Weekly Review September 11 '20

 This morning I was watching a short recap of the events of September 11, 2001. It's hard to believe it was 19 years ago! I still remember it so vividly. I guess I always will. I still get emotional about it. 

This week was a little more eventful than last week, and definitely less stressful (for me, anyway...not for Frank). Seth and I are figuring out a routine and I did much better at stepping back and letting him handle everything. I'm also feeling a bit less anxious about him being online so much. I am still at home while he's online, but I'm moving around the house a bit more and getting more things done (just checking on him frequently). 

On Saturday (the 5th) Seth had a service project with the Deacon's Quorum...they went to a single sister's house and spread mulch in her flower beds (31 bags). They got ice cream afterwards. Since Seth was doing that, I mowed the lawn (usually that is Seth's job). The rest of the day I did mostly just the normal Saturday chores. Frank was gone for a couple of hours working, but I can't remember now if it was for a client or for Roy Rogers. I went on a walk that evening...seems like I always feel cooped up by the time Saturday evening rolls around! I took a few photos:

I always look at this house and kind of wish I lived in it, because it has such a beautiful backyard with a view of the river (I mean, I have a view of the river from my deck also but this house has an even better view). I'm not sure where the yard ends and the common area begins, but it looks like their yard slopes all the way down to the river. The pictures aren't great because it was mostly in shadow when I took them but the yard has several pretty flower beds and there are bird houses and a small bird bath and a little fire pit area. It just looks like such a beautiful, peaceful place! I actually love walking past it because it makes me feel peaceful too. 😊

Here's a wider view from the other side...you can see that beautiful green sloping lawn. The trees on the left of the photo are growing along the river bank:

And here's a little bit better view of the yard (also from the side), with some of the flower beds a little more visible:

Okay, moving on! Sunday the 6th was somewhat eventful because Seth had online Sunday School and Bishop's Youth Council and I had an online RS testimony meeting. I also had an in-person visit with the RS president--my quarterly ministering interview. We actually went for a walk while we talked. It was nice to see her and to have a long talk.

We decided that for Labor Day we wanted to get out of the house for a while. We discussed a couple of options and decided to visit Harper's Ferry National Historical Park to go on a hike. I had done some online research so we knew that a lot of things in the park were still closed (like the Visitor's Center and most of the other buildings) but the hiking trails were open. We chose a short, not too strenuous hike. When we got to Harper's Ferry, we discovered that a few buildings were actually open, including restrooms (the website said that restrooms weren't open). The Visitor's Center and all the exhibits / museums were not open, as we expected, but they had a couple of park rangers outside the Visitor's Center to hand out information / maps and to answer questions so that was helpful...I was hoping that we would be able to get a map! They also had an inkpad and stamp so that I could stamp our National Parks passport. I was happy about that. We got our map and got directions to the trailhead and headed out. The hike was nice...some of it was through the woods and some of it was across grassy fields and most of it was in the shade! It was a little warm, but not too hot and a little humid but not too bad. There were several signs along the way with historical information about Civil War battles and so forth. We had a good time.

This is a foundation where John Brown's armory sat for a while. It has since been moved to a location that is near it's original location (where it was standing when John Brown and most of his followers died). 

The Shenandoah River. We could clearly see people in boats on the river, but you can't really see them in the photos:

Civil war cannon:

We really enjoyed getting outside for a while and spending some time together! On the way home we stopped to get some lunch. Frank and Seth played video games together for a lot of the afternoon. I can't remember what I did, besides getting the laundry done. That evening we watched a lot of the BYU / Navy football game. Unfortunately, Seth had one of his headache / nausea episodes so he was feeling quite sick and threw up several times. Since the game started pretty late, we went to bed about halfway through the third quarter. It was pretty obvious that BYU was going to win anyway, and actually I think we saw all but one of the touchdowns. We were glad to see BYU playing so well, but we felt sorry for Navy! 

One advantage to virtual school is that Seth was able to participate in school on Tuesday, even though he was sick the night before. As usual, he was fine the next morning. But when he's going to school I feel obligated to keep him home the day after he throws up, just to make sure he's not going to get anyone sick. (I'm actually pretty sure that he is not contagious. I really wish we could figure out what is causing this problem. Eye strain? Migraines? No idea!) Our ward's activity night just switched from Thursday to Tuesday (not that we are actually going anywhere for activities!) so Seth had a virtual Deacon's activity that night. They played "trashketball" (throwing a wadded up balls of paper into trash cans; trying to do different fancy shots). 

Wednesday was the usual school routine. I usually get groceries on Wednesdays, but I didn't need to do that because I decided to try out the online order / pickup service at Walmart. I put in an order on Tuesday that I could pick up on Thursday morning before Seth starts school at 9:00. That evening, I attended a virtual meeting for the Benjamin Franklin Johnson Family organization. I don't know if any of you got an invite to that...I got an email about it (I must have given them my email at some point) and it sounded kind of cool so I decided to attend and see what it was like. There were about 20 people there...most were in Utah but a few in Arizona and Canada. We read a story from My Life's Review about an experience BFJ had when he tried to help some people he came across while traveling. Then we talked about it a bit and just got a little acquainted with each other...everybody introduced themselves and told how they were descended from BFJ. They all seemed surprised when I said I was in Maryland. Most of them were a lot older than me. I didn't stay to the end because it was getting late...didn't start until 9:30 my time. I did enjoy it and it was kind of fun to meet a few BFJ descendants. 

On Thursday morning I picked up our Walmart order at 8:00 am. It was nice not to have to do the shopping myself and they mostly did a good job. One can I got has a pretty decent dent in the back so I need to return that (I don't really blame them for that...it's easy to miss dents when they are in the back of the can; I know I've done that myself). Whoever bagged my groceries didn't do the best job...one bag broke even before I got it out of the back of my car. It had 9 cans in it, and it wasn't even double bagged. Then another bag had only 2 cans. I can't figure out why they didn't put more cans in that bag and less in the other one! But overall, it worked out great so I'll probably be doing that regularly while we are in this crazy virtual school situation. 

I mentioned that this week was stressful for Frank. He had an overnight install on Tuesday evening and this one also turned into a true overnight. There were lots of problems and it went really slow so he didn't leave the restaurant until shortly after 6 am (and it is an hour away from Frederick). But then a few minutes later he got a call from the restaurant and there was a major problem, so he had to go back. He didn't get home until about 9:30. He did sleep for a while then, but not as long as he should have. He ended up doing about 4 more hours of work later that day. So by Thursday morning, he had already worked about 28 hours, and Monday was a day off! It didn't end there, though. He got to work about 6:45 Thursday morning and I didn't see him again until 6:30 that night. (He did take a lunch break; while doing that he met with a member of our ward who is job hunting to see if he could help him at all...Frank is currently serving as the self-reliance specialist.) He came home long enough to eat dinner, but then he had to go do some work for one of his clients. That only took a few minutes, but on his way back he got a desperate call from another restaurant with an emergency so he just went straight there. He finally got home from there about 10:30. (We're up to about 42 hours now.) To top it off, though, while he was at that restaurant he slipped on a wet floor (someone had mopped it and neglected to put up a warning sign) and fell hard on his right side...he hurt his right elbow, shoulder, and back, and he also banged his left knee really hard on something as he fell. Thankfully, he didn't break any bones and his injuries aren't too serious...just several contusions. He went to a doctor this morning to get everything checked out and he is supposed to go for a follow up on Monday morning. He is mostly just really sore and he has a pretty decent bump / cut on his left knee. He pulled a few muscles in his back but it's not too severe. He's mostly really sore all over and it hurts to move. The doctor told him he should not work today and get some rest, so he is trying to do that. He's been lying down for a while but as I'm typing this post, I can hear him upstairs talking on the phone, trying to solve a problem of some sort. As long as he doesn't have to go anywhere and can remain lying down, I'm not going to complain, though! I just feel so bad that he got hurt and that he is constantly having to work such long hours. Seems like he is always trying to do the work of 2 or 3 people! Oh, and did I mention that he was wearing a brand new pair of pants for the first time and they got all dirty? Hopefully the stains will come out.

We've had more rain this week and it has been VERY humid (98%) most of the week (although the weekend was beautiful). Fortunately, I haven't had to be outside much. Inside, I tend to get cold with the A/C running, so I go around in long pants and socks even though it's hot & humid outside. 

While Frank is working nonstop and Seth is doing schoolwork, I just keep the household running, read, and work on projects. I finished reading The Scarlet Pimpernel on Sunday (I think) and I read another book this week called Flora & Ulysses...it's a Newbery winner. It was short and easy to read and quite interesting / clever, so I enjoyed it. I am slowly making my way through a book about ADHD too. Actually, I have about 6 or 7 books that I am in the process of reading right now. How did that happen?! I've been working some more on the hat I'm crocheting and have made quite a bit of progress. A few days ago, it looked a lot like a doily: 

It looks less like a doily now:

Actually, I've done a few more rounds since I took that photo, but I forgot to take another picture of it before I uploaded all the photos from my phone this morning. I've also been working a lot on a personal history blog post but there's still a lot of work to do before I'll be ready to post it. 

To finish up, I'll share a few photos of a rainbow we saw last night. (Second rainbow we've seen in less than 3 weeks!) The photos aren't very good--the rainbow looks oddly white. It looked much better in real life, although it was not a really bright rainbow. The clouds behind it were light pink, which looked really beautiful but I think that might be why the colors look off in the photos.