how could she treat us so thoughtlessly

This weekend we went up to visit Grandma Maxine, and stopped to say hey to Grandma Herd while we were at it.  Ike wants to follow my uncle Craig around the ranch like a little puppy dog and "help" him do all the chores.  I joked about having Ike go do a ranch internship there when he graduates from high school, but we all know that John and I have robbed our children of the opportunity to learn thrift and industry, so he would probably be the worst intern ever, aside from me.  Grant got introduced to both "Downton Abbey" and "Sherlock" in the same night and is now obsessed and ready to jettison "Agents of Shield" in favor of watching through the "Sherlock" catalog.  I think he could tell that it was Grown Up television and it made him feel smart.  I always love visiting Grandma Maxine, because it reminds me that if you are awesome people will visit you even if you don't have an enormous fancypants house.  We are holdouts, Grandma and I, with our cute little old houses.

Grandma Herd is motoring along like usual, and seems to finally be getting over the awful cough she got over Christmas, so I guess it wasn't whooping cough after all, which means all the weird anti-vaccine people in Utah County have not earned painful retribution from me . . . yet.  Emmett and Ike and Willa climbed the mountain while John and Grant and I visited with Grandma and lamented our respective ward choir difficulties.  The kids didn't bring back any reports of dead deer in the cave, but the season is young yet, and so far the winter has been mild, so there's still a chance.  Grandma let the kids pick a little present, and the boys each got one of Grandpa's pocketknives.  I like that they'll have a little something to remember Grandpa by.  Grant has already had his taken away and a figurative corner torn off his Totin' Chip (oh, the unending lameness of the Boy Scout dialect) because he insisted on playing with it open on the leather couches.

Emmett and Ike are finally going to start swimming again, which is good, because they are both little slug people.  Willa is playing basketball and is so self-conscious that she runs around on her tiptoes during the games.  I'm glad we're addressing this now, because I was forever turned off of sports when my friend teased me about the terrible layup I did when I was thirteen.  I don't want Willa to feel like failure once means failure always.  If we can keep our kids from becoming locked in a fixed mindset it will be a monumental achievement.