Day 68 – { the price of an education }

Things are very well here. I feel incredibly blessed. Not only are my children healthy and doing well but we get to build a house. Not only do we get to build a house but it’s right next to my parents’ home, in a beautiful, quiet place. DC has a good job, we have a son serving as a missionary, we live only a few minutes from a temple. . .I could list blessings for a really long time.

Lately, though, the stress I have been under as general contractor of this house we’re building has started to kind of squash me. Unluckily I planned to wean myself off my antidepressants this summer, while there was plenty of light and the house was supposed to be done, but everything took much longer than anticipated and I am facing the most amount of stress right now, just as I am nearly off my meds completely.

The pressure includes all of the normal parts of overseeing the building of a house—hiring and communicating with subcontractors, making about a kapillion decisions, figuring out how to resolve the problems that come up nearly every day—but also the financial pressure. Without being an expert in this field, I have done my very best in designing and planning this house. I studied books and websites and thought hard and changed things around and tried always to find a happy medium between luxurious and stingy as I decided what this house would be like.

The truth is, you can’t really know what a house is going to cost, until you actually build it. Or at least you can get a good idea from bidding every single thing out and doing all the shopping in advance for all the materials and fixtures. But, by the time you’ve done all that, a year’s gone by, and most of the prices are now out of date or the materials you chose are no longer available, etc. We didn’t have a year to do that, anyway. Another huge blessing is that we’re living with my parents right now, and while that is wonderful, we know that they don’t plan on our staying for long. In fact, it’s already been more than twice as long as we told them it would be.

So I’ve tried to work quickly as well as prudently and thoughtfully. The result is that we are about 2/3 of the way through building a really lovely house. . . .and we have run out of money.

This week I realized how stuck that makes us.

We can’t go forward or backward! The plumbing and electric rough-in are nearly done. It needs wrap, which needs to be lath for stucco, since that will be our siding later on, but the roof is dried in. Way too late to back up and change the design. On the other hand, the money that is left from our private construction loan will get us about up to drywall. No drywall, no flooring, no appliances, no cabinets. It’s not going to be livable yet.

I feel like I have gotten us into the hugest mess of our lives. The only thing can compare it to is when DC failed his Level II fieldwork while we were in Fort Collins. That was a disaster. Emotionally and financially it set us back so much. DC felt truly awful. Here we had sold our house in Arkansas, moved the family across the country, gone into tens of thousands of dollars of debt, and now it looked like it might be for nothing. How grateful we are that it was only a bump in the road, and ended up being a blessing in disguise. It gave us another year in Fort Collins, a wonderful year. Exacto got to finish his senior year without changing schools again. We got to see the beautiful temple finished. DC got another year of time to try to learn this new profession that was like another language to him. It’s all working out just fine.

So I am hoping that somehow this is just another bump in our road. That it will end up being for our good. I feel like an absolute fool—that I should have realized that I was building too big / too nice of a house. But in my defense, I had a variety of estimates given me as to what it costs to build here. And the design drastically affects the cost. My draftsman made mistakes, too, that have been expensive to fix. So it’s not all completely my fault and all along I have prayed over this house, pleading with heaven not to let me make any disastrous mistakes as I took on this responsibility.

It will be rough ahead. The only solution I see is to try to find another private lender to give us just enough to finish and move in, probably leaving lots of work for us to do ourselves. This will require me to take on some part-time work or piano students (or maybe we can do fostercare? that is something I have considered several times since moving here. there’s quite a foster care crisis here in AZ). This also will require us to learn a lot of skills we don’t currently have.

I see us setting our own doors, installing our own stone veneer, building our own closet shelves, doing our own flooring and painting (at least we’ve done those before :), all the landscaping, installing sprinkler and drip systems, etc. I can see cheap or free light fixtures and appliances in this beautiful home, being grateful to have what we need until we can afford what is pretty or nice.

It’s going to be okay. Right?

I have started (out of necessity) to incorporate mediation into my daily routine. I’m already exercising and trying to eat well, and still feeling the anxiety get to me lately. So yep, meditation. I really love a Christian mediation podcast I found recently. It’s done by a hospital chaplain who uses the KJV of the Bible. It’s really beautiful and very helpful.

Today I meditated on the story of Christ asleep on the boat as the disciples start to panic with the storm threatening to overwhelm and sink them all. I have been feeling like the disciples, that this is more that I can handle, but that Christ will help me if I call to Him. Then along with my study of Pres. Uchtdorf’s talk Perfect Love Casteth Out Fear, I can see that He does not want me to be afraid. He does want to change my heart. I feel that if I look to Him and do my very best to live like Him, putting my faith in Him, that this storm too shall pass and soon we will see what this experience was for. I hope.

I am grateful for what I am learning.

Day 66–{ look to the day }

Look to the day when the world seems new again,
Morning so fresh that you could touch the sky.
The earth smells sweet and every flower looks bright
Shining in a dewy light as you wander by.

~John Rutter

This winter has been tough for me. I keep hearing that it is unusual for Fort Collins to have such long bitterly cold spells, but that hasn’t been much comfort in the midst of sub-zero temperatures and slippery roads with no snow days while fighting depression. I think for a while I even forgot that spring does eventually come. It does. Every year!

The middle of February was when work on the temple finally began. Evidently there was one more permit they had been waiting on, which had been delayed due to another large project going on in the city (a shopping mall renovation?).

We had been checking nearly every week since the groundbreaking in August, and were disappointed over and over at the lack of visible progress. A friend of mine joked, “Maybe we’re supposed to build it.” It has been tempting to get out there with a backhoe! If I only knew how to work one. :)

It was so exhilarating to drive by and FINALLY see some signs of construction beginning!

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First there were just these red flags marking something in construction language (I have no idea what, but it was exciting. :) Even though it was bitterly cold when I took these first photos, to me it felt like spring!

Doesn’t that red flag resemble a tulip? Maybe? :)

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A week later we saw that a chain link fence had been erected, trees felled and removed, and best of all, BIG MACHINERY and MOVED DIRT! Yippee!

And the next week, more trees gone, and LOTS of DIRT MOVED.

(I’ve never been so excited to see a port-a-potty in my entire life. :)

Winter was still very much present, but to see the ground broken up and change starting to take place reminded me of when the daffodil and tulip bulbs start to poke up out of the earth.

As I drove home from that first visit of seeing progress, this song was playing on my Mormon Tabernacle Choir cd.  (Couldn’t figure out how to embed a video of just the song, but follow this link to see it on YouTube – so worth it! It is gorgeous!)

I was amazed at how appropriate the words were for my feelings at that time!

Look to the day when the earth is green again,
Promise of spring after winter's sleep,
The sounds of life returning fill the air.
Music that's forever there,
For your heart to keep.

Deep in the earth lay the seed of life renewed,
Quiet and strong till the time of spring.
Life in each bud and shoot,
Life in each flower and fruit.
Look to that day when earth shall sing.

 

Thank You, dear Father, for the chance to live here and watch the building of this special place. And thank You especially for the hope and peace I feel as I see it begin.

Day 65 – { sunshine surprise }

Last Friday I woke up and performed the necessary emotional gymnastics of talking myself into getting up and facing life. I did a pretty good job, I thought, telling myself that everything was going to be okay and that after I taught piano that morning I could rest and look forward to the weekend with my Sweet Ones. I staggered downstairs with vague intentions of making a pot of oatmeal for breakfast.

DC was already in the kitchen and motioned for me to look in the family room. I turned my head and saw. . . . my sister-in-law Lori sitting up and smiling at me from an air mattress! And next to her, my brother Jofus! And in between them, adorable baby Benjamin J!!

 

 

It was a huge surprise. DC knew about it and had welcomed them late the night before. I couldn’t believe it. I was a little nervous about having company with the struggles I had been having, but DC and Lori handled nearly all of the cooking and I just let go mentally of everything else that I would have done and just ENJOYED them.

 

 

We went on to have one of the best weekends ever. . . .

 

 

A trip to the park and Benjamin’s first ride on a swing.

 

Really, really good food.

detail: Homemade ice cream (Lori’s original Key Lime Pie ice cream and Reese’s peanut-butter cup), French toast with tons of buttermilk syrup and fresh strawberries, Biscuits and gravy, Lori’s super yummy chicken enchiladas, Fruit pizza, etc.

Hyrum knit Benjamin this groovy scarf.

A trip to rural Colorado to be with DC’s brother and sister for a late Christmas get-together (already planned before the surprise :).

10 days and about 10 lbs apart! :)

 

Watching The Hobbit and playing Tapple and Ticket to Ride Europe edition

 

Going to church together and visiting the temple site

 

I could not believe how my spirits lifted having these two funny (and may I mention, nice!?) people and one very adorable baby nephew around. It felt like the sun had come back out.

 

Since then, DC has started classes again and we are completely back into the routine. And I am doing better. . .so far (may it continue and increase!).

 

So grateful for modern medicine but even more grateful. . . .

. . .for Family.

Day 64 – { eternal families, balloons }

This day turned out to be so beautiful!

Thank you so much for comments and emails on my post asking for ideas on how to remember Benjamin here in CO. We decided go ahead and try for a balloon release in front of the temple, and my sweet friend Suzie-Q offered to watch the littlies so that DC and I could go. This was an answer to prayers – I had felt like things weren’t coming together at all, and then, all of a sudden they did.

The work we did in the temple was so healing and strengthening. We helped to seal families together – husband to wife, son to parents, daughter to parents – people who are deceased who never had the chance to receive those blessings in this life. It was such a special, heavenly morning. One tender mercy was that in our group was an older couple who had lost twin girls in 1981. The mother was so compassionate to me, sharing some beautiful stories that I now hold close to my heart.

 

 

We were even able to go and meet Exacto and Fluffy in the temple baptistry – their faces were bright as we came out with them, even radiant.

I left the temple rejoicing that Heavenly Father has made a plan for families to be united eternally, and also wanting very much for our family to have more peace and harmony so that we can feel Benjamin with us more often.

 

Suzie-Q met us there with Hummer and Rosebud, and my awesome sister-in-law Daniela came over on very short notice with her Italian mother and the two sweet little ones. And so the celebration commenced, at the Denver Temple instead of Pinecrest Cemetery in central Arkansas.

We all wrote notes on the balloons and then sang Happy Birthday.

 

As we released the balloons we sang I Am a Child of God. Then we watched them until we couldn’t see them any more. Hummer lay out flat on the grass and watched the very longest.

 

I think of the temple as a bridge between heaven and earth. It really was a perfect place to sing to Benjamin and celebrate his place in our family -- which hopefully will be forever, if we can just be faithful now!

Tomorrow we’ll celebrate his “real” birthday, but I am so grateful for the beautiful day we had today at the Denver Temple.

Day 62 – { breaking ground for a temple of God }

The evening before the groundbreaking (8/24) DC and I went to the temple site as part of our date. It had been announced over the pulpit that once ground had been broken, the public would not be allowed on the site until the Open House.

I have fond memories of visiting “Pinhead Hill” in Snowflake just after the temple was announced for that site in 2000, and I still have a rock I picked up from there that is special to me. I really, really wanted to go and see if I could find a rock at the temple site here and to walk on the ground there one last time before I would only be able to watch from a distance.

Everything was set up and ready, and a few members were there making sure everything was still okay what with the rainish weather.

I couldn’t find a single rock. :) But I did take some dirt from the mound you can see in that picture. One of the people there said he heard that that spot is where the Celestial Room will be.

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We were so excited the next morning! We had to be very early because DC was serving as an usher and they were having a meeting beforehand. I planned for us to watch the groundbreaking broadcast at the nearby church.

When DC’s usher-meeting was over he came to us with extremely welcome news: we were invited to watch the groundbreaking from the temple site, if we didn’t mind standing at the back. Of course we didn’t! We agreed to take turns holding Rosebud.

Rosebud picked that flower for me. She also caught several grasshoppers as we sat there! :)

When we got to the back and were waiting for it to start, we were told to go sit in the chairs – there was room for us. I could hardly believe it! I never dreamed that as newbies in Fort Collins we would get a chance to be at the groundbreaking of the temple. I almost felt guilty because I knew there were probably hundreds of people more deserving of the privilege of attending in person.
But I had the feeling that this was a tender mercy from a loving Father to me.

Notice the architectural rendering of the temple in a frame to the left of the canopy.

Elder and Sister Rasband were there, as well as Elder William R. Walker and his wife. I loved their talks, especially Sis. Rasband, who shared some very tender feelings about their grandson who recently passed away, and the comfort she has felt through the blessings of the temple.
I was so relieved that Rosebud fell asleep on my lap during the talks – she had been a little restless and I didn’t know where I would take her if she started to be disruptive. Then, right during the prayer dedicating the ground, she started jiggling, then woke up and said she needed to go to the bathroom. Arg! I was thinking to myself, “Really? Right now? I am so glad that she will be two years older by the time the temple is dedicated!” And trying to convince her to hold it till the prayer was over. Then Elder Rasband started praying for the children in the temple district and I was struck with guilt. ;-) I stood up and took her to the nearby port-a-potty, missing the rest of the prayer. Talk about the sublime combining with the mundane. :)
Thankfully we got back in time to see the actual groundbreaking with the special fancy shovels. He invited all the community leaders to join in the symbolic turning over of the dirt, then the stake presidents, then the full-time missionaries, and Rosebud was fussing the whole time saying, “I want to dig with the shovels! Can I go dig with the shovels?” And just as I was explaining to her that it was not for the kids to do, Elder Rasband invited all the children to come up and have a turn!  Yippee!

Again, feeling a bit like we weren’t actually supposed to be there, like maybe we are not really Coloradoans yet, we took our turn. There was a sweet young man there that shared his turn since Rosebud was having a hard time and Hummer hadn’t made it up.


Then there was a closing hymn and prayer, and to our delight, Elder Rasband invited whatever families would like to come up and have a go with the shovels and take pictures. yay!

It was a beautiful morning. Such a sense of joy and anticipation and gratitude was there among all the people who had gathered. I felt -- and I hope so much that our children felt -- what a unique opportunity this was. It was the first time in my life ever to attend the groundbreaking of a temple, and possibly it will never happen again.

I love so much that we got to be here as this temple began its existence, and that we will get to see every stage of its construction. Hopefully by the time it’s dedicated and we can worship inside we will feel like we have served well here and that it really is “our” temple.


As I write this post I am struck again with amazement and deep gratitude at the special blessing it was to have been at this event. I can hardly believe sometimes how much Heavenly Father loves me!

Praise be to Him!

For the official writeup on the Church’s news website about this, go here. (I’m in one of the pictures, for better or for worse! Wish it could have been Rosebud. :0)