Month: April 2016

I gave one of the eulogies at my grandma’s funeral, and I tried to copy and paste it into the blog but am having formatting issues.

In the meantime, today Auntie Geri, the kids and I went to see Zootopia. I watched the movie with a huge grin on my face. It was so delightful. I know Abe would have loved it and my only regret is that he wasn’t with us.

Lydia also knocked her harp lesson out of the park. I was so proud of her for focusing and doing a great job. It has greatly helped that no one is allowed to eat breakfast or touch food until Lydia has finished her practicing. That helps with motivation. 🙂

We also watched the new Cinderella with Auntie Geri tonight. She hadn’t seen it. Today we got to be transported to delightful worlds twice! Well-made movies are amazing.

No pictures because I forgot, but we have a huge backlog that Abe took while I was away and from my Grandma’s funeral. Speaking of Abe, he did an AMAZING job while I was in Illinois. He got the girls dressed and coiffed for their dress rehearsal and ballet recital, he kept the baby alive and well, and he had the house clean and an amazing beef stew cooking when I got home from the airport. Auntie Geri was a big help too, and I was thrilled to walk in on a blissful domestic scene where everyone appeared content and order reigned. He is an incredible husband and life partner. I couldn’t imagine a better one!

Today Auntie Geri, the kids and I all rode the historic Heber Train. I had never been on it before, and we all enjoyed the scenery very much. The pretend bandit that entered the train unnerved Lydia and Mary quite a bit, but their nerves calmed down when Auntie Geri bought them M&M’s.

I have the cutest pictures of them on the train that I took with Instagram, but I’m still trying to figure out how to download Instagram pictures to my computer. The link to a really adorable picture is here: https://www.instagram.com/p/BEeg-aupcdz/

Abe took a picture of our Cobb salad dinner because he really likes composed salads. Also, he’s been really great at taking pictures lately.

Auntie Geri came to town today. All of the kids were so excited to see her that it was almost impossible to get them to go to bed. Even Ammon refused! We are so happy to have her in town (as the pictures attest).

My grandmother passed away on Sunday. I have been avoiding blogging because I don’t know what I could write that could do her life even a smidgeon of justice. I don’t feel like I have any words worthy of what she is and what she did for me. So until I figure out what I can write about her, I am just going to post pictures from the past two days.

I am not going to exercise restraint in posting variations of the same picture. Abe has been taking lots of great pictures in series, and I don’t have the brain power to choose which ones are the best.

Sunday:

Monday: As far as I can tell, I have no pictures. We had a harp lesson and spent a lot of the morning practicing for that. The lesson was a disaster and we still aren’t even on Twinkle.

Tuesday:

We had a play date with some twins in the ward and had dinner at South Fork Park.

Today was (and still is) a marathon, especially for Lily.

I started the day with a brunch with my good friend Morgan while Lily was engaged with service, cleaning the apartment of a ward-member who is going through a very difficult time.  I had a wonderful time talking to Morgan.  For most of our visit he was telling me of some amazing recent experiences he had. He recently woke up in the middle of the night with inspiration from God to visit a friend in a different state.  He bought a plane ticket and visit that friend only to learn that the friend is enduring a major crisis right now.  It was amazing to me how much God cares about us, so much so that He will enact miracles to help sustain and support us in our trials.

Speaking of God caring about us, I was pretty wiped out today because I was up until almost 2AM last night working on my Sunday school lesson which is on Jacob 5-7, the allegory of the olive tree.  In short, in Jacob 5 there is an extremely log, but powerful story about how the master of the vineyard (God) goes to extreme lengths to preserve trees in His vineyard and not lose them. It’s a moving allegory about how much God cares for us and helps us, even when we don’t deserve it.  Jacob 6 makes the point that we should cleave to God as God cleaves to us (and we learned how he cleaves to us in chapter 5) and chapter 7 is a story about how Jacob was able to cleave to God in the face false doctrine being preached by a cunning anti-Christ persecutor of the church. The way Jacob was able to not be phased was because of the many revelations and spiritual experiences he had had.

After my visit with Morgan we got the girls all ready for their ballet dress rehearsal. Here is a video of Mary after she was all dressed for the rehearsal. See pictures below.  It was sad because it took a while to get them all ready with the dresses, hair buns and make-up and when we got to the studio we learned that their rehersal was yesterday (not today), so that was a major bummer. On the upside, we found a really neat juice shop next to the studio and got some juice.

Back at home, Lily and I cleaned like crazy to get the house in shape for Sunday and then my dad and Suzanne came over.  They were coming over so my dad could join me and the girls for my stake’s daddy daughter dance and Suzanne babysat Ammon while Lily went to the temple.

That daddy daughter dance (pictures below) was one of the highlights of my year so far.  My dad and I and the girls all danced the night away to songs like “twist and shout” “let it go” “foot loose” and so on.  We got some really fun pictures, ate cookies and just had a blast. We all loved it so much. It was so fun to dance! And my dad had a great time too. When we got back he kept saying to Suzanne, “We need to go dancing!”

 

Back at the house, the girls were bouncing off the walls and we all chatted for 30 minutes. Also, Mary read to us (click here for video). Then my dad and Suzanne helped me to get them ready for bed and Suzanne fulfilled their bed-time routine by reading The Secret Garden.  Lily got home after they left and still has a long night (and early morning ahead of her). She needs to finish preparing her church lesson tonight and also get up super early to make food for her home-teachee’s post baby-blessing gathering.  I love her so much, and I have no idea how she does it. I hope tomorrow is restful for her, at least after her lesson!

 

We are really concerned about how rude Lydia has been lately. Abe gave me a blessing which I need to write down, but it gave me faith moving forward. I was really at my wit’s end before those sweet assurances uttered in the blessing.

I didn’t take any pictures today, but it was full of good things (other than Lydia’s concerning behavior). Abe has started feeling good again and has revamped his spiritual and work life so that he can trust in God and feel happy. I took the girls to the library, did harp practice with Lydia, cooked a bunch, and even took the kids grocery shopping. Tomorrow the girls are really excited to have a pj day, and I am too. I just want to curl up and read all day.

The harp teacher came by and showed Abe how to fix the harp strings. After she fixed a bunch of broken strings and tuned the harp all up, Abe and I were talking on the couch–and another string popped! We are rethinking our decision to buy the prettier sounding gut harp. If we had to do it over, we would have just gone with nylon strings.

Ammon has been really fussy today. It’s the first time he’s been like this since he was born six months ago. I hope tomorrow he’s back to normal so he can join in our plans to enjoy the day.

Today I just gave parenting my all. During the morning we worked on reading, puzzles, harp technique, and sight words. I fed the kids two meals, folded a ton of laundry, pumped every couple hours, and tidied the house. Then it was off to ballet where the girls received their costumes for the recital in two weeks.

When we got home, I ate, took care of Ammon, and collapsed in bed with a book. After Abe came home I roused myself to eat dinner and watch a scripture video with the family for FHE. Then I returned to bed where Abe gave me a really nice massage and we talked about how his work is going, my plans for the yard, and our family.

Abe took one photo of the girls in their cupcake costumes this evening. Sadly, I forgot to brush their hair this morning so they look a mess.

Abe just got done with a virus, and I started tonight. I went to bed at 7pm and woke up now to blog and pump. Also, poor Ammon caught a bizarre form of the chicken pox on a play date and now has a terrible cold sore on his bum. It’s so sad.

On a happier note, here are the pictures from today.

I had a great experience bearing my testimony in church today. We also had a great visit with our home teachers. One of them is a wildlife major and confirmed my suspicion that I need to be carrying around bear spray when I take the girls into the mountains. After our visit with them, I made dinner. Then I visit taught for an hour and a half. I love my companion and all the women we visit so much.

When I came home it was reading time with the girls. I am really enjoying The Secret Garden. It’s a great book to read during the spring time.

I haven’t been sleeping much lately because I have been so excited by all of the things I’ve been learning and right now I feel like I am about to pass out so I am just going to post pictures and head to bed.

Abe typing here. I admit, I woke up this morning feeling down. I think it’s a combination of a lot of things which include allergies, struggles and stress at work, dealing with the lingering emotional effects of winter and so on.

I prayed this morning seeking inspiration on how to still have a happy day even though I was feeling blue, and I had the thought to just keep moving all day and to try to “find joy in activity.”  I made that my mantra for the day.

Lily went to the temple in the morning (and she had an amazing experience there) and so I got to take care of the kids while she was there.  I fed them, dressed them, read to them, and built them a fort out of boxes in the yard (which they loved and played with for nearly two hours).  I should also mention about the fort that it was dark inside because it was almost fully enclosed and when Lily brought Mary a flashlight, Mary said brightly, “I don’t need a flashlight, I have eyesight.” I got a good laugh. The cuteness reminded me of the time when Mary prayed, “Dear Father in Heaven, Thank you for daddy to not be so tired,  thank you for mommy’s back to feel better, thank you for Lydia to not be mean to me. Thank you for me to not be cross-eyed. Amen.” When Lily got home, I fed the girls lunch, mowed the lawn and ran a bit. I gave Lily a good scare when Mary fell backwards on her chair while eating a peanut butter and strawberry jam sandwich.  Mary cried a bunch and when she calmed down, I went to tell Lily what happened.  I went upstairs and told Lily that Mary fell back and bumped her head and Lily looked at me horrified as she looked at the red jam on my shirt thinking it was blood that had gushed out of Mary’s head. Once I explained it was jam, she was less worried.

By the time I finished mowing the lawn, all the activity had given me some momentum and I was starting to feel rather good.  Lily and I then ran some errands and ended up at the park with Lydia and Mary.  Here is a picture of them playing.

At home we had dinner and Lily and I stayed up just having buddy talk for a couple hours which was really nice because my earlier gloom had initiated some tension between us. It was nice to end on such a wonderful note with my sweetheart.