Dr. Dyreng

 

Five years of studying for these few seconds of glory? At least I have my hood now. What's up with that anyway -- a hood that doesn't go on your head?

Maybe when Chelsea wins American Idol and we're rich I'll get robes that look like this:

But until then I'm not willing to shell out 702,000 Chilean pesos for a blue sheet!

Home Sweet Home

Okay, okay, here is a real photo of our home, and I'm not crossing my fingers this time. We all have our favorite things about the house:
My favorite part is that I'll have a bathroom with an electical outlet for my hairdryer.
Scott's favorite part is that the water heater can hold 80 gallons of water so he can have his hot showers even in a house full of girls.
Sophie and Syrena's favorite part are the stairs, which they have long coveted in other people's homes.
Unfortunatly, Naomi's favorite part is the dog that currently lives there and will not be there when we move in. Perhaps around Christmastime we can fix that problem. :)

We are all very very excited, and we get to move in after June 9th.
There is also a little creek that runs through the front yard, although you can't see it in the photo.

Hurray for our family hero, Scott, for getting a good job so we could have this nice home.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

12 words to describe my mom:
1. Life Saver. My mom flew with me and three week old sophie and syrena to our new home in North Carolina. She unpacked all of our boxes, and helped us get on our feet in Chapel Hill.
2. Soothing. I love listening to the sound of my mom's voice when she's reading bedtime stories. She read hundreds of stories to my sister and me.
3. Wise. I remember she let me buy a bikini (this was before I had any curves to fill the thing out--I was about as sexy as a tree). The first time I got to wear it was at a motel swimming pool and there was one boy there my age swimming with me. From the looks he kept sending my way I knew a bikini wasn't the right thing for me and I never wore it again. But I am grateful that my mom let me learn my own lesson.
4. Beautiful. I love the way she looks when she laughs so hard that tears start coming out of her eyes. I love to watch my mom watch the ocean. I love it when people say, "You look like your mom."
5. Tolerant. I played the trumpet, piano and I loved to "belt" out songs as a kid, and I never remember my mom telling me to be quiet or to move to another room.
6. Healer. Nobody takes as good care of you when you're are sick like your mom does. When I had a sore throat my mom would rub vicks vapor rub on my neck and chest and then wrap a warm flannel cloth around my throat before I went to bed. It felt better than anything in the world.
7. Accepting. My mom never told me I needed to get better grades.
8. Majestic. I think the moments when my mom looks most like a queen is when she is on a horse. She is a natural with horses.
9. Green. My mom can make any kind of tree grow. I'm sure she's planted over a hundered trees in her life and all of our old homes are now surrounded by mini forests.
10. Compassionate. I will never forget the day I saw my mom helping my dad up the hill to our home after he had had a seizure. She had her arms around him and he was leaning on her as they walked up the long gravel road. That is when I knew my mother loved my dad.
11. Adventurous. My mom served as a full-time missionary in South Africa, ALONE. She taught English to students in China for a year. She has traveled to many other countries.
12. Determined. My mom has made a lot of choices in her life that in the long run have directly impacted dozens of people. Her desire to live the gospel has already blessed generations.

I love you, Mom! Happy mother's day!

Our New Home

The grueling home search is over! After walking in and out of dozens of homes we have finally found the home of our dreams.

 

I know what you are thinking, but we actually didn't even have to pay full price. True, it isn't the biggest house on the block, but I think with a little paint and some tlc we could make this a real winner.

Ya'll come visit us, ya hear!

The Mysterious Skunk

A few weeks ago we noticed a skunk smell in our home. It didn't seem to originate from any corner of the house; the smell actually seemed to "roam" around the house. We thought that maybe there was a skunk that got into our crawl space. I walked around the outside of the house looking for a place that a skunk might get in but I couldn't find anything. Then I looked in the crawl space myself (well, I threw rocks into the crawl space. Does that count?) and could see no signs of skunk life.
After a couple days of this incredibly strong odor I bought a Glade plug in. Now my house smelled like a skunk that had eaten a lot of lavendar. Then I noticed that the smell seemed to follow me around the house. Perhaps I wasn't taking enough showers? The girls got into this, too, and helped me look for skunks. They told people that we had an invisible skunk at our house that follows us around.
Then we discovered the culpret. Their were FOUR of them. Not skunks, but

 

JELLY SHOES!!

I bought these cute--and very stinky--jelly shoes at Target a month ago. The girls love them and wear them constantly. What is a mother to do? I will pray their feet grow fast. Until then, my apologies to all who visit our home. But at least it is better than having a real skunk around.