Grateful Friday

I'm grateful for adult children.  I hung out with Emma a little last night and talked to Braeden on the phone (seeking help for data analysis--why is this my life?!?).

Adult children are pretty great.

I was talking to my friend, Jenn, at the ward party and we were talking about grandchildren and she said, "They just keep getting better, the older they get, just like our kids."

I agree.  The only trouble with adult children is when they move to California.

I'm grateful for Adam.  We're planning a quick trip to Nevada, just because.  I like spending time with that kid.

I'm grateful for my teacher team.  We sent about 30 text messages yesterday about a team t-shirt.  You know, priorities.

I am looking forward to a new school year.

I'm grateful for the steady progress I'm able to make on my degree pursuit.  Chipping away, always chipping away.

And I finished the basement!  (I mean, it was finished.  I finished organizing and cleaning it.)

Crashing reality

 Last night at our ward 24th of July party, I chatted with my friend Cortney.  I said something like, "How's your summer going?"

She said, "Fast.  We only have three weeks left."

She was right!  Three weeks from today is the first day of school!

I knew that but I didn't know that!

Usually by this point in the summer, all my brain is pointed toward school and this year my thoughts have been elsewhere and it has snuck up on me.

I told Adam this morning about my dream, "I didn't have any desks.  I was at school and there were no desks.  It was after lunch and I needed to go get my class but I was doing other stuff.  I wasn't ready at all."

Adam said, "I like how you didn't notice until after lunch that you had no desks."

My point exactly.  I don't feel ready!

On the rock our mothers planted

Firm as the mountains around us,

Stalwart and brave we stand

On the rock our fathers planted

For us in this goodly land—

The rock of honor and virtue,

Of faith in the living God.

They raised his banner triumphant—

Over the desert sod.

 

Today is Pioneer Day around here and I love it.  I grew up in the Great Basin and have pioneer ancestors so the 24th of July matters to me.  (It was barely a blip for Adam growing up in the Pacific Northwest and here I thought the whole church was having parades and ward parties.)

We're having parades and ward parties in Utah County.

I appreciate my ancestors who came here and set down roots and built something that I can benefit from.  

They were strong women who did good things.

We don't have to vanquish the same kinds of dangers, but my fellow sisters in Zion are here working together vanquishing all the same.

And these are strong women who do good things.

Emails and texts are flying about school. I work with the best women.

"Come to a BBQ at my house."

"I'll provide the burgers for the BBQ!"

"I'm going to make everyone a t-shirt.  What size?"

"Could anyone use this?"

They. Are. Amazing.  I would have crossed the plains with them.

One of our neighbors, Vickie, had a baby shower last night for another neighbor who none of us had met.  If you want something done well, ask Vickie.  She dropped off a cute invitation but also texted several times:  Hope you can make it!  

She wanted us to show up for our neighbor.  Forgetting was not an option.

I had ordered a gift from Amazon, but it did not arrive on time, so I went to Walmart yesterday afternoon to buy a gift.  I ran into Terri.  She was buying stuff for Girls Camp.  She is the leader and that almost (but not quite) makes me want to go.  Everything Terri does is top-notch.

In the baby section, I was pondering what to get for someone I know zero about.  I saw Jenn there.  She's another neighbor.  I said, "Are you here for the same reason as I am?"

She said yes.  She showed me the cute pink baby clothes she had picked out.  She wished me luck on my search for a gift and showed me again what she had.  "Don't get these!" she said.

The baby shower was lovely.  All the women except a few from our street and  three from the perpendicular street were there.  We got to know the soon to be new mother and she is very sweet.  

We decided when it is cooler we will have another neighborhood BBQ.  

When Adam was growing up, he said it was hard for him to get excited about the desert sod.

I love the desert sod and especially the people who live here with me.

My notebook runneth over

 I have one of those basic 70 page spiral bound notebooks that I have been using for my coursework this summer.

Friends, I am on the last page.

As in, I need a new notebook.

I wouldn't say I'm a copious note taker, but I am a note taker.  I like to write my notes more than type them because my brain connects to my handwriting.  Sometimes if I need to figure something out, I just need to write.

Adam acknowledges that I've done a lot of work this summer, but this morning he said he was kind of surprised by how fast I was going because he was comparing it to his master's degree.

Like I told him, no one is going to mistake a master's degree from Yale with a master's degree from WGU.

Still, it's been a lot.  My notebook is full and so is my brain.  I'm getting closer plus getting closer to school starting so I feel some urgency, but it's OK.

I have other notebooks.  And maybe I have more brain power?  Somewhere?

Weekend

 I met my friend Shannon for lunch on Friday.  It was such a nice time!  Meeting friends for lunch is one of the absolute pleasures of adulthood.

Her sister and brother-in-law happened to be having lunch in the same restaurant and Shannon and I must have been having an intense conversation because her sister texted, "What are you talking about?"

Pretty much everything.

Menopause, crashed hopes and dreams, being let down by family members, church callings, some of the lovably wacky people in our ward, living in Pleasant Grove, movies we'd seen, Channing Tatum's unfortunate hairstyle in Fly Me to the Moon.

She wasn't going right home so I took her leftovers home to my fridge and she stopped by later to pick them up.  Two Shannon sightings in one day!  We commented on how fun it had been to have lunch and Shannon said, "We have to do it again.  Maybe...next summer?"

Summer is all I've got and it's nice to have friends who get it.

I worked more in the basement Friday and Saturday.  It's a whole undertaking.

Saturday morning at 8:00 AM a guy came to give us a quote on some tree removals.  We were dressed to go to the temple and I asked, "Are we the most overdressed people you've ever given a quote to for tree removal?"

He said no.

It is Utah County after all.

I wore my grandma's small pearl earrings to the temple which I have done ever since I got them.  I love taking a little memory of her with me.

The rest of Saturday was taken up with work in the basement and a call with my WGU course instructor.  Mark came over to go through all the video game stuff.  He knew and I knew that I would throw it all away if he didn't.

It's nice to have leverage.

We took Mark to dinner at Bombay House in Provo which is oh so good.  Adam and I stopped at Harmon's on the way home and found some gluten free hamburger buns that might be Mark's new favorite.  (None of them are good, but they are the least bad.)

I taught Sunday School on Sunday and after church and a few appointments for Adam, we zipped to Salt Lake to attend sacrament meeting with Emma.  She is the newly minted choir director and they were performing for the first time.  I loved everything about her church.  The actual building was amazing.  It was built in 1902 in the Avenues and surrounded by huge shady trees.  The talks were good and people were very friendly (including but not limited to Emma's bishop's wife who is a 2nd grade teachers working on her master's degree from WGU in curriculum and instruction this summer.  We compared notes!)  Also, the choir director:  top notch!

We had our kids, Liberty and Nikki, and Clarissa over for dinner.  It was a farewell to Clarissa who is moving to the East coast.  We had a lovely time.  I gave an abbreviated version of my lesson, we played Snake Oil (and I laughed until I cried) and roasted s'mores.

It was a busy, but nice, weekend and now, on to a hopefully busy, but nice, Monday!

Grateful Friday

I am feeling grateful for people today.  Three in particular.

I emailed Matt for advice with my research project.  He sent back this:

 I am coaching a soccer tournament today and tomorrow. I can call between stuff.

Sure enough, he called me.  He was very helpful like I knew he would be.  There was a certain amount of, "Wait, let me write this down!" on my part.  I'm grateful he is my principal.

In the gaps of my day yesterday, I tried to bring some civility to our basement.  (It will take more time than that!) I was sorting through some books and a bookmark fell out of a book that I must have put there decades ago.  Marianne had written on the back and I think sent it to me when she was serving as a missionary:

She is not the older sister I deserve, but I will always be grateful she is the older sister I got.

I can't imagine a more capable, exemplary and kind person to try to be like when I grow up.

And then there's Adam.  I'm always grateful for that guy.

Yesterday when he was getting ready for work, I asked, "Can I talk this over with you?"

I started talking to him about my Sunday School lesson and he said, "Oh, I thought it was going to be your research project."

He's my go to for all kinds of can-I-talk-this-over-with-you situations.  It's nice to have a smart guy around who is willing to listen.

Mixing it up

 Yesterday was a different sort of day.  I mean, it wasn't that different, but time not spent in my office in front of my computer is novel and welcome this summer.

We had all the youth over for yard games and s'mores so I went to the store for some reinforcements.  I bought a few classroom things.  

I took my laptop to the library and found a little quiet corner and worked a few hours.  I got majorly distracted by the half price book sale they were having.  I got 11 books for $4.25.  Two were for my classroom, four were for QE and the rest were for me.

Is there anything better than buying a whole armful of books for under $5?

This book set me back a quarter and those are two of the places I loved most when we went to France.  It was written in 1913 and is the author's reaction to going there.

I have no idea if it will be interesting, but I was willing to take the 25 cent risk.

It ended up being a great evening.  We had about 25 kids here and 10 adults.  We had corn hole and ladder golf and bocce ball set up.  Some kids played on the trampoline and some sat on the grass and some kids brought their own yard games to play.

People roasted s'mores and a big melted marshmallow splatted on the pavers and Adam and I didn't care at all.  There is absolutely nothing precious about our yard and I'm glad.  I was more worried about boys getting stabbed by thorns as they dove into bushes to get a frisbee than I was about the bushes.  If these bushes can withstand the deer and wild temperature swings here, they can take about anything.

I guess I don't need to tell you.  I'm back at my desk today.