Summer's Last Hurrah

Our last two weeks of summer break are being spent out west again. It's been pretty awesome. :)

{ last week }

Swimming. . . . .

 

Taking the boys to see where Mommy and Daddy were married. . . .(and dropping off DC at the airport to go to his brother's wedding in Oregon)

 

Helping Ruby adjust to her new home. . . .

 

A very late night with Jofus :). . . . .

 

More swimming. . . .

 

Sweet remembering. . . .

 

And hoping. . . .

 

{ this week }

we will. . . .

drive up to Utar

squeeze ickle nieces and nephews

go on the famous BYU golf cart tour

attend Didier's wedding in the Mt. Timpanogos Temple

eat lots of yummy stuff (dare I hope for Cafe Rio and Creamery ice cream?)

drive back to Arkansas

 

 

Two days after we get back, school starts, and MY BABIES will be gone ALL DAY!!! WAAAAAHHHHH! So I am going to try really really hard to enjoy them during our 33 hours in the car this week. The stakes are high, eh? :)

Day 26 - { better-than-we-deserve neighbors }

Our Rooba (whose name continues to mutate) is good for many things:

Hand sanitizing. . . .

 

A pre-wash cycle for our dishes, thus saving on our water bill. . . .

(nice, short, sound-free, low-quality videos below)

 

But her heroic efforts at roto-tilling the garden, while appreciated, lacked the continuity and evenness that one would wish for. . . .

Thankfully, however, our garden is now planted and thriving.

 

I would like to introduce you to the nicest neighbors ever:

A recently retired couple, who are very involved with service activities at their church and with community organizations. They are talented at so many things and amazingly tech-savvy.

And they are just plain nice. It can't be easy living next to a noisy family like us, but they seem to think it's entertaining rather than annoying! (so awesome).

They have watered our plants for us when we were out of town, let us share the Sunday paper with them, given on-demand gardening advice, invited us to church, shared their many tools with us, invited our boys over to play with their granddaughter, visited us in the hospital after Benjamin was born, shared their home-project expertise with us, any thing you could think of that would be nice to have a neighbor for, they have given freely and with love.

I always worry that we are completely in their debt, that we can never be as good friends to them as they have been to us!

And so, this is the last straw!

I came home a couple of weeks ago to find that Roger had come over and roto-tilled our garden for us.

I thought: That's it. They get a post on my blog. 

(My charity never faileth. ha :)

 

Some people-- like these good neighbors of ours--help us understand Heavenly Father's love better. We are forever in His debt because first, He has given us our lives, the very air we breathe. And second, every time we "do something for" Him He blesses us again, ever more richly than we deserve. (*see King Benjamin's teachings about this*)

I am so grateful for these wonderful neighbors who are "peaceable followers of Christ", and with whom we will never catch up in the Niceness Contest. :) We love you guys!

 

Day 6 - {our new chickens}

Let me apologize for the long drought here. I have been experiencing some rather odd emotions and it has made it hard to post, because I don't feel honest unless I share how I'm really doing, and it's hard to explain. This is the fourth or fifth time I've tried to get something written, so here goes. Hope you don't think I'm totally losing it. :)

The weeks since Benjamin's birthday have been peaceful for the most part, and very productive. I felt an almost tangible peace that whole week after his birthday. Then the next week I felt it threatening to slip back into heavy grieving. So I got busy to try to keep my mind occupied.

I decided to start preparing our house for when we will have to sell it. I want us to be able enjoy the changes ourselves, so I've always planned to start early!

I also decided to start a new weight-loss program--wish me luck!

You may be shocked by my next decision: if I am not blessed with another pregnancy by January, I'm going to go back to school and get my R.N.! I've started researching the nursing schools in the area, and am very excited about this. Of course, things will hopefully change and I will finally be able to bring a baby home again. I just found myself starting to be obsessed about that, and it was not helping my mental health. For now, to have these plans helps me face the future.

This past week I found myself intentionally avoiding thinking about painful things--for probably the first time since this happened. I was so grateful to finally be into productive mode again, I didn't want to be pulled back down. I hope that is not unhealthy. . . . I still feel a huge urge to cry for about 10 years, but it doesn't help me to cry all day (unfortunately I know that from experience). I'm grateful to be healed enough to hold back the crying and save it for the evening, or for during scripture study, etc. I'm finding that I don't really need to cry every single day.

So, anyway! Now you know probably way more than you'd like about what's been going on in my head. :)

On to my next gratitude post!

 

Since getting married and giving birth to my first son, and subsequently three more sons, I have grown accustomed to being the only female around the house. It's kind of nice in some ways, but I admit there are times that I would appreciate another girl around. :)

 

As of last week, though, the total number of girls around here has increased and now we're WINNING!

 

  (Exacto says we're tied because of Benjamin, but I say that in this case he doesn't count because he doesn't live here.)

 

Benjamin is around the house, too!

Exacto

 

Okay, so anyway, I'm grateful for two more girls! Some of you may not have met our first chicken, so I'll introduce her here, too.

 

 

This here is the sweetest little hen you'll ever met. She lets us pet her, hold her, and she even follows us around when we're out in the Chicken Run with her. We've had her since November 2005.

Ms. Dickens has survived several companions: her childhood friend, a duck named Chuck; later a rooster named Cute; another duck, named Cutie; and a sweet little gray hen named Priscilla. Her latest compatriot was an elderly red hen named Matilda, who shuffled off this mortal coil last summer. With the cold weather starting, we worried about her not having another warm body to snuggle close to at night.

I mentioned it to our Relief Society president, who keeps chickens, and asked if she had any retired layers that she could spare. She let us come out and choose two. (Thanks, Tracy!)

So, now I introduce our two newest chickens, named by Exacto and Hummer, respectively. . . . .

and

 

 

Ruby was hysterical when we brought them home. It was pretty hilarious. She has the run of most of the backyard, but what she REALLY wants now is to penetrate the fascinating, chain-link-fence-enclosed Chicken Run.

Unfortunately the hens are rather clique-ish and completely unsympathetic.

 

So even though I'm not surrounded by pink stuff and dress-up clothes, it's fun not to be the only girl. Ruby and I hang out during the day--she's a sweetie. Most of the time. :)

 

And sometimes I just go out and pet the hens and have a little woman-to-woman chat. (They're great listeners.)

 

Yes, I'm a hillbilly wannabe.

Day 3 - {cute little puppy for a cute little boy}

 

When we first acquired our tiny Rubidium, I was enchanted by her sheer adorableness, but I had no idea how much real joy and delight she would bring to us. (And no idea how much real destruction, either--ahem!--but this IS a post about gratitude! :)

 

Yes, puppies are overly energetic, and need lots of attention, but with three little boys running around, this house obviously has no shortage of energy (a little more added to the mixture is hardly noticeable), and they give her Plenty of attention. Almost too much! Sometimes I send her outside just to get a break from them, bless her heart!

 

Her little cuteness has brought some much-needed comfort and distraction. It is so nice to take her for a walk and get accosted by little neighbor kids saying, "Aww. She's CUTE!" and wanting to pet her. I know it's not the same as having a baby, but it kind of fills in that gap as far as getting attention, ya know what I mean?

 

She definitely lightens up the mood around here with her spunky little personality.

 

And for Hummer, Ruby has been such a blessing. He is home all day every day with his boring, too-often-blue mama (we DO try to do fun stuff, I promise!), and Ruby has become his little buddy.

 

He takes her for walks. (She just can't stand those, can you tell? :)

He lets her lick his plate (after making sure with Mommy that it's dog-safe food).

He takes her for adventures in our rusted wheelbarrow with a flat tire--probably a good thing, cause it slows down the ride!

 

He even reads to her! Here he is reading "Chewy Louie." (I do hope it has inspired her to nobler, toothless actions! :)

 

I thank Thee, Heavenly Father, for this sweet little companion for my son at this particular time!