Happy days

I interrupt this not blogging about our trip to tell you this happened:

Emma texted Braeden “pic or it didn’t happen” so he texted this to us.

We COULD NOT BE HAPPIER!

Anna is wonderful and we are thrilled that she and Braeden are getting married.

Can I wrap my mind around having an engaged son?  Barely.  I love Anna though.  She is everything I could have asked for in a wife for Braeden.  She is good and kind and funny and likes the same kinds of books as I do and we are a great team in Codenames.  (So you know, all the important things.)

When we study Come Follow Me together on Sunday evenings, she has great insight.  I love Braeden and Anna together and I love how comfortable it feels to have her around.

They are planning an August wedding so I am planning an August reception.  Good thing I like planning.

Road tripping

Greetings from Santa Fe, New Mexico!

So far this trip is living up to the hype (the hype was all in my head, promising to cure everything that had ever ailed me).

Friday I was mostly morose about my frustrating job search and Adam cheered me back to good humor like he does.  We got in late to Page, Arizona.  Our first stop before the hotel though was Walmart because we had forgotten an air mattress for Mark and also I wanted to buy a road atlas.  I can look on my phone for a map but sometimes you just need to pore over a really big road atlas.

Saturday I started losing the battle with a cold I had been valiantly fighting.  So that was miserable but really a road trip isn’t a terrible place to have a cold because all you have to do is sit there and there is always something beautiful to look at.  Especially if you are going to the Grand Canyon!

When your son photo bombs you at a the Grand Canyon

We love everything there is to love about National Parks.

I have more to say (a lot), but blogging on my phone is the worst and I am only doing it for Marianne, because she asked me to.

I will add more later.

Grateful Friday

Things I'm grateful for today:

1- Birthday love from so many people.

2- Emma's BYU Women's Chorus concert.  I loved it.  I love her.

(I'm grateful Geri took some screenshots and video while she watched the livestream.)

My expressive girl with the bright red lips!  I love watching her sing.

She was chosen to be a dancer for the Mamma Mia medley the choir performed.

3- Dinner with Braeden and Anna before the concert.  Love them.

4- We leave tonight for our road trip.  I am REALLY looking forward to an entire week of nothing but Adam and Mark and Mark and Adam (and seeing Tabor's family in the mix).  I love them.

Turns out there's a lot to love in life.

This deserves its own blogpost

Yesterday I mailed in my forms for relicensing.  I. Am. Done.

It took a certain amount of angst and talking to a lot of people just to figure out the process.  I took online classes and attended a conference and volunteered and worked as an aide and substituted. But I did it!

(Every single night lately, I dream about being a teacher.)

So now, if I can get a job....

Brain break

Sometimes what I need from job search anxiety, trip planning, laundry, dishes, dinner planning, etc. etc. etc. is a look at my text messages.

Life is better when you're laughing.  My life is better when I check my text messages from these people.

Home school, continued

Mark and Adam have a pretty easy relationship.  Now that I think of it, those two have pretty easy relationships with most people.

Last night Mark lay on the couch with his feet on Adam's lap.  I love Mark completely but Adam takes it a step further and will rub Mark's feet.

Mark was telling Adam about the much anticipated (by Mark) debate in his AP world history class between capitalism and communism.  If you have ever watched Parks and Rec, Mark is a delightful mix of Tom Haverford and Ron Swanson.  He does like to treat himself, but he also is a Ron Swanson capitalist.  Anyone who loves money as much as Mark would have to be.

He was supremely disgusted in the classmates that chose to argue on the side of communism.  He was horrified that in the end, the advocates for communism won because capitalists defected to their side.

"It's the end of our democracy," he said gloomily.

I loved listening to him.  Not because I want it to be the end of our democracy, but because I love his passion and that he is learning things that are expanding his mind.  Like his brother before him, he reads the news and processes it and then discusses it (usually with Adam).  He has his own ideas and Chez Adam is a place where you can have your own ideas but you had better be ready to back them up.

They went on to talk about the report on the Mueller investigation and Mark told Adam about a new economic concept he'd learned about and then they talked about sources of energy.

I taught these kids the colors and letters and sounds.  I taught them to read and write and add and subtract.  I'm glad Adam's here to take up where I left off and push them to think deeper and express their ideas.

They all just think they're talking, but I see education happening.

We turned 46

Does that seem old?  It seems sort of old to us.  I don't know why age always surprises us.  I am amazed by how old our kids are.  I'm amazed by how old we are.  Is my brain somehow unable to process years?  I'm never surprised when it's been an hour.  I've never thought, "It's just not possible that it's dinnertime already.  Where has the time gone?"

These are the musings of a 46 year old woman.

It wasn't a particularly unusual or splashy celebration, but it was a nice day.

In the morning Adam went to referee some church basketball games in Provo. (They wanted to hire refs which begs the question of what has happened in the past?!?)  Mark went to work and I sat down at my desk to do some online suicide prevention training that I needed for my teaching license.

Adam came home and we split a cupcake from Cravings that a friend had dropped by.  Then errands. To prepare for hosting some mini missionaries (youth in our ward assigned to come to dinner and teach us a lesson).  We are having Finnish food so we went in quest of some.  We went to IKEA for lingonberry sauce and meatballs and licorice.  That's Swedish food, but also Finnish food.  We went to Pirate O's in Draper.  Mark thought it sounded like a breakfast cereal when we told him about it but it is an eclectic little store with shelves jam packed with foreign foods.  It's the kind of place we love.  We found more Finnish candy and some Finnish sourdough rye crackers.  Adam declared them perfect. (We aren't having missionaries as it turns out--but we're inviting some other Davises over for dinner--there are several in the neighborhood to choose from.)

We also swung by the grocery store and just thoroughly enjoyed our time together, like usual.

There's no one I would rather share my life or birthday with.

Mark was home when we got home.  We had originally decided to take our kids to Sam Hawk for dinner because it is the best Korean food in the world. (I'm guessing.  I've never been to Korea and I've been to about four Korean restaurants so I feel like I'm an authority on this one.)  We changed our minds though.  We didn't know where we wanted to go.

We changed our minds several times and I kept calling Braeden who was coming with Emma from Provo.  Every time, Braeden answered the phone with, "WHAT'S UP, birthday girl!"

We finally landed on Marley's which is a slider restaurant next to a big Harley Davidson store.  None of us had ever been there but we were fans!  We didn't fit in at all with the bikers there, but the food was delicious.

Mark regaled us with tales of his work day and we laughed a lot and talked over each other a lot and ate a lot.

So a successful birthday dinner.

We came home and opened gifts.  If you know me, you know I love gifts, but maybe my favorite part was Emma's cards.

This was Adam's (and Emma said,  "Maybe I shouldn't write birthday cards at 1:00 AM."):

This was mine:

Adam helped Braeden with his taxes and Emma and Mark and I played Caption This which we got for Christmas from the Jorgensens but had somehow never played together.  It was hilarious and Mark and Emma are both really good at it which was not in the least surprising, but as a result I lost.

Later we had cheesecake and Adam and Braeden joined us for more Caption This playing.  These are my people and they delight me.  That is all.

We sat down for scripture reading at the end of the night and Adam said, "This reminds me of January 2.  We are all here but there are no Christmas decorations."

It is true that the last time it was us five, it was Christmas vacation.  There's always room for more but as long as these four people are in my life, I am happy.  Forever and ever amen.