Maryland News April 25 '09

We were just figuring out a few days ago that there are less than 60 days until school gets out. How did that happen?! I am starting to get excited about the idea of summer vacation, though.

The painting continued this week as Frank finished up the living room and stairwells. Our neighbor helped, too. He refused to let us pay him earlier in the week, but he finally agreed on condition that we let him paint our front door and shutters sometime also. I don’t know why he was being so stubborn about it—we only paid him for one day’s work and he has easily put in 2-3 days worth. I’m just glad he finally let us give him something; I was feeling so guilty! Frank will continue to do computer work for him also, so at least we are helping him in some way. He is a good guy and has been a really great neighbor all these years. (Actually, almost all of our neighbors here have been great—we feel very fortunate about that!) Things are starting to look more “put together” around here although there is still some work to do before we are done with this project.

We’ve had some nice sunshine as well as some rain this week. On Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons we had little waves of thunderstorms roll in. It would storm, then clear up, then storm again! Snickers didn’t know what to make of the thunder—he barked every time the thunder rumbled! Since he was born in November, I don’t think he’d ever heard thunder before.
I had Primary presidency meeting on Sunday, so it wasn’t a very relaxing day, but I always enjoy our meetings and the visits we do afterwards.

I had book chat on Tuesday, where we discussed The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Everybody loved it as much as I did. If you haven’t read it, you should! That night after the kids were in bed, Frank colored my hair for me—and he did a great job! How many husbands do you think would be willing to do that for their wives? I was going to do it myself with help from him, but he just did it all for me. He had some computer stuff to do that night also, so we got to bed pretty late.

I didn’t sleep well that night, so I got a late start on Wednesday. Frank helped by taking the boys to school. I had some shopping to do and then I was supposed to go to sewing but by the time I got home from the store it was nearly noon and Seth was losing it, so I put him down for a nap. Frank was working from home that day, so I was able to go to “sewing” after I got Seth down, but they were done with their projects for the day by then and we were all hungry, so we just went to lunch instead. After school was crazy that day—Frank and our neighbor Tony were painting, I had to help Jared plant nine bean seeds for his science fair project, and I was trying to get dinner ready and get everybody out the door on time for scouts. Jared was also supposed to arrive at scouts dressed and packed for an overnight camp out (he wasn’t actually going camping, he was just supposed to show he knew what to bring—passed off a requirement for one of the activity badges) so I had to help him get that ready. We managed to get there right on time, somehow. I took Seth with me because Frank was painting. The scout master was interviewing the boys to find out what merit badges they have completed and what things they still need to do, so I stayed to let him know where Scott and Tanner are at with that. By the time we got done, it was close enough to 8:00 that I just stayed until then so I could bring Tanner and Jared home. Scott had a meeting, so I had to go back and get him later.

Since Frank and Tony were painting some more on Thursday evening, I took Seth with me to Jared’s soccer practice. Scott wanted to come also, and at the last minute I decided to take Snickers with us too. I didn’t see much of the practice—I was too busy chasing Seth around (he refused to sit in the stroller; he wanted to push it around instead) and walking Snickers. Scott helped a lot; he took turns with me alternately watching Seth or walking Snickers. It was a nice day, though, and it was good to get outside and get some fresh air and exercise. I think all of us were completely wiped out by the time we got home, though!

Seth came unglued right after we got home and then when we put him to bed he cried a lot and it took him nearly an hour to go to sleep which is definitely not usual for him. (He has been crying at night a lot lately, though—we’re not sure what’s going on with him.) Unfortunately, that was just the beginning of the trouble we had with him that night. It turned out to be one of those nights where you just lose track of how much you were up, you just know you were awake more than asleep! Seth just kept waking up and no matter how many times we got him back to sleep and back in his crib, he was awake and crying again within 15-20 minutes. By Friday morning he had a runny nose and by Friday evening he felt warm, so it was obvious that he wasn’t feeling very well.

Thursday was our 17th Anniversary, by the way. We had decided to celebrate by going to the temple on Friday afternoon and then to dinner on Saturday evening. (Frank took Friday off.) That was the plan, anyway! Seth messed up our plans. Even after our lack of sleep Thursday night, we were still hopeful that we would make it to the temple that day if we could take a nap while Seth was napping early Friday afternoon. Seth was only asleep for a few minutes, however, when he woke up again, crying. It was pretty much a repeat of the night before. So neither of us got a nap, and we were afraid to leave Seth for that long (and to go that far away) when he was not feeling his best. We had to give up on the idea of going to the temple (bummer!) but we did get to go out to dinner instead. It was nice to get away by ourselves, even if it was just for an hour or so.

Here's a few reminiscent photos from our big day!:

Don't we look cute? Young? Happy? All of the above?

On Friday morning we also did some shopping and finally decided to get a rocking chair and another comfortable chair that we found—those two chairs together cost less than any of the other love seats or “chair and a halfs” that we had looked at. We got to bring the rocking chair home with us, but the cushion we wanted for the other chair was not in stock, so we have to wait two weeks for it to come in.

I got a haircut on Friday also. The lady cut it shorter than I expected, but it looks ok. I like it better than I did before it was cut. Speaking of grooming, Snickers finally got a bath Friday evening (we had to wait 2 weeks after his surgery before we could bathe him) and he looks and smells much better! Except for his eyes...he gets dark “goop” (discharge from his eyes) stuck in the fur under his eyes (normal for his breed) but he will not let us come near his eyes. He tries to bite us every time we try to clean around his eyes. It is annoying!

Seth didn’t sleep well Friday night either, although it was better than Thursday night. He woke up a couple of times, though, arching his back and screaming…in obvious pain. He still woke up early this morning (6:00), and he kept telling me his nose hurt. Jared had a soccer game at 11:00, so I took Jared to his game (Snickers came, too) and Frank took Seth to the doctor. We found out he just has an upper respiratory virus which is good in that it’s nothing serious and bad in that there’s nothing they can do to help him feel better. We will just have to ride it out. Hopefully Frank and I won’t collapse from lack of sleep before then!

Jared’s game went well—his team won 4-3. Jared played offense the first half (almost made a goal, but he kicked it too high and it went over the net!) and defense the second half. He played goalie part of that time and made some good saves.

The rest of the day has been busy with homework and scout stuff. Frank finished painting the baseboards, which was the last painting that needed to be done—hooray! (Well, on this project….) Scott is at a party for his friend Ricardo, which I guess is going to go until midnight but we are making him come home at 10:00—aren’t we mean? Frank and I were supposed to go to a game night with some other couples in our ward but the host family had to cancel because of illness. That is probably just as well considering how Seth is feeling. We invited our friends the Becks to come here instead. I don’t think it’s going to be a late night, though. Frank and I are both exhausted and I’m starting to get a headache and slight sore throat. I just hope I’m not coming down with Seth’s illness.

Scott isn’t doing too well in one of his classes right now—he missed a test when he got his wisdom teeth pulled and then he forgot to stay after school to make up the test, so now his teacher won’t let him make it up. Tests are 50% of his grade—ouch! Hopefully he will be able to bring that grade up by the end of the year. He did find out, however, that he did really well on another test called the HSA. He has to take four of these tests at the end of certain courses during high school and pass them in order to graduate. He took the test for his Government class at the end of term 2. On his last report card it had his score with a P next to it, meaning he passed, which was good news. The score was a little meaningless to me, though, since I couldn’t remember what he had to get to pass. He talked to his guidance counselor this week, though, and she told him that in all the years she has been at his school (about 15 years), she has never seen a higher score on that test from any of her kids (she works with the kids with last names starting with A-L)! After he told me that, I looked it up. He had to get at least a 394 to pass. He got 460. We are happy he did so well, of course! Hopefully the other 3 tests will go just as well when he has to take them. Report cards came home last week and everybody did pretty well. Tanner managed to pull his three failing grades up to two B’s and a C—not too bad! (He got an A in his fourth class--even better!)

Frank started his exercise program again this week. (He was doing great last fall, but then the holidays came….) He hasn’t been able to exercise every day like he wanted to do—it’s just been a busy week and lack of sleep doesn’t exactly make you want to exercise—but it’s a start. He’s been very good about not snacking and eating smaller portions. Go Frank!

I'll finish off this week with photos of the boys enjoying the new furniture.

Scott and Tanner lounge on the couch--notice no one is sitting in the middle! The outside reclining seats are definitely the most popular.

Jared in the new rocking chair.

Seth gets a turn in the rocking chair.