Weekly Reviews January 24 & 31 '20

I'm sure this post will be long, since I have two weeks to cover, but I will try to keep it reasonable!! At least I don't remember much about what I did the last few days before I left for my trip, so there's not much to say about that. The Saturday before I left (January 18th), we were supposed to get a winter storm, but it didn't amount to much. We just saw a few snowflakes drifting down at one point, and then later we got a little bit of sleet / freezing rain. We had the Elders over for dinner on Sunday the 19th. Elder Gordon (Izak's trainee) is not training, so I got a photo of them to send to Izak--his "son" and "grandson"!

On Monday the 20th, Seth didn't have school since it was MLK Day, but Frank did have to work. I was busy the whole day doing the usual chores, plus packing for my trip. Seth vegetated in front of the television all day because I was too busy to entertain him or make him do something else. That evening we went to look at refrigerators again and decided to get one, but of course the one we wanted wasn't in stock. Frank called the next day and ordered it, though. Seth was complaining that evening that his head hurt and after we got back from the store he threw up. That didn't make me too happy since I was leaving the next day but as usual, he felt fine the next day so it all worked out. I don't know why he gets sick like that--I wish we could figure it out!! I did keep him home from school on Tuesday, just in case.

I felt like Tuesday morning, the 21st, went by fast. I was just finishing up a few things to get ready to go. I also ran to the store to get some soda and some crackers, because I discovered that we were out of both of those things, and Seth needed them. Frank came home from work long enough to take me to the airport. The trip out to Utah went fine, and Scott picked me up at the airport and took me to Mom's house. Tanner & Darlee and Jared came over too (Jessie wasn't feeling well) and Mom fed us pizza. We had a fun evening visiting together, and it was great to see all of them.

I love seeing these guys laughing together!

When I was in Utah last summer, I picked out an animal pattern that I wanted Mom to crochet for me, and she had finished it so she gave me that too:

Isn't he the cutest seagull ever? After some deliberation, I have decided to name him Skyler. (Btw, that's Darlee in the background of the first photo, looking through books to pick out an animal for Mom to crochet for her.)

We stayed up too late visiting...but that was pretty much the story of my trip! Staying up late and then waking up about 6:00 or 6:30. But I was just enjoying seeing people too much...I didn't want to sleep!!

Wednesday the 22nd we began our Arizona road trip adventure. It was just really awesome to spend all that time with my mom and sisters! We had a lot of fun, and talked and laughed (and sometimes cried a little too). On the trip down, we had to stop in Beaver to get ice cream (of course). None of us could get the automatic faucets in the bathroom to work, and we ended up all in a row, standing at the faucets, laughing hysterically that none of us were "substantial enough" to get the water to come on. (We did finally manage to get the water to come on long enough to wash our hands.) We drove to Page, Arizona that day and stayed at a Best Western hotel. I drove from Beaver to Page, but other than that Amy drove the whole trip which I really appreciated because I don't like driving.

On Thursday the 23rd, we drove the rest of the way to Gilbert, Arizona. We stopped on the way to see some Indian ruins at a place called Montezuma's Castle, which was really cool.

The weather was pleasant, the sky was so blue (see top photo) and it was just a really peaceful beautiful spot. Right outside the Visitor's Center, a man was playing a flute-like instrument which was really beautiful. There was a gift shop where I acquired a Christmas tree ornament and a micro block set for Seth that made a little roadrunner. There were a lot of other things there that interested me too--like syrup made from saguaro fruit--but I knew it was going to be hard to get stuff back home, so I resisted the desire to get more. Mom got some taffy and gummy bears made from cactus fruit (I think? Can't remember for sure now) which she shared with all of us, though. By the time we got done at Montezuma's Castle, it was practically 3:00 and we hadn't had lunch yet, so we got some food before continuing on south. We ended up getting to Phoenix right at rush hour, so it took forever to get to Uncle Bruce's house in Gilbert, but we finally made it. Aunt Gay had corn chowder and rolls ready for us which was really nice and we would have eaten more if we hadn't had lunch so late! We enjoyed visiting with them that evening.

We spent Friday the 24th at Saguaro National Park in Tucson. It was great to spend the day not only seeing beautiful cacti, but spending it with three other people who love cacti and the desert as much as I do!! We started out at the Visitor's Center in the west section of the park, where we saw a really cool movie that talked about the Saguaro cactus, and the desert and what they mean to one of the native Indian tribes. I wish I could remember everything they said, but Mom said afterwards "Now I understand why I feel the way I feel in the desert.", and I knew exactly what she meant. They talked a lot about how we came from the dust and we'll return to the dust someday, and that the land is not just the land, it's our ancestors too. It put into words the way I've always felt about Arizona, and the desert...that it's a sacred, special place to me because my roots are there. So many of my ancestors were born there, lived out their lives there, worked & toiled to build a community there, died there. Because of that, I feel a strong connection to that place. It feels like home, even though I've never lived there. (When I mentioned this to Tanner, he said he felt that way when he was there too, which is even more remarkable to me because Arizona was not a place that he visited or had memories of, as I always have, but he still felt that connection.) So anyway...we all love the desert and saguaro cacti seem to embody that feeling better than anything else. So spending the day among them was awesome!! After the movie, we did more shopping in the gift shop (where I once again restrained myself from buying a ton of things and just got a refrigerator magnet!) and then we walked through a beautiful cactus garden they had outside.

Then we drove to the eastern part of the park, stopping on the way to get lunch (at about 3:00 pm again)! In the eastern side, we drove on a scenic loop through the desert which was incredibly beautiful (the pictures can't capture it).

 

(We're leaning sideways to imitate the cactus)

Obviously, by the time we finished driving around the loop, the sun was going down. We drove back to Gilbert for another delicious late dinner provided by Aunt Gay, and more visiting.

We went to the Phoenix Temple on Saturday the 25th. We got there a little too late to get into the session we'd planned to attend, so we walked around the outside and took a lot of photos before we went inside.

We were amused by the two birds who had a nest on the spire and liked to hang out on Moroni's horn:

The temple was just as beautiful inside as outside, and wow did it feel good to walk in there! I hadn't made it to the temple since I was in Utah the end of July, and when I walked in, I definitely noticed a feeling of peace envelop me! I miss being able to go to the temple frequently. After going through a session, it was mid afternoon again and we were all hungry but decided to get some Italian ice from Rita's instead of a full lunch, since we were going to dinner at Uncle Joe's house in a few hours.

By a happy coincidence, we happened to be visiting Arizona the same weekend as Uncle Joe's 97th birthday, and they were having a family party for him which we got to attend. They had pizza and a big cake with 97 candles:

It took four people to light all those candles, so they wouldn't melt down too far before they were all lit!

With his grandson, Jacob, who shares the same birthday

Jacob blew out the 97 candles! Uncle Joe blew out a "9" and a "7" candle on a smaller cake!

They had several of their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren there for the party, and we enjoyed meeting a lot of them and getting all caught up on their family.

On Sunday the 26th, we were too tired to go to Bruce & Gay's ward, which began at 8:30, but they said they would be happy to go with us to the next ward at 10:30, since they knew many people in that ward too. But it turns out that the other ward meets at 10:00, not 10:30, so we were too late! We managed to find another ward that met nearby at 11:30, so we went to that ward instead. Then we came home and enjoyed a delicious Sunday dinner, visited all afternoon (including some reading from Come Follow Me) and then that evening a number of the Johnson relatives came over to visit, which was lots of fun.

Gay, Bruce, Conny, me, Shellie, Amy, Mom, Jared, Melinda (Ben's wife)

Jillene came to visit too but had to leave before we took the picture. It was great to see everyone!

On Monday January 27th, it was time to head back to Utah. We stopped at a place to get some citrus on our way out, and I was amused by the sign on the "Arizona BBQ" place next door:

We got oranges, tangerines, and grapefruit, as well as some honey. I knew I wouldn't be able to get a bunch of citrus back home with me, so I had to content myself with a few grapefruit that others shared with me. I couldn't resist getting some honey, though--I got orange blossom honey and desert wildflower honey. (Both are good! I tried them after I got home.) I put the honey in ziplock bags and thankfully they didn't leak at all. I'm pretty sure that's why my luggage got opened and inspected, though!! I had a note in my suitcase when I got home saying they had done that, and the ziplock bag with the honey in it was opened too.

We drove to Kanab that night, stopping in Flagstaff to visit a rock shop and to get lunch at a place called the Pita Pit. We spent the night at a La Quinta hotel, which was new and very nice. We had dinner at a place called the Wild Thyme Cafe. Once again, we had eaten lunch around 3:00 pm so we weren't really hungry. So we got two entrees and split them between the four of us, and that was perfect. The food was really good, too...we got Pistachio Chicken and some Ribs.

We drove the rest of the way back to Lehi on Tuesday the 28th. Scott, Tanner, and Darlee came over again to visit and so did Tim & Rachelle. It was so great to see everyone! Jared & Jessie took me to the airport on Wednesday the 29th, so I was able to visit with them too. The trip home was nice because the flight wasn't full and the seat next to mine was empty. That hasn't happened to me in years! Frank & Seth picked me up at the airport and it was great to see them again and to be back home. I was up late unpacking and getting settled, and then I woke up at 4:00 am and didn't go back to sleep! So that was a really short night.

I spent Thursday the 30th and Friday the 31st getting caught up on everything. I was actually surprised at how much I was able to do, even on Thursday when I was dead tired. I had an orientation on Thursday for the volunteer tax work that I am going to be doing. Besides that, I did the laundry, vacuumed and swept, planned meals & made a grocery list, and dusted. While Seth was at YM that evening, Frank went with me to Walmart to get stocked up on groceries. (While I was gone, Frank & Seth went to the store only to get a few "essentials", such as crackers, chips, ice cream, and cookies!! There was no fruit, vegetables, or milk in the house when I got home!) On Friday our new refrigerator was getting delivered in the morning and that ended up taking a lot of my time. First I needed to move all the freezer items to the downstairs chest freezer and everything had to come out of the refrigerator too. Then we needed to move the couch away from the door so they could bring in the refrigerator and that meant pulling back the rug in the living room and I discovered that a bunch of dirt had collected under there (and stuck to the floor because of the adhesive from the non-slip mats I put under there). So I was sweeping & mopping, and then of course there was a lot of dirt behind the old refrigerator to clean out too before they moved in the new one. The new refrigerator is nice, though, and I am happy to have it. It's a twin to Mom's refrigerator:

After getting everything settled with the refrigerator, I still needed to shower & eat lunch; then it was time to go to a concert at Seth's school that he wanted me to attend. Some of the 7th graders were in art and some were in music for the last semester, so the art students drew self portraits and the music students each composed a short piece of music to represent one of the art students. For the concert, they projected each self portrait up onto a screen while a recording of the music that represented that student was played. The names of the student who composed the music and the student who drew the portrait were next to each picture, but I couldn't read the names so I couldn't tell which one was Seth's. (I really, really need to get my eyes checked!) Seth was in music, so he had composed a short song that represented a girl named Kara. Anyway, the concert was right before dismissal time, so I took Seth home with me when it was over. I spent the rest of the afternoon / evening getting the budget updated, which took some time since I had two weeks' worth of stuff to get caught up on. I did get it done, though, and that means I was basically caught up on everything I missed while I was gone, except for this post. I ran out of time to do that, and yesterday I got my hair done and worked on our taxes and a few things like that so I didn't get it done yesterday either, which explains why I am doing it today.

A few things that happened while I was gone: Frank did a superb job taking care of Seth and getting him to school on time and such. On the Sunday that I was gone, Frank was released from his church calling as the building coordinator and was called to be the self-reliance specialist for our ward. He's not really sure what that entails yet; someone from the stake is supposed to be contacting him to let him know more about that. He was also asked if he would be willing to do something else, and he said he was, but it hasn't all been approved and worked out yet, so I won't share details about that yet. A few days before I got home, Frank discovered a dead mouse in a trap that we set over a year ago (it was empty right before I left for my trip; he thinks it was caught a day or two before he found it). So he set two more traps and on Friday morning we caught another mouse. Yuck!! So far we haven't caught any more. I hope that's our last little visitor for a while. I feel like they are getting in more frequently than they used to. (We've probably caught / found about 10 - 12 mice in the 20 years we've lived in this house, but four of those have been in the last 18 months.)

To end on a happier note (than a mice invasion!) I will tell you about the Christmas project that I kept mentioning in my posts leading up to Christmas. I didn't want to say what it was then, but now that Christmas is over and all the gifts have been given, I can talk about it without spoiling any surprises. What I made was a family cookbook for the boys. I got the idea when I was remembering that last year they all wanted me to send them the recipes for our traditional Christmas treats, like buckeye candy and paintbrush cookies. At first, I thought I would just make a small cookbook with the holiday recipes, but then I decided that it would be nice to include all the recipes from main dishes and such that they liked while they were growing up. So it morphed into a bigger project than I had originally intended, but that's okay because it turned out nice and the boys LOVED it! I was actually surprised at just how much they loved it. They all said it was one of the best gifts they got, that they were so happy to get all the recipes, etc. Jared even said "this is the Holy Grail of cookbooks!!" It took a lot of time to type up all those recipes, but I found a website called Create My Cookbook which is really good and the cookbooks were very reasonably priced. I got a copy for each of the boys, but I got one for me too and I've been surprised how much I use it. (We eat diabetic friendly food now, and most of the recipes we used when the boys were growing up are not very diabetic friendly). It's nice because now all the recipes I use the most (besides the diabetic friendly ones) are all in one book. Here's a few photos of the cookbook:

You can see that I could add pictures to the book; I wish I had taken more photos of mealtimes / food!! There wasn't a lot to choose from. (Mostly just photos from Christmas / Thanksgiving.) So if you plan to ever put together a family cookbook, start taking photos now. :)

That's it for this time; I think I managed to keep the length of this post reasonable! I'll just finish by saying that it was a wonderful trip and I am so glad I got to go; I will always treasure the memories! I am also grateful, though, that coming home was really nice too!

Weekly Review January 18 '20

I know...I'm a day late, but if you knew how much I got done yesterday, you'd be impressed! Writing the weekly blog post is the only thing on my list that I didn't get done. I think it is going to be easier to write by topics instead of daily events, though. Unlike last week, this week was pretty eventful. So here goes:

Dinner with Elder Pew--Last Thursday (the 9th, not the 16th), the Elders in our ward texted me to let me know that "Elder Pew" (Izak) would be in Frederick the next day for MLC. So I asked them to find out from him if we could take him to dinner afterwards. He secured permission from his mission president, so we arranged to meet him, his companion, and another set of Elders (they rode to the conference together) at Cafe Rio that evening. It was fun to see him! He looks good and sounds like he's doing really well.

While we were there, a set of sister missionaries came in as well as at least four members of our stake, including one of the counselors in our stake presidency. I don't think I've ever gone to Cafe Rio here in Frederick once without seeing at least one other member of the church, and usually some missionaries too.

Refrigerator issues--we haven't been using the ice maker, but the water was still hooked up (so we could use the water dispenser) but then the ice maker started leaking water all over. We found a waterfall in the back of the freezer one day!

(This photo was taken after we melted some of it, and all the icicles were gone, so not nearly as impressive as it was). So on Saturday (the 11th) we took everything out and Frank used my blow dryer to melt the waterfall. Then we went to Lowe's and got a cap for the water line so that we could shut off the water to the ice maker. And maybe just possibly we succumbed to the temptation to look at new refrigerators while we were there! But we haven't made a decision about that yet. In the meantime, we do have some ice in the freezer, so we're just putting a little ice in our cups and adding tap water when we want some ice water to drink.

Snickers--He deserves a whole post of his own (and I'll probably do one soon) but as most of you know, we put him down this week. It was a heart wrenching decision, and I never want to do anything like that again. Of course, this is something we've contemplated quite a bit the last 6 months since he has had so many health problems. And he was doing better than he was a few months ago--not in crisis, at least--so it might seem strange that we decided to do this now. Frank brought it up again a few weeks ago, and that's what I thought at first--why now, when he seems to be more stable? But he pointed out to me that Snickers really wasn't enjoying life that much. He was sleeping a lot of the time and only seemed happy when we were feeding him. He didn't meet us at the door with a wagging tail every time we came home anymore (only sometimes). I watched him a lot, and noticed that his tail was down between his legs about 95% of the time. I realized that Frank was right...he really wasn't enjoying life much and was probably uncomfortable, if not in pain, most of the time. So why go to so much effort to keep him alive if he was suffering? It didn't make sense. It was still really hard for me to do it, though. I told Frank he would have to call the vet, because I couldn't do it. So last weekend we decided that Frank would call the vet on Monday (the 13th) to see what could be done. When he called me Monday afternoon to say that we were scheduled for the next day, I was startled...so soon! And on Frank's birthday?? (He forgot all about his birthday when he was on the phone with the vet!) When I hung up the phone, I immediately started crying and I went over and hugged Snickers and told him I was sorry. But I was soon very glad that we were getting it over with soon because that last 24 hours were awful, knowing what was coming! I woke up really early on Tuesday and started crying and couldn't go back to sleep. Seth decided that he didn't want to go with us to the vet and I think it was better that way. Last photos:

(Snickers is trying to get away from Seth...haha!)

Tuesday morning was hard. Dogs are so smart...I think Snickers could sense my sadness and anxiety, and it made him restless. Usually he sleeps most of the morning, after going out, eating, and getting his insulin shot, but that morning he didn't. He followed me around or just stood around looking like he wasn't sure what to do. I think he may have thought that we were getting ready to go on a trip, because we were all hugging him more than usual (which we do when we're leaving him for a while) and I was also gathering up his stuff because I couldn't face the idea of coming home from the vet and seeing his empty bed and everything. He couldn't see what I was doing, of course, but he could hear the extra hustle and bustle. I was careful to leave out his water dish and his favorite bed and anything I thought he would need until the last minute. (And he got lots of extra treats!) But everything else went either in a trash bag or I put it away in the spare bedroom until I figure out a place I can donate it to. (I will probably call the local animal shelter). Snickers was still restless, so when I finished, I picked him up, put him in my lap, and we had a talk. I told him that we were not going anywhere, but that this time he was the one who would get to go on a journey and that the end of his journey would be wonderful. I know...he couldn't understand me, but it made me feel better, anyway! When it was time to leave, he was very happy, as usual, that he was going with me, but as usual he got really anxious in the car. (He hates car rides.) So he whined most of the way to the vet, which got me crying again. So I arrived at the vet an emotional mess but I guess they are used to that. All the receptionists were hugging me and saying they were sorry. They all love Snickers too! But at least it's not a bad way to go, and I'm glad we could be with him, and I'm glad he's at peace now. They had a nice peaceful room with a couch that we could sit on with him. I brought his blanket as well as a towel that came with him when we got him...the family we got him from gave us the towel to help him feel more comfortable because it smelled like his dog family. Our vet said she would wrap him in his towel and blanket and that he could be cremated with those wrapped around him. And they will scatter his ashes in an apple orchard, which sounds kind of nice. (We could have opted to save his ashes, but we didn't want to do that.) They clipped off some of his hair for us to keep and they made an impression of his paw for us too:

(I still need to choose a photo to put in there.)

 
We miss him. I knew I would miss him the most whenever I came home to an empty house, and I do. I miss having him around and being able to pick him up and snuggle him whenever I want. I also miss him whenever the doorbell rings and there's silence instead of barking. (Didn't think I'd miss that! And I don't really miss the barking...but it reminds me that he's gone.) It was hard at first not to feel guilt...he was such a fighter, and I worried that he had wanted to keep on fighting. I wondered if he was up in heaven wondering "Why did they do that?" But after a few days, when I was thinking about it, I realized that there's no way he'd feel that way. Where he is now must be so wonderful; would he really wish to go back into an old tired body that was painful and wearing out, compared to where he is now? No, I'm sure he wouldn't. He's probably grateful, and I know he's happy.

Everyone is doing okay. The older boys did face time with us Monday evening so they could see him one more time. Seth never bonded with him the way the older boys did, so although he loved Snickers, it wasn't too hard for him. It was hardest for Frank and I (Frank cried a little...I think I've only seen him cry 2 other times!) and probably hardest for me because I'm the one that was at home with him most of the time. I did most of the care giving (and I think I bonded even more with him the last 6 months, when he was so sick and needed a lot more care). When I was talking to Scott on Monday evening, he said "Your know, Mom, if Snickers is anyone's dog, he's really your dog." And that's pretty much true. One thing that makes this easier for me is that I'm going to be gone next week and that was going to be hard on both Snickers and me. He gets really stressed when I'm gone and I would have worried about him a lot. So now, at least, I won't have to do that, and it will be easier for Frank too, having one less responsibility. He was a good dog. He was patient and loyal and sweet, and I'm glad we had him!

Frank's birthday--So yes, it was Frank's birthday on Tuesday and in spite of it being a sad day, I think he had a pretty good birthday. After he got home from work we gave him some cards and presents. Then for dinner we went to a restaurant with some friends. I was kind of worried that we wouldn't be much fun, since we were so sad, but it turned out to be probably the best thing we could have done because it cheered us up a lot!! He didn't want to have a big birthday cake because we're trying not to eat stuff like that much, so we bought one of those smaller cake mixes that made a 4 serving size cake. We were too full after dinner, though, so we actually didn't have his cake until last night. The night of his birthday, Frank had to go back to work because he needed to do some stuff for several stores that had to be done after they close...and they don't close until 11:00 pm. So he was gone until 4:00 am...ugh!! I woke up around 2:00 am and didn't go back to sleep until after he got home, so both of us were really tired on Wednesday.

Health--My back is still doing pretty well but I didn't get much exercising done this week. On Wednesday I was sick and on Thursday I was recovering and didn't want to push my luck since I had a long day ahead of me. (See the next topic.) On Friday I woke up too late, and had a million other things to do. I don't know what exactly I had on Wednesday, but when I was up in the night, I was having stomach cramps. Then when I woke up again in the morning I started having more cramps...and they were really bad. I actually started sweating all over and I thought I was going to pass out (but didn't, thankfully). They didn't last long, though, and the rest of the day my stomach wasn't too bad although I didn't eat much at all. However, I had a bad headache all day and felt really drained. So not a great day, but I've had worse. When I woke up Thursday the headache was gone and I felt pretty much normal again, which was great.

Field Trip--Before I knew how crazy this week was going to be, I had volunteered to be a chaperone for a field trip with Seth's class on Thursday. When I was sick on Wednesday, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to go but thankfully it all worked out. The field trip was to the United States Holocaust Museum; they are going to be reading The Diary of Anne Frank so Seth's teacher wanted them to have some context to put it in. I've always kind of wanted to go to the this museum, but also always kind of avoided it because I thought it would be really upsetting. And of course it was upsetting, but I have actually read and seen a lot about the holocaust already and it turns out I really didn't see or read anything worse than things I had already seen and read. And I do think it's a really good idea to go to this museum if you get the chance. I was too busy looking at the exhibits and keeping track of kids to take any pictures. And honestly, most of the museum is quite dark (on purpose, I think) so the lighting would have made taking pictures difficult anyway. In this museum, they want you to go through the exhibits in chronological order so everyone starts in the same place. At the beginning, they give each person an "ID"...a short biography of someone who was either a victim or a survivor of the holocaust. Here is mine:

She is one of the survivors, but her parents and brother both died, so she is the only member of her immediate family who survived. I definitely had a few emotional moments going through that museum, but I managed to hold it together! I would like to go back someday because we were actually really rushed. The traffic going down to the museum was even more terrible than normal, so it took us 2 1/2 hours to get there. I felt like I skimmed through everything because there just wasn't enough time. The kids had an assignment they were filling out too--I'm glad I didn't have to worry about that at least! Overall I think it was a worthwhile trip and Seth and I had a good discussion about why there would be a museum about such a difficult topic. (It didn't seem to bother him much, thankfully.)

Activity Days--(or Primary activities for girls, or whatever it's called now!) We had an activity on Thursday night, so it was a full day for me. We had the girls make signs and cards for a college age girl in our ward who is in the hospital out in Utah (and has been there for over a month). Actually, she's in rehab now, not really the hospital. She's starting to get better now but still has a long recovery ahead. I was really impressed with how creative the girls were, and how colorful and beautiful the signs and cards were.

Weather--We had some really lovely weather last weekend, with temperatures in the 60s on both Saturday and Sunday. The earlier part of this week was fairly mild too. It sort of misted most of the day on Tuesday, but it wasn't cold. It started to get colder on Thursday and today we were originally supposed to get a big winter storm, but it mostly fizzled. I saw a few snowflakes drifting down around noon and we did get some freezing rain / sleet, but not a lot. It's going to be colder now, though, with highs in the 30s most days.

Tax Course--I passed the test, so I am now a certified VITA tax preparer!! But it took me all week. I finished going through all the course work last week, but for the test you also have to enter information into the tax software, so I had to practice doing that to become familiar with the tax software. That took some time, and I ran into a glitch with the tax software too. So I worked on that when I could this week, but with so many other things going on, I didn't have a lot of time for it. Since I was sick on Wednesday I spent most of the day sitting on the couch working on it, and by evening I had taken and passed two of the 3 tests, and I had started on the last test (which is the biggest one) but didn't have time to finish it. (The test is online, and there's no time limit so I could work on it for a while, log out, and log back in to do more later.) Then of course I was gone all day Thursday so I didn't get anything done on it that day. So yesterday that was my top priority. I started working on the test after I dropped Seth off at school and I managed to finish it just a few minutes before I had to go pick him up. (School is one hour shorter for him on Fridays.) It's not that the test is super difficult, it just takes time. I had completed the quicker parts of the test Wednesday evening, but the last two sections you basically have to prepare two complete tax returns in order to answer the questions, so that can take a while. And yes...I'm sure it took me longer than the average person because I'm so slow and deliberate when I'm doing something that I want to do right. I also still had the same glitch with the tax software (weird!!), but I managed to figure out the correct answers anyway. I only missed two questions, which is a score of 92%, and I only had to get 80% to pass. So I'm very, very happy to have that completed! It was a lot of work (tax law is complicated, ya'll), but I learned a lot and it feels good to learn new things and to work hard at something and then finish it.

Why Friday was so crazy--As you know by now, I was sick on Wednesday and didn't do anything but work on the tax course, I was gone all day on Thursday, and I spent all day up until 2:30 pm on Friday completing the tax test. That means that by Friday afternoon I had 3 days' worth of normal household tasks piled up. So after picking up Seth from school, I spent the rest of the day doing the following: folding & putting away 3 batches of laundry (I did keep the laundry moving during the day on Friday while I was working on the test), dusted, vacuumed, and swept the whole house, went grocery shopping, and updated the budget. Okay, it doesn't sound like much when I list it off like that, but it took me until bedtime to get all of that done! (Just updating the budget can take hours, depending on how much needs to be done, and there was a lot this week.) Frank went with me to the store which was nice. And I slept great last night, which was awesome since I didn't sleep well at all Saturday through Wednesday nights--I woke up all of those nights in the wee hours and didn't go back to sleep for a couple of hours each time.

I think that is enough craziness for one week. If you've made it this far, you're a trooper!

Weekly Review January 10 '20

I don't think there was anything very extraordinary about most days this week, so I'm going to do topics this week. I mostly kept very busy with the usual stuff, plus working on the tax course. So let's start with that, I guess.

Tax Course--I worked really hard on it and finished going through all the chapters on Tuesday. Then Wednesday I was pretty busy so I didn't get a chance to work on it. Yesterday I went through two other chapters which are not part of the tax law course, but are about the volunteer standards of conduct and the process of intake / interview with a taxpayer when they first come in. I'm getting tested on those things, too, so I had to go over them even though most of that is pretty intuitive. (As a volunteer, I'm not supposed to offer to let a taxpayer deposit their refund into my personal bank account if they don't have one of their own? Really?? Shocker!!) Then I started looking over a sample test, but I didn't have time to start working on the actual test. Hopefully I will get some of that done today.

Weather--We got some snow on Tuesday afternoon / evening. Since the forecast for Tuesday afternoon was 1-3 inches of snow mixed with rain (which often means icy conditions), the schools closed 2 hours early. And since the roads were pretty icy on Wednesday morning too, there was a 2 hour delay that morning, even though we only got about an inch of snow. I'm just glad we made it through that without a snow day.

Starting to come down, Tuesday afternoon

Wednesday morning sunrise

The last few days have been pretty frigid, and even this morning it was really cold, but today it's supposed to get up to 55 and tomorrow it's going to be 68 degrees! So crazy!! I mean, you know I'm never one to complain about mild weather in the winter. But I'm starting to wonder if it's going to be colder in Arizona when I go there in about 10 days than it is here!

Book Chat--I had book chat on Wednesday evening and it was fun as always. A couple of new people came, too. Some people didn't like the book we read (which I had suggested) but we still had an interesting discussion about it. Now we are reading a book called Becoming Mrs. Lewis; hopefully I will get my copy from the library in another day or two.

Religion Class--I made it to religion class for the first time in a month (they didn't meet the last 2 weeks because of Christmas and New Year's). It was nice to go again, but it was a very small group. The teacher is having some car issues and might not have transportation on Wednesdays so the class might move to Mondays. But anyway, we are doing the Book of Mormon now and I love it!

Seth--He's been doing pretty well lately; he's been more even tempered and we haven't had any blow ups in quite a while. (Now that I said that, he'll be awful tonight!) I feel like he's been more cooperative...coming sooner when we call him, eating food he doesn't like without making a big deal out of it, stuff like that. Last night the Deacons were in charge of the YM activity and they did a Book of Mormon scripture chase thing. Each of them had to come up with 5 questions that could be asked...one of Seth's, for example, was "Find an example of a group of people escaping from the Lamanites". Since Seth is the president of the Deacon's Quorum, he ran the whole activity last night and our bishop told me afterwards that he did a great job. That's one thing about Seth...he really doesn't worry about what other people think of him, so he's totally comfortable getting up in front of a group of people and leading them. I could learn from him!

My back--For some mysterious reason, it's doing a lot better, but I'm not complaining about that! It was actually pretty bad on Saturday evening / Sunday morning, but then it started feeling better and by Wednesday I was able to job a full 30 minutes again. It still doesn't feel great, but it's a lot better than it was. I'll take it.

Baby Shower--I went to a baby shower for a lady in our ward on Saturday. She's actually not pregnant; she has a surrogate mom (who came to the shower too) which is kind of different. But this lady has a lot of health problems, so I can't imagine her being able to go through a pregnancy.  Plus she's probably pretty old to be having a baby (although I'm sure she's quite a bit younger than me)--she and her husband have one other child, and he is a senior in high school, so leaving home for college later this year. I can't imagine starting over with a baby at that point in life, but more power to them! Their baby is a girl, so it was fun to pick out cute girl stuff to give her. And the shower was quite the party, because both she and her husband have a lot of family in the area so it was like a big family party with several members of the ward added on. They had a full meal, too--soup, breads, fruit, salads, dessert, etc. It was at 2:00 in the afternoon and I wasn't expecting them to have that much food so I had just eaten lunch an hour before. So I actually didn't eat anything, but I did enjoy visiting with a number of sisters in our ward.

Choir / music calling--This has kept me pretty busy this week. I'm trying to get choir started up again, but we're doing something pretty different (we have 4 directors who will rotate directing each month, among other things) so it has taken a lot of coordination and communicating with a lot of people. I finally heard back from the pianist yesterday, so I think I have the plan mostly worked out now. In the meantime, I haven't been thinking about musical numbers because I've been preoccupied with all the choir stuff, so no I am realizing that I don't have any musical numbers set up at all. So I need to start working on that again.

Utah / Arizona trip--Some of you know this already, but I'm going to Utah January 21st and then going on a road trip to Arizona with Mom, Amy, and Shellie. It's going to be so fun!! I'm really excited about it and grateful I get to go. I hope it won't be too much for Frank to keep up with everything here at home, along with his job and business which have been keeping him pretty busy lately. He's a trooper to agree to let me go. Everybody pray for him, please!

Other stuff--Seth has still been working on Safety patrol at school this week but today is his last day for a while. On Tuesday morning, we took 3 other kids to school with us...one of my friends in the ward whose kids go to the same school as Seth. She's the friend who had a lot of health problems last year and I picked her kids up from school quite a bit. This time, she and her husband were going to be gone overnight to celebrate his birthday / their anniversary and their grandma (who was staying with the kids) needed to get to work before drop off time, so she just brought them here on her way to work...they were only here about 15 minutes before we had to go to school. I'm glad that this time my friend was getting to do something fun for a change, instead of being sick / going to medical procedures! Last night I had a ministering interview with the RS president. She might make some changes to my list, but it will mostly stay the same. Oh, and that reminds me that we watched the little girl of one of the sisters I minister to on Sunday evening for a while. And I also helped one of the other sisters I minister to find a babysitter for her kids on Wednesday evening. So I've been ministering through babysitting lately! And finally, when I was sweeping the living room floor yesterday, I swept up this:

It's the missing piece from the puzzle we made! I have no idea how it manged to hide from us for over a week (I even swept a couple of other times), but I'm glad it turned up.

Weekly Review January 3 '20

When I left off last week, we were planning to have the Hatch family over for dinner. In the midst of updating the budget and starting dinner preparations, I got a phone call and when I saw who it was I immediately realized that I had forgotten that Seth had a play date that afternoon! A boy in the ward had a birthday the day after Christmas and his mom had invited Seth and a couple of other boys to meet at the park to play on Friday. It wasn't really a party, but I had told her that Seth would come. But then I forgot all about it!! So Frank took Seth to the park while I finished the budget and got dinner going. We had a fun evening with the Hatch family, eating dinner and playing some games. But of course I forgot to take pictures!

On Saturday the 28th I had a hair appointment. Frank had cleaning at the church that morning...it's not our ward's turn again until March. Jared & Jessie came over for a while in the afternoon but they had dinner plans so didn't stay too long. Scott wanted to walk around downtown Frederick...that and seeing the Christmas lights at the temple were the two things he said he wanted to do while he was here. So after dinner, Scott, Seth and I drove downtown. Frank was tired and his back and knee were hurting, so he didn't want to walk around. During the winter months, they have a bunch of small lit up boats in Carroll Creek, so we saw those first. Then we walked up and down Market Street for several blocks and visited all the stores that looked interesting to us. There are a ton of unique little shops and restaurants in that part of town. It's really cool and I should go down there more often (I drive through there frequently, and always wish I had time to get out and explore). So anyway, it was pretty fun. One of the places we stopped was a place called the Pop Shop, which has tons of unique brands / types of soda pop. Scott bought a bottle for each of us...mine is pumpkin spice, but I keep forgetting to drink it! (It wasn't cold when we bought it, and it said on the bottle that it is best chilled, so I didn't want to drink it then.)

  
Scott's flight back to Utah was very early on Sunday the 29th. Frank took him to the airport. I got up to tell him goodbye, and then I didn't go back to sleep for quite a while. But I did get a little more sleep before I had to get up to get ready for church. We're so glad Scott could come spend Christmas week with us!! It was so nice to have him here; he is really fun to have around. Jared & Jessie came to church with us and then came over afterwards to have some lunch and play some games. Frank took a nap, but the rest of us played a new game that I got for Christmas called Time Line, and it was pretty fun. Then Jared & Jessie taught us how to play a card game called Palace, which was also fun. Frank woke up in time to play a few rounds of that with us. After Jared & Jessie left, I worked on a bunch of stuff for my music and Primary activities callings, and we had family night.

Frank went back to work on Monday the 30th. Seth had a Deacon's quorum service project that morning...they cleaned all the sacrament trays. I dropped him off at the church and then ran to the store to get some things. When I got back, they weren't done, so I helped them finish cleaning the trays. The rest of the day I was pretty busy with all the regular chores, plus working on the tax training. I guess I could say that about every day this week--I worked on regular chores and I did a chapter of the tax training too. I'm making progress, though, and only have 5 more chapters to go. Monday was especially busy because I also took down all the Christmas decorations. Frank had some work to do for clients, as well as some billing after he got home from work so I did most of the decorations myself. I miss the beautiful decorations, but it was good to vacuum, sweep, and dust during that process / afterwards. The house looks a lot cleaner and less cluttered!

I'm actually having a hard time remembering much about Tuesday the 31st, other than Seth slept pretty late so I already had a lot of chores done by the time he got up. I know I kept busy all day. Oh, and the other Primary activities leader came over that afternoon so we could plan our next couple of activities. That evening was New Year's Eve, of course. We did the usual...had a dinner of appetizers while we watched movies and put together a jigsaw puzzle. I know...we're such party animals!! Jared came over for a while and helped with the puzzle but Jessie was at a party that a friend was having, and Jared joined her there after visiting with us for a few hours. Frank had been up early for work so he didn't even try to stay up until midnight, so that meant I was elected to stay up with Seth. I mostly worked on the puzzle while Seth watched The Sandlot and then Prince Caspian. I didn't buy a new puzzle this year...it occurred to me that we have about 10 - 15 puzzles already and I could just pull out one of the ones we made several years ago and make it again. It's not like we remember where all the pieces go! :) We didn't make much progress on it that evening, really, but we did get the outside edge done and started working on the inside.

I stopped working on it about 11:45 and watched Prince Caspian with Seth. We took this selfie right after midnight to send to Tanner and Scott with the caption "Greetings from 2020":

The movie wasn't over yet, so we stayed up until it ended and didn't get to bed until 12:45ish. I took this picture of the puzzle before going to bed:

Seth woke us up on Wednesday January 1st 2020 at about 5:45 am to tell us that he had just thrown up...on his bedroom floor. What a great way to start the new year!! After doing our best to clean up the mess (we still need to rent a carpet cleaner), Frank remembered something he needed to check on his computer for work, Seth went back to sleep in a sleeping bag on our floor, and I tried to go back to sleep but I was too wide awake by then. So I finally gave up and got up and worked on the puzzle. Frank helped, but he had to go into work to solve a problem too. I worked on the puzzle, with some help from Frank, until we finished it around noon.

And yes...there's a piece missing!! (Can you spot it?) I guess that's what I get for pulling out an old puzzle. I don't think it was missing a piece the first time we made it, but the piece got lost at some point. It still looks pretty good, though, don't you think? Meanwhile, when Seth woke up he felt fine and after keeping down ginger ale and then crackers, he moved on to regular food by late afternoon and he's been fine since. After we finished the puzzle, I showered and got a couple of worthwhile things done, like working on the tax course (which was quite a feat, since I never had a nap and I struggle to stay awake even when I've had a decent night's sleep...which I definitely didn't have the night before.) At some point, I made myself our traditional New Year's Eve frappe:

It's supposed to be made from ginger ale and lime sherbet, but apparently they don't sell lime sherbet anymore (not at Wal-Mart, anyway) so I used rainbow sherbet instead.

Thursday January 2nd was back to normal life for everyone. Seth went to school and Frank went to work and I had a ton of stuff to do. I needed to do the grocery shopping, which I usually do on Wednesdays, in addition to all the usual stuff I do on Thursdays. Plus I needed to go to the storage unit to find a few things that Tanner wanted me to send back with Jared and my friend Wanda called and needed some things from the store too. So I was actually barely home all day because I was running around getting all that stuff done. That's good, though, because otherwise I would have been alone in the house with a bunch of cookies, candy, chips, soda, and other junk food. (Although I still ate plenty of those things this week, I'm afraid.) I still managed to get a chapter of the tax course done before I had to pick up Seth from school. He is doing safety patrol this week and next, which means I have a few extra minutes before I need to pick him up since he doesn't finish his safety patrol job until a few minutes after dismissal ends. When I picked him up on Thursday, we went directly from there to meet Jared, Jessie, and all of Jessie's family including her grandparents at a restaurant for dinner. Frank had to go directly from work to do work for a client that afternoon / evening, so he wasn't able to come. It was Jared & Jessie's last evening here, so we wanted to spend as much time with them as possible. They came back to our house afterwards and stayed to visit with us until shortly after Frank got home. Meanwhile, Seth and I had to leave because I had Primary Activities and Seth had YM so we said our goodbyes to Jared & Jessie. For our activity, we did short spotlights on the new girls who just came in (the girls who are turning 8 this year, who are also the girls from my Primary class so that's fun for me) and then we played a game to help all the girls get to know each other better. I think it was fun. Meanwhile, Seth was helping plan YM activities for the next 6 months.

Jared & Jessie had an early flight today (Friday January 3rd). I heard they got home okay, although they weren't too happy when they got home to discover that the workers who installed new bathroom and kitchen floors in their apartment while they were gone had left a huge mess and they had also left their doors unlocked and open!! So they spent a couple of hours cleaning but thankfully nothing was stolen from their apartment and the new floors look nice. I spent the day working on the tax course and on the budget. Frank had to be at a store really early this morning (and yesterday morning too) and he just got home from work about 10 minutes ago (it's 8:30 pm) so he had a really long day.

My back has been hurting so much this week that I haven't been able to jog for a half hour each morning as I normally do. I have been doing some other exercises on the Wii that helps loosen my back up a bit so it doesn't hurt quite so much, and then I'm able to jog for 10 minutes, or sometimes 20 minutes. I guess I am going to have to go to a doctor soon to try to figure out what's going on with my back. Or maybe get a new mattress first and see how much that helps!!

I'm using my new tablet now and I like it but there are things about the calendar that are different and it makes it a lot harder for me to look back and see what I've done so I'm having to rely on my memory more when writing these posts, which means I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot of things. I wish the calendar on the new tablet was the same as the one I had on my old one. Sometimes updates are not an improvement!

That's it for this week...hope you all have a happy and healthy 2020.