Lily Leaves for Baltimore

Our friend Jenn has devoted her life recently to helping process refugees from Afghanistan. First she was on a military base in Texas and now she is moving to Baltimore to work at a local refugee center. She’s taking her car out there and making the long drive and Lily is going with her. I’m so happy Lily is able to support our friend in that way, and also hopefully have a fun adventure with a break from the kids. Here is Lily and also Jenn just before they left!

After Lily left, I took the kids to church only to find it was on-line only due to Covid. We listened to Sunday school on the way home, and then I listened to the main session on my computer at home.

Then we all went to In-and-Out. I didn’t eat there because I’m trying to cut red-meat for myself, but the kids wanted In-and-out and it was an easy solution for a slightly overwhelmed temporarily single parent. They seemed to love it!

After that, we went and visited Georgia. Lydia was sweet to watch the smaller kids in the car while Mary and I visited with Georgia in a room that was within eye-shot of the car. We had a wonderful visit.

Then we all went on a walk in Squaw Peak Canyon. Once we started, we realized the trail was muddy, but we all were in need of a walk outside (especially Basil), so we forged ahead. It was a wonderful time.

Here is me feeling like a Jedi

Because of all the mud, bathing Basil afterwards was a complete necessity. Although, he seemed to disagree because he literally put his paws firmly down so Mary had to drag him towards the door of the dog-wash. I let the kids take pictures and videos while I washed Basil. I’ll start with my favorite one, which is a slow-motion video of Basil shaking off.

Turns out Youtube doesn’t capture the slow motion we got on our iphone

Lily and Jen finished their driving and arrived in Santa Fe. Here are some pictures that Lily took. Lily called me raving about Santa Fe. We knew we love it, but she was reminded just how much we love love, and how it’s really not that far (8 hours).

At night I grilled salmon and vegetables for the kids from meal kits I got at Sprouts. We had some sweets afterwards and then all went to bed. Ammon got up throughout the night and threw up multiple times (I’m not sure how many because he would just throw up and then come report to me in my bed that he threw up and I was in a sleepy daze).