Weekly Review August 22 '14

Sorry, boring post without any photos this week.  You can stop reading now if you'd like.

But if you are still reading, I will tell you what we did this week.  It was a really busy week.  Don't worry...I won't give you a play by play.  I posted last on Thursday evening.  The next morning I woke up and didn't feel so well.  Bad headache and upset stomach.  Plus just really tired!  So I ended up staying in bed all day, not eating much.  Frank was able to work from home, thankfully, and took care of a bunch of things for me that I couldn't put off...like taking food to a family who was moving as well as to the sister missionaries, because we were supposed to have them over for dinner.  Plus he took care of ME.  So that was nice.  I actually watched two movies (but didn't enjoy them as much as I would have if my head hadn't been killing me), which I never do.

Whatever it was, it was only a 24 hour thing thankfully so although I wasn't 100% myself the next day, I was able to get up and do the things that needed to be done.  Which is good, since of course Frank came down with it that afternoon.  So it was my turn to take care of him.  The boys helped me get some work done and I spent part of the day helping a sister in our ward who needed a place to stay, plus trying to do some of the things that I should have done on Friday.  Tanner & Jared had a dance that night, so I got them there and back as well (it was just in Frederick, thankfully).

Sunday was the usual business with lots of meetings.  Jared sang with a group of men in Sacrament Meeting and it was beautiful.  Plus the mission president and his wife spoke, and gave excellent talks.  Tanner and Jared had a song practice that night...now they are singing a different song in Spanish this Sunday.  It's for an Elder in the Spanish branch who is speaking after recently returning from his mission.  The guy who is playing the piano for this musical number told me the other day how impressed he is with both Tanner and Jared--how well they sing, and how they were able to sing in Spanish without difficulty.  Nice to hear!

This week has been really busy because there have been a lot of extra things to do to make sure Tanner is ready to head off to college next week (and to make sure we are ready for our trip as well).  There are a lot of extra things going on because school starts next week as well, and of course a lot of RS stuff came up because that usually happens on the weeks that I am already insanely busy!

So, to sum things up instead of exhausting you with a day by day account of what we did (it was exhausting enough to live it) here are all the "extra" things we did.  To get Tanner ready to go, I took him to the doctor for a check up (and to make arrangements for him to get his medication while he's away), took him to get a haircut, and took him to open up a bank account.  Frank took him to buy a laptop.  He also had a couple of get togethers with his friend Taylor so I got him to Taylor's house and back a few times.

Besides that, we were totally shocked to get an email from the district guy in charge of Eagle Boards of Review on Monday evening.  He said "Have you got your approval from council and have you made your copies of your paperwork, and if I can get a board together, how soon can you be ready?"  I have no idea what changed his mind, but I am not complaining!  We told him we did have the council approval, we hadn't made the copies yet but could certainly do that immediately, and that Tanner could be ready the next day if needed.  So we got the copies made too.  Turns out his Board of Review won't be until Monday evening (the night before he leaves!) and there won't be any time for a Court of Honor, but that's ok.  Now I have to eat all my words about this guy and feel grateful to him, but that is something I am happy to do.

Other things I did:  Jared had a wire pop off of his braces and he couldn't get it back on so I had to take him to the orthodontist early Tuesday morning to get that fixed.  Did I mention the orthodontist is a half hour away?  I had my follow up appointment with the eye doctor and got my new contacts ordered.  Tanner's new glasses and contacts came in so we picked them up.  Then my contacts came in, but I still need to pick them up.  So three trips out to the eye doctor (about 20 minutes away)...couldn't have managed to do all of that in one trip, of course!  I had book chat this week.  For RS, I went with the sister missionaries to visit one less active sister (it was a great visit!), had a presidency meeting, and did 3 food orders.  Like I said before, food orders always seem to come up on weeks that I am already super busy.  And hoping to save a little time, I asked one of the families to come pick the order up at my house after the bishop signed it (instead of taking it to them, as I usually do).  That was a bad idea because I ended up spending over a half hour on the phone, trying to help them find my house!  I finally gave up and said "stay where you are; I will bring it to you."  She did follow me back to my house after that, though, so at least now she knows how to get here!  I hope I don't sound like I am complaining...I don't mind doing food orders.  I always like seeing how the church can help people.  It is such a wonderful, inspired system!  And I always get thanked for it, even though I don't really deserve thanks.  I am sorry to see the struggles that people have, though.

I also went to a meeting for the parents of Seminary kids (and found out there's hardly anyone to carpool with this year so we are probably going to be driving every day) and to a Scout Committee meeting.  One day we went to a ward members' house to pick tomatoes...they are out of town and their tomatoes are just going to waste so they said anyone could come get some.  That was well worth the effort because...well, garden fresh tomatoes!  Do I need to say more?

Tanner and Jared have had a couple more song practices.  I took Jared and Seth to the store with me...always fun.  (Not!)  The guys helped with a lot of the household chores, which was a lifesaver.  And in spite of everything else, I did manage to stick to my exercise schedule too...I am proud of myself!  I did not manage to get any sewing done, and that deadline is starting to loom.  Hopefully I will get a little done the next few days.

Our friends finally left for Alaska on Tuesday.  We were over there again on Monday afternoon and they gave us even MORE stuff.  So all in all, we have several large bins of stuff from them, just sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor.  It's been there all week because I haven't had a chance to do a thing about it.  And honestly, it's going to take some major cleaning out and organizing (both in the kitchen and in the storage room downstairs) to find a place for everything.  We don't have time for a big project like that, but we are having the missionaries over for dinner tonight so we're going to have to figure out something before then.  Wish us luck.  I have to get the budget caught up and take Seth to an openhouse at his school before I can get started on that, though.

Frank had a busy week too.  Thankfully, he was feeling well enough by Monday morning to go to work as usual.  He has been busy with projects for one client and he also went down to do some work with one of his other clients...the one that is farthest away (a couple of hours away).  While he was down there, he also met with a potential new client...the client he already has down there recommended him to this other company.  They are really unhappy with their current IT guy, he isn't very honest and has been ripping them off.  When they asked Frank's current client if they could recommend someone trustworthy...well, of course they recommended Frank!  This is a small company and they wouldn't need a lot of work done so they are a good fit for Frank and he'll probably start doing work for them soon.  Besides that, of course he has his regular job too!  We are really grateful for all the hard work he does to support our family.

And on that note, I'll end.  I'll be seeing a lot of you in a few days...looking forward to that!