Weekly Review March 27 '20

Here we are at the end of week 2 of social distancing / sort of quarantining. Once again, there's not a lot to report as far as our day-to-day activities go. I'm keeping up with daily chores and exercising, Seth is working on his goals, and we're doing pretty well with limiting screen time. (He gets extra time on weekends.) We've gone on a few walks and Seth and I have both done a lot of reading. I managed to consolidate my grocery shopping into one Walmart trip, but I also had to go to Costco once. (I was worried that Costco was going to be a mob scene, but it was actually kind of a ghost town and it was encouraging to see that a lot of people are taking this social distancing thing seriously. Also kind of surreal to see all the barriers and signs everywhere, designed to keep people away from each other.) We helped Frank take some equipment to his work on Tuesday evening, but other than that, those are the only places I've been. Frank suggested I fill my gas tank when we went to Costco and I laughed-- my tank is still full even though I haven't filled it since March 14th. I guess that's one financial benefit from not going anywhere--we're spending less on gas. Which is good, since we're going to need it.

At the end of last week I was feeling kind of overwhelmed about all the different things I felt like I should be or could be doing, so I made a list. That always helps me! Because of that, I think I had a more productive day on Saturday. I spent quite a bit of time submitting claims for reimbursement to our flex spending account (because it wasn't working...again...for about a month, so we had to pay for several things out of pocket), I sent a few emails and cards to people I've been thinking about, and I finally got around to filing a stack of financial papers that have been accumulating on my desk.

We had another nice family worship service on Sunday but afterwards Frank had to go take care of an emergency for one of his clients. Seth and I played a game called Time Line, which basically involves trying to place all your cards (that have different historical events, inventions, etc) in the correct sequence in the time line. I have a distinct advantage in that game since I'm older and can remember a lot more things than Seth does, but he does remarkably well at making logical / educated guesses. I did some indexing on Sunday too.

The rest of the week pretty much blends together in my mind and I can't remember what happened on which day, for the most part. I wasn't nearly as productive as I should have been, but I feel like the days went by really fast. I finished reading the next book in the Wings of Fire series (a children's series about dragons that Seth loves and begged me to read), and then spent some time going back to review the previous book before starting the next one because I felt like I needed to remember it better before I kept going (I finished reading the previous book a few months ago, so I had forgotten a lot of details). I watched the next season of a series called Victoria (which--predictably--is about Queen Victoria) and I had to laugh a bit when one episode dealt with a cholera outbreak in London--can't seem to get away from epidemics, even in entertainment!! I still didn't get much accomplished on projects, but one project had stalled because I was trying to learn a new way to do it. This week I made the decision to do it the way I already know, even though it will take longer...because actually it probably won't take longer since doing it that way means I'll start working on it instead of putting it off because I'm worried I'm going to destroy the whole thing. So now I'm working on that project again and starting to make some progress. I did cross one thing off my list--I went through all my clothes and filled a bagful to donate.

Things changed a lot with Frank's job this week. First, on Monday they made the decision to switch to telework, starting on Tuesday. So on Monday Frank was really busy getting ready for that. Then on Tuesday he kept pretty busy answering calls and emails from co-workers who were trying to get set up to work at home and needed help with the technology aspect. On Wednesday evening he found out that starting next week, he will be furloughed (time off without pay) for 2 days each week for the next 30 days. That, of course, is not good news. We knew, of course, that his company was being impacted pretty negatively by the shutdown of business / social distancing and that something like this may happen, but we didn't expect it quite so soon. He's still trying to figure out when he's going to take his time off, because he doesn't think it's likely that he'll be able to take 2 full days off without someone needing him to do something. So he may work 5 hours each weekday--or something like that--instead. Honestly, I'm not expecting that he's going to really get 2 full days worth off each week. His help is critical to keeping restaurants operating, so if they need him to do something, he's going to do it even if that means he works more hours than he technically has to. I hope that we'll get to spend more time with him (silver lining of the financial loss cloud), but I'm not counting on it. Maybe I will be pleasantly surprised, though. He still has a job and we're grateful for that. Many of his co-workers were put on furlough full time, so it could be worse. They are trying to avoid lay offs and other more dire financial issues, so I can't blame his employer for making this decision. But I can't say that it's added to my sense of peace and well being. It's not going to be fun figuring out how to make ends meet on 40% less, but somehow things always seem to work out. I feel less anxious about the next 30 days (we have some savings, so we'll be okay) than I do about the future after that...because certainly there's a real possibility that the 30 days will be extended, and in general it's pretty likely that the financial impact on his company (and the economy as a whole) could last for years. We've definitely taken a beating in the financial department for the last 2 years, and I wonder how long we can keep managing. But as I said...things always seem to work out, and I cannot deny the presence of multiple miracles in our financial life over the nearly 28 years that we've been married. So I'm trying to focus on that faith instead of my fears, but sometimes it's challenging.

The state of Maryland announced this week that schools will now be closed until April 24th, and that distance learning will begin on Monday (March 30th). I'm still waiting to hear specifics from Seth's school / teachers. Hopefully Seth will be able to handle that without major supervision from me. (He does pretty well managing his homework with only minor supervision / help from me, most of the time.) I hope that doesn't sound lazy--I'm more worried about how our personalities tend to clash when I'm trying to work with him than how much time it might take!

Remember last week I said I felt like I was coming down with something? I still feel a lot the same. I seem to have an almost permanent headache and my throat feels constantly irritated / raw. I'm starting to think it's probably caused by seasonal allergies (although I am taking allergy medication). I'm also having a lot of trouble with insomnia and I'm feeling my heart doing it's fluttery "A-fib" thing fairly often, mostly in the mornings--those are both likely related to stress and anxiety, which are kind of in abundance in our life right now, so it's no wonder.

I must report that I am officially a tax geek. Last night one of Frank's sisters had some questions about her taxes so I told her I might be able to help her. I spent about an hour reviewing her information and looking up the pertinent tax laws so that I could answer her questions. It's the most fun I've had in weeks! Seriously, I don't know why I enjoy working through tax scenarios so much, but I do.

That's all I can think of for this week, so I'll finish with a couple of photos from our walk yesterday. It was sunny and warmish yesterday, which was really nice--especially the sunny part, because we've had more cloudy days than not the last 2 weeks (it's cloudy again today) and the grayness has added to the general feeling of gloom. (But at least it hasn't snowed here...sorry, Utahns!)

Or maybe not...I guess I'm not going to finish with a couple of photos because something weird is happening with blogger, and I can't add pictures. Sorry! I'll have to post them next time.

Glad Jeremy got home safely and excited for Micah's mission call! Everyone stay safe, well, and sane!

Weekly Review March 20 '20

Well, here we are at the end of this strange week. It feels like it's been much longer than a week! I bet most people are feeling that way. I'm not going to do a daily summary because there's not a ton to say about each day (I also didn't keep very good records of what I did). I don't feel like I got much accomplished...didn't work on projects at all...but I dedicated most of my free time to keeping Seth busy with things that didn't involve a screen, and I feel like that is a worthwhile thing to do so I don't feel bad about the things I didn't do. I'm trying to keep him on as normal a schedule as possible. He doesn't have school work (yet) because in Frederick County they decided to treat these 10 days off as "snow days" that will need to be made up. I think when they decided to close the schools for two weeks, they made that decision because they were thinking it would only be 2 weeks. And maybe it will be...but it certainly isn't looking that way right now. Seth did bring home some things so that they can transition to "distance learning" if needed and yesterday the school district sent out an email saying that they are working on a plan for distance learning that they hope will be approved and if the kids don't go back to school on March 30th, they will begin distance learning then. Seth already does some work through Google Classroom, and some of his teachers have put some optional stuff on there this week. So he will probably do most of his work that way although maybe they will have some other things set up too. Meanwhile, I hope they really aren't going to have to make up those 10 days. They have already said, though, that if they are back in school before the scheduled spring break that they will not have spring break and they will use those three days as three of the make up days. Then they also have 8 snow days built into the school year and they have only used 1 so far, so that would account for the other 7 days they need to make up. That would take them to the originally planned last day of school, but that is June 23rd, which is pretty late. (That's what I get for looking at the school calendar a few weeks ago and being happy that they hadn't used most of the snow days and were going to get out of school by June 12th!!) Anyway, what I'm really wondering is if they don't go back to school at all this school year, as some people are predicting, how do they expect to make up those 10 days? I guess we'll worry about that if it happens.

So, as I mentioned, I've been putting a lot of effort into keeping Seth busy. It's gone pretty well. He's definitely had moments of boredom and complained a bit about not being able to have more screen time (I've stuck to his 2 hour a day limit pretty well) but he has done pretty well overall. He's spent more time in his room playing (he also cleaned his room!!), he's done some reading, and he's played outside a few times. I've been having him help me with chores each day and he is still working on his goals to exercise and to read scriptures 3 times per week. I played board games with him one day and we spent quite a bit of time the last 3 days making a jigsaw puzzle. We have also gone on a walk every day. On Wednesday we went to the park for a couple of hours. We met a few families from our ward there (this is before the hard and fast rule about no gatherings over 10 people was decided, and there were only 11 of us anyway) and the 4 boys played basketball and 4 square together (2 of them were Seth's deacon friends), along with the Dad of one family while the 3 girls played together and the 3 moms talked. (We were sitting in a pavilion and we sat far apart.) It was about 50 degrees that day and I got pretty cold sitting outside that long, but it was really nice to get out of the house for a few hours and to talk to some other human beings!

Having church at home was really lovely, although I miss seeing the other members of our ward. Seth shared something he learned in his scripture reading during the week and we read Jacob 5 and talked about it. (I had found some information about it to help Seth understand it better.) And of course, we had the sacrament. We dressed up in Sunday clothes for church, and plan to do that for as long as we are doing church at home. On Sunday we also did a Facetime call with all the Utah boys, which was nice. This Sunday I think Frank is going to give a talk about "following the prophet" because he was actually supposed to do that for sacrament meeting this week. I don't think he minds that he got out of doing that!!

Last Friday, we went out to eat at Cracker Barrel because I hadn't planned anything for dinner (I thought we were going to be in Philadelphia that night). I'm glad we got to do that before everything shut down!

I have been exercising most days but my left ankle started hurting on Monday evening for some reason (I don't remember doing anything to injure it in any way) so I had to take a few days off from jogging. It bothered me quite a bit on Tuesday but was starting to feel better on Wednesday. By yesterday I was able to start jogging again and it feels fine now. So that was weird, but I'm glad it didn't last long. I finished reading the book Midnight's Children on Saturday and returned it to the library. That was the last day the libraries around here were open. It was a strange book...pretty interesting and I learned quite a bit about the history of India. I can appreciate that the author is a talented writer, too. But other than that, I'm not sure how I feel about it. Now I have returned to reading the Wings of Fire series that Seth loves. I'm in the 7th book in that series. I got a few small things done, like cleaning out the in basket on my desk, and I started sorting through our 2 -3 boxes of memorabilia that I've been saving our whole married life (birthday cards and programs from events and things like that) although that project is going to take a while! Yesterday I mowed our front lawn, which had gotten quite long and bushy. We've had lots of days in the 50s and yesterday and today the temperatures are in the 70s so things have been growing. The back lawn isn't as long because it doesn't get as much sunlight. I decided not to mow it too because the battery for our lawn mower needs to be replaced. The charge doesn't last long and often doesn't last long enough to mow both the front and back lawns. We've been trying to find a battery to replace it but have not been successful yet. Other than the trip to the park, I haven't been anywhere this week except to the grocery store twice. (I get a few items, like fresh produce, on Mondays and the bulk of the weekly groceries on Wednesdays.) This week I got a lot of stuff on Monday because we wanted to stock up a little on some meat and canned / frozen fruits and vegetables (in case fresh ones aren't available). Those are the things that Frank needs for a healthy diet--meat and vegetables. Like everywhere else, we have a lot of shortages here although I think we're a lot better off than Utah. On Monday there were pretty slim pickings when it came to meat, milk, and a lot of canned items (plus TP, paper towels, and cleaning products have been gone for weeks) but I did manage to get a lot of the things we need. When I went to the store on Wednesday, some of the things that were missing on Monday had been restocked (which is encouraging) while other things had become scarce. I still managed to get most of the things on my list. We have a fairly decent amount of food stocked up in the house now so I'm not too worried about that. 

Frank is still working at his office, which I think is strange because they have about 40 people in his office. He could certainly do a lot of his work from home, but they haven't started allowing people to work from home yet. It's been a difficult and stressful week at his work, with lots of "crisis meetings". The company he works for is getting hit pretty hard economically because they're a restaurant chain and they also own some hotels. A lot of Frank's large projects are on hold now because they don't know if they'll have the budget for them (most of them involve equipment installations). He still has plenty to do, though. They put a hold on all raises which is a bummer because he hit his year mark recently and was supposed to be getting a raise soon. But at least he still has a job--I can't complain when so many people are out of work right now. We're much better off than that. We're not worried about Frank getting laid off--he's the only IT guy--but we are worried about the overall financial health of the company he works for and the long term economic impact. I mean, overall I think things will be okay but it's definitely unsettling.

Honestly, I'm not feeling that great physically. I keep feeling like I'm coming down with something. I've had a lot of headaches and the last few days my throat has been somewhat sore. I really don't think I have the Coronavirus, but I've got some sort of mild cold or something. Frank says his throat has also hurt a little and Seth was complaining yesterday that his ear hurt. I don't really think we are hypochondriacs! I think my headaches might be stress related but the sore throat is probably something else. It's not really getting any worse, though, so I'm grateful for that. And I've been keeping away from people, of course, so whatever it is, I'm not passing it on to anyone else.

That's all I can think of to report this week. We're glad the earthquake in Utah wasn't too bad. We are thinking about all of you, and will keep all of you in our prayers!! I'll finish up with some photos from this week:

Playing Battleship with Seth on Monday

I won the game! (But you can see that Seth was doing really well.)

When Seth found out I was planning the meals for next week, he made me a list of "demands".

He actually does know how to spell, he just thinks it's funny to creatively spell things. (It says Sunday--Mashed Potatoes, Tuesday--Tuna Casserole, Thursday--pizza, Saturday--Mac & Cheese)

Starting a puzzle on Tuesday

Making progress--Thursday morning

Puzzle finished--Thursday afternoon

And last, photos from our walk last night (we walked along the river behind our house, which is pretty low right now):

 

Weekly Review March 13 '20

Well, what to say about this week? I'd say it was a fairly normal, pretty uneventful week until yesterday. So let's talk about the normal stuff first. Besides the ordinary stuff, we had a few other things going on.

Friday the 6th we had the Deacons Quorum over in the evening to play games. There's only 4 active Deacons (including Seth), and one didn't come so it wasn't a big gathering or anything. They watched some Studio C and played some Mario Kart and some bowling. They seemed to have a fun time.

On Saturday the 7th, I got my hair done in the morning. The lady who has been cutting my hair for the last several years told me that she is retiring next month because she's having a lot of trouble with her hands. I was really sorry to hear that--she does a good job and she's a nice person to talk to, also. So the next time I get my hair done will be the last time she does my hair. She is going to connect me with one of the other stylists who she says is good. I hope so! It's always great to find someone who understands how your hair works and knows how to make it look good. That evening, one of my friends was having an Open House for her daughter, who got married last month and she asked me if I could help keep the refreshment table stocked. I was happy to do that--especially because she was one of the friends who helped so much with Tanner's open house last summer. It was an easy job and I got to visit with a lot of people too, so it was fun. Frank didn't go to the open house because he still wasn't feeling great--his cough was still bothering him quite a bit at that point. (He seems to be doing quite a bit better now. He's still coughing some, but not a lot.)

Sunday the 8th was fast Sunday for us, since we had stake conference the week before. I ended up going to the 14 & 15 year old YW class because the advisor wasn't there that day and so the counselor needed another adult in there with her. It was kind of fun for a change to go to YW. Frank made it to church for the first time in a couple of weeks but that evening he had a meeting for his new calling that he ended up not attending because he was coughing so much and feeling worn out. I've been reading a book about BFJ's family and I read about his mom and she was such an amazing woman! I mean, I already knew that, but the more I learn about her the more impressed I am. I feel really grateful to have the ancestors I have. I'm sure their lives have influenced my life far more than I can even comprehend, but just the part that I can comprehend is pretty overwhelming.

I had a dentist appointment on Monday the 9th and this time neither I nor they had to cancel it. It was just my bi-annual cleaning, and my teeth look great, thankfully. My tooth that I had to get a crown for last summer still bothers me a bit--mostly when I eat cold things, although sometimes I can eat cold things without any pain. So I mentioned that, but the hygienist said it could be sensitive for a long time after getting a crown. She said I should definitely keep them informed if it gets worse or if it's still bothering me in a few more months.

On Tuesday the 10th I went and got fingerprinted so that I will be able to volunteer at Seth's school. It takes a few weeks for them to process that and do a background check, but after that I should be good to go. (Assuming there will be school...I hope!)  That evening one of my ministering sisters came to visit me and I enjoyed that.

Seth had a counseling appointment right after school on Wednesday the 11th. He was glad that he didn't have to miss any school for that, and it was interesting because his counselor got to see him for the first time when he is not medicated. (Seth's medication is wearing off right about that time of day.)  He definitely noticed a difference! I also got to talk to Tanner for a long time on Wednesday; it was nice to get caught up with him!

So that brings us to Thursday the 12th, the day that everything went a little crazy! Actually, the day started out pretty normal. I had my shift at the tax preparation place, although we started an hour later than normal because the room we use was needed for something else that morning. That gave me time to get the laundry further along and to vacuum the house before I had to go in. I also went to the store and got some donuts, because one of the girls in my Primary activity group is having a birthday today and we usually get a treat to share at the activity right before someone's birthday. While I was getting donuts for that, I decided to get another dozen to take to share with everybody at the tax place. It turns out it wasn't the best day to bring donuts--one of the volunteers was out of town and another one was sick--so we didn't have a lot of people there. But those who were there did enjoy the donuts, and about half of them were gone before I left. Thankfully, the site coordinator knew we were going to have fewer people ahead of time, so she had scheduled fewer appointments so we weren't overwhelmed with stuff to do. I did keep fairly busy the whole time I was there--I prepared 2 tax returns and reviewed another one. After I got home and ate lunch, I started pulling out clothes to pack for Seth and I because we were planning to go to the temple today, and needed to leave right after school today. (We were planning to spend the night in Philadelphia--Frank would attend an endowment session Friday evening and then I would attend a session Saturday morning while Seth did baptisms and Frank helped with baptisms.) But right in the middle of that, I got a phone call from Frank, who had just checked his email and there was an email letting us know that the Philadelphia Temple had just been closed and so our ward temple trip had been cancelled. I was super bummed about that, because I was really looking forward to this temple trip! Opportunities to go to the temple have been really scarce for us the last 2 years and I miss being able to go regularly so much. This is the first time we were going to all be able to go together as a family, so it was a big disappointment. I did know it was a slight possibility that they would close the temple since others have been closed already because of the Coronavirus, but I was hoping it wouldn't happen so soon. BUT if I am disappointed, I can't imagine how much worse it must be for anyone who was planning to get married or receive their own endowment! So I can't complain too much. Frank called the hotel we were supposed to stay at and thankfully they are not going to charge us for our room--I'm grateful for that! Anyway, that first email was just the beginning of a whole bunch of similar emails. Within a few more hours, we got an email letting us know that the governor of Maryland had decided that all the public schools in the state needed to be closed for two weeks (starting Monday--there is school today). Then I got an email from the tax place saying they are closing until March 31st. And then right as Seth and I were about to walk out the door to go to Primary and YM activities, we got the email letting us know that the church has cancelled all meetings and activities worldwide until further notice. So we didn't go after all. Well!! It all seems kind of crazy although I knew there was a possibility that something like this would happen. I am not overly concerned about the Coronavirus itself--I doubt I will get it and even if I do I doubt it will kill me--but I am concerned about people who are more vulnerable and I am also concerned about the economic impact this is going to have on the nation as a whole. I'm not thrilled that I won't be able to go to church for who knows how long, although of course it's awesome that we are all prepared for home-based church! I think right now I am feeling unsettled because I'm wondering exactly how things are going to go for the next few weeks. I still have things to do--the house still needs to be cleaned, we still need to eat, the laundry still needs to be done--but all of my other responsibilities like church callings and volunteer work and taking Seth to school and back are temporarily suspended. So I imagine I will have more free time than usual and I'm trying to think what would be the best way to spend that time. I really don't want to waste it!! I have projects to work on, of course, and I can certainly work on those. Seth will also have at least some school work to do at home (I don't know much of the details about that yet) so I'm sure I'll have to be helping him with that. But I really want to try to keep him busy with things besides video games and television. And as I said--I want to feel like I'm doing something worthwhile myself. There's a part of me that's really tempted to buy plane tickets for me and Seth and fly out to Utah for a visit!! But I can think of a lot of practical reasons why that's not a good idea.

So that brings us to today, which is a pretty normal day but will be the last normal day we'll have for a while. Seth is at school and will be bringing home a lot of stuff, I imagine, when I go to pick him up. So far today I have exercised and showered and gone through the mail and written this post and talked to Scott a couple of times. He is busy today moving his computer and other stuff from work to his home because they are allowing them to work from home for a while. Tanner and Jared both report that they will be doing their classes online for the rest of the semester (as most of you have probably already heard). I still need to pay bills and update the budget this afternoon.

I didn't get anything done on projects this week. I have been doing a lot of reading--I'm trying to finish a book that I've been reading called Midnight's Children. It's interesting, but it's also a really strange book and I hope I'm not going to get to the end of it and wonder "what was the point of that?!" It's actually due today and when I went online to try to renew it I couldn't renew it because it has holds on it. So I will have to finish it today if I want to avoid paying a fine. I have about 100 pages to go, so I'm not sure I'll manage it. But I should be able to finish it tomorrow if I don't finish it today.

In my random Facebook scrolling this week I have been really quite disturbed by a lot of posts and comments about the whole BYU honor code thing. The two things that have disturbed me the most are first, the amount of arguing going on and how rude people are to each other and second, how many church members out there seem to be totally confused about really basic fundamental truths like the plan of salvation. I could go on and on about this, but I will be merciful and spare you!! I'll just say that my worrying and anxiety and pondering and prayers over this led me to reading again the proclamation on the family as well as President Hinckley's entire talk when he presented the proclamation. It was beautiful and I cried tears of gratitude that he and the other leaders of the church at that time were led by the spirit to write that sacred proclamation which is so clearly needed in our world today. They couldn't have guessed 25 years ago how much we would need it now! It was clearly inspired.

And on that note, I will end this post. I have a lot of reading to do! :)

Weekly Review March 6 '20

Well, this week was better than last week. We're all feeling better although poor Frank still has a nasty cough. We had stake conference last weekend but since we were still recuperating, Frank and I didn't go to the adult session on Saturday the 29th. I spent the day trying to get caught up with things, but also trying not to do too much.

Seth and I did go to the general session of stake conference on Sunday morning. Frank still wasn't feeling great, and mostly he felt like he should avoid people when he was coughing so much, so he stayed home. Conference was good and Seth was especially interested in the first talk because it was given by his friend Henry, from his Deacon's Quorum.

On Monday the 2nd I continued to work on getting caught up on everything. I also went to see my friend Wanda--she had asked me to trim her bangs the week before but since I got sick and she lives in a nursing home, I couldn't go see her until I got better. So I got her bangs trimmed and she was happy about that. Then I tried to go to the religion class but no one was there. I texted one of the other class members and she let me know that the teacher is getting ready to move so the class is cancelled for now. That evening for family night activity we played Uno Flip and I had a crazy streak of luck and won the first 4 rounds. We decided to play one more round and Frank won that one. It's a pretty fun game...more interesting than regular Uno.

By Tuesday the 3rd I was mostly caught up on everything. I spent most of my free time this week working on Christmas stockings and I finished the cross stitched picture for one of them:

I also worked on that other Christmas project a little bit, but I didn't get much accomplished. I'm trying to learn how to do something new and it's taking time and I'm not at all sure if it's going to turn out okay or if I'm going to ruin the whole thing. Hopefully I'll figure it out, though.

I was supposed to go to the dentist on Tuesday (rescheduled from last Thursday, because I was sick) but then someone called from the dentist office Tuesday morning to say that the hygienist that was supposed to clean my teeth was out sick. Apparently, half their office was sick so they were having a "fun" time scrambling around trying to reschedule a bunch of appointments. They rescheduled me for this Monday, so we'll see if it works out this time. Hopefully 3rd time's a charm!

On Wednesday the 4th, besides the usual stuff, I went to the store to get some supplies for that Christmas project I'm trying to work on. We also got our tax returns filed. They've basically been done and ready to go for a few weeks, but I was worried about a problem with our estimated taxes for this year--I'm almost positive there is some kind of glitch in Turbo Tax, because the amount of tax they estimated we would owe next year is about 50% of our estimated taxable income. That just can't be right!! So I had to look over things and satisfy myself that there weren't any other mistakes somewhere. The estimated tax mistake is not a really big problem because it's just a suggestion--we don't actually have to pay that much. I expect that our income and taxes for 2020 will not be significantly different from 2019, so if we make estimated tax payments equal to what our tax liability is for 2019, we'll be fine. As it turns out, we're getting a smallish refund from the federal government but we owe taxes to the state. But at least we're getting a little bit back--the federal government owes us more than we owe to the state. Seth got out of school 2 hours early on Wednesday because it was midterm--not sure how it is midterm already! This school year is going by so fast!

Thursday the 5th was pretty busy, as most Thursdays are since I have my tax volunteer work during the day and the Primary activity in the evening. We actually weren't very busy at the tax place this week, though. Sometimes people don't show up for their appointments, so then we have less to do. I completed two tax returns and reviewed a third one. When we don't have a lot to do, we usually end up discussing tax situations we've run into since we're all numbers / accounting / tax geeks! It's fun! We had a fun Primary activity. This month, we are focusing on learning about the First Vision / Restoration in preparation for General Conference. We combined with the older girls' group last night and had a movie night, where we watched one of the church's movies that depicts the first vision. We told the girls they could wear pajamas and bring pillows / blankets, and we had popcorn, twizzlers, and root beer floats. After the movie, we gave them cards and asked them to write down their feelings about Joseph Smith, the first vision, and / or the restoration. Then we let them build a big fort out of chairs and blankets for the rest of the time. Oh, and an impromptu pillow fight broke out too:

Today Seth's class at school had a Medieval Renaissance Fair, because they've been studying that time period in their history class. The kids each chose a part and researched it. Seth was a Medieval Lord. They could wear costumes, but that was optional and he chose not to wear one. (Which I didn't mind, since his teacher didn't even send home information about this until Monday. Why don't they give us more time?) I did look up how Medieval Lords dress, and found a hat online and offered to make a simple tunic for Seth, but he didn't want to wear that so I was saved the trouble. Anyway, I went in to his class for about a half hour this morning to see the fair. It was fun to see what they did--some of the kids came up with some pretty creative costumes. I watched a knighting ceremony and some acrobats. After I left, they did jousting, archery, and dancing. (I didn't stay long because I didn't have time to eat breakfast before I left.)

The jester doing some tricks

Seth playing chess with another Medieval Lord

A tanner and a candle maker (can't remember who the girl in the middle was portraying)

The boy on the end was an apothecary and he gave me some homemade eucalyptus lotion to put on my hand.

A knight

A fortune teller

After I got home from the school, I got the finances all caught up, had lunch, and picked up Seth from school.

Seth had safety patrol all week (last week too, but he was absent 3 of the 5 days). He seems to enjoy doing that. We are still having warmer than usual weather, overall. We have definitely had milder winters than usual the last several years, and this winter has been the mildest of all (I'm not complaining about that). Last week, some daffodils came up (in February!):

And these pansies that I bought last fall are still hanging in there...never got cold enough to kill them:

Poor Frank--he loves snow, and we barely got any this year! I suppose we still could get some snow--it's only early March--but it feels like spring.

That's all I can think of to report this week.

Weekly Review February 28 '20

Well, this week was fun. Not really...that was sarcastic, but of course you can't hear my tone of voice when you're reading this. I mean, nothing really terrible happened (thankfully) but we have all been sick. Frank started feeling sick on Saturday (the 22nd). He stayed home from church on Sunday and on Monday the 24th he still felt terrible, so he decided to go to the doctor. But first, he went to work for a few hours because there was something unavoidable that he needed to be there for. At the doctor he was tested for the flu, and the test came out positive. He DID have a flu shot this year, so where's the justice in that?? But one thing about getting diagnosed with the flu is that it convinced him that he needed to stay home for a few days. He still got a number of phone calls from work and did some work remotely on Monday afternoon, but he didn't do anything for work on Tuesday and Wednesday. He was starting to feel a bit better by Thursday the 27th which is good because he had more unavoidable things to do at work (as in, people had flown in from somewhere else to do something) and Thursday night he had another POS installation to do at a store so he was up a lot of the night. The original plan was that he would go in to work for a few hours Thursday morning and then come home and rest until he had to go back in to work that evening. But of course once he got to work there were a ton of things to do and everybody needed him so he didn't come home until about 4:30. I was feeling pretty anxious about him over-doing it and getting really sick again, but so far today he seems to be okay although of course he is tired. (I mean the fact that he is needed so much at work is good for job security, but seriously I think they are going to kill him with all the work he has to do!)

Meanwhile, I started to feel slightly "off" on Tuesday the 25th, but I kept hoping I was just imagining it. However, on Wednesday the 26th I definitely felt worse and Thursday the 27th I was feverish and really wiped out. Today I am starting to feel a bit better...I don't feel feverish anymore, I'm not coughing much and I'm not so achy. I do, however, have no energy whatsoever. I think it's going to take awhile before I get my energy back. For Frank and I, the flu has been mostly coughing, fever, headache, and general aches all over. Frank has had some congestion but I really haven't. It's kind of weird to be really sick without having a lot of congestion, but I'm not complaining about that! Seth said he was feeling fine on Tuesday, but I noticed that he was coughing a little bit on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. So when I got a call from the school nurse on Wednesday afternoon saying he had come in complaining of not feeling well, I wasn't incredibly surprised. His temperature was only slightly elevated and she said he could stay at school if I didn't want to come get him until dismissal (which was only about an hour away) but I told her I was sure he was coming down with something since we were already sick, so I went & picked him up. By evening he had a fever and then he threw up too. On the living room floor--he didn't make it to the bathroom--which Frank & I weren't very happy about. (He claims he didn't feel like he was going to throw up until it was too late, but we keep telling him he's old enough he should be able to tell by now!) So we had a mess to clean up (of course it was on the rug, not on the wood laminate floor, which would have been a lot easier to clean) when neither of us were feeling well either. At least he hadn't eaten dinner or lunch, so there wasn't much in his stomach. We had Seth sleep on our bedroom floor in a sleeping bag that night, and he threw up 3 or 4 more times in the early hours of the morning but we put a bucket by him so at least clean up was easy. Not a very restful night, though--he was moaning in his sleep a lot too. Frank threw up once too--last night while he was at work--but he seems okay now, and he and Seth have both been able to eat normal food. I did have to do the "1 tablespoon of soda every 10 minutes for 2 hours" routine with Seth on Thursday morning, but that did the trick--that calmed his stomach down and he was able to start eating crackers and things like that. Seth seems totally back to normal now and he doesn't even seem to be tired. (He was thinking he was going to school this morning until I told him I thought he needed to stay home since he had a fever the day before.) Frank still has a really wicked cough, but he has trouble with coughing even when he's well so I'm not sure how much of it is from the flu and how much of it is normal. But anyway...we are all on the mend and glad to be over the worst of the flu.

That covers most of what we did this week, but there were a few other things. I can't remember anything about Saturday the 22nd now, but I think I mostly did the usual things like practice ukulele and work on things for my church callings. On Sunday the 23rd we watched the face to face devotional for the youth with Seth. We decided to watch it at home rather than go to the church, which all things considered is probably a good thing. (Frank wouldn't have gone with us if we'd gone to the church either.) I had choir practice before church and the choir sang in sacrament meeting. Seth came with me to choir practice since it was right before church and I wouldn't have had time to go back and get him. (If Frank had been well, they would have come to church together in a separate car.) I got a lot of errands done on Monday the 24th which is good since the rest of my week wasn't very productive. For family night activity we watched some episodes of Studio C--we picked that since Frank wasn't really feeling up to playing a game or anything. I went to an RS activity Tuesday evening--it was a dinner to celebrate the birthday of RS. I debated a bit about whether or not to go to that since I was starting to feel like maybe I was getting sick, but I really wanted to go so I went. It was fun and the dinner was delicious and I'm glad I got to do that since I was pretty cooped up the rest of the week. Hopefully I didn't expose a bunch of people to the flu, but since I knew it was slightly possible that I was getting sick I was really careful and kept my distance from people--no hand shaking or hugging or anything!! I worked on the Christmas stockings a bit and have made some progress. I probably would have got a lot more done if I had been feeling well, though.

Seth and I were supposed to go to the dentist on Thursday afternoon but I called Wednesday morning to cancel those appointments and rescheduled them. I also emailed my supervisor at the tax place on Wednesday morning to let her know I wasn't coming in, and I arranged to have someone else help with the girls' Primary activity Thursday evening. Yep, Thursday would have been a very busy day, if I had been well. Instead I spent the day on the couch, keeping and eye on Seth. I took a few short naps too. I did manage to get the laundry done, but just doing that much was draining. I watched a lot of stuff on Netflix and Disney plus on Wednesday and Thursday since I wasn't feeling well enough to do much else. I watched the live action version of Aladdin and the classic Lady and the Tramp (cartoon version), both of which I had never seen before. They were pretty good, but I was getting tired of lying around doing nothing and I'm glad that today I have been feeling well enough to do a few things like updating the budget. 

I usually do the grocery shopping on Wednesdays but I wasn't feeling well enough to do that on Wednesday and Thursday I was even worse. So I was worrying about how we were going to get the food we needed because Frank wasn't feeling well either and I didn't want him to spend the little time he had to rest on Thursday going to the store. But then I remembered that the WalMart near us has a free pickup service--you order what you want online and pay for it online and they put it all together for you and all you have to do is pick it up. They've had this service for about a year now but I've never used it because I prefer to do my own shopping--especially I prefer to pick out my own produce. So anyway, that's what we did. I went online Thursday morning and ordered what we needed and Frank picked it up that evening. It was pretty great! I'm glad that option is available because it was really what we needed this week. As nice as it was, I will probably only use it for emergencies. I would feel like a lazy bum if I had someone else do my shopping for me every week!

Anyway, that was our exciting week. Not much fun, but we're glad to be feeling better than we were. Everyone is getting hungry so I'd better go get some dinner made.

Weekly Review February 21 '20

I was just realizing that the official first day of spring is only one month away!! :) We've definitely had a very mild winter so it hasn't been too bad, but I am looking forward to seeing leaves on the trees again! And of course, I know that even once we get to where it's officially spring, that doesn't mean it's guaranteed to be warm and sunny. (I can think of several spring snowstorms in my past.) But anyway, it's nice to realize we are getting closer to that time when the weather stays nice. In the meantime, the bulbs in my front flower bed are already starting to come up (they first made an appearance a few weeks ago) which isn't too surprising since we've had a lot of days with highs in the 50s. The last few days have been in the 40s, but we will be back to the 50s for the weekend.

There wasn't a lot going on for us this week, but Jared certainly had an eventful weekend...unfortunately, not in the best way. He and Jessie were actually in Idaho visiting but he had been feeling some pain when he sat down for about a week. He thought at first that he had just been sitting down too long at work the day before, and he thought he had a bruise or something. But anyway, after they got to Idaho (on Friday the 14th) it got a lot worse and he ended up going to an urgent care there. They sent him to the ER because he had a cyst of some sort. At the ER, they decided the cyst needed to be drained, which they did. It was supposed to get better after that, but the next day it felt even worse so he went back to the ER. They said it had closed back up and wasn't draining properly, so they did a scan and discovered the cyst was much bigger than they thought originally--the size of a baseball. So they decided he needed surgery to get it all cleaned out. The surgery went well, though, and he was discharged that evening. They were able to drive back to Provo the next day, Sunday. (Jessie drove...Jared was on a narcotic so he couldn't drive.) He has been recovering this week and he seems to be healing and hasn't had a lot of pain, so that's good. But everyone please keep him in your prayers. He wasn't able to go to classes or to work this week because the pain medication makes him drowsy and woozy. We're glad he is doing better than he was, though.

Meanwhile, back in Maryland, Frank and I went out for breakfast on Saturday the 15th and that was nice. I spent the day working on stuff for my callings, reading, and exchanging text messages / phone calls with Jared & Jessie to get updates on how things were going for them. Frank ended up doing a lot of work for clients.

On Sunday the 16th, we had ward conference and it was pretty good. For part of the second hour, they had some break out sessions where we could choose which one to go to and Frank had been asked to lead one of those about self-reliance since he is the ward self-reliance specialist now. It turned out there was only a few minutes for the break out sessions, though, so he didn't end up getting to do much. I had choir practice that afternoon and enjoyed it...I've missed singing in choir! I read some more in the BFJ book and really enjoyed that. The more I read about my ancestors, the more I realize that I get a lot of my personality / character traits from them. (The good traits, that is!) In particular, I was reading something that Sarah Melissa Holman wrote. These words really touched me: "I here say that my religion is my meat and drink. Never once in my life have I felt to say aught against the authorities or the principles of this church." I recognized in those words the way I feel myself. Maybe I got that from her! There is so much talk in the church these days of doubts and how to handle them. I also hear a lot of people criticizing the leaders of the church. But I've never felt that way. As a matter of fact, I found myself wondering recently if there's something wrong with me--I don't doubt! Should I be doubting? (Because a lot of people are.) I sometimes don't understand things, but I just really don't doubt and never have, and I've always trusted the church leaders and never felt a need to criticize them. So I loved those words from Sarah Melissa Holman. Apparently, not doubting is part of my heritage. (And I know I got that from my parents too...I've never heard them criticize or express doubt either.) On Sunday we also had family night lesson and I sat down with Seth to talk about what goals he wants to work on and he picked two...to exercise 3 times a week and to read his scriptures every day. So he's been working on that this week.

Seth didn't have school on Monday the 17th because of President's Day. Frank had to work, though. I had a lot of stuff to get done so I didn't go to the religion class. I wrote the music spotlight for the ward newsletter and got the regular chores done. I also went to the store to pick up the sweaters I ordered and went to a craft store to get some supplies for Primary activities and to look for the one color of embroidery floss that I still needed for the stocking project (and I found it). I picked up Seth's prescription and visited my friend Wanda too. I like all the sweaters and they all fit well except for one, which is just too big so I'll have to send it back. It's funny because it's the same brand and size of one of the other sweaters I got, and the other one fits great. It's just a different cut, I guess. We had family night activity and treat that evening, after Frank got home from work.

Seth had an appointment with his counselor on Tuesday the 18th which I took him to. It was at noon, so I hurried that morning to get the regular chores done before I had to take him to that appointment. The appointment went well...the counselor had both of us talk with him for most of the time this time. He asked if Seth had activities and friends besides at school, which led to a discussion about church activities and he asked if our church buildings are different than the big white building that he sees near the beltway. We didn't give him an extensive explanation about the temple (other than to say yes, they are different), but I told him when they are done renovating it they are going to have an open house where members of the public can tour the inside and he said he'd like to go to that. So we promised to let him know about it when that happens...hopefully this fall. I did a lot of reading on Monday and Tuesday and finished North and South. It was pretty good. I started watching the BBC version of the book on Netflix on Wednesday...hoping to finish that today.

On Wednesday the 19th I got the regular chores done and then I spent the afternoon working on that other project that I was hoping to finish for Christmas (but had to give up). Maybe I will get it done before this Christmas!! (Hoping to get it done much sooner than that.) I also spent some time winding all the different floss colors for the Christmas stockings onto floss cards. I cut out the aida cloth to the right sizes over the weekend, so I am ready to start cross stitching now. I'm hoping to work on those over the weekend. Frank put in a full day of work on Wednesday as usual but he also worked all night Wednesday night because they were installing a new POS system at one of the stores (he did take a nap after dinner before going back to work, but only for about an hour or so.) 

Thursday the 20th was busy as Thursdays always are lately between my tax volunteer shift during the day and Primary activities / YM in the evening. My volunteer shift went well; I got more tax returns done and I'm feeling more comfortable with it each week. We were a lot busier, too...I really didn't have time for a break from 10:00 until about 1:00. After I got home from my shift, I got regular chores done (except for folding laundry, but I did that later that evening). I had kind of a break for the Primary activity...the YW had planned a talent show and invited the whole ward to participate, so that was our activity. I didn't have to plan anything, and it turns out that the families of all the girls in my group who attended came too so I didn't even have to supervise them. The talent show itself was pretty fun with a lot of different "talents" from a variety of age groups, including Primary kids. Seth and the rest of the Deacons did a funny skit. Meanwhile, Frank had come home from work at 6:00 am and went to bed but he was awake again before Seth and I left at 8:40. He ended up getting up and going to work and didn't get home until about 4:00, so he stayed home from the talent show to rest. He was planning to take today off, except for going in to supervise some printers being installed, which was supposed to take about an hour.

Today he did go in a little late--10:00 am--but of course there were problems with the printer installation so he just got home a few minutes ago (4:30 pm). So much for taking the day off!! This means that in the last 3 days, he has worked 4 days' worth of hours. I hope he gets to take a day off sometime soon. I spent today working on fun things like trying to get our flex card to work again since there's problems with that again. Seriously, I think we're cursed when it comes to flexible spending accounts. It's such a headache!! I also got the budget updated and renewed library books and sent some checks to Jared because the checks he ordered came to our house even though he told them to send them to Provo. Now everyone is wanting dinner so I'd better sign off and do something about that. 

Weekly Review February 14 '20

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!

It is really cold & windy here today. Most of the week was fairly mild, though, and we got a lot more rain. Although it's a lot colder today, I feel happier because it is sunny. It's been days since we've seen the sun.

This week was not incredibly eventful, but I'll try to think of a few things to tell you about. Saturday the 8th was nice because I got everything done that I needed to do and I had some free time to read. When I woke up, I had a text message from my friend Lori letting me know that she had a baby that morning...8 minutes after she got to the hospital. Whew! This baby is her 6th and all of her children are girls. Seth had some reading to do for school (they are reading portions of Anne Frank) and he was being a total drama king about it for some reason. (I have to read 35 whole pages!! This is so boring!! etc.) I just laughed at him and when he wasn't paying attention, I took a picture:

Sundays always seem to go by fast. When it's time to go to bed, I wonder how it got that late already! I guess part of the reason for that is that our meeting time changed from 9:00 am to 10:30 am, and I'm still adjusting to that. This Sunday I spent a lot of time reading a book about BF Johnson. I had stuff to do for my music calling too.

On Monday the 10th I had a lot to do and I totally forgot to go to the religion class. I haven't adjusted to it being on Mondays instead of Wednesdays yet. Besides the usual stuff, I was getting small packages ready to send to my Utah kids for Valentine's Day, I went through the cross stitch patterns Mom sent me and picked out the ones I want to use for the stockings I'm making, and I visited my friend Wanda briefly to take her some things she needed. After we had family night activity, Frank came with me to the fabric store so I could get materials for the stockings. I couldn't find the kind of fabric I want for the outside of the stockings, but I got everything else (except for one color of floss because it was out of stock).

Tuesday the 11th was pretty busy because I met with my co-leader for Primary activities to plan the next couple of months. I also had to take Seth to the orthodontist. That evening I went to an orientation for volunteers at Seth's school. In between all those things, I got all the usual chores done. I'm excited for all the fun things we've planned for activities. We are focusing on the restoration for the whole month of March, to prepare for General Conference. The orthodontist appointment was so they could take x-rays, photographs of Seth's mouth, and do impressions--all for the purpose of determining a treatment plan. (This means Seth will be getting braces soon.) I was pleasantly surprised to find out that they have a new way of doing impressions--I mean, they really don't have to do impressions at all anymore. Instead, they had a special camera on the end of a wand that they put in Seth's mouth and ran it all around his teeth, inside and out and that created a detailed 3-D image of his teeth. He didn't like it when they were doing that much, but the technician and I were both telling him how much better it was than the alternative. (I still remember getting impressions when I got braces...since I have such a great gag reflex, I felt like I was choking to death.) The volunteer orientation at Seth's school is a new requirement we have to fulfill in order to volunteer at the school. And that's not the only thing...now we have to be fingerprinted and get a criminal background check, and we have to do that every year! I was really disappointed to hear the yearly requirement, since I already went through the fingerprinting / background check about 18 months ago when I applied to be a substitute teacher. It costs $35 to get that done (which is a discounted rate, but still...). I think it's crazy that parents have to shell out money and go through the hassle of getting that done, so that they can help at the schools. I think the school system is going to have a harder time finding parents who are willing to volunteer. I know they are trying to protect kids (and let's be honest...cover their backs, legally) but this is just another example of how bad people are messing things up for the rest of us.

I don't know why I didn't get a lot of stuff done on Wednesday the 12th, because during the day I only had the regular chores to get done. Although one of those is grocery shopping, which takes longer than most of my other household jobs. I think I woke up later than usual, too, so I didn't get showered before I took Seth to school. But anyway...I must really be one of the least efficient people on the planet when I am not pressured for time. It seems like the more things I have to do, the faster I get through them. If I don't have a lot to do, I must slow way down! I'm trying to work on that. Frank went with some co-workers to dinner right after work & Seth and I just had leftovers. In the evening I had book chat which is always a joy. Oh, and I also did a favor for my friend Renata...picked her son up from a basketball practice and took him home, since she was gone to a lecture that evening. So that made me a little late for book chat, but that's okay. This month was particularly enjoyable because it was our annual fondue night. One lady always makes chocolate and cheese fondue, and the rest of us bring things to dip. I always bring keilbasa, but we also had broccoli, cauliflower, bread, pretzels, oranges, strawberries, cake, shortbread cookies...I'm sure I'm forgetting something. We had a pretty lively discussion about Becoming Mrs. Lewis (we all liked the book, mostly, but weren't sure we liked the main character that much) and now we are reading North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. I already started reading it and I'm about 200 pages in now, but it has 500 pages so I've got a ways to go. I like it so far.

Thursday the 13th was my usual VITA volunteer day, and that went well. I completed tax returns for two people and also did intake for two more who had to come back because they hadn't brought all of their tax forms. It still wasn't very busy (a few people didn't show up for their appointments) but I'm glad I'm having the chance to learn a few things before it gets crazy. After I got home from my shift, I went into the kitchen to get some lunch and then noticed this sitting on the table:

That was a nice surprise! Frank had picked it up an dropped it off at home while I was gone.

Seth had YM that evening and I had the Primary activity. This week we did an activity to help the girls realize the importance of kind words (and the damage that unkind words can have) and then we helped them make cards with kind words to give away. We also gave them some Valentine treats at the end.

(We related unkind words to the dirt--once they took out a handful, it was impossible to get every grain of dirt back into the container. Once you say unkind words, you can't take them back and the effect of your words lingers indefinitely.)

I got most of the household chores done in between my volunteer shift and picking Seth up from school (still ended up folding one batch of laundry this morning). I purposely planned a really easy meal for that night since I knew I'd be tired and not have a lot of time to cook.

Seth had a 2 hour early release from school today, so he is home already. I spent the morning / early afternoon getting the budget caught up and sending some emails and things like that. Frank had to be at a store at 5:00 am so he was up early and unfortunately I woke up too and didn't go back to sleep for a few hours, so then I was running late! So I also exercised and showered after I took Seth to school. I was pretty good at focusing and staying on task, though, so I was able to get everything done that I needed to do. We got Seth a card and some candy for Valentine's Day, and I sent cards and candy to the other kids too. Rather than fight the crowds at restaurants tonight, Frank and I decided that we are going to go to breakfast tomorrow morning to celebrate Valentine's Day together.

I've been noticing the last few months that most of my long sleeved shirts and sweaters are getting old and worn out or not fitting well anymore. So I went online and ordered a few new sweaters this week (I found them on sale.) Hopefully they will fit right when I get them. It's always a risk when I buy things online, but I didn't really have time to go shopping.

That sums up our week, or at least the parts that I can remember!