I'm it

merideth got me!
not only did she tag me on her blog but posted a comment on mine telling me she did.
and because I have this ridiculous sense of duty, here goes...

5 things i was doing 10 years ago:
1. just completing my 1st quarter at cal-poly san luis obispo
2. and quickly realizing how much harder the quarter system was compared to the jc I was at previously as my gpa dropped below a 3.0 for the 1st time in my life
3. because I was living the fun college life in the dorms (including a lot of middle of the night taco bell runs). I did study. usually at 3am when everyone else was sleeping.
4. parties. parties. parties. and the beach. (just for the record: I was always the sober driver)
5. writing to one of my best friends, a mormon boy who was serving a mission in chile
(I'm now a mormon girl. and he's my husband.)

5 things on my to-do list today:
1. take beckam to gavin's (our babysitting co-op on wed. they went to the aquarium today)
2. exercise. in peace and quiet. (asher slept the whole time--woohoo)
3. clean the bathrooms
4. make a dr. appointment for jaden to have his "staph" infection looked at
(the dr. is the father of one of jaden's friends from school. he made a house call and said it's fine. no need for antibiotics. I hope it goes away soon. it's very annoying.)
5. make butternut squash soup. again. mmm mmmmm.

5 snacks i enjoy:
1. fruit smoothies
(non-fat vanilla yogurt, frozen berries, one banana, frozen tj's pineapple (they're so sweet), a little milk, some protein powder. delish)
2. hummus and pita chips
3. tj's peanut butter pretzels
3. tj's raspberry and chocolate trail mix
4. micah makes awesome milk shakes. cookies and cream ice cream with peanut butter, marshmallow, banana and hot fudge. yummy.
5. lately I love ecco (or perro. like postum.) with biscotti

5 things i would do if i was a billionaire:
1. always pick up the tab when eating out with friends or family
2. donate regularly to good causes
3. pay for strangers meals and perform other random acts of kindness like that. a lot.
(a stranger once secretly bought our dinner at the roof in the joseph smith building. it was our 1 year anniversary dinner and it meant a lot.)
4. buy a house
5. help any family members who needed it (and it would actually help). education. car payments. shopping sprees.

(funny. does this list look familiar sister bear?)

5 of my bad habits:
1. yelling at my kids. hey--that's how I was raised. and it works.
2. I'm a little compulsive about completing my to-do lists. I've mentioned this before. I blame my mother.
3. I think I talk rudely to my husband and kids sometimes, too. I only notice when I hear myself in a 6 or almost 3 year old.
4. micah says, "if you get upset, you don't let things go very easily." he put that very nicely didn't he? luckily, we've been married long enough, that I don't get upset very often. at least with him.
5. I LOVE to go out for lunch. and if I can find good justification, I go. sometimes I invite micah.

5 places i have lived:
1. monterey
2. davis
3. bakersfield
4. san diego
5. hawaii

5 jobs i have had:
1. cpa assistant
2. sales associate at hands gallery
3. manager's assistant at PacBell Yellow Pages
4. academic advisor, BYU-Hawaii, School of Education
(my DREAM job! I LOVED it!)
5. MOM, hardest but most rewarding job EVER!

5 things people don't know about me:
is there anything you don't know about me? here are some interesting things that you probably already know...

1. I'm known in my family as lolly. so much so that

• my mother had to tell me on the first day of kindergarten that my name was cheryl so when they said, "cheryl" I was supposed to answer. (mom is this really true?)

• when I was getting married, my mother asked if I was going to put "lolly" on the invitations. she was afraid that our family wouldn't know who "cheryl" was.

2. in my early childhood, we often had what I realize now may be considered an unusual living situation. my mom was single with four kids. but she was still best friends with her first husband--my "curt daddy"--and the father to the first three kids so sometimes he and Ray (that's why they're no longer married) lived with us. or sometimes auntie and her partner, which sometimes included children, usually lots of dogs and sometimes cats (until the dogs killed them). it made for lots of fun times and great memories.
3. I'm a litte bit of an okie at heart. my grandma is full-fledged and I spent lots of summers with her in oklahoma. so I do enjoy donuts with a coke for breakfast on occasion.
4. in highschool I played on an awesome softball team, was science club treasurer and sr. class pres. (and I married the homecoming king)
5. I have two false teeth. ever noticed? right up front. on either side of my two front teeth. and I had braces for 6 years!

here's the story for anyone interested:

the teeth on either side of my two front teeth didn't develop normally so they pulled them.
then on one side, the "eye" tooth wouldn't come down so they had to attach a chain to it--in my gums--and the other end to the wire on my braces to pull it down.
then they had to move my eye teeth into the right place to make room for my fake teeth.
it was such a long and torturous process.
can you imagine what a disaster this would have been from jr. high through high school?!
I had fake teeth attached to my wire so I didn't look so funny but wow was it an ordeal.
oh and before I got braces, I had a retainer for 2 years with teeth on it that often broke off so I carried super glue with me at all times. and once, in 6th grade I accidentally left for school without my retainer and realized it while I was on the bus. I jumped out of my seat and demanded that the bus driver let me off--I told her I'd forgotten that I had an appointment.
okay and here is the most embarassing story: for a while in high school I had a gap between my front tooth and my eye tooth because they couldn't fit a fake tooth in or something. I was dating this boy who was a big time soccer player and one day when he showed up for practice, his whole team had colored their tooth that I was missing BLACK to make fun of me!! mean, huh?! a really good friend of mine was on the team, too and told me because he was really mad about it. he was the only one who didn't do it!

okay that is the end.
that was actually fun. I just never wanted to take the time to do it.

now I have to tag five people AND leave a comment on their blog telling them that they've been tagged.

so alyson (unless you're having a baby, then you're off the hook), sandee, phoebe, amy d. and tara, you're it!