Category: Family Time

Celebrate

Do you keep a treasure box of precious notes? I have a box in my closet filled with sweet gifts and cards from my children. My favorite are the spontaneous, misspelled notes which they obviously created themselves with no editor overstepping the bounds of their devotion.

It seems that only children have the courage to try to put their love into poetry. Should it be this way? Shouldn’t we be braver as we age, matching our growing appreciation with a little bit of sentiment? I believe that mothers’ acts of love help give us the capacity to love others because they are the best messengers to carry a portion of God’s love for us.

Let’s celebrate that, and be courageous in our gestures of gratitude.

What to do?

Richard

It’s Sunday, and that usually means extra church meetings for Richard and me. But today is special because it’s a rare, unscheduled 5th Sunday.

What to do?

I think I’ll take some time and reflect about the week. It was a big week.

The mornings brought seminary, school, visitors, and a trip to Tucson for some scriptures.

The afternoons involved more school, violin teaching, a bike ride with friends, grocery shopping, cleaning, playing with friends, a birthday party, and Piano Guild Auditions.

In the evenings, we had 4 baseball games, 2 practices, 3 ballet classes, one night working with the missionaries, Scout meetings, a Young Women activity, and one night out to dinner to celebrate the end of Piano Guild auditions. We had a youth temple trip all day on Saturday.

What do all of these activities have in common?

They produced a lot of laundry, my magnum opus.

I’ve learned that doing laundry provides a special key to knowledge about my family. As I empty pockets, I discover what is important to my little people. I see who played outside on the grass enough (I don’t hate grass stains. I encourage them.) and who needs to shower more often. I see evidence of baseball feats of skill, ballet workouts, weight training, bicycling (Love those mud stains up the back of the shirts…), and dirt play (which I also encourage). I can’t say that I love doing laundry, but I take pride in doing it and caring for our clothing.

We wear many clothes and play many roles, and it was a happy family reunion on Friday when our schedules eventually collided and we all met at the restaurant to celebrate a year of piano effort. The kids were dressed up in their Sunday best. Mark’s face was probably a bit sticky from birthday party food, I looked a bit bedraggled, and Richard was clad in his work outfit.

After a Saturday evening laundry marathon, the piles of laundry are neatly folded in their baskets and they smell fresh. It was a good week and now I get to enjoy this day of rest.

I’ll choose these memories

Black light volleyball photo by Jen C.

Last week I had sad news from extended family and weird challenges sprang up around me. I felt heavy and sorrowful. On the other hand, I had good news, too, and there were opportunities for me to serve and feel needed and this made me happy.

Someday when I look back at this time in my life it will be a smudged, incoherent image because of all of the activity, but I will work to see that the good memories will rise up and be more prominent than the bad.

I will remember how Mark’s little drawings cheer me. I will remember the love I feel for the people around me, of the fun times with the Young Women playing black light volleyball and hearing them sing.

I’ll remember how I much I enjoy Richard’s dinners from the grill and chats with him during a baseball game. I’ll think of the way Timothy twirls his hair when he reads to me and how Daniel looks when he’s acting grown up and unselfish. I will remember the way the little ballerinas watch Paige sweep into the dance studio and how she smiles when Richard teases her.

I’ll remember the good people who serve my family in the community, sports, and church.

I will be grateful for a husband who lets me sleep in and remembers to kiss me goodbye every morning.

The difficult things will just serve as a counterpoint, essential in emphasizing the good and forming character, but they won’t take a prominent place on the mantel.

Now I’m going to get back to work.

10 Years Ago Today

I took Paige and Daniel to Georgetown, Texas for lunch and ice cream at the Courthouse Cafe. It was Grandma Carol’s birthday and we were celebrating, despite the fact that the birthday girl was several states away.

Yesterday Richard and I sat in church and looked up at these two kids sitting on the stand. Paige was giving a talk and Daniel was the Bishop’s messenger for the day. They’re growing up and they still have that happy light in their countenances.

Happy Birthday, Grandma Carol!

Mother Daughter Family History Night

This is what our house looked like last night. I invited the young women and their mothers to come for dinner and an evening of family history research and assistance. We’re getting ready to go to the temple next month and we are trying to prepare some of our ancestors’ names for temple ordinances.

The sister on the right was very helpful and so generous to give up an evening with her family to help us. The young woman is showing an ordinance sheet which she prepared during the evening. The names on the paper are ready for temple work.

As for our family’s work, we found the names we were looking for on census records from 1920 and 1930. Along with an obituary, we have information to lead us to many more of Cerie’s family members. We were so excited that we had Daniel join us and help us to enter some names.

I am learning how much the youth love family history and temple work.

Sabino Canyon

Richard decided he wanted us to visit Sabino Canyon this week. We had to wait for the weather to cooperate, but we finally made it today.

We bought tram tickets to give us a ride to the top of the canyon and waited for our turn.

At the top of the canyon we tried hiking a trail but it was so dry and hot and the creek was calling to us, so we decided to get our feet wet instead.

Daniel found a waterfall to climb.

There were superb skipping rocks and smooth water to test your skipping skills.

Paige counted over 20 kinds of wildflowers in bloom. It was a warmer day than we expected, but the creek made it all better.

The Birthday list

I’ve heard it said that true love is when you care for a person for who he is and not for what he does for you. However, when I take the time to look at all the good things that Richard does for our family and for me, his actions and his identity are inseparable. I appreciate him because he does so much, but I love him because of the person he has become through these acts of sacrifice.

Here are a few of the good things that I have observed Richard do over the past 8 days:

He was a merit badge counselor at a Scout event on Saturday and prepared an awesome activity with lasers.

He drove Daniel and another boy to piano rehearsals during his lunch break at the Scout event.

He prepared a talk and was a Stake high council speaker for another congregation on Sunday.

He made dinner for us on Sunday because I was busy feeling devastated about something.

He babysat while I attended a new member fireside.

He went to work each day and one night he stayed up to midnight working from home.

He drove Paige to seminary at 6:40 a.m. each school day.

He conducted Family Home Evening and gathered us for family prayers.

He attended a district Scout meeting before picking up Paige from ballet.

He attended a baseball parent meeting with Daniel.

He ate my brownies and remembered to compliment them.

He babysat while I went to youth activities on Wednesday night.

He washed the windows of the house and enlisted the help of his sons so they could learn to work.

He mowed the lawn.

He organized the garage.

He sprayed the weeds and sprayed for bugs.

He cleaned the back patio.

He chopped up branches from our thorny trees for disposal, also enlisting the sons for help.

He made a movie to show at the youth fundraiser on Friday night.

He helped set up for the youth fundraiser and donated generously.

He helped clean up the fundraiser and mopped the church cultural hall.

He tutored Paige in math for four hours on his day off and smiled about it.

He watched a romantic comedy with me for our date night.

On another night, he took me out to dinner.

He was the first to get up when he heard one of our kids vomiting in the middle of the night.

He went to church meetings which began at 6 a.m. even though he’d been up in the middle of the night with sick children.

He drove a new member to church.

He’s on his way home to take care of the sick kids so I can attend Young Women meeting.

Dear Birthday boy,
I know it's not an ideal day, but I'm sure glad you are here to
share it with me. Happy birthday, Rich. I love you.
-A

Tucson Gem and Mineral Show

The Tucson Gem and Mineral show is the place to awaken your inner child. You can see the sensational and the humble, the flashy and the fossilized. We like to go on the School Day because vendors bring out boxes of rocks for $1 or $2. We give each child $5 and they can collect quite an assortment.

This year they had Geronimo’s rifle and Wyatt Earp’s pistol on display. Mark was simply amazed (wink). We had to wait a full 5 minutes to muscle our way through all the old history buffs to get this photo.

Mark was my buddy and we sifted through a lot of rocks together to find just the right ones.

Richard came with us this year and this means we have some photos of the event. Do you like rocks? You should come next year!