Yuba Lake

My poor red-haired boys have to stay in the shade.

Sadie Buckles after wakeboarding.

John Jonas wakesurfing with Austin.


Kim and Bailey Jonas.


Tyler loves to eat dirt.

Around our House, Josh Wears Many Hats

To state the obvious: Potty training is going really, really well. In the first picture, Josh is wearing his "Cars" underwear beret-style. I was there when he put it on his head. I wasn't there, obviously, when Josh decided to wear the toilet seat as a crown -- or a halo. I only came after I heard screaming. (Sadly, this happens a lot). I can only imagine the thought process went something like this: "This is so fun to sit on that I better put it on my head."
It tooks about 15 minutes for me to figure out how to get the thing back over his ears, and he was shrieking the whole time. A better mother would have started solving that problem immediately. I just grabbed a camera to document the humilation. Let the therapy begin.

If You're Reading This ...

I didn't actually write 43 blog entries in the course of a week. I've just posted all of my old newspaper columns from The Daily Herald to this blog (with permission, of course), so that I could have them archived in one place. The column that runs in the paper is called "The Skinny." It's a reference to the article's thin column width, not my obsession with body weight. (If the latter were the case, I'd call it "The Fat," no matter how many Weight Watchers meetings I attended. But I digress.) Anyone who takes the time to read anything posted after this entry will notice the columns fall mostly into three categories: 1) My obsession with plastic surgery and Britney Spears 2) How being a mom is, like, exhausting and 3) Complaints about snowmobiling, camping and pretty much anything else Dave enjoys (we make a great couple). If you can handle that kind of superficial rambling, read on (or make better use of your time and invest in TiVo). If not, Grandma, I promise not to take it personally.
-- Elyssa

America's Next Top Mother

Heaven knows, there are plenty of nipped and tucked models on the catwalk, but I don't think I've ever heard of a fashion show dedicated to plastic surgery itself. Still, it was bound to happen sooner or later. Dressed in designer duds, several patients of New York-area plastic surgeons took to the runway to showcase their new breasts, noses and tummies. The cosmetic-surgery fashion show debuted at the Carlyle on the Green manor in Farmingdale, N.Y., last Thursday. Much like well-enhanced country singer Dolly Parton, I have never embraced the idea of natural beauty. I love highlights, concealer, spray tans. I'd wear fake eyelashes to bed if I thought my husband would believe it. When I was 12, I slept in sponge curlers at my church's girls' camp, so I could, I guess, have my hair in ringlets as I hiked in the mountains and cooked over an open fire. It made sleeping in a tent that much more uncomfortable, but somehow I managed it. (Pretty much everyone at the camp rolled their eyes at me, even the leaders.) But until recently, I've never been comfortable with the idea of plastic surgery. Seems painful -- I'm a wimp -- and very permanent.
Still, after having children, you only have to stare at your stomach for about two seconds to see why tummy tucks are such a popular surgery. They are among the top five cosmetic surgical procedures performed by plastic surgeons in 2007 (along with liposuction, breast augmentation, rhinoplasty and eyelid surgery). And the number of tummies tucked has risen 137 percent since 2000, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. Call me Humpty Dumpty: After having two boys in two and a half years, I sometimes just want to be put back together again.
But if I do some day go for an extreme makeover, you certainly won't see me strutting my new stuff down the catwalk. I've learned a thing or two since girls' camp. Sometimes your beauty secrets are best kept ... secret.
-- Elyssa Andrus
This article appeared in The Daily Herald on June 18, 2008. See http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/270422/149/

Holy Hannah Montana!

Holy Hannah: I have a confession to make. I am 30 years old and I really like Hannah Montana. If there is anyone left in Utah County who missed all of this year's Stadium of Fire fireworks, here's a quick primer. Hannah Montana is the fictional alter ego of the very real and adorable 15-year-old Miley Cyrus. There is a Disney Channel TV show called "Hannah Montana," about a young pop superstar (played by Miley). Cyrus is, herself, a young pop superstar. Confusing? A little bit. But ask any 11-year-old girl, and she can work it out for you.
Organizers of the yearly Provo Fourth of July event Stadium of Fire must have promised to change the name of the state (a second Montana, perhaps?) to get Miley to come, but it's a huge deal. Huge. Her concerts routinely sell out in a matter of minutes.
I'm the oldest of 11 children, many of whom are still teenagers and pre-teens and religiously watch the "Hannah Montana" show on Disney. I, personally, became more of a fan of the show and of Miley when my son Tyler (now 3 months old) was born. Literally.
I was in labor and my husband -- sweet, considerate man that he is -- was watching the inane vehicle-makeover show "Trick my Truck" on CMT. When I realized that Tyler was about to be born, I started freaking out about bringing a child into the world with a bunch of big-rig mechanics yammering on in the background. I told my husband to start flipping channels, and he landed on the "Hannah Montana" show just as Tyler made his entrance into the world. Coincidence? I think not.
And Miley Cyrus will likely be Tyler's first concert. Through some stroke of dumb luck on the computer, my husband was able to get some tickets before they sold out. So Tyler and I will go, but my older son and my husband will likely stay home. There are way too many other people in my family fighting over the tickets. These are people who would never choose to watch "Trick my Truck" when they could be watching "Hannah Montana." They know what a good thing she's got going. They know.
-- Elyssa Andrus
This article appeared in The Daily Herald on April 9, 2008. See http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/261648/149/

The Skinny: The Fat

Christmas is coming, and I am getting ... huge: I asked one of our page designers to change the name of this column for this week because I just can't bring myself to write for something titled "The Skinny." I am about 100 months pregnant and as wide as I am tall, and there is nothing thin, slender, sleek or svelte about me right now.
I realize that being with child in the state with the nation's highest birthrate is nothing new or special. And I am sure that there are more than a few readers out there who can't see their feet anymore either. To them I say, "Have another milkshake."
Actually, I'm doing a little better with this pregnancy than my last. With my first child, I had a McDonald's Egg McMuffin nearly every single day of my pregnancy and put on a solid 50 pounds. At the time, I told myself that eating the 300-calorie slab of breakfast goodness was a sacrifice I was making for the baby. So was downing a nightly milkshake, and chasing that with a candy bar.
It took me more than a year to lose that extra 50 pounds, so I vowed that this pregnancy I would be better. For the most part, I've done OK. I've eaten healthier, exercised more, and severely limited my Egg McMuffin consumption. Yet, still, it seems like every part of my body is expanding to make room for baby. This includes my feet, arms and chin, all parts, which, last time I checked, don't actually house an infant.
I still have to make it through the Sundance resort's Thanksgiving buffet and plenty of holiday nibbling before Bundle of Joy No. 2 makes his debut. And as each day passes, my goal of gaining only 25 pounds this pregnancy seems more insane and laughable. In fact, I'm about to the point of throwing in the dietary towel and just embracing my Stay Puft Marshmallow Man moment. Pass the stuffing and pumpkin pie. It's all for the baby, I swear.
-- Elyssa Andrus
This article appeared in The Daily Herald on Nov. 14, 2007. See http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/243370/149/

Dave Don't Read This (Shoe vs. Snowmobile Spending)

Dave don't read this: My husband, Dave, and I have a long-running financial argument, which goes like this:
Elyssa: "All our money goes to fixing broken snowmobiles."
Dave: "All our money goes to your shoe collection."
Let me state, for the record, that snowmobiles get rolled, crashed into trees and blown up every year, requiring hundreds of dollars for repairs each winter. My shoes sit quietly in the closet, minding their own business and bringing nothing but goodwill and happiness to my feet, home and life. Snowmobiles do none of those things.
You can imagine my dismay, then, when I received what some might consider a solid piece of evidence in Dave's favor.
MapInfo Corporation (www.mapinfo.com) is sending press releases to heaven knows how many people about the counties that spend the most money on women's footwear annually. Guess which county made the No. 1 spot? Utah County.
Yep, according to the press release (which I still have a hard time believing), women in Utah County outspent their counterparts in New York, Chicago, Florida and California on shoes. Utah County took the top spot, followed by Santa Clara, Calif., and San Mateo, Calif.
"While it may be no surprise that Santa Clara and San Mateo counties in sunny California would top the list with the array of sandal and flip flop styles available, who knew that women in the Beehive State of Utah had such a shoe fetish?" asks the press release.
Who knew? My husband, that's who.
According to a publicist for MapInfo, the company "took the aggregate dollars spent in each county on women's footwear between July 2005 and June 2006 and divided it by the number of households in the area. The data ranks average annual spending per household on women's footwear per counties with more than 100,000 households."
There could be a million reasons that Utah County ranked so high, namely that we have a lot of big households that require a lot of shoes. And my personal collection is more Nine West and Steve Madden than Christian Louboutin and Jimmy Choo, so it's not like each shoe is a snowmobile-repair equivalent. Or that I personally am driving up Utah County's average spending.
And did I mention that my shoes have never rolled, crashed into trees or caught on fire? Did I? Did I?
I'm still awaiting the press release on nationwide snowmobile-repair spending.
-- Elyssa Andrus
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page B1 on Feb. 07, 2007. See http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/209168/149/