Weekly Review September 9 & 16 '16

I have two weeks to cover and I was out of town one of those weeks, so there is a lot to remember. It's a good thing that I have a schedule on my tablet to refer to. The last few days before Jared and I flew to Utah, I was mostly busy trying to get ready for the trip, trying to help Frank as much as possible, and keeping up with the usual chores. On Saturday (the 3rd) I spent quite a bit of time sorting through Legos, and finished sorting the big bin I was working on. There are still 3 bins downstairs under Jared's bed which I need to do, but I am making some headway. I am still shocked at how many Legos we've managed to accumulate over the years! I took Jared to get a haircut on Saturday too.

On Sunday (the 4th) after church I helped Seth build some Lego sets. Our goal is to eventually put as many together as we can, and then take them apart and put them in bags with their directions. Then anyone (mostly future grandchildren?!) can put a set together if they want. I've been finding pieces to quite a few really old sets that I forgot we had.

Monday (the 5th) was Labor Day of course, so everyone was home. It was mostly a normal Monday; I did drive Frank to the store so he could buy something for a client, and while we were there we ran into his manager at work, who said "Wow, you don't look very good!" (Frank was wearing his knee brace and limping quite a bit.) Jared and Jessie got together for one last time that evening--they went to dinner and got frozen yogurt. Frank, Seth and I played golf on the Wii for FHE activity.

On Tuesday (the 6th) Frank was able to go into work and put in a pretty full day, but he talked with his manager and arranged to work from home the rest of the week. This was helpful not only because he isn't feeling well but also since I would be gone and he needed to get Seth to school and back every day. A ward friend who also has kids at his school took Seth to school Tuesday morning so that Frank could go into work earlier (before Seth left for school). We could get a rental car through the car insurance but since I was about to leave for nearly a week, it didn't really make sense to get one. We got one after I got back, since my car wasn't done yet, but we only needed it for a few days.

I was busy on Tuesday with all the usual chores, plus packing. Jared was still working on his room and we took a load to the storage unit that evening right before YM / Cub Scouts. At den meeting, the boys continued to work on their rockets and most of them finished carving and got their rockets painted too. I had a Cub Committee meeting after den meeting so we got home late.

On Wednesday (the 7th) Jared and I flew to Utah. Getting to the airport was a bit of an adventure because the traffic was bad plus we had to turn around and go back home shortly after we got on the freeway because I realized that I had forgotten to put my wallet in my backpack. Frank asked me if I had any cash, and I started to say "Yes, I have some in my wallet" when I realized that I had forgotten all about my wallet! I still shudder to think what would have happened if I had got all the way to the airport before I realized I didn't have it! As it was, it just put us behind so that we got caught in Baltimore morning rush hour traffic. Not fun. We got to the airport only about an hour before our flight left and then one of Jared's bags was overweight (we had also forgotten to weigh bags) so that delayed us a bit too. I asked the lady how much we had to pay for the extra weight and she said it was $75. But then she said that we could purchase a duffel bag from the airline for $25 and shift some of his stuff to that bag if we would rather. Since that would save us $50 and get a duffel bag into the bargain, we did that. I had only brought one bag, so we were able to check the duffel bag too. Anyway, doing all that took time but thank goodness the line for security was really short. We made it to our gate and barely had time for a restroom stop and purchasing some food for lunch before they started boarding. The flight itself was uneventful (just how I like it!) and we arrived in Salt Lake City about 20 minutes early. We had no trouble picking up the rental car for once, either, so we got to Mom and Dad's house about the time that we thought we would be picking up the rental car.

Oh, I forgot! When I flew out to college with Tanner, someone we talked to at the airport thought we were siblings! Well, the guy sitting next to Jared and I on the plane on this trip said he thought I was Jared's girlfriend!!! What in the world???? Anyway, we spent the rest of Wednesday just resting and visiting with Dad & Mom. In the evening, Tim, Emily, and Gwen came over as well as Amy, Shellie and Christian, and Scott. I'm really glad I got to see all of them!

On Thursday (the 8th) Jared and I headed up to Idaho. The traffic was nasty going through Salt Lake City but since there were two of us we were able to use the HOV lane and we mostly sailed through. We took a different route than normal because we wanted to visit Franklin, Idaho on our way. Our ancestor, Lorenzo Hill Hatch, built a house there which is still standing so I wanted to see that. Plus, there is a Sister missionary who served in our ward earlier this year who is from Franklin and we wanted to meet her family. This was particularly convenient because her dad happens to be the president of the Pioneer Association in Franklin and he has the keys to the house and to a museum there that we also wanted to visit. So, we got to visit the house and the museum and we visited with her family and they are really lovely people. When we were getting ready to leave, they gave us a big bag of snacks to take with us--water, apples, grapes, bugles, Chex mix, granola bars, Nibs, nut rolls, and best of all--homemade cookies!! We each got a huge snicker doodle and  a chocolate chip cookie, plus a somewhat smaller oatmeal raisin cookie. The snicker doodles were soft and were literally the best snicker doodles I have ever tasted. We didn't even stop for lunch that day because we had so much good food to snack on. I thought that was so nice of them to do that for us!

Old store in Franklin

A chest made by Lorenzo Hill Hatch

Cradle made by Lorenzo Hill Hatch

Jared and I with Sister Olsen's parents, in the museum

 

Me with Sister Olsen's mom

Jared with Sister Olsen's brothers (Yes, they are twins!)

Lorenzo Hill Hatch's house

A monument for the founders of Franklin. I am pointing to Lorenzo Hill Hatch's name on the plaque.

On this plaque, it mentions that when Brigham Young visited the community, he usually stayed at the Hatch home.

The bag of treats!!

Incidentally, the lady who took us through the Hatch house looked at my eyes and mentioned that she's noticed that most of the Hatch descendants have blue eyes. I have the Hatch blue eyes, apparently!!

After we left Franklin, we drove up to Idaho Falls and checked into our hotel. Then we briefly visited the Idaho Falls Temple visitor center (the temple itself is closed right now for renovations) and then drove to Bed, Bath and Beyond and picked up the stuff we had ordered for Jared here in Frederick. After that we went to dinner and then we spent the evening trying to negotiate the BYU-I website so we could plan everything we needed to do the next day. I forgot to mention that our route through Franklin also took us through Logan, so we drove around the temple there too so that Jared could see it.

We left early the next morning (Friday the 9th) for Rexburg. The main road to Rexburg had road construction and there were supposed to be significant delays possible, but thankfully the traffic was fairly light and we got there quickly without any trouble. At his apartment, they had a "drop off zone" set up so that you could pull in and unload your vehicle before parking, which was helpful. It was organized chaos, a lot like move in day for Tanner at Helaman Halls. I got a kick out of a lot of the conversations I overheard and just the sight in general of all these people and piles of stuff everywhere. One guy was wheeling a cart across the street with 3 or 4 large clear bins and all the bins were full of...Nerf guns!! Anyway, Jared got registered for orientation and we got all his stuff into his room. He was the first one in his apartment to arrive. The apartment itself is very nice. It looks brand new. It has a large kitchen with more counter and cupboard space than I have in my kitchen, plus two refrigerators. They have their own washer and dryer in the apartment. They have two small bathrooms plus a big open area with two extra sinks. There are closets and storage cabinets everywhere. He can see the top spire of the Rexburg temple from his bedroom and living room windows. (The Rexburg Temple is closed right now, too, though!)

Move-in day chaos:

I took a ton of pictures of Jared's building and apartment because Seth wanted to see exactly what it is like. Here is a common area on his floor:

Here is the large kitchen in his apartment:

I liked this picture on the wall in his kitchen:

This is the hallway from the kitchen to the bedrooms. Bedrooms are on the right and the laundry area and bathrooms are on the left.

Jared's bedroom (mostly empty at this point):

Two large closets in his bedroom. They each have built-in shelves and cubbies inside:

Open area with two sinks, in between the 2 bathrooms. Lots of storage cabinets on the left!

One of the two bathrooms:

Looking down the hall from Jared's bedroom, toward the laundry area and kitchen (lots more storage cabinets!):

The sink area again, with a better view of the storage on one wall:

The other bathroom, on the right:

The long hallway leading to Jared's apartment:

The hallways have tons of nice pictures of Idaho farmland, which I thought was cool. A few examples:

Plus, this picture of the Rexburg Temple is just across the hall from Jared's front door:

Jared at his apartment door. He loves that to get in, all he has to do is swipe his I-card. No keys needed!!:

Jared in the living room of his apartment:

Can you spot the Rexburg Temple spire? (View from the living room window.):

Sign in front of his apartment complex. We walked past it MANY times that day on our trips back and forth across campus.

After we got stuff into Jared's room, we walked up to the other end of campus so he could get his ID card and pick up his books and some bedding we had ordered. They actually had things very well organized so that didn't take very long. Then we had lunch. And guess what? They have BYU Creamery Cookies & Cream milk at BYU-I too! (I'm sure they also have the chocolate milk, but they must have been out of it because I didn't see any.)

 After that we went to WalMart to buy some groceries and other things Jared needs. It was, of course, an absolute madhouse so that took a lot longer than we wanted. All the check out lines had about 10 people waiting but then Jared had the bright idea to go to the garden area check out and there were only 2 or 3 people in line there so we got out a lot faster than we would have. We still barely got his stuff dropped off at his apartment in time for me to drop him off where he was supposed to meet his "I group". They had an activity and then there was a big introductory meeting / devotional for both the students and the parents. Then all the students went to meet with people about their majors while the parents had a question and answer session with the Dean of Students and other head honchos, including the president of BYU-I and his wife. The meetings were really good and I was once again really impressed with the school as a whole. I feel very thankful that my boys have the chance to go to universities where the faculty and staff are not just concerned with educating them, but also have a goal to help them become who the Lord wants them to become. Especially in the crazy world we live in these days!!

Seth wanted pictures of campus too, so I took some of those. He actually said that--"Make sure you take some pictures of the campus for me!!" I didn't know he even had the word 'campus' in his vocabulary!! I liked all the inspirational signs in the Manwaring Student Center.

I think this is the Snow Building:

The Manwaring Student Center:

You can sort of see the Rexburg Temple:

We walked up this hill a bunch of times:

After all the meetings, we picked up Joey Koetting (son of my very good friend, Jeanine) at his apartment and took him to dinner. (He is attending BYU-I also.) I haven't seen him since before his mission (he's Scott's age) and it was really cool to see him again. He looks mostly the same to me, just more mature and shorter hair. :) But he has also grown up a lot and turned into a great young man. I always knew he would. His mom worried a lot more about him than I did!

 We had a long dinner since we were visiting, so after we took Joey back to his apartment and stopped at Jared's apartment briefly it was nearly 8:30 and time for me to go. We said our goodbyes and I dropped Jared off across campus so he could attend a talent show they had that evening. He got to meet up there with his district leader from the HCP work crew, so that was fun for him.

I drove back to Idaho Falls with one slight adventure--I got on I-15 going the wrong way and had to go 8 miles before the first exit so I could turn around and go back!! The same thing happened to me when I dropped Scott off four years ago and I was determined not to do the same thing again. I blame the GPS, plus the signs at that intersection are misleading! I did manage to get back to the hotel in one piece.

Saturday morning (the 10th) I accidentally slept in but I still got on the road in good time and had an uneventful trip back to Salt Lake City. Dawn (Frank's sister) and Mike (her husband) met me at the rental car return and gave me a ride back to Mom and Dad's house. Then Scott came down for a short visit and he took me to Bed, Bath and Beyond to return one thing that Jared didn't need. I wanted Anna to take some pictures of Amy and I together so I was trying to get that coordinated and I got some laundry done. All of that took time. I wanted to go to the temple but there just wasn't time to do that. The BYU - University of Utah football game started at 5:30 and most of Tim's and Amy's families came over to watch that.

It was really fun to watch the game with all of them, even though BYU lost (again!!!) Amy and I left at half time to go with Anna to get photos taken so we missed some of the 3rd quarter. The photos turned out really nice, though. Here are a few:

Sunday (the 11th) I could sleep in as late as I wanted, so of course I woke up at 5:00 am and couldn't get back to sleep. I finally gave up and got up and Skyped with Frank and Seth. They seemed to be holding up okay, and it was great to talk with them and see them. They didn't go to church that day though (it was our Stake Conference) because Frank was hurting quite a bit.

I talked to Jared a bit on Saturday (the 10th) and he seemed to be doing well. All but one of his roommates had arrived and he was surprised to find out that one is from Virginia and one is from Washington DC. The other two are from Nevada and Salt Lake City. He was doing some juggling with his schedule.

Frank finally heard back from the doctor about his sleep study while I was gone on my trip, and he has severe sleep apnea. So he will need to sleep with a CPAP machine. He's not thrilled about it but I hope it really helps him and that getting a decent night's sleep will make a difference for him. I think it will. We are still waiting on the insurance to get the CPAP machine though. It is taking a lot longer than I would like.  

On Sunday (the 11th) I went to church with Mom & Dad.. Mom taught the RS lesson, and she did a really good job. After church, Scott picked me up and took me to meet a few people from his mission. Then we went to the Higgs house (another family from his mission--one he spends a lot of time with) for dinner. They fed us salmon, roast beef, loaded mashed potatoes, green beans, fruit, Texas toast, and ice cream with homemade caramel sauce. It was all really delicious!! Jared texted Scott a picture of his dinner—ramen noodles—with the caption “Dinner of Champions”. So Scott took a picture of our dinner and sent it back with the caption “Dinner of Celestial Beings”. It was pretty funny!

Monday (the 12th) was spent mostly just getting home. The flight went well and I got home on time. I read most of the way home and finished the book I was reading, which is called Island of Saints. It was really good. Frank & Seth met me at the airport, and we stopped on our way home to get dinner. I got unpacked and we went to bed!

Tuesday (the 13th) was busy because I was trying to get caught up on everything I missed while I was gone. I did laundry and went to both the grocery store and WalMart. I also did a bunch of planning for cub scouts, including preparing for the den meeting we had that evening. I did a bunch of other things like random cleaning (floors, etc.) plus paying Jared’s tuition and putting money on his I-card. This was a rather expensive week with all of Jared’s stuff but there is still money in the bank, I’m grateful to say. At den meeting, the boys were finishing up their rockets for the space derby and it was kind of crazy because it is hard to help 5 or 6 boys all at the same time. Seth had a bit of a meltdown too, which didn’t help. But by the end of the evening, most of the boys had their rockets fully assembled.

By Wednesday (the 14th) I was starting to get caught up on things and life was getting close to back to normal. I did more cleaning and helped Seth finish putting together his space derby rocket (he didn’t finish his at den meeting, because of the melt down.) I also picked up a rental car. Frank wanted to go into work on Thursday, so I needed a way to get Seth to school and back.The car I got was red and it had New York license plates.

Seth had a field trip at school on Wednesday—they walked to a place at a nearby elementary school called the Earth Space Science Lab and he says they saw some cool things there.

Yesterday (the 15th) I was back on a normal schedule, which meant I did laundry and grocery shopping and vacuuming. I had a visiting teaching appointment in the afternoon. I also switched the wreath on the front door so it doesn’t look like Independence Day anymore—now it’s fall. :) I changed out the S&P shakers too—from sea shells to roosters and a squirrel holding acorns. I knew today was going to be busy so last night I sat down and got the budget all caught up. (I usually do that on Friday.) I’m glad I did, because it took hours and I definitely would not have had time to do it today.

The reason I was busy today is that I spent the morning helping some sisters in our ward who are moving. The big move is tomorrow but today they wanted help boxing up smaller items and moving a few things over to the new house. So a few of us went over there to help this morning. I got back around noon and then exercised and then showered and by then it was almost time to go pick up Seth from school. (He gets out at 2:30 on Fridays.) The place that has been fixing my car called and said it was ready to be picked up (it wasn’t supposed to be done until Monday, but I am not complaining about that) so I dropped Frank off at that place. After picking up Seth, I took the rental car to put some gas in it and then returned the rental car. Frank met us at the rental car place with my car and we all came home. It is really nice to have my car back! However, I need a new “Y” sticker for the back. They replaced the whole hatchback, and my “Y” sticker was on that piece, so it’s gone. I am sad. :(

Frank has been able to work from home every day this week except yesterday (and that day he went in because he really wanted to get some things done at the office). His manager is being really great about letting him work from home, which we appreciate. He had a follow up visit with the orthopedic doctor on Wednesday, and since his knee is still really hurting a lot, the doctor scheduled him for an MRI. He also wants him to do physical therapy, but not until after he gets the MRI and they find out what’s really going on with his knee. Unfortunately, he can’t get the MRI until Wednesday—not sure why it takes a whole week to get in to get that done! Frank asked the doctor if there was a possibility that he could get a temporary disability placard (so he can park in handicap parking) and the doctor said “Oh, sure!” and filled out the paperwork for him right then.  He got a placard for each car and they are good until December. Hopefully he will be feeling a lot better by then! In the meantime, he went to the store with me this evening and it was kind of fun to park right up front. He has been getting the motorized carts to ride around on in the stores too. I think he’d enjoy all of this a lot more if he weren’t hurting all the time. Because his neck and back are also hurting a lot, he went in to see our primary care physician today about that. The doctor was feeling all up and down his spine, and he got to one spot that really hurt, so he sent Frank over to get x-rays of his spine. We won’t know the results of that for a few more days. He has also been noticing that his back molars hurt and have been hurting since the wreck, so he thinks he may have cracked or chipped something and he needs to get that checked too. So yeah—he’s been pretty miserable and I’m not sure how he managed while I was gone. It seems to me that he’s getting worse, not better. I hope they can figure out what is really going on and get him some treatment that will bring some relief soon. On the upside, Frank says that Seth helped him a lot while I was gone and Seth has continued to be quite helpful since I’ve been home. I notice that he usually jumps up and does things right away without complaining when we ask him to.

Jared seems to be doing well. He reports that he likes his roommates and classes are going well so far. He is still trying to get his schedule finalized, which stresses me out a bit because he currently is not signed up for enough credits to get his scholarship. He is still trying to add one more theater class. If he can add that class, he will be set.

I think that is everything that we have to report. My trip was definitely not restful, but I am grateful I could go and it was really nice to see a lot of you!