I don’t want to bore you with my bio, so here are 100 fun (and frightening) facts about my life.

1. When I was little my mom wrote an article about me, and I had my picture in Women’s World.

   
   
2. In high school I sold my first story to American Cheerleader Magazine.
   
   

3. The article was about the time I broke four ribs when a basketball player ran into me and knocked me into the bleachers.

   
   

4. Twice after that I had panic attacks when a basketball even got close to me. Not cool when you’re sixteen.

   
   

5. I also got whiplash when my head bounced off the floor after I was tossed into the air for a stunt and the other cheerleaders only caught my legs.

   
   

6. I now coach my daughters in cheerleading for Upward.

   
   

7. A friend once bought an issue of Glamour magazine for me, since she thought the cover picture of Katherine Heigl looked just like me. When my five- year-old daughter saw the cover, she asked if it was me.

   
   

8. I met my husband on the first day of college when he walked into my dorm room looking for my roommate (who he’d dated the year before) and asked me out.

   
   

9. My husband gained a little bit of a reputation in college, and when we started dating I was then known as “Daniel’s girlfriend” not as Angela. I’m a little bitter.

   
   

10. At least it was my picture on the college post cards.

    
    

11. I then transferred to the University of Oregon and took a creative writing class I absolutely hated. (I had rhyming picture books and everybody else wrote about suicide and stoning and strippers.)

    
    

12. But we’re still Duck fans—causing Dan’s brother to spray paint our yard with Boise State colors when we moved to Idaho.

    
    

13. I once called 911 because I was home alone and heard noises downstairs. The cops surrounded my house only to find my sister’s cats had knocked over a couple potted plants.

    
    

14. When I got locked out of our house in high school I was small enough to crawl through the cat door.

    
    

15. As a kid, I cut my finger with a saw when trying to build a cat house.

    
    

16. My husband describes me as a cross between Alicia Silverstone and an Ewok.

    
    

17. I describe my husband as a cross between Nicholas Cage and Jim Carrey.

    
    

18. I dressed up like Tinkerbell for Halloween and made it to the final four in a poker tournament even though I’d never played before.

    
    

19. I wore canvas platform tennis shoes in my wedding.

    
    

20. I spend 75% of my life in either yoga pants or my pink bathrobe.

    
    

21. I don’t remember the last time I bought hair spray.

    
    

22. My husband is better at styling the girls’ hair than I am.

    
    

23. I’ve ridden on the shoulders of a unicyclist.

    
    

24. When I was seven months pregnant with my firstborn, I blacked out while driving on the freeway in Portland and rolled my car before getting hit by a semi.

    
    

25. I got out of my totaled car with glass down my shirt but not a scratch on me.

    
    

26. Another time I totaled a brand new Honda SUV, but only had $500 damage to the bumper of my Suburban.

    
    

27. I backed into a second Honda that same month.

    
    

28. My great uncle dated Marilyn Monroe.

    
    

29. My kids laugh really hard when I try to sing.

    
    

30. I beat my father-in-law in a push-ups contest.

    
    

31. I have a lot of dreams, and I thought it was because I have such a creative mind, but a psychologist told me that it’s really because I don’t get much deep sleep.

    
    

32. My pre-marital counselor also counseled the author of The Shack.

    
    

33. In the middle of 6^th grade I went from an elementary Christian school with less than 100 students to a public middle school of over 1,000 where whites were a minority. Huge learning experience.

    
    

34. We once ordered a pizza in my driver’s ed class, and the pizza arrived with a slice missing.

    
    

35. I wore braces my senior year of high school and actually made my orthodontist take them off just for my senior pictures.

    
    

36. In high school my best friend and I lied to our parents, saying that we were spending the night at each other’s house. Her parents bought her a new car and called my house to tell her, but obviously we weren’t there. When I went home, I got grounded while she got a new car.

    
    

37. My parents grounded me for a month, but they got sick of me at home so they finally amended my punishment so that I was only grounded until I got a job.

    
    

38. The owner of Figaro’s pizza hired me when I told him my sad story.

    
    

39. My dad also used to take me to the movies when I was grounded.

    
    

40. On my 18^th birthday I met up with my best friend at the movie theatre, and she brought me a blind date—a teddy bear that I still have.

    
    

41. I wrote “Elvis lives” on everybody’s yearbook in 8^th grade.

    
    

42. If glasses/contacts didn’t correct my vision, I would be legally blind.

    
    

43. My son Jordan is a genius. I taught him how to read at a second grade level before he started preschool.

    
    

44. This was about the same time he checked out a book from the library to teach himself to speak Chinese. I finally figured out it was because all his toys say “Made in China.” He thought China was a giant toyland.

    
    

45. My daughter Caitlin once asked me to put her hair in a “hot dog.” She then explained that’s how ballerinas wear their hair. She meant a bun.

    
    

46. If Caitlin had been born one week earlier she would have shared a birthday with me and my mom.

    
    

47. Lauren was born on Valentine’s Day. When she found out that my friend’s son was born the same day she called him a “copier.”

    
    

48. Whenever Dan kisses me, Lauren says, “Oh, so romantic.” She told me it’s because she’s pretending we are Troy and Gabriella from High School Muscial.

    
    

49. For my husbands birthday I once wrapped a pregnancy test as his gift. He thought it was going to be Trailblazer tickets.

    
    

50. In high school I got arrested for decorating a car with shaving cream. No handcuffs, just fingerprints and a mug shot. The charges were dropped.

    
    

51. When Cher was in town for her final tour, my friend’s husband arranged for Cher’s entourage to get a private screening of Lord of the Rings at his theatre in exchange for tickets to her concert. My friend took me to the concert.

    
    

52. I couldn’t watch Lord of the Rings. Good magic, bad magic, good magic, bad magic…boring.

    
    

53. My favorite classic book is The Scarlet Pimpernel. Not boring.

    
    

54. If I hadn’t moved away from Kansas, I would have gone to the same high school as the BTK killer.

    
    

55. In Kansas we lived in one town for three months, and not once while we lived there did anybody ask my name in Sunday school.

    
    

56. The thing I miss most about Kansas is the lightning bugs.

    
    

57. I didn’t take swimming lessons until college.

    
    

58. I was in an advertising brochure for a ski boat.

    
    

59. My husband hates it when I wear socks to bed.

    
    

60. One of my biggest pet peeves is when a door is left open in a movie or a television show. It ruins the authenticity for me. Who wouldn’t close the front door to their house? Besides my children.

    
    

61. I find the Bible fascinating. Like the law about how if a woman’s husband died and her brother-in-law didn’t want to marry her, she could take him to “court”, remove one of his sandals, and spit in his face. Then for many generations their family would be known as “the family with only one sandal.” What a disgrace.

    
    

62. I also think it’s funny that both David and Solomon are always talking about fools. I picture them like Mr. T. “I pitty the fool.”

    
    

63. Sometimes when I read Psalms I wonder if David was bi-polar.

    
    

64. I took a Christian personality test. It said my favorite scripture is Romans 8:28, and guess what! It is.

    
    

65. I cry at Hallmark commercials.

    
    

66. I also cry when I read Junie B. Jones, but it’s because I’m laughing so hard.

    
    

67. My favorite movie is The Count of Monte Cristo.

    
    

68. Once I was so mad at my husband I wanted to throw a toilet seat at his head. And yes, I was holding a toilet seat at the time.

    
    

69. There are a lot of stupid things about my marriage that I would like to forget (like our first big fight over pancake mix), but I’m really glad I got to grow up with my husband.

    
    

70. My husband has been mistaken for Ben Affleck at an airport.

    
    

71. I call him the mascot for dynamic men. He represents and entertains them.

    
    

72. And I call his Blackberry his “mistress.” I get a little upset when he tries to bring her to bed.

    
    

73. When I was at the swimming pool as a kid, my younger brother had to go to the bathroom, and I didn’t want to take him. I told him to pee in the pool. So he stood up at the side of the pool, pulled his pants down, and aimed for the water. My mom caught him just in time.

    
    

74. I did take Joey to the bathroom once before he learned how to aim. I picked him up and help him upside down so his pee went into the toilet.

    
    

75. My sister Emily and I used to tell all kind of secrets. We called them, “secret talkings.”

    
    

76. Playing Truth or Dare at a slumber party at my house, we dared a girl to eat a special chip dip that we made for her. She liked it until we told her it had cat food in it.

    
    

77. I was in 3^rd grade when I did my mom’s aerobic video for the first time. I was hooked. I started teaching group fitness when I turned eighteen.

    
    

78. I’ve taught aerobics on television before, though I didn’t realize at the time that the newscaster was actually filming me.

    
    

79. On one of my birthdays in high school, a male friend showed up at my door holding a balloon bouquet. I leaped into his arms and asked, “How did you know it was my birthday?” He didn’t. He was working for a delivery service. The balloons were from my parents.

    
    

80. I’m the only one of my sisters to make it over five feet tall.

    
    

81. I think I’m going to adopt another child someday.

    
    

82. In middle school, I’m the one who started the annual talent show. I don’t actually have any talents to perform, so I got to MC.

    
    

83. I walk funny in high heels.

    
    

84. My favorite color is red. I really, really want a red house.

    
    

85. My husband promised me he would buy me a Porsche someday.

    
    

86. My husband’s friend has a Porsche, but he won’t let me drive it.

    
    

87. We moved to Boise because we used to fly out here every summer to go to Dan’s grandparent’s cabin on the lake in McCall. I used to look down on the city from the sky and think, “It’s so clean, and neat and organized.” We love it here.

    
    

88. I did research Mormonism when we moved here. They are really good people, but the history of their church is so sad/perverted. And they don’t know it.

    
    

89. There’s not much graffiti in Boise, but about a year ago I started noticing blue hearts spray painted all around town. I wondered if it was a gang of Mormon girls doing it.

    
    

90. My kids love Build-a-Bear Workshop. If we want to punish them, we just take away one of their stuffed dogs.

    
    

91. My son is really good at making Jell-O. He’s planning to start his own Jell-O restaurant when he grows up.

    
    

92. My oldest daughter has a great idea for a picture book: Puppyhontas. A Pocahontas story with dogs and cats instead of Indians and Europeans.

    
    

93. My youngest daughter would rather watch home videos than watch a movie at the theatre. She quotes us to ourselves like we are celebrities.

    
    

94. I used to be a scrapbook-a-holic.

    
    

95. My husband lets my kids jump off the roof onto the trampoline. We’ve only had to go to the emergency room once for a trampoline related injury.

    
    

96. I got purple highlights in my hair once. Dan called me a punk.

    
    

97. I used to sell t-shirts at Jesus Northwest, and Jeff from the band Newsboys made me his honorary manager. He also drummed on my head with pencils.

    
    

98. I started the first Teen MOPS in Idaho, and sometimes I speak at high schools about teen pregnancy.

    
    

99. If I were an animal, I’d want to be a dolphin. They are always having fun.

    
    

100. Fourth graders are my favorite graders. They get my jokes.