h is for...

I'm still trying to catch up to DebR (hahaha! like that’ll happen! she’s on t right now) and other folks doing Laume's WordPlay. anyway, come on and play! it's fun! i love seeing what other people have in their own personal dictionary.

honey – I love honey. when I was pregnant with irene, local honey was the only thing that helped the allergies that I suddenly had. prior to irene, I’d never had seasonal allergies. I was VERY pleased to find that the local honey helped me. something else I love about honey...it was one of the desserts we’d have in spain. honey on fresh french bread. Y.U.M! I stil love that. in fact, I had it for dinner the other night – honey on a cibatta roll that had been toasted. delish! it’s also good with peanut butter mixed together. and on popcorn with a bit of salt. and and and :)

henry – a name we were toying with when I was pg w/rhys. we didn’t find out w/either child what we were having before hand. irene, at the time, pronounced it “hengery” and she would say it a lot b/c ‘hengery’ is angelina ballerina’s little cousin and angelina ballerina was her favorite little mouse and her favorite set of books for several years. lydia felt we were obligated to name a boy henry b/c, c’mon! Hank De Haan! no one’s gonna mess with Hank De Haan! *smile*

hay – when we lived in sonoma county, we saw a LOT of trucks carrying millions of bales of hay. I would make a wish on them. still do. (I think the rhyme is something like “see a truck carrying hay, make a wish and look away”)

house and home – we’ve owned three now. I like our new house a lot. the painting we have done so far is fun. our home in rohnert park is one of my favorites. it was funky and had a great yard and a wonderful patio cover and my swing. I am sure that part of it is that it was our first house and I got pregnant with both children there. we took ownership of it on our 3rd anniversary. our petaluma house was cool (the upstairs was all the master “suite”) but I get sad more often than not when I think about it b/c we hadn’t planned on leaving it when we did. THIS house has a really cool backyard. it’s not as big as I’d like it to be and we don’t have a patio cover (yet?), but I really like our rock wall (they mistakenly call it a retaining wall, but they didn’t put it together very well, so it doesn’t so much retain) with all the flowers and plants and tree that we’ve planted in it.

hawaii – rhys calls it wah-ah-ee in 3 very very distinct syllables (“let’s go to wa-ah-ee. there are VOLCANOS there!”). irene has wanted to go there since she was 4. rob and I went together in 1994 b/c I was presenting a paper w/my friend and co-author kelly at the WPA which just HAPPENED to be on The Big Island! we had an amazing time. we were snorkling and ended up right by where a family of sea turtles was eating! there was a small one and some very big ones, just about 10 feet out into the ocean. my sister, jolie, wants to run the honolulu marathon in a year, so we’re hoping we can go at that time and cheer her on as well as enjoy hawaii with the kids.

hephalumps – pooh’s word for elephants. hephalumps and bumbershoots. I think that’s one of the chapters in the book.

help – something I like to do for people, and something I tend to forget to ask for.

haggis – does anyone (besides the scots) really like this??

honeysuckle – I love the smell of honeysuckle. surprisingly, mom has some honeysuckle that the previous owner planted that has NO SCENT AT ALL! very odd.

heart – I tend to think with my heart rather than my head in many situations.

husband – I feel enormously lucky to have such a wonderful husband. he is my best friend and my soul mate and the one who balances me and grounds me when I’m going crazy out of my head with worry, fear, anxiousness etc. on august 28th, rob and I will have been together for FIFTEEN years! on october 28th, we’ll have been married for 11. we met at a friend’s house around midnight. it was the night before school started and I had just returned from spain 2 months before. he sat down and I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. he had no idea that I was hitting on him. it took one of his friends taking him outside to explain that everyone in the room knew I was hitting on rob EXCEPT for rob, and that when they went back inside, rob needed to sit next to me. needless to say, mark is uncle mark to the kids and is also one of my very good friends too (though we don’t see him or his wife nearly enough). anyway, rob and I have been together ever since that night.

habitat for humanity – a charity that I support when I can

hanging butt flies – I don’t know what these are really called, but it’s what I call them. these are the flies that circle around often in groups of 2 or more. they fly quite slowly and their rear ends hang down. I’m watching 2 of them in my house right now.

hake – an atlantic ocean white fleshed fish – it’s similar to cod. in spain it’s called merluza (that’s merlutha, to non castillian spanish speakers *wink*). it was a staple in our house and we had lots of reallllly good meals with it. I haven’t had it since being in spain. I need to look for it so I can make a yummy merluza dish that i’ve been craving.

history – I love world history. I am not so very fond of american history. it makes me angry more often than not b/c of all the really heinous ways we’ve treated the native americans, the africans, ourselves. I don’t know that I’ve ever been so angry and horrified in a movie as when I saw GLORY. it’s an outstanding movie that I think everyone should see, but I can’t watch it very often. it makes my blood boil and makes me cry and cry.

halloween – halloween is very fun. I love dressing up and dressing up the kids. I don’t so much dress up anymore. but as a kid, it was one of my very favorite things. when we lived in riverside, I can remember (in my 5 – 7 year old kid memory) that everyone really did it up for halloween. lots of cool houses and props and such. don’t get that so much these days.

happy – I would say, that mostly, I am a pretty happy person :)

hate – in our house, we do our very best not to say this word. the kids know that it’s a word that causes hurt and pain. if there weren’t such rabid hate in the world, we’d probably be in a better place than we are right now (that’s the global we, not the royal we).

hezbollah – anyone know the correct pronunciation? it’s interesting to listen to reporters talking about it and in 5 minutes they’ve pronounced it in several different ways.

health – I need to work on mine. I’m relatively healthy now, but not at a healthy weight. I don’t have healthy exercise habits. it’s something I’m trying to change.

heat – dear me! it’s finally broken here (for the most part), but the east coast now has it and also has the humidity! ick ick yuck!

hollyhocks – we have some growing in our backyard b/c mom gave us a bunch of seeds that the kids threw around. can’t wait until next year when they do more than just a little mound.

heaven – my cousin’s husband recently explained heaven to his son as being the place where our thoughts and feelings go after we die. I like that explanation.

hell – according to the baptists that came to our house, that’s where I’m going b/c I tend to believe that most religions have the same beginnings and are all quite similar and so, we are all one.

hippie – I’m definitely more hippie than hip. I think that some of the folks that live around us think we’re way hippie-ish b/c we try to eat organic foods when we can and we have a prius, and we try to be good to the earth and not use so many bleachy, chemically things.

if I think of more, I’ll add them later.