Weekly Review November 28 '09

I'm going to start this post with photos--not because I want to, but because I can't get the photos to move for some reason, and I am too impatient to mess with them any more! They are in backwards order, for the same reason.

Look out! He's a teenager now!


Seth's head met the fruit salad



Front view of the "fruit salad look"

Let's eat!

This one is better of a few people!

The boy with his new "toys"

Waiting to open his presents

Now here's the review:

Sundays are always busy days, and this one was no exception. Besides church, I had Ward Council before church, a visiting teaching appointment right after church, and the Priesthood Preview that evening. This event was not terribly stressful for me—I had to do some planning ahead of time, getting it organized and providing refreshments—but once I was there, all I had to do was sit there and enjoy it. I had asked one of the boys to talk a few minutes about what he could do to prepare to receive the priesthood, and he did a fabulous job—really, one of the best talks I’ve ever heard about the priesthood. Our bishop also talked to the boys. He sells physical therapy equipment for a living, and he used a little device he has for an object lesson about the power of the priesthood. This device uses electrical impulses to stimulate muscles—basically, he could get Jared to lift up his hand without Jared doing anything! The boys got a big kick out of that and I’m sure they won’t forget the object lesson for a long time. Anyway, I was really happy with how it all turned out with the exception that one of the boys that I was really hoping would come didn’t make it. On the way home from that, we stopped at my friend Rebecca’s house—her husband, Mark, had called Frank with a computer problem, so Frank looked at his computer while Rebecca and I visited a little bit.

The rest of this week was busy with Thanksgiving preparations. I moved around all my regular chores since I normally go to the grocery store on Thursdays. I got my hair done on Tuesday. We invited 2 families in our ward to come for Thanksgiving, but one family couldn’t make it, so we had a fairly small crowd, for us. The boys were out of school starting on Wednesday and Frank took Wednesday through Friday off work also. Wednesday was busy getting some of the cooking done in advance, as well as picking up some tables and chairs from the church and doing some general cleaning / tidying around the house to prepare for guests. I am glad Frank was home to help with all of that! I got the sweet potato casserole and a chocolate pudding pie made. Frank did the rest of the pies—pumpkin, peach, and strawberry—as well as a banana pudding dish. The strawberry pie was actually turnovers, and Frank made homemade pie crust for those as well as for the peach pie. The pumpkin pie had a store-bought crust, and really—there is just no comparison! Frank’s homemade crust was 10 times better!

Thursday was also Tanner’s birthday, so in the morning he opened his presents. He got a movie, a game, and the first season of Star Wars Clone Wars on DVD. He seemed to be happy with everything and enjoyed watching some of the Star Wars show that morning before the guests arrived, as well as playing the new game.

We got a call from Frank’s sister that morning also, telling us that Frank’s mom was in the hospital and they thought that she may have had a heart attack (she had pain in her left arm and felt pressure on her chest). That was a worry to us, of course! Thankfully, after running tests, they determined that her potassium was low and nothing more. We hope she is feeling rested and a lot better now.

Frank was a bit concerned Thursday morning when he pulled the turkey out of the refrigerator and discovered that it was still somewhat frozen. But we did a little quick thawing in water and it turned out fine—as a matter of fact, it got done about 2 hours earlier than we’d planned! We put together a green bean casserole and made some rolls and gravy also. Our friends, the Days, brought stuffing, mashed potatoes, drinks, and fruit salad so we had lots of yummy food, as always. The Days have three young children—Devon, Tyler, and Kaitlyn. Devon (age 5) was a little nervous about Snickers, but Tyler (age 3) was unphased and Kaitlyn (almost 1) was pretty fascinated by him. We had a good time, eating and playing games, and all the kids got along really well. Tanner was eating some of the fruit salad later, in the living room (which he wasn’t supposed to do) and Seth managed to put his head in Tanner’s plate. It was a good photo op, though: see photos above! Then Seth got a bath!

I would have had more fun than I did if my stomach hadn’t been bothering me all day. I didn’t feel nauseated and I was able to eat, but it just felt all knotted up and as the day wore on it kept getting worse. Shortly after the Days went home, it got much worse and then the nausea hit. I was really quite sick for several hours and couldn’t do anything except lie in bed. I drifted off a few times, but would wake up and get sick again. Not fun! My back and kidneys, as well as my stomach were also hurting. I very rarely get the stomach flu, but it seems like the last couple of times that I have it’s been much more severe, with pretty intense pain. Thankfully, sometime around midnight I finally went to sleep for a while. I woke up once more sometime in the night, still hurting, but didn’t get sick again. When I woke up Friday morning, I felt a lot better. I just took it easy that day, for the most part, and didn’t eat very much. (No Thanksgiving leftovers for me!)

Frank bravely took all the boys shopping at Wal-Mart Friday morning and was able to acquire some very inexpensive Christmas gifts. He also got some clothes for the boys and a much needed new coat for himself, also at rock-bottom prices. He got a jacket for me also, but realized after he got home that he had grabbed an extra large instead of a small, as he had intended! He had to take that back, but they were out of size smalls, so I’ll have to go back to get one that fits another day. That afternoon, Tanner’s friend Matt came over to play and spend the night. We ordered pizza and had Tanner’s cake, also. (No pizza or cake for me, though!) After we sang to Tanner and finished his cake, Scott and Jared both went to spend the night with friends—Scott with Ryan and Jared with Bryson. That gave Tanner more one-on-one time with Matt, which was nice for him, I think.

This morning the boys had leftover pizza and pie for breakfast! Frank had the more traditional biscuits and gravy, and I had an egg because that’s about all I dared to try. This has been a pretty relaxed Saturday, as far as Saturdays go. We really didn’t have a ton of things to do—for once! Matt went home around 11:00 and I went to pick up the other two boys around 2:00. I had to make another Wal-Mart trip (we go to that store far too often) because we discovered we were all out of toilet paper! Besides that, I finished up preparations for Sharing Time tomorrow and Frank and I went to look at a couple of houses.

Actually, we ended up looking at three houses. They were all in the same neighborhood and all of them were foreclosures; kind of sad. However, they were the best three possibilities we’ve looked at yet, since they had almost everything we are looking for—fenced yards, family rooms, storage space, space for an office, larger bedrooms for the kids. Frank and I both liked the first two houses we looked at; particularly the second one which was roomier and had a beautiful front porch (although it was filthy!). Frank didn’t like the third house so we’re ruling it out although I thought it was ok. Both houses needed floors replaced and painting done, but that wouldn’t be a big deal. The main drawback to both of them is that the kitchens would need to be re-done, and that would be a big expense. I’m not sure we’d be able to manage that. Also, because they’re foreclosures, the banks won’t accept any contingencies and we really wouldn’t be very comfortable putting in an offer without a contingency that our house sells. So we are thinking about it, but I have a feeling we don’t have a lot of time to think—those houses will probably sell fast. But that’s ok—I’m just not willing to hurry into a big decision like this!

Unfortunately, by the time we got home from looking at houses, Frank wasn’t feeling too well, and he has continued to get worse this evening. He definitely seems to have the same thing that I’m still getting over—poor guy!

I’ve enjoyed reading about some of the things all of you are thankful for lately. I haven’t had a chance to write a “Thankful Thursday” for a while, but that doesn’t mean I’m not feeling thankful! (Just busy.) It seems ironic to me, especially, that I didn’t post a “Thankful Thursday” on Thanksgiving, of all days. As you know, however, I spent that evening curled up in bed feeling very sick! I do remember thinking at that time, though, how thankful I am that I am usually very healthy! I am also thankful for all of you and the efforts you make to keep in touch.

Now bring on the joys of Christmas!!

Weekly Review November 21 '09

This has been an expensive week. On Tuesday I noticed the battery warning light on the Expedition had come on when I went to pick up the boys from school. The next morning, the car started, but then all the lights went out. Frank took the battery out and took it to have it tested—it was dead. So he bought a new battery and put it in, but the warning light was still on, so he had to replace the alternator also. Luckily, Frank was able to do all the work himself—that saved us a bit. It was also fortunate that the weather was sunny and fairly mild temperatures that day—the next day it got a lot colder and it rained buckets! The car works great now and an added bonus—it’s been making an annoying squeaking noise for months and that noise is gone now. We thought we had a belt loose somewhere, but it turns out it was part of the alternator that was making that noise.

On Thursday the television quit working. The screen wouldn’t come on at all. We’ve had that television for several years—probably close to 10 years—so I guess it was time for it to go. We decided to go do some price comparisons Thursday evening and we found a good deal, so we ended up buying a new television that evening. We talked about waiting until after Thanksgiving, when I’m sure there will be some good deals—it wouldn’t kill us to go without a television for a week (or longer)! But then we remembered that Tanner’s birthday is also on Thanksgiving and everything we got for him requires a television (movies and video games)! So we didn’t figure it would go over too well with him if we waited. We’ve now joined the 21st century—we have a flat screen television! That’s the only kind they sell these days, apparently. It is nice, and the boys pointed out to me that the gaming systems can now be stored in the cabinet behind the television, so now I’m totally sold on it. It seems like repairs / replacements always come in threes, so I’m waiting to see what’s going to break next! (Please—let it be something small and inexpensive.)

Besides all that, Frank and I also went out and did almost all of the Christmas shopping the first couple of days of this week. After the television broke, we decided that we really are done except for letting the boys get something for each other! I hope the boys will be happy with what we decided to do this year—I think they will be. It’s nice to have most of that done so December will be less hectic and we can enjoy the Christmas season to the fullest.

Besides all the shopping, my visiting teachers came to see me Monday, I had book chat on Tuesday, a Primary presidency meeting on Wednesday morning (we had to move it to my house, since that was the day the Expedition was being fixed) and I went visiting teaching on Thursday. I had some shopping to do for Primary, also—Priesthood Preview refreshments and supplies for a project I’m going to have the kids do for their teachers next Sunday. Seth has been a real trooper, being dragged from store to store and having his nap schedule all messed up.

Speaking of Seth, he has become adept at climbing out of his crib, which is nice in some ways and not nice in others. No more yelling for me when he wakes up in the morning or after naps—he just climbs out of the crib and comes to find me. If I make sure he’s pretty tired by the time I put him down at night, he usually stays in the crib and goes to sleep. For naps, I have always got him to sleep before putting him down (it’s our special “snuggle time”) so that hasn’t been a problem. However, we are worried that climbing out of the crib is potentially dangerous, so we decided it’s time to get him a toddler bed. The nice thing is, we didn’t have to buy one because about a week ago Frank went to help another member of our ward put together and move a bunk bed, and they mentioned that they had just got a regular bed for their little boy and had his toddler bed available, which they were planning to give away. Frank came home and told me about it, but I was reluctant to give up the crib at that point. Within a few days, Seth started climbing out of his crib, though! So on Thursday we stopped at our friends’ house on the way home from buying the television and we brought the toddler bed home with us also. It is car shaped, so Seth is very excited about it!!!

On Monday we remembered to call the police about Scott’s bike. They said a bike fitting our description had just been turned in that morning, so after school I took Scott over there to see if it was his bike, but it wasn’t. He didn’t use the bike much, so he wasn’t too disappointed, but it would be nice to get it back. I’m guessing even if he does get it back, however, that it probably won’t be in the best condition.

Back to Sunday—it was a very busy day. I had choir before church and after church I barely had time to grab something to eat and then I was off to visit one of the families with Primary children in our ward. This family lives about 20 minutes away, so that added to the time it took, but my secretary went with me and we enjoyed visiting with each other on the way there and back. After I got home we had dinner and family night. Sundays always seem busy to me—even if I don’t have extra meetings or visits, I always feel like I have a lot of people that I need to talk to for one reason or another. I found out this week that I’m getting one more new teacher on Sunday and losing another one, which means I’ve now lost 5 teachers and only gained 3 new ones. However, it has worked out that two of the classes that had 2 teachers before are going to be ok with just one teacher, so we should be fine and it seems like (finally, for the first time since I got this calling!) that we are fully staffed. Let’s see how long it lasts—I’m hoping for at least a week or two!

Friday was our stake’s annual “Temple Jubilee” which means we all try to go to the temple that day (stay all day or part of the day, if possible), so Frank and I went to the temple that evening. Our original plan was to go as soon as the boys got home from school (2:45 on Fridays) but one of Frank’s clients had a problem come up that took a long time to fix, so he was late. We also had to drop off a computer at another client’s house in Rockville on our way down, so in the end we made it to the 6:00 session. We’re glad we made it, though. There were 7 other people from our ward and 2 or 3 people from our stake in the same session with us, which made it particularly nice. We saw several people we knew as we arrived and left the temple as well, and we even saw an old friend from Delaware (Brother Moyes, Carrie!) which is always a treat.

There’s not a lot to say about today except that we kept busy getting lots of little things done. This evening we all watched the newest Star Trek movie. I thought it was pretty good. I was frustrated for the first half of the movie, though, trying to figure out where I’d seen the actor who plays James T. Kirk before. Scott finally figured it out for me—he’s “Sir Nicholas” in Princess Diaries 2—so I enjoyed the rest of the movie! Now if you see the movie, you won’t be bothered like I was; aren’t you grateful we figured that out for you?!

I’ll finish up this week with some fall photos, taken from our back deck. We are still periodically enjoying some sunny warmer days—we’re grateful for that. Everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Did You Really Just Say That?

When I climbed in the car yesterday morning, the radio was on. There was some kind of discussion going on where people could call in with their opinions. I don't know what the discussion was about, exactly, because I only heard the end of one caller's comments and the beginning of the next caller's comments, but I was totally floored by what I heard. Here's what I heard (paraphrased a little; I can't remember the exact words used):

First female caller: "...I have definitely felt pressured to do things that I wasn't comfortable doing in order to save the relationship."

Second female caller: "I agree with her (first caller). I'd say over the last 10 years I have definitely noticed a change in what men expect of women. Don't get me wrong--I'm not saying that porn is unhealthy..."

What? What did you just say?!

I felt like a ton of bricks just fell on my head! I think it would be hard for me to put into words why these comments bothered me so much, but here are a few reasons, just for starters:

1. Apparently we live in a society where women, not just men, are making excuses and / or justifying an evil thing.
2. Women are justifying this evil thing in spite of the fact that they see it having an effect on their lives, and in spite of the fact that the effect it's having on them is not positive. Are they blind?!
3. Satan has obviously convinced a lot of people that a blatant lie ("pornography is not harmful--in fact, it's normal and healthy") is true.
4. Pornography is destroying normal, healthy relationships and very few people seem to realize that.
5. Pornography destroys souls and ruins lives.
6. Pornography is addictive.
7. Pornography leads to crime and violence.
8. If left unchecked, pornography could very well lead to the downfall of our society / civilization.

I turned off the radio, because I couldn't stand to listen to any more. But my two middle boys and I had a discussion on the way to school about everything that was wrong with those comments. I asked them "What does the prophet have to say about pornography?" and I was pleased that they gave responses like this: "It's evil." "It's wrong." "It destroys people." "We have to stay far away from it."

Whew! I feel a little bit better now....

Weekly Review November 14 '09

Happy Birthday, Mom!!

Sunday was kind of crazy again, with more changes. By the time I got home, I had a lot of new information to process to try to figure out how I was going to get the right people in the places I need them. But after sitting down and thinking about it (and praying about it) on Monday, things started falling into place. I love it when that happens, because that’s always a sign that I’m on the right track—putting the right people in the right places. Hopefully it will all work out the way I think it should! Another thing that has really helped—one of my new teachers sent me an e-mail saying she loved her new class and “please don’t split them”! I had told her I was going to split the class I gave to her because there are 11 kids who are all there every week, and about half of them have behavioral issues. They are good kids, but still a difficult class. I had a feeling this new teacher was just the right person for them; I’m so glad it seems to be working out. I’m giving her a couple more weeks with all of them to make sure that’s really what she wants to do. If that works out, though, it means I have to find one less teacher, which will help a lot.

After church our home teachers came to see us and then Frank and the two oldest boys had Stake Priesthood Meeting. My friend Marci called me while they were gone, needing a favor. They had accidentally left their kids’ birth certificates and immunization records at their house and they needed them so they could enroll their kids in their new schools. So Frank and I went over to their house after he got home to get those items (she told me where to find them) and the next day I sent them to her FedEx.

Besides sending the FedEx, I had several other errands to do that morning, and Seth and I took Snickers on a long walk also. (It was very nice on Sunday and Monday—in the 80’s!! We loved it!) Frank met me at the FedEx place and we went to lunch before he had to go back to work and I took Seth home for his nap.

I’ve had a lot of Primary stuff to do this week—working on the Priesthood Preview, figuring out staffing, meetings (more on that later), planning a gift for the kids to make for their teachers, and it’s still my month for Sharing Time. All of that has kept me very busy. I’ve also been trying to read the book for book chat (short stories by Leo Tolstoy) and I did finally finish the first story (The Death of Ivan Ilyich) and started the second one (Master and Man) but I doubt I’m going to get through the other two before Tuesday. I’ve enjoyed what I’ve read, but I just haven’t had enough time to read more.

On Tuesday the weather started cooling down and then the rain came and it’s been pretty cold and dreary. At least we aren’t getting flooded like our neighbors to the south, though! Frank worked pretty long hours on Tuesday and Wednesday. He also had a dentist appointment on Tuesday afternoon—everything looks good. They didn’t even bring up the two teeth that they told him previously need crowns, which leaves us wondering if he still needs that done or if they were incorrect the first time. I told Frank he needs to call them back and ask about it because I actually saved up enough for him to have those done. I think he should get it done now, while we have a way to pay for it! If they say he’s ok, I’m sure I can find something else to do with that money…Christmas is coming up, after all!

Jared had a field trip on Wednesday where they had a “Guatemalan” experience—they were outside all day and they cooked authentic Guatemalan food and learned to play games that kids played there. Sounds pretty cool to me, although I’m sure they got cold and wet. That evening I took the boys to scouts as usual. I stayed at the church until they were done because I’d been asked to come to the cub scouts’ den meeting to represent a “hero”—moms, that is. I also had an appointment to talk with the bishop about some Primary things, so by the time I did both of those things everyone else was almost done. The scouts started working on the Disability Awareness Merit Badge, and since Jared is an 11 year old scout now, they were all 3 doing the same thing.

Wednesday was also Snickers’ birthday—he’s one year old now! Since he really needs some good dog toys to chew on (in lieu of chewing on Seth’s toys), I bought him a couple of toys as well as a sweater (since it’s getting cold). Pampered animal! We really do love him, though, and hope he is happy with us. Training to go “potty” outside is working out pretty well, by the way. He just needs to figure out a way to let us know when he needs to go out. Right now we are still just taking him out several times a day, trying to guess when he needs to go out!

On Thursday I decided I really had to go through all Seth’s clothes because I was having a hard time finding something to put on him that wasn’t too small. I considered going out to buy him some clothes that morning, but decided to wait and make sure I didn’t have a few things that would fit him put away somewhere. I’m glad I decided to wait, because when I looked I did find a few things and then when I called my friend Christine to tell her I had some clothes to give her (she had let me know that a friend of hers could use things Seth grows out of) she said she had some things to bring me—mostly pants, size 3T—which is exactly what I need for Seth. She brought me some shirts, too, so I don’t have to get anything new after all, which helps. Thursday evening I went visiting teaching; I have a new companion and all new people to visit this month.

On Friday I had some special meetings to go to for Primary. The General Primary President, General YW President, and a member of the General Relief Society Board are all here in our area this week end to do training. Sister Lant (General Primary President) did home visits with three mothers and their children in our stake—two of them were in our ward; I am really happy that two of our families got to have that experience! I was invited on Friday afternoon to attend a focus group with Sister Lant, along with about 14 other people from my stake (mostly Primary presidents, but a few counselors and a teacher as well). It was really nice—we got to talk in a small group about some of our questions and concerns, and discussed some things we can do that might help. Sister Lant told us that we are facing the same challenges here that other Primaries are dealing with all over the world. She also said that she was a ward Primary president once but she wouldn’t want to be now because she thinks it is getting a lot harder, because the children are much stronger these days (ie: stubborn!) After that meeting was over, I had a chance to talk with Sister Lant for a minute, and I told her that her husband used to be our bishop. She said “I thought you looked familiar, but I didn’t remember where I’d seen you before!” I went home for dinner, and then I had another meeting at the stake center from 7:30 to 9:30. This meeting was for stake leaders and Primary, YW, and Relief Society ward leaders from six stakes in our area, so there were a lot of people there. We met in the chapel first, where we got to hear brief remarks from all three of the visiting women as well as Elder Hardy, a member of the Quorum of the Seventy. Then we broke out into groups for each auxiliary, and we got more training from Sister Lant. It was really good and inspiring, and I am excited to use some of the things that I learned to help our Primary. I think we are very fortunate to have had this opportunity, and especially lucky that we didn’t have to drive very far to get to these meetings (many of the people who attended had to drive an hour or two to get there).

Last night Tanner and Scott were busy also—they had a night hike (it rained again, but not as hard as last time, so it wasn’t cancelled again) and then they went to their scoutmaster’s house for a “camp out”. I put that in quotes because it rained a lot more, so they all ended up sleeping inside. Apparently they didn’t get much sleep. Then in the morning they all went to pick up the “Scouting for Food” contributions. I picked up Tanner at 10:00, but the older kids (including Scott) went to the food bank to help deliver and sort all the contributions. The YW always help with the sorting, also. Frank picked Scott up later, at 1:30. Both Scott and Tanner were very tired and both took naps, but we didn’t let them sleep very long because we want them to sleep tonight!

Jared had his friend Sage over to play all day. Sage’s mom had to work all day, so she asked if he could come play with Jared instead of going with her and being bored. That worked out well for us, since we still hadn’t made Jared’s birthday cake because he wanted to have a couple of friends over to share it. So his friend Bryson came over later and we had dinner and cake. The weather was fairly mild today (although still a bit wet and gray) so they were able to play outside quite a bit, which was nice.

Jared with friends Sage & Bryson

Seth decided to help himself to more cake later—Frank caught him red handed, the little monkey! No remorse!

The cake is looking a bit worse for wear--ok, actually the frosting was the main victim!

Frank was busy this morning putting caulk on the crown molding in our bedroom so we can paint it. (The molding has been up for a long time, as in several years—this is an unfinished project that we are FINALLY finishing. I hope, that is—it’s not finished yet!) He did a good job—it looks very nice. I kept busy today, too—mostly housework and Primary stuff. Seth didn’t have much of a nap today. He was sound asleep when I put him down in his crib, but a few minutes later we were very surprised to hear his little voice as he came down the stairs “Mom and Dad, it’s time to get up!” He finally figured out that he can climb out of the crib—rats! My life is over. When I put him in his crib tonight, though, he was still awake and he stayed there, so maybe there is hope.

Seth has started using the word “sure” in a cute way. I guess because we’ll ask him a question like “Are you hungry?” and then when he responds we’ll often say “Are you sure?” So now he says things like “I sure do want to watch a movie”, especially if he’s already asked and I’ve said “no”! One day this week he was looking out the window and told me he saw “some Chip and Dales”. Actually, I’m guessing what he really saw was squirrels, but that’s close to chipmunks, right? A new vocabulary word I noticed him using this week—“microphone”. Seth usually talks very clearly, but sometimes he is hard to understand. There is one phrase that he has been using frequently over the last month or so, and none of us can figure out what he’s saying. It sounds something like “Icka ba heada”. It’s driving all of us crazy, because we just can’t tell what he’s saying, but we’re sure he really does mean something! He says it the most while we are at the dinner table, but he does use it at other random times; tonight he said that to me while he was in the bathtub. Maybe some day we will figure it out! If you have any bright ideas, let us know.

Now it’s late and tomorrow is going to be a busy day, so I’d better get this posted so I can go to bed! My heart has been quite “fluttery” today and when my heart acts up, I get tired easily. I’m not sure why it’s been that way today—I have not felt it like this since I was pregnant with Seth. I will keep an eye on things and get checked again if it doesn’t improve. It seems to have calmed down right at the moment, thankfully.

Weekly Review November 7 '09

Sunday was eventful because there were quite a few changes in our ward. The YW presidency changed, which of course led to “trickle down” changes in a lot of other places, including Primary. I knew some of what was happening ahead of time and that’s one of the things that kept me busy last week—figuring out who I needed to replace the people I was loosing. Besides that, our chorister (my friend Rebecca) had asked to be released also and another teacher was taken from Primary to replace my friend Marci’s husband since they are moving. The bottom line is, at this point I have lost 2 teachers and am going to lose 2 more tomorrow, and I’ve only been given 2 teachers in return. Let’s hope it doesn’t take another 3 months to get the other teachers replaced. This kind of stuff drives me crazy! Everything else about Primary I love, but staffing—yikes. I did get a new chorister, though. The funny thing was, he didn’t know it until they sustained him at church. I was sitting across the aisle from him and it was obvious to me that they had forgotten to talk to him. Thankfully, he was a good sport about it and accepted the calling anyway. He said it was like being back in the 19th century, when they used to call people over the pulpit and as long as he didn’t have to go colonize St. George, he was ok!

Frank missed all the excitement because he was still feeling pretty sick and stayed home. Tanner complained that morning of a headache and stomach ache, and his temperature was a little elevated, so we let him stay home too. That turned out to be a good idea, since by the time we got home from church his temperature was over 100.

In Sacrament meeting, Scott and I both shared our testimonies. I was a bit anxious about going up because Frank wasn’t there and Seth was not behaving too well, but I felt that prompting so I went up. After a minute or so, Seth followed me up and when Scott came up to get him for me, Seth bolted into the choir seats and a chase ensued. I couldn’t see what was happening because they were behind me, but I could tell from the noise (pounding feet, loud giggles from Seth) and as a result I don’t think the things I wanted to say came out in a very coherent fashion, but I’m hoping I get blessings for trying!

The boys did not have school on Monday. Jared and Scott were both invited to spend time with friends that day. Tanner was invited also, but couldn’t go because he was sick. He had a field trip scheduled for Tuesday which had cost me $24, so I decided not to “wait it out” with him, but took him to the doctor Monday morning. Of course, it turned out that he just had a virus, so we were out of luck getting any treatment that would shorten his illness. He missed the field trip on Tuesday and also stayed home on Wednesday, but by Thursday he was better enough to go back to school. The trip to the doctor was not a complete waste, though. The doctor noticed Seth and asked how old he is. When I replied that he was almost 2 ½, she said that they had seasonal flu vaccine and swine flu vaccine available for his age and asked if I wanted them to give it to him while we were there. That seemed like too good an opportunity to pass up, so I went ahead and had them do that. I was also able to pick up the refill for Tanner’s prescription medication, which is a controlled substance so I can’t just call to get it refilled.

Frank started feeling better early in the week and returned to his regular work schedule on Tuesday, although he still wasn’t feeling terrific. He worked a lot of overtime on Thursday and Friday because they were setting up a server for a client.
I took Scott as well as Marci’s daughter Haley to Seminary every morning this week except for Wednesday. That was convenient on Tuesday since it was election day and the place we vote is at our church. I was able to vote when I went to pick them up to take them to school. In this election we were electing the mayor and the board of aldermen. I was interested to find out the next day that all 5 incumbent aldermen had lost the election, so we now have a completely new board of aldermen for Frederick. The mayor is brand new also. Only one republican candidate made it onto the board of aldermen, but the new mayor is a republican also. Should make city government interesting, I think!

I went to my friend Marci’s house Tuesday evening. I was too tired to take a project, so I just visited with her while she worked on making jewelry. That was our last craft night since she is moving tomorrow. I think I’m in denial!

Wednesday evening I had a Primary presidency meeting while the boys had scouts. Jared had 11 year old scouts for the first time. Thursday was busy also. After dropping the boys off at school, I went to the church to help sew baby bibs and blankets—we’re giving them to a local charity who will give them to new mothers in need. I went straight from there to a “farewell” lunch for Marci. I wanted to take the older two boys to an open house for the local Career & Technology center that evening, but since Frank didn’t get home until about 9:00, I wasn’t able to do that after all.

On Friday after dropping the boys off at school, I took Snickers to the vet to get a vaccination and then took Seth to get his hair cut. A new lady in our ward (Kathleen) cuts hair (she did mine last month) so I took him to her to get it done. Seth was very good and he looks so handsome with his new hair cut! After he was done, I let him play for a while with Kathleen’s son Tyler—they play very well together! Marci came over before we left to get her hair done, so I got to visit with her a little more also.

Jared had soccer practice on Friday at 4:30 instead of 5:30 because it gets dark by 5:30 now. I lost track of the time, though, so we didn’t make it to practice. That evening I took all the boys and Snickers over to the Nelsons so we could all say good bye. I am mad at myself for forgetting my camera because I could have got some cute pictures of Snickers with his parents and baby siblings. We had a fun visit and said our good byes; we will miss them!

This morning we tried to take some family pictures. Why is it that whenever we try to take a family photo it becomes such an ordeal that I think most of us are wondering if we even want to be a family by the time we are done?! We only got one family photo that is pretty good. Most of them looked more like this:

(No, Seth is not really picking his nose, although it looks like it! We all laughed so hard over this photo. Frank looks like he'd rather be anywhere else but here, and Snickers is looking at Frank, who had just run into the picture.)

Seth was very uncooperative. I don’t have a picture of the four boys together because Seth refused to get in the picture with them, and it was equally hard to get a picture of him by himself. We could have had a few really cute photos of him if he had stayed still for more than 2 seconds, but most of the time, he didn’t. We are planning to get some copies made of the good ones to send to all of you soon.

After the photo shoot, Jared had his last soccer game of the season. Wouldn’t you know it--after a whole season of losses, his team finally got things pulled together and actually won their game 3-2! I have no idea what happened, but they looked like a whole different team than the one I’ve been watching all season. It was a great way to end the season, at least.

I missed the second half of the game because I took Seth down to the playground to play. Scott and Tanner watched him for most of the first half until Ryan’s mom came to pick them up—they went to Ryan’s house for the afternoon to play. She also dropped off Ryan’s brother Bryson—he watched the rest of Jared’s game, and then came home with us to play with Jared for the afternoon. Seth took a nap and I kept busy doing Primary things. Frank changed the filter on the heater (it was pretty cold this morning; I think we are going to start using the heater a lot more) and replaced the ceiling light in the hall downstairs. That light has not been working for a long time, so it is very nice to have light down there again!

Snickers has been driving us crazy the last month or so because he has started getting careless—he puts his front paws only on the puppy pad, which means he ends up peeing on the carpet. Then the last week he has started “going” other places in the house instead of on the puppy pad. We can’t figure out why he’s doing that when he was completely trained a long time ago. This week I decided I’d had enough, so the last few days I have been taking him outside several times a day. So far, it seems to be helping, and he really enjoys getting outside a little more, even if it is only for a few minutes at a time. I hope we’ll have him trained to go outside instead of inside soon.

They are doing a lot of road construction in downtown Frederick near the boys’ school, which means I’ve had to be creative in finding different ways to get home from their school since the usual roads I use are often closed without warning. Fun! Just something else to keep life interesting.

I went online last week to check for houses in our price range and found a few that looked promising, so we went to look at 3 houses this week—one on Monday afternoon and two on Wednesday afternoon. These houses were better options than the ones we looked at a month ago, but I’m still not feeling motivated to move. The first house we saw was immaculate, but really no bigger than the one we’re in now. The second house is the best option, I think. It’s in a nice neighborhood, is the biggest house we’ve looked at, and it’s in great shape although it is pretty old. It also has a HUGE backyard. There were a lot of things I liked about that house, but it is also pretty expensive (a little out of our price range, actually) and the bathrooms (although clean and in great shape) are very small and very dated. As in pink tile all the way up the walls in the master bath, and yellow tiled walls in another! I actually don’t mind that too much (and it could be changed eventually) but the size of the bathrooms is harder to fix. I worry about resale value, especially since this home has been on the market for over a year! The last home was also in a neighborhood we like and it had a great backyard with a play structure, large deck with screened in porch, and a small in ground pool. But the house itself was not in very good shape and I think we’d still be crowded in it. We got a laugh from that house, though. The two upstairs kids’ bedrooms were wallpapered in baseball themes. One featured the Boston Red Sox and the other the New York Yankees! Our realtor’s comment: “do you think they fight?!” Anyway, the bottom line is, I am not going to be motivated to go into a lot more debt unless I find something I really like (or something that can be fixed up to be something I really like). We’ll keep looking—maybe that home buyer’s credit that congress just passed (for 2nd time buyers, as well as for 1st time buyers) will mean more homes go on the market soon.

That’s more than enough for this week, I think! I’m seeing Christmas stuff in the stores now, so I guess there’s not going to be any slowing down now until after the New Year. I am really looking forward to the holiday season, though! We’re going to try to keep things simple and enjoy this wonderful time of year.

Weekly Reveiw October 31 '09

Happy Halloween!

When I left off last week, we were on our way to the chili cook off. We had a good time visiting, and when it came time to eat, there were lots of yummy choices! And yes, we did win an award for our chili. We didn’t win all around best, but they also had several category awards, and we won “Best Chili Like Mom Used to Make”, which is funny since Frank is the one who made it! After dinner, there was a story told by the father of the host family—The Green Gorilla Story—it’s a family tradition of sorts. I really wish I could have taken a picture of some of the kids’ faces while he told that story! He had them riveted!

Sunday was the long awaited Primary program. I had to be there early for ward council; by the time I got out of that meeting my counselors, with help from Frank and the boys, already had all the chairs set up and things ready to go. I guess I’ve gotten used to doing Primary programs, because I was only a little bit anxious—I still remember being a nervous wreck the first couple of times I had to do one of these! (Although I had to laugh when I woke up Sunday morning—I realized I’d been having “disaster program” dreams all night!) I think I’ve learned over the years that everything always comes together and the congregation always loves it no matter what. I was very pleased with how things worked out this time. Not a single child “chickened out”, everybody spoke their parts loud and clear, the kids were mostly reverent (especially for the sacrament), and the songs were all really good also. Everything moved along smoothly and we only went over about 10 minutes, which is what was expected—much to my relief! We had included an insert in the program asking for comments to share with the children, and we received a lot of really nice feedback, which I enjoyed reading to the kids. The children were pretty wired during Primary, but we planned a very laid back sharing time—we watched a church movie and ate snacks! The older kids got to see “Together Forever”, and my secretary had me laughing—she was mouthing all the words because she saw it so many times while she was on her mission, and so did I!

The rest of the week has been pretty busy. My visiting teachers came on Monday and I did some visiting teaching on Thursday. On Tuesday evening I went to Marci’s to help her paint. (She’s still getting her house ready to sell.) We got a lot done, and I also got to see and hold all of Snickers’ new siblings—so cute! It’s hard to believe he was ever that small; he’s grown up a lot!

Wednesday evening we had a Primary / Ward Halloween activity. We didn’t do Trunk or Treat this year; we just had games, a costume parade with prizes, and refreshments. We were going to visit the nursing home across the street from the church to show off costumes, visit, and deliver some warm socks, but all the nursing homes around here have stopped allowing large groups of children to come in because of all the flu (swine or otherwise) going around, so we couldn’t do that. We wrote notes to tuck into the socks instead. I think all the kids had a good time. I didn’t have a chance to take any pictures because I was helping run our game all evening, which was a fish pond. The kids all seemed to really enjoy that one. The YW had two games also, I heard, and the YM did a spook alley. I helped to judge the costumes; we gave awards in lots of different categories and it was fun. Scott and his friend Ricardo won the award for “best group costume”—they dressed up as missionaries complete with black name tags, pass along cards, and back packs full of copies of the Book of Mormon. They went around all night trying to give away BOMs and make appointments! I wish I had got a picture of them.

Wednesday was also Jared’s 11th birthday, so it was a busy day. Jared was actually home from school that day because he was sick, but luckily he was on the tail end of the illness so he really wasn’t feeling too bad. So staying home from school and watching television all day is not such a bad way to spend your birthday! He complained on Monday of a headache, and by evening he had a pretty high temperature (102.4, I think.) On Tuesday he hovered in the lower 99s all day and seemed to feel much better. By Wednesday, he was close to normal again, so although I kept him home from school, he did get to go to the Halloween activity that night. He opened his presents after everyone got home from school—all he asked for was two games for the Nintendo DS—so that’s what he got, along with 3 books from us and 2 books from Grandpa & Grandma Pew. He seemed happy with everything. He wanted to wait to have his cake when he was well enough to invite a couple of friends over, but I did make a bunch of Halloween sugar cookies (pumpkins, ghosts, and black cats) instead. We also ordered pizza for dinner, which worked well for me because I had to get through dinner fast in order to get over to the church by 6:30 to set up for the activity.

Jared was feeling better on Wednesday, but Frank started to feel pretty sick and he has been miserable ever since. I think he has the same thing Jared did—just a more severe case of it. Since Frank wasn’t feeling well enough to go to the activity on Wednesday evening, and I knew I was going to be busy all evening, I left Seth home with Frank. Seth didn’t know he was missing anything, so it didn’t really matter.

The boys got out of school early on Friday. It was also the last day of the term, so we were busy this week making sure everybody was caught up with school work. Scott had to stay after nearly every day to make up tests and quizzes he missed while he was sick, but he got everything done and I think both he and Tanner have managed to pull off all A’s and B’s. We’ll see for sure when the report cards come home! Jared had soccer practice Friday evening and Tanner went to spend the night with his friend Ryan. We rented a couple of movies for the other boys—the newest X-Men movie and Monsters vs. Aliens. I didn’t really watch either of them that night—I was too busy with other stuff—but I did watch the second one on Saturday afternoon. It was pretty good, but not anything to get too excited about.

Jared had a soccer game Saturday afternoon; his team lost again. I didn’t actually keep track of the score, but it was about 4-0. His team just has never pulled it together this season. It hasn’t helped that so many practices have been cancelled because of rain or other games interfering. Thankfully, Jared has still been having fun, so it doesn’t really matter.

For trick or treating that evening, Jared had his friend Evan come over to go with him. His friend Sage also came, but he was later, so he hooked up with us while we were already out. Tanner passed out candy at our house; Scott helped and both of them also spent a lot of time outdoors playing with their friend Joey. Since Frank was still feeling terrible, I took Seth and Jared (and friends) trick or treating. I just took Seth around our part of the court and then dropped him off at home and continued through the rest of the neighborhood with Jared. Seth was Batman this year—mainly because by the time I was able to get to the store to get him a costume (this Tuesday) that’s all that was left in his size. I like to pick cute things for them to wear their first couple of years before they get all opinionated and start picking super heroes, but this year I just didn’t have time to figure anything else out. He looked adorable in the Batman costume anyway, although he refused to wear the hat/mask. Jared wanted to be Aragorn (from Lord of the Rings) and so he just wore part of the Legolas costume I made for Scott a few years ago—that worked for me!!

It rained a little bit during the late afternoon on Saturday, but it cleared up in time for trick or treating and it was mild enough outside that we didn’t need to wear coats or jackets, which was nice. Even so, we had VERY FEW trick or treaters come to our house, which means we have lots of extra candy in the house—which is good or bad, depending on how you look at it! I got back home with Jared by about 8:30, and we only had one small group of kids come by after that. We visited with Sage’s dad for a while and Evan’s parents didn’t come get him until after 10:00, so we were up pretty late and glad that we got to set the clocks back an hour!

We’ve had quite a bit more rain this week, but it’s mostly been warmer so it hasn’t been too unpleasant. We are glad for every nice day we have from here on out!

Now it is Tuesday afternoon and I really need to get this posted before another week goes by. The last few days have been pretty busy and eventful, but I’ll save all that for this week’s post!

Weekly Review October 24 '09

I'll start out with some pretty fall pictures this week:

Of course, the photos don't really do justice to how beautiful it is right now, but I had to try. The hillsides are just covered with trees of all different colors. Wherever I go, I have a hard time keeping my eyes on the road!

This week wasn’t quite as crazy as last week, thank goodness! It was still busy, though. My second counselor (Tammy) told me that her husband thinks we (the Primary Presidency) broke the record for the number of e-mails sent in one week! Well, probably not—but there were a whole ton of e-mails going back and forth as we have thought of last minute things for the program and as we’ve been gearing up for the next event, which is the Halloween Activity—it’s going to be on Wednesday, just 3 days after the program. It’s no wonder we are busy! I will be very glad when both of those events are over. Of course, then I have to start planning the Priesthood Preview….

Frank was very tired on Sunday and he had sore legs for days from all the time he spent on his feet cooking for the wedding reception and for the youth activity. I think both events were great successes, though. I think Scott had fun at the barn dance. They had a pumpkin carving contest, and he and a friend won 3rd place (out of about 20 entries); not bad! They pulled a bunch of the stringy stuff and seeds through the jack ‘o lantern’s mouth to make it look like it was throwing up—nice, huh?! What else can you expect from teen age boys?

Our second practice for the program went pretty well and we got through the whole thing this time. It’s going to be long, but hopefully no one will mind too much. They gave the Sunday School teachers warning that they’d have a shorter class time, at least. And actually, I don’t think we’re going to go over any more than the high council speaker did on Sunday! (Which meant we had less time to practice…)

Seth is starting to give up naps, apparently. The only day he got a good nap was Thursday. (Well, actually, he’s napping right now, so hopefully today will be a good nap day also.) Monday through Wednesday I got him to sleep each day, but he woke up when I put him down (which he never does!) That was frustrating, especially since I had so much to do. He picked a bad week to give up naps! He took a good nap on Thursday, though, and on Friday he got a nap—but it was only for an hour while we were in the car coming back from the orthodontist as well as picking up Tanner & Jared from school.

On the days he didn’t nap, I was able to get him to sleep earlier in the evening, at least. One day he conked out on the couch right after dinner.

On Wednesday, I got him down right before I left to take the boys to scouts at 7:00. (I had an appointment to talk with the bishop about several Primary things, including some callings we need to fill. Can I just whine that staffing is the worst part of being Primary president?!)

Seth may not be napping much anymore, but he is still saying cute things. On Friday morning, I had just turned off the television so the older boys would get ready for school. Seth said (very indignantly!) “Mom! You turned off Special Agent Oso! (A favorite show.) Not a good idea!!”

I had book chat on Tuesday. We discussed Triangle, and now we are reading some short stories by Tolstoy. I managed to make it all the way through high school as well as a college minor in English without ever reading Tolstoy (I wasn’t avoiding him, either!) so I am looking forward to reading some of his works. I wasn’t sure we were going to have book chat this week because we normally have it at Jane’s house but her daughter is the one who just got married, so we had planned to have it at Cheryl’s house instead. But then Cheryl fell down in her backyard (it’s a hill) last Thursday evening while taking her dog out and she broke 3 ribs, her upper arm, and tore her rotator cuff! Crazy! I felt so bad when I heard about it—her husband wasn’t home at the time and her daughter in the house didn’t hear her cries for help. So she was stuck lying on the ground in the cold and rain for quite a while until our bishop, who happens to live next door, went out to his backyard and heard her. She is on the mend now, but it’s going to take a lot of time. Anyway, we had book chat at Laura’s house instead, and then she ended up working on a job (she does decorative painting) which took much longer than she thought it would, so she wasn’t even there! But she left the door unlocked for us. Laura has this absolutely gorgeous home because she is so talented at decorating. I loved being there—it is so elegant—but I realized as I looked around (feasting my eyes) that even if I were talented enough to decorate like that (I’m not!), that a house like that would never fit my family’s personality! I found that thought rather comforting—I immediately stopped wishing I had a house like that!

Tuesday evening I went to my friend Marci’s house and we had a nice talk while she shortened all the necklaces that she had made for me. (I discovered that most of them were too long—she forgot I’m a lot shorter than she is!) She is moving to Kentucky in just a couple of weeks, so our time together is pretty limited. They just bought a house in Kentucky that she is excited about, so it was fun to hear about it. I hope they can sell their house here. Their dog, Cookie (Snicker’s mother), was due to have puppies soon—we were watching her panting and trying to decide if she was in labor or not. She stopped panting before I left, though. The puppies arrived early Friday morning, and there are 7 of them! The vet said she was having 5, but Marci thought there were more. I guess she was right. Snickers was part of a litter of 6 puppies, and he will not be a year old until November 11th, so Cookie has given birth to 13 puppies in less than a year! Pretty impressive. (I’m so glad I’m not a dog! Although the shorter pregnancies must be nice.) Marci said that after the last puppy was born, Cookie raised her head and looked at all the puppies carefully—as if she were counting them—and then looked at Marci with a look like “Oi! There’s so many!”

Scott was supposed to get his braces off on Wednesday (I changed the appointment from 2 weeks ago because he was sick) but his appointment had to be moved back again because of a funeral. (The orthodontist had to go to one, not us—thankfully.) He went on Friday afternoon instead. So here are the photos—before and after!:

He has retainers now, which he is supposed to wear at night and for 4 hours each day. They are clear (he’s actually wearing them in the “after” photo) so they don’t really show. Much to my relief, he did manage to brush well enough while wearing braces that he didn’t leave permanent stains on his teeth. I think he looks great!

Friday was busy with appointments because I also had a mammogram that morning. Thankfully, that went well and I don’t have to go back until my “annual” appointment in 6 months. (This was a follow up to my last one 6 months ago, to make sure nothing had changed since something looked questionable to the radiologist, I guess.)
I haven’t been sleeping so well this week, and neither has Tanner. On Wednesday night he was up a lot of the night so I let him sleep in and took him to school a few hours late. The next night he had some trouble falling asleep, but thankfully he slept well once he got to sleep. I hope both of us will go back to sleeping well soon!

I had to take Seth to get his blood drawn on Thursday. He had to be checked for lead and iron levels. I actually got the lab order at his 2 year old check up in July, but guess who forgot all about it? It ended up in a stack of papers and I didn’t “unbury” it until last month. Poor Seth had to get poked in both arms because they had so much trouble finding a vein, but my stoic little Spartan boy barely fussed at all, although I could tell he wasn’t happy about it. No kicking, no screaming, and barely any crying. He didn’t cry at all with the first poke and subsequent probing around. It was only after the second poke (with more probing involved) and they were almost done filling the vials that he decided he’d had enough and started to cry a little. I was so proud of him! He got tons of stickers from the lab technicians for being so brave, and after we got out to the car I was searching in the diaper bag for a snack and found a small bag of skittles, so he got those, too. When we got home he wanted the band aid off immediately, but after that he seemed to forget all about it. He did tell me in the car on the way home “Those Mommies poked me.”

Starting on Monday, we had really nice beautiful fall weather for most of the week, and we certainly enjoyed it! On Thursday evening, Scott and I planted some bulbs in the flower beds out front. (Frank had taken Jared and Tanner to get haircuts—they desperately needed them!) When the flowers came up this spring, I noticed there were big bare patches in the flower beds where no flowers came up. So I was smart and actually wrote down where the bare spots were, so I would remember where to plant more bulbs in the fall! We’ll see in the spring if it actually helped. It started raining again on Friday, which meant a night hike the scouts had planned got cancelled—Tanner and Scott were a little disappointed about that.

Frank hurt his foot somehow on Thursday, so he is limping around a bit. He tried to stay off of it a lot on Friday (he worked from home all day) so it is feeling a little bit better now.

Friday night we had Pack Meeting. (Jared’s soccer practice got cancelled because of the rain, which was nice because it made the evening less hectic!) It was kind of an historic event for us—we’ve been going to Pack Meetings for 7 years now—because it was our last one until Seth turns 8 in 6 years. Jared will be 11 next week—unbelievable! Jared received his Arrow of Light and they had a bridging ceremony for him, since he is now going to be going to 11 year old scouts. Jared also received 3 more activity badges (Forrester, Scientist, and Showman) and the science belt loop. We are proud of Jared for working so hard in Cub Scouts. He is the only one of my boys to earn all the activity badges except for one. (He didn’t get Aquanaut, because we don’t have access to a pool.) Anyway, Pack Meeting was fun. We have several new leaders, and I think they are doing a great job!

We arrived at Pack Meeting with 4 boys and left with 1. Jared went home with his friend Bryson to spend the night. Scott and Tanner went home with their friend Brian to play until late (we wouldn’t let them spend the night because they have homework to do today.)

This morning I had a stake meeting for all the Primary presidencies. It was a nice meeting; we got a lot of good ideas, and they fed us a yummy lunch afterwards. I don’t think it was very well attended, though.

Jared did not have a soccer game scheduled, but even if he did I’m sure it would have been cancelled because it has been raining most of the day—torrentially at times! A family in our ward is having a chili cook off this afternoon / evening and it got moved to the church (instead of at their house—they have a lot of land) because of the weather. We will be going to that event soon. Frank is making chili now, so I should probably post this and go help him!