, etc.
The difficult part is that some verbs can be both action verbs and linking verbs. Grammer Girl uses the example of feel. In the sentence He feels bad, feel is acting as a linking verb. (she says that you can replace the verb with to be you can see if it’s a linking verb) In the sentence He feels badly, feel is acting as a action verb.

Now here’s the kicker. Adjectives are commonly and correctly used after linking verbs. In such a case the adjective is referred to as a predicate adjective which refers back to the noun before the linking verb. In the sentence He feels bad, bad is the predicate adjective referring back to describe He.

Using this information on grammar we can see that it is grammatically correct to say “I am good.”

Another confusing point is that well can be both an adverb and a predicate adjective. Grammar Girl says that historically, well is used as a predicate adjective to refer to one’s health. For example if you’re asking about how Max is--he’s been sick for the past few days--it would be appropriate to say “he is well” Conversely, it wouldn’t be as appropriate for me to say “he is good” in this instance.

The lesson I take from this is that when referring to health, well is most appropriate and when referring to general state of being the best choice would actually be good. So Mom, all I can say is that next time someone give you a hard time for saying "I’m good", tell them that Grammar Girl has your back--at all times.

And yes, Max has been quite ill. We hope that he gets WELL soon.

::Friends?::

In this picture they certainly look like friends, don't they?
In reality between boy and dog there's a pretty healthy case of what I like to call sibling rivalry.
Max will sometimes get upset if Sultan comes in his room when we're reading bedtime stories.
He's also had a really hard time forgetting the few times that Sultan has "borrowed" some of his food, like the last time he put his cheeseburger down. That hasn't gone over well.
Max likes to boss Sultan. In fact he loves to boss Sultan. He issues commands, sometimes in german or russian as well as english. But no matter the language it does no good. Sultan completely ignores him. Basically that's how Sultan deals with Max. The few times Max actually tries to play with Sultan he's ignored (probably because he "plays" by bopping Sultan with stuff, and annoying him as much as possible)
I did get Max to help me brush Sultan the other day, but it took some work to get him to be gentle. It's really funny. I don't know why they're that way with each other. I really expect them to like each other.
I'm thinking that when Max gets a little older their relationship will change. I guess we'll see.
It was funny last night, Sultan went on a ride in the car with us. When we got home instead of running up to the porch as he's been trained he took off down the street and Kris had to go get him. Max was very upset, and took a lot of relish in commanding Sultan to go into the basement for "time out." He told me later it was bad Sultan ran away because he could get lost. I'm just glad he remembers one thing I've told him.
He probably only remembers that because on Sunday after sacrament meeting and unbeknownst to me went up to the stand to do something mischievous. As a result of this I was running around the church for about 10 minutes trying to find him and of course ultimately ended up freaking out. I had all the ladies in the ward looking for him.
I was very glad to find him, but rather ANNOYED to have been put in that situation--and of course embarrassed that I had told everyone about it.
Oh well. So anyway, do you think that Max and Sultan will ever be friends?

.:.:Tennis:.:.

I've been swamped with work and school and so haven't gotten to post as often or as much as I'd like. Sad yes, but oh well.
This is important though, so I made time for it.
Max got tennis lessons for his birthday from Kris's parents. He LOVES them. He was so excited the first week of the lessons that he could hardly stand it. The court is indoor and it's set up so that parents can sit outside in a hall area and watch what's going on through some windows. It's so funny to watch the little kids in the class. The class is for 3 and 4 yr olds I think. I'll have to take some video next time to post because it's pretty much impossible to describe in words how funny it is to watch a little kid try to hit a big tennis ball of a tee, but miss it and spin himself around instead.

Max is doing really well in class. He seems to follow directions pretty well, he can throw the ball and sometimes even catch.

I think though, that the best thing he's bringing to the table is his enthusiasm. He can hardly hold it in. He's leaping and jumping in joy all over the court.
Who would've thought the guy would like tennis? It's so funny.

I think I'll try to get him into some other sports this summer. It would be funny if he ended up being a sporty kind of guy since neither Kris nor I ever were, but it would be great!

Here he is with his teacher. What a patient lady to teach a bunch of squirrely kids how to play tennis!
Kris and I are taking a class right now as well--beginning adult tennis, and it's surprisingly difficult! There are all sort of crazy hand positions and stuff like that to learn. We're enjoying it. Hopefully we can get to the point that we can play with each other a bit. And if Max could play that would only make it more fun!
We're proud of him--what a big boy!

::Calamari or Katamari??::

Here's Max eating a piece of Calamari at a restaurant this evening. I think maybe he only ate it because he thought it was Katamari.
Later when Kris and I were talking about how Calamari was spelled Max insisted that I was saying it wrong and it was KATamari.
I'm just surprised he ate it at all.

.:.:A Nest or Something:.:.

We got Sultan a bed at costco. Somehow he actually likes it.

::Wimpy::

Have you ever cried at the dentist? Well I never had....until yesterday. I have a tooth that could use a crown--I don't say that it needs a crown because it's the kind of tooth that will need a crown someday, but not necessarily right now. But Kris has a desperate need to get some crowns done now or he won't graduate. So I'm getting a crown.
There aren't many times I've cried in public. Besides like during sad movies and stuff of course. The two times I can think of are once at work--back when I worked at Summerhays Music--my boss tried to make me stay really late at work. I blame that crying on being young--and the commute from Orem to SLC.
The other time was when I was working with a personal trainer at the gym. It was leg day and he was making me use this terrible machine. He tried to kill me. Then I cried.
But I had never cried at the dentist. Until yesterday. When Kris poked me in the mouth with a bunch of needles.
It was kind of like when a kid falls down and hurts himself, he's pretty much ok until he finds his mom or dad. Then he's a crying mess, right? Or like when you have a terrible day at work, you're ok until you get home to somebody who's sympathetic, then you fall apart.
The problem was, my sympathetic person was there sticking me with needles. So I couldn't hold it in. I felt bad, because I didn't want Kris to think he was doing a bad job, or to think he was torturing me more than was necessary.
So it was just a couple of tears. But boy did I feel wimpy after that.
Kris did a good job. It was a long appointment, and there's more to come before we're done, but I was really impressed with him. His "chairside manner" is really good and I felt confident in his skills. And if I feel confident, knowing everything that goes on in that clinic, everyone else should too!
Besides, it's silly but it was nice to spend some time together. And I liked looking at his pretty green eyes while he was working on me.
I'm proud of him. It's still going to be quite the trick to get all his requirements done in time for graduation, but he's going to do it--I know he will!
And I'll have a nice big gold crown to show for it. Yipee. I'm going to try not to cry in the chair anymore. Wish me luck.

.:.:If Only:.:.

I was working on this picture tonight and it made me wish for the warm air and sunlight of summer.
I know it's coming--it's on it's way. And when it is the middle of summer I start wishing for the cold. I guess I'm just never satisfied. But tonight I'm nostalgic for warmth and sun.
Anybody else?