Why Women Who Want Kids Should Not go to Law School

This is a blog about my life – my thoughts, happenings in our family, cute shots of my toddler, etc. I have no idea why I’m going to spout off career advice, especially when pretty much no one who reads this blog is deciding whether or not to attend law school.

I guess I want young impressionable women about to get sucked into the law school trap to learn from my mistakes.

My first two weeks of law school, three if you include orientation, were awful. Awful not in the sense that I wasn’t enjoying myself, but awful in the sense that, because of unfortunate dating choices, I was not applying myself. I found myself in the career services office before the drop deadline, asking if it wouldn’t be a good move to defer my legal education for a year. Without realizing it, I had gotten far behind my classmates and I knew I wasn’t likely to do particularly well given my late start.

“Do you want to work for a law firm in a large city?” the counselor asked. “If you do, you need to be in the top ten percent. Otherwise, your grades don’t really matter. You’ll get a job no matter what.”

Awesome, I thought. I can focus on pre-marital counseling and working things out with my boyfriend. I’ll just sort of get through law school.

And I absolutely loved law school. I loved the class discussions, I loved my professors, I loved the friends I made (I still love you guys!), and I even loved the reading assignments when I did them. I didn’t worry too much about test-taking skills and how to get on law review. Why would I, when I could get a job no matter my grades? When I really liked the subject I did very well, but usually my grades were a respectable average. I constantly heard people complain about how much they hated law school, and I pitied them for their misplaced ambition. Didn’t they know that we were all going to get jobs?

And then the financial crisis hit, and even lawyers with stellar credentials were laid off in droves. I also got married (to another guy – it’s a long story) and, a year later, got pregnant.

I made the choice to go to law school in a world where I was single and able to work a full-time job anywhere in the country, and in an economy that had jobs just waiting for BYU Law graduates to snatch them up. And now, I find myself looking for part-time work in the same city my husband needs to be in for his schooling, in an economy suffering from an overabundance of lawyers. Oh, and I’m tens of thousands of dollars in debt.

I thought part-time work would be pretty easy to find. Part-timers don’t require benefits and can help attorneys out with a lot of tasks that paralegals can’t. I was totally wrong. When law firms hire attorneys fresh out of law school, they have to train them. It’s not worth it to law firms to hire part-time attorneys with no previous experience because it takes much longer for part-timers to get the hang of things and start being valuable to the firm. Also, when a firm does decide to get some part-time help, guess who they hire? Not the people in the bottom half of the class with no previous experience. Not in this economy, anyway.

So, if a woman who wants kids does decide to go to law school, she better get the best grades possible. I’ve heard men complain about women who do well in law school because they’re taking a good spot away from a man who needs a good job to support a family. Ignoring the general ridiculousness of the statement for a moment, I want to point out that it’s just wrong. In a household that follows traditional gender roles, everyone sacrifices for the husband to get a job. The family relocates, the wife looks after the kids so the husband can job hunt or start a practice, etc. My husband is not going quit law school so that I can brush up on my legal skills to make myself more employable. That scenario would require us to give up money for the chance to make much less money.

And by the way, when we relocate, guess who has to take another bar exam in order to have a chance at getting a job? My husband won’t have to because of reciprocity between states, which only applies to full-time attorneys. The legal profession isn’t very kind to wives and mothers.

In order to avoid wasting the money spent on the wife’s education, she needs to make her resume the best she possibly can so that employers want to train her, even for part-time work. She needs to do way better in school than most of those future breadwinners.

So here’s what it takes to do well in law school. Not that I know from personal experience, but I have seen my husband, a current 2L, do well. To get great grades, you should work 12 hour days 6 days a week. Twelve is a minimum, at least for the first year. You can’t just spend this time studying for classes, though that should take a big chunk of your 12 hour day. You also need to spend time figuring out how to do well in law school. It’s a skill, and it takes time to learn. People who do well in law school figure out who did well in classes before them and ask them how to take tests.

Oh, and 12 hour days does not mean just spending 12 hours at the law school, chatting with friends or watching Hulu. It means really working for 12 hours. And you need to do this for months without a break. This, by the way, is extremely difficult.

Some people don’t need to study for 12 hours a day. But those people are really special, and most people are not that kind of special. Twelve hours is pretty much a guarantee of good grades. Of course, if you go to Harvard, 12 hour days are not necessary. 

So unless you are a male, or you are a female who is willing and able to spend 12 hours a day studying for tests, or you have a large trust fund, or you're going to Harvard or Stanford or Yale, I don’t recommend law school.

Of course, some women work full-time. Or they think they don’t want to have kids. But most women, no matter how undesirable childbearing might sound when they begin law school, eventually want to have kids. And that usually leads to wanting to spend time at home with them, particularly if the husband has a full-time job. So don’t count on always being able to pick up and get whatever full-time job comes your way.

Another option is to delay childbearing until you are settled in your career. This is a good option, if you can delay childbearing, because if you already know what you’re doing, employers will want you. But who wants to stave off the baby hungriness for a few years while you wait to get settled in your career? Why do that when you could just take care of your career by kicking butt in law school?

I really like my life as a stay-at-home mom. And I don’t know that I can say that I regret going to law school, because it changed the way I think about life in invaluable ways. I’m also very lucky to be married to an amazing person who is willing to pay off my student loans. At the same time, I wish I could work a couple of days a week to earn some money, have a break from my wonderful daughter, and improve my legal skills. I keep applying, and one of these days I think an employer will recognize how awesome I am and hire me. But I don’t want others to make the same mistakes I did, so I’m trying to at least give them fair warning. 

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Pride and Shame

Things that make me feel foolish:

• Yesterday I got really frustrated with Summer. I recently heard someone say that she believes in slamming the door when she's angry because it makes her feel better. I was in the kitchen, so I slammed the oven door and somehow smashed my pinky finger. Yep, it hurt and I was mad. Then I remembered a New York Times article about how swearing makes women (but not men) feel better. So I swore. Intentionally. For the first time since tenth grade (12 years ago, if you're curious). Hopefully it'll be the last time, too. My finger felt better, but probably just because my idiocy was distracting me from the pain. 
• Today, after working up a sweat in the gym, I went over to the spot on the floor where my stuff was, picked up my hoodie, and pulled it over my (sweaty) face. Only, it felt really big and unusually soft. Yeah, not my hoodie. I really hope it didn't belong to the guy who gave me a funny look as I rapidly gathered up my things and left.
• Here is a list of things I've left on top of my car prior to driving: a cinnamon roll, a cup of water, a large stack of important papers, a set of keys, and Summer. Just kidding about Summer. But I did drop her when I slipped on black ice the other day. Still waiting for that maternal protective instinct to kick in.

Things that make me feel awesome:

• I'm sticking to our food budget. It's weekly instead of monthly now, so the plan is to do the bulk of the shopping at Winco once a week and fill in the gaps here and there (especially with Buy-Low's Wednesday produce). It helps that Winco is so far away, and that the people who shop at those stores usually look at least as frumpy as I do (I don't know why that helps, but it does). It's only been three weeks, but I think this is a plan I can actually stick to. Unlike couponing, which makes me want to crawl under the bed and never come out.
• I have drastically lowered expectations. Yeah, I've heard a million times that if I'm just doing the best I can, I'm doing all right. I guess I just need reminders that even though I can't do a full Insanity work-out, if I just do the warm-up, that's awesome! If I don't feel like cleaning the entire house but I do the dishes, go me! I'll might never be as skinny as Shakira, but if I make a batch of cinnamon rolls and I avoid eating them all myself, that's a victory!
• I think I'm less judgey than I used to be. In church last Sunday our awesome Stake Relief Society president gave a lesson about garments. One girl raised her hand and asked about all those girls who wore leggings under short skirts and whether or not that was that okay. Sister Hicks said that that was something that was a personal matter and every woman just had to figure it out for herself.* She added, "Everyone does different things. If you see people doing something that you would do differently, don't judge them. They are good and righteous and daughters of God." It was the only time she got sort of stern. I can remember my first years at BYU, and I would look at others' clothing choices and decide that they were wrong - too tight, too low cut, too sheer, etc. It's hard to love others when you can't stop condemning their clothes. I'm sure I still judge based on appearance, but I'm much more interested now in what people are feeling and thinking and doing. 

*The honor code says differently, I know. I pretty much hate BYU's honor code. The dress and grooming part of it. Another blog post for another day.

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Untitled

My family tree is a grab bag of mental illness. You name it, someone in my family has probably been diagnosed with it. Once, I was talking to my dad about that and he said, "You know, Dorothy, there is a good chance you have some sort of mental illness. If you think that might be the case, it's okay. We'll work it out. There is no shame in that."

My dad is really great.

I don't think I'm clinically depressed. But I do sometimes wonder if it's harder for me to avoid feeling depressed than it is for others. I've always had to put forth a lot of effort, it seems.

Before I became a mom, if I was feeling depressed, I pulled back from the world. I dropped everything and went to the temple at three in the afternoon. Or I spend a few hours reading scriptures in a special place where no one could find me. I wrote in my journal a lot too. Going to the gym for a couple of hours was also really nice.

How do you do things like that when you're a mom? And your husband studies/slaves at law review a lot and you have no money for babysitters? (And wouldn't it be weird to get a babysitter so you can write in your journal in the canyon?) Am I just being incredibly unrealistic and spoiled to think that I need several hours of alone time every day to function? Summer is twenty-one months old. It's been almost two years, and I feel like I've no made progress in figuring out that tricky balance - making my needs as important as hers.

Last week, I got to see some great friends from law school and we talked about being moms. One of my friends said, "If I don't work two days a week, I get so depressed."

Don't you love it when people are honest? I do. I love that talking about the difficulties people have with motherhood is okay. Yay, I'm not the only one!

Sometimes I wish I could go back to the times before I was a mom. But I can't, and even if I could I wouldn't because I am crazy in love my daughter. I have to remember it's not a matter of whether or not to be a mom, it's learning how to be a mom the right way.

I'm working on it. I've checked out daycare, I've discovered the inconsistency of babyswapping (although I will sing its praises if you give me the chance), I applied for the one part-time job that was advertised, I've offered attorneys my own part-time work, etc. I have a research job, but it's on an as-needed basis. Anyway, I think I'll figure it out.

But in the meantime, I struggle. Sorry this isn't one of those blogs that makes Mormon motherhood look like shiny happiness all the time. It might be for some moms. And motherhood is often bliss for me too. But today, not so much.

Until I watched a couple episodes of Modern Family. Is that the answer? Really funny TV?

I guess this is just a post to remind me that I need to be more careful. I need to plan better and make sure that I'm taking time for myself. Yeah. That's it.

The end.

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Discipline

I know Summer shouldn't be allowed to get into the fridge, open an egg carton, grab an egg, and crack it on her highchair, all while I'm on the phone.

But sometimes I'm just so impressed with her that I can't feign disappointment. An unbroken yolk? You go girl.

P.S. Yes, we're eating the egg.

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True Love

Here they are: the people that I love most. Families are awesome.

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Accepting the Things I Cannot Change

Lately, I was reminded of the serenity prayer: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Trite? Probably. Helpful when applied? Yes.

I know I have things I should probably accept and stop worrying about, but lately I've been thinking about how awesome it is that I'm not worrying about something.

Nathaniel is better than I am at most things.

A sampling: Nathaniel placed much higher than I did in the Moot Court competition. He gets better grades. He is more organized. He speaks Russian better than I speak Romanian or Spanish. He is better and more consistent at cleaning. He folds clothes better than I do.

And my favorite: He does Summer's hair better than I do. Yes, try as I might, I can't do my daughter's hair very well.

I always thought that when I had a girl I would just learn to do her hair and I would make it beautiful every day. I didn't anticipate a wiggly toddler with a low threshold for pain and me as a mother with little patience for learning to do hair.

Maybe this is something I could change. Maybe I should add a line: "Help me start with the most important changes." Sometimes I cringe when I see Summer's bad haircut (yes, I cut her hair) and accompanying lack of bows or clips or flowers or ponytails, but most of the time I just see pretty, straight, strong brown hair. Actually, when I look at Summer, what I usually see are her eyes - full of mischief or questioning or happiness or love or pain or excitement. And sometimes a blank stare. But no matter what her hair looks like, I think she's beautiful and I'd rather show her maps in our atlas and tell her stories of ships sailing across the sea than wrestle with elastic bands. And let's face it, I should probably get organized before I worry about pigtails.

I think it's wonderful that Nathaniel is so good at so many things. I'm not going to let that fact make me feel superfluous, because I'm not. If it weren't for me, Nathaniel would starve.

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Life Is Not Fair

Today I heard about another mom who is going back to school to get her degree. I want to do that! I want to got to classes and discuss interesting things and learn more! I'll even do correspondence classes. Sign me up!

The problem is that I already have a Bachelor's. And a Juris Doctorate. And when you've got tens of thousands of dollars you need to pay off for the education you have, there is no justifying plunking down another five hundred for that awesome Shakespeare class.

Why didn't anybody tell me I would want to keep going to school? Maybe then I wouldn't have been in such a rush to finish.

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Another Bad Mom Card?

Sometimes Summer bugs me. There are a lot of great things about her: she never had separation anxiety, she eats veggies, she says the most hilarious things, etc. Of course I adore her and I'm so grateful to be her mom, but every once in a while, she bugs.

Like when she made me pick up a ton of little ice pieces up off the floor of Costa Vida. Or when she tells me to put away the toaster or close a cupboard. I can't tell her to mind her own business because these are things I should do, so I have to just do them. And it's annoying because I was planning on closing the stupid cupboards and putting the toaster away, but I don't like doing it at the command of a 20-month old.

Another thing that bugs me: she drinks my Slim-Fast. I can't drink it in front of her without her having at least a sip, which makes it hard to know how much I drank. (By the way, I'm not trying to lose weight, I just like Slim-Fast [okay, that's a lie.])

Tonight, when I got home from the gym, I made Summer some cinnamon toast and myself a slim-fast. She was really into her cinnamon toast until she accidentally tore it apart, which always makes her super mad (yes, another thing that bugs). I try to ignore her fits, but I don't always succeed. I offered her some Slim-Fast, which stopped the tears immediately. As she drank it, I had some of her cinnamon toast. Pretty soon, I had eaten all the cinnamon toast and she drank my entire shake. It's like it was her plan all along. Or was it my plan all along?

Anyway, yes, for dinner I gave my daughter cinnamon toast and a Creamy Chocolate high protein Slim Fast shake - complete with whey protein isolate, gum arabic, and acesulfame potassium. Am I awesome or what?

Proof:

The end. Don't click on that read more thing. Sorry about that.

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Reslut

My favorite typo. I also really like "abou tit."

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Gender Roles

Summer is a very maternal person.  Or maybe she is simply responding to the nurturing part of her feminine nature.  Or maybe we have unconsciously indoctrinated her with traditional gender roles and she knows that she's socially expected to change diapers.  Either way, we are all very relieved that this bee's diaper has been taken care of:

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Because You Know You Want to Watch a Music Video or Two

Tonight, as I was driving home from the gym, I was listening to our local top 40 station.  Yep, I like the Top 40 stuff.  Actually, since Summer started repeated the words she hears in radio music and the radio is now set to Classical 98.1 whenever she's in the car, I would say I love Top 40.  It's my little adult indulgence and, now that I think about it, it should really motivate me to go the gym more often.  Sure, by the time Nathaniel gets home and I can actually go to the gym, it's dark and icy and only seven degrees, but I can listen to all the Lady Gaga I want.  

Anyway, as I was listening to the radio, I started to think of European music.  I have always really liked it (I wrote "loved," but then deleted it because someone who loves something actually makes an effort to experience it, which is not the case when it comes to me and music one would hear in a club in Munich [ps why do we spell München Munich?]).  I know this is very poser-y of me to say, but Euro music sounds so sophisticated and exotic and cool to me. I will never actually go to a club and be hip like that, so I experience it vicariously through the music. I loved European techno-type stuff when I visited my English nanny when I was in high school,  I loved it when I lived in Spain as an undergraduate, and I really loved it when I was a missionary in Romania and I heard it everywhere - in the internet cafes, the buses, the grocery store, the cabs, people's houses, etc.  

As I listened to the radio, I thought about manele (Roma, [or, if you're politically incorrect, gypsy]music) and how much I like it even though it's considered filthy by a lot of Romanians.  I decided that I really need to brush up on my Romanian for our trip out there this Summer.  I thought of an Elder on my mission who just today made me sick with jealousy when he posted a bunch of pictures on Facebook of his recent trip to Romania, and how I can't wait to go back.

I started listening to the song that was playing, and realized that I was driving slower so I could listen to the whole thing.  When there was a yellow light, I slowed down and made no effort to make it before it turned red. It was in that delightful Euro style, something unusual for this station.  I started memorizing some words so I could figure out what it was when I got home.  

Guess what?  It's Romanian.  I feel like an idiot for not having heard it before.  The music video of the song has 90 million views on YouTube.  If you don't mind watching some hot chick prancing around in wellies and her underpants on the beach, check out the music video.  I actually really like it.  Except, you know, the big ad during the final moments when the hero and heroine unite.

(Did you watch it?  Did you notice how the woman in this video is gorgeous and the guy inspires a rousing "meh?"   And he's wearing red pants and a vest with some shirt he got for free at his work holiday raffle underneath it?  Welcome to Romania.)

When I was in Romania, the big hit song was Dragoste din Tei, which, if  you watch the hilarious music video I've embedded below, might sound familiar because T.I. and Rhianna borrowed from good ol' Romanian OZone.  It's weird to me and kind of sad that Romania has moved on, if that makes sense.  Not that I consciously expected the country to avoid progression after I left, but I thought I understood a lot of its culture.  And perhaps I did, but the fact that a huge international hit originated in Romania a year and a half ago and I just heard it tonight tells me that I definitely don't know the country anymore.  But it's all good.  I can only keep up with so much pop culture in a lifetime.  Plus, we're going back this summer.

Anyway, enjoy this video!

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Resolved

I am going to smile at a stranger every day this year.

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Bad Mom Cards - Christmas Edition

Have you heard about Bad Mom Cards?  They're a group of cartoons from the New Yorker, with depictions of bad moms and an explanation of the deed they did that was so terrible to merit a collectible card.  One says "#35 Martina F.: Didn't put up St. Patrick cards one year."  Another says "#61 Deborah Z: Has never even tried to make Play-Dough from scratch."  My personal favorite is #89 - I don't want to spoil it so you have to click over and look at it.  The illustrations are hilarious, too.

I love them because it's a good way to get rid of mom guilt.  All moms make mistakes, and the things we do that we feel the most guilty about are probably not a big deal.  When I do something worthy of a bad mom card, I remember those cards, have a laugh about it, and try to do better next time.

So here's mine:  "#96 Dorothy W.: Did not get child a stocking for Christmas."

I feel so bad about it I kind of want to cry.  I really meant to get her a stocking.  I planned on getting her a really cute one and ironing on a pretty "S" and filling it with cool candies and little toys and fruits and nuts.  But I didn't like any of the ones I saw when I went shopping for one a couple of days after Thanksgiving.  Then I contemplated sewing one myself (I've never really sewed anything in my life and I don't have a sewing machine, so who knows why I thought that might be an option).  Then, these past couple of days, I planned on doing it for sure.  But Nathaniel needed the car to get to school to work on his paper, and by the time he got home it was dark and cold and snowy outside and who wants to go to Walmart then?  So today, I thought I'd get one after we got to Nathaniel's parent's house.  But by the time we got to Farmington, ate Christmas Eve bread and cheese dinner, and filled up the gas tank, Walmart was closed.  It was 9:20 PM on Christmas Eve, so I wasn't surprised.  I just drove through the parking lot, feeling tears well up in my eyes, imagining my daughter who has been a model child this past year waking up on Christmas morning to see everyone else joyfully dump out the contents of their stockings and then realizing there wasn't one for her.

So I went to 711.  I figured that even if Summer couldn't have the beautiful stocking I'd envisioned, she could at least have some good candy.  I bought her Pop Tarts, Pringles, Nerds, honey roasted peanuts,  Ritter Sport chocolates (okay, those were at least partially for me), TicTacs, and some of those dumb plastic bracelets that change shape.  I went home and put it into a plastic Christmas bag we used to transport my homemade crackers.  So lame.

As I wrapped Summer's Pop Tarts, I thought what a bad mom I was and remembered the Bad Mom Cards.  Okay, so it's really lame I didn't get it together enough to get Summer a freaking stocking.  But when I ask Summer what Christmas is, she says, "Jesus burfday."  When I ask Summer what song she wants me to sing her, she says, "Jesus Christmas music."  She likes the trees and the ornaments and the lights, but I think I've done a good job teaching her that the reason behind Christmas is the Savior, and it doesn't matter if her stocking is a used plastic bag.

Merry Christmas everyone.

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Brown-Eyed Girl

Summer is constantly sleep-deprived, and she has the tired-looking eyes too prove it.  Today, I told Nathaniel she took a three-hour nap (turns out I was wrong, but that's irrelevant).  Nathaniel came home and after playing with her for a bit, said, "Let me look at your eyes, Summer."

Summer obediently turned toward Nathaniel and said, "They're brown."

Like, "Dad, don't waste your time.  I know this."

She's really cute.

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Patronizing Emails

When we moved into our apartment, the walls had not been patched or painted and looked pretty ugly. The carpets had not been cleaned and looked awful. I sent an email to the landlady letting her know that we thought the apartment was junk and she never responded. Four months later (yesterday), I got an email from my landlady's local "manager" (i.e. the person who gets cheaper rent because he's willing to deal with disgruntled tenants so that the landlady doesn't have to). I've been debating how to respond. I can write back the little helper and tell him this is ridiculous. I can write the landlady and tell her this is ridiculous. Or, I could post the email on our blog and tell all of you that this is ridiculous. I think I might do all three, but here's to the last option:

Hello Fantastic Tenants,

    Just got off the line with [landlady] today. There are some units that are lacking extra paint to match the current walls, and as such, lack the ability to cover up any needed cover-ups! As such, she felt it most efficacious to have any of you who are need of paint take a small one or two inch section of paint from an unobtrusive spot in your unit to the nearest paint matching store (Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes, etc...) and buy a quart of matching paint. Then, send your receipt to her with your next months rent and she will reimburse you by taking off that money from your NEXT months rent. She feels this will be a better process than having a paint shop have to come out and get a sample form each unit and then provide the paint, as that would be MUCH more expensive! Let me know if any of you have any questions. Thanks for being so great, and have a VERY Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas indeed. I can't wait to spend it scraping paint samples off the wall, matching it at Lowes, and painting our piece of crap walls with it. At least this alternative is MUCH cheaper for the landlady!

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The Story of My Life

It's very easy, if you are a stay-at-home mom, to completely forget how to talk to people who are not parents.  My life has exhilarating moments, heartbreaking moments, hilarious moments, and tenderly sweet moments.  And nearly all of them revolve around my daughter.  If I'm not careful, here is what a conversation with a non-parent looks like:

Me: Summer did the cutest thing today!  She picked up a stick and said, 'Question mark.' I looked at it and it totally looked like a question mark.

Non-parent: Oh, cute.

Me: Oh, and today I started singing Christmas music to her, and she looked at me and stuck her fingers in both ears.

Non-parent: Ha, that's hilarious.

Me: I know, right?  She loves Christmas music, though, and she loves it when I sing it to her at night.  When I'm putting her to bed, she always wants me to sing to her in the chair in her room.  So I sit down and ask her what song she wants me to sing.  Tonight, she said, "Jesus," so I started singing her a Primary song about Jesus, but then she interrupted me and said, "Christmas."  So I sang Away in a Manger and Silent Night, and she loved it.

Non-parent: That's so sweet.

Me: Oh, she can say so many things!  When we read No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed, Summer always supplies all the 'No more monkeys jumping on the bed' parts.  And, when I was singing the Dora theme song, after I sang, 'Swiper no swiping! Swiper no swiping!' she said, 'Oh, man!'  I hadn't even sung that with her before!  It was soooo cute!

Non-parent: Awesome.

Me: But being a parent can be rough.  Today, as I was putting her down for a nap, she grabbed both of these huge, ridiculous earrings I was wearing and pulled as hard as she could.  I yelled at her to stop, but she didn't and just yanked them out of my ears.

Non-parent: (horrified) Oh, gosh!

Me: Oh, it wasn't that bad.  She didn't rip a hole in my ear or anything.  And she's usually really sweet.  She is teething right now, and it's unusually rough on her.  She's getting three of her smaller molars.  All at once.

Non-parent: Oh.

Me:  But she pooped in the toilet, so that's good!  Before she refused to sit on it, but I guess all she needed was a Dora potty seat cover, 'cause now she wants to sit on it all the time!

Non-parent:  Huh.

Me: So, yeah, being a mom is great.  Um, so, how is school going?

I know that reciting all the goings-on with Summer does little to foster a relationship with another person.  I used to be good at making friends and conversation, but I am so rusty I fear I've lost the art.  The sad thing is that it was a talent I had to work for.  In middle school I had a reputation for being stuck-up, but the truth was I was deeply insecure and scared to talk to people I didn't already know, and when I did talk to people I knew I pretty much only talked about myself, because that's what insecure people do.  I got better at that, but now I'm afraid my social skills are the same as they were when I was thirteen and I got a boyfriend and broke up with him the same day.  I hope to get better at it, but it's easier to say nothing, so that's usually what I wind up doing.  That or talk about Summer's Dora potty.

Blogging is sort of similar.  I haven't done it as much lately because I've been insanely busy with work and raising a kid (and baking mini banana cream pies).  I feel bad that Summer is progressing so much and I have done so little to document it, but I'm not too interested in writing a milestone blog, because I know they can be uninteresting to read if the kid isn't related to you.  And while I can turn Summer's funny/sad/cute stories into something funny and worth reading, I don't have the time.  (I have to make mini banana cream pies!  And eat all of them even though I made them for the ladies in my ward whom I visit teach!)

So that pretty much sums up my life: hanging out with Summer which is awesome (except for today when she was awful because of her teething), working, and baking.  Hopefully soon I'll get the guts and find the time to make new friends and write awesome blog posts, too.  Or maybe I'll get the guts to write the posts I want to write and not worry about what people will think.  Or maybe I'll just realize that the internet is a colossal waste of my time and I'll disconnect it and live a very happy life.  Who knows?



P.S.  I represented a client in court for the first time yesterday.  It was....okay.

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Creepy Jimmy Wales

Every year when Wikipedia asks me to donate money I get creeped out by Jimmy Wales and his personal appeals. What's with his super intense pictures? Am I supposed to be so awed by his image that I'll want to donate to Wikipedia? Feels like a lame attempt at a personality cult.  Or it could be Big Brother watching me read Wikipedia articles. Creepy.

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Playing In the Leaves

This is a very Summeresque picture: super pensive.

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Healthy Food Ideas

I'm usually a pretty healthy eater.  Some of my in-laws may laugh at this statement, because I do have a sweet tooth.  But generally, I try to pick fruits and veggies over bacon cheeseburgers and hot dogs.  

This time of the year, though, it gets hard.  I eat low-fat, minimally sweetened yogurt with frozen blueberries and it makes me so cold I want some hot chocolate to wash it down.  Last year I ate a lot of pot roasts and roasted chicken, and while those are awesome, I'm looking for some healthier ideas.  Anyone got any ideas for warm healthy food?  It'd be great to have both quick little meals and recipes.  I aim to eat one fruit, one vegetable, and one protein at every meal, so anything that helps with that goal will be cherished forever. 

In case you're curious, here are some thing I've been eating:

• Baked sweet potatoes (although regular baked potatoes are awesome and I still eat them)
• Red peppers at breakfast
• A healthy version of cole slaw to go with soups
• Lots of homemade soups - lentil, tomato, African peanut...yeah, kinda sick of soup.
• Frozen veggies sautéed with some grana padano
• Boiled eggs (trying not to think of that one office episode...)
• Roasted acorn squash
• Whole-wheat pasta with a quick homemade tomato sauce and fancy Kraft parmesan in the green shakey can.  

I also have big plans to make these crust-less quiche/frittata thingies and freeze them.  

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Adoption

I didn’t give up a baby for adoption.  I probably won’t adopt any kids.  But adoption is such an important part of my life that I can’t imagine where or who I’d be without it.

I know very little about my biological grandmother.  I know her last name.  I know she had red hair.  I know she passed away many years ago.  I know that she was in a mental hospital around the time my dad was adopted.   And I know that she made what I can only imagine was an unspeakably difficult decision: the decision to give my father up for adoption. 

My dad never shared my curiosity about his birth mother.  To him, he has a mom and a dad who both had brown hair, who were (and are) good strong Mormons of pioneer stock, who were poor but gave more love than I can fathom.  My grandmother adored children and took in those who needed her love and care.  My dad was one of those kids and was so blessed to be adopted by Elmer and Tressa Hatch, of Springville Utah.  Grandma and Grandpa Hatch gave my dad the blessing of being a Mormon, of examples of hard work and sacrifice, of love and kindness, of a happy childhood, of unwavering support and confidence, of adoring brothers and sisters, and, later, loving grandparents to his children.   They gave me the blessing of the opportunity to learn about the LDS Church, the blessing of their examples, my pioneer ancestry, and their love.  Because of them my dad is the amazing dad he is.  I can’t imagine what my dad’s life would have been like had he not been adopted.  I thank God for the red-haired woman who let my dad be raised by grandma and grandpa.

My mom did not have such a happy childhood.  When she was nineteen, she found herself pregnant and unmarried, with no chance to marry the father of the child she was carrying.  There was a woman - a kind and loving source of strength to my mother since she was a child -  who was LDS and who suggested my mom give the baby up for adoption through LDS Adoption Services.  My mother should really be telling this story.  Anyway, the point is that my mom started going to church to see how her baby would be raised.  Later, she was baptized.

I am so grateful to be a Mormon.  It is because of my faith that I have everything that is dear to me, and it is because of adoption that I have my faith.  So thank goodness for adoption.  

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Study Music

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The Rules

In our house, we have rules.  They're not too strict, and they're not written in stone - or even written down, until now - but they exist.  And here they are.

The Rules:

1. Hot dogs, canned pasta, and boxed mac and cheese are not consumed here.  But ice cream, cookies, apple crisp, pie, etc. are encouraged.  By Dorothy and Summer.

2. No Disney.  Veggie Tales, Sesame Street, and Teletubbies are acceptable.

3. You may not mix up there, their, and there.  The punishment for breaking this rule is merciless teasing.
UPDATE:  I thought I fixed the theres, but apparently I didn't.  Feel free to tease me.

4.  Back up your argument with sound reasoning.  Logical fallacies, formal or informal are not tolerated. This includes the appeal to emotion.

5.  No eating outside the kitchen if you're under three feet tall.  There is no punishment for breaking this rule.

6.  No legalese or otherwise pretentious language.

7.  You may not exit the shower without drying off first.

8.  Be nice.  To everyone.  (We're working on this, especially in the contexts of driving and nursery.)

9.  Get the amount of sleep appropriate for your age group.

10.  Work hard, unless your name is Summer or you're having a bad day.

It's been so interesting to watch our little family culture develop.  There are so many rules I'd like to be there but are not, like "read lots and lots of books" or "never leave crap out on the kitchen counter."  I want to do a lot of things better and keep improving our family and develop great traditions.  But I like us, as imperfect as we are.  And, as silly as some of our rules are, I like them, too.

I'm curious - what are your family rules?

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Off

Summer read her first word today.  She was sitting on a chair playing with a CD case for Microsoft Home and Office saying "off...off...off...on off, on off."  Dorothy got really excited when she realized that Summer was was pointing at the word "office" while she was saying this.  I wasn't sure if this was for real, so I got out the "Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed" book (apparently this is where she learned to read the word "off" in the first place) and made Summer point to "off."  She did it!  So, little Summer can read "off."

We reenacted part of the event for you:

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Nathaniel's Weekly Update -- Installment 2 (last one was a year ago)

This was supposed to be the coolest week ever, and it ended up being super poopy.  Let me tell you about it.  

I didn't have any classes this week.  Sweet, right?  Yeah, should have been sweet.  Last Sunday night Dorothy and I, in our "weekly" planning session (that happens more like once every four months), decided that I would spend the whole day at school Monday through Thursday.  This would give me plenty of time to get caught up in my classes and maybe give me a fighting chance to pass my finals.  Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were all going to be spent chilling with some of our favorite friends in California.  Seems like a great plan, doesn't it?  Work really hard for the first half of the week, play really hard for the second half.

Well, Monday I spent pretending to be a research assistant by trying to do some research (I figured that was a pretty good way to pretend).  I figured I had about 10 hours worth of work to get done and that I could be finished with it by the end of Monday.  Well, plot spoiler, it's 8 pm on Saturday night and I'm still sitting in the law library trying to divine a better method for pretending to be a research assistant.  So, what happened in between?

Dorothy got strep throat on Tuesday.  Yeah, I thought only little kids got that.  Turns out (according to the doctor), kids Summer's age almost never get it but adults are fair game.  Unfortunately, Summer, while protected from the awful hell Dorothy has been going through, got something that is apparently not strep throat but that causes a fever, coughing, runny nose, ear infection and tonsil swelling.  So, I spent the bulk of Tuesday through Thursday taking care of my girls.  When I wasn't doing that, I pretended to be a research assistant again.  

We cancelled our would-have-been-awesome trip to California.  Instead, I spent all of Friday in the library playing pretend.  Friday night, Dorothy and I went and watched the Social Network, which I 100%ly recommend.  And today (Saturday), I've been alone with my self in the library.  Over the last couple of hours I've noticed this nagging pain in my throat.  Can't wait to get diagnosed on Monday.  Oh, and not only have I not got caught up on my classes, I haven't done any of the reading for Monday.  

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Exciting News! - for people who care where Nathaniel is going to work next summer

Nathaniel accepted an offer with Jones Day in DC!  Nathaniel loved the firm and is excited to spend ten weeks there next summer.  The interviewing process, from what I could tell, was a lot like dating.  The law students check out the firms and the firms check out the law students, while both sides do their best to impress.  Of course, unlike dating, the firms have significantly greater bargaining power.  Or maybe that is like dating if you're dating out of your league?Anyway, if they like his work as a summer associate, they'll ask him to come back after he graduates.  If not, we're in trouble!  But we won't worry about that right now.  We're just grateful everything worked out and we're excited to go back to DC this summer.  

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Muzzle

Ready for some random thoughts?  Let’s do this.

Yesterday in WalMart, Summer wiggled out of her lap belt.  I slowly stopped the cart as she stood up.  I told her to sit down.  She promptly sat down on the back rest, out of my reach.  As I was walking around the cart to pick her up, she fell back into the main part of the cart.  Her screams were deafening.  I counted about five people who saw the whole thing.  As  I consoled Summer, I wondered how it was possible that I am allowed to be a parent.  As in, shouldn’t they have a class on how to properly strap your child into a shopping cart before you can be allowed to have complete responsibility for a human being?
Summer was fine.

I didn’t get a job I really wanted.  I’m okay with that for two reasons: first, there were 73 applicants, so they didn’t even look at people like me who don’t have bar results yet.  Even if I really wanted to take the rejection personally, I couldn't.  Second, though the hours would be flexible, it was full-time, which would have been rough.   Staying home is great in a lot of ways, especially now that Nathaniel decided to take it a little easier at school and give me a break from  Summer for a couple of hours every day.  I have the best husband in the world.  Sorry, TAMN.  It’s true.

You know how people who cook fall into two categories, bakers and, um, cooks?  Well, they do, and I decided I’m a baker.  Cooking is great because I can eat whatever I want and it provides a fantastic sense of accomplishment.  But when I measure baking powder and sift flour, when I create the perfect pastry cream or crust, when I pop something into the oven and then check it for that golden-brown color, all the craziness of life just fizzles away and my mind is clear and I am calm.  Way less stressful than, say, making lasagna. 

Speaking of suspect self-classifications, I love this article from the New York Times.  I remember in junior high trying to decide if I was right- or left-brained, and thinking that I was a little bit of both.  I think I was the only one in my class who said that.  The teacher even tried to teach to our supposed right- and left-brained tendencies.  Same for a high-school physics teacher who gave us a quiz to figure out what our learning styles were.  I just decided that I would be different from everyone else in my group and be auditory. 

We are sort of decorating our apartment, and it definitely looks better than any other apartment we’ve been in.  Of course, that’s not saying much.  I don’t have a color scheme or a theme or any words on the walls, but we do have a filing cabinet that we’re using as a side table, and I did make an ottoman.  With Velcro.  It’s ghetto.  I want to take a picture of our little living area and post it, but I want it to be “finished” before I do, and considering our moving history and how often I have days in which I do pretty much nothing, finished will never happen.  But here is a link to the sofa we bought, if you’re interested.  We paid 1/7^th of the price.  And there was a big rip in the middle seam but Nathaniel bought heavy-duty thread and an upholstery needle and sewed it up perfectly and it looks awesome.  See?  I really do have the best husband in the world. 

I still like the Smashing Pumpkins.  Muzzle is my favorite song.  It has been since I was in eighth grade.  I also still wear t-shirts, jeans, and converse like I did in the eighth grade.   Luckily, I don't live in Vernal, Utah anymore.  So things do change for the better.  

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Um, What's a Blog?

So in the past few months, I've flown to Utah, taken the bar, flown back to DC, driven to Utah, moved into an apartment, and supported a husband in his first week of law review.  During that time, I've completely forgotten how to live my life.  Today I made crappy no-bakes.  I haven't cooked dinner in a week.  And I haven't blogged.  What kind of SAHM am I?

So here is a Summer update.  She's basically the cutest, sweetest, funnest (yes, that's a word), smartest, and all around bestest (also a word) little girl in the whole world.  We just adore her.  She says everything now, which makes communicating with Nathaniel difficult.  We have to spell words like outside and chalk and trailer (we got a bike trailer for her).  Her favorite things are trash, trucks, birds, dolls, and ice cream.  I had no idea a fifteen-month old girl could be so obsessed with trucks.  We put hers in her crib, along with all her stuffed animals, and I swear she just plays with it for half an hour before she wakes up.  And if she's in her carseat and can see trucks, she's happy.

Here are a few pictures.  Please don't make fun of her hair.  It's a sensitive subject for me.  I don't know what to do with it.  Any ideas would be appreciated.

My brother bought a drum set for his daughter and Summer had a go:

Summer really loves the bunny:

For the first time ever, Summer ran away from the camera rather than trying to grab it.  But it's okay.  She came back.

Yep, we're keeping her.  

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Slightly Disappointed

Ever since Summer was teeny tiny, I have desperately wanted to know what she was thinking.  So I did everything I could to encourage her to talk as soon as possible.  I read to her all the time.  I talked to her even when she was a blob and she had no idea that my voice was in any way distinguishable from the sound of a vacuum cleaner.  I took Omega 3 supplements.

And  I got lucky.  Summer talks.  All the time.  And do you want to know what's going on in the head of this little girl?

"Button.  Light.  Flower.  Button.  Hi.  Ouch.  No.  Eyes.  Ice.  Clock.  Dot.  Button.  Bug.  Ball.  Ball.  Ball.  Pool.  Dog.  Kitty kitty.  Trees.  Shoes.  Daddy.  Dance.  Block.  Button.  Light.  Yes.  Ball.  Dog.  Danny (the Schaerr's son).  Eat.  Apa.  Baby.  Down.  Up.  Button.  Toes.  Poo.  Bye.  Out.  Dot.  Book.  Door.  Moon.  Dirt.  Hat.  Hair.  Earring.  Nose. Button..."

Repeat.

Repeat.

Repeat.

I don't know what I was expecting.  Maybe, "Mommy, I love you.  You are so good at doing what you do and I really appreciate it."  Or "A couple of years ago, I was living with Our Father in Heaven and He said..." Or even, "Mama."

But random nouns and prepositions are cool, too.

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Neglect

Dear Blog,

I've been a bad blogger as of late.  I've been neglecting you.  I'm sorry.

I have a good excuse, though.  I'm studying for the bar.  It's really hard because I'm doing it my myself, instead of paying thousands of dollars for a class.  And if I don't pass, I'll die of shame.  So I won't really be spending much time with you until after I take it, which happens the last week of July.

Don't feel bad.  You're certainly not the only area of my life that I've been neglecting.  I haven't exercised for months.  The only pants I can wear have holes or were made for doing yoga.

So don't feel bad.

Love,  Dorothy

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13 Months

Summer is 13 months old today.  Martha, the woman we're staying with, told Nathaniel that little Summer has grown a ton this past month.  I didn't realize it before, but now I can see it.  Here is a sampling of her milestones:

Walking.  This girl is walking pretty well.  When we got here, it was a few toddles and lots of falls.  Now, her falls are more rare, and therefore funnier.  She can also go pretty fast, which is great for those "I'm going to get you" games.

Talking.  Summer talks.  The cutest thing is the talking that just sounds like she's speaking her own foreign language, complete with lots of different sounds and voice inflections.  But she also says several words, including ball, tree, "what's that?" eyes, button, dog, eat, book, dot, no, yes, clock, and apa (water in Romanian).  She understands plenty of words and phrases as well, like "give mommy the _______", "turn around," fingers, toes, chair, tongue, "where do you want to go?" "give ________ a kiss," "where's Summer?" (after which she covers her face with her hands" and "I'm going to get you."  It's fun stuff to see her grow.

Um, I don't know what other milestones there are besides mobility and speech.

Anyways, this girl loves to move.  People always says stuff like, "wow, she's a wiggly one," or "I don't think I've ever seen her still."  We use Nathaniel's big leather belt to strap her into her high chair, which sometimes keeps her from getting one leg out of the high chair or attempting to crawl onto the kitchen table.  Now that she can walk, there is a lot of moving going around.  I don't really mind it, except during Church.  I think we're going to start to lay down the law.  I feel really bad for anyone who wanted a pleasant Sacrament Meeting.

She loves books.  I frequently find her just sitting down, flipping the pages and pointing at the pictures, while talking to herself in that special language of hers.

This girl is adorable.  She just has the sweetest smile that brightens everyone's day.  Summer is a joy.

Pictures Later.

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