Softly, deftly

So you try directing 700 teenagers from all over the state of Utah and performing in front of a packed house.

Last night I sat on the 4th row of the acoustically perfect Salt Lake Tabernacle to listen to theGrand Festival Concert of the Utah All-State Choir. The choir was directed by the delightful and talented Ann Howard Jones. The kids had spent most all of their fall break rehearsing and it was absolutely fabulous. Hey, even my eight-year-old was interested.

No, this isn’t them, but, see the middle and largest pipe in the set of foremost and largest pipes right of center? Luke stood right below it. I bet he had the best seat in the house when Linda Margetts pulled out all the stops on Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Anyway, the concert was amazing. I sat there and thought, Wow! How cool is this that that’s my kid up there having this experience of a lifetime and I get to watch and listen.

So if you enjoy choral and chamber music (I didn’t really know how much I did until I spent the last couple of years as “choir mom” to Luke and a few other of the choir kids), I’m inviting you to attend Provo High’s Fall Sing on Wednesday, October 17, at 7 p.m. in the PHS Auditorium.

Trust me, I would not even mention this if it were going to be lame. These kids are amazing. The chamber choir moves me to tears almost every time. Do come.

Some pumpkin

The other day I bumped into a neighbor at the local grocery store. Her delightfully precocious daughter chatted my ears off. She was especially excited to tell me about her pumpkin patch. She was selling her pumpkins to earn some money. “For college?” I asked. “Oh no,” she replied, “but maybe for a trip to Disneyland.”

The very next evening the little girl and her mother appeared at my door, with a wagon load of pumpins trailing behind her. She wanted to know if I wanted to buy one. “How much?” I asked. “Whatever it’s worth to you,” she replied. Not wanting to take advantage I pointed out one of the smaller pumpkins and put the bid back in her court. “How much is that one worth to you?”

“Five dollars,” she said firmly. “Sheesh–I’m involved in a bidding war with a five-year-old over pumpkins!” I thought to myself. She then pointed to an even bigger one and assured me that one was worth at least $10!

Wanting to be generous, but also knowing I’m not made out of money, I told her I needed to go inside to see if I had any cash. It was almost a relief to see all I had on hand was three one-dollar bills. Realizing I was still in way over my head, I took out the ones and told her that was all I had and sweetly asked her if there were any pumpkins in her wagon that were worth three dollars. She thought for a second and pointed out the very smallest pumpkin. We exchanged money for pumpkin and she went on her way to shake down the next unsuspecting neighbor.

Whew! Never underestimate the business savy of a kindergartener.

The day the rabbit died

So most of you are too young to even know what I meant by that. Except I didn’t really mean that anyway. I just really wanted to be able to write that.

I found our pet rabbit, Cookie (short for Cookie Dough, because as a baby she looked just like Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough ice cream), dead this morning and it broke my heart.

We bought her on a whim just over five years ago. I’d run out to Vineyard Garden Center for some mulch. I must have gone in the back way, because it was only as I was leaving with my purchase in hand that I noticed the bunny cage. Bunnies for sale, $3, the sign read. I’d always wanted a lop-eared bunny and these were too cute to resist. Cookie was the runt of the litter and had been chewed up a bit by her siblings. But she thrived on all the attention and extra calories we tried to give her.

As far as pets go she’s probably one of the best we’ve ever had. Sweet disposition, warm and cuddly and a kick to watch when she hopped around the yard and garden. We’d often talked about breeding her because she was so good with the kids. (The ad I wrote in my head and intended to put up at the local IFA went something like this: SWR–single white rabbit–seeks one-night stand with friendly and fertile male.)

We all loved Cookie, but my daugher L~ loved her the most. In that sweet and serendipitous way in which sometimes something good will happen just before you’re about to get your heart broken, L~ had spent most of Friday afternoon playing with Cookie out under the crabapple tree.

Goldfish and betas aside, I’m pretty much a puddle over the passing of pets. (I bawled for an entire day over the death of our pet rat Tillie.) You learn to love what you care for and of course as mom I get to help take care of a lot of pets. But losing this one was especially hard. The worst part was watching my daughter. It’s hard to just sit back and watch your kid’s heart get broken. Wracked with sobs, she removed Cookie from her box in her cage and held her close for most of the morning. It was almost more than I could bear.

Just as I was wondering how to balance L~’s need to grieve with the rest of the family’s need to watch General Conference without a dead rabbit in the room, L~ got up to look for a box and went out to dig a hole. It just seemed to be understood that she would do it, and do it herself. Wracked with sobs myself, I watched from my bedroom window as L~ dug through the rain-laden soil, measured the hole then dug again and again until she got it right. I didn’t worry that the location she chose was in the middle of my flower bed, but instead resolved to take L~ shopping next spring for just the right perennial to plant over Cookie’s grave.

With the same stubborn independence I’ve noticed in other members of my family, L~ refused to be comforted or consoled. But I was worried for her. Then I remembered my part-time neighbor Jan had just arrived in town yesterday. Jan and L~ share the same birthday and have forged a special friendship. And Jan’s pets are family to her, so I knew she would understand. I casually mentioned Jan’s return to L~ and watched hopefully as she bounded out the door to go see her. Sure enough, Jan let her talk about it and then put her to work on a project that would serve both to distract her and help her work out her grief.

So although I am sad today, I’m also grateful. Grateful for tender mercies–that L~ will have the fresh memory of Friday to soothe her sadness a bit. Grateful for good neighbors who have compassionate hearts and are willing to be there for my kids at times when, for whatever the reason, they need to deal with things in their own way. And grateful for the inspiration that helps me see that without being hurt by it and also lets me know exactly what I need to do to help them find what they need.

During conference this afternoon I picked up a piece of appliqué I need to complete for a block-of-the-month out at Amercian Quilting. It’s a chocolate brown bunny. Although the pattern calls for the ears to be straight-up, I’m going to make them lop back. In memory of Cookie.

This old house - compiled

This old house table – October 3, 2007

I’m quite sure by now you are all sick and tired of reading about my remodel. But let me tell you, you’re probably not quite so sick of hearing about it as I am of doing it! You write what you know and right now this is all I know.

Tonight, after painstakingly masking off the upstairs with yards and yards of blue tape (and I’ve only just begun) and just as I was thinking about how nice it would be to be able to afford to hire out this type of grunt work, I went into to do one last wipe-down of my soon-to-be refinished dining room table (yes, silly me. I figured it was already in pieces and with the room empty until Friday now was as good a time as any). As I was running my hand–the one that’s still reverberating from too much time holding the power sander–across the smooth wood I realized that is exactly what I would miss if I paid someone else to do it.

Sure the DIY series make it all look sooooo much easier than it is IRL. (And no, most redo or remodel projects cannot be completed in the standard 22 minutes.) But nothing can quite capture that sense of satisfaction that comes from having realized that with no more than the free advice of the friendly wood guy at your local D&B, some toxic substance sure to cause cancer in the state of California and just a little bit of elbow grease, you managed to pull a few muscles you didn’t remember you still had and make something old seem like new again.

Of course I might be feeling differently about that when I try to drag my old and tired bones out of bed in the morning. But I’ll take that chance.

*****

Enough about the pain, let’s talk about carpet – September 29, 2007

Yesterday–after two weeks of trying–I finally heard back from the carpet retailer and I now have a date on the calendar for them to measure my house for new carpet. Wahoo!

It’s not a lot of new carpet. We have some pretty beat up wood flooring in the upstairs bedrooms, tile in the kitchen and we are putting wood in the dining room (to be installed Friday–Yay!) And we are leaving the bright red but practically invincible carpet downstairs alone. But having new carpet in on the split-entry stairs and in the living room and hallway will make a big difference in the look and feel of our upstairs as well as in my desire to vacuum (like there will actually be a point to vacuuming now).

So it’s time to move on from my completely depressing paint failures and talk about the new carpet. Here is why I’m hopeful this new carpet will the best ever:

1. I’ve discovered the absolutely genius and beauty of a product called Folex.

2. Because I bought my wood flooring during a big promotion I’m also getting a brand newHoover absolutely free. I’m really more of a commercial Eureka girl, but hey, if the price is right… (And just think how nice it will be to have a vacuum on each floor of the house and have attachments to use on the stairs.)

3. It’s Stainmaster.

4. It’s the color of dirt (twelve different kinds of dirt).

5. Three of my four children will have moved out before the stain warranty expires.

Enough said.

*****

When the room and my mood are dripping – September 28, 2007

So like all good remodel projects this one hasn’t been without its setbacks. Aside from it being impossible to get someone from the flooring retailer (from whom I am resigned to purchase my carpet because their “bid” came in at about half of the one I got from RC Willey for the same carpet) to come and measure for the carpet, things had been going fairly well until yesterday afternoon. When I had a panic attack.

I’m trying to invest a bit more time and money to do this the right way. Which means I’m sanding everything before I paint, painting one coat, sanding again, then painting a second coat. But yesterday while I was sanding a little chunk of paint came off and I more or less stopped breathing. What if I had just painted Latex over oil-based paint and the entire room would peel off much like one would peel a banana?

YIKES!

I was fairly certain this wasn’t the case because a friend of mine who does faux painting professionally painted my daughter’s room over a year ago and she had done the alcohol test and decided the paint was Latex. But this is where I start to drive myself and others crazy–my not-really OCD omes out in full glory and I start obsessing over things. What if she had been wrong?

I ransacked the cupboard looking for rubbing alcohol and cotton balls and frantically ran through the house trying desperately to rub off the old paint in various rooms. What if…? What am I…? Oh no, how will I ever…? Assuming the acohol test is even accurate, I’m guessing what I have is Latex over oil-based in most rooms, but straight-up oil based in the bathrooms. Which, if I remember correctly, may have been the fashionable thing to do back in the day.

Having no choice at this point but to bravely forge ahead, I proceeded with the second coat in the dining room, because the paint needs to cure for an entire week before the wood flooring is installed next Friday.

Enter panic attack number two. As we pulled the blue masking tape off the ceiling and from around the windows the paint came off (in parts) in this neat little skin of Latex paint. ARGH! Of course then my paint paranoia struck again and I pictured myself standing in a room of freshing painted peeling paint. Quel disastre!

(Here’s one thing I wish I’d have known before I started painting. And of course, if all else fails, it never hurts to actually read the directions. Although the jury isn’t out on the part about how long you can wait to remove tape. If it’s still too wet, it smudges. If it’s too dry, your paint peels off. And who knew the use of masking tape required directions?)

Oh well, live-n-learn.

sigh.

*****

The Story of the Little Red Hen – September 25, 2007

The Little Red Hen (known heretoafter simply as LRH, but not to be confused with Lucky Red Hen whose presence is sorely missed in these parts) decided she was tired of worn and dirty carpet and ill-painted walls and she needed to update her look. So she ordered some new flooring and chose some new paint and jumped into the project with both feet.

“Who will help me put things away?” LRH asked.

“Not I,” said each of her four chickadees all at the same time.

“Then I will,” said the LRH. And so she did.

“Who will help me move the furniture?” asked LRH.

“Not I,” came the unified reply.

And so it went. No one wanted to do the boring stuff so LRH was left to do it all herself. OK, well a lot of it anyway.

“Who will prep the room(s) because even I don’t want to do that?” said LRH, but in spite of her bad habits of usually skipping that part she resigned herself to do this job the right way.

“Now who will help me paint the walls?” whispered LRH a bit sarcastically.

“I will!” “I will!” “I want to!” “Me! Me! Me!” they all cried.

“Fat chance of that,” said LRH and she savored every minute of changing the look of her home as if from night to day. Well more like day to night because she chose carpet the color of dirt and was going with darker paint, too.

(disclaimer: Eventually LRH’s little chicks might reluctantly give in a help a little, but no where nearly enough to merit the reward of helping paint. But by then LRH’s hard heart might have softened and she might let them help anyway. At least a little.)

Overheard: desperate times call for...

After an 30 minutes of almost incessant fighting between my two youngest I found the following escaping from my lips:

You and your sister are not allowed in the same hemisphere!

Haven’t yet figured out the logistics of that one.

Suggestions?

when the room and my mood are dripping

So like all good remodel projects this one hasnt been without its setbacks. Aside from it being impossible to get someone from the flooring retailer (from whom I am resigned to purchase my carpet because their bid came in at about half of the one I got from RC Willey for the same carpet) to come and measure for the carpet, things had been going fairly well until yesterday afternoon. When I had a panic attack.

Im trying to invest a bit more time and money to do this the right way. Which means Im sanding everything before I paint, painting one coat, sanding again, then painting a second coat. But yesterday while I was sanding a little chunk of paint came off and I more or less stopped breathing. What if I had just painted Latex over oil-based paint and the entire room would peel off much like one would peel a banana?

YIKES!

I was fairly certain this wasnt the case because a friend of mine who does faux painting professionally painted my daughters room over a year ago and she had done the alcohol test and decided the paint was Latex. But this is where I start to drive myself and others crazymy OCDC comes out in full glory and I start obsessing over things. What if she had been wrong?

I ransacked the cupboard looking for rubbing alcohol and cotton balls and frantically ran through the house trying desperately to rub off the old paint in various rooms. What if? What am I? Oh no, how will I ever? Assuming the acohol test is even accurate, Im guessing what I have is Latex over oil-based in most rooms, but straight-up oil based in the bathrooms. Which, if I remember correctly, may have been the fashionable thing to do back in the day.

Having no choice at this point but to bravely forge ahead, I proceeded with the second coat in the dining room, because the paint needs to cure for an entire week before the wood flooring is installed next Friday.

Enter panic attack number two. As we pulled the blue masking tape off the ceiling and from around the windows the paint came off (in parts) in this neat little skin of Latex paint. ARGH! Of course then my paint paranoia struck again and I pictured myself standing in a room of freshing painted peeling paint. Quel disastre!

(Heres one thing I wish Id have known before I started painting. And of course, if all else fails, it never hurts to actually read the directions. Although the jury isnt out on the part about how long you can wait to remove tape. If its still too wet, it smudges. If its too dry, your paint peels off. And who knew the use of masking tape required directions?)

Oh well, live-n-learn.

sigh.

The Story of the Little Red Hen

The Little Red Hen (known heretoafter simply as LRH, but not to be confused with Lucky Red Hen whose presence is sorely missed in these parts) decided she was tired of worn and dirty carpet and ill-painted walls and she needed to update her look. So she ordered some new flooring and chose some new paint and jumped into the project with both feet.

Who will help me put things away? LRH asked.

Not I, said each of her four chickadees all at the same time.

Then I will, said the LRH. And so she did.

Who will help me move the furniture? asked LRH.

Not I, came the unified reply.

And so it went. No one wanted to do the boring stuff so LRH was left to do it all herself. OK, well a lot of it anyway.

Who will prep the room(s) because even I dont want to do that? said LRH, but in spite of her bad habits of usually skipping that part she resigned herself to do this job the right way.

Now who will help me paint the walls? whispered LRH a bit sarcastically.

I will! I will! I want to! Me! Me! Me! they all cried.

Fat chance of that, said LRH and she savored every minute of changing the look of her home as if from night to day. Well more like day to night because she chose carpet the color of dirt and was going with darker paint, too.

(disclaimer: Eventually LRHs little chicks might reluctantly give in a help a little, but no where nearly enough to merit the reward of helping paint. But by then LRHs hard heart might have softened and she might let them help anyway. At least a little.)

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fin

I should have taken a before and after picture

Preface: As many of you know, it has been a life-long challenge for me to discover the zen in the art of homemaking. Sooooo…

Yesterday when they got to the part in Relief Society meeting in which the sisters shared good news I turned to my friend and admitted the following: “I can’t say this out loud, but my good news is I finally got all the laundry folded and put away.”

Trust me, the washing is the easy part

For those of you who have it together (that would probably mean all the rest of you), that may be a daily or weekly occurrence. But not chez moi. I’m really good at washing it, but then it just piles up waiting for attention. It had spilled out of the laundry room an into the family room in the form of a mountain of mostly folded towels sheets, odd socks and hand-me-downs gathering dust on our second-hand pool table. My goal for the weekend was to clean it off entirely, find a place for everything and put everything in its place, and match all the socks–with the added treat of tossing any that didn’t have mates in the trash.

One of the biggest challenges was the socks. I do believe the first thing out of my mouth when I get to the other side is, “Where are all the other socks?” I remember hearing my mother recounting a funny story about my dad when I was growing up. They went to the local appliance store to purchase a long-awaited new washer and dryer. (As there were six of us kids you can imagine she had even more laundry than I do.) The salesman asked my father what kind of washer and dryer he wanted–enumerating the virtues of many of the newest models. My dad simply said,

I want the one that doesn’t eat socks.”

Aside from the socks there were enough towels to mop up what’s left of Felix. I don’t know how we inherit towels, but between car washes, kids playing on our slip-n-slide, my propensity for saving things for rags as well my not being able to resist the brand spanking new perfectly white towels and washcloths my grandmother was giving away when she downsized into The Jamestown, I’m getting buried.

There are also an awful lots of items that are just sitting around waiting to go to D.I. and find a good home. These tend to hang around longer than they should because I can never seem to find a big enough bag or box in which to put them. Luckily I happened upon a roll of huge leaf bags and now there are two of them completely full of clothes (and even some of those extra towels) ready for D.I.

I’m happy to say the pool table is bare and ready for play. There is once again both floor and some counter space in my laundry room. And I now have a place to hopefully go to work on some too-long-put-off quilting projects.

I still have a couple of rooms (hint: ~j, you are not the only one) to tackle in my quest for some semblance of order. But there is some light at the end of the long dark tunnel. And that my friends, is indeed good news!

I'm just another Blueblood--that's Cougar blue

my kids attended with various levels of enthusiasm. or not

it's always fun to hone in on someone else's photo shoot

and that was a photo op not to be resisted

Overheard: put another dime in the jukebox baby

f you’d been a fly on the wall (well, technically somewhere over the VoIP) this is what you would’ve overheard the other day while I was at work:

Ring.

Me: Hello. Burgundy London; this is Dalene, may I help you?

Caller X: Hello, I’m calling from Lackawanna. I just want to let you know blah blah blah blah blah.

Me (thinking I’m ending the call): Sure. I’ll be happy to take care of that for you. Thank you for calling.

Caller X: Dalene. That’s an unusual name.

Me (still thinking I’m ending the call): Yes it is. My parents made it up. Thanks for…(read: end of story.)

Caller X: Irish. “Lene” is Irish. You’re not Irish are you?

Me (still trying to end the call and figuring there is no point in explaining it’s not Irish; it’s Intermountain West. All the other offices of my company already think we’re weird here because we are sober.): Nope. I was firstborn; my dad’s name was Dale. Dalene is simply Dale with an “n-e” tacked on. Dalene. (He did not get the long explanation, which has something to do with my not being a firstborn son, but Dad making the best of it anyway.)

Caller X: That’s a good name. You should be a rock star. Like Madonna.

Me (seeing the similarities-ha!): Oh yeah. I should be just like Madonna. Me and Madonna.

Caller X: Or Joan Jett. You know, if you really love rock and roll.

Me (amused now because previously his entire point was about being a one-name band. Joan Jett. Two words.?): Yeah, I like Joan Jett.

Caller X: Get it? You know the song, “I Love Rock and Roll.”

Me (with eyes rolling and hands up in the air for the benefit of my co-workers who have by now realized this is not your every day call to QA): Yeah. I get it. I Love Rock and Roll. I know the song. (I probably still remember all the words.)

Caller X: Joan Jett is with Carmen Electra, you know.

Me (not even feigning my disbelief): Really? I did not know that. Aren’t they like from two different generations? (read: I grew up with Joan, Carmen used to be a new kid on the block. She used to have a thing for Candies shoes, but that was ages ago. Is Carmen even gay? Who knew?)

Caller X: Yeah. They’re together. But they’re not from different generations.

Me: Yeah, well, I guess I’ll have to Google that. I really had no idea. (read: how such pertinent information could have escaped my notice? I mean I work in the business of news, you know.)

Caller X (convincingly–as if he has personal knowledge of the fact): Yeah, it’s true.

Me (determined now more than ever to end the call): Yeah, well, um, thanks! You have a nice day now. Bye.

Meme is the word...

I interrupt this program to bring you urgent breaking news of the very best kind.
Then you may return to this regularly scheduled programming. (My apologies. I realize this makes two memes in a row and indicates a complete lack of original thought. But I couldn’t resist the complete randomness of this one, so I gave it a go:)

My roommate and I once…used to frequent Punk Night at The Palace. (Hey, I could Rebel Yell with the best of them.)

Never in my life have I…been to the opera, a Justin Timberlake concert or a clam bake. I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything, do you?

High school was…so long ago! But so much fun. I had friends in every crowd, which made it easy to have a good time. I also have lots of stories. I probably shouldn’t mention any names when I mention one of our teachers who tried to hit on a couple of us (not at the same time). Ewww!

When I’m nervous…I feel like I’m going to throw up. I also forget people’s names just a tad more than I usually do when I’m not nervous. I’m may even blush.

My hair…is getting darker every year. People used to tell my sister and me apart by whose hair was the darkest–hers. For some unexplicable reason after I had a serious bout with double pneumonia my hair became significantly darker. I didn’t even realize it until I was explaining that trick to a niece at a family reunion. I said “My hair is lighter than J~’s.” My siblings said in unision, “Not anymore!” I had no idea. Later I was talking to my friend who was also my stylist and she had noticed the same thing. It was so drastic she thought I’d been “stepping out” on her. Wierd, huh?

When I was 5… I remember going to a Presbyterian kindergarten. Or some other demonination with which I was unfamiliar. I loved school, but I never did understand why they didn’t have kindergarten at the public elementary.

When I turn my head left… I can see right out the big picture window that looks out on our street. I notice the spot where we had a rogue squash plant growing out of the sidewalk until some mean neighbor kids deliberately ganged up and ran it down with bikes and mo-peds while we were out of town a couple of weeks ago. (But I’m not bitter.)

I should be…doing the dishes. I already scrubbed the toilets and my shower and bathroom sink. But I took a break and found this meme over at e-dub’s (can’t you just see her fleeing from campus security on the back of her roommate’s Vespa?) and couldn’t stop myself.

By this time next year… I will be trying to keep even more busy than I already am so as not to have my mother’s heartstrings pulled so hard by the empty chair at the dining room table. (I might also secretly be enjoying the fact that the auto insurance and grocery bill will have shrunk considerably.)

You know I like you if…you breathe. It’s a fault. With the exception of about two people I have ever met, I like just about everyone. Now loving is a different story. I’m a little bit more discriminating with my love. I do love all my family and most all my co-workers and of course all my blogger friends.

My ideal breakfast is…sliced boiled eggs and gravy over toast. My mom used to make it for me on my birthday sometimes. I make it for my two youngest who also love it. (The two oldest prefer crêpes, but that’s so much more work.)

If you visit my home town… please take me with you. I haven’t been there in ages. But do let’s go in time for this.

My favorite blonde is… my babies. Who were all blond until about ten or so. Which means I’ve only got about 1 1/2 left. (But I do like a good blonde brownie.)

My favorite brunette is…? I don’t like to play favorites.

The animal I would like to see flying besides birds…pigs. Because I understand once that happens there will be a lot of other impossible things happening too. I wouldn’t want to miss that!

I shouldn’t have been…so uptight at certain periods in my life when I was prone to be uptight.

Last night I… had a great time. We went to the ladybug picnic a lovely outdoor social at which we dined on freshly picked corn on the cob and tomatoes, delicious barbequed chicken, and heavenly homemade ice cream. Later I sat on the top of the bleachers next to the PHS drumline and watched them beat their hearts out on those big huge drums as the football team squeaked by Lehi (Here’s a bit of trivia: I helped this sports reporter get hired when he was just getting started and I was working at a certain now-defunct local paper. And the injured QB lives right around the corner from us). It was loud. But the grins on their faces rivaled that of the Kool-Aid Man and being there made me want to be a kid again (Not really, it just made me want to beat really loud on the big bass drum).

I’ve been told I look like…I need a good vacation.

If I could have any car, it would be… a brand new Toyota Sienna. Call me crazy, but I love my ‘04 and I would drive a Sienna even if I didn’t have to drive a minivan. Great gas mileage for something so roomy and it drives like a car, not a truck. Ask me how much I love having sliding doors on both sides. And oh the cargo room! As well as the simple fact there are enough drink holders for the entire population of Rhode Island! I love it!

As usual, if you’ve got game, consider yourself tagged. (If you play let me know and I’ll tag on a link to your post at the end of this one.)

Marriage Meme

Recently I was tagged by the lovely café johnsonia to participate in a marriage meme. As you know, I can’t resist a good meme, so here it goes:

Where did you meet your husband?

BYU 122nd ward, comprised of one-half of Centennial Apartments. And, you guessed it, twice we served together as counterparts in various church auxiliaries. But we didn’t really want to have anything to do with one another. Does it get any more cliché than that?

What was the first thing you said to your husband?

I truly have no idea. But according to him it was the third week in April, 1983. I was sitting on the floor in a lower floor apartment on the outside of the complex, at the home of Jay Jorgensen, whose little sister Janelle was my roommate. Shane came over to tell Jay’s apartment about an upcoming softball game. We all exchanged casual “Hi’s” and that was it. He doesn’t believe me, but as he was recounting the details it did all come back to me.

What I remember best was that 4th of July. We had volunteered to save a few blankets for the fireworks display (it was so cool–they used to sync the fireworks with music on a local radio station) at Kiwanis Park. We had a couple of hours to kill, so we talked about where we were from and got to know each other a bit. I mentioned how much I missed our 1/2-acre family garden and my particular love of fresh beets.

A short time later Shane showed up at my door with a bag full of fresh beets. Maybe I’m too easy, but he pretty much guaranteed himself at least a first date with that thoughtful act.

Where was the first kiss? First date?

(Interesting they are in that order, no?) We were friends for such a long time before we ever thought about dating…

What happened was this: As is common around BYU during the holidays, the place was deserted. Only Shane worked retail and my family had moved to Utah by then, so we were still around. He and his roommate and I and one other girl ended up going to a dance together on New Year’s Eve. We traded dances back and forth all night till the end of the evening, when I found myself dancing more and more with Shane.

Only that wasn’t really a date. That was just when we started to become interested. We eventually had the discussion over whether or not we wanted to complicate a great friendship by dating one another. The answer was unanimous.

Later I found myself working the afternoon shift at the BYU Bookstore when I received the first of many “Roses are red, violets are blue…” poems. This one read “Roses are red, violets are blue, I would die for a date with you.”

We went to a BYU basketball game. But I was cool with that. Just don’t ask me if we won or lost. I’ll bet Shane could tell you thought. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s the one with the mind for details.

The first kiss was in my apartment, which, miraculously was free of the usual scattering of roommates.

Did you have a long or short courtship/engagement?

Here is where the cliché ends. We dated for three years–breaking up a few times in between–until, at the ancient age of 23, I went on a mission. He wrote faithfully the entire 18 months and upon my return we didn’t really want to have anything to do with one another.

That lasted for about 48 hours, but during that 48 hours we both ended up at our respective family reunions only to practially be thrown out for coming alone. I had been gone 18 months and returned to hear only, “Where’s Shane?” “Where’s Shane?” He went to his only to have the family pound their fists on the table and chant, “We want Dalene! We want Dalene!”

Needless to say we saw the writing on the wall and got together shortly after.

Where did you get engaged?

Stewart Falls. He was up at the top and I was at the bottom, when he sent me to get something. In it was a green ring box with another of his famous “Roses are Red” poems, this one asking me to marry him. He made me shout “Yes!” at the top of my lungs. I guess he wanted to make sure I was sure.

Where did you get married?

In the Manti LDS temple, the tower room. We went the entire way up the spiral staircase with the bishop from our ward behind me whispering in my ear, “It’s not too late to back out. It’s not too late to back out.” Almost 20 years later, you can see I didn’t intend to back out.

How did the reception go?

It was nice. I am not really into that kind of thing, so aside from insisting we not have a huge line (I had my brother stand in for my dad and and had my only sister and his baby sister as bridesmaids) and just a simple white cake it really didn’t matter to me. It was just before Christmas, so our colors were black and white with a touch of red. At that point in history black and white we not at all considered traditional wedding colors, so our families were a bit nervous. But it looked great. Our gifts were placed underneath a flocked Christmas tree with dotted with black and red decorations.

One funny thing happened, however. In a move that to this day I saw as wise beyond our years, we planned the reception for the week after the wedding. One sweet gentleman came twice. The evening of our wedding (when he found a gym full of sweaty boys playing basketball) and then again the next week.

How was the honeymoon?

Short, sweet and simple. I still had finals starting early the next week, so we just went up to Salt Lake City for a couple of days. (I did pack along my books just in case I needed to study. But of course I never opened my backpack.)

I still managed to pull straight A’s that semester.

But I do have to add this: When I realized how close it was to our upcoming 20th anniversary, I decided to consider our trip to Finland last fall a perfect second honeymoon. It was worth waiting for.