Darais Days

Lily and I both had a great day today. I think our souls were refreshed from being in nature over the weekend. After work, I did two weeks of blogging. It was a little hard to concentrate, but also highly amusing and joy inducing, to have Lydia and Mary next to me in constant giggle fits. 🙂

Here is Lydia and Mary still goofing off together during Lydia’s harp practicing. They are such cute pals!

Lily is starting to feel better and she had a lot of energy today. She has been so diligent about trying to improve her health after getting knocked down from all the issues with yeast infection and skin rash. I hope she has turned a corner. I love that woman and she has had so much to deal with lately!

As a family, we have been to Canyonlands a number of years ago when we checked out the Island-In-The-Sky district. We liked it, but we were not completely wowed by it. Not long ago when Lily commented to our friend Jessie that we weren’t wowed by Canyonlands, she said, “you’ve never been to the Needles District.” She was right.

This morning we woke up after a semi-dramatic night. Dramatic good and dramatic bad. Dramatic bad was that it was cold, and Lily and my airmat malfunctioned and lost tons of air in the night. Also, Clarissa woke up at night, and needed to jump in Lily and my double sleeping bag. Dramatic good was that it was really fun to cuddle with Clarissa and Lily for warmth, and the stars were unbelievable. Lily slept less than everyone, but she spent a lot of time gazing out her window at the remarkable stars.

In the morning, I played a super fun game with the kids in which we pretended the dirt was lava and someone was chosen to be the lavamonster. As long as people stayed on logs or rocks, they were safe, but as soon as they were tagged by the lava monster or fell on the lava (dirt), that person also became a lava monster to chase (walking slowly per the rules) the rest of the survivors. I had a blast and truly forgot my worries!

Then we headed to the Needles area. The drive was incredibly gorgeous. The cliffs were incredible, and sometimes had climbers on them. Once we arrived in the Needles area, we did the Pot Hole and Walking Slickrock trails. They were so fun! Much of the trail was over interesting rock and boulder terrain. The kids had so much fun climbing on rock features, and hiking on such interesting terrain!

Here are the pictures of the pot hole trail.

Here are the pictures of Slickrock

Here is video #1 and #2 of Clarissa happily working her way down the Slickrock trail.

After our wonderful and sunny hiking, we went again to our most favorite Moab eating establishment, Pasta Jays. Lily got an incredible portabello pasta dish, Mary got macaroni and cheese, Lydia got tortellini and the rest of us got spaghetti and meatballs.

Then we drove home! We rotating requesting songs to play on the way home, and just enjoyed our last bit of time traveling as a family.

At home, Lily and I were exhausted. She bathed to help with the skin issues she’s been having and to decompress, and I decompressed on the floor next to her. We both felt stressed and overwhelmed at the thought of all life is throwing at us right now. I also had a nice long prayer that helped me to center and remember that I’ve always found balance and light through focusing on the Holy Ghost, inviting into my life, and heeding It’s whispers.

This morning, we woke up in our yurt and had a yummy breakfast from food Lily packed from Trader Joe’s. Then Lily and I walked with the kids while they explored around the area of the yurt.

Then we went to see Dead Horse Point Overlook. It was spectacular!

Then we all hiked on what I think was the East Rim trail. Here are some photos.

As soon as I found out Dead Horse point was near Moab, I got really excited. I love Moab. It is so nostalgic for me due to all the times I was there for work, many of which times my family joined me. Pasta Jay’s has become a family establishment, I was really looking forward to going. And go we did!!

I will admit, I was burning out today. Work has been very grueling, especially now that it is end of the year, and I am managing 9 people which is one over the technical maximum for team size-limits.

Still, in spite of my burnout, I had a trip to look forward to (leaving to Dead Horse Point tonight), and also, I was bouyed up by all of the beauty happening around me in my family. For example, here is sweet Mary reading to Ammon. I have to laugh because in the backgound, you can see me holding my forehead on the couch during a break at work…..yeah, I was ready for a vacation.

Lily also was in desperate need of a vacation. She got a UTI on our last trip to Arizona. Then she took anti-biotics, but it still turned into a really bad infection that she could feel in her kidneys. Then she got an insane yeast infection, thrush, and a crazy skin rash that broke out and started moving all around her body at different times. Additionally, she’s been having weird things with the circulation in her hands, where her hands will lose feeling during the night sometimes. I’m really worried about her health :(. Needless to say, I think we both needed a getaway from the daily grind, especially Lily who now has extra pressure during the day with Lydia and Mary homeschooling and Ammon and Clarissa only in preschool 5 hours per week.

Another sweet moment during the day was when Ammon danced to “This is Me” from The Greatest Showman. Here is a video.

It took us a few times to get out the door. First we came back to the house to print out something that would give us a free National Parks pass because Obama started a program for families with a fourth-grader, then we came back for an air-matress and then finally we pulled out. Yay vacation, albeit two days, it’s amazing how immersed one can become in powerful nature in just two days in Utah.

It is difficult to describe how significant this day was for me. Mary has been in eye therapy for, I suppose, about one year now, probably more. We were referred to Dr. Duval by our friend Moroni Hair, while I was doing tithing with him after church. He had a son with a lazy eye, and Dr. Duval was a miracle worker for his son.

We signed Mary up, and Dr. Duval had an entire methodology about how to help Mary’s lazy eye start to work with her brain better in concert with her other eye. The catch? Lots and lots of homework. It was supposed to be 5 days a week. At best, I averaged 2-3 days a week, some weeks were definitely better, some weeks were definitely worse. I think it was equally hard for me and Mary to do. I’d finish a long day of work and feel exhausted, and she would have finished school, piano, and homework, and often feel sad that others could play while she did eye exercises. Last spring, I felt my motivation to finish strong waning, so I made this hundred chart, to motivate both me and Mary to finish strong.

I had to reschedule her graduation one time when we didn’t quite finish the hundred chart on-time, but the fact is, this week we finished it, in time for her graduation today. I am so proud of that girl. I’m also thrilled because last month Dr. Duval said she officially no longer has a lazy eye. That was even before her graduation today! I feel so blessed for Dr. Duval, and his knowledge of how to get eyes working together. Mary made steady progress the entire time we were with Dr. Duval, and I also have to hand it to his staff who were always so cheerful, knowledgeable, and focused. It would honestly be worth it to hang out in the office just so the positive happy vibe can rub off on me. At any rate, I feel so blessed that God connected me to Moroni who referred me to Dr. Duval, for Dr. Duval and his staff, for Mary for putting in the work to improve, and for Lily for being so supportive and managing so many things while I was working with Mary (food, cleanup, Lydia’s harp, baby-duty etc). Today was a truly special day.

When we arrived, one of the first things that happened was we got our homework for the next two months. Seriously, my heart broke a little bit. I really thought homework would mostly be done at the graduation, but this is a lighter battery of homework, and if Mary does well on the two-month check-up, she might be done with homework for good. I’m taking a week or two before ramping back into the homework. I am so so so tired of her eye exercises. Not tired of doing them with her. I honestly loved, and hope to always remember that one on one time we spent together. It was truly special. But I am very tired of just having one more thing to do every day before I feel like the work for the day is done. I look forward to being free of that. And I know that Mary does too.

After we got our homework assignment, Mary got her new pair of glasses which look so adorable on her. She did such a good job picking them! Then she wore a cap and gown and walked around the office while everyone clapped for her while they played Mary’s song of choice “Seven Years Old” by Lukas Graham. Then she picked a Hatchimals prize from the prize rack. Then she got her picture taken with her certificate (my phone was dead at that point). I felt zombie-like and tired, but it was such a special occasion. To make it even more special, Lydia tagged along for the build-a-bear excursion, but got to be a part of the graduation too. It was such a special evening.

After the graduation, we went to the promised build-a-bear trip. Mary and Lydia each picked a bear and some accessories. When what they picked exceeded the budget I declared, they were so sweet and said they didn’t need the bed accessories they picked. They were so nice about it that I told them I would go ahead and get the beds for them. I have such sweet girls, and they behaved so well that I was happy to make sure this was a fully special night for them.

Congratulations Mary my sweet girl!!

The highlight today is that we all played some tennis together after I finished work. It was a beautiful weather day for mid-November! After we all played for a bit, we put Ammon and Clarissa in the car right by the court, and Lily and I played together. We LOVE playing tennis together!

Last night I played dolls with Mary and Lydia, and Ammon sat and watched, wishing he could play.

I told Ammon I would play with him the next night and so tonight we did. Honestly, work has been so stressful, that it was so nice to just tell myself, “Abe forget everything grown-up in your life, and just be a kid with Ammon for the next hour.” It’s hard to describe how refreshing and fun it was for me. We build lots of towers out of magnet-tiles and had a little bit of play with figures with a storyline about crystals being fought over, and then we learned that magnet-tile buildings could look awesome in the dark when we put flashlights in them and turned out the lights. Ammon was enthralled by the discover, and excitedly showed others in the house and continued building magnet-tile buildings with flashlights the next day. I love that boy so so so much!

Also, here is a picture of Lily walking with Lydia and of Lily reading a book to Ammon and Clarissa. She is such a wonderful mother!

Today we did home church, and then I did Mary’s eye exercises. I got some pictures because she has her graduation soon and I want to remember all the time we spent together doing her exercises.

Today, after home church, and Mary’s eye exercises, I felt desperate for sunshine. I love working from home, but sometimes it does mean I barely leave the house. It’s dark when I start the workday and dark when I finish, and if it’s cold outside, I might never leave the house. I get really cagey. So, I announced that I wanted to go on a hike. I researched where in Utah had sunshine because it was cloudy, gross and cold in Orem. I learned it was sunny and 8 degrees warmer in Scipio. Lily’s been under the weather still getting over the mother of all yeast infections (she also has thrush, and quite possibly a larger case of candida) so she stayed home to catch her breath.

Driving to Scipio was amazing. There was a huge ceiling of cloud blocking the sun from Utah Valley, and as we drove south, we could see where the ceiling ended, and it ended just before Scipio. When we got to the trail, we were in full sun!

We did the Scipio pioneer trail (I think that’s what it is called?). Headed south, it was off the Scipio exit after the gas station/dairy queen. You get on the frontage road, go down a bit and then hang a right to get to the trailhead. It was sunny, beautiful and so fun. Afterwards, we all got subway and icecream. Here are the pictures:

Back at home, I played dolls with the girls before bedtime. It was seriously so fun. Here are a couple videos and some pictures capturing our time together:

Video 1

Video 2

Today when Lily had had enough of Lydia whining at the harp, she sat the kids down and showed them videos of children in the Philippines eating pagpag and she explained that her dad was in very similar circumstances and that the children have wonderful lives, and should never feel like it they have it hard, because they are not far removed from what really would be a difficult life. Pagpag is food found in someone else’s trash. Lydia volunteered to give some of her money to help those children, and Mary followed suite. I was so touched by their empathy and also by Lily’s powerful lesson to our children to be grateful for what we have and aware of the suffering of others.

Then we all had a delicious and rather large pizza.

My veteran’s day started with a wonderful swim and deep concern for our country. Trump was insisting he won the election and doing crazy things to try to call into question and subvert our democratic process. I was upset and posted on facebook, which I almost never do. Here is my post.

On This Veteran’s Day

To my family, friends, and anyone who stumbles upon this post, I want to share the feelings of my heart about what is happening in our country. I check Facebook maybe four times a year, and I rarely speak out because I don’t like to make waves.

But at this moment my heart is bursting with hurt, disappointment, fear and even anger. Never in my 36 years of living have I had to wonder if our democracy is at risk. Never in my life have I wondered if a war is coming or if my family will be safe in the next year. Never have I seen a president more obsessed with his preservation of power than in the peaceful continuation of country that he leads.  As a country, we have never been more divided. I feel it. Do you?

Trump has said before that he will accept election results only if he wins. In the past, I’ve laughed at a lot of Trump’s antics.  For example, it felt comically poetic that he would leave office while in the process suing America. But I’m now realizing Trump isn’t just extremely dysfunctional. He is highly dangerous. His decision to not give a concession speech has put America on edge and made so many people uncertain of the road ahead. Trump’s secretary of State announced there will be a smooth transition into Trump having a second term. Trump just replaced the head of the Department of Defense today with someone who is loyal to him. For those who have followed Trump, you know the list of people he has fired and removed to replace with loyalists is ever growing, but this most recent move is particularly alarming. The scariest thing is that Trump is a compulsive liar and his followers believe what he says. He said we’ve never been more united as a country in his last debate. Is that really what you see? He also said he has done more for Black people than any president except for maybe Abraham Lincoln.  Anyone who has any pulse on the overall feelings of the Black community towards Trump know that is a flat-out lie. This morning I was listening to NPR and wondering if and when that will be either cancelled or taken over by Trump loyalists. I’m literally scared of what he is capable of.

I want to make something incredibly clear. This is not about Republicans versus Democrats. I personally decided I am a Democrat yesterday, but prior to that I spent years wanting to focus more on the caliber of the person–regardless of party, and I spent many more years before that as a Republican. The reason I’m now a Democrat is primarily because of how appalled I am that Republican leaders are choosing Trump over our democratic system. We have never had someone lose in the electoral college and try to sue, intimidate, and grab his way to victory. Even Al Gore gave a concession speech as soon as the Supreme Court gave their verdict. I’ve followed the law-suits Trump is initiating and by and large they are spurious lawsuits that will go nowhere and certainly not change the outcome of the election. Again, this is not a partisan matter. This is about our democratic system. I would be equally appalled if a Democrat were holding on to power this way. I was appalled at both the Democrats and the Republicans (except for Mitt Romney) during Trump’s impeachment because everyone lined up exactly along party lines. No one is thinking anymore. And that is what is happening now. Well, now is the time to think. Look around. Understand that what is sacred in America is not our politicians, not our positions, not even our policies. It is our PROCESS. No one in the history of America (that I am aware of) has done so much to undermine our sacred processes. Processes like voting for elected officials. Processes like the transfer of power. Processes like how the balances of power can check each other. If our voting process breaks down, and the candidate who won the most popular votes (by millions) and the most electoral votes does not get put into office, then all of a sudden we have no working process. That leaves a power vacuum for fascists like Trump, who has appointed loyalists all around him and desires to rule through autocracy and not through the democratic voice of the people.

I am wounded and hurt by what Trump has done to this country. I am wounded and hurt that otherwise good and decent politicians, family members, friends and citizens continue to support this person who is so poisonous to our democracy. As I have said, I have never in my life actually worried about the future of democracy in this country, or the safety of my family. I cannot express sufficiently my disappointment in anyone who would continue to defend someone who endangers me, my family and my country.

On this Veteran’s day, may we reflect on the courage that so many in the past have summoned both on the battlefield and in daily life to protect our democracy, to stand up for civility, and to preserve the stability of our country. May we go beyond feeling grateful for what others have done to protect what we have and realize it is our turn now to be courageous and to stand up for what we want future generations to have down the road.  Nothing would make me happier than to learn that I’m overreacting and that we never really were that close to having our democracy topple. But democracy, national stability, peace and the security of my family is not something I will leave to chance. My family and I are educating ourselves, speaking out, donating to causes that uphold democracy and engaging in civil discourse. I invite everyone to do the same, regardless of your party or politics.

Things got more fun in the afternoon. We all did s’mores outside and then got in our pjs and watched a movie as a family. I think we might have watched the second Despicable Me movie. It was so nice to spend the day with family and have a day off of work!