Weekly Review September 26 '09

This week was busy with a lot of things going on that we don’t usually do. I didn’t write anything down about Monday on my planner, so now I can’t remember anything about it. Oh, except that for family night we went on a walk and stopped at a park to play for a while. Snickers came with us, too. We could hear the tractor pull going on at the fair grounds while we were outside—it was loud! We are glad we don’t live any closer to the fairgrounds than we do.

I had visiting teaching appointments Tuesday morning. The second one was with my friend Marci, but she forgot we were coming. I chatted with her on facebook later that day, though, and that evening she had “craft night” at her house so I went to that and got to visit with her for quite a while (I’m the only one who came this week). She had made me not just one necklace, but three! Along with that, she made 2 matching bracelets and a pair of earrings. They are all beautiful; she is very talented! She was feeling better this week than last week because her husband is home this week and they kind of put the house selling thing on hold. They are not even sure now if they are going to be moving—they expected to have a contract in hand by now, but they don’t, so she starting to think the transfer may not work out after all. I would be happy if they stayed, although I know she is ready for a change.

Frank worked really late Tuesday night, so the older boys stayed with Seth while I was gone to Marci’s and I got them all put to bed when I got home.

On Wednesday the oldest two boys had a special fireside given by a visiting member of the Quorum of the Seventy (can’t remember his name) which was held at another building in our stake. They had to be at the church at 6:00 to carpool. Then Jared had to be at the church at 7:00 for Webelos, picked up at 8:00, and the older boys arrived back at the church at 9:00. So it was one of those nights where we were shuttling kids back and forth and didn’t get much else done. (Except for bathing Snickers and Seth—separately, not together!) I was supposed to have a Primary presidency meeting that evening, but too many conflicts came up, so we postponed it.

The boys had a 2 hour early release from school on Thursday, so that day went by fast. Scott went on an overnighter for the Teachers and Priests at one of their leader’s cabins. He left around 3:00 in the afternoon and didn’t get back until late Friday night. I think he had fun except he didn’t get to sleep outside as he was hoping to do—it rained too hard. Tanner went to spend the night with his friend Ryan and didn’t get back until Friday afternoon. The rest of us rented a movie called Battle for Terra. I think Jared liked it, but it didn’t hold my attention much so I can’t give it an honest review. We got lots of treats to enjoy while we watched the movie; everyone liked that!

I had my yearly cardiologist check up Friday morning. Everything looks fine. When I am sitting in the waiting room looking at the other patients, I always think “I’m too young to have a cardiologist!” I had to giggle a little thinking about the very un-heart-healthy breakfast I had that morning: biscuits with sausage gravy, sausage patties, and scrambled eggs!

Frank took Snickers to the groomer Friday morning; he came back looking great! After my doctor appointment, I took Seth and Jared to the “Great Frederick Fair” to see the animals. All the kids were out of school that day for “Fair Day”, and admission to the fair is free for kids that day. (It cost $7 for me to get in, though, which I think is ridiculous considering once you get inside everything else costs money also, except for the exhibits!) I had a much more positive experience this time (I took the 3 older boys several years ago) because Jared was old enough to understand that we were ONLY going to see the animals (not ride on the outrageously priced rides—about $5 per ride!) and Seth was too young to care what we did. He was perfectly happy to see all the animals. While I was at the doctor that morning, Frank told him that he was going to see animals when I got back. Seth informed me when I got home that we were going to go see “cows, and dinosaurs, and pigs!” So cute!! Well, as you may have guessed, we did not see any dinosaurs, but we did see lots of cows, goats, pigs, sheep, horses, chickens, ducks, rabbits, and an alpaca. We also saw lots of tractors—Seth loved that! One tractor even had a slide inside for kids to go down—Seth tried that out, too. We stopped in to see some displays of vegetables, fruits and other farm produce, and checked out the 4-H building where we saw photography, place setting displays, crafts, and a short fashion show where some girls were modeling clothes they sewed themselves—quite impressive! After that we were more than ready to come home. Too much walking! Seth fell asleep on the way home.

Petting a goat

Baby pigs--all 8 are girls!

I finished reading Triangle early in the week. It was kind of a mystery and I got pulled into the story, so I couldn’t put it down! I was wrong on the date I cited in last week’s post: the fire actually happened in 1911, not 1907. Being the person that I am, after I finished the book I had to go online and read up on everything I could find about that fire, to compare the actual event to the events described in the book. It was pretty interesting, but so tragic.

I forgot to mention last week that Frank had a great missionary experience. He was at a client’s workplace down in La Plata, Maryland and a lady who works there started asking him questions about our church (she knew he’s LDS). She said that she and her mother are Catholic but there are a lot of things in that church they don’t agree with, so they are looking for another church. As she asked Frank questions and he told her what we believe about a lot of different things, she said she agreed with everything he said; in particular, she believes that if God spoke to prophets a long time ago, He should still speak to them today. After talking for a while, Frank offered to have the missionaries come to her home to answer more of her questions, and she said “I’d like that.” So he got her address and phone number, and early this week he tracked down the correct mission office (it turns out she lives in the Washington, DC North mission’s area) and gave them the referral. Who knows what will happen, but it was a great experience for him to have such a positive gospel discussion like that.

I drove by a couple of homes for sale in our area that I found online; I was mostly pretty uninspired by the neighborhoods and the homes themselves. But to get a better idea of what is really available in our price range, we asked our realtor friend if he could take us to see the inside of a few of these houses. We went today to see three of them. Two of them were townhouses, but bigger than the one we live in, and one was a single family house. Each of them had pros and cons. The single family home had the most room by far, but it’s pretty old and needs a lot of updating. Plus Frank could tell that the foundation is settling, the basement seems to be leaking water, and the roof needs to be replaced. So that one is definitely out. The townhouses are in much better shape and each of them had some nice features. Although they both have more room than we have here, I don’t think the extra room is distributed the way we need it. That is, we could really use a family room, bigger bedrooms for the kids, more storage space (including kitchen cabinets / counter space), and an office for Frank. Both homes had family rooms, but they actually had less storage space, mostly smaller bedrooms for the boys, and no space that would work well for an office. Most of the extra space seemed to go to huge master bedrooms and formal dining rooms—we don’t need either of those things! So at this point, we’ve decided to keep looking. There is one other house that I am really interested in seeing, but if that one doesn’t fit our needs either than we will just wait a while. I am thinking after the houses I saw today that what we really want is still out of our price range, so it would make sense to wait until our price range increases. In the meantime, we can focus on making improvements to this house and find ways to make the space that we have work better for us.

The rest of today was busy getting the boys caught up on homework and working on scout stuff. It started raining this afternoon and it’s still coming down hard. This evening I went to our Stake Enrichment Meeting (I guess it won’t be called that anymore!) which included a potluck dinner and short (but very inspiring) message given by our stake RS president. Then, of course, we watched the General RS meeting broadcast from Salt Lake City. All I can say is WOW! It was amazing. I feel like there are a lot of things I can work on, but I don’t feel discouraged about it; I feel motivated and inspired. I hope the rest of you who attended feel the same way.

I forgot to mention last week that while I was at stake conference another woman (who looked familiar) approached me in the foyer and asked me if I was from Orem. I said I was, and she said "Are you... Annette?" Yep, that's me. It turns out she is Jolie Ridd. She moved here with her family this summer. I am really surprised that she recognized me! I saw her again tonight.

Now it is late and I have ward council meeting kind of early in the morning, so I’d better post this week’s review and go to bed!