Super Camm=Smokey the Bear

Do you remember the post where I told you about my SUPER HERO husband?

Well, this post is about him as a different TYPE of Super Hero--one possibly even cooler.

Or more precisely:

Smokey the Camm

My husband is Smokey the Bear....basically.

One day when we were beginning to fall in love (back in 2008), Camm invited me to go up the canyon for a fun day with some friends. We went rafting and had a BBQ and overall just enjoying the summer fun with friends.

All of the sudden we heard a little kid scream, "HELP! It's burning."

Without a blink of an eye Camm grabbed a cooler and told his friends to do the same. They filled up from the stream, and with the strength of a bear, Camm carried his cooler to a mound of burning brush and drenched the fire then stomped it out with nothing but his sandals.

smokey the CAMM at work

And that, my friends, is when I knew that my boyfriend was something worth hanging on to.

"Oh Cammie Smoke! You're a forest hero! I love you.

A couple years later, Camm was reflecting on that experience, "You know, I think I want to be a forest ranger." He began looking into it but upon finding out you had to shoot and ride a horse, he decided being an occassionally Smokey the Camm was better than a forest ranger.



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PPS--Smokey pictures courtesy of this site.

Trip high-lights

Made it here safely. Only hit one traffic jam:

 

Stopped for gas. Cash only in Adel, OR. 

yes, that says population 78.

 

Packing, Moving, No Time

No time to blog this week. We're packing up and getting ready to become Oregonians. Ruby's excited.

"This is an AB conversation so C your way out"

This post is a little embarrassing. Both me Camm and to me. But isn't it fun to laugh at yourself?

I talk to myself. I'm just going to admit that straight up. I do.
So Camm will sometimes hear me muttering under my breath and asks me what I'm talking about. I laugh and say "Hey Camm, you're not part of this conversation." It has kind of become a joke between us. Sometimes I'll repeat the popular phrase from elementary school, "This is an AB conversation, so C your way out". The only problem with that, is that it really isn't an AB conversation, more just an A conversation...

So anyway, the other day I was in the shower and talking to myself (of course). The next thing I knew, I heard Camm out of the door shout, "Oh dang it!"
"Camm, what's up?" I called (worried that something had happened to him or Ruby).
"Camm peeked his head in the door, "Uh, so I got out this cup to eaves drop on your conversation with yourself, and I didn't realize it had water in it. Now I'm all wet!"

Serves him right, don't you think?

Is anyone else a self-talker?

Mother's Day tribute to Ruby's Grandmas

Sunday was my first real Mother's Day. Last year, Camm told me that I was a mother since I was 8 months pregnant, but I didn't really believe him. This year was the first time I was ACTUALLY a mom.

As I was thinking about the mom that I want to be, I couldn't help but think of the mothers in my life who have meant so much to me. I came up with an idea to do a tribute to Ruby's grandmothers.

Of course, first we have my mom. I know she will instill in Ruby a sense of adventure. She'll teach Ruby the importance of following your dreams and doing your best. Ruby will look to her as an example and see the importance of service and hard work.

Next, we have Ruby's Grandma Clark. Ruby gets so excited to see her every time she's around. Ruby will always be excited to get to visit her and hang out with her. I'm sure she'll be asking to visit her and call her up on the phone whenever we're far away.

Ruby still has two great-grandmas living. She can look to them as great examples of faith and courage. I only have a picture of her with one of them to put here.

Though my grandma (Granny) isn't around anymore, I hope that Ruby still learns from her. Granny's example will teach her creativity, bravery, spunk, and sense of humor. I hope that Ruby inherits Granny's great qualities. Rather than a picture of Granny here, I will include a little note that she once sent to me. Granny was famous for writing little poems--as is included in the card. I love Granny and hope that I can become the kind of woman that she was. More than that, I hope that Ruby can become the kind of woman that she was.

In case it it hard to read, it says:
Who's this little girl
Standing with her shadow
Looking up at me
From her Papa's meadow?
Why I believe that's Miriam Grace
Looking at the world with her pretty face!

Thank you to all of the wonderful moms who have taught me so much!

CHUMS

Before we start this post, I need to lay down some important vocabulary. Do you know what chums are? They're those strings that go on the back of glasses to make sure that your glasses don't fall off. Here's Steve Urkel sporting a good pair:

OK, so let's fast forward 20ish years to the year 2010. Camm and I were newly-weds and newly-grad students.
Camm wears glasses. I know they're usually not included on the stick figure depictions of him, but he has glasses.

The professor that my husband was working for invited us to a BBQ at her house. She lives in one of those really humongous houses in the mountains (you know, something a grad student could never DREAM of occupying).

Her house is on a big plot of land with all kinds of cool landscaping--such as cliffs.

For someone as clumsy as me, cliffs aren't a good thing. Somehow Camm's glasses fell down the cliff (I may or may not have accidentally knocked them off his face).

After a horrible mess of him having to climb down with a headlamp and finally getting a hold of them, we realized that they were VERY bent and were not going to be able to stay on his face.

So, what do two poor newly wed grad students do? I naturally made him a pair of chums out of some pink and yellow string I found around the house.

Stunning, don't you think?

The next night we heard a knock on the door. It was a leader in our church coming probably to welcome us into the area.

"So, uh, what exactly is the pink headgear thing you have?" he tried his best to sound kind.

"Oh, its just a...something," Camm tried to think of how to say it without looking too strange.
"They're chums!" I piped in, "I made them myself! Don't you love them? I sure think I did a great job!"
He replied with such a confused look on his face, "Oh, uh, great."
"Do you want to come in?" I asked cheerfully.
"Um, no, I think I have to go now." And off he went.

These chums were not going to hack it, I could see right then. So I got on the phone and called our university's bookstore. (it seemed like an easy option since we were spending all our time on campus anyway)
"So, I'm wondering how much your chums are?" I asked with as much enthusiasm as I could muster.
"Um, you mean the things for the glasses?" The student employee responded.
"Yes, of course, you know--chums!"
She put me on hold to go check. Somehow the phone got knocked off of hold and I could hear her talking to someone else.
"This lady wants CHUMS? Can you believe it? Do we even have those?"
I heard them discuss things back and forth--clearly making fun of me. She then got back on the phone.
"Yes, we found some here. They're $5."
"Perfect," I said and I hung up and told Camm.

The next day Camm put on his home-made chums and left for campus. I was too embarrassed to go with him into the bookstore but I wanted to see what would happen. I acted like I didn't know him and kept my distance.
I saw him walk up to a student employee.
"Hey, my wife called about chums. They said you guys have some for $5."
"Uh, what?" she looked confused.
Camm pointed to his make-shift chums, "You know, I have these chums but they're not very nice and might not last too long. Don't you guys have some better ones?"
She spoke very quickly and said, "Go ask at that table over there!" She hurriedly walked away.
Camm went to the next table and asked for chums. Again, he proceeded through his spiel about his handcrafted chums he was sporting.
"Um, yes, we have chums," this clerk was better at stifling laughs. After a few phone calls he found some and showed them to Camm.
They were all nicely embroidered with flowers.
"Those are woman chums!" Camm sounded appalled. "I need MANCHUMS! Don't you have any?"

That's me behind the bookshelf acting like I don't know this guy

The man explained that all they had were woman chums.  Camm walked out looking dejected.

He ended up just buying new glasses.

Has anyone else tried to buy chums within the last fifteen years?

Ruby's precious personality

"Uh, what are you looking at?"

"Ohhhh yeah!"

"It's Easter morning and you gave me an empty egg!"

"I swear it wasn't me who ate the cake!"

"Guys! I'm naked! Why are you taking my picture?"

"Don't you dare take away my bag of snacks"

Advice board

This blog post may not be good for someone with a weak stomach, but the purpose is to help out those who may need it. Let's just say, I was SICK during pregnancy, and my heart goes out to all those going through the same thing. I include some words of advice here.

First, here is a note that Camm wrote me during pregnancy on the white board in our kitchen. We haven't erased it still (you can see the date on it) so that we remember how rough it was--it is a sort of birth control:

I was reminded the other day of one of MANY pregnancy/nausea stories. I had been throwing up all day and nothing sounded appetizing. Finally at about 10pm I realized that chicken nuggets sounded tasty. Naturally my most amazing hub in the world made a quick run to Wendy’s and came home with nuggets and barbecue sauce. Eating them never tasted so delicious. But when those things came up it was quite possibly one of the most painful things that I have ever experienced in my entire life. Turns out that barbecue sauce mixed with stomach juice is EXTREMELY acidic.

The thing about pregnancy is that you throw up everything. So its not a question of what is makes you throw up and what doesn't; it is a question of what comes up painlessly versus painfully.

So as to help out any pregnant or otherwise nauseas people, I thought that I ought to make a list of foods that aren’t so bad coming up, versus those that are bad coming up (I wish someone would have given me this list ahead of time rather than having to experience it myself through trial and error):

Foods painlessly barfed up	AVOID while prego!! (too painful!)
Mashed potatoes	Garlic
Plain pasta	Barbecue anything (sauce, chips, etc)
Water	Onions
Popcorn	Dill pickles
Apples	Orange juice
French fries	Tomatoes (sauce, ketchup, anything)
Chocolate	Citrus fruit

Do you have anything to add to either list? 

Caveman Camm takes on yet a new identity:

I know Caveman Camm doesn't have the best reputation. Remember this fateful event? Or the episode of him on laughing gas? Or how about some typical quotes?
Well, this Caveman Camm post is different. This is a post about the night that my dear Caveman Camm became a celebrity. This is when Cavement Camm turned into:

SUPER CAVEMAN CAMM

Doesn't he fit right in?

The crime scene: 3:30am. Several teenagers out in the middle of the night garbage-can-bandit boogie men were  being annoying teenagers and knocking over garbage cans doing very illegal activity on our street.

We were asleep. We heard a small noise outside of the window and without a pause, Caveman Camm knew just what to do. He began BANGING with all his might against the window.

I wish Guinness himself had been here because I think these guys would have set the world record for the fastest ever run. I could see the fear billowing from their eyes as they took off, jumped in a car and sped away. 

Super Caveman Camm did it--he rose to the occasion, he scared the bandits, and they stopped their illegal activity.

I was left star-struck by my Super-Power husband:

 And unfortunately...Camm's hand was left bleeding after using his super-power strength to bang on the window hard enough to scare the bandits but just barely not hard enough to break the glass.

Images courtesy of: Superman BatMan Spiderman