22 September 2019

Ah, deep breath and sigh of relief…it was actually a quiet week.  School was winding down since it was the last week before fall break so nobody had any large projects or crazy homework assignments.  Afternoons found the kids playing outside or relaxing after getting homework done.  Arlo is fanatically digging holes in the yard, that’s his new favorite past time, bringing me rocks and anything else interesting he finds to admire.  I caught the girls practicing their instruments together this week, it was a bit of a funny sounding duet!

We delivered eggs, picked up compost, and had mutual on Tuesday evening.  Arlo had piano practice on Wednesday afternoon.  I wasn’t able to run during his practice because I needed to run some errands.  The middle school had their honors assemblies this week, and both girls received awards.  Felicity’s assembly was on Thursday and she received High Honor Roll, and recognition for her Principal’s 200 and Student of the Week.  I had to be in the office all week, so I missed it.  Helen’s was on Friday morning and she also got High Honor Roll and recognition for her Principal’s 200, my lovely friend Lori sent me pictures since I couldn’t be there.

All three kids had dentist appointments early on Friday morning.  I usually think of these as my bi-annual guilt trip, but they went fairly well.  Nobody had cavities and the dentist raved about how beautifully Felicity’s teeth turned out. 

Helen and Arlo went to visit their dad on Friday evening and I met my friend Leona in Tucson to go for a walk and to visit.  We walked along the new Pantano River path and quite honestly I wished I’d brought my sidearm with me!  I have gotten far too accustom to living outside of town, that or Tucson has gotten more scary since I’ve been gone.  We had dinner when we were done.  I sure do love her, I’m grateful for any time we get to spend together.

I headed outside first thing on Saturday morning and got a fair amount done before it got too hot, there’s always more to do though.  I feel like I have yard work ADD most weekends, I have a list of things I want to accomplish, but then get sidetracked along the way.  I’m watering the trees and notice the weeds that need to be pulled, I’m feeding the pig and notice his hutch needs to be fixed, I’m grabbing a tool from the barn and realize there’s feed that needs to be swept up.  By the time I’m ready to go in I can’t really pinpoint what I actually accomplished!  I did the grocery shopping and some cleaning when I was done.  Felicity and I watched a couple of movies together in the evening and did some crafts, me crocheting and her making pompom animals.

I had volunteered to be a backup Relief Society teacher and sure enough got a message Sunday morning that I was needed to fill in, so I ended up teaching the lesson in Relief Society on Sunday which I think went well; it was based on the talk Abound with Blessings by Elder Dale G. Renlund.  My fabulous ministering sisters came for a visit in the afternoon and then I had a meeting after that.  It meant that I couldn’t go with my mom to visit my grandma again this week, hopefully I will be able to go next week because I feel like it’s been too long since I visited.  We went to have dinner with my folks in the evening and visit, not having to worry about leaving early since nobody has school tomorrow.  See there, it was rather uneventful this week!

15 September 2019

I’m telling myself that next week will be far less busy as we head into the last week of school before a nice long fall break; we’ll see.  We had our final regular-season cross country meet on Monday and Felicity didn’t run, she had been having trouble with her knee all week, so she kept some stats for coach instead.  Helen ran a good race, I was really proud of her and her effort.  She made some great improvements and I think she was pleased with how it turned out. 

Arlo had a follow up appointment with the pediatrician on Tuesday morning, so I picked him up from school for that.  We adjusted his medication dosage about six weeks ago and there were no noticeable improvements to his symptoms.  It’s frustrating for sure.  His doctor said the best course of action at this point would be to increase the dose again; if we don’t see improvement she’ll consider adding a second drug.  It’s sad that the side effects of the Adderall he tried first were so sever as that drug worked wonderfully for him.  We’ll just have to keep trying and coming back for evaluation every six weeks until we get it figured out.   No one had church activities on Tuesday evening, so we had Family Home Evening instead.  Our lesson was based on Ether 2:12 and we talked about what a blessing it is to live in this nation.  We also talked about my memories of September 11, 2001 and how it changed my perspectives and our country.  We had some oatmeal raisin cookies as our treat, but didn’t have time for an activity.

Arlo had his piano class on Wednesday and I ran for 40 minutes after dropping him off.  I’ve been doing yoga nightly for two weeks and it vastly helped my strained hip flexor.  I’m able to run without pain in my hip and I’m enjoying the ability to go further for longer periods of time.  One of the things that I really like about Arlo’s piano class is the structured practices, his book tells me exactly what he should be practicing every night and it’s a variety of short tasks so that it keeps his interest and isn’t too long.  One of his practice activities this week was to play the pieces he’s been learning upside down.  He really got a kick out of that one!  He also had practice items that included teaching what he’s learning to someone else.  He taught Felicity his bug rhythms this week.

Since Wednesday was the September 11^th anniversary, I pulled out my MxPx t-shirt to wear like I’ve done every year since I got it, although this year it was just around the house as its pretty hole ridden and tattered.  I enjoyed the tributes that popped up all over Facebook like they usually do and reflected on my own experience.  I was 20 years old, almost 21 and a junior in college at the time.  I was living at home and was asleep when my mom came in to tell me that a plane had hit the World Trade Center building in New York; she and my dad watched the news every morning before leaving for work.  I got out of bed and wandered into the living room to join them in watching the news.  It was so sad to see the building smoking and all the shocked faces on the ground.  I figured that there must have been a problem with air traffic control and someone had made a fatal mistake.  Looking back that seems like a ridiculous assumption, even if a traffic controller had given poor instructions, a pilot would be able to avoid hitting a huge building.  But, non the less, that’s what I thought…man someone is going to lose their job over this!  While watching, we saw the other plane come in, live and in color; I watched that plane hit tower two and yet, still I remember thinking, there is something wrong with whoever is directing the air traffic.  Terrorism did not cross my mind.  That wasn’t a feasible option, not really a word in my vocabulary.  I don’t know why I was so naive, but I was.  I just was.  I was 14 when the federal building in Oklahoma City was bombed and I only remembered it vaguely and even then, it was a lone crazy person.  Planes hijacked by foreign extremists set to harm Americans was such an alien idea that I truly believed that it was more likely that communication to the planes had failed and the planes accidentally crashed into the buildings, two of them.  Now of course it isn’t an abstract idea, because after that day, my views have forever changed.  The University cancelled classes that afternoon and I didn’t go to campus.  I had grown up ¼ mile from the air force base and so the sounds of jets overhead was a common noise that I never paid much attention to, but in the weeks following the attack, I remember sitting in large lecture halls and the sound of jets overhead made me nervous and anxious.  I remember feeling angry and confused as days went by and there was no swift, immediate, and merciless retribution that I was sure our strong nation would enact…even more bewildered when we invaded Iraq instead.  Our world, my world, changed.  It’s never been quite the same.  I never felt worried to be in crowded places or really looked to see where the nearest exit was, I do those things now.  On September 21^st some girlfriends and I went to a concert downtown.  I looked at exits, I worried about the size of the crowd.  I bought a t-shirt that night, ones especially made in the ten days between the concert and the 9/11 attack, because I knew it would always mean something.  And it still does.  I love my country, flawed as it may be, and I'm proud to be an American.  I have more respect for how much we take our security for granted, I pray for my and my children's safety every morning.  I'm grateful for those that serve and protect us; sometimes making the ultimate sacrifice.    I won't ever forget.

I got a phone call on Thursday morning from Corona Foothills to let me know that Helen had received a Principal's 200 award.  I was really proud of her...and I may have mentioned that it took Felicity till 8th grade to get one and she managed it in the first quarter of 6th grade.  She deserved the bragging rights!  The kids had a 1/2 day and  I was able to come home early to get them off the bus. We enjoyed some time together and I appreciated a more relaxed weekday evening.

Friday was back to back crazy.  I dropped the kids off at the bus stop and headed to the temple.  After the temple I had a dentist appointment back in Green Valley.  The kids had another 1/2 day so when I was done at the dentist, I picked the kids up at the bus stop and then went to the elementary school for Arlo's parent-teacher conference.  She asked that I bring Arlo with me and she included him in the discussion.  His grades were great, all above 90% and all 3s and 4s, his benchmarks were good too, he averaged 90% in both math and ELA.  Her concerns all revolved around behaviors that would be, at the very least, greatly minimized if we could figure out his medication.  Things like an inability to sit still, not blurt out answers, read all the directions, and be organized (actually turn in the homework he completed or find his stuff at the end of the day).  Overall, it was a good conference and I'm proud of Arlo, I know he will continue to make good progress.

Felicity had the opportunity to participate in a high school band preview night of sorts.  I dropped her off at Cienega at 4:30.  I dropped Helen off at her friend Morgan's house for a movie night at 6 and then Arlo and I went back to the high school for the football game.  Felicity got to sit with the band and play some stand tunes with them...it was pretty entertaining; they have adapted some stuff we did at the UA into their stands repertoire.  Arlo and I also really enjoyed watching the game, he was so excited, and I talked him through the whole game I think he understood most of it.  Felicity got to play on the sidelines during the 1/2 time show, she had a great time.  We slipped out after half time, she told me on the way to the car how much fun she had and that she wanted a piccolo, Heaven help me!  We picked up Helen and then I dropped her and Arlo off at my parents so that Felicity and I could meet the other beehives in Gardner Canyon for a camp out.

Felicity and I got the campground a little after ten and set up my tent and got ready for bed.  After awhile Felicity moved from the big tent with the other girls back to my tent where she proceeded to try and share my twin sized air mattress.  The weather was nice and I did get some sleep, although certainly not as good as if I had been sleeping solo.  We had breakfast in the morning and then the girls cleaned up camp.  Felicity and I headed out and picked up Helen and Arlo on our way.  We worked on chores when we got home including grocery shopping and laundry and in the evening had a family movie night with pizza and some theater candy (always a hit at Two Jack Ranch).

I did not feel well overnight and worse come Sunday morning.  I rarely miss church, but we all stayed home Sunday.  It was nice and quiet.  In the evening the kids and I went to my parent's house for dinner and visiting.  We survived this week and like I said earlier am hoping for a more tame week coming up.

08 September 2019

Is it just me?  Was it the longest short week ever?  We really enjoyed our day off on Monday and hit the lake early.  I won’t lie and say it was a beautiful day for fishing, because it wasn’t.  It was hot!  We did, nonetheless find some shade and have a great time.  My patience in taking the kids over and over is starting to pay off.  I only untangled one line and only had to cut one pole out of a tree (they were both Felicity’s).  Arlo did a great job casting for himself the whole day.  Felicity caught a little sunfish and Arlo was pretty hot around the collar about it.  He was further incensed because she wouldn’t take the hook out for herself, but had me do it.  He was really frustrated when she caught another, although this time I told him he could take it off the hook.  He was unsuccessful and insisted it was “more floppy” than the first one.  He’s a character for sure. 

We had lunch when we were done and then in the evening Felicity and I went dove hunting with my dad.  He had scouted out some sites, but unfortunately the first three we went to were already occupied.  We did find a little watering hole along the power utility road between Sahuarita and I-10.  We only saw a handful of dove and none within shooting range.  It was a little disappointing.

I had another of those “my kid didn’t get off the bus” incidents on Tuesday.  This time it was Arlo who didn’t get off the bus.  I tried to chase the bus down, but that’s hard when there were a dozen cars behind the bus by the time I got out on the road.  I did eventually run one down and the driver called the school (no one had picked up when I tried earlier).  The school let us know that Arlo was in afterschool reading tutoring…the one I signed him up for last week and then promptly forgot about.  So I went to get him at 3:30 when he was done.  I picked up compost buckets and dropped Helen off at church for activity days and then picked up a pizza and Felicity and I went back to the church for mutual.  I stayed to help the young women (a combined activity) sew drawstring bags like I had with the beehives last week.  I was skeptical that it wouldn’t be utter chaos, but was pleasantly surprised by how well it went.  We didn’t finish all of the bags so Felicity and I took 40 home to complete later.

The girls had a make-up cross country meet on Wednesday and Arlo and I went out to Esmond Station for that.  Felicity had a much slower race, complaining that her knee hurt and Helen came in dead last.  She was pretty upset and teary when she finished, but her coach gave her a little pep talk.  I’m proud of her for finishing and for doing something that is hard and something she’s not excelling at; sometimes we shy away from not only doing hard things, but things we might come in last at, and I think that’s a missed opportunity for growth.  I told her she lapped everyone not running and if she considered everyone at her school, she was in the top 90%.  I don’t know if it helped, but she shook it off pretty quickly. 

We had to leave right after the girls finished to get Arlo to piano class on time.  He is having such a great experience and is really enjoying learning.  I am enjoying watching the process unfold and seeing the value in the unique way the lessons and practices are structured.  I’m looking forward to seeing how much he’s able to pick up this first year.  The girls, understandably, didn’t want to run with me, so we went and grabbed dinner instead.  Without her braces, Felicity is able to enjoy sandwiches again.  We made sure to bring one back for Arlo.

We had our weekday Relief Society activity this week and I think it went fairly well.  I dropped Felicity off with my dad to do some more hunting and then the other two kids and I went to help set up for our Relief Society Auction.  I hope the ladies had a fun time, I know I did, and I came home with a coupon for an hour long cross fit lesson (Helen was disappointed I used my points on exercise and not the over-sized brownies that were also an option).  Felicity joined us after it had gotten dark.  She was able to get one dove and my dad showed her how to clean it.  She also got several mosquito bites from sitting at a cow pond at dusk.

Work was fairly busy this week and I had to be in the office all day on Friday.  Arlo and Helen went to see their dad for the weekend and Felicity and I grabbed some Chipotle and then watched “Jaws” while we worked to complete the drawstring bags when we got home.  She was funny, jumping and screaming out the whole movie; it was entertaining!   

Felicity brought home two awards this week.  She was the 8^th grade student of the week last week and got a Principal’s 200 award this week.  She was pretty nonchalant about the whole thing, but I’m grateful my kids are good when I’m not there breathing down their necks…or I should say my girls are anyway!

Our Saturday was a combination of chores and sewing.  We worked outside for only a short time and then got the grocery shopping done.  We cleaned the house and by evening finished sewing the last of the bags.  We had made a total of 50 this weekend. 

Felicity and I enjoyed church on Sunday, less enjoyable was the flat tire we got on the way home.  A sharp rock put a gash in the tire and I had to drive it out of the wash and then for another several yards until I could find a semi-level area to change it.  Felicity and I did it in our heels and dresses and other than it taking a lot of effort to get it jacked up high enough (because of the sand and uneven dirt road) we were able to swap the flat for the spare fairly quickly.  We had a quiet afternoon.  I didn’t end up going to see my grandma since I had a 2PM meeting.  I had to drive into Tucson to pick up the kids at 5, everyone was pretty wound up when we got home; it took me a while to get everyone bathed, fed, and lunches packed for Monday.  I have a short work week next week and a couple of half days at the end, so I’m hoping it will go by smoothly!

01 September 2019

Is it almost fall?  It was such a great week, we had a lot of wonderful experiences this week.  On Monday they girls had a Cross Country meet and it was really hot, like sweat running down my back and I’m just sitting in the shade waiting for it to start.  I don’t know what got into Felicity, but she had a fabulous race.  She paced well, her stride was really open and she came in ten runners sooner than she did at her first meet.  I was really proud of her and she was really proud of herself.  Helen struggled more this race, but finished strong.  When we were done with Cross Country we headed home for Family Home Evening.  We watched a video based on a talk given by Elder Wilford Andersen called The Music of the Gospel and discussed it.  We had a really great conversation and the kids were very insightful.  We watched a movie as our activity.

Tuesday felt very chaotic.  Tuesdays usually are, but this week it just seemed so much more so.  After work I picked up Arlo and brought him home and then prepped our compost buckets.  We loaded everything up and drove to the end of the street to get the girls off the activity bus.  Helen needed to be at church at 6pm for Activity Days and I needed to feed everyone and get back to the church by 7:30 to help with a beehive activity.  We were expecting the bus at 4:25, but waited and waited.  Finally at 4:50 it showed up, but my girls weren’t on it.  I drove to the school and there was no sign of them there, so I drove back to the end of the street to wait, nothing.  I called the school and only got a message, I called the districts transportation office, only a message.  I was pretty panicked by 5:15, I called my parent’s house, but nobody answered.  I felt inspired to drive over there and thankfully the girls were on my parent’s front porch.  They’d missed the activity bus and walked to Nana and Papa’s, but nobody was there so they couldn’t call me.  I rushed Helen to the church, made our compost and egg rounds, ordered a pizza from my phone, ran everyone else home to drop off the compost, changed and grabbed my sewing stuff, picked up the pizza on the way to the church, fed my kids “dinner” in the car, and made it in time to help the beehives sew drawstring bags for a service project.  It was quite the afternoon!

Wednesday the kids had a half day and since we were up late on Tuesday evening I just let everyone sleep in and we skipped.  Arlo had piano in the afternoon and really enjoyed himself.  I was able to run during his class, I took it kind of easy since my hip is still pretty tender.   We got a lot of wind and a little bit of rain on Wednesday evening.  I noticed some roof shingles lifting in the wind as we drove to piano.  I guess I will have to get on the roof (ugh) and nail those back down. 

 I’m happy to report that our stump-tail kitten Goose is doing really well.  He hasn’t seemed bothered by missing the top half of his tail, although the piece that is fur-less and had been wound in the couch has now turned black.  It’s not infected or anything, but there is a clear line of delineation between the healthy pick stump and the rest.  I think it looks like a mummy’s finger poking out of his fur and am hoping it will just fall off.

On Thursday I had volunteered to take a meal to someone in our community who was in need, so I made that after work and then put it in the oven while I went to pick up the girls from the activity bus.  Everything was ready and hot when I got back from the bus so I loaded it up and took Felicity with me to deliver it.   I didn’t know the person we were taking it to, but had assumed it was in Corona (20min away), but it was actually in the Del Lago community in Vail, so it was more like a 40 minute drive.  We really hustled and got it there just in time.  We enjoyed a quiet evening of homework when I got home, I sure hate having to rush!

I was off on Friday, so I dropped the kids off at school and then went to the temple.  I was pleasantly surprised to see so many people there.  I enjoyed my time at the temple and then did my household chores when I got home.  Afterschool I helped Helen pack for her eleven-year-old camp out and dropped her off at the church.  I couldn’t go this year, but she didn’t seem to mind too much.  After I got her settled I took Arlo to Copper Ridge for their family movie night.  We took a picnic blanket and dinner and enjoyed that while we waited for the sun to go down.  Once it did we got to watch “Ralph Breaks the Internet” outside on the grass.  Arlo was so good, he just sat there on our blanket and watched the whole thing, there were quite a few kids that just ran around the whole time.

We had to be in Oro Valley on Saturday morning for Felicity’s counseling appointment.  Arlo and I went to the park to play and I was dressed for a run.  The walking/running track around the playground was nice, but there were parts of it that would leave me without a line of site to the playground.  So I asked Arlo, “you would never go off with someone you didn’t know, right?”  “No Mama”.  “What if a man with a dog leash asked you to help him find his lost puppy, would you help him?”  “Of course I would help him!”  I guess charity does fail some time!  “What if an older boy asked you to come in the bathroom with him because he found a squirrel in there?”  “That would be cool, maybe we could catch it”.  Ugh! So I didn’t run the path and I know what we’ll be discussing in Family Home Evening this week!  I did run on the sidewalk around the park for 20 minutes.  It was hot, but I was glad to get it done.  Felicity had a nice session and her therapist asked if I would like to schedule another when I picked her up.  I turned to Felicity and she said, “I think I’d like to do one more, but after that I’m feeling pretty confident that I can go without”.  I was proud of her and her self-awareness.  I did tell the therapist that we would probably continue appointments for Helen for a while.

I picked up Helen from her eleven year old campout and she told me all about it and how much fun she had had.  I guessed it rained on the mountain overnight and there was a lot of lightning and thunder.  She said that with all the girls in the tent it had gotten hot, so they took off the rain fly.  Then in the middle of the night it started to rain!  So everything that came home was pretty wet!  In the evening Felicity went with my Mom to see a Beatles tribute band.  She enjoyed herself and said she had a really good time. 

We had a very nice Sabbath.  I volunteered to substitute in Felicity’s Sunday school class and I wasn’t sure what to expect.  They were the best 12 and 13 year olds I’ve ever taught.  Honestly, they were quiet, respectful, and all of them participated.  It made it so much easier!  Arlo had discovered one of his teeth was loose on Saturday night and by Sunday afternoon had wiggled it out.  He was so proud of himself.  He said to me, “Mama, I know that there’s no tooth fairy, but do you think if I put it under my pillow anyway, she might come?”  That kid really wants to believe in all the fun make-believe characters that his joy-stealing mother never told him about.  Do you remember him crying when he got his rejection letter from Santa when he applied to be an elf? I told him “if she did come, she wouldn’t be able to find you because you never sleep in your bed, you’d have to actually sleep in your own bed I reckon”. 

Our intention was to camp out on Sunday evening, but torrential rain pretty much washed those plans out.  We went to my parents instead for dinner and we had microwave s’mores.  The kids were pretty disappointed.  I was grateful my trees got some more rain. I promised them we would still go fishing on Monday since we’d all be home together.