Hodge Podge of Craziness

I have been contemplating a variety of different posts in the last few weeks and I have not been able to settle on any of them. You think it'd be easy to just make several little short posts here and there but maybe I'm just too lazy because I never blogged about any of them. So I've decided to just blog today about all the different things that I've been thinking about.

I guess the first thing that is always on my mind is Nathan. He will be 11 months old on Sunday and so I've started thinking about his birthday. I would like to buy him some new toys. He has been so patient with me, playing with the same old toys for pretty much his entire first year of life. I haven't bought him a new toy in a long time. Most of his toys are appropriate for 3 to 6 month-olds so I'd like to get him at least a couple things that are more at his level. It's weird because I had this idea that he would be drowning in all the toys that he would get from us and other people so I have purposely kind of always been on guard for impulse toy buying. As a result, he has an alarmingly small collection of things to occupy his attention every day. I don't think I'll be able to afford too much, though, as his main birthday present will be a toddler car seat. While this isn't exactly the gift I think he really wants...he's 1, so he won't remember anyway. In other news he is cutting four teeth right now, all in the front on the top gum. He has been drooling quite a bit but isn't ridiculously fussy all things considered. Then again, he's always been pretty mild mannered.

The other day I was in his closet and I found a bag of clothes he had gotten for Christmas last year from my grandmother. The clothes consisted of a few outfits that had belonged to my father when he was a baby. I think it is cool to have the clothes, although I am too nervous to actually use them as every day clothing because they are so old and fragile. In fact, one of the buttons snapped in half just because I touched it. It was on this white shirt. Anyway, I wanted to at least get some pictures of Nate in the clothes but I've been waiting for them to fit. They finally do, so I took him out front and took his picture in a couple outfits.

Last week we also bought tickets for a trip to Ohio. I prayed a long time about going to Ohio for Christmas and finally received the answer that I was supposed to be in Utah for Christmas. It was not an easy answer to accept, but I feel it is the right thing. I hope after the holidays are over I will be able to understand more about this answer because right now it's looking pretty hazy. So far all I know beyond the Lord wanting me and Nathan to be here is that David will be working both Christmas Eve and Christmas day from 8am-6pm. Being alone on those days is probably the most depressing thing I can think of. However, the upside is that while David may hate having to work those days, at least his family will be here when he gets home. I'd hate to think how depressing it'd be for him if he had to come home to an empty house. I'm annoyed at the company, though, because I was under the impression he'd have all major holidays off. Guess that doesn't apply at the airport. Bah Humbug. Anyway, after getting my answers about needing to spend the holidays here with David, I started praying about another time I could go to see my family since this is the only time of year I really do get to see them. There was a lot of praying involved in my next decision to visit for Thanksgiving, but this time the Lord gave a different answer. Everything has worked out so that I can take an extended trip with Nathan to see my family in Ohio, and maybe even to see Andy and Heather in Nashville. Work gave me the OK to work from Ohio for a month and I figured out a way to get a second phone line into my grandmother's house without it costing me an arm and a leg. I am very excited to spend those four weeks relaxing and hanging out with my family, and hopefully David will also get to come out for a part of that time and spend Thanksgiving with us. I'm keeping my fingers crossed at this point.

Some other things I was thinking about blogging about recently are some stories I've been reading about in the news. The first story that I came across was about some high school senior girls who were denied entrance to their homecoming dance because the administrators thought their dresses were inappropriate. The video I watched showed the girls in the dresses and also interviewed a few of them and their parents. There were several things that caught my attention about this story. First of all, I am a fairly conservative person. I have strong opinions about modesty that stem a lot from my religious beliefs, and from that perspective, my first thought was to applaud the administrators for taking a stand on what was bound to become a controversial decision. The dresses these girls were wearing were, in my opinion, too short and too revealing. Hearing the prices on some of these dresses made me even more shocked considering the lack of material needed to make them. The girl that was featured on the news story had a dress that reminded me of Tinkerbell. I think that having modesty standards at public school functions is comendable, and had the school been clear and consistant with these standards, I would still be standing by them today in their decision. Unfortunately this was not the case.

According to the story, the school's flyers about the dance did say that attire was to be "modest" but stopped short of explaining the modesty standards they were expecting. Who knows why they wouldn't be clear on this (don't want to upset the kids? Afraid of looking too picky?) but by not clarifying what they meant, they are leaving the kids and their parents' opinions of modesty to be the judges. One father interviewed was upset by what happened because he felt the school was questioning his judgement when it came to his daughter. Unfortunately, there are girls and yes, even parents, who think wearing these Britney Spears-hoochie type outfits is appropriate and acceptable at a public school dance. If the administrators didn't want that, they needed to be clear on their standards long before the night of the dance.

The other thing that made the school look bad is that pictures were taken inside the dance showing even worse dresses that were allowed inside. One picture even showed a girl wearing the exact same Tinkerbell dress that the featured girl was wearing. I'm sorry, but if you're going to turn girls away at the door, there needs to be consistancy. If you or another administrator lets one girl in with a short dress, you have to be fair and let them all in, even if you don't agree with that decision. In the end, I don't blame the administrators for turning the girls away, because I do believe their dresses were inappropriate, however, because the school was not clear from the beginning about these standards, they made a poor decision by not allowing these girls to go to their dance. They were seniors, which means this was their last homecoming, and they may have poor taste in clothing, but they should have been allowed their last chance. The school should have taken that opportunity to learn and improve for next year instead of punishing these girls for being ignorant.

There was another story but I don't remember it right now. If I think if it I will blog later.