Weekly Review Janary 8 '11

We had visitors last Saturday night--my friend Marci and her children stopped in to see us on their way home to Kentucky. It was really fun to see how Snickers still remembered them, even though he hasn't seen them for over a year. (This is the family who gave us Snickers.) The kids enjoyed watching a movie and playing some games while Marci and I went for a drive so that we could talk in peace and quiet. It's been such a hard year for their family, but they are doing amazingly well. I can really see the power of the atonement working in their lives! It was great to see them again even though it was a short visit.

Only Seth, Jared and I went to church on Sunday; everyone else was sick. Because it was the first Sunday of the year, all the Primary kids had new teachers and new classes but in spite of that, things went pretty smoothly. It was Seth's first day in the Sunbeam class. There were only two of them there that day (there are six kids in the class). The other little girl who was there is the daughter of one of my counselors, and she and Seth kept getting out of their chairs and following us around! But once their teacher arrived (she was a little late) they did better at sitting in their seats. She was one of their nursery leaders--I moved her from Nursery to Sunbeams this year to provide some consistency for those kids and it looks like that was a good idea!

After church we tried to relax. We got out the puzzle that we didn't do on New Year's Eve and got it made in just a few hours. I couldn't find a good 1000 piece puzzle, so I got a 500 piece puzzle this year instead and it was definitely a lot easier to put together! I kind of like the challenge of the 1000 piece puzzles better, but it was nice to get the puzzle put together so much quicker, since we didn't have much time. Here is the end result:

We have a whole collection of puzzles of this type now. One day I would really like to put them all together and have them framed!

The kids were all supposed to go back to school this week, but because of illness, I didn't have a single day that all four of my kids went to school. Scott, Jared, and Tanner were home Monday and Tuesday, Tanner was still home on Wednesday, and Seth was home Thursday and Friday. I might have sent Seth to school on Friday, but we got a little bit of snow that morning and there was a 2 hour delay and whenever that happens they cancel preschool. Everyone seems to be better now. They all had the chills / congestion / cough / sore throat / headache thing that I had for Christmas. Frank was really miserable all weekend but was thankfully well enough to go back to work on Monday. As a matter of fact, he worked over 50 hours this week--it was a busy week!

Unfortunately, I still seem to be caught in a time warp--the days have continued to zip by and I don't feel like I get enough done. I had a doctor appointment Wednesday afternoon, a Primary presidency meeting Wednesday evening, took Tanner to a doctor appointment Thursday afternoon, and had my hair done Thursday afternoon also. Besides that, I was working on lots of Primary things, did some shopping for Frank's birthday, and also tried to find something to hang on my front door--but was unsuccessful.

I wanted to get something to hang on the door to replace the Christmas wreath that I just took down. I thought it would cheer me up to have something new for the door since it looks kind of bare. But all I could find in the stores were Christmas things on clearance--nothing generic that would work for January like snowflakes or a snowman or something. I can't figure it out. I did get something for Valentine's Day and for St. Patrick's Day, though--so I guess I'm set for February and March.

My doctor appointment was a follow up with the doctor who did my eye surgery. He removed the stent and says everything looks good. Hopefully I will not be going back there ever again! I had Seth with me and I was very grateful we didn't have to wait very long--last time I went there, I was in the waiting room for 45 minutes. Tanner's doctor appointment was just one of the check ups he has because of his medication. We did have to wait a long time for this appointment but at least Seth was at home! They measured Tanner and he is 5 feet, 11 1/2 inches tall. He is very annoyed that he isn't quite 6 feet yet!

Last night Frank and I went out to eat. He received a gift card from a client for a restaurant we had never been to before, so we decided to try it out. There were a lot of good choices on the menu and the things we chose were really good, so we'll probably go there again. It was great to get away for a while after his long week at work and my long week taking care of sick people!

I spent a lot of the afternoon on Tuesday trying to help Scott with his math class (Algebra 2). The problem is, it's been over 25 years since I took Algebra 2 in high school, so I can't remember how to do any of it anymore. He is trying to prepare for his final exam next week. Unfortunately, he has not done well on any of the tests for this class this term, so it's pretty critical that he do well on the final. It's been frustrating--he's been staying after school to get tutoring and he thinks he understands the concepts but then he still does poorly on the tests so it's obvious that he doesn't understand as much as he thinks he does. Anyway, I ended up feeling pretty tired and frustrated by the end of that day!

Today we woke up to a good inch or two of fresh snow. It's been a busy day with lots of trips to various places. Jared was supposed to have a basketball game this morning at 8:00 but the other team didn't have enough players so they forfeited. Thankfully, they realized last night that they weren't going to have enough players and let us know so we didn't get up early to get over to the church for nothing! None of us were too disappointed when we found out we didn't have to get over there that early. I did have to be at the church at 10:00 for a baptism, though, for one of the little girls in our ward. They do baptisms on the stake level now, but she happened to be the only child in the whole stake getting baptized this month, so it was a smaller group than usual. Since I had been asked to conduct the music as well as do the Primary welcome, I was glad that it was a more intimate group! (I don't enjoy getting up in front of people to do anything!) The baptism was very nice.

I ran an errand on the way home and then came home to eat lunch, give Seth a bath, and sweep & mop the kitchen floor before I had to take Scott back to the church for his basketball game at 2:30. One of our neighbors came with me--she needed a ride to a car dealership to pick up her car and it was very close to the stake center, so that worked out well. Jared came also--I dropped Scott off so he could warm up, then took Jared to his friend Bryson's house, and then went back to the church to watch the game. Our ward's team lost by about 35 points, but I really can't feel too bad about the game. Our team played very well and they were good sports, too. The other team is the best team in the stake and they also play very agressively, so they are hard to beat. I really saw a lot of improvement in our team over other years, so it was actually satisfying to see that. Scott scored the first point of the game on a free throw after he was fouled and he scored the last basket of the game right before the time ran out. I was really proud of him and of his team.

Now it is time to get dinner made and I have some more things I want to do for Primary before tomorrow, so I'd better wrap this up. I hope the new year is going well for all of you so far!