October!

Yes. I believe in ghosts.

They haunt me all the time. The ghosts of my former self. The ghosts of my fairly-recent-self. The ghosts of my untold-future.

There's the shadow of nineteen year old me who fell madly in love with an older, gigantic BYU offensive lineman and who, when it became painfully certain he didn't share the sentiments, went on a desperate stalking phase, a phase so wildly consumed it would be illegal had it been brought to the public's attention.

(There she is again, dating/kissing/stalking this guy at the cost of some vital relationships. Oh the agony!)

And who, in that same year, had a friend's father who unexpectedly died and that ghost couldn't get herself to cross her dear friend's doorstep because she felt so overwhelmingly insecure about what to say and how to console at such a painful hour.

I have been visited by the ghost of my high school past who should've/could've/would've gotten that English Sterling Scholar award, after the adviser strongly advised her to go after it, but was too scared to think she was smart enough. And who also should have been nicer to her boyfriend because he was really a funny guy and he didn't have long to surf this world's waves of mortality.

There have been sightings of myself as early as last week, self-absorbed in late-term pregnancy woes. She visited me just last night, making me resort to a stuttering apology to Chup.
"I've just been so SELFISH lately. I am so SORRY. I don't know what's GOTTEN IN TO ME."
(Except, I soberly confess, I know exactly what's gotten into me...)

And on some evenings, after the raucousness of bedtime is over, I'll creep into my children's rooms and whisper in their warm ears, "I am sorry I am messing you up! I promise I don't mean to. It's just what happens when an imperfect woman tries to raise perfect children!" Those are the nights when I've been checked by the spirit of my future and I'm left to realize there's nothing to be done. There's nothing to be done! I will be that mom. And that mom . . . and that mom.

(You know, the one wearing the muu-muu at carpool?)

Yes, I believe in ghosts except, my ghosts don't say "BOO!" they say, "DOH!" and "DUH!" and they really don't care about my silly adventures, my experiments, my daring escapades. No, these ghosts only visit to remind me to be nice to people . . . and to myself.


Thanks for the haunts, October.


photo Jed Wells

What? You wanted to see some outtakes?



And one more, with belly, looking . . . scared? Spooked? Suspicious?:



It is a tradition here on my blog that I write a fictionally non-fiction Halloween-themed story. It's so fun (smoking ghosts! a tent! Charles Dickens!) except, this year I can't breathe when I sit down to type and so, I am posting a better option for us all, Stephanie Mabey's IF I WERE A ZOMBIE video which you will LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! AND WATCH TWENTY TIMES! It's spooky and quirky and perfect for your house party tonight!
(Also it's a free download here!)

Happy Halloween you non-brain-eating zombies!

Best Blogging Week Ever: Halloween Edition

Halloween + early onset puberty=two themes of my life . . . scary themes, actually.




Thanks for watching ghouls!

Could This Be Considered A Book Review Post?

Today we went to DI  to buy some supplies for Ever's Halloween costume, just me and my boy. He found a blue robot in the dumpy toys section and insisted on having it for good. I like his track record of taking care of his robot collection. Most of them are treated pretty well, I'd almost say with skilled sophistication. And I've made a mental note that the only robots to survive the toy basket so far are the ones we've picked up from second hand stores and dumpster bins. Dumpster bins, that's daddy's business.

He was so cute and pleasant and the afternoon was so bright and brisk as we left the store, I decided on ice cream. Bubble Gum ice cream from Baskin Robbins. No, not for me. Mine was an enriching cup of peanut butter chocolate. If you are a BR fan, you know those are the only two flavors. Everything else is just sugar-coated churned fat in a tub.

The thing is, my boy here, he's not my baby to be packed and played with anymore. He's sorta my dude. He's like a little buddy piece. We have conversations now. We laugh at the same jokes. He likes to massage my back. I like to wipe his bubble gum ice cream face with wet wipes. 

He made me read that soaking wet emotional toddler drama, "Love You Forever" before bed tonight. Ugh. I told Chup we're going to throw that one away (in the dumpster bin) because it makes me get teary as if I DON'T HAVE A CHOICE. That's sick manipulation, is what that book is. I don't really love it when the boy's mom has to call him to say, "Hello? I'm dying? Want to come over and hold me one last time?" because why wasn't the boy already aware? And then when he does show up she can't . . . finish . . . the lullaby . . . because . . .

So help me, if this boy ever forgets me in my old age--after I bought him a lifetime of robots and bubble gum ice cream--I will haunt him from my grave.

FROM MY GRAVE.
(with love, of course)


At the beginning of the week I got a request from my editor Aaron Shill from the Des News, "Will you write a column about why you don't like the term Mommy Blogger?" and I said I would. As I wrote it this morning I decided this was my last attempt at explaining why I don't like the term. It took me four hours to write that piece of editorial pie and meanwhile my kids were running around without pants. Just not worth the fight anymore. So let it be written, so let it be published. Oh, it was published. Here's the link.

And now, I rest my case.

Faith Soup

 
Last Friday night The Chief stopped eating.

He told me he wanted pizza for dinner, so I made a phone call to Chup who produced a hot cheese pizza in mere minutes. If only parenting were always so convenient . . .

But when my three year old son came to the dinner table to eat his selected meal, he announced,

"Pizza is ouchy."

And he didn't eat another solid piece of food for a week.

A week.

We thought it was his teeth.

"Do your teeth hurt?" we prodded. We poked. We made him open his mouth a million times.

"No!" he'd wail.

"Is it your throat, does your throat hurt?" we'd point to his neck to identify the throat area.

"No!"

We bought him his favorite treats, snacks and tempting sugary things. Apples, potatoes, fries. Toast, cheese, noodles in warm soup.

"No! No! No! OUCHY!" he'd protest.

By Sunday we were genuinely worried. At meal times Chup would stare at me and I'd stare at Chup and we'd communicate looks that said, "WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO?"

I thought of everything, from flu to diabetes. From constipation to cancer. I let myself take mental shots of fear--over and over until I was utterly drunk from anxiety. I tried not to talk about it to others because it was raising a lot of, "Oh, I would be worried"--type commenting crops.

Sometimes I forget there is so much more to parenting then seeing a problem and fixing it. Along with being worried for my child, I was also worried I wasn't competent enough to help him. I wanted to take him in to see a doctor, a specialist, a whatever, just to rid myself of the shame. I wasn't so afraid of him being sick as I was of me being helpless to help him.

Finally I let myself be quiet long enough to hear the sense in my spirit.

He's fine. He'll eat when he's ready.

So I calmed myself down knowing that if something were to be wrong, I'd feel that too. And even though faith-based parenting can be as overwhelming as fear-based parenting, (so many "what ifs?" to overcome, as in "what if this goes on for two weeks, two months, two years?") I decided to give it a try.

Chup bought him some vitamin packages to mix in with his milk consumption. I allowed him to eat soft sherbet when he wanted. He drank Janna's grape juice and seemed to have a perfectly functioning digestive system all the while.

And exactly one week later, on the next Friday night, the kid inexplicably ate a healthy helping of tortellini. And he's been eating like a ravenous, brown-eyed wolf ever since.

Which leads me to ask myself, about this parenting thing, what exactly am I so afraid of?

On the Last Warm Day of the Year

Last week I spoke to a BYU class on the theory of blogging. It was perhaps the highlight of my career. I didn't really speak as much as discuss--with a classroom full of bright minds and curious students--the criticisms and ideas of the portrayal of life in the virtual world. I was infused with new energy about doing what I do, which is I suppose, to write the experience.

(You can read more about that experience here.)


“And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”
― Sylvia Plath

The weather report told us it was the last warm day for awhile. Tuesday was going to bring in a wet storm front and usher in the brisk. It was our last chance to go short-sleeved and flip flopped. Until next year, perhaps.

We picked up a bag of apples from Allred's stand on University and honey wheat bread from Great Harvest. Ever and The Chief had a mobile lunch of bread and apples as we ran errands and finished a few business transactions in the car.

Later in the afternoon Ever slept upstairs while I--trying to get work done--battled the warm spell from my living room. I lost. I woke up when I heard Ever saying, "OUT!" from her crib.

Ever's vocabulary is the highlight of my life.

After a small mix of lemon and Coke with a few cooling ice cubes, we went for a walk in last of daylight. The sun had made trail marks of orange and pink across the sky. The Chief asked, "Is the sun going good night?"

"Soon!" I replied as I pushed the stroller over the leaf-coated sidewalk. My gait is more side to side these days. I walk like I hurt. But the very act of walking has always been empowering to me, more so at 39 weeks pregnant.

Ever spotted every pumpkin on every decorated porch, "punkin! punkin!" And we welcomed Brother and Sister West's newest scarecrow into the neighborhood. The boys were out playing flag football by Mindy's house and we greeted Roger Larsen home from a week in Cedar City.

Then The Chief said, "Let's go home."

On our way we stopped by Janna's to eat some dried pears and picked up Maya in her black and hot pink princess fairy costume. Back at home there was a bowl of granola for dinner with bananas and peaches. It's been a simple culinary season around here.

After a very brief Family Home Evening we--the drowsy parents--introduced an early bedtime. Then Chup and I retreated downstairs to the den, watching end of the World Series game five--a game we're invested in only because my parents live in St. Louis now. Better luck Wednesday, Cards.

On the news people were being interviewed about the oncoming cold front.

"Are you ready?" they asked people on the street.

"Yes," I answered in my head. Last Saturday was spent shelving the bags of swimming gear and beach towels, replacing their spot in the Green Room with tubs of coats, gloves, hats and boots.

I finished the day thinking in bed. I'm learning to put a cap on my thoughts, as sometimes I think too much and bridge gaps of concern with unnecessary resolutions. I am seeking less for answers and more for the cognizance of unfettered gratitude.

Yes, I am ready.

Best Blogging Week Ever: OUR BIG ANNOUNCEMENT

We've been working on it for about six months now!

That really is an awful freeze frame of me, shoot.
See also: A Mormon's Guide to Surviving the Election.

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

Five Things I Believe About Myself

It's Wednesday, my kids are Wubbzy-ing up on the iPad. My husband is scrubbing the kitchen floor, I just finished a Deseret News column in record timing, and now I have a killer lower back pain that is asking for my attention. In honor of all this I am going to write five things I believe about myself:

1. I am a good cleaner. My house is usually clean enough for me. I like to pick up, scrub and organize. I'm pretty happy with my state of living, it's not always tidy but it's always getting attention. And I get really excited to take on projects of this nature (except: cleaning the kitchen floor).

2. I am not a social human being. I have a few close friends who I spill my guts out to on occasion, but in general I like being at home with my family and my bathtub. I watched one of my favorite creepy movies the other day, "The Others" and I laughed when Nicole Kidman says something like, "Quiet is something we prize highly in this house." That's sorta me. I live for quiet time.

3. Cultural dishonesty annoys me. I can't go with the flow very often if the flow makes no sense to me. Of course I could get into specifics, but Wubbzy can only last so long. Another day?


4. The older I get the less impressed I am. With ideals I mean. I am still impressed with the view I see out my window every morning--a spectrum of fall foliage on the gigantic Y mountain--or my children's ability to grow before my VERY EYES. Or how my husband is using his back right now to mop up every spot on the kitchen floor. Genuine people impress me all the time, but as for ideals? They never fail to disappoint.

5. I am capable. I was on the phone with my mom last night talking about motherhood and I said to her, "I've been through some tough times Mom and I never felt you were overly concerned about me. I always felt like you had confidence that I'd figure it out." And she said to me, "You were born with an independent spirit. And I've always trusted your experience." But when I was in bed last night I thought about that statement and while it may be true, I think my mom and dad really directed me to be a strong, capable, conscientious person. They never cultured dependence in me (other than on my Creator). I also think it's a product of being a middle child, what are you going to do?

Well, enough about me. On to the day.

p.s. a couple weeks ago my sister Page and I attended a seminar in Salt Lake called, LDS Female Sexuality with Dr. Jennifer Finlayson-Fife. Uh, it was incredible. I thought I'd share the Mormon Stories podcast link with you. It's basically the same information as the seminar. Go here. Enjoy!

*photo, Jed Wells outtake.

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

Checking In With Myself: Today

 

Today I realized Ever is talking. All her words are real words. And she sings a lot too. She broke a picture frame, a glass bowl containing hair clips and a ceramic pot in under one hour. Which means, she also broke her own record of how many things she can destroy in one hour. I can't get enough of her though, she's like my own bag of tricks.

The Chief has learned the word "stupid" and in trying to explain why we don't "use that word" I looked at Chup for some help. I use that word. He uses that word. Why does it sound so foul coming out of my three-year old's mouth? It's, well, stupid.



Chup has been so incredible lately, I get all teary when I think of him. He's so sweet and patient with me as I roll around and bark orders. This morning we sat in bed with his hand on my belly feeling the inner soccer star Squishy shooting goals at my ribcage. Maybe that's too personal a moment to share on a blog, but I don't want to forget it. Also, tonight Chup made dinner for three families. And then did the dishes afterward. I should quit blogging right now so I can go smooch his face . . .


As for me, I had a meeting with the mayor wherein I used the term "crowning" which makes me right on course for somehow always dropping inappropriate words during official meetings. I got to visit with my cousin Jayne's new baby boy George, who has the courage to be dashingly handsome at just a few weeks old. And I reorganized a closet. The best part of pregnancy for me is nesting. I do everything in double time.

And the kicking. I like that too. I always miss the kicking when the baby finally comes. And speaking of Squishy . . . I feel like the babe has dropped.

Which has to mean we're getting close.

We'll see what tomorrow brings.



*pictures taken at the pumpkin patch at Vineyard Nursery (Grants Plants)

Look what your money can buy you. RYAN INNES!

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

Sufficient Grace

Self-portrait taken of me right before I went into the studio. I was flu-ish. Checking for boogs. You know.

Infertility is so much more than not having a baby in your arms.

That's why you can't hand your crying baby to the infertile woman at church and say things like, "Here, this will make you feel better. Aren't you glad you don't have to put up with this?"

The woman experiencing infertility doesn't want your baby. Certainly, your baby is squishy and lovely (even when crying) and smells so nice, but that's not it. That's not even a consolation.

Nor is saying to your infertile neighbor, "You should just adopt. If you adopt I swear you'd get pregnant. It's happened to like, three of my friends/relatives/coworkers."

Because, that's not it either. It's not about achieving some ends to a means. It's not about belittling adoption so you can achieve a pregnancy.

And adoption is not a scientific cure for infertility--and it's not an emotional cure either.

Infertility is an all encompassing state of being. It has the force to completely take over the core of a woman's belief about who she is and what she is capable of. It's not about having a biological baby or an adopted baby or a foster baby, it's about feeling whole even if no baby ever comes at all.

It's about overcoming those days when you are called to repentance (by well-meaning family members, or ladies at church) for "lacking the faith to conceive" or for being selfish because "what is taking you so long to have a baby?"

It's being able to love your body even though it's not functioning in a fertile way. It's about ignoring the statements like, "if you lost weight you'd get pregnant," or "the clock is ticking! you're getting too old," or "I don't know what the problem is, my husband looks at me wrong and I'm pregnant!"

It's the determination that no matter how family-friendly our culture is, or how valuable we pronounce motherhood or how we like to say well-meaning things like, "we're all mothers!" that the truth is we are all daughters of a loving Heavenly Father. And that isolated characteristic is mighty powerful in its own course. Anything else added to it is cherry, but not necessary for our eternal self-esteem.

My own battle with infertility ripped me apart. In those heavy years I felt every emotion given to mankind to feel. Jealously like a furious ocean. Anger, rage and self-directed disappointment. It wasn't just the inability to conceive, it was the inability to believe in myself.

There was a lot of misunderstanding everywhere I went.

BUT. There is a belief structure that we preach in our church based on a scripture in the Book of Mormon it says:

Ether 12:27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

If we come unto Christ, He will make our weaknesses strengths.

I'm not talking about being infertile for five years and then pregnant for the next four (which, as it turns out has happened in my experience). My weakness wasn't infertility which was washed away by strong fertility.

My weakness was not seeing who I really was, with or without a baby. I could only see myself as a person who wanted. I was incomplete. And upon getting (miraculously) pregnant I didn't suddenly understand, but somehow along the way I could see how the Lord took me by my hand and showed me my strength:

I am a daughter of God, and therefore entitled to intelligence, creativity, joy, inspiration and beyond. These are my strengths. Real strengths.

That is not to say there aren't residual wounds that came because of that inner turmoil (I am still working on forgiving some of those "helpful" remarks . . .) I feel I'll never get over the entire experience completely. And I suppose this is a post easier to write on the eve of having my third child. But I remember saying to myself during those extremely lonely years, "I want hope more than I want a baby." I didn't mean hope that someday I'd conceive, I meant hope that someday it wouldn't be so painful to be me.

This past week I was asked by Studio 5 to be a guest on their Sensitivity Training segment. They asked me to speak about how to talk to someone experiencing infertility. During the interview I said a phrase I didn't get to really explain "there's light at the end of the tunnel." It sounds so cliche and trite out of context. I didn't mean conception.

I meant: the light at the end of the tunnel comes when the light inside of yourself illuminates who you really are, and what you're really capable of.

That's when infertility becomes less about having a baby in your arms and more about gratitude for having experienced it.


Thanks Stephanie, Brooke and Darin, til we meet again at Broadcast House!

We made our goal in just 3 days, thanks to you. BUT, 5k is just a tiny part of our budget, which means YOU CAN STILL DONATE! And there are some lovely incentives waiting for you. CHECK IT OUT!

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

Sister Wife Week in Review

The Horror! has reached Retro House.
A ghost in the hallway appears!


A black cat with a wet nose!


A maniacal pumpkin face!


Ever Jane peering around corners . . . waiting to make unforgiving messes!


But gravy! Look at those piggies!



Happy Weekend Everyone!
Sister Wife and I are on Instagram as: CJaneKendrick

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

Best Blogging Week Ever: Say My Name

In this VERY SPECIAL VLOG you will see Mindy Gledhill (with baby Griffin) and me singing the names of RCS donors to a tune Justin Hackworth made up on the spot. You think he's good with a camera? Just wait to see him on a guitar.

Sarah Wiley opted not to share her untouched violin and though we tried to convinced her otherwise, she felt she was better suited to Mindy's tambourine.

Now listen, I kinda lose it at the end (NOT KINDA) because I know Mindy is about to sing about my mom, and I know my mom is a generous fan of my vlogs and it suddenly made me explosively happy to think about my mom in Missouri hearing Mindy Gledhill and me in a duet, sing her name.

So that's what that's about.

And yes, I do wear my Queen of Provo crown at all official events. Please get used to it. Royal duties, ok? (You probably wouldn't understand...)


HUGE THANKS TO TIFFANY BAUMSTARK for her kind contribution--we wish would've seen it in time for the vlog. Next time?

You can still donate! SO GREAT!

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

More Like, FUNraising.

Someone once commented years ago, "C. Jane you seem to get sick a lot."

And that comment killed me because I always felt so proud of my healthy heritage.

For years I've felt insecure about blogging when feeling under the weather. Isn't that funny? I have lived a life where I care so much about what people--a stranger no less--thinks about my health situation?

I am currently undertaking a very serious pledge to myself to stop caring what other people think of me, or shall I phrase it: I am working on my pride. And let me tell you something, the minute I started praying and dedicating myself to this cause, the world opened up and I've been tested and tried to pieces. For instance, this *picture floating around on the internet:

What? Haven't you seen nostrils on a nine month pregnant woman before?

Or this one, I've had to say to myself, THOSE THIGHS ARE FINE! SO WHAT YOU CANT ZIP UP YOUR BOOTS! WHO CARES! Over and over in my head:

Anyway, I have to remind myself regularly to unplug all the inputs of vanity, selfishness and egotism plugging my soul. I am working on being a good human being who cares more about compassion, charity and hope than perfection.

Which leads me to say, I am sick.

I've got that transition into fall/winter cold. You know what I am talking about don't you? Runny nose one second, stuffy the next. Heaviness in the chest area (as if I haven't felt that since I was ten), itchy eyes one second, watery the next. And a whole lot of sneezing. Which means, at this point in gestation, a whole lot of losing bladder control.

I slept 1.5 hours last night. It wasn't even tossing and turning. It was cursing and cussing.

Chup is a hero, you know. He took charge of me. He made me stay down this morning and let me sleep. I know what you are thinking, WISH I HAD THAT LUXURY. But the man has been traveling about the country doing speeches and I've been alone for the past few weeks carrying on without him with a body so completely unbend-able and a job so desperately dependent on bending over (put on little shoes, take off little shoes, put on a diaper, pick up the toys, pick up the child, put child down again...) So take back your guilt trip and don't forget your flip flops.

Is that my pride getting all hot in that last paragraph? Did I detect some defensiveness? Tsk, tsk! We've got work to do C. Jane!

I slept until ten o'clock and then I woke up with a panic. I didn't want to sleep all day! I didn't even want to be sick all day! I rolled over and opened my laptop. No, today I was going to do some good.


Today I am going to raise money for the Rooftop Concert Series, I decided. So I got to work, obnoxiously spilling out tweet after facebook status update until we started to see some movement on our Kickstarter page. My goal, I committed to reach was $1000 in pledges in one day.

By noon we were over half way there. By 4pm we were done. Goal achieved.

But I was still hot. So I upped the ante to $2,000, increased my tweeting and facebooking and by about 9:30pm we had surpassed that goal too.

I guess you should know I love you, people who donated. People who forwarded links. People who retweeted. People who were really annoyed with all my tweeting and facebooking but kept with me anyway. I can't even write this dang post because I keep going to check our Kickstarter page to see where we're at with the pledges. (We're about 45% funded! $2,270 SMOKES! IN ONE DAY!)


NOTE TO THE MASSES: if you have a highly addictive personality, don't start a Kickstarter page! You will habitually hit refresh on your page like a smoker to his pipe. (I am Mormon, did I use that analogy properly?)

Anyway, I am sick so I should probably hit the sack. Plus, I am going to be on Studio 5 tomorrow discussing what NOT to say to a woman experiencing infertility (and a little bit about what you SHOULD say). With all this going on, you're probably thinking, why aren't you hitting the sack yet C. Jane?

Oh right, but I don't care what you think of my sleeping habits.





By the way, Mindy Gledhill has agreed to help me sing all the names of donors who have given to our Kickstarter page in my vlog for Friday. If you would like us to sing your name in this VERY SPECIAL VLOG you'll need to donate before 9:00pm (mst) Thursday night. JHack will be doing some light guitar in the background and we're trying to persuade Sarah Wiley to pick up the violin she hasn't touched in twenty years. So, like I said, VERY SPECIAL VLOG.

To donate, click here.

*also it should be said, JHack's photography is always honest, which means sometimes I really have to own up to myself and my image. I am a lucky girl to have such a photographer in my life.

One dollar gets you a warm glow in your heart. $500 gets you your own private Fictionist concert. No kidding. Donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012!

I Saw The Light

Want to donate to the Rooftop Concert Series 2012? Click HERE!
 
The first thing you should know is that I ate a lot of chocolate. Bad chocolate. The kind of chocolate that is only borderline cocoa, but mostly wax. And I ate it all day long as I looked out my window at the rain.

How is this last Rooftop Concert going to go? Will anyone show? Should we cancel?

And it was so cold too. Cold and wet. At some point Chup and I drove down to the venue to see how the set up was carrying on. We found everyone huddled under the canopy tents, shrouded in rain gear and looking hopeless.

If we go under the parking garage like we said we would, is the sound going to be okay? Will it make a comfortable fit for a crowd? How will we move all those cars that have already parked in their spaces for the day? ANd how long will it take to take all the equipment and start the set up all over again?

I was so stressed about it I actually told Chup I had to go shopping. I had exhausted my ability to inhale more chocolate and so I upgraded my disorder from stress eating to retail therapy.

Boots. A nice new pair of boots or a sparkly shirt should do the trick.

But while at the mall we'd pass by shops and see the rain coming down constantly outside. I purchased a flesh-colored sparkly shirt, I tried on a couple pairs of boots, but still I felt a panic.

Then Sarah Wiley texted me, "We're moving down. We're moving all the cars. We're doing this."

Which meant that she had hunted down, located and asked all the owners of the cars in the parking garage to move their cars because we had a concert to put on. Have I told you how incredible she is? By the time I arrived on scene we had ourselves a venue.

Which solved our first problem, our second problem?
Would you show up?

Oh heck yes you did:

I could have cuddled with all of you.

And though we were forced to start later, we still enjoyed a few tunes from that dazzling Stephanie Mabey:


And also from dashing Dustin Christensen:



We also heard from our good sponsors, Platinum Salon and my own stylist, Ashlee Wilcken aka I love her:


(Don't forget to call Platinum and ask for the C. Jane special with participating stylists,
$15 off a color and
$20 off a skin treatment!
Yesssss!)

Then, somehow, I was crowned Queen of Provo by Mayor Curtis (and PR Director Helen Anderson) which, as far as I am concerned could have ended the whole night. I mean, I was crowned Queen of Provo, what else was left to do?


But no, those Lower Lights had to show up on stage and steal my thunder:




There was some new stuff, some old stuff, some surprising stuff, some Ryan Tanner stuff. All I know is that by the end of the night we were all on our feet, dancing, singing and acting as if all the rain, cold and wet October could throw our way didn't even matter.

And for some, it was the best concert of the entire series.

Can I get an amen?


Or at least a really cool photo with George and Scott?


Not seen: Colton from Communal one flight down cooking P712 pizzas for all our musicians out of their transportable wood stove. I am telling you, the Heirloom Group is outstanding. I can't say enough.

Also not seen: our armies of volunteers. From Thomas and Andrea who set up each week with Joe Andersound to Trilby, Bill and Court in the Green Room (and beyond) to Ariel and Steven Martin, Lauren, Tess, Emily, Scott and ~J. Daren Smith! And so many others. I can't give them enough love in this paragraph to adequately explain how much I appreciated them throughout the entire process.

Also, also not seen: my family for support and love this entire season. Chup, my children, my babysitters and especially Andrew and Megan who came to every concert and helped with sponsorships.

I really did turn into a Queen just now, didn't I?

Oh boy.

Last of all, we now have our DONATION PAGE for the ROOFTOP CONCERT SERIES 2011. I was just looking it over and I'm pretty blown away by the incentives. Your own Fictionist house concert? Your own Justin Hackworth photo shoot? I think there's even one where we send you a poster signed by me. ME! THE QUEEN OF PROVO.

Go check it out (and donate!) click here.

p.s. thanks to all of you who already donated at the concert the other night. So generous! Except you, person who plinked in a few washers. Very sneaky. A pox on your head. Or house?

Whatever they say...



*all photos by the indelible wedding photographer, Justin Hackworth.