23 September 2018

We had a crazy busy week.  It was our last week of class before fall break and our vacation.  I ended up working, between this week and last 30 hours of overtime.  I was in the office late on Monday and we played a board game when I got home for Family Home Evening.   

On Tuesday we picked up our compost and dropped off our eggs and then headed to the church for activities.  I was helping out in Helen’s Activity Days group where the girls were dressing up and reenacting scripture stories involving strong women.  They had such a great time.  Felicity had mutual, and after that I drove Arlo and Helen home and then returned to church to pick up Felicity. 

 We had some unexpected rain on Wednesday and as it turned out, it was quite a bit.  I drove home to get the kids off the bus and the washes were just starting to run.  I had to go back into the office after dropping them off.  I worked until 9ish and by then the rain had caused some significant flooding and road damage; I had to pick up my dad’s truck to get back home as not only was Sahuarita road a mess, but our actual road was impassable.  I wouldn’t have made it home without the truck and would have been stranded at home on Thursday if I didn’t have it.  There were a couple of cars stuck along Mann more than a mile from our place.  Luckily some of our neighbors were out in their tractors trying to get it at least safe to drive down in trucks. 

 I worked late again on Thursday and had to miss Helen’s fifth grade musical performance.  I hear it was really cute.  I also had to miss Felicity’s honor’s assembly on Friday morning where she received a high honor roll recognition.  I was able to come home at my normal time on Friday and got the kids off the bus, but ended up working from my home office until 9 getting everything ready so that I could check out for a week.  Helen worked on completing her Hunter Safety online course work on Friday and took her first practice test.  I had her signed up for a field exam on Sunday morning, but was mercifully able to move it to later in October. 

Saturday morning Helen and I went shooting with my dad in preparation for her Hunter Safety Field exam.  She did great and we had fun, but had to make it home early so that we could get everything at the house ready for us to leave on vacation, including getting the animals all squared away and meeting with the young lady who was coming out to look in on them while we are gone.  I felt like I had a pretty good handle on everything by late afternoon, although hadn’t started packing at all.  I had a dinner date with some girlfriends in Tucson in the evening and had a really nice time.

 Saturday night, when I got home I noticed a post to our neighborhood Facebook page about a missing white cat.  A neighbor was asking if anyone was missing a white cat, they had one on their porch that was injured.  I met with them and sure enough it was Henry and it looked like he’d escaped a coyote attack.  He had a puncture to his upper thigh and there was some blood, but I couldn’t really tell what else was damaged.  I got him home and decided to see if I could clean him off and bandage him up, although admittedly I was annoyed since we were leaving on vacation on Sunday and wouldn’t be able to get him antibiotics.  He let me give him a bath even though he was obviously in a lot of pain.  Sweet Henry didn’t growl or try to scratch me or anything.  I could tell while I was bathing him that his leg was broken.  So with tears of frustration I made the decision to drive him to the 24 hour vet…for the second time in his life.  I honestly thought about just putting him out of his misery, but I couldn’t do that not fully knowing if he could be helped.  I love that stinker after all.  They got him right in and medicated him and then she wanted me to put up a $500 retainer for exploratory x-rays and tests.  I asked that they just do one x-ray, and I could make a decision from there.  So they did and when she showed me the x-ray it was clear that he wasn’t attacked by a coyote.  Someone had shot him and part of the pellet was still in his leg and his leg at the knee was completely shattered.  I was shocked.  Two weeks ago I posted a picture of Henry to our neighborhood site and explained that Henry was friendly and I suspected he was playing house cat at other people’s houses (since he’d disappear for a couple days to a week and then would come home well fed and happy).  I said that if he was bothering anyone to let me know and I would come get him.  So I was heartbroken that someone for fun or out of annoyance shot my sweet boy.  My two options were to have his leg amputated and keep him as a house cat or to put him down.  I made the hard decision to have them euthanize him.  I may talk tough about my animals serving a purpose on the ranch and not being “fur babies” but I will be honest, I cried.  The vet staff was very sweet.  I left Tucson at around midnight.

I let the kids know what had happened in the morning and they got out early and dug a grave under one of the mulberry trees in the front and decorated the little cardboard coffin the vet sent him home in.  I love living where I live.  Almost all of the neighbors I have interacted with have been great people who care about each other.  I have a pretty good idea of who did it, seeing as Henry would not have been able to get far on a completely shattered leg and I know where the neighbor who rescued him lives, but I doubt I will go say anything.  It was a lesson to my kids that we have to think through our actions and fully understand their consequences.  Someone shot a cat that was in their yard, but it caused him a lot of pain, it cost me a lot of money, it meant the loss of a loved cat and great mouser, and it damaged neighborly trust.

 After getting Henry buried we were able to pack for our trip and my mom came by around noon to pick us up.  She rented an Expedition and we set off for Anaheim after picking up lunch in Sahuarita.  We listened to an audio book and the kids were pretty good at keeping themselves occupied.  We ended up getting to our hotel around 9PM, just in time to see the fireworks over Disneyland.  

16 September 2018

Come on fall break, we're ready!  Hurry up!  Alas, we still have another week to get through.  Felicity had her last cross country meet and it was another scorcher!  She didn't end up qualifying for the regional meet, but she stretched herself and completed a good season and I am proud of her.  We had Family Home Evening after her meet when we got back home.

 I worked several hours of over time this week to use in lieu of PTO when we go on vacation.   I'm grateful for the flexibility I have with my time and PTO.  I NEVER have PTO left at the end of the year, and this year is no exception, so I'm trying to use the last little bit sparingly.  I should set a goal to roll at least one hour into next year...that would be a first for me!  The kids had half days on Thursday and Friday and got to go with Nana to a carnival at Copper Canyon where my grandpa Gene lives.  They had a great time and it meant I could get in my full ten hour day without having to come home to get them off the bus.

On Friday afternoon I had Helen and Arlo's parent-teacher conferences.  They went really well and I was especially impressed with Arlo's teacher.  She has been so good with helping him manage his distractedness.  She even got him a squishy stress reliever that he can manipulate at his desk or at the rug as opposed to making whatever objects are closest to him fly at each other while exchanging ninja-like dialog.  I asked her if she felt his seemingly constant distractedness was keeping him from learning and she said absolutely not.  He grasps things very quickly and finishes his work early and then gets in trouble because he's bored and finds creative ways to entertain himself.  She said that she read It's Hard to Be a Verb to the class recently and Arlo was utterly mesmerized.  He told her, "that's just like me!  I even have a squishy too!" 

Academically, he's doing so well, his grades and test scores were fabulous.  It made my mother's heart happy to hear her say what a sweet boy he is despite how difficult some of his idiosyncrasies can be when trying to manage a classroom.  She says he often leaves her notes on her desk, the last one said "Dear Mrs. Pearson, I like bugs".  Occasionally he leaves unsolicited notes for his friends, she showed me one he left for a boy named Evan that said "Dear Evan, I like to play with you.  I am glad we are friends".  She showed me a personal behavior chart she made for him to help him with his focus and at the bottom, his reward if he earned a certain number of points was "Alex Time".  I asked her, "so what's Alex time?",  to which she surprisingly asked me, "he hasn't told you about Alex?"  She explained that Alex is a little boy in Arlo's class who has multiple disabilities and who Arlo has developed a bond with.  She said Arlo takes him by the hand and makes sure he gets where the rest of the class goes, and shows him how to do the assignments they're working on and is just generally Alex's buddy.  She said that time on the playground and in the cafeteria is overwhelming for Alex so he stays in during lunch and Arlo chose staying in with Alex to read and play together quietly as his reward for a week's worth of good behavior.  She says Arlo plays well with all of his classmates and has lots of friends and playmates, but he has taken it upon himself to watch over Alex.  I walk into parent-teacher conferences for Arlo feeling like a failure as a mother because I know he's not an  "ideal, sits still, ultra obedient" student.  I prepare myself to hear that he's difficult and troublesome (although the reality is I've only had two conferences--in preschool--that were like this) and am ready with my responses of "what can I do at home to support you" and "I will continue to talk with him about my expectations for his behavior".  I walked away this week feeling like he was understood and cared about and that she was trying creative methods to help him succeed as a student in his own way as opposed to trying to figure out how to stop or change his annoying habits, his inability to sit still and focus in an obvious way.  He's learning and succeeding and better than any of that, I learned that autonomous of me or my direction, my child is kind.  He has charity towards others and is empathetic.  He's a friend and is gentle and is kind.  Maybe I'm doing alright after all.

Helen's conference went well also and there were no surprises.  She's doing well in school and her writing and spelling are the only areas where she struggles.  Her writing is truly atrocious.  She is articulate and has a wonderful vocabulary and has no  problem expressing herself, but ask her to translate that into words on paper and its not unusual for there to be tears.  Ideas on how to improve a ten-year-old's confidence in writing and for making improvements to spelling and writing conventions?  I have some work to do I think.

The kids went to visit their dad in the evening and I went into Tucson and met Leona at Udhall park where we talked and walked laps around the park.  Its great to have time with her and to get in exercise at the same time.  I was up early on Saturday morning and spent time inside cleaning and doing laundry.  I took a nice deep satisfied breath when I was done; its nice to know that my house will be perfectly clean for at least a couple of days, until the kids come home.  Saturday afternoon my friend Aubrey came over to visit and we enjoyed a really nice lunch together and spent quite a bit of time chatting and catching up.  In the evening I went clothes shopping as I was in need of some chubby clothes.  Unfortunately I'm not joking!  I just need a few basics to get me through the next couple of weeks since my everyday wardrobe has started creeping in on me.  Work should calm down, we'll get through our vacation, and I'll be able to refocus on treating my body more like a temple and less like a trash can.

I prepared my Primary lesson on Sunday morning and then headed to church.  I was pleasantly surprised to see the kids in the lobby, their dad brought them for the Primary Program.  We all quickly realized that there was something not quite right in the church building however.  The electricity was out for some reason and so we had no lights, microphone, or air conditioner.  Then, because of a combination of the Primary needing the first two pews and us not being early to the meeting, we had to sit in the overflow instead of in the chapel.  It was pretty dark, I wasn't the only one illuminating the hymn book with my phone!  We ended up having the first part of our meeting, partaking of the Sacrament, and then the children sang the songs that they  had prepared for the Primary Program.  We ended the meeting about a quarter to the hour since it was getting so hot in the chapel and because the kids couldn't really do the whole program without a microphone.  I went back to the house and took a nap, and went to pick the kids up in the evening. 

We have a lot of good things on the horizon.  I have a very busy work week coming up, but I am grateful for all the cool opportunities I've had lately.  After fall break we'll be diving head long into our most frantic time of year.  I almost have the kids' locked into their Halloween costumes so that I can start working on them and there's Thanksgiving, birthdays, and the holidays.  I love the cooler temperatures and the fun activities that the last part of the year brings.