Weekly Review December 20 '14

Well, there wasn't quite as much to do this week but throw in a couple of sick kids and a car that wasn't working (again) and it was hard to figure out when I was going to be able to go anywhere.  The end result was that the week was rather hectic again.  But I guess that's just life!

Last Saturday was pretty busy for all of us.  Jared had three performances of the play (the final three performances).  We went to see the play (Shrek, the Musical) on Friday evening and really enjoyed it, by the way.  They did a really good job.  I was impressed with the boy who played Lord Farquad because he had to do everything on his knees!  (So he would look short; they had a clever costume that made the upper half of his legs look like his whole legs, and which concealed the bottom half of his legs.)  Anyway, Jared was gone pretty much all day doing that.  

In the morning I took Seth to a museum here in Frederick...it was the annual Museums by Candlelight event which they have on a Saturday in December every year.  On this day, many of the museums in the county are open free of charge.  Many of them have kid's crafts, special music, and / or refreshments too.  I have made it a tradition to take the boys to see one or two museums every year.  The older boys have seen most of them now so it's just me and Seth.  Because we had a lot going on and time was short, I decided to just visit one place this year.  I took him to see the Steiner House, which is a beautiful historic home in downtown Frederick.  I took a load of pictures!  This museum had gingerbread cookies, Seth got to make an ornament, and they also had a fun activity for the kids...they had to see how many nutcrackers they could find in each room and write it down.  Seth really enjoyed that, and it kept him busy while I got to listen to the docents tell about each room.  (He was a bit interested in what the docents had to say, also, but being able to look around for nutcrackers while they talked kept his mind busy so he didn't get bored.)  When he was done, they checked his paper and because he did an excellent job, they let him pick out a candy cane.  

So here are the pictures:  

This first one was taken in the front parlor.  Now several of the dining room:

 
Love the built ins, and all the little details all over the house like pictures, mirrors, beautiful old dishes, lamps, etc!

Seth counting nutcrackers.  Can you see one?

The kitchen fireplace is huge!

Front entry; Seth is writing down more nutcrackers.  The stairs are beautiful too:

A small upstairs bedroom:

Large upstairs bedroom:

Making an ornament:

Of course there's a great dollhouse too:

Upstairs secondary bedroom:

Another upstairs small bedroom (love the coat on the door!):

Steep old stairs:

Back downstairs, back parlor:

Front parlor:

Foyer again

And now, the summer kitchen out back:

And the side yard:

Front steps:

While we were gone to the museum, Frank was at home installing the new faucet in the half bath and hanging the pictures, so it's finally all done (except we still need to buy a new vent cover):

After visiting the museum, I took Seth to a birthday party.  Saturday was also nice because I had the opportunity to do a lot of small acts of service.  For one thing, my friend whose daughter was having the birthday party told me when I talked to her that morning that her washing machine had just broken and they didn't have many clean clothes.  So when I dropped Seth off at the party, I picked up a load of laundry and took it back home with me and washed it.  Then when I picked him up, I took the clean laundry back.  It was an easy thing to do, but really helped them out a lot.  Another family in our ward had a child in the hospital, so I took them dinner.  Then that evening I took another mom in the ward and her children to visit her husband, who unfortunately is in jail right now.  They don't have a car so they need someone to take them out there.  (While they were visiting, I got some shopping done, and also walked around the mall to get some exercise.)

Also on Saturday we delivered the 12 Days of Christmas box.  This year we had picked out a family in our ward; the parents separated earlier this year so things have been difficult for them.  The problem was, the mom and her children live in a condo where you have to buzz in to get into the building.  So that made it hard to do it anonymously.  So we let another family in on our secret and asked them to give them the box, and let them know it was from someone else but they didn't want them to know who it was.  Well, anyway, a few days before that the father was taken to jail.  They knew that was probably going to happen eventually, but not exactly when.  So of course that was very hard on the kids.  When I found out he had gone to jail, I thought "well, maybe this will be good timing for them to get the box this week."  I was very happy to hear the next day that I was right.  The family who took them the box said they appreciated it so much and it made a huge difference in brightening the atmosphere in their home.  The gift for the first day was a gingerbread train kit, and they said that they made it right away and had so much fun and it really cheered all of them up.  It made us so happy to hear that!  So sorry they had such a difficult week, but since it had to happen, we're glad the timing worked out the way it did, and we feel really grateful that we are in a position to help a little bit.

Ok, I promise I will not have that much to say about every day this week!

On Sunday we had tithing settlement after church and that evening the youth in our ward gave a Christmas musical fireside.  Jared was the conductor for most of the songs, and it was very nice.  I went to it but Frank did not because sometime in the afternoon Seth started complaining that his head and legs hurt, and he looked flushed and had that "I'm getting sick" look in his eyes.  So Frank stayed home with Seth.  We discovered that the only working thermometer in our house has gone missing (of course!)--we have several that don't work for some reason.  So I wasn't sure if he had a fever or not but he looked feverish to me.

I kept him home from school on Monday and later in the day (after Jared got home from school) I went out and bought a new thermometer and sure enough...he had a temperature of 101.6.  Meanwhile, Jared was not feeling very well either and by Tuesday morning he had a fever too.  I kept Seth home through Wednesday when his fever finally went down, but the whole time he never acted all that sick...he was bouncing off the walls most of the time.  Jared, on the other hand, was definitely miserable and had a fever up to about 102.4.  I shouldn't say "had", because he's still sick actually.  He's feeling a little better but he still has a fever, cough, congestion, and sore throat.  Seth went back to school Thursday and Friday and seemed just fine, but then this morning he woke up early and complained of a headache and sore legs again.  I took his temperature and it was back up to 101.6 again!  So it kind of feels like they are never going to get better.

We carpool to Seminary with another family in our ward and their daughter, who is in the same theater crowd with Jared at school (she actually played Fiona in the play), was also sick this week.  They took her to the doctor and confirmed that she has influenza type A.  So it's likely that's what Jared has also.  I was sorry she was sick, but since they both had to be sick, it was convenient that they both got sick at the same time!  We didn't have to do the Seminary drive on Wednesday through Friday.  Actually got to sleep in all the way until 7:00 some days!!  It was also convenient to have Jared and Seth sick at the same time so that I could leave them home together while I did all the things I needed to do this week, and while I drove the carpool boys to school each morning.

I have had a slight sore throat and headache off and on all week (last week too) so I kept worrying that I was getting sick too but thankfully it has not turned into anything significant (keep your fingers crossed!) not only because being sick is unpleasant, but because I had so much to do.  No time to be sick!!

At school Seth was personality of the week which means he filled out an information sheet about himself, took in a timeline with a photo of himself from each year of his life, and took in a bag of his favorite things to tell about.  These activities were supposed to be spread throughout the week, but since he was sick they got squashed into the last two days of the week.  He enjoyed it and thankfully it wasn't a lot of work to get those things ready (the timeline was already put together from previous years; I just had to add a photo for this year.)

Other things I did this week:  we had the Elders over for dinner on Wednesday (the sick ones ate in another room so we wouldn't contaminate the Elders), I had a presidency meeting and book chat on Thursday, an RS visit on Friday, and today I did some sewing (needed clothing repairs) and went through several bags of clothing that someone in the ward donated to figure out who might be able to use them.  (One of my counselors helped me.)  Frank did maintenance for all his clients.  My other project for the week was helping put together 18 baskets to give to single sisters / widows in our ward for Christmas.  I had a lot of help with them this year (one of my counselors did most of the shopping and five of us got together to put them all together) so it wasn't nearly so stressful.  I did end up with all of them at my house for a few days because I was picking up the last thing that needed to go in...loaves of bread.  Then the YM president picked them up from our house so that the YM could deliver them.  While they were here, they took up all the space on our kitchen table:    

And a few had to go on the floor:

We put a few of the same things in as last year, but a couple of things were different.

It was a fun project and I enjoy doing it even though it's at a busy time of year!!

Last night Frank and I left the sick ones at home and went out on a date.  First we went to dinner, then we did some shopping, then we went to a wedding reception, and then we went to pick up my car.  I forgot to explain that early in the week my car started acting up again; same problem with the suspension.  So I took it back in on Wednesday so they could try to figure out what was going on.  Frank was at work but a friend met me at the mechanic's and gave me a ride home.  They had to keep the car for a few days because sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't, but they finally figured out that they needed to replace one more part and now it is fine again.  It complicated my life not having a car for a few days, but we worked it all out.  Anyway, we had fun on our date.  Today we did some more shopping (crazy idea...last Saturday before Christmas!) and now I sincerely hope we are all ready for Christmas, except for baking and wrapping.

Here's the tree:

This afternoon Frank took his drone outside to play with it for a while and he also took a few pictures:

And here is the tree again, this time when it's dark:

Here are the sick boys.  This is pretty much how they have looked all week, sitting on the couch:

 I think that's it, except to note that the US Postal Service has been giving me grief.  I mailed two packages last Friday.  One (to Ben's family) was supposed to be delivered on Monday and the other (to Scott) was supposed to be delivered yesterday.  Well, Ben's package arrived on time but it got damaged, and one item inside was totally destroyed.  (It was insured, but we've got to figure out how to make a claim.)  Then Scott's package has still not been delivered (I've been tracking it).  I was feeling quite concerned yesterday when there was no record of it even arriving anywhere in Utah.  It left Greensboro, NC early in the morning on Monday, and that's the last information they had.  I was starting to get nervous that it wouldn't arrive in time for Christmas (in Scott's mission you send packages only to the mission office and they only deliver them on P-days so it needed to get there by Monday) but thankfully this afternoon the package finally arrived in Utah.  So I think it will get to him in time now.  Whew!

We are excited that Tanner will be back home tomorrow!

That was our crazy week.  We wish you all a happy, healthy Christmas!!

Weekly Review December 12 '14

 I'll start this week out with some more salt & pepper shakers.  When my mother and father in law came for Thanksgiving, they brought me four sets that they had found for me.  So here they are:

These ones are LARGE!  They will hold a lot of salt and pepper.

It took us a while to figure out how to fill these clear lighthouses.  There's a piece on the bottom of each one that comes all the way off.

Some more corn!  (I have two more corn S&P sets, but each set is different!)

This set is really unique.  The silver birds have pegs in the bottom that fit into holes on the top of the flowered branch.  I wonder how old this set is?

This week was super busy.  Kind of hard to avoid this time of year!  I had all the usual things that needed to be done around the house...I had to smash those things in wherever they would fit with everything else.

First of all, Frank arrived home from Las Vegas safe and sound Friday evening.  I didn't see a whole lot of him on Saturday because it was our ward Christmas dinner that evening and he was helping to cook all the meat for that.  But in past years they've done the whole dinner...this year only the meat, so it wasn't nearly as much work.  In the morning I took Seth to a free Lego event at a nearby store.  He got to build a Lego eagle and bring it home with him.  He was very happy with it:

  

He named his eagle "Eagie".  I'm telling you, this kid is no good at naming things.  His stuffed chimpanzee is named "Chimp".  His stuffed T Rex is "Rexie".  Just a few examples.  I'm afraid when he grows up and has kids that I am going to have grandkids named "Boy 1", "Boy 2" and "Girl 1".

Anyway, while I took Seth to the Lego event, Frank took Jared to a Cooking Merit Badge sign off and he got the whole badge signed off...hooray!  One less thing he needs to do.  Now his Eagle project is the only thing left.

I was a lot less stressed about the ward Christmas party this year than last year.  Last year I was in charge of the food.  Plus I sort of ended up being in charge of serving the food at the last minute, and my counselor who was also helping with the food ended up doing the decorations at the last minute.  So basically, my counselor and I did almost everything.  We learned from our mistakes, so this year we had a committee in charge of food, another in charge of decorations, and another in charge of the program.  It turned out a lot better this way...or at least, from my perspective it did.  Maybe the committee chairs would disagree. :)  I did show up a little early to help with some set up, but other than that I didn't have to do anything except make a fruit salad and a green bean casserole.  The RS was assigned to do a musical number for the program, but the sister in charge of the program had a great idea for what we could do and planned the whole thing so I didn't have to do anything for that either.  The Primary kids also did a musical number and they were asked to dress up as either a shepherd, an angel, or hold up a star...but it was optional; only if they wanted to dress up.  Seth wanted to be a shepherd and thankfully one of his Primary teachers a few years ago actually gave them each a shepherd costume.  So that was easy!  And he looked adorable in it:

The kids looked so cute when they sang their song and sang so beautifully...it was really sweet!  Probably my favorite part of the whole evening!

Jared had two play performances on Saturday so he didn't go to the party with us.  I realized if we hadn't had Seth, it would be just Frank and I--strange!

Sunday was pretty busy too.  All the regular meetings.  Then after church we had Erin & Dan over for dinner:

I'm afraid that was our last get together...they're moving next week and we will really miss them!  We enjoyed one last chance to visit and we played some fun games too.  After they headed back home, we watched the First Presidency Christmas Devotional, which was excellent, as always.

This week has been packed with Christmas preparations.  I won't give a day to day account, but overall here are all the things we did.  We got the tree and all the decorations put up (except outside lights...not sure if we'll get those up or not).  While we were decorating the tree, Seth decided to be Santa Claus:

He came up with the costume all on his own...cracked me up!

I ordered and picked up the Christmas cards, wrote the Christmas letter, and made copies of the letter.  Just need to stuff all the envelopes and address them now.  Got more shopping done...not much left!  Shopped for and put together the 12 Days of Christmas service project.  Made a gift for Tanner (can't say what...just in case he reads this).  Got packages ready to mail, and mailed them.

I think that's all the Christmas stuff!

Besides that, we had our monthly RS meeting this week so I had a few things to do for that, like making cookies.  We had a fun, relaxing evening.  First we shared Christmas service ideas.  Then we wrote letters to soldiers.  We also gathered up items to send to the troops.  At the end we had a Christmas cookie exchange, so I brought home a yummy variety of cookies.

Frank helped with the parking at the Festival of Lights at the temple on Tuesday evening.  He came home not feeling very well and has spent the last few days quite sick with a sore throat, cough, congestion, chills, and fever.  He is starting to feel a lot better today, though.  He took days off on Wednesday and yesterday and today he is doing some work from home.

Jared had a busy week, too.  He did the lights and sounds for a concert on Tuesday and for a showcase on Wednesday.  Tonight he has a play performance and tomorrow he has 3 play performances.  After tomorrow, the play will be done though.  We are going to see it tonight.

Besides all that, I also went to Seth's school twice this week to help him with some of his work.  The idea is that I am there to help him focus so he'll get more done.  Usually he only gets one or two things done per day.  On a good day, he might get four things done.  The first day I went to help him he got 7 things done.  It was interesting for me to see what kinds of things are distracting him.  I learned a lot.  It's not just other kids that distract him.  Sometimes the work itself distracts him, along with his perfectionist tendencies.  Like when he decides that all the apostrophes on his page have to be perfect and spends a lot of time making them that way.  Or when he decides he wants to count how many questions he had to answer today on his reading, and compare it to how many he had yesterday.  Stuff like that!  He isn't just distracted, a lot of things slow him down.  A lot of it has to do with his personality...everything has to be just so.  My original intention was to just be there to help him get through his work quicker and to hopefully help him learn some coping strategies to help him focus.  But I think it is also going to help me figure out what kind of help he needs, and what we need to do to help him.

I had car trouble this week as well.  The oil light was coming on and the suspension system was having problems.  We got the oil changed on Monday which solved that problem and then on Wednesday we got the car in to get the suspension system fixed.  Thankfully, that didn't cost a fortune although it wasn't super cheap either.  They were able to get it fixed quickly.  My carpool boys were disappointed that I got it fixed...they were enjoying the extra-bumpy rides to school!

I am proud of myself because in spite of all the craziness, I also managed to exercise every day!  Oh, and I had a RS visit too.  And to finish up...Snickers went to the groomer and came home looking great and with a very festive little silver and blue bow on his collar:

I guess even the dog is ready for Christmas now.

Hopefully next week is not going to be quite so crazy.  It probably will be, but I feel like we have a lot of the major Christmas preparations done now.  Just need to finish up shopping.  And there's baking to do...but that needs to wait until right before Christmas.

One more thing I want to add.  A sister in my ward shared her testimony on Sunday...she talked about how she had just been reading the account of the brother of Jared when he created the 16 clear stones and saw the finger of the Lord, and what she learned from that story about how the Lord gives us opportunities to grow and figure things out for ourselves.  Something about the way she worded things caused some thoughts to click in my head, and to think about that story in a way that I never have before.  Here is what I was thinking.  Sometimes we, like the brother of Jared, have a problem to solve and we don't know how to solve it.  There's really no way we can do it all by ourselves, actually.  But like the brother of Jared, we do everything that we can do.  We act in faith, and then when we've done everything we can, we go to the Lord in faith and ask Him to help us.  I've done that.  It is those experiences...doing everything I can, asking in faith for help, and then getting the help that I need that has helped me to see the hand of the Lord in my life.  I obviously haven't literally seen the finger of the Lord, as the brother of Jared did, but figuratively, I can look back and see the hand of the Lord, because I know there is no way that problem could have been solved on my own.  I know He worked miracles in my behalf.  Those experiences have given me great faith in the Lord...it's more than faith, really.  It's knowing.  I know He's there, because I've felt Him and I've seen what He has done in my behalf.  So like the brother of Jared:  I had a problem...I did everything I could... I asked in faith...I saw the hand of the Lord...my faith became knowledge.

I've been realizing lately that Scott will be home soon.  Less than four months.  And Tanner is finishing up his first semester at BYU.  There was a time in my life that I wondered how on earth we were ever going to be able to support our boys on missions.  Or help them with college.  And yet here we are...one boy is almost done with his mission.  And we've been able to support him.  Another boy in college at the same time.  And we've been able to help him.  How?!!  Well, we did everything we could.  We tried to manage our resources wisely.  We lived within a budget.  We made sacrifices.  We paid our tithing.  We paid fast offerings and tried to be generous with what we had when we could.  But most importantly, we prayed...a lot!  We prayed probably with more pleading than faith (but trying to act in faith as we did all of the previous things) that somehow it would all work out.  How clearly then, we have seen the hand of the Lord in this aspect of our lives.  Because it's working out.  And we have literally seen miracles take place to make it possible.  I can't even say how grateful we are for that!      

Weekly Review December 5 '14

Sometimes I wonder what there is to write about.  I mean, so much of my time each week is spent doing the same things--grocery shopping, cleaning, cooking, driving kids to places they need to go, laundry, etc.  Probably takes up 75 -80% of my time.  Or maybe more.  

Then there is all the Relief Society stuff.  That's a constant, too.  Are you all tired of hearing about that?  This week is the week before the first Sunday of the month, which means I was working on VT changes...again.  I texted Frank last night and said "I think I have all the VT changes figured out, thank goodness."  and his answer was "Until next month...bwahahaha!"  He's right, of course!  Besides that, I had a presidency meeting (nothing new there) and met with the bishop (because it's the first week of the month, and I always have a meeting with him the first week of the month).  Plus, I had lots of phone calls to make and emails to send out...as always.

This sounds like I'm complaining, but I'm not.  I'm just pointing out that if all I ever wrote about was the unusual things I do, it would sound like I sit around doing nothing most of the time!  I guess I've been reflecting a bit on my "job" this week.  That's because Frank had been out of town all week on a business trip--at a conference in Las Vegas.  He wanted me to come with him, and of course I would have loved to do that.  But then how would the kids get to school?  Who would buy the groceries or do the laundry?  Who would take the dog out?  Or mail Tanner that prescription he really needs?  So it occurred to me that when Frank wants a day off, he just asks for it, and the work at Marriott goes on without him for a day or two (or even a week or two).  Overall, I'd say he has the more rigid working conditions.  He is not as free to choose what he does or to set his own hours (although he can do both of those things, up to a point).  But when it comes to days off?  It's a lot simpler for him than it is for me.  My job never goes away!  And even though I don't get paid for it, I would have to pay someone else quite a bit to do it in my place.  

Again, I am not complaining!  I have the job that I always wanted the most and I am exceedingly grateful for it!  I'm so thankful I can focus on my home and on my children all the time and I don't have another job competing for my time and attention (unless you count RS...haha!)  I'm so thankful I am here for my kids all the time even in spite of the fact that every last one of them at some time or another has said (as Seth just said today) "Mom, I wish you had a job."  (Seth's reason was so we would have more money (!!!), another kid wanted to go to daycare like his friends.)  Bless them all, I DO have a job.  A 24 / 7 unpaid job with no days off, but a job nevertheless.  And the most important job there is, even though my kids don't realize it.  Or at least my youngest kid doesn't realize it.  My older kids are definitely seeing that now.  For example, Jared had a super busy week because this was opening week for the play at his school.  He was leaving the house at 6:15 for Seminary and not getting home until 10:00 or 11:00 at night.  So I was dropping dinner off at the high school for him every night.  I was getting text messages from him like this "You are a goddess."  Yeah, it's nice to be appreciated sometimes! :)

Well, now that I've said all that, we did have a number of events going on this week.so I do have something to write about besides laundry and cooking.  

Frank's parents left Saturday morning.  I teased Frank last week that we had no proof that his parents were here for Thanksgiving since he didn't take any pictures of them.  So here is our proof:

  

On Saturday we had a fun excursion down to Washington DC.  If it weren't for Erin & Dan, we would probably never go down there anymore, but they are always finding out about cool things to do there and telling us about them, plus we want to spend time with them so off we go.  It's going to be a real bummer when they move to Idaho in a few weeks.  (For a lot of reasons.)

Anyway, this time we planned to meet them at the National Geographic Museum and the Daughters of the American Revolution Museum.  They were going to a place called Eastern Market first, along with Dan's visiting sister, and they ended up running a lot later than they'd planned so we ended up doing the National Geographic Museum without them and meeting them later at the DAR Museum.  At the National Geographic Museum we watched a 3D movie about ancient sea creatures (it was fun, and Seth really loved it) and looked at their exhibits.  There really were only 3 large exhibits...one about food, one about Spinosaurus, and one about Mars rovers.  They were interesting...I liked the food exhibit the most (we even got to sample some turkey pumpkin chili, which was quite good) and Seth loved the Spinosaurus exhibit, of course!:

But overall, we thought it was a bit on the expensive side for only having 3 exhibits.  (The movie cost extra.)  We did enjoy it, though.

Frank got some nice pictures of Seth in the courtyard, too:

Oh, and one more from the Spinosaurus exhibit:

Then it was on to the DAR Museum, which was awesome because admission is free and it is located in this really cool historical old building with tons of gorgeous architectural details.  Plus they had a big quilt exhibit.  And several dollhouses on every level.  And a cute gift shop.  And all these beautiful period rooms.  And right in the middle of the building was a big genealogical research library.  Totally my kind of place!!

The whole building was beautifully decorated for Christmas:

Frank was taking pictures the whole time and it wasn't until afterwards that I realized that he was mostly taking pictures of all the architectural details, and he didn't get many of the period rooms.  But that's ok because the architectural details are certainly worth photographing and if you really want to see all the period rooms, you can actually do a virtual tour of them on the DAR website.

Each of the rooms represents a different time period sometime between the 1700's (or maybe it was the 1600's) and the mid 1900's.  There were parlors, sitting rooms, dining rooms, bedrooms, libraries / studies, at least one kitchen, and an attic playroom.  Each room is named after a state, because they were created (and undoubtably paid for) by a different state's DAR charter organization.  There are not 50 of them, but there were probably close to 25 of them, at least.  Anyway, here are a bunch of pictures so you can get an idea of what the place was like:

(Attic playroom.  Erin noticed that in front of the fireplace there was a mark along the wood floor and there were hinges on one side of the mantle, so there must be a secret passageway behind the fireplace!)

And here's the library, which was also beautiful (the pictures don't do it justice)

At the top left of the picture, you can see the bottom of a bunch of flags.  I think they had a flag for every state hanging around the top of the wall.

And check out these cool little alcoves!

It would have been really fun to poke around in that library and do a little research, but we didn't have time.

Actually, no time was the theme of this museum, since we got there only one hour before it closed.  We ran around so we could see all the period rooms and I barely got to glance through the quilt exhibit (which was Virginia and Maryland quilts...a lot of Baltimore Album quilts in there, but others too) and we couldn't browse in the gift shop at all (which was probably a good thing...would have been too tempted to buy something).  I really wish we could have had more time there, because I could have spent an hour or two more.  I will just have to go back!

After we got home, Jared went to a Seminary party (he was late).  They had each researched a different person from church history so they could share information with each other, and they were supposed to dress up like their person, too.  Jared was George Albert Smith...the apostle, not the one who became the prophet.  They had a gift exchange and lots of food too, of course.

On Sunday I did not have any meetings for once but I still had to get up just as early because Jared was getting his patriarchal blessing.  Worth getting up for, of course!  The patriarch was quite emotional when we got there, and told us that he had never prayed harder over giving a blessing than this one.  And he did give Jared a beautiful blessing!  He already has the written copy, too...we got it in the mail on Tuesday.  We were totally surprised (and impressed) when it came that fast!  I read all three of my boys' blessings this week and it was really sweet.  Reaffirmed my testimony that these blessings come not from the patriarch, but from a loving Father who knows us so completely.  Even though their blessings say many similar things, each one is unique and I get a sense of each boy's personality in their blessing, and can see that it is tailored to that particular boy's strengths and weaknesses.  Kind of hard to explain, but hopefully you get the idea.

Frank left for Las Vegas very early Monday morning.  He will be back late tonight.  I think he enjoyed his week, but he will be glad to be home too.  He never did get on Las Vegas time, which is 3 hours behind us...he was waking up at 2:30 or so every morning, which is 5:30 here and he's usually up by that time.  He was able to go to bed fairly early most nights (8:00 or 9:00).  I guess that means he doesn't have to adjust back to our time now!  One kind of cool thing that happened is that he won a door prize from a vendor...a really nice drone.  He had to ship it home because he couldn't take it on the plane, which was not cheap but much less expensive than buying the drone would have been.  So early Merry Christmas to him!

I had the Sister missionaries over for dinner on Monday.  One of them...Sister Shumway (not Jeanette's daughter; there are two Sister Shumways in the mission) went home on Wednesday so I asked her to pick what she wanted for her last dinner with us and she chose chicken chili.  The sad thing was, when they came they told me that they just found out that not only was Sister Shumway going home, but Sister Madsen was getting transferred and in their place we were getting a second set of Elders instead of Sisters.  What a bummer!  I can't even begin to tell you how much help the Sister missionaries have been to me with all the RS work there is to do in our ward.  But I guess I will have to muddle through without them.  Hopefully it won't be permanent.  Nothing against the new Elders, of course.  I'm sure I'll love them too!

Today was our stake's annual Temple Jubilee, so I went to the temple this morning.  I actually debated going...the sore throat I had last week turned into a sort of cold with some congestion and the kind of cough where you occasionally, without warning, having nasty coughing fits.  Overall, I haven't felt my best all week although I pretended I felt fine.  Anyway, I didn't think a nasty coughing fit would be so great in the temple, but I finally decided to go anyway.  And it was wonderful and I didn't have any coughing fits so I'm really glad I went.  The trip home was rather rough, though...as soon as I got on the beltway, the traffic was just creeping along.  And then I saw the sign which said there was an accident at exit 35 and two lanes were blocked, and so was the ramp.  Well, exit 35 is where the beltway connects with 270 North...which is the only way to get to Frederick.  I didn't really want to go to Northern Virginia today so I decided I'd better get off at exit 34 and try to make my way home some other way.  Of course, I was in the car without the GPS and I don't have a smart phone.  But by following some signs and making one phone call to Frank, I managed to find my way back to 270 North, past the accident.  In the meantime, I got some lunch (I happened to pull into a Popeye's parking lot to call Frank, and it was after lunchtime and I was very hungry) so by the time I got home it was practically time for Seth to be home from school, I was really tired, and I still had a ton of things to do today.  But that's ok--it was worth it.

In between everything else, I have done quite a bit of Christmas shopping this week and I made quite a dent in what I need to do, so I'm happy about that.  Still haven't even started on Christmas cards or decorations, but I'm making progress at least.  I didn't have much free time, but I did finish reading my book for book chat (All Together in One Place...really enjoyed it; thanks Mom!) and I've also been reading a book called Here Is Where--Discovering America's Great Forgotten History, which is pretty interesting.  It even has a chapter on the Haun's Mill Massacre.  (Although it had an account of the Mountain Meadows Massacre in the same chapter, of course.)  Wednesday was probably the day I felt the worst, so I did take the afternoon off and watched the first few episodes of Downton Abbey season 4.

It's mostly been just Seth and I hanging out together this week with Frank gone and Jared at the school all day every day.  Thank goodness he's been able to get rides home at night since Seth had to be in bed long before he got home.  As a matter of fact, he was home so late Wednesday night that I had gone to bed.  I didn't even hear him come in!  (Nice to know someone could break in and murder us in our beds, and I would not wake up until it was too late.)  I woke up suddenly around midnight and panicked for a minute, thinking Jared hadn't gotten home.  But then I checked downstairs and all the lights were out (I'd left one on) and his shoes and backpack were on the floor so I went back to bed.

We had a really nice warm day on Monday, but overall the week has been cold, grey, and rainy.  We were actually supposed to get a wintry mix Monday night / Tuesday morning and 1-3 inches of snow on Tuesday afternoon.  We did get some of the wintry mix...I was awakened by the sound of ice pellets hitting the window during the night, but the temperature must have warmed up more than expected because by the time I woke up Tuesday morning it was raining, all the ice was melted, and the snow never materialized...just more rain.  

Overall, I don't like having Frank gone but it doesn't seem to be as hard as it used to be.  Maybe because I'm busier, so the time goes by faster.  When he used to travel when the kids were little, it was a lot harder.  I really wasn't as busy then, which seems strange.  You'd think now that my kids can feed and dress themselves, I'd be less busy.  But now that they're older, they have a lot more going on, too, so they keep me running.  Besides that, I don't get as nervous about him being gone as I used to.  For one thing, I feel really safe in my current neighborhood.  And I suppose having a teenage son who is bigger than I am adds an element of security as well, not that I would expect Jared to defend me.  I'm still his Mom, and I'm sure I would still stand between him and danger.  But it's nice to think that in a crisis there would be another sort of adult around to help me cope.  I think the idea of facing a dangerous situation alone is what has always scared me the most.  I always try to compensate in little ways when Frank's gone too...I do things like plan super easy meals.  It's just me and Seth (and sometimes Jared) anyway and they are really happy with things like mac and cheese.  Plus I really like those Totino's Party pizzas, for some reason.  I have no idea why, but I do.

Well, I started out saying I don't have a lot to write about, but I managed to write a lot somehow.  Feeling philosophical tonight for some reason.  I guess that's what being left alone with my thoughts for a week, without a husband to talk to, does to me!  I'm very glad he'll be back in a few hours.  Now on to the all the other things I need to get done tonight....