Weekly Review December 6 '19

Well, here we are in December...and the first week is almost over already! I've had a few moments of anxiety this week as I've been realizing that Christmas is only 3 weeks away. How did that happen?? Besides that, it's been a very busy week with an activity / event nearly every day. I'm sure everything will come together somehow, though...it always does!Here's what we've been doing:

Saturday the 30th: We spent most of the day in the car, driving home. It rained a lot of the way and it was much colder, so not as pleasant for travelling. There were a couple of accidents again but we ended up making better time on this trip than on the trip down, so we got home around 5:00. We spent the evening unpacking and doing laundry.

It was really foggy in western NC / eastern TN. Sometimes it was so thick we couldn't see more than a few hundred feet in front of us.

All the rest stops in Virginia have these cute little brick buildings!

 
We had to take this photo for Tim & Rachelle!

Sunday the 1st: I got a text message that morning from a Primary teacher looking for a substitute because her kids had woken up with fevers. I told her I'd do it, but then after I got to church I got another message from her saying she had found someone else by the time she got my message. I had already told the Primary president that I was subbing; when I told her I didn't need to do it after all, she mentioned that she had a sub to help with my former class (since I got released) but she wasn't sure if the sub would show up, so it would be great if I would be a back up. It turns out the sub didn't show up, so I helped teach "my" class as usual...kind of funny! I was actually glad, because I really hadn't had a chance to let them know that I had been released and won't be coming to class every week. After church Seth had Bishop's Youth Council and I had a ministering interview with a member of the RS presidency. Then I went back to the church in the afternoon for a song practice. Our song is really starting to come together now; I feel like I know the part pretty well. In between all of that, I was working on stuff for my music calling and writing an email to all my kids (except Seth)--I'm trying to do that every week because they don't read this blog. Plus I can tell them things that they specifically need to know, and I am also trying to share a spiritual thought with them every week. Frank went to the doctor after church because his left foot was hurting and it was red and a little swollen. It started hurting on Friday, I guess, but he didn't mention it to me until halfway through the drive home on Saturday. It turns out he has an infected vein in his foot, so he's on an antibiotic for that and he's also supposed to take an aspirin every day. So on the way home from my practice, I stopped at the pharmacy to get his prescription and the good news is--the flex card for our health spending account actually worked!! (And it worked again when Frank used it to pay the doctor bill this week, so maybe MAYBE we have worked through all the problems with that.)

Monday the 2nd: Besides all the regular stuff, I had to buy groceries and pay bills since I couldn't do those things last week while we were in NC. I also went to the library to pick up a book I'd put on hold, did some shopping for a wedding gift and for activity days, and went to a ward member's house to pick up a pitch pipe (which I needed for later this week). While I was picking up the pitch pipe, I also had a discussion about choir stuff with this ward member. Because we actually don't have a choir director right now, and there's no one who can do it permanently, we're going to try something new and have 4 people take turns directing (and this person is one of the 4). But we're still trying to think through all the details of how it's going to work best for our ward right now. So I'm going to have to figure that out but honestly I haven't had time to think about it since then! It's going to have to wait until I get through the next week or so. For family night that evening we played Monopoly and had egg nog & Christmas cookies. We finished the game early (Seth won) because Frank needed to go to the HOA meeting to find out why our parking spaces haven't been fixed yet (that was supposed to happen mid November, but no one showed up.) He found out that the contractor had cancelled the day before, so the HOA people were trying to find someone else to do it.

Tuesday the 3rd: All the regular stuff, plus I had to call the vet to get more insulin and syringes for Snickers and I also worked on the volunteer tax training quite a bit. I figured out that it's better for me to work on that first thing in the morning instead of afternoon...I'm less likely to fall asleep!! That evening I went to the RS activity, where we made ornaments. I'll include photos next week; neither of my ornaments is completely finished yet. For one, we squirted different colors of paint and some glitter into one of those clear plastic balls. Then you shake the ball up to swirl the paint around. It was easy, but it's not done yet because the excess paint has to drain out of the ball for a few days. So we put our balls upside down in plastic cups to let the paint drain out. Actually, I checked mine last night and I think it's pretty much done draining so all I have to do now is put the cap / hanger back on the top of the ball and it'll be done. The second ornament was more complicated...it involves folding squares of fabric and pinning them to a styrofoam ball in a certain pattern. I actually finished folding & pinning the squares yesterday but I still have to add the trim and a hanger to it. Anyway, we visited while we were working on the ornaments and it was a lot of fun! I always come home from RS meetings feeling uplifted and happier.

Wednesday the 4th: I spent the morning doing the regular Walmart shopping. I went to the religion class that afternoon and then worked on the tax training (and managed to stay awake!) I also finished writing our annual Christmas letter that we send in the Christmas cards, so hopefully I'll be able to get those sent out soon. That evening, we went to the town of Walkersville's Christmas tree lighting ceremony because our ward had been invited to sing for that. And since I'm the ward music chair and there isn't a choir director, I was pretty much in charge. We did this last year and instead of having the choir prepare a song we just invited the entire ward to come sing a familiar Christmas hymn. That worked out well last year so we decided to do the same thing this year. I was a little concerned because our ward has something going on nearly every night this week so I was worried that a lot of people would decide to skip the Christmas tree lighting and we wouldn't have a lot of people to sing. I prayed about it, though, and felt like it was going to be fine and it was. Plenty of people showed up and our song turned out great! We sang "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing". I used the pitch pipe I'd borrowed to make sure that we all started out on the same note and got us all started together but then I turned around and just sang with the group. It was actually really cool. I could see the faces of some of the crowd and they were all smiling and I could tell they were enjoying it and feeling the spirit. So that was nice! Seth got some hot chocolate afterwards, so he was happy. We've been having some trouble with the ice maker in our refrigerator lately (it wasn't making ice at all for a while) and shortly before we left we noticed water leaking from the refrigerator onto the kitchen floor so we had to take care of that and put something there to catch the dripping water. Then Frank worked on it some more after we got back and he knows something is wrong with the ice maker, but he's not sure what. He got the dripping to stop, but we are back to no ice. Not sure if we're going to be able to get it fixed or not...we may just have to live without it until we can get a new refrigerator someday.

Thursday the 5th: Again, during the day I worked on the tax course and got the usual chores done. I'd like to say I've made a lot of progress with the tax training--and I have done quite a bit--but it's going a lot slower than I'd like and I still have a LOT to get through. I feel like I've barely made a dent in it. We were surprised on Wednesday to get an email from the HOA letting us know that someone would be coming on Thursday to repair the asphalt in the parking lot. So we had to move our cars from our parking spots by 7:30 am on Thursday. And someone actually did show up at 7:30 and started working on it. (Not very good photos because I was taking them through the window):

That truck that's digging things up is sitting in my parking spot.

By late afternoon they were done and now I don't have to bump into and out of my parking spot every day. (There was a bad patch job done previously and the front part of my spot had sunk down several inches from the patch, so the back of my spot was several inches higher than the front.) They need to re-paint the lines now though.

On Thursday evening, I went to a song practice for a song that some of the older Primary girls are singing for the Christmas Sacrament meeting program (to give feedback). They sound pretty good!! From there I went to Activity days, where we helped the girls make Christmas ornaments--cinnamon stick & fabric trees. They are a really lively group and I am amazed at how much noise they can make and what a big mess they can make too! But it is fun. After I got home I started working on updating my address list for Christmas cards, but I didn't finish it before it was time for bed.

Friday the 6th: I haven't done much today besides exercise, eat breakfast, and get Seth to school because I decided to write this post first. I need to update the budget and submit a bunch of medical receipts to be reimbursed. I also need to get some things done to prepare for the program for the Ward Christmas Party, which is tomorrow. It's mostly music so I ended up in charge of that somehow! There's a wedding open house for a girl in the ward this evening, and if by some miracle I get all of that done and still have leftover time, I have a long list of Christmas things to do. Oh, and our lawn is in desperate need of raking since all the remaining leaves of our neighbor's tree came down while we were in NC. We haven't had a chance to put up any Christmas decorations yet either! I really need Frank's help with both the leaves and the decorations, but he's been super busy doing work for clients (besides his regular job) and unfortunately tomorrow is going to be a wash because he has to help clean the church in the morning and then he's helping cook all the food for the Christmas party. So he'll pretty much be gone all day. Not sure when any of that is going to get done, but if I have time I may see if I can make some headway with the leaves today since it's actually going to be up into the low 50s and it's not supposed to rain.

So on that note, I'd better wrap up here and dive into all those other things that need to be done! I'll just finish up with the positive thought that although I don't like winter, it is the time of year that I usually get up before the sun comes up so I get to see some pretty sunrises like this one that we had this week:

Weekly Review November 29 '19

Hello from Brevard, NC...we came here for Thanksgiving. I'm going to have to write this post in bits and pieces because we've got a lot going on today. So if it doesn't make a lot of sense, that is why. Here goes:

Saturday, November 23rd: I attended the funeral for a member of our ward (and sang a song in the choir). It was a really nice funeral, with lots of beautiful music. The man who passed away was a great man, and it's always inspiring to hear about the life of a great person. I stayed after the funeral to help set up everything for a luncheon for the family. Those things took up most of my day. Frank was busy doing a lot of work for clients most of the day.

Sunday, November 24th: I got released as a Primary teacher, so I'm back down to two callings. There was a special RS meeting, so a bunch of the men taught Primary so that all the Primary teachers could go to that. After church I worked on music calling stuff and had another song practice for the women's group Christmas song. Seth wanted to make rice crispy treats, so we made those too.

Monday, November 25th and Tuesday, November 26th: these two days were pretty busy because I was trying to get all the usual chores done, plus get ready for our trip to NC. I had lots of extra errands to run. I also sent Thanksgiving cards to all the sisters I minister to, and took treats to one of them. Tuesday was Tanner's birthday and we got to talk to him for a little while. Darlee sent me a photo in the morning of Tanner sitting on their couch with a bunch of presents and a birthday banner on the wall behind him. Tanner later sent me a photo of him with the beautiful cake that Darlee made for him. So even though we are sorry we didn't get to spend the day with him, we felt good knowing that he was well taken care of on his birthday! (Way to go, Darlee!) The part Frank ordered for the heater came on Monday, which was surprising because we weren't expecting it until the end of the week. He installed it...and we still had the same problem. This led us to believe that the problem wasn't the control panel at all, but must be something else. Frank decided to try cleaning the flame sensor and after he did that the heater worked perfectly! So who knows why the repairman told us the control panel wasn't working. I'm just glad we didn't buy a whole new system! It's a blessing that Frank is so handy with things like that.

Wednesday, November 27th: We got up and got on the road before 8:00, which was great. We were fortunate that the weather was cloudy but not raining--we only got a little bit of rain at one point--and the temperatures were in the 50's, so it was actually a pretty pleasant day for traveling. We decided to take Snickers with us on this trip and since he is usually very anxious when we travel in the car, we got some calming medicine from the vet to give to him. It definitely didn't make him sleepy (if anything, he seemed more alert than usual) but he was relatively relaxed--for him--so I guess the medicine did its job. There was, of course, a lot of traffic. We made fairly good time most of the day but a few accidents slowed us down and then we hit rush hour traffic in Asheville. Those slow downs, along with a few extra stops for the dog, meant we didn't arrive at our air b&b until about 6:00. (We have sometimes made the trip in as little as 8 hours.) After getting our belongings settled, we went to Frank's parents' house to visit for a little while and then Frank & I went shopping for a few groceries before we turned in for the night.

Thursday, November 28th: Happy Thanksgiving! We made banana pudding, chocolate pudding, and a relish tray in the morning. We had Thanksgiving dinner at the church with Frank's extended family, several of their friends, and the missionaries who are serving in Brevard. There was SO MUCH FOOD!! We spent the day eating and playing games. It was nice. We spent the evening relaxing at our place. I did a lot of reading--it's my turn to pick the book for book chat next time, so I decided to read one of the books that I'm considering. I don't remember where I heard about it now, but it sounded interesting so I got a copy of it from the library right before we left for our trip. I read a little in the car, a little more during the day on Thursday, and then a lot that evening. Snickers was being kind of a pill and he didn't want to go to sleep so I stayed up late with him until he settled down. Since the book was getting pretty interesting by then, that wasn't such a hardship for me! The book is called Searching for Sylvie Lee.

Playing games and making puzzles:

Friday, November 29th: This morning I finished up the book I was reading, and it was pretty good. We went for a drive up into Pisgah National Forest and also onto the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was in the 50s again, so fairly pleasant. The scenic views are not as spectacular right now as they would be in spring, summer, or fall, but they are still pretty nice.

Pisgah Forest:

Blue Ridge Parkway:

Looking Glass Falls:

We really enjoyed getting out and getting some fresh air, and bonus--we saw license plates from both Utah and Alaska on our drive today. (We still have 13 state license plates left to find, though.) Afterwards, we spent some time visiting with Frank's parents at their house and then we came back to our place to lie down for a little while before going to see Frozen II. The movie theater here in this small town is pretty small and you can't buy tickets until 30 minutes before the show starts but we had no trouble getting tickets and we also got great seats. The theater was only about 3 blocks from where we are staying, so we walked to the theater and back:

We all enjoyed the movie. I think my favorite part was when Kristoff sang his 80's spoof song "Lost in the Woods". All of the adults in the theater where laughing hysterically while Seth kept saying "What's so funny??" If you didn't live through the 80's, the humor was totally lost on you! Anyway, it was a pretty good movie overall. Snickers was pretty happy to see us when we got back from the movie because that's the only time we left him here the whole trip (we even took him to the church with us.) After the movie, we went back to the church to eat more Thanksgiving leftovers and to play more games and visit some more. Then we said our goodbyes and came back to our place. It's been a nice visit. We are driving back home tomorrow.

Overall, we have enjoyed our little "apartment" where we've been staying. We have 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, a living room, kitchen, and laundry and it cost less than a hotel room would have. We are on the bottom floor of a little two story house. It's a cute little place. We haven't loved the shower (water pressure or water temperature) but our main complaint is the upstairs neighbor, who is extremely quiet during the day but seems to stay up all night, walking around and moving things around and dropping things. Like literally--it sounds like she's moving furniture around up there or something! I woke up several times the first night we were here and thought I heard a lot of movement going on up there but in the morning I figured it all probably happened within the first hour or so after I fell asleep. But then last night I was up until midnight and the entire time I could hear tons of noise going on up there. Then I woke up again around 3:00 am and I could still hear noise (Frank said he heard it around that time too.) Now it is nearly 11:00 pm and I'm hearing lots of walking around again (although it doesn't sound like there is any furniture moving, at least). So strange! It's mostly been a good place to stay, though, and I think we will stay here again on future visits, if possible.

(This note was on the refrigerator when we arrived.)

I've probably forgotten a lot of stuff, but that's all I can think of for now. We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

Weekly Review November 22 '19

This week was pretty busy although I'm not sure how much of it is worth telling you about. We'll see how long this gets!

Saturday the 16th: I did the usual music calling stuff, practiced ukulele, and cleaned the kitchen floor. But besides that, I submitted my timesheet for my Arc job (I haven't worked since September but I did some online training that I get paid for), got a birthday treat ready for my Primary class (last birthday this year!), and Frank and I went to Walmart and to Lowe's to get some things we needed. Then we came home and spent the afternoon spreading mulch, raking / mulching leaves, and mowing the lawn. I sincerely hope that's the last time I will have to mow until next spring! Then our backs hurt for the rest of the evening, especially Frank's. But the yard does look a lot better. (At least, it did--we need to rake & mulch leaves again.)

Sunday the 17th: It wasn't a very relaxing Sunday because after church I had a song practice at 3:00 and then we all went to the Face to Face program to learn about the new children and youth activity program. The Face to Face was good, but Frank had to sit out in the foyer (remember his back is hurting) and Seth was totally unmedicated by then so he couldn't sit still. He kept getting up and going out to the foyer and then coming back. Hopefully he got something out of it! Back to the song practice, it went well but we actually ended up changing songs because the accompaniment was super strange--the pianist (who is really talented; she can pick up practically any piece and play it beautifully without practice) said that it was actually impossible to play on a piano in some places. We're singing the same song (The First Noel), but she found a different arrangement. I like the new arrangement better anyway. At church I was sustained as an activity days leader but they forgot to release me from my Primary teacher calling so I currently have 3 callings. Hopefully they will rectify that mistake on Sunday. I also had the first half of my temple recommend interview on Sunday before church. So anyway...I feel like I ran from one thing to another most of the day. Kind of reminded me of the days when I was Primary president and Relief Society president! I'm glad it's not like that every week, at least.

Monday the 18th: Mostly an ordinary Monday, but I spent the morning picking up those donations from my friend and delivering them to where they needed to go (see last week's review, if you don't know what I'm talking about). I also did some work for my music calling and made a follow up call to the child psychologist. I got a call back from the therapist the next day but I haven't scheduled an appointment for Seth yet because they are so busy that they usually can't fit kids in during the after school hours. Since Seth will have to miss school to go to appointments, I wanted to get some feedback from his teachers about what times of day / days of the week might be the best for him to miss school. After getting that information from his teachers,  I called again today and had to leave a message, but hopefully I'll hear back early next week and we'll be able to schedule his first appointment. For family night, Seth wanted to get donuts for treat so we did that (only a half dozen this time, though!) and we played Mario Kart because it was Frank's turn to choose the activity. (We do the lesson portion on Sunday, and this week we decided the Face to Face broadcast would count for that.) Frank won the Mario Kart races, but he always wins. I'm always terrible at Mario Kart but I did even worse than usual this time.

Tuesday the 19th: I worked hard and got all the usual chores done by lunch time. Then I spent some time doing some training for the volunteer tax preparer position. I got an email on Saturday with the information about training. I'm not positive I will be able to do it this year because the training is extensive--takes about 40 hours, and they want me to be done by January! It's all online, so I can do it when I have time here and there but I'm still not sure I'll manage to squeeze in 40 hours during the busy holiday season. We'll see how it goes. I worked on it for an hour or so that day and didn't feel like I made much headway. But part of the problem was that I didn't sleep well the night before and so after only about 15 minutes of working on it, I had to stop and take a nap! Then I worked on it some more before I had to run an errand to the store and then pick up Seth from school.

Wednesday the 20th: Originally I was planning to work on that Christmas project that I'm still trying to get done, but then the compassionate service leader asked me if I could help a sister in the ward get to an appointment (she doesn't have a car). Originally, I was just dropping her off, but it morphed into me watching her two babies while she was at the appointment and then that hour-at-the-most appointment turned into an hour and a half. So there went any chance of working on that project that morning! Besides that, I was almost late for the religion class. I wasn't too thrilled about it but oh well. It was kind of funny, though, because when I dropped her off she suggested that I could just go for a drive if I wanted, rather than take her kids back to my house. (This is when we thought her appointment would be an hour, tops.) She said the kids would fall asleep if I did that. And since my house is not very baby proof and I don't have any baby toys at my house either (the ones I saved are in the storage unit), I decided a drive would be a good idea. So where to go? I remembered that every time I drive to Walkersville for any reason, I always see a sign for a place called Taneytown, which is only about 15 miles north, but in the almost 20 years I've lived here, I've never been there. I doubted there was anything exciting to see there, but it just always kind of bugged me that it was so nearby and yet I've never been there. Every time I pass that sign, I think "I should just drive up there someday." But of course I'm always busy. So here was my perfect opportunity--I needed to drive somewhere, so why not Taneytown? So that's what I did. (Besides that, I knew it would be a pretty drive through the countryside.) I was right--there wasn't anything particularly exciting about Taneytown. It's just a cute little Maryland farming town, like many others I've been to. But at least now I can drive by that sign and not wonder! Besides that, the babies did fall asleep, so they were no trouble at all. After that adventure, I went to the religion class and did the weekly grocery shopping before I needed to pick Seth up from school. Meanwhile, my friend that I had helped on Monday emailed me and asked if I could help her get some prints made of some photos of her dad (for a display for the funeral, which is tomorrow) so I spent the evening doing that, along with getting some prints ordered that I've been meaning to order for myself and it also morphed into ordering our Christmas cards. I'm glad to have all that done, though. Frank and I also went to the stake center that evening to get the second half of our temple recommend interviews, so we both have shiny new recommends now.

Thursday the 21st: Snickers went to the groomer and he looks so nice now! I got all the regular chores done, picked up the prints and Christmas cards that I ordered on Wednesday, and spent a little bit of time practicing machine quilting. I want to learn how to machine quilt, so I can make quilts faster. (I enjoyed hand quilting and I will probably still do that sometimes, but it took forever!!) I had to buy a few supplies (like a walking foot for my sewing machine) and I've been getting tips from friends who know how to do it, reading directions, and watching YouTube videos to try to learn how to do it. By this week I felt like I'd finally gathered enough information to give it a try. So I used some of the leftover fabric squares from my two quilting projects to do some practicing and my first attempt turned out quite well. So there's hope I might actually be able to make a real quilt someday and have it turn out looking nice! The evening was busy because I had activity days and a song practice (this practice was for the funeral song). The two events overlapped, so I just went to the beginning of activity days and then went to the practice. They had 2 leaders there besides me, so it was okay for me to leave. (There are 3 leaders right now but there are 11 girls and 6 more coming in next year and none leaving! So they are actually probably going to call a fourth leader and then split the group into two groups.) Seth was supposed to be at YM at the same time I had those two things, but around dinner time he started complaining of a headache and said he didn't feel very well. So he stayed home, and it's a good thing because shortly after I got home he threw up. And unfortunately, he was sitting in the kitchen at the time and didn't run to the bathroom (or even the kitchen trash can or sink) but instead threw up all over the floor. Ugh!! At least the kitchen floor is tile--that made clean up a lot easier, although it still wasn't fun.

Friday the 22nd: Our heater has been acting up lately and on Thursday it wasn't coming on properly so Frank called a repairman, who came this morning. Frank stayed home and did some work from home so that he could talk to the repairman. I was trying to mentally prepare for the fact that we might have to replace the whole system, because our heater is 26 years old. The repairman determined that the control panel wasn't working so he said they would check into getting a new one and call us to let us know how much. It turns out that our heater is so old that they can't get that part anymore. They could get a different control panel, which costs $600, but can't guarantee that it will work. So it was looking like we really would have to get a new heater but then resourceful Frank decided to look on eBay and he found the exact part we need (used, not new) for only $100. So he ordered it, and we'll see if it works. In the meantime, we are leaving the heater off unless it gets really cold. Fortunately, it hasn't been terribly cold here (highs in the 50s) so we haven't needed it to be on much. By the time the repairman left, Frank wasn't feeling very well so he decided to take a sick day. Seth slept well last night but he did throw up a few times this morning. By early afternoon he was starting to feel a lot better, though, and he's been able to start eating normal food again (and he's bouncing off the walls). I spent most of the day working on the budget and I also got my hair cut. I tried to pay a medical bill using the flex card and it was denied again, so I'm super annoyed / frustrated by that! It was supposed to be working now! So I tried to call the lady at Frank's work, but I had to leave a message. Hopefully I will hear from her soon. Frank spent quite a bit of time on the phone trying to clear up the problem with his CPAP payment too, but I do think he finally made some headway there and I think when I am able to talk to the lady at his work, we'll be able to get that cleared up at least. But I'm kind of losing faith that the flex card is ever going to work.

Other than that, I've been reading my book for book chat and I have less than 100 pages left. I'm hoping to finish in the next day or two because one of my friends is waiting to get the book from me when I'm done. I exercised every day this week and while I've been running, I've been watching a documentary about WWII which has been really interesting. The episode about the Battle of Midway was particularly fascinating. Frank is usually eating his breakfast and getting ready to leave for work when I'm running; I've noticed he's been getting interested in this documentary too, and often sits down to watch some of it with me before he leaves for work. And I've been telling Seth different stories / interesting facts from it too and he has really liked that.

So that was our pretty busy week. I forgot to take pictures this week, so I guess this one will just have to be boring words.

Weekly Review November 15 '19

I'm going to do categories this week, since most days nothing unusual happened.

Church callings: My ward music chair calling is keeping me very busy lately. There's a lot to do with Christmas coming up. Things are starting to come together, though. I spent quite a bit of time (hours) on Saturday looking at possible song arrangements for a women's group to sing, because I'm organizing that. After I found several possibilities, I asked one of my friends (who sings and plays the piano) if I could get her opinion on which one we should do. Not only did she help me pick out a song for the women's group, but she also suggested that one of the songs I found would work really well for a group of Primary girls to sing and she offered to help them learn it. So now I have 5 songs lined up for the Christmas program on the 15th. I might need one more, or that might be enough. Anyway, I have also been sending out a lot of emails to get practices set up and so forth (plus I wrote the music spotlight for the December ward newsletter). But as I said--the Christmas music is coming together. I'm glad I only have to arrange this many musical numbers once a year! I got this calling a year ago and overall I've really enjoyed it and our ward is really great. I have a lot of people offer to do musical numbers. We have actually sung a congregational hymn only 8 times this year so far! (We've had musical numbers 21 weeks; the rest of the weeks were fast Sundays, Stake or General Conferences, and church was cancelled one week because of snow.) A lot of those I didn't have to arrange--people came to me and asked to do them. So that's pretty great. I have musical numbers arranged for every Sunday for the rest of the year, too, except for the last Sunday in December. I have also enjoyed being a Primary teacher for the last year, but that is going to change soon. On Sunday one of the counselors in the bishopric asked me to be an activity days leader, so I'm going to get released as a Primary teacher and do that instead. I will miss my class, but I think activity days will be fun. It will be particularly interesting with all the changes to the programs for the children and the youth. I'm not even sure what I'll be doing yet, but I guess I will learn as I go. And since the kids in my Primary class are turning 8 next year, I'll be seeing them soon at activity days! (The girls, anyway. But maybe the boys too--not sure if my ward will be combining.)

Meanwhile, Seth is keeping busy as the Deacon's Quorum president. This Sunday he was asked to attend the priesthood and temple preparation meeting that they were having for all the 11 year olds who will be turning 12 next year. Seems like we just went to that for Seth--this year has gone by fast!

More music: On Sunday I went to a practice for the song for the funeral that's coming up next week. My practicing at home paid off--I actually knew my part better than I thought I did! We had a good practice and it's coming together. I really enjoyed that practice--I've missed going to choir practices. (We haven't had a choir director for a couple of months and the choir hasn't sung since July.) Singing really feeds my soul in a way that nothing else does!

Scouting for Food: Seth helped pick up food on Saturday morning and then he went with all the youth in our ward to the food bank to help sort all the contributions. (They do that every year.) I guess he won't be picking up food as a scout next year, but I'm pretty sure the youth will still be helping to sort food.

Health Spending Account: Dealing with our health spending account is driving me crazy and has caused me a lot of stress and frustration!! I ended up talking on the phone with the lady at Frank's work who manages the health spending accounts again today to try to clear some things up. Our card that we use to access the account has not been working for the last month (long story why) so we've paid for a lot of medical expenses out of pocket. But every time I submit them to be reimbursed, they get denied. So, so frustrating!!! The lady at Frank's work talked to someone at the health spending account company again today and she says our card should work now and they are also going to do an audit on our account and figure out how much we need to be reimbursed, so we should get that money back soon. Here's hoping. Meanwhile, we're also trying to clear up a problem with the place that Frank purchased his CPAP from. He used the health spending account to pay for that (the card actually worked that time...I think it's the last transaction that did work) but for some reason the company has not submitted the information to our insurance yet (it's been a month now) which means we don't have the required documentation to prove that it was a legitimate medical purchase. So now we're getting hate emails from the health spending account saying that we have to reimburse the account for that amount, because we didn't provide the documentation before the deadline. The lady at his work also talked to them about that and explained the situation so I don't think they're going to do anything drastic (like suspend our card) for a while yet. In the meantime, Frank called the company he purchased the CPAP from again today (he called them for the same reason 2 weeks ago) and they said they're submitting the transaction to our insurance company today. Well, they told him the same thing 2 weeks ago! So we'll see if they really do it this time. Believe it or not, that's the short version of all the problems we've been having. Can you see why I'm frustrated? Hopefully it will all be cleared up soon.

Child Psychologist: I talked to a friend at church who works for LDS Family Services to see if taking Seth there for counseling would be a better option. After talking to me about him, she felt like he would be better off going to a child psychologist, and recommended the place that has not been returning my calls. She said they're really good. So I decided to try one more time to get in touch with them. I called on Monday and left a message, and someone called me back 5 minutes later!! I was so surprised! I have no idea why it finally worked. They are scheduling out 6 - 8 weeks, though, so he won't be seeing anyone too soon. Plus, the therapists do their own scheduling so the therapist they assigned him to is supposed to be calling me to set up an appointment and he hasn't done that yet. I will have to follow up on that on Monday. Meanwhile, things went better this week with Seth, thankfully.

Christmas Projects: I worked on both this week and I finished one of them! I've made some progress with the other one too but to be honest I'm not sure I'll finish it in time for Christmas. It might have to wait until later.

Volunteering: I volunteered to help my friend who's dad recently passed away. She had some things she wanted to donate and needed help finding a place that would take them. So did a little bit of research and found a place. I'll be picking those things up from her next week and taking them to the donation place. I also have been looking into being a volunteer for a place that provides free help with income tax filing. If I do that, I will be volunteering 4 hours a week for 11 weeks (February - April). I sent an email to someone yesterday to get more information about it, but I haven't heard back yet. (Which is the story of my life this week--I'm literally waiting to hear back from about 10 different people about different things! Sometimes I feel like I am sending emails and text messages out into the void.)

RS / EQ Activity: Last Saturday our ward had an activity for the adults. We divided up into teams and played some "Minute to Win It" games. It was pretty fun. Frank and I both ended up doing challenges that involved plastic cups. I had to build a structure with 36 plastic cups and then take it down again in a minute. (I didn't quite make it, but I was awfully close and no one else got as close to finishing as I did.) They had dessert too although I didn't eat any (I was still full from dinner). Not a lot of people cam to the activity, but those of us who did had fun.

Snickers: Snickers is doing well overall although the last couple of days I think his blood sugar has been a little higher, judging from his behavior. Hopefully that will resolve on its own. Monday was his birthday, so he turned 11 on 11/11. We weren't sure he was going to make it to his 11th birthday, but he did! I got him some treats, because I know that's all he really cares about!

Weather: It's gotten a lot colder; we had temperatures way below average a few days this week. (A high of 36 one day, I think it was.) We saw a few snowflakes drifting down for a while on Tuesday. Today was a bit warmer. Most days have been sunny, at least. The sky looked really cool yesterday when I went to pick Seth up from school so I took a few pictures:

Everything Else: I exercised most days, went to the religion class, did all the usual chores, and in between I've been reading the book chat book. I'm about halfway through (it's nearly 500 pages). Seth did safety patrol again and he seems to be keeping up with his school work pretty well. Frank has been very busy with work and he has been doing quite a bit of work for clients too. Like just about everyone else in America (or so it appears) we got Disney + this week and it's been fun to browse through all the choices of things to watch on there. We came across the movie The Apple Dumpling Gang, and Frank insisted that we had to watch it. I guess he really loved that movie; I remember liking it a lot when I was a kid as well. So we watched it tonight. Seth complained--he didn't think he'd like it--but we convinced him to watch it with us and he was laughing like crazy.

It's bedtime now and I didn't sleep very well last night so I am ready to turn in!  

Weekly Review November 8 '19

Well, here we are--it's Friday again. I don't think this week was incredibly eventful. I'll just dive right in.

Friday the 1st: Frank and I wanted to go out that night because we haven't done that in a while. I wanted to do more than just go out to eat, but Frank was thinking he needed to go do some work for a client that evening (the one that is over an hour away) and I had some work on the budget to get done, so while we were eating we decided we'd better go home after we were done eating. (We enjoyed having an uninterrupted conversation while we ate dinner, at least.)  Mainly we needed to do those things because I was planning to go to the temple the next day so I'd be gone most of the day. Frank needed to do some work for this client, but he didn't want to leave Snickers alone for several hours so he decided he needed to do it Friday night, instead of Saturday. Then after we got home, I had a call from the friend I was going to ride to the temple with and she couldn't go after all. So that meant I had time to get the budget done on Saturday and Frank could go do the work for his client on Saturday too, since I would be home to stay with Snickers. Oh well!! I was disappointed not to be able to go to the temple, but hopefully I will get to go another time soon and in the meantime, I had plenty of things to get done on Saturday.

Saturday the 2nd: Frank got up early to go do the work for his client. I spent the morning getting Seth to the places he needed to go. First, he helped pass out fliers for Scouting for Food. Then he came home and changed and I took him back to the church where they were meeting for the temple baptism trip. They left around noon and got home about 9:00. He seemed to have enjoyed it. He got to do 4 baptisms and he was a witness for some of the other baptisms too. They stopped and got pizza on the way home, so he was happy about that. Meanwhile, I got all the usual Saturday stuff done and I also got quite a bit of work done on one of the Christmas projects. I completed some online training for my Arc job, too--one of the trainings has to be updated once a year.

Sunday the 3rd: It was mostly a typical Sunday, although it felt busy to me. I guess that's because I was preparing my Primary lesson for this Sunday, working on stuff for my music calling, and writing an email to all my Utah kids. (I'm trying to do that once a week now.) Seth had a youth council meeting to go to as well.

Monday the 4th: All the usual stuff, plus I had to make several phone calls. I needed to take care of a doctor bill (part of the complications with our health spending account that we're working out), I had to call the vet to get more insulin for Snickers, I paid for our storage unit for another year, and I called the new child psychologist to make an appointment for Seth. Except I didn't make an appointment, because they don't accept our insurance. (Even though my doctor said they did.) I keep wondering if I'm doing the wrong thing, trying to get him in to talk to a psychologist, because every time I try to do something about it, I encounter roadblocks. It's super frustrating! Meanwhile, we had a few really difficult days with Seth this week (and last week wasn't great either), so it would be nice if we could get some help for him / us. Maybe we just aren't parenting him correctly, but I would like to rule out other things. I mean, we're really trying to work on our parenting, in the meantime. But if he has some anxiety or OCD or bipolar tendencies or something else, then I'd like to know about it because it might help us figure out some things that will help him. Coping strategies, and things that will maybe help life go a little smoother. He's not terrible all the time, he really isn't. But then he has these moments where he completely blows up over something and it seems totally out of proportion to whatever the trigger was. Anyway, that was a tangent. I'm not sure where we're going to go from here. I guess try to get another referral for someone who accepts our insurance.

On Monday I also talked to Mom (or was that Tuesday?) and I got some more work done on one of the Christmas projects. We played Sequence for family night and it took a long time because none of us were having much luck getting a sequence. We had almost the entire board covered with our different colored chips before I finally won the game! We got donuts for family night treat and we went to Dunkin' Donuts to get them. We were going to get a half dozen, but they gave us a dozen instead--for the same price. Only one problem with that--there's only 3 of us, which meant 4 donuts EACH! I normally wouldn't eat 4 donuts over the course of 3 days, but if they are sitting around in my house, I will. Ugh! The whole world wants me to be fat, apparently.

Tuesday the 5th: I don't have much on the calendar for Tuesday, but I know I was busy all day. I think most of my extra time was taken up by working on stuff for my music calling. I'm trying to get a bunch of musical numbers set up for Christmas. Our Christmas program is going to be on the 15th, but I also want to have a musical number on the 8th and at least one (preferably two) on the 22nd. Besides that, we've been asked to sing at the town of Walkersville tree lighting ceremony so I've got to figure something out for that too. And it's all complicated by the fact that we don't have a choir director right now. So there's a lot to do right now. So much fun for me! Frank picked up insulin for Snickers so I didn't have to do that (the vet is in between here and his office) but I need to call them back. When I ordered the insulin, they said he'd due for another blood glucose curve test. But Frank and I talked about it and decided that we don't want to do that unless there's a really good reason why it's needed. Snickers seems to be doing so much better right now that we're pretty sure his blood glucose levels are fine. And the curve is a pretty expensive test--costs hundreds of dollars--so we don't want to do that if there's not a really good reason to do it.

Wednesday the 6th: I decided to try out the religion class this week, and I really liked it. The new teacher is very different from the one we had before. He has a completely different teaching style and the atmosphere is different because of that, but it was nice. I'll probably start going again most weeks, but I just feel like I should be more willing to let it go if something more urgent comes up. I did some more work on one of the Christmas projects and got the regular chores done. It was a pretty busy day.

Thursday the 7th: Besides the usual stuff, I also worked on the other Christmas project (not the one I was working on the rest of the week). I also practiced a song that I'm learning that I'll be singing with a large group at a funeral. I can't remember if I mentioned last week that the member of our ward who was in hospice care passed away last week--on Monday. The funeral is not for another couple of weeks--that's what works best for his family--but his daughter asked a group of us to sing an arrangement of Come, Come Ye Saints at his funeral. She wrote the arrangement herself, and it's really nice, but somewhat challenging. So I've been working on that a little bit all week but spent more time with it on Thursday. Frank ended up having a problem at work that he needed to solve, so he didn't get home until about 9:00 pm. Meanwhile, I took Seth to YM and I stayed to help with the activity days girls because they were short a leader. Or actually, they thought the were going to be short a leader, so I had volunteered to help (earlier in the week). They ended up having enough leaders, but they still appreciated having another set of hands. The girls wrote thank you cards and helped put together treat bags for all the construction workers who are working on the Washington DC temple renovation--there's about 100 workers. (There were a bunch of other thank you cards that single adults in the region had written; the girls didn't have to do 100 thank you cards!) Anyway, it was fun and those girls are just as noisy as the Cub Scouts!

Friday the 8th: Seth doesn't have school today so I enjoyed not having to get him out the door at a certain time. Other than that, my morning schedule didn't change much, though. I didn't sleep in--I still got up early and exercised, then ate breakfast and showered. Seth also ate and showered, and then he got some homework done. He's been watching some television, but right now he is in his room drawing or playing or something. He's actually a really good artist. I keep thinking I should find a way to encourage his artistic pursuits more.

In between everything else I have been trying not to eat too much Halloween candy (unsuccessfully) and reading the book for book chat a bit--Giants in the Earth--and it is quite good. I'm really enjoying my study of the General Conference talks, too. Seth signed up to help with the Safety Patrol at school and this week was his group's turn (they do 2 week shifts, so he'll be doing it next week too). The safety patrol helps with the car line at dismissal every day. This week he was on the outside crew, which means he was walking kids to their cars and opening and closing car doors. Next week, he will be inside, which means he will be assigned an area near a couple of classrooms and if a child gets called for the second time, he will go to their classroom to make sure they are coming. Both jobs help the car line move more quickly and smoothly, and he gets community service hours for doing it. He seems to be enjoying it. For me, it means that I pick him up about 10 minutes later than usual, since he's not done until after dismissal completely ends.

We have still had some pretty nice days here, but it is definitely getting colder and we have had more rain. I love the view out my back windows--it's one of the things I liked most about this house, the location. I'll finish with a few photos that I took a few mornings ago. I loved the lighting, although it always looks better in real life than it does in the photos.

Weekly Review November 1 '19

Happy November! Today is actually a nice sunny day. It's windy and a little on the cold side, but still--it's nice. We've had a lot more rain lately so the grass is mostly green again and the green grass along with all the colorful leaves makes looking outside a visual treat. I just got back from picking up Seth from school and I don't feel like I've accomplished much today so far, so now I need to really focus and get a lot done in the next few hours. Here's what we did this week:

Friday October 25th: Seth had a doctor appointment that afternoon; just his check up that he has to have every 6 months. When the nurse measured him, she said he's 5' 2", which means he is now officially taller than I am. Seems like he's been growing pretty rapidly lately and the pants he got last year are looking much too short. Even the pants I bought him shortly before school started look a little on the short side! I also got a new referral for a different child psychologist, since the other place would never return my calls.

Saturday October 26th: I had an appointment to get my hair done in the afternoon. Frank and Seth both got haircuts too. Our ward had their Trunk or Treat that evening, which we attended only so we could hand out candy since Seth is getting too old to be one of the trick or treaters now. (Although some kids his age were dressed up, so I guess he could have, but he really didn't want to.) In between everything else, I reviewed my Primary lesson, cleaned the kitchen floor, practiced ukulele, worked on music calling stuff, and looked up ideas for fun Halloween activities (I'll explain why later). I also tried to figure out some stuff with medical receipts / health insurance / our health spending account, but without success and I was honestly really frustrated about it! But we got that resolved later this week. Overall, it was a busy day. We took Snickers with us to the Trunk or Treat (just so we wouldn't have to leave him alone) and he was the only one of us wearing a costume, because he has a little black and orange jester collar, with bells, that I put on him.

Sunday, October 27th: It was a pretty busy Sunday. After church, we had tithing settlement. Then a few hours later we went back to the church so that Seth could get set apart as the Deacon's Quorum president. Then shortly after that I went with Seth to a family history workshop they were having for the youth to help them find family names. They have a temple baptism trip tomorrow, so they wanted all the youth to have at least one family name to do, if possible. With a little help, we did find 4 family names (on Frank's line) and Jared sent us several more so Seth has quite a few names to take with him. After we got done with that, we had dinner and family night, so it was a full day.

Monday, October 28th: It was Jared's 21st birthday, but of course he's on the other side of the country so we didn't get to celebrate with him. We did send him an animated card and a gift card, which he seemed happy to get. I actually had a pretty busy day. Besides all the usual chores, I also gave Snickers a bath. Then in the early afternoon, one of the sisters I minister to contacted me needing some help with a crisis so I went to help her and Frank picked Seth up from school so that I could stay with her until things were a little more resolved. After dinner, I mowed the lawn and then we had family night activity and treat. I'm still trying to figure out how I managed to get all of that done!!

Tuesday, October 29th: The daytime was mostly normal, with the usual chores, but when I was planning the meals for the next week (which I usually do on Tuesdays), I somehow ended up cleaning out both freezers too. (We have a chest freezer in the basement, along with the regular freezer section of the refrigerator.) I also worked on one of the Christmas projects a little bit, and did some reading too. That evening, one of my ministering sisters came to visit me. I always enjoy her visits and she always brings me something thoughtful. Like this time she brought me information about a couple of volunteering opportunities she thought might interest me (I've mentioned that I want to find some kind of service to do) and she also brought me a General Conference notebook, which has space to record details about each talk and what impressions I receive when I study them. I've been reading all the talks over again and taking notes--particularly trying to focus on what things I feel like I need to do--so this notebook is perfect! She is currently the Primary president, so while we were talking she asked me how I felt about my calling--do I need a change, do I have a preference what class I teach next year, etc. But she also asked me how I would feel about a different Primary calling, because I guess they've been considering me for another calling they need to fill. I told her I'd be okay with whatever they decide. So maybe I will be doing something new soon, or maybe I will still be a teacher. It will be interesting to see how that turns out.

Wednesday, October 30th: I got the usual chores done and I also went to lunch with Frank and then we met with the person at his office who manages the health insurance / health spending accounts and she helped us straighten out what is going on with all that. So that was a relief! I worked a little bit on one of the Christmas projects, and I went to visit briefly with my friend Wanda. She wasn't at church on Sunday so I went to check on her. She was getting over being sick and since it was pouring rain on Sunday morning, she didn't want to go out. But she is feeling better now. She wants to go shopping again soon so we discussed what day would work best to do that. That evening I had book chat which was fun and lively and therapeutic, as usual. We ended up talking longer than usual and afterwards I was talking to one of my friends after we walked out to our cars to leave and ended up talking to her for quite a while, in spite of the fact that it was raining again and I got pretty wet! So I didn't get home until bedtime. We discussed a book called Under the Scarlet Sky, and now we are going to read Giants in the Earth.

Thursday, October 31st: I mostly go the usual chores done and I read a lot too because I was almost finished with a book I was reading--one of the books in the Wings of Fire series that I'm reading because Seth loves them. It got really interesting and I wanted to know what was going to happen! So I finished that book, but I'm waiting a bit to start the next one because I'm afraid it will be just as interesting and I have other things I need to get done first. On Thursday I also baked a cake and made a few more preparations for a little Halloween party (?) we were having that evening. I put a question mark because it wasn't really a party. Thursday is usually YM for Seth, but since it was Halloween, they cancelled activities and instead encouraged the youth to get together on their own if they wanted to. So we invited the rest of the Deacon's Quorum over to our house for some Halloween activities. Don't be too impressed--there are only 2 other active Deacons besides Seth! We had decided that they were going to meet in one of the other boys' neighborhoods to do some trick or treating (I would follow them around, since I don't have other kids at home but the other two moms do) and then I'd bring them back to our house for some activities and then take them home. It rained quite a bit during the day and the forecast for the evening looked tricky (no pun intended!) There was a possibility for strong storms and it was supposed to be windy. By late afternoon, we were under a tornado watch, which was supposed to last until midnight. One of the moms decided she wasn't comfortable sending her son out in those weather conditions, but Seth and the other boy still met in his neighborhood to trick or treat. The weather wasn't supposed to get really bad until about 7:00, so we met at 6:00 and it turned out just perfect. It WAS really windy (so windy that the other boy's pirate eye patch blew off and we couldn't find it!!) but the rain held off, there were no tornadoes (bonus!!) and it was actually pleasantly warm. In the 70s on the last day of October!  I mean, even with all that wind I was actually kind of hot in my sweater. (It was really humid too).

The other boy met us after we were done trick or treating and I brought them back to our house. (Frank had stayed home to hand out candy. We still have a ton left over because there were fewer trick or treaters than usual, no doubt because of the weather forecast). It started raining a little when we were on the way to our house, and while we were doing our activities the storm hit big time. First, they painted acorn squashes that looked a lot like little pumpkins (note to self: don't wait until the day before Halloween to buy mini pumpkins--they will be all gone):

Then they had this little competition where they had to move gummy worms from one plate to another using nothing but their mouths, and the gummy worms were covered in whipped cream. The person who moved all of their worms over first, won the competition. Seth said "I have an idea and I'm going to win." And what did he do? Instead of grabbing the worms with his teeth one by one, he grabbed the edge of his paper plate with his teeth instead and dumped the whole thing on the other plate! What a stinker!! He did finish first, and he didn't get any whipped cream on his face either. But we told him that was cheating!! We had to put some whipped cream on his face anyway.

After the gummy worm competition, they ate cake while we did some spooky mad libs.

Then we took them home, which was an adventure because it was raining torrentially, the wind was howling, and there was lightning too. But everyone made it home okay and I think all the boys had fun.

Friday November 1st: Like I said, I don't feel like I got much done today. Every other day this week I woke up pretty early. I was able to exercise and shower before taking Seth to school. But today I didn't wake up until 6:45, so I didn't exercise or shower until after I took Seth to school. That always seems to take so long, so my days go a lot better if I get those things done early. Today it is 20 degrees cooler than yesterday, but as I said--it's still pretty nice.

The only other thing I should mention about this week is that things were pretty exciting in these parts with the Nationals winning the World Series. I mean, I don't get into baseball much but there were a lot of excited people around here! Frank watched part of the last two games but since they didn't end until really late in our time zone, he didn't stay up to watch the end of either one. Both times, he ended up going to bed right before the really exciting parts of the game began. Oh well!! It was always kind of fun to wake up in the morning and find out that the Nats had won, after all. (Although I felt a little conflicted, since the Astros is one of our family's favorite teams. But I've lived here almost 20 years! I only lived in Houston for 3 1/3 years. I should root for "my" teams, right?!)

Now I need to get the budget done, so that's it for this week!