25 May 2014

Happy Sunday!  I can not believe we are in the last week of May, how did that happen?  We had a lovely week and it started with a trip to the Family History Center for a Family Home Evening hosted by our Stake Family History Director.  We learned about using https://familysearch.org, the importance of recording family stories, and we shared stories from our family histories.  I'm glad that my blog counts toward recording my family's history!  I hope that my children will be able to read through these posts when they are grown and have fond memories of their childhood, and be able to see what we were like when we were young.

On Tuesday, I worked from home so that Arlo and I could attend Helen's Kindergarten celebration.  They had a cute little performance with singing and then each child was presented with a certificate and the teacher read a poem that their families had supplied the details for.  Afterward there was a slide show, and cake, and my favorite part, I got to bring home Helen's kindergarten memory book which had page after page of the most adorable art work that she made this year!  I brought both girls home with me and we stopped for an ice cream to celebrate.  In the evening I made some thank you cards for the girls' teachers, even though I know that I could never thank them enough for all they did for my girls.

 

 The girls had field day on Wednesday and were excited for the end of the year activities.  As luck would have it, I ended up home on Thursday.  I purposefully picked out the outfits for the girls that they wore on their first day of school so I could get comparison photos.  It is amazing how much they've grown, matured, and changed in the last nine months.  It was only a 1/2 day, so they were home again by 12:30 and we enjoyed time in the backyard with the sprinklers.  We also had "last day of school brownies".  We've been spending a lot of time outside and the garden is doing so well.  We've harvested many a salad from our spinach, lettuce, and beet leaves.  The spinach and lettuce had finally started to bolt and become bitter, so we pulled it all up and fed it to the chickens...who were in chicken heaven.  We've also been getting peas and green beans, which the girls eat right off the bushes in the backyard, I love it!

 

 Thursday night we had pizza and a movie, Felicity chose "Freaky Friday".  We ate popcorn and candy and cuddled on the couch together.  I was also home Friday, so we spent time coloring, playing with friends, and building with Legos.  Our new summer babysitter came over to go over the schedule and the rules, etc.  In the evening, the kids went with their dad, and I had a girls camp meeting, but after that it was pretty much me at home alone.

So this is the part of the story where I admit that there are some weekends where I don't have kids and am not terribly productive.  The house was clean, the groceries were bought, and my home was very quiet and empty.  I watched a movie, wrote in my journal, and went to bed early.  It's nights like that when a date would be nice, but alas, no such luck.  I've dabbled in online dating a bit and have been out a few times on dates.  I determined on my trip to Montana a couple months ago, that a platonic relationship is what existed there. One of the LDS sites I tried sends me five suggestions daily and to be completely honest the suggestions I've gotten lately look like they could also be on America's Most Wanted's website. Sigh. 

 Saturday I went for a run and tried to improve my 5K time in preparation for a run I'm doing with some girlfriends on Monday.  It was hot out, but a good run just the same.  I did some gardening and milled about the house for a bit.  It was a pretty uneventful day.  I think my trip to WalMart for a white running shirt was the highlight!  Sunday morning I picked up the kids and we had a nice time at church.  Arlo is slowly getting better at sitting through Sacrament meeting, especially if he sits on my lap and falls asleep!  The girl's have certainly gotten better about sitting reverently. 

My Sunday School class was good, we were studying the beginning of the life of Moses and had a pretty good learning session around ancient midwifery.  I know...only in one of my classes!  One of the boys (they're eleven year olds) said "Sister Davidson, I'm glad you seem to know where the "Too Much Information" line is and get really close but never cross it".  I had a good snicker!  After church we went to Nana and Papa's for ribs and family time.  We had a lot of fun, I'm so thankful for them! 

I'm really hoping that next week goes smoothly for the new babysitter and the arrangement works out for all of us.  I'm excited for my 5K run tomorrow and to have another day off to get things done.  I really wish I could find a way to be independently wealthy so I could just never worry about work again!

18 May 2014

 

This week was exactly what I needed it to be!  It was relatively relaxing and free from  an abundance of stress.  We had our Family Home Evening, strangely enough, on how to teach a Family Home Evening lesson.  Since Felicity has started Activity Days, she has also started the Faith in God program.  One of the Learning and Living the Gospel achievements is to teach a Family Home Evening lesson on the first vision.  We went over some good ways to teach something we know.  We talked about using the scriptures, telling the story in our own words, using pictures, using videos, and closing with our own feelings or testimony of the subject.  I love that because of the church my children are given opportunities to prepare and teach lessons as well speak in public from a very early age.

On Tuesday I ended up having to stay home with Helen who woke up with a stomach bug.  She was quite sick in the morning and then seemed better in the afternoon.  I had promised to pick up a friend from an out patient surgery and after doing that Helen said she was hungry, so I got her something to eat before we headed home.  Well that was a mistake because I ended up cleaning up what little of it she did eat from off of her and the seats and the car seat when it came back up.  I'm grateful that she was pretty docile and spent most of the day on the couch so that I could get some work done.  It's only May and I've already used a significant portion of my paid time off with sick kids.

Friday was hat day at school, so the girls chose to wear their Minnie ears from Disneyland.  It was my off-Friday, so I took them to the book fair at school before class and since the books were buy one get one free, I let them each pick out two.  Everyone needs more books!  Speaking of which, we are loving the Voyage of the Dawn Treader and are almost half way through!  Arlo and I cleaned and did laundry and grocery shopping before the sisters got home from school so that we had a very nice evening.  We played Legos and in the evening had pizza for dinner and watched a movie.

Saturday we played around the house and at about noon we left for Sierra Vista.  A friend of mine from high school and I became reacquainted through Facebook a few years ago and have enjoyed catching up.  Over the past few months I was excited that she began asking questions about my faith.  I had shared some Mormon Messages with her via Facebook when I felt inspired and I have been very grateful that she felt comfortable running some of her thoughts and questions by me.  I shared my testimony and tried to answer her questions and concerns honestly and even invited her have the missionaries over.  A couple of weeks ago she told me that she had made the decision to be baptized, so obviously I was elated to be with her for her (and her daughter's) special day!  

I hadn't been down into Cochise county for awhile and we enjoyed the drive while we listened to Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll on CD.  We enjoyed the baptism, although Arlo was a bit of a handful because he slept much of the ride down and was tired of sitting still.  We attended a luncheon at her house afterward and had such a nice time.  I was so glad to see that she already had a loving ward family; so many people came to support them in their decision.  I was utterly honored to have played a very minor role in such a great thing!

When we got back into Sahuarita in the evening, we were still satisfied from the luncheon so we only picked up popcorn and candy for our weekly family movie night.  Felicity also wanted to spend some of her birthday money, so we perused the toy section of Wal-Mart, briefly, where she picked out some Legos, a new favorite at our house.  We watched Home on the Range and by the end I somehow managed to have all three kiddos on my lap.  I love them so!

We had a very nice Sabbath and enjoyed our meetings.  We had dinner with Nana and Papa after.  We are anxiously waiting for the arrival of summer break.  The kids are excited for less strict screen time rules and looser bedtime schedules.  I'm looking forward to having more time with them.  I hope everyone has a fabulous week! 

11 May 2014: Mother's Day

 Happy Mother's Day!  It was a relatively peaceful week, and I'm grateful for that.  On Tuesday I took a couple hours off in the morning to accompany Helen's kindergarten class on their field trip to the International Wildlife Museum.  I love going to the museum, it was somewhere my Nana took me when I was little often and I have many fond memories of being there with her.  We had a small group of three girls and I talked their ears off!  They should now be able to distinguish between male and female butterflies and birds, the difference between crocodiles and alligators, the difference between antlers and horns, be able to tell a butterfly from a moth, the hunting patterns of felines vs. canines, and be able to tell what an animal eats based on its dentition.  They also learned the words diurnal, camouflage, homologous, and one of my favorites, scat!  To be honest I was so proud of Helen when we were looking at the scat exhibit and one of the girls said "it's poop!" and Helen corrected her and said, "actually, its called scat".  I'm hoping they walked away having learned something new.  It felt good to get out from behind the computer and talk about things that I'm passionate about.

On Wednesday Felicity got to participate in the Activity Days recognition night.  They had a talent show and Felicity painted a watercolor to display.  It was a nice little event, Felicity is really loving being able to participate with the other girls her age, now that she's 8.

 Arlo is still having trouble sleeping in his own bed.  I resorted to putting a lock on his door, mostly to make sure that he doesn't roam the house in the middle of the night.  The first night with the lock (a chain lock) Arlo used his hand from the other side of the door to lift the chain.  The second night I moved the lock to the top of the door.  15 minutes after putting him to bed, he appeared in the kitchen where I was doing dishes.  I put him back in his room, locked the door, and waited.  Evidently he climbed up onto the changing table and used a fishing pole toy to lift the lock.  Sigh, he ended up sleeping either in my bed or in the sister's bed.  We'll keep working on it.

The girls came home with cute gifts from school for me for Mother's Day.  I love the framed photo of Helen with her hand print and poem.  Her teacher really goes above and beyond.  Felicity made a chore coupon book.  She really made it convincing that it was a gift for me from the heart when she said "yeah, I don't like any of the chores it says I'll do".  

 The kids went to spend the weekend with their dad since he needed to change the weekends.  I cleaned and did my grocery shopping, nothing exciting.  Saturday morning I met Jeff and my Sister-in-law at Park Mall to get a picture of the grand kids as a gift for my Mom.  Well, Arlo was utterly uncooperative and I have no idea why.  So, needless to say, we didn't get a good shot of the kids; it was a little disappointing.  Saturday afternoon I helped a friend sew a cover for a porch swing cushion.  I did laundry on Saturday too and spent the evening folding it and putting it all away...all very boring!

I woke up Sunday morning, and it was honestly a little bit sad.  There were no kids in the house, no breakfast in bed, or flowers, or cards.  I went to pick them up around 11 and was happy to hear that they had a really good visit.  Felicity told me that she got to spend all day with just Dad on Friday and Saturday.  We went to church and my mom came with us to Sacrament meeting.  The girl's sang, well, Helen was confused and I don't know where she was standing and if she even sang.  Felicity was up front, but stood their rubbing her eyes not singing.  Alas, kids are so unpredictable!  After church we went to my parents and had a really nice dinner and I was glad to relax and visit.

I'm so grateful for my mom and her influence on my life.  I'm grateful for the opportunity I have to be a mother.  I'm trying everyday to be worthy of the great blessing it is to be a mother.  I really enjoyed this video on motherhood this year and felt the Spirit strongly when watching it and contemplating Heavenly Father's plan for us on earth.  Life doesn't come with a manual, because it comes with a mother.  Happy Mother's Day!

And just for fun...

4 May 2014: Felicity's Baptism

I am exhausted.  I tried to "catch up" on my sleep this morning, but am still pretty tired from a hectic week!  I'm looking forward to a normal week with nothing big to plan or prepare for.  I think my next event is planning the Stake girl's camp certification day later this month.

I had a good week at work.  Toward the end of the week, I had a meeting with my supervisor and got word that not only did a get a raise based on my last years performance, but that I also had received a promotion.  I moved up a pay grade and had a slight change to my job title.   I'm very thankful for this blessing, which will have a significant impact on our finances.  I feel so blessed to be able to amply care for my family, especially while I do it on my own.  If I ever feel down because of my situation and some of my thus-unfilled righteous desires, I think to these tender mercies that I receive daily.  Some are larger, like a raise and promotion, some of them are so small, but noticed and appreciated none the less.  I believe strongly in counting your own blessings, not envying the apparent blessings and talents of others.

A couple of girls who love out of dress code days

I had a really packed week with Felicity's baptism on Saturday.  I finished sewing a dress for her to go into the water in, and I made her the cutest little Scripture tote.  I also had this hair-brained idea to use my fancy cake stand for the luncheon, but it required that I make three cakes.  So I had three cakes to bake and decorate.  Then there was house cleaning, food preparation, and a lot of other things.  I was very fortunate that my sister-in-law volunteered to decorate for the luncheon and she did a lovely job.  I had all day Friday to work on things and enjoyed time with Arlo.  We went into Tucson to buy Felicity her first set of scriptures and then stopped by Chipotle for lunch.  Nana came with us, and she likes to get the guacamole with chips and Arlo discovered that he loves guacamole!

This also happened to be the last week of my six week fitness challenge.  I don't have all the stats in yet, so you'll have to wait until next week to see how I fared and how many of my three $50 gift cards, if any, I get to keep!   I will tell you that as of this week I weigh less than my 16 year-old driver's license said I weighed in 1996; and yes, I did wear the dress from senior pictures to Felicity's baptism.  It was something I hoped I would do some day, but didn't really think possible.  Now to be honest, it didn't fit perfectly, but I was proud of myself.  I hope that I can keep up some of the momentum and get the last 18 pounds off to hit my goal.  Once I get to goal I'm going to do some toning before I head into maintenance, because, lets face it, I have some wobbly bits that need help finding where they really belong.

So Felicity's big day came on Saturday, and I was pleased with how smoothly things went.  The kids and I arrived early, but I didn't have anyone to help me with Arlo right away, so I didn't get as many pictures as I would have liked.  There were seven kids from our stake being baptized, three from our ward.  We got to go back to the font first, so that was nice.  Felicity chose our dear friend, Victor Bryson, to baptize and confirm her, and her uncle Chris and psedo-uncle Landon were the witnesses.  She did great!  We snapped up the bottom of the dress I made her (so it wouldn't float up) and had practiced plenty, so that when she went down into the water she was ready.  She went all the way under and came up with a huge smile on her face.  I was so proud of her.


I was honored to give a talk about the Gift of the Holy Ghost after the baptisms.  I retold the story from Matthew chapter 3 of Jesus being baptized.  I talked about the difference between the influence of the Holy Ghost that everyone can feel from time to time and the gift of the Holy Ghost.  I used a traffic light as an analogy to the Holy Ghost and how He helps us, an idea I borrowed from this sugardoodle blog post.  I talked a little bit about how we can only expect to exercise the gift of the Holy Ghost if we are worthy to, quoting from 2 Nephi 26:11.  I ended with my testimony of the Holy Ghost and how listening to and obeying the whisperings of the Spirit will lead and direct our lives in happiness and bring us joy and peace in this life.  In the end I quoted again from Matthew 3:17, reminding the children that if their Heavenly Father were standing in the room He would say to them, just like He said to Jesus: "this is my beloved son [daughter] in whom I am well pleased".  I think it went well and hope that all three of them will remember what a privileged it is to have the Gift of the Holy Ghost and exercise it daily.

After the talk, they were each confirmed and received a special blessing.  Felicity was blessed to be a good example to her younger siblings and also to her parents.  She was blessed to be able to remember her baptism day and recall the special feelings she had.  She was also blessed to be able to exercise faith in Christ and use the Holy Ghost to help direct her life.

We had lots of family and friends over to the house for a luncheon afterward to celebrate.  It was great to see so many people come to love and support Felicity in her decision to be baptized.  I only wish that I had gotten more pictures!  We missed those that couldn't make it for various reasons.  It was nice to share my ward family with my family.   In the evening, after everyone went home and I cleaned up a bit, Felicity and Helen and I finished reading Prince Caspian and so we watched the movie for family movie night.  We had to fast forward through some of the battle scenes because they were too intense/violent.  Felicity was a little dissappointed that some of her favorite characters didn't make it into the movie and that there was plot added to the movie that wasn't in the book, and plot removed from the movie that was in the book.  Welcome to what the rest of us who love reading and watching movies endure!

Sunday was peaceful and quiet.  Felicity got to wear her special baptism dress to church and the Bishop called her up to the stand to give her a picture of the Savior for her room.  She also fasted for the first time today.  She picked a special reason to fast and was ready to give up at 10:30, but I kept telling her to try for 10 more minutes, and before we knew it, it was time to go to church.  She fasted for both breakfast and lunch and was very excited to break her fast when we got over to Nana and Papa's for dinner.  I pray that she's blessed for her willingness to sacrifice, it was a very selfless thing she wanted to fast for.

I feel so incredibly blessed.  I'm grateful for Felicity and her example to me and to the other children.  I'm grateful that I can raise them in the Gospel and give them what I believe to be the best foundation for a happy, productive, satisfying life of joy and service.  I can hardly feel slighted that I didn't have many of the same opportunities by knowing that my children will have them all because of the choice I made to follow the example of my Savior, and my choice everyday to continue to keep the covenants I've made.