suziebeezieland

candace loses her phone for the 5th time, perry smiles for the 1st time since season 2, rare tangerine orangutans, jamie oliver, + other cool stuff

New episodes of Phineas and Ferb! Whoo hoo!

You can't see much of the skyline
It looks like more of a grid
It's a viable variation of view
But something I'm sure we'll be glad that we did

It's not like the world that we see from the ground
I guess the main difference is we're looking down

So climb on our aerial area rug
It's certain to keep us aloft
Its aerodynamics are highly advanced
And its weave is so tight and so soft

Though this vista's diverse
Is it better or worse?
If you ask, I'll just give you a shrug
But you can vary your view of the area
From our aerial area rug

It's a brand new perspective
Literally
We can see the tops of buildings
Come along with me

You can vary your view of the area
From our aerial area rug
You can vary your view of the area
From our aerial area rug

yowayowa camera woman diary

Do you know about the Yowayowa Camera Woman Diary? I learned about it in a feature on Yahoo News.

Photographer Natsumi Hayashi, who is very beautiful and very ethereal-looking, blogs a photo each day that looks like she is levitating somewhere in Tokyo. 

She's not! She's jumping, and sometimes she has to jump more than 300 times a day to get the perfect shot.

But it looks so real. :)

victoria, british columbia 2011:beacon hill children's farm + the royal bc museum

The Inner Harbour in Victoria was all pretty with colorful flags on Friday, June 17, because the Van Isle 360 International Yacht Race was in town.

This happens every two years, and is a 580 nautical mile point-to-point race which circumnavigates Vancouver Island. 

Pretty interesting, eh? :)  

But we didn't see it. We were off to explore nearby Beacon Hill Park.

I'm telling you, these Canada Geese were unflappable. I walked right up to them, and they glanced at me very nonchalantly, as if to say, "Lady, we have waited a long time for a sunny day up here, and we ain't movin'."

(Although these geese look somewhat too elegant to say "ain't." They probably said, "We are not inclined to go elsewhere, madame.")

I wonder if these are the same Canada Geese who spend a big chunk of the winter down here in Lacy Park. I love these geese. 

I was sorry to disappoint these ducks, who started swimming straight toward me in hopes of delicious snack items. Look at the anxious wakes behind them. I'm sorry, guys. Next time I'll bring bread.

There was a long dispute relating to Beacon Hill Park that you can read about here if you like long disputes.

Basically, the Hudson's Bay Company claimed it (and other land) for awhile in the mid-1800s, and then the Company had to give it to Her Majesty. When Vancouver Island was becoming a colony, there was a Legislative Assembly that ran things on behalf of Her Majesty, but then the colony disbanded and Vancouver Island became part of British Columbia, and a Legislative Council ran some things, while the Municipal Corporation of Victoria ran others. And they fought with each other a lot.

Meanwhile, British Columbia was on its way to becoming part of Canada. While things were in the midst of becoming this and that, everybody claimed the park. But finally, it was turned over to the City of Victoria in 1882.

(Note: If you are a student reading this for a report or something, don't quote me or you'll probably get an F. I was a bit fuzzy on some of the who's-in-charge-now details.)

It's so beautiful ... two hundred acres in downtown Victoria. And there is this delightful petting zoo in it, called Beacon Hill Children's Farm.

I don't actually know who Mrs. D. is, but I like her.

There were a LOT of exciting things going on. Just look. 

I'm sorry to say, we missed the goat stampede.

Right off the bat, they try to just kill you with the cuteness of baby pigs. These two piglets are named Fleur and Noir. They were born in January. They will never, ever become bacon, because a spider named Charlotte is going to save them. I just know it.

These alpacas are named Donny and Osmond. The brown one is Donny.

The peacock is a nameless hanger-on.

There was a miniature horse named Peanut Butter who is twenty years old.

(Li'l Sebastian. Hee.)

There was also this sweet baby donkey named Jeneece who really liked having her ears scratched.

And guinea pigs. And bunnies.

And several batches of baby goats.

And a little aviary. It was the greatest little kids' farm, and we all liked it. We were probably there about an hour.

Then we walked on back into town, and the Royal BC Museum.

We looked around for a couple hours, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's full of nature and wonder and mystery.

John Lennon’s 1965 Yellow Submarine Rolls-Royce is sitting in its lobby when you walk in.

It is the same age I am. But I think it's in better condition. :)

victoria, british columbia 2011: the victoria butterfly gardens, the butchart gardens, + fisherman's wharf

On Thursday, we rented a car and drove up to The Butchart Gardens. On the way, we stopped at the Victoria Butterfly Gardens.

The Victoria Butterfly Gardens is a 12,000 square foot enclosure full of 3,000 butterflies. It is fun to buy the butterfly identification chart when you come in, and then misidentify butterflies for about an hour. :) We recognized the Blue Morphos, but that's about it.  

It's really cool, how much is going on inside that space. Very enjoyable.

However, I should warn you in case you care about such things: your hair will get frizzy from the humidity.

This Blue Morpho from South America very obligingly landed on a the bench next to me.

I hope what you notice most about these next two photos is that I have a butterfly on my head. I hope what you notice least about these next two photos is the lovely gray stripe in my hair, and the aforementioned frizziness. Yeesh.

 

Then we drove down the road a bit more to The Butchart Gardens. If Francis Rattenbury's legacy of beautiful buildings in Victoria is testimony to what one man can do to make a big difference somewhere, The Butchart Gardens is testimony to what one woman can do to make a big difference somewhere.

Jennie Butchart's husband made cement, and when he used up all the limestone in the quarry near their home in 1908, Jennie decided to turn the quarry into a sunken garden. 

That big chimney in the background is from an old kiln, and is all that remains of the cement factory.

Jennie didn't just point her finger and tell other people what to do. She worked hard herself. For instance, she hung in a boson's chair to plant ivy in the barren rock walls of the quarry.

I don't think you'd catch me dead hanging off a rock wall in a boson's chair. (Maybe dead.)

Later, Jennie added a Japanese Garden, an Italian Garden, and a Rose Garden to their home. (She got rid of their tennis court to put in the Italian Garden.) By the 1920s, fifty thousand people a year were coming to see Jennie's gardens. 

The Butcharts' grandson, Ian Ross, designed this spectacular fountain and had it installed in this smaller quarry in 1964, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Butchart Gardens.

Nowadays, close to one million people a year visit the Butchart Gardens, which is about the same number of bedding plants used there. Fifty-five acres of the Gardens are available to the public, with even more "off stage". The suggested route (shown with little pink arrows) on the map makes for a very pleasant walk, and we recommend it.

 

I love rose names. :) 

After lunch, we left Butchart Gardens and headed back south to our hotel.

Fisherman's Wharf (which was a short walk from our hotel) is a marina with a bunch of floating cabins around it. If the weather is nice, it's worth a visit to sit outside and eat fish and chips from Barb's, and to feed the harbour seals who come up to the dock looking for handouts. You also have a nice view of float planes taking off and landing, and of cute little water taxis zooming back and forth to the Inner Harbour.

Do you see the red-haired woman sitting in a chair on the balcony? It's a mannequin. Kind of creepy. :) I'm guessing she's to keep the birds away.

Here comes our hungry, pig-nosed friend.

Here's Claire buying six more herring with her own spending money. She would have fed this harbour seal all day if we'd let her.

But we didn't let her, because we needed to get some food of our own. 

victoria, british columbia 2011:the victoria bug zoo + tea at the empress

On Wednesday, we slept in and then headed to the Victoria Bug Zoo.

What is that, you say? You would not head to the bug zoo on vacation, necessarily?

Do not scorn the bug zoo. The bug zoo is awesome.

Here is Mr. B. wearing a millipede moustache.

I politely declined the opportunity to wear a millipede moustache myself, because ... I needed to hold the camera. Yep, that's it. 

The Victoria Bug Zoo guides are biology students and biologists with recent degrees, and are enthusiastic, knowledgeable, funny, great with kids, and remarkably unsqueamish.

The kids can hold many of the bugs if they care to. You have to be 19 or older to hold some of the creatures, such as tarantulas, which are very delicate. If a tarantula is dropped on the ground, he can break his leg, and a tarantula can die from a broken leg.

I was so happy that I'm not yet 19, and therefore did not have to hold a tarantula.

I politely declined holding anything, actually, because I needed both hands for my camera, if you recall. 

After the bug zoo, I think we went back to the hotel and took naps or something. I can't really remember. I know I made everybody wash their hands and upper lips really well.

Then in the afternoon we headed over to the Empress Hotel for Afternoon Tea. Afternoon Tea at the Empress is something else. They've been doing it since 1908. Our waitress told Claire that when Queen Elizabeth has tea at the Empress, she takes two sugars. :)

I like how our waitress used the present tense verb -- "Queen Elizabeth takes two sugars" -- instead of saying "That one time way back when she came here, she took two sugars." That makes Afternoon Tea that much more exciting, because you expect the Queen to just walk through the doors at any minute.

The Duchess of Bedford is credited with inventing the ritual of afternoon tea back in the 1700s, when she would get a "sinking feeling" in the afternoon. Next time you get that afternoon "sinking feeling," you just sit yourself down and ask for somebody to bring you some tiny little cakes and thin little sandwiches and a pot of hot tea. It's all very civilized and restorative. The Empress has its own bakery and makes all its own goodies. They were all delicious. There was real clotted cream, which I piled up so high on my scone that it toppled over. Thank goodness the Queen had not just walked through the door to see such greediness.

I apologize for the lack of a good buffer photo between bugs and tea. We find that the best family vacations involve an odd mixture of activities that cater to all of our individual interests. :) 

There was a fancy mom and two fancy daughters at a table next to us, and they wanted to know what we had done that morning. They were surrounded by shopping bags and they smelled like perfume and lived in a gated community in Texas and had traveled hither and yon quite extensively to escape the scorching summer heat, but Claire just very cheerfully told them all about the bug zoo, and Bob chimed in, and I stood there smiling but thinking, "These are not bug zoo ladies."

But Claire and Bob must have sold it, because we ran into these same women several days later on Robson Street in Vancouver, and they had gone to the bug zoo! They said it was one of the best things they did while they were in Victoria. They even held the tarantulas.

So you just never know about people, and let this be a lesson to me never to assume that sweet-smelling fancy ladies from gated communities dislike bugs. 

After tea, we went over to the Imax Theatre in the BC Museum, which we had mostly to ourselves because the rest of Canada was watching Game 7 on the telly. We watched a very lovely film called Born to Be Wild, which is narrated by Morgan Freeman and is the story of a woman in Borneo who rescues orphaned orangutans, and a woman in Kenya who rescues orphaned elephants. We all loved it. I recommend it if it is playing somewhere near you. I got a bit choked up when the older orphaned elephants came to greet the newer orphaned elephants. 

Then we poked around the National Geographic shop by the theatre for a bit, and then we had dinner and watched the Canucks lose to Boston on the television in the Old Spaghetti Factory, and I was so sad about that because I had become a staunch Canucks fan in just one day, and then of course all H-E-double-hockey-sticks broke loose in Vancouver, which I followed for a bit via a news feed on my phone, but then we just conked out and went to sleep. 

We kept wanting to see the lights on the Parliament Buildings, but I think you have to stay up until eleven or midnight before it gets dark! And I get a Duchess of San Gabriel sinking feeling at around eight p.m., so midnight wasn't working for me.

victoria, british columbia 2011: around town

We just got back Monday night from a week in the cities of Victoria and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

It was such a lovely trip. It is cool and green and friendly-like up there. :)

We flew into the city of Vancouver and then took the ferry over to Victoria bright and early the next morning. The ferry was huge. Our bus drove right onto it. 

The most exciting thing that happened on the ferry was that a huge bald eagle flew right by. Everybody was talking about that. It was so much bigger than I would ever have guessed from our money. :) I still get a thrill just thinking about that.

Here's a wee map if you need a quick refresher. Vancouver (the city) is on the mainland of British Columbia. Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, is located on Vancouver Island. Vancouver Island is west of the city of Vancouver and north of Edward Cullen.

The mainland is separated from the island by the Straight of Georgia. We went past the Gulf Islands on the ferry. The San Juan Islands are just south of the Gulf Islands.

Vancouver Island is about 286 miles from top to bottom, and a bit more than half of its population of 750,000 live in Victoria.

The last time I was in Victoria, I was 14 or 15 years old. It is every bit as picturesque as I remember it. :)

We stayed at the Best Western Inner Harbour. It was a really nice hotel for families, and I recommend it. It was clean and friendly, with a nice outdoor heated swimming pool, and the location is perfect. It is about a block away from the British Columbia Parliament Buildings, and short walking distance to almost everything else you'd want to see.

We got in the afternoon of Tuesday, June 14th, and walked around some to get a feel for everything.

An architect named Francis Rattenbury gave Victoria much of its beautiful look. He designed the Parliament Buildings, the Empress Hotel, and the Canadian Pacific Railway Steamship Terminal, which are all in the Inner Harbour.

He was a very successful architect, but had a very messy private life. You can read about it online. Wild.

The Parliament Buildings face the Inner Harbour and are diagonal from the Empress. The Legislative Assembly of British Columbia meets here.

This was the day before Game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals, and everybody had Canuck Fever. Even Parliament. :)

I guess now is as good a time as any to mention that we missed the hockey riots in Vancouver on Wednesday night but got there Saturday when things had cooled off and everything was being analyzed. It's always a shame when a small minority of idiots (is there a worse trifecta on earth than youth + testosterone + alcohol?) mess things up for the majority of nice people. We have stuff like that happen here in southern California, too.

Everyone we spoke with in Vancouver was delightful, and really bent over backwards to let us know that they loved their city and their hockey team, and were mortified by the hooligans. But we'll talk about that a bit more when we get back to Vancouver.

For now, let's look at Victoria in all its loveliness. :)

We were told several times that the weather has been unseasonably cool. Rose gardens that were typically in bloom had not had enough sun and were still closed up tight as buds. But the spring flowers that typically would already have died were still going, so it was still lovely. My geraniums at home are starting to wilt in the heat, but these were still fresh and so pretty.

This is the BC Museum, which is also right there close to the Inner Harbour. It's fantastic, and I'll talk more about it later.

We snuck up on the Empress Hotel from its south side.

Victoria is known for its lush hanging baskets and pretty street lights.

That middle flag up there on top of the Empress's front facade is a Canucks flag. :)

And here's the Empress from its north side. 

Well done, Francis Rattenbury. I'm sorry your second wife's lover murdered you.

After we'd checked out the Inner Harbour, we went north on Government Street to check out the shops. Some of Government Street (the bit closest to the Inner Harbour) has succumbed to tacky souvenir shops, but it's not too bad. There is still plenty of loveliness to be found.

I think several of you would like the Button & Needlework Boutique in Trounce Alley off View Street. I didn't buy anything, but I wanted to. :)

 There is coffee to suit any mood you can think of. :)

Such a good day. :) I'll show you more later.

the last day of second grade + the first day of summer vacation

Yesterday was Claire's last day of second grade. I have loved her second grade year, and got a little teary. :)

It was a half-day at school, and her class had a party at a local park. It was also International Day at her school, so the kids got to dress according to their cultural heritage.

"What am I?" Claire asked. 

"Your grandma is Canadian, so you are one quarter Canadian. You're also English, Irish, French, German and Danish on my side, and English, Irish, and Swedish on your dad's side."

"Okay, but what am I, exactly?" She wanted a clean-cut answer that would settle the question of (1) what to wear and (2) what food to bring.

"You're American."

"But I want to be SOMETHING tomorrow."

Finally, we settled on English. She wore her Paddington Bear t-shirt and took some scones from Trader Joe's (my oven is still out of commission from the cake ruckus), and I'm pretty sure I heard her speaking with a British accent at one point during the party's water balloon fight. :)

Claire's second grade teacher is also a dear family friend from church. She is a lovely, intelligent, kind, and Godly woman, and we love her very much.

She is a third-culture kid, who grew up with her missionary parents in Thailand. Claire's current favorite thing to do is write her name in Thai on things.

 

Some of the older folks who were doing Tai Chi in the park in the morning stopped and gathered around to watch Claire's class play games. It was sweet. :)

Our community is predominantly Asian, mostly from China and Taiwan, but one of the older gentlemen heard the kids saying some Thai words during one of the games, and came and spoke Thai with Claire's teacher, who is fluent. That was exciting for the kids, to hear her conversing in Thai. :) Claire is still talking about it today. 

The girls from her class said an emotional summer goodbye to each other back at school. :)

Then after school, my sister and I took Claire and Jonathan and Grace to Shakey's for pizza, to celebrate now having two third-graders and one fifth-grader. Sniff.

We are going to be busy this weekend and next week, but today, the Official First Day of Summer Vacation, I promised Claire a pajama day.

She is taking it very seriously. :)

The dolls are having a pajama day, too. :)

Yay, summer!

richard scarry's best word book ever: 1963 v. 1991

On Richard Scarry's birthday a few days ago, I busted out my old version of his Best Word Book Ever, and Claire's newer version, and had her look for the differences between the two. (She likes that kind of thing. It was not a chore.)

Of course you are familiar with Richard Scarry, but if you're not, the people in his books are animals. But they are people-animals, not animal-animals. Except there are some animal-animals on the farm, even though the farmer and his wife are also animals, but they're people-animals. 

It all makes sense in context. :)

They've done some fairly complex deconstruction of gender and race in the new edition. They've also changed the tone of some passages from directive and mildly threatening ("The dental hygienist hasn't a cavity in her teeth. Brush your teeth well and you may not get any.") to mildly informative ("The dentist looks for cavities and the dental hygienist explains how to care for your teeth.")

I didn't even touch on the ethics of censorship with Claire. There is only so much you can cover in one day. 

I am wondering what the next update will say. "They're your teeth, kid. Do what you like. See if we care. After all, you're eight. Who are we to oppress you with our patriarchal commands?"

Ha. :)

The most current edition has an abundance of new yellow hair ribbons. I can imagine the publisher's planning meeting:

"There aren't enough girls in this book. And there are too many stereotypes. Look, this boy bear who is driving a steam roller, turn him into a girl bear by ... let's see ... by adding yellow ribbons to his hair. And that pig playing the bass drum ... girls can play the bass drum ... turn that boy pig into a girl pig by ... let's see ... by adding yellow ribbons to his hair."

Much better. No stereotypes there. Wait.

So I joke, but boy, I am happy Claire will grow up understanding that the motivation for rescuing someone from a burning building is because she is "in danger", not because she is a "beautiful screaming lady." Yeesh.

I was going to explain some of the changes to you, but happily, someone has already catalogued fourteen of the most interesting pages (old juxtaposed beside new) here in a flickr gallery. (The photos with white boxes on them have comments that will appear if you hover over them. For a fun game, look for "Extra Mouse: No apparent reason". )

ps I cannot help feeling sad that "cowboy" is really no longer a viable career option for kids. I always loved that elephant cowboy when I was a kid, but I remember wondering, how he was going to find a big enough horse?

a few of my favorite iphone apps

 
Our family has made its way through intense, short-lived family fads with all kinds of iPhone and iPad apps. Angry Birds, Tiny Wings, Cut the Rope, Doodle Jump, Pictureka ... you name it, we've all gotten excited about it for a week at a time before fickly moving on to whatever is newer and more exciting. :) And you already know that I'm a Hipstamatic fan, because the photos appear here in suziebeezieland whenever I'm caught out with my phone but without my camera.  I also regularly use such popular apps as Facebook and Fandango.

Here are a few others I use regularly, which have stood the test of time around here. :)

What are some of your favorite apps?

Cartolina
Cartolina allows you to send brief messages embellished with graphic designer Fiona Richards' really pretty artwork. The current version cost me $1.99 and has been updated for free regularly with lovely new graphics. The current app is unavailable for download between June 3 and June 13, but a new Cartolina app will be available on the 13th. I'm excited.

Weight Watchers Mobile
This app allows me to track my points while I'm on the go, and gives me access to the huge WW food database, as well as any custom info I've saved to my online WW account. It has been invaluable. The app is free to WW members.

ESV Bible
This Bible app is so good that when I'm out and about, I frequently use it in lieu of carrying my Bible with me. The Browse feature is quick and easy. It's free. Also, I am in the process of using it to memorize Bible verses while I dry my hair in the morning. :) Drying my hair is a tedious chore that I hate, but is now more interesting since I've started propping my phone on the counter, open to the ESV. I know I could also have done that with my regular Bible, but I never thought to do it. :)

Run Pee
This is actually a pretty well-known app, but I'm just including it in case you have not heard of it. Despite its crass name, this is really a helpful little app: it lets you know when the lulls are going to occur in the movie you're watching, so that you can schedule your restroom breaks accordingly. I have only used it for big, blockbuster movies. I'm not sure what it considers a "lull" in smaller Indie films which some folks might consider "all lull". :D

Stack the States
This is a game Bob downloaded for Claire on his iPad, and which I later downloaded for her on my iPhone, because it was such a hit. She played through quickly and with great enthusiasm, and now knows more about U.S. geography than either Bob or I do. (I kid you not.) She followed this with Stack the Countries, and again, can fill in the names on a blank map, while Bob and I stare blankly. :) Stack the States is 99 cents, and Stack the Countries is $1.99. Money well spent.

Realtor.com
The Realtor.com app can use your current location to tell you where Open Houses are close by, and then guide you there via GPS. You can also customize it to find Open Houses anywhere you'd like, as well as just browse homes for sale. Fun for a Sunday afternoon driving around nice neighborhoods, especially if you're nosy like I am. :) Free.

Pocket First Aid & CPR
I haven't had to use this, but I'm happy it's on my phone. Compassion International's Dan Wooley used the app to help himself survive when he was trapped in the Haiti earthquake. It has an emergency quick reference section for things like Adult & Child Choking, Bad Allergic Reaction, Bleeding, Heart Attack, Shock, Stroke, etc., and also has more in-depth information on many different first-aid-needed scenarios. Sometimes I read it recreationally when I'm having to sit around and wait for something, because I figure it can't hurt to have that info inside my head. :)

the cake ruckus

Tonight was our final school board meeting of the year. We have food at this last meeting, when we say goodbye to the board members who are rotating off and say hello to the new members who are coming on.

I was supposed to bring dessert.

The plan was that I would make this cake, as seen in Matthew Mead's (super duper fantabulous) Summer magazine. It is an easy cake. You make three layer cakes (from boxes), and smear each layer with whipped cream and pile them on top of each other and throw some berries on top. I went and got all the stuff from the grocery store at 1:45 today, and got back in time to go pick Claire up at 2:30.

Easy peasy, and very pretty and summery and delicious-looking.

And yet, something happened to my cakes. What? I do not know. I smelled burning about the time they were supposed to be cooked, and molten lava cake batter was spewing out of the cakes onto the floor of the oven. They looked like little volcanos.

See that shiny part? It's still liquid if you poke it with your finger. 

Have you ever had this happen before? These were just your basic Duncan Hines cake mixes. I have made a bazillion boxed cakes in my life.  I have no idea what I did wrong this time.

So then it's four p.m., and our meeting starts at six p.m., and I am standing there completely surrounded by no desserts.

So I told Claire to grab her shoes, quick, and we jumped in the car and started driving nowhere in particular, but fast.

And then I remembered Dots! Yay, Dots! Dots to the rescue! Except that I couldn't remember exactly where one was. So I drove in the general direction of Pasadena, and typed "Dots" into my GPS, but I ended up with some office supply company in Indiana, and I don't know what all else, and what use is my GPS if I can't just think "cupcakes" at it in a panic, and it tells me clearly and quickly where they are?

So then I had Claire call Bob on my cell and get directions. He knows Pasadena food sources like the back of his hand. All the guys in his office do. You could call any of them and name any dish that is part of any world cuisine, and you could say that you want to eat it at three a.m. on a Sunday, and they could tell you where to go to make that happen.

Except that Claire was just repeating whatever Bob told her and then saying "uh huh", without speaking to me or giving me any context:

"Huntington. Uh huh. Fair Oaks. Uh huh. California. Uh huh. Del Mar. Uh huh. Royal Parkway. Uh huh."

"Arroyo Parkway?" I asked her. "Is it on Arroyo Parkway?"

"Royal something. Or maybe Royo. Del Mar. California."

Finally, I very calmly and slowly and gently and patiently, and them some more calmly, just for good measure, suggested she put him on speaker phone, and he gave me the address (400 South Arroyo Parkway), and I said "okay, goodbye" too quickly, because then we couldn't actually find it.

I mean, I found the address, but Dots was not there.

"We just drove past 400 South Arroyo Parkway, and it's not there!" I said at the phone. I forgot to say "hello" or anything when Bob answered. I just started talking fast.

"It's there. Next to Pasadena Inn. Park in the Pasadena Inn parking lot. I was going to say that when you hung up on me last ..."

I hung up quick, and sure enough, the second time we drove by, Dots had materialized OUT OF THIN AIR and was there. It was definitely not there before.

I ordered one dozen assorted cupcakes, plus two.

The "plus two" were for Bob and Claire, my sweet and longsuffering helpers. :)

discretion and purity

Linda B. asked a really good question about when we should share some of these issues regarding purity (and lack thereof) in our thought lives with our husbands. 

I would say probably never, if we are actively fighting our crushes and whatnot, and if the impurity is relegated to our own hearts and has not developed into a full-blown affair or any kind of mutual attachment. But let me qualify that. So don't stop reading right now and go skipping off thinking "phew, okay, I'm good." :)

I know Linda to be a Godly woman who knows scripture, and I believe she could probably give a much more clear, concise, and solid answer to this question herself. But here are some thoughts, anyway, and we can hope that by thinking together in the Word, we'll think more truthfully and clearly as we work all of this through.

Please speak up, ladies, if you have further thoughts or think I'm off. (Be willing to back up your opinions with scripture.)

First of all, although we do harm to ourselves and our marriages by nurturing crushes and an impure thought life (again, see the excellent article over at Desiring God to read some of the bad effects that a lack of purity can have on our lives), having impure thoughts is not the same as having a full-blown affair. God honors our obedience in NOT acting on our feelings, even while at the same time He desires for us to be pure in our thoughts as well as our actions.

In other words, if I think about hitting you, that's not as bad as hauling off and hitting you. But the ultimate good would be that my heart itself was changed, so that I would not be angry with you at all, and not even have those thoughts of desiring to hit you. 

In the book I mentioned earlier, The Holiness of God, RC Sproul elaborates on these "degrees of sin" a bit. He addresses it in the greater context of making very clear that as Christians, we are set apart and called to be holy and consecrated to God. He wants to make certain we understand that this nonconformity to the world's standards is not something we apply to our lives by just trying to follow a bunch of rules. He wants to make sure we understand that holiness comes through the power of the Holy Spirit working in our lives. He wants us to avoid Pharisaical behavior:

We tend to think that sin is sin and that no sin is greater than any other. We think of Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount that to lust after a woman is to be guilty of adultery. We are aware that the Bible teaches if we sin against one point of the law, we sin against the whole law. These two Biblical teachings can easily confuse us about the degrees of sin.

When Jesus said that to lust is to violate the law against adultery, He did not say or imply that lust is as bad as the full act of adultery. His point was that the full measure of the law prohibited more than the actual act of adultery. The law has a broader application. The Pharisees thought that because they never committed the actual act of adultery, they were free of sin against the law. 

So while obviously a full-blown affair or any kind of extramarital entanglement would need to be confessed to a spouse, I can't think of too many instances where what I'll call our "daily impure thought lives and feelings" need to be confessed to a spouse. If we have given in to these deep dark feelings, it will soon enough show up in our actions. But if we're fighting the good fight inside our head, and resisting this sin, and asking God to deliver us from the tyranny of our feelings and emotions, I'm not sure it would serve a Godly purpose to confess this to a spouse. 

Linda's point about "venting" versus discretion is a very good one. The worldly idea of "venting" is a cheap imitation of the Biblical mandate to confess our sins to God and repent. In many ways, truly repenting and confessing is much more difficult to do than "venting" our sins to a spouse. And when you've vented, really all you've done is pass your burden to him, and maybe you feel better, but now he feels lousy. We want to be confessing and repenting to God.

First John 1:9 says, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

That said, I think there is value, if you are struggling and need help, in confessing these sins to a mature Christian WOMAN who is discrete and who will hold you accountable in this area. An accountability partner can pray for you, and also can keep an eye on you and make sure you're not saying "I don't want to have this crush" with your mouth, but then doing things to perpetuate it with your actions. :)

James 5:16 says, "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working."

Secondly, in answer to Linda's question, I think it's probably enough for both genders to know that the other gender struggles with lust. I think most women are very clear that all men, Christian or not, struggle with this their entire lives. Frankly, I do not want the details of their thought lives. And thank goodness we are spared them and people don't walk around with thought bubbles over their heads!

Men may not be universally aware that women also struggle with lust, because it has been a taboo subject. If you think your husband doesn't know this about women, you might want to tell him generally sometime that it's a problem. But he probably knows.

Thirdly, as far as women having crushes on men we can't get away from, that's tough, but probably pretty common throughout history. I don't mean the fact that it's common makes it okay in any way, but this indicates that God has dealt with this particular sin before, and provides a way out, as He always does. Although you may not physically be able to run away from this crush, there are still a lot of practical things you can do to run away from him inside your head. You can probably control much of the content of your conversation with this man, and keep it from becoming intimate. You can probably choose where you sit when you're in a group, and who you spend most of your time on. You can choose to behave like the Godly woman you wish to be, even if weird things are going on inside your head. And you can scare yourself out of it by reading the Bible a lot, and concentrating on verses about what God thinks about immorality and people who pull other people down into sin. 

Seriously, I think that concentrating on God's hatred of sin and His passion for His own glory can really help straighten us out in so many different ways. :) There are all kinds of terrible sins I would never, ever even fantasize about in my head because they are abhorrent to me. We have to work at getting our definition of "abhorrent" in line with God's own definition of "abhorrent," so we see how awful it truly is that we would ever want to betray our own husbands (even inside our heads), or take another woman's husband, or teach our own daughters that this is an okay way to think and feel about men, or betray the trust of our friends and family, or objectify men the way our brains sometimes can ... I could go on, but you get the idea.

My crushes tend to be movie stars or fictional characters in books (although this is not always the case), because real people usually irritate me too much. :) And with a movie star or book character, nothing is ever going to actually happen, so it might seem pretty innocuous. Bob and I have even joked about these celebrity crushes before, and he knows who "my guys" are, and I know who "his girls" are. But recently (very recently, because if you scroll down this page you can see me drooling over some movie stars), I've decided to even stop talking about these crushes, or letting them play in my head, just because I was convicted by this thing that John Piper said: "Don't ask, what's wrong with it? Ask: Does it maximize my experience of the power of Christ, my enjoyment of his fellowship, my perception of his beauty, my reflection of his glory?"

Finally, here are some more thoughts from Sproul and the Bible about the ultimate purpose in our pursuit of this purity:

Many people have spoken to me about being ethical, moral, spiritual, or even pious. But nobody seems to want to talk about being righteous. Perhaps it is because we know it is a sin to be self-righteous. The word righteous sounds a bit pharisaical. It sounds more spiritual to talk about being spiritual than to talk about being righteous.

To be spiritual has only one real purpose. It is a means to an end, not the end itself. The goal of all spiritual exercise must be the goal of righteousness. God calls us to be holy. Christ sets the priority of the Christian life: "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well" (Matt. 6:33). The goal is righteousness.

happy birthday, richard scarry!

I love Google! :) 

Today is Richard Scarry's birthday. He was born in 1919, and if he were still alive, he would be 92. 

Like some of you, I grew up on Richard Scarry, and loved Busytown. He, Jim Henson, and Charles Schulz taught me the great joy of creating a busy, diverse, vibrant, sometimes chaotic, yet always fundamentally gentle community within the greater world. 

I recommend getting your hands on older copies of his books, if you can. The later reprints leave out sections of the older books. 

If you like Richard Scarry, you might enjoy this suziebeezieland post from September 2009, where I showed you some differences between my copy of Richard Scarry's Best Word Book Ever (circa 1963), and Claire's copy (circa 1991).

Happy birthday, Richard Scarry! :)

'cause we support L.A.! L-A L-A L-A! L-A L-A L-A!

Bob and I took Claire and our niece and nephew to a Galaxy game last night. They were playing DC United. 

Alas, neither team scored. And alas, Landon Donovan (the leading goal scorer in MLS soccer this season) is currently off playing on the U.S. National Team for the CONCACAF Gold Cup.

But the weather was great, the crowd was fun, they had good snacks, they got to see Beckham, and they could be as goofy as they wanted to be. It was a very good evening.

I took a couple few-second videos. In this first video, you can see the kids cheering.

In this second video, you can see Beckham run across the field and make a corner kick, and you can see Claire getting popcorn out of her teeth, and you can see me put my phone away but forget to turn off the video, so you might get seasick at the end. It's a low-budget operation around here in suziebeezieland, so I don't hire any film editors. :)

produce day

Yesterday was pretty exciting around here, as far as fruits and vegetables go. I went to visit my sister in the morning, and she gave me three oranges which the neighbors next door gave her off their tree. They look plain, but are sweet and good, which is true of so many of us, n'est-ce pas? ;D

Then, in the afternoon, I noticed that we had our first ripe cherry tomato. So Claire and I did our traditional "We grew a tomato!" dance, and then each ate exactly half of it. It was warm and delicious, and had that meaty, crumbly texture that homegrown tomatoes have.

I'm thinking cheese and tomato sandwiches on homemade bread, all summer long.

Realistically, if we have twenty edible cherry tomatoes total, we will be beating our previous records. But a girl can dream.

Then Bob came home in the evening and gave me these three onions, which his coworker Fred sent for me. It is terribly exciting in the summer to see what Fred will send home with Bob, because his wife is an award-winning gardener, and I do believe with all my heart that she is magic out there in the dirt. The things she can grow. One of her tomatoes last year made me get a little teary, it was so delicious.

A good tomato is a spiritual experience, testifying to God's goodness, creativity, and faithfulness to His people.

I'm thinking I'll use the onions to make an onion tart. I've got my eye on this Alsace Onion Tart here. Unless I've got it wrong, my French Huguenot ancestors were from Alsace-Lorraine. Or maybe that's something we just decided and don't actually know. I don't remember. Anyway, they make a mean onion tart.

summer tour guides

ETA: I bumped this post back up to the top in hopes of getting some more responses. :)

Where do you live? If someone came to visit you this summer, what are five (or so) things you would take her to see in your area? What's great about where you live? What's not-so-great?

It dawned on me this morning that some of you might be visiting areas this summer where some others of you live, and such info might come in handy.