Weekly Reviews June 23 & June 30 '23

 I didn't write a post last Friday because we were at Trek. I was hoping to get last week's post written before now, but that was not meant to be, evidently, so here it goes with two week's worth of events. I will try not to get too detailed! 

I actually can't remember much about the weekend of June 17th and 18th, so I guess I won't write much about those days! We took Frank to breakfast on Saturday morning as an early Father's Day gift. I'm sure I was busy the rest of the day but I don't remember what I was doing except that we went to another baptism for another 8 year old girl in our ward. The baptism was really nice. Sunday was Father's Day and Frank didn't have any meetings (besides our 2 hour meeting block) so he got to sleep in a little bit which was nice. Jared & Jessie came over for dinner and Scott and Tanner both called to talk to him so he had a nice day, I think. 

I remember more about the next few days because I had so much to do that I made a list of things I needed to get done each day in order to be ready for Trek. I also rearranged all my regular weekly chores to make sure everything got done before leaving for Trek. It was a really crazy couple of days! Besides all the usual weekly chores, exercising, scripture reading, and Seminary prep, some of the other things I got done were gathering up and packing everything for Trek (including making sure Seth had everything ready too which involved buying a few things), printing up some family pioneer stories, returning books to the library, preparing a lesson for my YW class for Sunday, and shortening my apron for Trek. 

Frank had Monday off work for Juneteenth. He and Seth went to help with a move...the Seminary teacher from our ward who just got released and is going on a mission needed help loading a van with a bunch of her stuff that was going to storage while she's gone. They are her ministering brothers so of course they wanted to help. 

On Tuesday, there was a stake youth temple day in connection with Trek so Seth went to that. I had to get him to the church at 7:20 am and he got home around 6:30 pm. In addition to doing baptisms, they also went to the temple visitor's center where the missionaries serving there taught several differentl classes. He seemed to enjoy it a lot. Also on Tuesday the other new seminary teacher (Tammy) and I met with the outgoing teacher (Tina, the one who is going on a mission) to ask her some questions and get more information about Seminary before she left. 

Frank worked from home on Wednesday and Seth and I left at 2:00 for Trek because the food committee was meeting at 3:00 at Caledonia State Park in Pennsylvania, which is where we did all the cooking. Frank needed to work until 3:00 so he was going to be late but we had already decided that we were going to need to take two cars so Seth and I decided to leave earlier so we could get there on time. In addition to our clothes and other personal items, we also had to transport 3 tent canopies, a bin of cooking utensils, our water cooler, two ice chests full of precooked meat & potatoes, 3 large chafing dishes, and probably some other things I'm forgetting. That morning I had to pick up some large bowls from the church, buy 3 boxes of butter pats from a local business, and pick up precooked meat and potatoes from one of the other committee members who wasn't able to go to Trek. This committee member is in my ward and happens to be the advisor for my YW class. (She was planning to go to Trek but the previous Friday she had a freak accident. She had taken her dog and her son's dog to play at a dog park and in the excitement for some reason her dog ran into her full speed and knocked her flat on her back. She landed so hard that the impact actually broke one of her ribs and the pressure caused one of her lungs to collapse. So crazy!! She ended up in the hospital from Sunday through Thursday evening.) Anyway, her daughter in law was staying at her house so I was able to go pick up the meat and potatoes from her. I was working on all these things nonstop and managed to get everything done and the car packed and ready to go just in time to leave at my planned 2:00 pm departure time. 

The GPS did not take me the way I thought it would--we were on some crazy back route--but the scenery was quite beautiful so we didn't mind. Thankfully I thought to have Seth bring his phone too even though he wasn't going to be taking it on Trek with him because my phone lost its signal at one point and we would have been completely lost if Seth's phone hadn't been working. My phone is plagued with connection issues and I actually didn't have service most of the time we were gone. It worked at the air B&B where we stayed but not at the campground where we were doing the cooking and since we were only at the air B&B long enough to get a short night's sleep each night, that meant I usually couldn't use my phone, Anyway, we arrived at the campground right on time and just in time for it to start raining. It rained for almost all of Trek...sometimes lightly, sometimes a steady downpour, and a few times really hard. The temperatures were in the mid 60s to low 70s most of the time so it wasn't very warm either. Kind of wet and chilly the whole time! Overall, that was probably better than it being really hot and humid though. (And we really needed rain...it's been so dry here.) I was just really glad that I thought to check the weather forecast and decided to pack a rain coat, long pants, socks, hiking boots, and a sweatshirt instead of the t-shirts, shorts, and sandals that I had previously planned to bring. 

We spent the rest of Wednesday setting up our "kitchen" and then making dinner for the approximately 40 staff members (which included the 10 of us on the food committee) who were there that night. It was a long day and I was exhausted by the end of it. Dinner was really good though...we had pulled pork sandwiches, potatoes, watermelon, and super delicious double chocolate chip cookies. The pulled pork was the best I've ever had too. One couple on the food committee had a gigantic tarp that they brought which was a huge blessing because it kept us dry for the entire time. Here are a few photos of our set up at the campground:

This box truck was used to bring up a lot of the equipment and most of the food. We stored the food in the truck at night too.

All of these coolers were used to store the perishable food. They were full when we started! We labeled all of them sith their contents so we could find things quickly.

Some more of the food and other supplies

Here is a view of the area where we did all the prep and cooking.

We did all the cooking on three large propane stoves.

A table with all the utensils

Another table with bowls, pans, etc.

And a third table with more pans, cutting boards, etc.

Some of the supplies like napkins and trash bags.

Most of the food committee members stayed at the campground in either tents or RVs, but we stayed at an air b&b about 7 miles away so that Frank would have electricity for his CPAP. (We looked into renting an RV, but it was much more expensive.) Our air b&b was in a restored farmhouse that is over 100 years old. We had 3 spacious bedrooms plus a kitchen, living room, bathroom, and laundry room. As I said, we didn't spend much time there but we were grateful to have a comfortable place to sleep. It was called "The Rested Rooster" and it was on the main floor of the farmhouse. There was another unit above us called "The Happy Hen", but no one was staying there until the last night we were there.

The kitchen had some cute rooster S&P shakers on a shelf.

This is the room Seth slept in the first night, before Trek started:

The floor of his room was beautiful:

This was our room:

Here is the third bedroom, which we didn't use at all:

We didn't sleep very well Wednesday night and we had to be up really early because breakfast had to be ready by 6:00 am. After making breakfast, Frank and I and a number of the other members of the food committee went to the location where all the youth were being dropped off for Trek to help with registration. I wore my pioneer clothes for this part. 

It was fun to see all the other kids in our ward who were participating and I tried to get photos of each of them to send to their parents (sent later, when I had service). It was raining this entire time, although not heavily. 

Fellow food committee members helping with registration (during a lull):

Seth in front of his family's handcart:

The girl on the far right in this photo is in our ward:

After finishing registration and saying goodbye to Seth, we were able to go back to the air b&b for a short rest before heading back to the campground to prepare lunch. The rest of Thursday, all of Friday, and over half of Saturday we were busy, busy, busy preparing meals, preparing snack bags, and washing dishes. Everything went smoothly and we really enjoyed working with all the other members of the food committee--they were a lot of fun! But it was a lot of work, as we anticipated. There were 15 Trek families plus all the staff...about 200 people to feed every day. We were usually exhausted and our backs were always hurting but as I said...it was fun too and very rewarding. We really enjoyed being a part of Trek and the food was really good, if I do say so myself! We kept getting reports from the staff that the youth were saying that the best part of Trek was the food! 

We didn't have a lot of contact with the Trekkers, but on the first evening we decided (not previously planned) to provide hot chocolate for all the youth because it was so wet and chilly. Yes--in June--so crazy! I went with some of the other food committee members to the first night's camp to deliver the hot chocolate. I saw a few of the kids in our ward but not Seth, but that was okay. I was actually worried if he saw me that he would want to leave with me so I didn't really want to see him. (And I found out later that he really wanted to quit the first night, so I'm glad I didn't see him.) At the first camp there was a lot of mud and a large puddle near the porta potties was full of frogs. They were making so much noise that it sounded like Jurassic Park to me! The kids were really happy to get the hot chocolate, though. 

The second evening they had some fun pioneer activities planned and a lot of stake leaders were visiting so we decided it would be easier to take all the food up to the camp and eat with the youth, so that's what we did. We did see Seth that night and I got to talk to his ma and pa for a while. They reported that Seth had wanted to quit the first night but they had talked him through it and he did a lot better the second day. One reason he wanted to quit was that his back was hurting a lot. Seth does complain about back pain at home too sometimes...like when he vacuums or when he mows the lawn...so maybe I need to get his back checked out to make sure nothing is wrong with it. They hiked about 16 miles the first day, so that was their most strenuous day. Seth was happy to see us Friday night and he did ask if he could come back with us to help cook, but he didn't seem to be too serious about it. We told him "you've got this, Seth" and he didn't argue with us. We're glad he stuck it out and finished the Trek. 

Some photos taken during the activities the second night:

Those buckets they are using for seats were also their "suitcases". They had a very specific list of items they could bring and it all had to fit in the bucket.

Sawing logs:

One of the girls in our ward:

One of the boys in our ward doing one of the activities. They had to try walking together with their feet connected to these boards. A lot of people fell over!

Hatchet throwing:

Seth had just finished eating his "covered wagon" made out of graham crackers and marshmallows.

Seth sawing a log:

On Saturday we made breakfast and got it sent to the camp, warmed up the food for lunch, and then started taking down our campground. The Trek was ending at nearby Camp Liahona, which is a campground owned by several stakes (ours included). This is where Girls' Camp is usually held. Another stake was using the camp for Girls' Camp that week, but they were leaving that morning. We transported all the food for lunch to Camp Liahona and served lunch there after the Trekkers arrived. Frank was asked to get some video footage of the Trekkers arriving at the camp using a drone, and I helped him with that. It was fun to see them all arrive at the camp. They had a testimony meeting in an amphitheater while we set up lunch in a pavilion. When we served lunch, we had a lot of people thank us, which was nice. One of the "pas" said "The food was the difference between being cheerful or being miserable." 

A few random photos taken during those couple of days of cooking:

Sandwich making...we made sandwiches both days for lunches

Assembling bags of snacks and utensils to go with one of the meals. This always took a lot of time. 

Washing potatoes

Stew ingredients for Thursday night dinner

Assembling breakfast for Friday morning

Strawberries for Friday night's strawberry shortcake

Bagging strawberries

Cooking potatoes & chicken for Friday night dinner

We forgot to put butter pats in the utensil bags for dinner so we just added them to the top of the bags of rolls.

One of the few moments we weren't working!

Coolers for each of the families. We packed a cooler with their food for each meal. These coolers were in addition to all the coolers we had for storing food.

Here are some photos of the last day, after the Trek group arrived at Camp Liahona:

This is the group arriving in camp. (Somehow I don't think the actual pioneers traveled through this kind of terrain! 😅)

Parked hadcarts:

The parade at the end for the parents. Seth looking glad to be done:

The girl in the orange shirt is in our ward:

The boy in the white shirt is also in our ward:

They were going down a hill, so this boy is using a rope to slow down their cart:

The boy in the white shirt pulling the handcart (no supspenders) is in our ward:

The girl waving is also in our ward:

After the parade for the parents, we finally headed home. I spent the rest of the day unpacking, cleaning things, doing mounds of laundry and so forth. I was so tired, but there was a lot to be done. Neither Frank nor I could face the idea of cooking anything else that day so we ordered Chinese food for dinner. Then Frank got sick during dinner and had to take a nap. I think he was probably just really exhausted and maybe his blood sugar was off. He had to lie down for the rest of the day but he was feeling much better on Sunday. At one point that afternoon it started raining hard but the sun was still out and we had a really pretty double rainbow. My phone camera is not good with colors at all, so it doesn't look very good in the photos:

On Sunday I was supposed to have choir practice and the choir was going to sing during Sacrament Meeting but the choir director was sick so that had to be postponed. I'm going to miss singing the song now because I will be gone the Sunday that the choir is singing. This was my last week to have a lesson with my YW class because I'm getting released soon and I will be gone a few Sundays in July. I had prepared the lesson, but it turned out that only 2 girls in my class and 1 girl in the older class were there, so we ended up combining our classes and all meeting together. The YW president had prepared the lesson for her class, so we each just took a few minutes to talk about one thing we wanted to emphasize from the lesson. We spent the first half of our class time discussing Trek and allowing the girls who had participated (2 of the 3 who were there; the other one wasn't old enough to go) to talk about what they had learned from the experience. It was also the last week in YW for one of the girls because she just graduated from high school and is going to start attending the YSA ward, so there wree a lot of emotional goodbyes. She is a great girl, and we are going to miss her so much!! I will also really miss serving in YW. Frank and I both took long naps on Sunday afternoon. We were still so tired from Trek. 

Monday was a busy day too because I was trying to get caught up on things like buying groceries but Seth also had an appointment at the orthodontist and I had an appointment to get my hair done. Seth was excited for his appointment because he was getting his braces off. 

Before:

After:

The orthodontist gave him a bag full of treats...some of the stuff he couldn't eat while he had braces on:

I had also purchased a bag a skittles and a bag of starburst for him that morning at the store (but didn't tell him until after he got his braces off). He was really good about not eating the taboo items the entire 2 1/2 years that he had braces, so I have been spoiling him a little with those kinds of treats this week. Later in the week I bought popcorn and rice crispy treats! 

The orthodontist appointment was only supposed to take an hour but it took an hour and a half so then I was really rushing to get to my hair appointment, which I had scheduled for two hours after his appointment. The orthodontist office is 30 minutes from our house and we also ran into some freaky unusually heavy traffic so I just had time to drop Seth off at home and go to my appointment and I was still about 10 minutes late. (I know my hair stylist so I texted her to let her know I was running late, so that worked out fine.) I had to skip lunch entirely, just grabbed a protein bar to eat when I dropped Seth off. I had some highlights put in so the haircut / color took most of the afternoon. I came home, ate lunch really late and started making dinner for Frank! Frank and Seth had haircuts scheduled for that evening; we had family night first. 

That evening my left eye started hurting a lot. It felt like I had something stuck in my eye and it kept hurting and tearing up; I couldn't really keep it open. I looked in my eye and couldn't see anything and Frank looked in my eye for me and couldn't see anything either. It started hurting shortly after I took my contact lenses out so at first I thought maybe I hadn't removed that contact lens all the way. By bedtime, I thought maybe I had injured my eye in some way but it was too late at night to get it checked. It was still hurting a lot Tuesday morning and I still couldn't open it for more than a few seconds at a time, so Frank worked from home that day and he spent quite a bit of time on the phone figuring out where I could go to get my eye checked. We finally ended up at an urgent care facility because all the doctors were booked up. The doctor put drops in to numb my eye and then some dye in my eye and looked at it under a black light and said I had a scratch on my eye. He said scratches on the eye can be quite painful (I'd already figured that out!) and take about a week to heal. He said my eye was also infected, so he prescribed antibiotic drops for the infection and also some drops for the pain. We got the antibiotic drops that afternoon but the drops for pain were out of stock and Frank wasn't able to get them for me until Wednesday evening. In the meantime, I couldn't do a whole lot because I couldn't keep my eye open long enough to do anything. I was also strangely tired...I guess being in pain was draining. It wasn't too fun because I had so much to do to get caught up on things after being gone to Trek and I couldn't do anything. Tuesday was the worst day and Wednesday morning wasn't much better but about middday on Wednesday my eye started to hurt less and I was able to start keeping it open. Frank usually works from home on Wednesdays, so he was home to help me out a bit on Wednesday too.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday evening, Frank and Seth went to the YM activity where the boys rode bikes--preparing for their upcoming YM camp where they will be doing a lot of bike riding. They also took the 3 tent canopies that were still in the back of my car and set them up at the church to let them dry out all the way while they biked. At the end of the activity, they took them down and stored them in the attic at the church. The YW didn't have an activity that night (which was fortunate for me) because the stake was having a kick off event for camp the following evening.

On Wednesday afternoon Tammy (my team Seminary teacher) came over so we could start working on all the organization stuff we need to do to get ready for Seminary. It was shortly before she came over that my eye started to feel better which was a great blessing because I was able to meet with her and I was able to take some notes about what we talked about. Originally, we were going to meet at the church but I wasn't able to drive yet. The YW president picked me up for the camp kick off event that evening. I probably didn't really need to go...it was mostly for the girls attending and their parents...but I did get a chance to talk to the stake camp director to ask her what I would be doing, as the YW presidency representative of my ward. She said I'd be helping in the kitchen part of the time and just spending time with the girls and taking them to their classes and so forth for the rest of the time. She also said that she may not need me to be there every day. I don't have to spend the night this year, either...just be there during the day, so that will be nice. I'm looking forward to spending time with the girls but if I don't have to go every day that will be fine because we'll be getting ready for our Utah trip and I have plenty of other things to do.

On Thursday I was finally starting to feel a lot better although my eye is still sore and not completely healed yet. By that time, a whole lot of things had piled up since I hadn't been able to do much the previous couple of days. I was really busy that entire day trying to get caught up on household chores. I'm still not caught up, but I'm getting close now. I was able to go to the store to get some groceries on Thursday but going outside in the sunshine really bothered my eye. On the drive home, I had trouble keeping my eye open and had to drive one-eyed for a lot of the trip home so I decided I'd better not drive anymore for a while longer. 

Our skies are all hazy again from Canadian wildfires...they say it's going to be like this all summer, whenever the wind is coming from the north. How fun! Our air quality is better today but on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday it was at unhealthy levels for the general public again. Seth is supposed to be riding his bike as much as possible to work up strength for YM camp, but the poor air quality is really interfering with that. (Plus being gone for Trek.) 

Hazy skies (doesn't show up very well in the photo):

Yesterday Seth's friend Lyndon came over to play video games with him for a lot of the day. I went to lunch with my friend Rebekah...we were supposed to go on Tuesday but I had to reschedule because of my eye. She picked me up and dropped me off so I wouldn't have to drive. I got the budget caught up and started on this post but it was too long to finish it last night. Jared & Jessie also came over to do laundry and have dinner with us and we enjoyed seeing them and playing a game together. 

Now it's Saturday morning (nearly noon) and I have mostly just been working on this post. I have also been setting up a Group Me chat for the Seminary class and trying to work through all the bugs of that with my team teacher. I have a long list of other things to get done today but if I get through it then I will be caught back up on all the regular things...at least for a few days, until we leave again!

That's everything for the last two weeks. 

Weekly Review June 16 '23

 Well, here we are with week 2 of summer vacation already coming to an end. I can tell that this summer is going to go by waaaayyy too fast. 

I forgot to mention one thing that happened last week. I was concerned about one of the sisters I minister to because I heard she was having some health problems, so I sent her an email to ask how she is doing. (She doesn't come to church.) She didn't answer me right away (which didn't surprise me...she often takes a while to answer my emails) but the following day when I was grocery shopping with Seth, I suddenly felt a tap on my shoulder and it was this sister. She opened her arms wide, and gave me a big hug and then we were able to talk for a few minutes and now I'm not as worried about her, even though she does have some health problems going on...just not as severe as I had feared, thankfully. I am so grateful that our paths crossed at the store and I am sure it was not a coincidence.

This week has been really busy again. I guess I should get used to it, because I'm sure the whole summer is going to be like this. When I wrote last week, Frank wasn't feeling very well. Thankfully, by Saturday he was feeling a lot better and he seems to be fine now. It does worry me a bit that he is having pain in his kidney area, though, and yet doesn't seem to pass any kidney stones. I'd really like him to get his kidney function checked to make sure everything is okay. 

On Saturday morning I slept later than I normally do. I was surprised that it was nearly 8:00 by the time I woke up; I guess I needed that extra sleep though. Shortly after I woke up, we went to the pick up meat and potatoes from the Trek food committee heads. We were given the ingredients to make 3 batches of stew meat and 4 batches of potatoes. Frank had the bright idea to borrow crock pots from two of our friends so we were able to make all 3 batches of the stew meat at the same time. Our house smelled like delicious stew meat all day and for a few days thereafter! Frank and Seth went to see a movie but I didn't want to go and I had a lot of other things to do. Besides cleaning the kitchen floor and practicing ukulele (I try to do those two things every Saturday), I also finished reading The Color Purple, got caught up on emails, did some YW planning, and sewed my apron for Trek. 

Sunday was busy too...I had a class presidency meeting before church and choir practice after church. We're singing an arrangement of "Let Us All Press On" and the director asked me to sing soprano this time because most of the regular sopranos won't be here to sing this month. 

I mentioned last week that there was some confusion about who I was going to be teaching Seminary with. Two teachers have been teaching Seth's class, which is all the kids who attend Walkersville and Thomas Johnson High Schools. This includes all the kids in our ward, but also includes a few kids from Frederick Ward and a few kids from Frederick 2nd Ward, which is a Spanish ward. One of the teachers is in our ward and the other one is in Frederick Ward. The teacher from our ward is going on a mission so she needed to be replaced, but most people assumed that the other teacher (from the other ward) would continue teaching our group. She's great, and I would be happy to teach with her, but Frank told me after I was called that the stake presidency had told our bishopric that they needed to call two teachers from our ward. The calling was issued to the other teacher on the same Sunday that I was sustained, but not until after church so she wasn't sustained until the following Sunday (this past Sunday). She did send me a text message after church last week letting me know that she had been called, so I knew who it would be and I was thrilled, because she is awesome!! She's a great teacher, has a strong testimony, is a good friend, and we work really well together. She was one of my counselors years ago when I was Primary president and she is organized, dependable, and has great ideas. And she says she's really happy to be teaching with me too, so that is all good. She came to the training meeting that evening too but the confusion came in when the teacher from the Frederick Ward was also there and when she introduced herself, she said that she was teaching the kids from Walkersville and Thomas Johnson High. The newly called teacher and I just looked at each other in confusion. It turns out (we found out later) that the teacher from Frederick Ward was getting released. (At least I think she was released!) Why they didn't tell her she was getting released before she went to a training meeting for the new year is beyond me...I guess that detail fell through the cracks somehow. I feel really bad about it, even though it's not my fault. 

Anyway, you're all probably really confused by now! On Sunday in between church and choir practice, the other teacher (her name is Tammy) and I were set apart. One of the counselors in the Stake Presidency set Tammy apart and then the high councilman who issued the calling to both of us set me apart. The blessing I received was amazing and beautiful and just what I need right now, so I am grateful. It's been a relief this week to be able to talk with Tammy openly about Seminary, now that everybody knows that we are both the new teachers. We haven't been able to talk a lot yet but we have already discovered that we are both on the same page about a few things like no candy and we really want to find ways to encourage the kids to participate more. She's going to be gone the first week of Seminary, though, because her oldest daughter is starting at BYU this fall and they already planned for Tammy to take her out to Utah to get her settled that week. I'm not sure what we're going to do about that yet but I'm sure we'll figure something out. I have started going through some of the training materials that I am aware of (there are probably a lot of things I'm not aware of) and they are good, but there is a LOT of stuff and I'm not making as much progress as I would like. I am trying to do at least a little bit each day but there have been a few days this week that I ran out of time. 

On Monday besides the usual laundry, grocery shopping, and vacuuming, I also made all four batches of the roasted potatoes for Trek. They also smelled delicious! All the stew meat and the potatoes are double bagged in freezer bags and are in our freezer. Now we just have to remember to take them with us when we leave for Trek. There's a lot to bring, so I could see us forgetting them by accident! Frank and I also went to a baptism for an 8 year old girl in our ward on Monday; her dad is the other counselor in the bishopric with Frank. Originally, Frank thought he would not be able to go because it was scheduled for 4:30 and he wouldn't be home from work yet. But they ended up having to push the time back a little bit so he barely made it home in time to change and we headed over to the baptism and arrived only a few minutes late. The baptism was really nice and Frank was asked to join the circle when she was confirmed. At the beginning of the year, Frank challenged all the Primary kids to read scriptures a little bit every day and this little girl took him very seriously and she actually was able to read the entire Book of Mormon, finishing a day or two before her baptism. Pretty cool! After we got home from the baptism, we had dinner and family night and by then it was time to go to bed.

I don't remember a lot about Tuesday except that in additon to all the regular chores, I spent a lot of time putting together the final shopping list for Trek (the items that need to be ordered and picked up the morning we leave) and I made some brownies for my YW class activity that night. The girls wanted to watch a cheesy movie and one of the girls was excited to have us come to her house to watch it. We had lots of snacks (the brownies were just one thing) and the movie was, indeed, very cheesy. I actually saw it last year with the older class so I wasn't really looking forward to seeing it again but it was fun to see the girls' reactions. The movie was a modern Christian spoof of "Beauty and the Beast" that was obviously filmed in Utah. (I recognized Mt. Timp and Cascade mountain.) The girls had a great time so it was a successful activity, overall.

On Wednesday I sewed my skirt for Trek. It turned out better than the first one...definitely long enough. The apron turned out nice too but I actually wish it was not quite so long, so I may shorten it if I have time before Trek. I don't know why I have so many problems with making things the right length...they always turn out too long or too short! I obviously am not very good at measuring. 

Yesterday I went to the temple, which I really didn't have time to do but I'm glad I went anyway. It as great to be there! I ran into Tracy Hatch (Jared's mother in law) there so we sat together and we were remembering that exactly 4 years ago to the day we were getting Jared & Jessie's wedding reception set up. 

Last night I went to a RS activity. A sister in our ward taught us all about the gastrointestinal system. (She's a surgical assistant for a GI doctor.) That might not sound like a great topic, but it was actually really interesting and I learned a lot and I was able to ask some questions that Jessie wanted me to ask for Jared's benefit. 

This morning I went to the dentist...just my usual 6 month checkup, and everything is fine with my teeth. Coming home, I drove through a pretty heavy rainstorm but that's good since we need rain. After the rain stopped, I ran some errands and got our finances caught up. This day has gone by fast and I can't believe it is late afternoon already! 

I've been waking up pretty early most days because Frank is still getting up early for work so I have been able to exercise every day this week. I enjoy watching shows on Netflix or Disney Plus while I jog. In my few spare moments (mostly while eating lunch) I have been reading a book called Rise and Shine, Benedict Stone by Phaedra Patrick. I am enjoying it a lot. 

I forgot to mention earlier when I was talking about Sunday that Seth was sustained as the first assistant in the Priest's Quorum that day too. We've known that was going to happen for about 3 weeks, but the bishop was out of town so it didn't happen until this past Sunday. 

I believe that is everything I have to report this week.

Weekly Review June 9 '23

 Last week when I wrote, I was leaving to go to the temple soon. I met Frank there and it was really nice to go to the temple together. We stopped on the way home to get a quick bite to eat. 

On Saturday we spent the morning at Costco buying a lot of the non-perishable food for Trek. It took us 3 hours to get that done. We brought Seth with us to help and it's a good thing we did because we ended up with 2 full carts, plus a pallet so we needed all three of us to push the carts and pallet to the check out line. 

(The orange flat cart behind them is the one I was pushing.) We met the couple who is the head of the food committee at their warehouse on our way home to drop off everything we bought. Yesterday Seth came with me on my regular trip to Wal-Mart to get groceries and we got another cartful of non-perishable items for Trek. I'll be dropping off those items at the warehouse in a few hours. Believe it or not, that's only about a third of the food we need for Trek. The heads of the food committee are picking up the rest of the non-perishable items from Sam's Club today (we couldn't get everything at Costco and we don't have a Sam's Club membership) along with most of the meat because we are going to divide it up among the members of the food committee to pre-cook and freeze it. We will be picking up another really huge order of all the perishable food from Sam's Club on the morning before Trek. It takes a lot of food to feed 200 people for 3 days!

We were supposed to have the Sister missionaries over for dinner on Saturday evening but one of them wasn't feeling well so we took food over to them instead. 

On Sunday I was sustained as a Seminary teacher and lots of people congratulated me, which I always think is kind of strange. It's not like I applied for the job and won out over all the other applicants! 😂I was supposed to get set apart after church but the visiting member of the stake presidency who was supposed to set me apart ended up spending the entire Sunday School hour and beyond out in the parking lot with an upset member of our ward who was offended when the stake presidency member reminded us at the end of our testimony meeting that our testimonies should be brief and focused on Christ. I don't think these comments were even directed at the guy who got offended but anyway...he was really upset. I waited around for a while after church but finally gave up and went home. 

Jared came by that afternoon to do some laundry and have dinner with us since they hadn't been able to come on Thursday to do laundry (they were detained by car trouble). Jessie didn't come because she had other plans already.

We ate a little earlier than normal because I had a Seminary teacher training meeting at 5:00 pm and Frank had a Trek food committee meeting at 5:00 pm also. (The Trek food committee meeting was obviously for me too but I couldn't be two places at once, of course.) Frank's meeting was online but mine was in person at the stake center. It was a very short meeting and it was about the new graduation requirements for Seminary students, so I didn't really learn much about what I am supposed to be doing. From what I've been hearing from other teachers in our stake, we don't get a whole lot of training or support from the local CES coordinator which doesn't leave me feeling very warm and fuzzy. But my ministering sister helped me a little bit with that...she visited me on Wednesday and it turns out that her sister in law is a Seminary teacher in a nearby stake and her sister in law told her where I can go in the gospel library app to find training materials. So I've been able to start going through that, at least. 

I'm kind of jumping around though...on Sunday there was also some confusion about who I will be teaching with and the end result is that I came home feeling upset about all the uncertainty and not being set apart as I anticipated as well as some frustration about YW stuff and I had kind of a meltdown that evening. It was all just too much at once. I'm feeling better now, though. 

I feel like I've been really busy this week with many different things. On Monday and Thursday I helped with some community service stuff. There's a group of local churches that provide free hot lunch for kids in the summer time at various parks in the area and every year our ward provides volunteers for that for a week and this was our week. On Monday I went alone but I took Seth with me to help on Thursday. His friend Henry (and Henry's mom) were signed up to help on Thursday so I thought Seth would enjoy helping that day. On Monday our RS president and my friend Sherrie were helping but there were several other volunteers and only about 20 kids showed up to eat lunch so we really didn't have much to do. We ended up talkng with each other most of the time which was helpful for me since Sherrie has been a Seminary teacher in the past. She sent me some emails later that day with some helpful information. According to her, there is a LOT I will be needing to do to prepare and get things set up over the summer. 

On Thursday there were fewer volunteers so I felt like I was able to help more. Lunch is usually served in a pavilion at the park, but on Thursday it was moved inside to a nearby HOA building because the air quality is so bad here right now. You may have heard that we are getting a lot of smoke all over the northeast, mid-Atlantic, and some of the southeast because of wildfires in Canada. It was noticably hazy outside on Wednesday and on Thursday it was even worse and we could smell smoke in the air. We couldn't see the nearby "mountains" at all and even trees a short distance away looked hazy. Our area was on Code Red for air quality yesterday, which means that it is unhealthy for the general public to be outside. So fun! It does seem to be quite a bit better today and we've dropped to code yellow which is just moderate air pollution. Hopefully we are over the worst of it. Other than the haziness, we really can't complain about the weather around here. It has been cool at night and in the 70s or 80s during the day...very pleasant!! I guess we aren't getting enough rain, though. We're going to be in drought conditions soon, I think, if it doesn't rain. Seth hasn't had to mow the lawn in a few weeks because the grass isn't growing. 

Okay, now back to Tuesday. We had a combined YM / YW activity that evening which was an end-of-the-school-year celebration and a farewell for the 2 YW and 1 YM who just graduated from high school and are moving on to college. They will be missed! We had a dinner and played "minute to win it" games and played dodgeball. There was a little slide show with photos of the graduates, too, and there was a little book for each one of them that we all wrote farewell messages in.

Trying to get Oreos from their foreheads into their mouths without using their hands:

Playing dodgeball:

After the activity, the Bishopric and YW leaders met together to discuss plans for the summer. I had talked to the YW president earlier that day and told her that it would make the most sense to release me from YW right before or after Girls' Camp. We are leaving for Utah the day after Girls' Camp ends and won't be back until 2 weeks before school starts. At that point, I will definitely need to be focusing just on Seminary and getting ready for that. The YW president agreed that this makes sense so I will be released sometime in mid-July. I don't think they are going to call a replacement for me until the end of the summer, though, because the Bishopric is supposed to get released in early September so a lot of things will probably shift around then. The YW president has two college age daughters who are home for the summer so they are available to help her with YW stuff. Anyway, our meeting was good and at the end the bishop commented "I'm really going to miss this group" and I couldn't agree with him more! We have had such a great time serving together and I feel super sad that it's coming to an end soon. I think that is one of the great things about the Lord's church though...He could do everything Himself and do a much better job than us, but instead He gives us the opportunity to participate in His work. In the process, we learn and grow and we also get to work with other people and come to love and appreciate them. It's the best!! I feel so grateful for that.

I already mentioned that my ministering sister came to visit me on Wednesday evening. Earlier that day I went to the fabric store to buy fabric and supplies to make an apron for Trek and I decided to get fabric to make another skirt, too. The skirt I made for Trek just isn't as long as I wanted it to be so I'm going to make a different one and this one will be longer. (I figure I'm going to need a lot of skirts when school starts anyway, for Seminary.) Last night, Jared & Jessie came over for dinner and as usual we played a game afterwards. We played Ticket to Ride again and this time Jessie won. Frank didn't play with us because he hasn't been feeling well. His back is hurting a lot and he feels nauseated too. He's not sure if it's a kidney stone or something else. Yesterday he was working from home because he had to go into the office on Wednesday for meetings (his usual work from home day) but today he took a sick day because he's feeling pretty rotten. I hope he feels better soon!

With all of those things, plus my usual household tasks, I have been really busy all week. In between everything else I have been reading The Color Purple and I am close to finishing it. (It's definitely a much easier read than Dear Theo!) It's certainly not a happy book and a lot of bad things happen and yet it's a good book in many ways. 

Seth was supposed to be riding his bike every day this week but since the air quality has been so bad, he hasn't been able to do that. They actually recommended that everyone avoid exercising outdoors so he was off the hook and spent most of his days glued to a screen of some sort. I did have him help me with some household chores but it's the first week of summer vacation so I was pretty lenient and let him have a lot of screen time. 

I didn't sleep well at all on Sunday or Monday nights so on Tuesday morning I ended up going back to bed and sleeping for a couple of hours. I've slept much better since then, though. I've been having a lot of trouble lately with my nose being really dry & sore and bleeding. This usually happens when I am in Utah but it's been happening a lot here at home lately. It's been really bad some days. I was able to get some saline nose mist at the store yesterday and that is really making a difference already. 

To finish up, here are some photos from last week. A few of Seth with his cake and one photo I asked him to take on the last day of school. In his CTC classroom, they have a board on the wall that lists the names of all the kids who passed the different certification exams so I asked him to get a photo of the one with his name on it. 

(It's hard to read...he's the twelfth name on the list.):

Weekly Review June 2 '23

 It's finally June AND it's the last day of school. I'm so glad. Seth will be getting home in a few hours because they get out 2 hours early today. 

Going back to last Saturday...I got a haircut. I also made a cake for Seth's birthday, wrapped his present, practiced ukulele and cleaned the kitchen floor. I probably did a lot of other things too, but I can't remember what they were now. I probably did some things for YW too. For dinner we got Little Caesar's pizza because that is what Seth wanted for his birthday. 

Sunday was Seth's birthday of course. He opened his last present from us as well as a present from Scott that morning, before church:

I had choir practice before church and Jared came to that too because our choir director asked to "borrow" him for choir in May and June (because we have so few men coming...he was the only tenor). Jared & Jessie attended Sacrament Meeting with us and we (the choir) sang our song. They had to leave after Sacrament Meeting but came back to our house later that afternoon to have dinner with us, play a game, and share Seth's birthday cake. 

Meanwhile, after church I had to meet with a member of the high council who asked me to be a Seminary teacher. I kind of had a feeling this was coming a few months ago and then Frank started asking me how I would feel about teaching Seminary so I knew they were considering me. So this was not a big surprise, but it's definitely going to be a big change and I have mixed feelings about it. I know it's what I'm supposed to do right now so I'm sure everything will work out although it's a challenging calling that will take a lot of time. If I had received this calling several years ago, I would have been terrified, but I feel better prepared now and I'm grateful for that. (I still don't feel totally prepared though, so believe me...it's humbling and overwhelming.) I have also been feeling very, very sad all week because this means I will have to be released from YW. I'm not sure if that will happen now or at the end of the summer...I'm not sure yet how much time and preparation and training is involved this summer. I have a meeting on Sunday and hopefully I will know more after that. I've been practically crying thinking about leaving YW though...I have loved serving with the girls and the other leaders so much!! It's been the best!! And it's been very sweet for Frank, Seth, and I to all be going to youth activities together so I will miss that too.

After church and before Jared & Jessie came over, I took a long nap. I didn't intend for it to be long, but I guess I needed it. I was really surprised how late it was when I woke up! Later in the evening, after Jared & Jessie left, we all went on a walk together (Seth under duress!) It was a beautiful day and a nice walk but made my allergies act up again. 

Since Monday was Memorial Day, Frank and Seth were both home. I had the regular chores to do, of course, and Frank came with me to buy groceries. Frank and I went on another walk after family night that evening...this time I came prepared with tissues, and I definitely needed them. We saw a couple of deer but the photos I got weren't very good. (One deer silhouetted in the first photo and one barely visible to the right in the second photo.)

I haven't had a chance to go on a walk since then but with my allergies, I guess it's just as well. 

The rest of the week has been back to the normal routine, but I have felt disoriented with Seth going to school but not Seminary, for some reason. I kept thinking he was done with school too. At least that will be actually the case next week! 

On Tuesday I went to lunch with my friend Rebekah and then went to the dollar store to get some items for my YW class activity that night. For my class activity, we went to a local park and picked up trash. We had a competition to see who could pick up the most, and I had a bag of prizes...the winner got first choice, and then each girl got to pick something out, based on the order of how much trash she picked up. That made it fun, and they were able to pick up a lot of trash even though the park really wasn't that cluttered. After choosing prizes, they each got a frozen treat. I enjoyed the evening, but it did make my allergies act up again. We've been having such beautiful mild weather that it's a bummer I can't be outside without unpleasant consequences!  Meanwhile, the YM were celebrating one of the boy's birthdays...he actually has the same birthday as Seth. They had a nerf gun capture the flag game and ate Snickerdoodle cookies (made by Frank and me on Monday). 

I don't remember much about Wednesday except that Frank worked from home and I was busy all day. I had book chat that evening. We discussed Dear Theo. Most had not finished the book (I was one of the few who did) and most people didn't have a lot of good things to say about it. It was definitely a challenging read, but I do think it was worth reading. It gave me a lot to think about and I learned a lot and have a greater appreciation for impressionist painting. We had a bit of a debate of what to read next but finally settled on The Color Purple. I put it on hold at the library and was able to pick it up today, along with another book we talked about reading that sounded interesting to me.

Yesterday I was planning to go to the temple but Seth wasn't feeling well and about 30 minutes after I dropped him off at school he texted me to say he had thrown up. I went to pick him up and thought maybe I could still go to the temple but when I asked him if he would be okay alone he said he wasn't sure so I decided I'd better not go. I hate cancelling my appointment at the last minute...makes me feel so flakey!...but it couldn't be helped. It turns out that he was just fine--a few hours after coming home he was able to eat some crackers and kept them down and by mid afternoon he seemed to be back to normal. Oh well! I'm glad he wasn't really sick, just wish it hadn't happened at all. One thing I think is crazy...he said he threw up in the hallway because when he ran to the bathroom it was locked. He was heading downstairs to another bathroom but he didn't make it. They lock the bathrooms at his school because kids go in there to smoke and do drugs. It's just terrible that everyone suffers because some kids can't behave. 

I got all the regular chores done yesterday and I also updated the budget last night because today Frank and I are planning to go to the temple together. I knew I'd be busy today and might not have time to do it. I just picked Seth up from school a while ago and I will be leaving to meet Frank at the temple in a few hours. Seth is VERY happy to be done with school for a while! He didn't have to do much today...they played board games in his English class and watched a movie in his Biology class. At CTC he cleaned out his locker (because he wasn't there to do it yesterday) and they watched a movie about how PCs were invented. 

I'm probably forgetting a bunch of stuff but that's all I can think of to tell you about this week.