Weekly Review October 7 '22

 This week was surprisingly busy, considering I didn't have much on my calendar when the week started. Quite a few things came up, though. The weekend was dominated by General Conference, of course, which was great!! I felt like I spent all day on Saturday either listening to Conference, cooking, or washing dishes / cleaning up the kitchen. That's because we invited the sister missionaries over for lunch and to watch the first session of Conference with us that day. We made homemade pizza for lunch and we had a crock pot meal for dinner so I spent most of the morning before Conference started getting food in the crock pot and making pizza. In between the first two sessions I watched the world report and cleaned up the kitchen from lunch. In between the second and third session we ate dinner and cleaned up the kitchen again. That was my day! I didn't enjoy the cooking / cleaning parts, but I did enjoy the General Conference sessions a lot. 

We discovered when talking to the Sisters that no one had invited them over for any other meals on Saturday or Sunday or for any other sessions of General Conference, so we invited them to come back to watch all the sessions with us and to share what food we had. (We had a lot of snacks for Conference, so that helped). They did come back to watch all of the sessions with us except for the Saturday evening session...they preferred to watch that at home so they could go right to bed afterwards. They brought us some homemade cinnamon rolls on Sunday morning, which was nice! One of the sisters serving in our ward right now is from Cedar Hills, Utah and she knows some of Tim's kids. The other one was finishing her mission...she went home this week. 

In between the sessions on Sunday I had a YW presidency meeting with the presidency and the advisors. We met online and had so much to discuss that we didn't finish until the next session was starting! It was a productive meeting, though.

I'm looking forward to reading all the Conference talks because I get so much more out of them when I'm able to go through them slowly and really think about what they're saying. I don't know about the rest of you, but President Nelson's last words at the end of the last session left me in tears. The sincerity and depth of his feelings as he expressed love for all of us was really touching! (And also left me wondering if that was his last General Conference with us. After he finished, Frank looked at me and said "Was that a good bye?" and I replied "I was wondering the same thing!" Only time will tell.)

I went to lunch with my friend Rebekah on Tuesday. Or rather, she came to me. I forgot the night before and made myself lunch for the next day as I usually do and since it was a salad that wouldn't last another day, I asked if she would just come to my house to eat and she was happy to do that. 

That evening for YW we had class activities but each class did basically the same thing...we all carved pumpkins. Each girl got to carve her own pumpkin, but we also had a fun little competition. Each class carved a class pumpkin representing this year's theme "Trust In the Lord". We had our bishop judge them at the end. Leading up to the activity, things were a little crazy--the YW president had a hurt back so she couldn't come and the advisor for my class came down with a fever and headache a few hours before it started so she couldn't come either. I also thought that only one girl from my class would be able to come but happily that turned out to be wrong and I actually had 3 of the 4 girls in my class come. It all worked out in the end and everyone seemed to have a great time.

 Here is each of my girls with her pumpkin:

 My class also won the competition (by one point), so here they are with the winning pumpkin:

The bishop gave points for theme as well as for carving and it was our carving that won it for us! 

Meanwhile, the YM were playing soccer in the gym (it was raining hard that evening) and Frank has been really sore since then because a) he's not used to that much exercise and b) he and one of the YM collided at one point.

There was no school on Wednesday--Yom Kippur--and I didn't have a long list of things to do but somehow that day went by fast and I didn't feel like I accomplished anything. Part of the reason for that was because it started late...since I didn't have to get up to get Seth to Seminary and school, I slept until I woke up on my own and that was 8:00!! I must have been really tired. I had a few chores to do, which I got done, but I feel like I spent a good part of the day helping Seth practice for the Accuplacer test. He didn't really want to work on it, either, so he didn't focus and the results of the practice tests he took weren't good, which left me wondering if he was going to be able to pass it with the required scores. All in all, I felt rather discouraged at the end of that day. 

Yesterday the sun came back out, though (literally and figuratively!). I had a productive day--besides all the regular chores of vacuuming, laundry, and grocery shopping, I also visited a friend (the same one I visited last week) and attended an online information session about benefits enrollment for Frank's work (it's that time of year where we have to choose our insurance etc. for the coming year) When Seth got home from school, he was in a better frame of mind (and so was I) so we went over a couple of practice tests together for the Accuplacer and this time he did much better. Well enough, in fact, that we decided he should go ahead and take the test, so he did. (He could take it online with a remote proctor.) And happily, he passed!! He had to take two sections--reading and writing--and had to get above a certain score on each section to qualify for dual enrollment. He scored well over the minimum score needed for each section. What a relief to have that behind him!! We got the paperwork done and submitted this week too so all that is left to do now is to pay the tuition for his class. I tried to do that last night but ran into issues logging into his student account (of course...no part of this process can be easy, can it?) but Frank called the college today and hopefully we've got that figured out too. Today I got the chance to look at his Accuplacer scores more closely and discovered that he actually scored in the highest bracket for reading and missed scoring in the highest bracket for writing by just one point, so he actually didn't just do well enough to pass...he did really well. One good thing about the effort we've been putting into preparing for the Accuplacer is that it will also help prepare him for the PSAT, which he is taking next week. 

I mentioned the sun coming out...because of Hurricane Ian remnants, we had wet, cold, and cloudy weather from last Friday until yesterday. I actually like rainy days, but after nearly a week of clouds I was really happy to see the sun again yesterday! It is pretty and sunny today too. Pretty soon all the leaves will start turning beautiful colors. 

As I said earlier, I ended up quite busy for a lot of the week so I didn't get much else done besides the things I already wrote about. I still haven't been able to exercise and somehow haven't found the time to go on any walks either. For some reason that 5:00 am time slot seems to be the only time that works for me! (But I'm not going to go on a walk outside alone at that time!) I'm going to have to figure something out. I did do a little bit of "exercising" on Wii sports resort this week but I really need to get a solid 30 minutes of aerobic exercise per day to keep my heart in good shape. 

I am still reading The Dark Is Rising and I'm getting close to finishing it. I haven't been able to get the book for book chat yet. I have it on hold at the library but I'm waiting in line behind someone else so it's not available for me yet. Last week I started watching the musical Hamilton and I finished watching it earlier this week. (I watched it in 3 or 4 installments, since it's a couple of hours long). There were things I didn't like about it but overall I enjoyed it. My favorite character was George III. He didn't have a big part but he sings a couple of songs and they're hilarious. 

When I was at the YW activity on Tuesday evening the bishop asked me to speak in church on the 16th. My topic is the new For the Strength of Youth booklet. I read the whole thing on Wednesday morning and it is AMAZING!!! I recommend that everyone read it, no matter how old you are. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to talk about, but there's a lot of good stuff in there. 

I was able to talk to Jared on Wednesday about the doctor appointment he had on Tuesday. His doctor thinks the pain in his back (he still has some pain) is most likely caused by something going on in his GI tract that is causing inflammation. He is sending him to a GI specialist. The earliest he could get an appointment with the GI specialist is October 31st, but Jared is on the list to be called if they have a cancellation so hopefully he will get in sooner. The doctor examined the surgery site and it still hasn't closed / healed completely which is crazy since he had the surgery nearly 6 months ago. Jared is mostly doing okay but I could tell when I talked to him that all of this is really draining him and he's somewhat discouraged. He really hasn't felt well for over two years, and the last year has been bad enough that he has barely been able to work (which causes financial stress, of course). He expressed frustration that there just isn't much that he can do. He is tired of lying around!! Please keep him in your prayers.

That's the update for this week.

Weekly Review September 30 '22

 When I wrote last week, neither Frank nor I was feeling well. I woke up on Saturday feeling a lot better and I've been pretty good ever since. Frank was really miserable through the weekend but started feeling a little better on Monday and he is mostly better now, just tired. He dragged himself to work on Monday but stayed in his office with his door closed all day so that he wouldn't have much contact with people. He didn't sleep well at all Monday night, though, so he decided to take another sick day on Tuesday. That seemed to help a lot and he has mostly been back to normal since then, other than being tired. He stayed home from the YM / YW activity on Tuesday evening also so that he could get some rest. He's been fairly busy after work most days doing work for clients...there just seems to be a lot to do for his business lately. 

I had an appointment to get my hair cut on Saturday but other than that I didn't have a lot going on...just the usual chores. I offered to take Seth to the fair, but he didn't really want to go so we gave our tickets to a family in our ward and they were happy to have them. Frank stayed home from church and all his meetings on Sunday. I think that was the day he felt the worst so he stayed in bed most of the day. We were supposed to meet with our bishop for our tithing declaration right after church but we had to reschedule that. I went to a fireside that evening at the stake center. I really didn't feel much like going anywhere but the topic was a good one and I just felt like it was going to be valuable and I would be glad I went if I did. And I was right...I'm really glad I went because it was really good and I took a lot of notes and got a lot of helpful information. It was about preparing our children to serve missions and / or leave home when they get older. I really liked it because I got a lot of good ideas for things I could be doing with Seth but I also felt like many of the things they talked about were things that we're already doing with him. It was the best of both worlds--encouraging to know we're doing some things right and inspiration for some other things we can start doing. 

Seth was out of school on Monday for Rosh Hashanah...they always have that Jewish holiday as well as Yom Kippur off. Even though Frank wasn't feeling great, he had work he had to do for a client that evening so we had a short family night with only an activity and treat. We played bowling on the Wii (it has been broken for months but Frank ordered a new part and was able to fix it). Seth was really excited because he won the game...he's never beat us before. He started out the game with getting 2 strikes in a row and he got a few others later in the game too. 

We had a combined YM/YW activity on Tuesday evening. The oldest YW class planned it and they chose to do "dart painting". If you have seen the movie The Princess Diaries, you will know what this is, but if you haven't I will explain. They attached ballons filled with different colors of paint to a large canvas and we threw darts at the ballons to pop them. When a balloon popped, it splashed paint across the canvas. It was surprisingly difficult to hit the balloons (I never did hit one, although I came within a fraction of an inch from one balloon) and it was also much messier than I thought it would be...mainly because we didn't have a lot of darts, so we had to keep retrieving the ones we already threw and they were often covered in paint! For the large canvas, they taped together several smaller canvasses so when we were done we could pull them apart and everyone got to take home a piece of the painting. It was actually a really fun activity; I think everyone had a great time.

Finished product:

Here's the piece of the larger painting that Seth and I brought home (complete with a couple of dart holes!):

I had a busy day Wednesday because I had a YW presidency meeting in the morning and I went to visit a friend from my ward in the afternoon. She fell and broke her hip and one of her arms about 3 weeks ago...she had surgery on both and was in the hospital for a few weeks and now she's in a rehab center until she is well again. I wasn't able to visit her before now since I've been sick but I had a nice long visit with her on Wednesday. I got there later than I planned but that turned out to be good because they didn't bring her lunch until nearly 1:30 so I was there to help feed her some of her lunch. It's really hard for her to feed herself since one of her arms is broken (not to mention her hip, which makes it hard for her to move at all). On Wednesday evening I went grocery shopping and vacuumed...those are usually Thursday chores but I was planning to go to the temple on Thursday so I wanted to get those things done early. Frank and Seth both came with me to get groceries which I really appreciated because we had a big list this week and it would have been a big job to do that by myself. 

I spent Thursday morning at the temple and it was wonderful, as always. I couldn't help taking more pictures when I got out because the temple always looks so beautiful!! 

I had book club last night and I enjoyed that as usual. We always have a lively and fun and often even inspirational discussion. The book we are reading next is Snow Falling on Cedars. I have to wait to get a copy from the library...hopefully that won't take too long. 

I haven't seen any deer in the common area behind our house for quite a while, but this morning there were two of them and one of them got much closer to our house than usual. They usually stay at the far end of the hill but this morning one of them walked across the hill towards our house and stopped right under a tree that is right behind our house.

The weather changed near the end of last week and it has gotten quite a bit cooler--feels like fall now instead of summer! It has mostly been crisp and sunny but today we have gray skies...we're getting clouds from the edge of Hurricane Ian (or what's left of it) and tonight it's going to start raining and it's going to be wet and rather cold all weekend. It's nice that we won't have to go anywhere this weekend...we can stay inside and keep cozy while we watch General Conference.

Seth has still been having trouble with math so I emailed his teacher and we're working on getting him some more help. We are still working on the dual enrollment stuff too. He went through a bunch of practice questions for his test this week and he did pretty well...I think probably well enough that he can pass the test, but he's going to do a little more practicing before he takes it. We have a lot of the paperwork filled out too so hopefully we'll be done with all of that soon.

I started reading the next book in The Dark Is Rising series; this book has the same title as the series name. I haven't had a lot of time to read this week but I'm about half way through the book. I actually like this one quite a bit better than the first book in the series. The story is more compelling and I think it is a lot better written than the first one. There was a bit of time in between when the author wrote the first one and the second one and I can tell...she's just a much better writer by the time she writes this book. 

Jared ended up going to the ER on Sunday because he was having a lot of pain in his back and thought he had another kidney stone. It turns out there's no kidney stone, though, so they are not sure what was causing the pain. He has been on a strong antibiotic because he was still having trouble with infection / not healing completely from his surgery last spring so they thought maybe the pain could be related to a reaction to this antibiotic. He has an appointment to see his doctor on Tuesday. In the meantime, the pain has diminished quite a bit, thankfully. I communicated with Jared by text today and he is doing okay. He says it is quite windy and rainy there...they are getting remnants from Hurricane Ian, of course. I'm guessing that Frank's family in Brevard are also seeing a lot of wind and rain. 

I tried to start exercising again this week but I wasn't very successful. I did exercise as normal on Monday but on Tuesday morning my foot started hurting again and I could tell it hasn't completely healed so I stopped halfway through the time. I guess I need to give it some more time. In the meantime, I decided I am going to try to walk instead of jog...walking doesn't seem to be hurting. I went on a walk yesterday afternoon but haven't been able to do more than that. My foot felt fine on the walk but I felt strangely tired and a little out of breath so I didn't walk far. At least it was a beautiful day and I will finish up with a photo I took of some wild flowers. 

Weekly Review September 23 '22

I'll start out with a couple of photos from last week's temple baptism trip. One of the moms who went took the photos and sent them to me later (you can see Frank in the 2nd picture):

 

This week wasn't as busy as last week--mostly because I haven't been feeling very great all week so I have just been doing the necessary stuff. I woke up Saturday morning with a headache, sore throat, and some congestion. I haven't been terribly sick, but I haven't really gotten much better either. Whatever it is has been hanging on all week--some days are better than others.

Seth had two events he could have gone to on Saturday--a stake activity for 14 & 15 year olds at a lake in the morning, and a family history regional broadcast in the evening. He preferred sleeping in to getting up for the lake activity though. I probably would have gone to the fireside that evening and made him come with me, but as I mentioned--I wasn't feeling very well on Saturday. We just got an email with a link to the broadcast today, though, so now we can watch it from home. In spite of not feeling my best, I did get the regular Saturday chores done. Frank and I also watched the BYU football game which wasn't too fun since our team didn't play well at all and BYU lost the game. It was super frustrating to watch. It seems to me that this happens every year...they start the season out with 2 or 3 really great, exciting games that are late at night so we can't watch them (I mean, I guess we could watch them--but we'd have to stay up until the wee hours of the morning to do that and that doesn't seem wise for us to do that when we have church the next day) so we are anxiously awaiting the first afternoon game so we can finally share in the fun and excitement, and then they totally choke!!! I actually read an article this week about BYU football and one of the sections was titled "What Gives With Afternoon Games?" and it mentioned that they seem to play really well in the evenings but not well at all in the afternoons, so it is not just my imagination!! Anyway...hopefully they'll play better this week. It's another late night game, so they probably will!

On Saturday evening we found out that the husband of a friend of ours (she used to be in our ward) passed away suddenly that morning from a heart attack. So sad!! Her first husband divorced her to pursue a homosexual relationship. I was so happy for her when she met her new husband and was able to be married again. It just doesn't seem fair to go through losing a husband twice. After hearing about Jeanette's daughter and her unborn baby being killed in a car accident a few days earlier, it was really shocking to hear of another tragic death a few days later. I feel so sad for everyone who is mourning, and yet grateful that I'm not currently facing that kind of trial.

I decided to stay home from church on Sunday because I still wasn't feeling well. I wasn't extremely sick, but there was no point in going to choir practice because I couldn't sing and I just thought I should keep my germs away from other people. I was able to watch Sacrament Meeting from home, though. We were supposed to have the sister missionaries over for dinner that evening but since I was sick we sent food over to them instead. Hopefully we'll be able to have them over to our house soon. 

I took a Covid test on Monday morning and it was negative (didn't really think I had Covid, but thought I should check before I went anywhere). I've been wearing a mask all week when I've had to go out so that I won't transmit whatever it is to anyone else. I lay low on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday and only went places I had to go. Thankfully, I was able to get all the normal housework done in spite of not doing great. 

I didn't go to the YW activity on Tuesday evening, though, because by Tuesday I had developed a cough. I felt like it would just be smarter to stay away from people and also to get some rest. I felt bad about missing the activity, though. Originally we were going to do a photo scavenger hunt in downtown Frederick, but when I was working on it on Saturday evening I noticed that it was already pretty dark and it was only 7:30. Our activities don't start until 7:00 so I started having second thoughts about doing this activity at this time of year--I really want us to have more daylight time if we're going to do it. So I sent a text message to the rest of the leaders asking their opinion and suggesting that if we put off the activity until spring, we could instead attend soccer games for some of the girls in our YW. Everyone liked the idea of attending the soccer games a lot, so that's what we decided to do. One of the girls in my class played in one of the games, so as I said...I was really sorry to miss it. 

I also decided to postpone a visit from one of my ministering sisters that was scheduled for Wednesday night. I was still coughing a lot on Wednesday. I am not coughing as much now, thankfully. Yesterday I had a meeting with the rest of the VITA volunteers--it was held online, so I didn't have to worry about getting anyone else sick. Our program manager retired at the end of last tax season (she's still going to be a volunteer, though) and they are currently in the process of interviewing candidates for that position so they wanted input from the volunteers on what qualities we think that person should have. They also wanted input on which of two possible locations would be better for VITA this year. I think it was a pretty productive meeting and it was fun to see some of my VITA friends again.

Unfortunately, Frank started feeling unwell last night and he feels pretty yucky today. It seems to be the same thing that I have. He did a little bit of work from here, but since he isn't officially approved to work from home yet, he took a sick day. I got Seth to Seminary and to school this morning so that Frank could get some more sleep. Seth had a very short school day today...they got out 3 1/2 hours early for "Fair Day". The Frederick County Fair has been going this whole week and they always give the kids a partial day off for that. Frank got tickets, a parking pass, and ride passes for the fair from one of his clients but I'm not sure we're going to go at all since he and I are both not feeling well. Maybe by tomorrow I will feel well enough to take Seth over for a while. He's not really into carnival rides but he does enjoy seeing the animals. 

Since I have only been doing the necessary stuff this week, I've had quite a bit of time to read. I finished the book chat book (Ribbons of Scarlet) on Monday. I also finished listening to The Pilgrim Hypothesis, and as I expected, it was really good. I've started listening to another book about forgiveness by Neil L. Andersen. I also started reading a children's book series called The Dark Is Rising; I finished the first book, Over Sea, Under Stone, last night. It was pretty good overall. I'm reading this series because the 4th book in the series is a Newbery winner, and the only Newbery winner that I haven't read yet. 

Frank went to the dentist twice this week...on Monday for his bi-annual cleaning and check up and then back on Tuesday so they could close a gap between two of his teeth--food tends to get stuck in that gap. Unfortunately, we found out this week that our dentist is not in network for our new dental insurance (when I called them they told me they were) so these visits are costing us more than they used to. (Cleanings used to be free and now they cost about $75.) We've been going to this dentist for decades and really like him so we don't want to switch but we may have to. We're not too worried about paying a bit for cleanings, but if we need anything major done (like a crown) that could get really expensive. We're hoping that we'll have other dental insurance options when we sign up for next year's benefits, but we'll have to wait and see.

I'm hoping that next week I will be able to start exercising again. My foot is finally feeling like it has healed, but I haven't been feeling up to exercising this week. I usually feel worse in the morning than I do later in the day (I usually exercise first thing in the morning). Frank started exercising again this week, but now of course he isn't feeling well so he didn't exercise this morning either. 

Seth is mostly doing well in school but he's having some trouble with his math class. Math is usually his best subject, but his teacher this year is hard to understand (he has an accent) and they don't have a textbook to refer to. They have a short period every day called "Connect" and they can request to meet with a teacher during that time to get help. He's requested to go to Connect with this teacher several times but it hasn't worked out most of the time. A couple of times he didn't get called in even though he sent a request, another time they gave him the wrong room number so he couldn't find where to go, another day they had a mandatory assembly for all the Sophomores during that time, they've had a couple of early release days so that Connect wasn't available (today was one of those days), and at least once he did get to go but there were so many other students there needing help that the teacher never got to him. Frustrating!! He has another request to go in on Tuesday (there's no school on Monday); if it doesn't work out this time I am going to email the teacher. He currently has a C in the class and usually he easily gets an A in his math classes. Fortunately, he is doing great in his Government class. I was worried about this class because English and History / Social Studies classes are usually difficult for him but he currently has 98% in this class. He says it is really interesting too. He is enjoying his computer tech class also and currently has a high B in that class. If we can just get math figured out, things will be good! This week I've been working on getting him set up for dual enrollment at Frederick Community College. He can get college credit for his computer tech class if we sign him up for dual enrollment. We're still in the process but we're making progress. He has to take a test to get accepted to the college and we got the voucher for him to do that yesterday. Now he just has to prepare and set up a time to take the test...he can take the test online, from home. 

I believe that is all the news I have to share this week and it's time to make dinner so I'd better go do that.

Weekly Review September 16 '22

 There are quite a few things on my calendar for the last week...I will try not to ramble on too much, though! 

On Saturday Frank got my new laptop set up so I have been able to use it this week and that's been nice. The battery lasts a lot longer and it's quite a bit lighter than my old laptop. I'm still figuring out how to do some things though...like add photos!...so I will have to add photos to this post later, after Frank gets home to show me how to do that. That evening there was a stake activity for the 16+ youth. Our ward and another ward were in charge of it though and our ward had a list of things we needed to do...mainly help with set up and order and pick up some pizza. Most of our ward leaders were busy that day so Frank offered to order and pick up the pizza and I offered to help with set up. A leader from the other ward brought all the supplies for the activity and was in charge of running all the "Minute to Win It" games. Another leader from our ward was supposed to be there for the activity to help, but there was some sort of miscommunication and that leader didn't come so I ended up going back over (I left after helping with all the set up) to help with the activity. I wasn't very happy about that, since I had other things I wanted to do that evening, but thankfully I didn't have anything urgent that needed to be done and the activity turned out to be fairly fun, with about 25 youth attending.

We did not stay up to watch the BYU football game that evening since we have church at 9:00 am and Frank and I both had meetings / practices even earlier than that. When I found out the game had gone into two overtimes, I was really glad I hadn't tried to stay up. It was fun to hear about how exciting the game was and to watch the highlights later! I was very surprised to wake up to all the text messages about Erin's baby arriving early. We're glad he is doing so well in spite of being so small and that he's been able to go home already. 

Frank had bishopric meeting that morning as usual and I had a song practice and then choir practice right after that. The song practice was just a quick run through because we sang in Sacrament Meeting that day. I'm glad I got to learn this song...it was really beautiful! The meeting was especially good that day...a departing missionary was speaking and all of the talks were really good. The departing missionary also participated in our song...she played the cello for part of the accompaniment. Frank had several meetings after church as well. 

On Monday I had a YW presidency meeting that ended up being really long because we hadn't met in a while and the president has been gone a lot lately. We got a lot accomplished, though. We had a combined activity for all the YM and YW on Tuesday evening. We started earlier than usual because we were driving to a different location and doing an outdoor activity, and we wanted some time before it got dark. For the activity, we went to a farm owned by a couple in our stake (same place we had Girls Camp in 2021) and played hide and seek and sardines. We also had a campfire for making s'mores. It was fun and my only complaint is that my hair smelled like smoke when we got home so I had to wash it again on Wednesday morning (even though I had just washed it Tuesday morning). 

I was so sorry to hear on Wednesday morning about Jeanette's daughter being killed in car accident on Monday night. I have been thinking about her and all her family all week. I just can't imagine how difficult this must be for them. I wish I could do something for them, but all I can do is pray, which I've been doing. I visited my friend Wanda on Wednesday afternoon. My friend Rebekah came with me to visit too. I trimmed Wanda's bangs for her and then we had a nice visit outside because it was a beautiful day. The time went by fast! We were surprised when we arrived at the care center where Wanda lives that we had to be tested for Covid-19. (Even though we didn't even go inside!) I've visited her before when there were more Covid cases than there are now, and didn't have to be tested. But no big deal and I got a free home Covid test because they gave each of us a 2 pack and told us we could keep the extra one. 

Frank came home from work early on Wednesday and worked from home the rest of the day because they were cutting the grass again and once again...he started to get really itchy all over. So strange!! He thinks the ventilation system at his work is bringing in a lot of outside air (he didn't even go outside and he still got itchy). There was a RS activity that evening and I was planning to go but I had a headache and just felt tired so I didn't go.

I felt better by morning and I was able to go to the temple. I had an appointment to do initiatories this time and that was really nice. That whole area of the temple was remodeled and it's much nicer now. When I was done with the initiatory session, I didn't want to leave yet (it only took about 45 minutes) so I walked down to the basement to see what it's like since I hadn't been down there since the remodel (and the basement wasn't part of the open house tour). There's a really nice dining area down there but what I really enjoyed was walking all around the halls looking at all the beautiful art work. There are many new paintings all over the temple and they are all so beautiful! After I went outside, I took a lot of pictures because it was really beautiful out there too! 

The rest of Thursday was really busy because I still had all the regular chores to get done but by working diligently the rest of the day I got everything done by bedtime. Today has not been as hectic. We signed up to provide cereal and juice for Seminary this morning. (They have cereal every Friday morning and we take turns providing the cereal.) The drive from Seminary to school took longer than usual because there had been a wreck and it was blocking the road we usually take but we managed to get there okay...just a bit later than usual. School got out 2 hours early today so it was a short school day. A group of youth from our ward went to the temple to do baptisms this afternoon so I got back from taking Seth to the church a little while ago. Originally, I was going to help drive but one of the dads volunteered to drive and he has a bigger car and it's always helpful to have priesthood holders along so I didn't need to go. Frank is meeting them at the temple to help too...his work isn't far from the temple so he just left work a little bit early today. I will meet Seth & Frank later at a restaurant for dinner. 

I've been pretty busy this week in between everything else working on an activity for YW next week. We're going to do a scavenger hunt in downtown Frederick, so I am adapting the scavenger hunt that I did with Seth's class when he was in middle school. It's quite a bit of work but hopefully I will get it done in time. Because of that project, I haven't had a lot of time to read so I haven't made a lot of progress in the book chat book but I have read it a little bit. I also finished listening to Even the Dog Knows and it was pretty good, but I didn't love it...mostly because I thought two of the main characters wer acting pretty dumb through the whole book! I started listening to another book called The Pilgrim Hypothesis yesterday. I've already listened to two other books by the same author and they were both excellent, so I expect this one will be the same. 

That brings you up to date on all of our activities. I was able to talk to Frank on the phone and he explained how to move photos onto my new laptop so I was able to add the photos and now I can get this posted.

Weekly Review September 9 '22

 I don't think there is a lot to write about this week, but we did have a few things going on.

Frank was really busy last week, including Friday evening and part of Saturday, finishing up a large project for a client. This week he had to go onsite to do work for another client, so he did that after work on Wednesday and didn't get home until nearly 8:00 pm. Hopefully there won't be more of that for a while. 

Last Saturday evening Frank and I went to the temple. We attended the same session with a group of couples from our ward including the bishop and his wife, the EQ president and his wife, and the ward clerk and his wife. We saw another couple who used to live in our ward while we were there as well as one of my ministering sisters. It is always nice to see familiar faces in the temple! We met at a restaurant in Frederick to have some dinner before we drove down to the temple. It was fun to visit with everyone. Our session was pretty full but I was surprised that it wasn't as full as the one I attended on Thursday morning. It was really wonderful to attend the temple twice in one week, especially after not being able to go regularly for over four years. 

Sunday started early because I had a song practice again before church. Frank had his usual meetings afterwards; I also had a meeting later in the afternoon with the rest of the YW leaders and the class presidents to do some planning for activities. 

We all enjoyed having a day off from our normal routine on Monday, since Frank and Seth were both home because of Labor Day. They helped me get my chores done which was particularly nice since I was still not very comfortable walking. Remember that my right foot hurt when I woke up last Friday? It improved and by Saturday evening when we went to the temple it wasn't bothering me very much but when I stood up to leave church on Sunday, my left foot started hurting!! It actually hurts a lot more than my right foot did, and has continued to bother me this whole week. It's quite a bit better now than it was early in the week, but it's still slightly uncomfortable to walk so I haven't been able to exercise all week. Hopefully it will continue to improve and I'll be back to my regular routine soon. I have no idea why either foot started hurting, and the pain has been different in each foot so it could be different things. Just really strange that happened, but I'm grateful that they weren't both hurting a lot at the same time.

The school week was fairly busy for me because Seth had a dentist appointment (6 month check up) on Tuesday after school and he had an orthodontist appointment on Thursday after school so I picked him up from school both days and went straight to his appointments. I picked him up on Wednesday too because it was raining. 

On Tuesday evening we had youth activities as usual. We had class activities but none of the girls in my class came. One of them was sick, two of them have school activities on Tuesday evenings, and the other one hasn't been coming to activities for over a month. (She did come to church on Sunday though so I got to see her briefly then.) The younger class has 3 girls but one was sick and another had a school activity so that class had only one girl. The YW secretary brought her daughter, though, who will be in YW next year and the advisor for the youngest class also brought her daughter who is coming into YW next year, so the three of them did their activity together and I helped. Since my class advisor had a lot to do, I told her she could go home since the YW secretary and youngest class advisor were also there to help. For their activity, the girls decorated our ward's long neglected bulletin board. It looked really cute when they were done:

On Wednesday I was supposed to have a presidency meeting but both the president and the secretary forgot about it and the president was very busy and in the middle of a crisis (her kitchen faucet broke and was leaking) so we decided to postpone the meeing. Instead, I did some shoe shopping because my one pair of Sunday sandals is old and both shoes are going to break any day now. I looked online and didn't find much I liked so I decided to try looking at a couple of stores at the local mall. I didn't find anything there I liked either though. I could have tried more places, but my foot was hurting too much to walk very far. (Kind of ironic I guess!) There really are very few shoe stores in Frederick so there is not much to choose from. I will have to keep looking online I guess. My friend Rebekah gave me a few ideas of websites to try.

I had lunch with Rebekah on Thursday and that evening I had another song practice. We'll be singing this Sunday so that was our last practice besides a quick review we'll have on Sunday before choir practice. 

In between everything else I've been reading Ribbons of Scarlet for book chat; I'm about 2/3 of the way through and it's pretty good. I've also been listening to some audio books. I listened to a book called Falling to Heaven which was really good and gave me a lot to think about. I started listening to a fiction book called Even the Dog Knows, which seems to be pretty good but I haven't gotten far enough into it to make a clear decision on how I feel about it. Part of it is told from the dog's perspective and I do find that amusing. 

I don't pay a lot of attention to world news but I did hear about Queen Elizabeth's death right after it happened yesterday. 70 years is a really impressive time to reign. I think she was quite the trooper and she deserves a good rest! I watched a 96 gun salute they did for her this morning which was pretty cool.

That's all the news from these parts until next week.

Weekly Review September 2 '22

 Last weekend we had Stake Conference, and I think it was one of the best ones I've ever attended. Frank and I were both invited to attend the leadership session which was from 4:00 to 6:00 on Saturday afternoon and then we both went to the adult session which was from 7:00 to 9:00. In between, we grabbed some food to eat and ended up visiting with a boy who grew up in our ward, who is Scott's age, and his wife while we ate. There were some really powerful talks in both sessions. One of the things our stake presidency really emphasized is the need to cleary teach the doctrines of the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

When we got home from the meetings, Frank had some work to do...he's been working on a big project for one of his clients, which is why he's been so busy lately. He ended up working until 2:30 am, so he was pretty tired on Sunday. We all went to the general session of Stake Conference in the morning. That afternoon Seth had a meeting with the Bishopric and other YM to plan their activities for the rest of the year. I took Seth to that, though, because Frank really needed to take a nap. He felt a lot better after getting some rest.

The rest of this week has been mostly pretty routine so I won't give a day by day account; just mention the things we did that were out of the ordinary. On Monday I had a whole bunch of errands to run. I went to my bank to get a new debit card because for some reason they didn't send me a new one when the last one expired over a year ago. (I don't use it much at all, but sometimes I need one.) I also deposited a check for Seth, picked up medicine for Seth, picked up a book I had on hold at the library, and went to the fabric store to get some elastic for some baseball pants I've been altering for a friend. I finished the alterations that evening.

I had a YW presidency meeting on Tuesday morning. The president has been out of town so we had a lot to catch up on. That evening we had a combined YM / YW activity, planned by the YM. Originally, the plan was to go swimming but of course we had thunderstorms predicted for that evening! As it turned out, we did get some rain and thunder but it was mostly cleared up by the time we were supposed to have our activity. Pools close when there's even a hint of thunder, though, so our bishop had already decided to change the activity. Instead, we helped a ward member change a flat tire on his van and also jumped his battery. In the process, the youth learned how to do those two things. Afterwards, they played dodgeball and had cookies. The ward member we helped was really grateful, too!

Frank was still working on his big project for his client, so he couldn't attend the activity. 

I did a little bit of sewing on Wednesday...I have several unfinished sewing projects and working on the baseball uniform for my friend reminded me that those projects still need to be done...and that I actually enjoy sewing when I get around to doing it! I would have got more done except Scott called me and we talked for a couple of hours. (I always enjoy talking to him though.) 

Yesterday I got to go to the temple. The DC temple finally opened for patrons on Wednesday and I had an appointment for the first session on Thursday at 10:00 am. There are only sessions in the evening on Wednesdays, which is why I waited until day 2 to go. It's too bad the temple isn't open during the day on Wednesdays because that would be the best day of the week for me to go, but I will just have to adjust my schedule and go on Thursday or Friday instead. The temple was really busy; the session I attended had almost every seat full. That is really unusual for a daytime session on a weekday...I've attended many weekday daytime sessions where there were only 5 - 15 people or so. It seems that many people are eager to be at the temple again, besides the fact that the temple isn't open as much so we have fewer choices of times we can go. Hopefully it will continue to be busy. It felt soooooo good to be back in my beloved Washington DC temple again!!

Somehow, in spite of the time it took to go to the temple, I still managed to get all the regular chores like laundry and grocery shopping done yesterday. This isn't a new phenomenon...I've noticed this happening in the past when I've attended the temple. I also noticed that happening a lot when I was RS president and had lots of things to do for my calling. I'm sure it is not coincidental. 

Frank came home from work early yesterday and worked from home for the afternoon because he was having some sort of allergic reaction to something. He got itchy all over, especially the palms of his hands and the bottom of his feet. He took some benadryl when he got home and that helped a lot. After he finished working, he did some more work on his big project and he is almost done with it, thankfully.

I've continued to listen to audio books a lot this past week. I finished The Divine Signature and also listened to a book called The Priesthood Power of Women. Now I've started on a book called Falling to Heaven and another one called Don't Miss This in the Old Testament. I actually prefer to read books, rather than listen to them, but I can listen to books while I'm doing other things (like cooking, cleaning bathrooms, or driving places) so I enjoy having the option to listen to some books that I would not have the time to read otherwise. 

I have also been reading the next book for book chat which is called Ribbons of Scarlet. It's pretty unique because it is written by 6 different authors (all women). Each author wrote a story about a different woman during the French Revolution. Each character has a story that is from her point of view, but also shows up as a minor character in some of the other stories. I just finished the first story last night. It was good, although there was some slightly inappropriate content. Plus it started with a gruesome execution...I never like reading stuff like that!! (Although I should expect violence, considering the historical background.) We'll see how the next story goes.

This morning when I woke up I noticed my right foot was hurting. It felt fine yesterday, so I have no idea why it is hurting today but it hurts to walk on it. Not severely...but enough that it's uncomfortable. Because of that, I didn't jog this morning. Hopefully after a few days of resting it, I will be able to exercise again.

Our ward's bishopric made breakfast for all the Seminary kids this morning so when Frank took Seth to Seminary he stuck around for 30 minutes to help make breakfast. They had pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream as well as sausages. The kids seemed to enjoy that. 

That's everything for this week, so as usual I'll finish up with a couple of pictures. Tuesday was a day for wildlife sightings...I saw a deer that morning and that afternoon I saw a fox. At least, I think it's a fox. It looks mostly like a fox except for its tail. The other foxes I have seen have beautiful bushy tails. This animal doesn't. I don't know if it is a different type of fox, or it's sick, or if it's another animal altogether. I was just really surprised to see it at all...it was out on the same hill where we often see deer. I guess it was attracted by the food, too.

Weekly Review August 26 '22

 When I looked at the date yesterday, I realized that we are only 4 months away from Christmas...how can that be?? This week has felt long, but perhaps that is because it was our first full week of school, and Seth started Seminary this week too. We're not used to getting up so early yet!

I mentioned last week that I was going to a wedding reception. Frank met me there on his way home from work. It was not a "drop in" type of reception--they actually had a full sit down dinner. We ended up at a table with some friends from both our ward and our stake, and it was fun to visit. After dinner they had dancing. They did one thing I thought was fun...they asked all married couples to come to the dance floor. After a minute or so of dancing, they said "anyone who's been married less than 5 hours, sit down". That was the couple who had just got married, of course. Then they asked anyone who had been married less than a year to sit down and then proceeded from there, adding on a couple of years every time. Finally there was only one couple left, who had been married 51 years. They asked that couple to share some words of advice with the newly married couple. Here's a picture my friend Michelle (she's the YW president that I'm serving with) took at the wedding (not the reception). We were sitting together; she has to keep out of the sun so she had brought an umbrella:

Saturday was pretty busy. I got my hair cut in the morning. When I got home, we went to the store to buy a chromebook for Seth. The laptop he's been using is not working great and it's also pretty heavy for him to carry back and forth to school. The school system will rent him a chromebook, but it costs $60 / year to do that. Since Seth has 3 more years of school, that means we'll pay $180 in rental fees before we're done and since some chromebooks don't cost much more than that, we decided to buy him his own...then he can keep it! We also got a laptop for me because the laptop I've been using is starting to show signs of age. Believe it or not, the laptop we bought is the first brand new laptop I've ever had! All of the other laptops I've used over the years are ones that Frank picked up here and there from other people. We did buy a laptop at the store for me once, but even that one was not brand new because it had been used as a display (and therefore was less expensive). I'm still using my old laptop to write this post, though, because we haven't had a chance to fully set up the new one yet. 

That evening there was a post-FSY activity and dance for the youth at our stake center. We found out on Friday morning that each ward needed to provide a chaperone for the dance portion. Most of our youth leaders and parents were unavailable, so Frank and I ended up volunteering to go. (We didn't both have to go but I thought it would be more fun if we went together). We were assigned to sit on a couch at the end of one of the hallways to keep youth from wandering into the chapel or outside. It wasn't a bad gig...a lot of the other chaperones had to circlulate through the halls or walk around outside in the parking lot. We got to sit on a comfortable couch, inside where it was cooler. Before the dance, which was for multiple stakes, our stake had a dinner for the youth in our stake. Seth went to that and then stayed for the dance, although he didn't dance at all. They had a room with board / card games and another room with games like corn hole and giant jenga. He spent the night in those rooms with friends. I think it's nice that they have other options besides dancing (I would have enjoyed that a lot more than dancing when I was a teenager) but I hope someday he'll be interested in doing some dancing too.

Sunday was even busier than Saturday. Before church, I had a song practice because I'll be singing with a small group in sacrament meeting in a few weeks. The song is called "Shards of Glass" which is a reference to the china & glassware that early church members smashed and added to the plaster of the Kirtland Temple so that the outside walls would be shiny. The message of the song is that the Lord can take our meager, imperfect efforts and turn them into great things. It's a beautiful song and I am enjoying learning it. After that I had regular church meetings, of course. After church I just had time to come home and make lunch, eat, and do some advance preparations for dinner before leaving again to go to ward council. (Frank went too of course.) The YW president left Saturday morning to drive her two oldest daughters out to Utah since they are both attending BYU this semester, so I went to the meeting in her place. That meeting went longer than usual and by the time we got home it was time to put dinner in the oven. We had a little bit of down time while dinner cooked, but not a lot. The Elders came over for dinner and we enjoyed having them here. We just found out that morning that both of them were being transferred in a few days and sister missionaries were going to take their place. We'll miss the Elders, but I am excited to have Sisters here again! 

We had dinner a little early because at 6:00 we all had a meeting at the stake center...it was for all the Seminary students and their parents, just to go over information for this new year of Seminary. We also found out that day that our Seminary class was going to be bigger. Up until now, the kids in our ward have had their own class (along with a few kids from the Spanish ward who live in our ward boundaries). But this year they decided to have all the kids who go to TJ High School (Seth's high school) attend the same Seminary class as the kids in our ward. (Most of the kids in our ward go to Walkersville High School; Seth is one of only a few in our ward who go to TJ.) There are several kids in the Frederick Ward who attend TJ High School, so they are joining our Seminary class this year. Seth is actually the only youth in our ward attending TJ who attends Seminary regularly, so it's nice that he's not the only one going to his school from Seminary now. It's also nice that he is getting to know some of the other LDS kids at his school. We could have joined a carpool with the Frederick Ward kids, but since Seth needs to take his medicine every day in between Seminary and school and I know he will forget to take it if I just send it to Seminary with him, I will still be picking him up from Seminary every day to take him to school. We may occasionally take some of the other TJ kids with us, though. 

After the Seminary meeting, Frank and Seth went home but I stayed because there was a post-camp fireside for all the YW and YW leaders in the stake. They showed a slide show with pictures from camp and had a few leaders speak briefly, then had time for girls to share testimonies. It was really nice so I'm glad I went even though I was pretty tired by then. It was definitely a long day!! I went home and went to bed since we had to be up at 5:00 am the next morning. 

The rest of the week hasn't been as busy as the weekend was, but we've still had a few events. Since Frank has been leaving for work around 6:00 am every morning and Seminary starts at 6:10, he is now taking Seth to Seminary every morning before going to work. That is nice for me, since last year I usually took him to Seminary and then went back to pick him up and take him to school. It makes my morning routine easier to only make one trip! On Monday I went to lunch with my friend Sherrie. She was the 2nd counselor in the YW presidency until recently...she got released because she is going to be a temple worker and is assigned to work at the temple the same night as our activity night. I've missed her now that I don't see her and talk to her as frequently so we decided to go to lunch. It was nice to get caught up with her.

We had a combined YW activity on Tuesday evening...the younger class was in charge and they decided that they want to paint their nails while chatting about the first week of school. It was a fun and relaxing activity. Meanwhile, the boys were playing volleyball and eating bagels. 

On Wednesday we didn't have to go anywhere in the evening but we did get some unexpected visitors...the new sister missionaries stopped by to meet us. It was fun to get to know them a little bit. One of them has been out 15 months and the other one is brand new from the MTC. On Wednesday we also did some online searching and booked a place to stay in Brevard for Thanksgiving. Scott is coming with us and Jared & Jessie will likely come over too. Tanner & Darlee would like to come but they don't know Darlee's school schedule yet so we'll have to wait and see if that will work out. 

Last night I had book chat. We had a lively discussion about Patriots while enjoying fondue. Yum!! Now we are going to read a book called Ribbons of Scarlet, which is about several women during the French Revolution. 

Seth has had a friend from school / church come over after school three days this week. He is in another ward but goes to Seth's high school. His dad asked me if we'd be willing to let him come to our house for about an hour after school each day so that his dad doesn't have to make two trips to Frederick every day to pick up both this boy and his two younter sisters from their schools, which dismiss about an hour apart. I told him we'd try it...my only concern was that Seth needs to get his homework done, and having his friend here could be a distraction. This boy is a really nice boy and he and Seth get along well so other than that, I'm happy to have him come here. So far it has worked out fine although Seth hasn't had any homework yet so we'll see how it goes as we get farther into the school year. We decided to change our rules for screen time this school year. Last year Seth got 2 hours of screen time on school nights if he got his homework done. This year we decided not to have any screen time on school nights. (He gets plently of screen time on Fridays and Saturdays.) We made this decision because we feel like last year Seth would rush through his homework and not give it his best effort because he just wanted to finish so he could get his screen time. When I explained this to Seth, I was surprised that he agreed with me! I'm sure we'll hear complaints about it as the year goes by, but I think it's going to be a lot better this way.

This week I got to talk on the phone to Mom, Amy, Tanner, and Scott so that was nice. I've been listening to audio books a lot and just finished listening to the last book in a 6 book series. I started listening to a new book called Divine Signatures which is really uplifting; I like it a lot. 

The weather has changed and we are back to typical miserable hot and humid August weather. I don't have to go outside much, though, so it's not too bad. The sky was really beautiful this morning though, so I will finish up with a few pictures I took at the church (while waiting for Seth to get out of Seminary) and at home: