Junior Escort

Shilo was a Junior Escort this year for graduation. They select the top ____% of the Junior class to participate (not sure what percentage... 5? 10?), so it's an honor to be asked.

I attended, to support Shi... and all the Seniors I know.

"Yep, you're doing it right, Shi!"

(An inside joke:  After I had Mauri, a 4-1/2 year-old Shilo would sit on the sofa and watch me work out with Denise Austin every day. As she sat comfortably watching me pant and jive away, she would say, "Yep, you're doing it right, Mom!" Loved the moral support.)

Shilo was in the same section that Lex sat in last year as a graduate. Shi told me that if I wanted to see her face, I should sit on the home side of the stadium. You don't have to ask me twice.

Because of how things are set up (four corners), if you have a graduate sitting in Shilo's section, you sit on the visitors side so you can see them receive their diploma(holder) and have photo ops as they exit the platform towards you.  I remember last year being envious of the opposite shady sun-to-your-back side as we sweltered and fanned ourselves for the 2-hour ceremony. It's all done alphabetically by last name, and the graduates are assigned their seats, so there's really no choice in the whole matter.

This year I was quite comfortable on the home side, sitting along the edge of the shadow, sun to my back. When I would feel a little warm, I could shuffle slightly to the left into the shade. When the shade became a bit chilly, I could slide back into the sun. Perfect. I also consciously selected to sit behind a small child, ensuring I would have a good view of the entire affair. I sympathized with the crowd on the opposite side and their incessant fanning. I noticed the ambulance that came to carry away a guest who had passed out from the heat.

I took notes for next year, because I know I will forget the important things.

I asked Shilo to try and jockey for a position on the home side next year. Of course, she told me she couldn't do a thing about where her seat would be assigned. Still, I encouraged her to try.

I decided that the best seats would be on the home side, six to seven rows down from the top, on the edge of the shadow, on the north side (all graduates exit towards the north to pick up their diplomas). 

If wishes were fishes.

BTW, the Blue Heron (mentioned in my last post) that was stalking our goldfish, successfully managed to eat all but one of them. Bill and Mar added two dozen more little feeder goldfish, and today I could only count 13. There are some hiding spots in the rocks, so I hope they are all just being cautious. AND, when I went out for an early morning walk this morning, what I thought was a young deer in the median of our culdesac, was really a coyote... a really big one. I figured that was probably why my dogs had gone nuts a few minutes earlier (thankfully, I had taken them out for their morning potty break and then brought them right back in, rather than letting them run around unattended for 30 minutes or so, which is more of the usual routine).

Today was the last day of school for Shi and Mar.
Mar had an end-of-year party. Apparently it is still going.
More on that next time.

Mishmash.

I thought I would do a quick (ha!) post covering a random bunch of stuff that has happened in between all the other stuff I've already posted about. For memory's sake.

Hmmmm..... where to begin.

How about here, since this picture cracks me up. This is our cute neighbor, who loved that Conan was a bit smaller in stature (not much) than Jack and Ava. He enjoyed feeling more "comfortable" and "safe," and thus wanted to carry poor little Conan around with him for a while. 

I smile every time I look at Conan's look of desperation. He's totally giving me the "get me outta here" eye.

I can't remember if I already posted about Lex coming home for a visit during her semester break...?

Before we knew it, she was heading back up to Idaho with her roommate Sydney (via Utah, thus with Conan in tow).

Ten-four, little buddy.

We've done some yard work.

 There are life lessons in this power-raking incident. A lesson about communication. A lesson about the power of a power rake. A lesson about how many bags it takes to clean up the mess.

 The communication lesson comes from the conversation Bill and I had that morning. It was the Saturday of General Conference, and we needed to do some work inside and outside the house to prepare for our semi-annual Conference Luncheon the following day. We talked about the need to rake and mow the yard. Bill mentioned that if we were to rent a power rake, it would most likely take a chunk of the day, especially with 4 hours of Conference breaks thrown in (and he would need to be done by 5 to attend the Priesthood session). I thought I had clearly expressed that the priority that day was inside the house, and we didn't really have that much time to put into the yard, so would he mind just mowing and trimming?

Next thing I know, he's borrowing the neighbor's truck to go pick up a power rake.

Then the power rake is at the house.

Then he's madly power raking, leaving huge piles of dead grass all over the ground, along with chunks of sod ripped out by the powerful power rake.

Then he's returning the power rake, and Mar and I are raking and filling bag after bag of grass.

Later, I asked him if he thought I had told him to power rake that day.

"Yes. Didn't you?"

{NO}

Clearly there are still things to be learned in a marriage relationship, even after 25 years.

The power of a power rake lesson comes in now that, over a month later, our lawn is still looking pretty distressed, with giant divots here and there. All that work with nothing to show. I keep telling myself that next year we will have the best lawn on the street (or not). 

The final lesson: 13, if you really squish that grass in tight.

We've had a few long-course swim meets at pools far from home (not exciting far in another state or anything, just boring far, like an hours drive away).

Meet #1

This was Shilo's first ever long-course breaststroke swim. She did just fine.

Meet #2

And a few middle school track meets.

 Just like her big sister Lex, Mar dealt with heel pain the whole season. I've decided that it's plantar fasciitis, plain and simple. In the longer high school season, Lex could usually work hers out after a few weeks, but the middle school season is only three weeks long (2 of the 5 meets were rained out), so Mar had to run through her pain every race.

This was Mar's medley relay team in the last race of the final meet (and the only meet against other 6th-grade middle schoolers, since only two middle schools in our district have them).

They won. We don't think the judges were DQing, but if they were, they would have been DQed at the first hand-off (Mar was not involved). It seriously slowed them WAY down, and they were still able to pull out a win (barring the DQ, of course). Nice!

Cheyenne had a birthday, so we made her a mint chocolate chip cake to help celebrate.

And we've had this guy (or gal) hanging around the past few days, checking out the fish in our pond:

This picture doesn't really give an accurate portrayal of the size of this crazy bird. I am fascinated that a bird that looks like he should live in some exotic place (or at least the un-exotic zoo) is flying freely around my neighborhood, with a fancy for my backyard. Every time I try to grab a pic, he flies to the top of the back-door-kitty-corner-2-houses-over neighbor's roof.

We think he's munched one of our large, plump goldfish, and he's looking to finish the other three off.

That's the mishmash for today.

Goodbye Tweet(t)y

I have sad news to share. Mar's bird Tweet(t)y is no longer with us.

She's in a better place.

It started last Saturday when we noticed Tweet(t)y acting funny. As Mar observed her, she thought, perhaps, that Tweet(t)y was trying to lay an egg. Since Buddy's been gone for over 5 months, that seemed a little curious.  Mar did some research and discovered that yes, female parakeets can lay eggs without a male around (I assume the same is true for chickens, right?). Since Tweet(t)y had never laid an egg before, this was all new to us. She would lean over her perch, drop her tail feathers, and pant. She seemed to be trying to squeeze the bulge on her bottom out (it definitely looked like labor to me). 

This continued all day Sunday. Mar did some more research and discovered that parakeets can be "egg-bound," meaning that the egg gets stuck, and that, without intervention by an avian vet, the parakeet will die. She discovered this news while we were google chatting Sunday evening with the out-of-town kids, and immediately had big tears streaming down her face.

"We have to take Tweet(t)y to the vet," she said.

I promised I would call around the next morning to find a vet, and hoped that Tweet(t)y would just drop the egg while we were all sleeping that night (I'd dropped a chunk of change earlier in the week for Jack and Ava's check-ups, and did not cherish the thought of dropping more for a bird). Nope.

As Mar left for school the next day, she asked me to come get her out of school when I took Tweet(t)y to the vet. I told her I would "see," since very likely I would just be dropping her off, then picking her up once the egg issue was resolved.  As soon as offices were open, I started my calls.

After locating the nearest avian vet that had an opening ("Can you bring her in right now?"), I threw on some shoes, grabbed the birdcage, and debated if I should go pull Mar out of school. I decided that I would (I call it personal revelation... divine intervention...), called the school to notify them I was on my way, and headed out the door.

Dr. Summar was great.

Before he picked Tweet(t)y up he said, "I think Tweet(t)y is a boy."

Female parakeets have pink at the top of their beaks, and male parakeets have blue. Tweet(t)y's had started out pink, but over the past 6 months or so had turned blue. Mar had even mentioned it to me.

(My initial reaction was to chuckle thinking that, perhaps, Tweet(t)y had been a boy all along. Then I wondered if birds could spontaneously change their gender...)

He picked her up, carefully took a look, then said, "I'm sorry to tell you that it's not good news."

*Start tears*

He explained that it wasn't an egg, it was a tumor on Tweet(t)y's ovary. The weeping tumor was excreting testosterone, which probably caused the color change in her beak. She had lost most of the muscle in her chest, and was struggling to breathe because the tumor was closing off the access to her lungs. She was going to die. He asked what we would like to do, and I asked for a few minutes alone with Mar.

We chatted briefly about what the compassionate thing to do was: let Tweet(t)y go now. We had observed her suffering over the past three days, and it would only get worse.

Amid tears, Mar held her on her finger and sang "You Are My Sunshine."

(As I look at the pictures now, I can see how sick Tweet(t)y was. She definitely was not the vibrant, healthy bird from a few months earlier.)

The vet came back in, took Tweet(t)y in a soft cloth, had Mar pet her one last time, then left the room. Within 5 minutes he was back with Tweet(t)y neatly wrapped and ready to be taken home for burial.


I am so grateful that I took Mar with me to the vet. It would have been devastating for her not to say goodbye had I needed to make that decision for her. Tender mercy.
Heavenly Father loves her!

She is such a sweet girl with such a tender heart. She often talks about how she wants to be a vet someday. On our drive home, I asked her if she would still want to be one, as it would include this sad side of the profession.

"I would think about all the animals I could help," she said.

We had the funeral Tuesday evening.

Now Buddy and Tweet(t)y can be together.
Mar says she is never moving from this house. Ever.

Mother's Day Weekend

I can't sleep this morning (I believe hormonally related - as usual - awakened by a hot flash... night sweat... whatever you want to call it), so I thought I would catch up on a couple of posts in the cool and quiet of the 5am office (been up since 4, just taking care of a few other items of business, too).

Here's a review of last weekend:

Mar was inspired by mine and Taylor's bold haircut move to take her lengths to a new level. She was in desperate need of a trim, but decided to make big change and cut it off. I have been preparing her to take charge of styling her own hair once she has completed 6th grade (a week away!!), and she thought shorter would be simpler. We thought to grab a couple of "before" pictures, but things were pretty busy around our house and we didn't get any official "after" pics. Luckily, there are pictures from later in the day to follow.

Bill wanted in the photo action. He also wanted to prove that he was being helpful and productive in the kitchen while I was cutting away.

He was icing the 4 dozen cinnamon rolls I had made that morning for our girls camp fundraiser.

I have to mention that I made these a little begrudgingly. I had not volunteered (I would have made bread like last year - much less effort required), but had been asked via text, along with a "I heard you make great cinnamon rolls" thrown in. First, let me say that I don't think I have ever made cinnamon rolls for anyone other than my family. I think I mentioned back here how I prefer the bready type, and usually just mix up my regular bread dough when I make them for the fam. I am certainly not known far and wide for my awesome cinnamon rolls. 

I decided to make a recipe I had only made once, a few years back. I remembered that they were sweet and soft, more of what most people would expect from a cinnamon roll. In the interest of time, I was daring and quadrupled the batch, not knowing if it would work, then made a few of my own adjustments in rolling and baking them. They took a lot of time, and, being the messy baker I am, made for a tedious clean up. 

Mar had been asking for a trim/cut for weeks, and wanted to have time to play on her Saturday, so after whipping up the icing, I assigned Bill the task of spreading it on while I did the trim + another cut for Emily Yoshikawa who would be leaving on her mission the following Wednesday (less than 24 hours after her brother returned from his).

To be honest, I didn't think the rolls looked that great, but I sent them off with the girls when they headed to the fundraiser to set up.

This was the second year of a "drive-thru" dinner fundraiser and bake sale. I think it's the best idea ever. (You can also catch a glimpse of Mar's new 'do.)

 The girls are each assigned families in the ward to call (and encouraged to invite neighbors and friends) to take orders for burgers/dogs/chips/drinks. Families that order give a 30 minute time-frame of when they will "drive-thru" to pick up their order on the given date.

 The girls help put the meals together and deliver them to the waiting cars.

This year we had a professional-chef-turned-chiropractor do the grilling (nice to have one in the ward), and our camp director was uber organized, so things ran like clockwork. In fact, every last burger was sold. That's a careful plan! Everyone was worried when a dear VERY elderly brother from our ward pulled up towards the end of the drive-thru and we were OUT of burgers. 

He had ordered hot dogs. Perfect.

This was the first reveal of my new hair, and I was anxious to get the initial comments out of the way.

I noted at the bake sale that my cinnamon rolls had all been purchased. I hoped that they were good, and at the very least baked through, but not overdone on the bottom (those kinds of things you can't be really sure of, especially when you're baking a recipe you are not terribly familiar with in those flimsy disposable aluminum pans).

I've gone on so much about the cinnamon rolls because boy-oh-boy did I receive kudos for them the following day at church. One family that had purchased some had their extended family in town for their oldest child's baptism. The best comment of the day was from the grandfather:

"I am a cinnamon roll connoisseur. People bring cinnamon rolls for me to try, so I can let them know if they're good. I've eaten hundreds of cinnamon rolls in my life. My wife makes great cinnamon rolls. But those were the best cinnamon rolls I have ever had. The only thing that could have improved them are raisins!" (I totally agree on the raisin thing, but I didn't put any in because most people - in my family - prefer them without.)

Okay, so maybe the effort was worth the praise.

Other comments I received on Sunday:

"Wow. You got your hair cut!"

"I was wondering who that was sitting up there. From the back I couldn't tell who you were."

"Hi! Are you new to the ward?"

So glad that's over.

Once church was done, Bill was home nice and early (Happy Mother's Day to me!).

We whipped together our fondue (notice the nice pot I purchased received),

 and ate to our heart's content.

 (By the way, fondue is super quick to put together. The following day I whipped some up for Shi on her lunch break, lickity split. Yum.)

Then Mar gave me a swing in the hammock. 

After chatting with our Moms and taking a nice evening walk with the dogs, we indulged again.

I won't mention that I ruined two batches while trying to make the chocolate fondue. Bill's the master. He figured it out and saved the day.

We google chatted with the out-of-town kids, then helped Shi finish up an essay (until 1 in the morning) before hitting the sack.

I can't wait for school to be over!!

Gems of the Week

I want to share a few gems I found over the past week.

These were just what I needed to get through some rough days and give me food for thought.

I'll start with the most recent, which I came across here.  I ran into Emily's Lioness at the Gate blog as I was searching for an appropriate quote for the Mother's Day "gift" for the sisters in our ward. I remembered a talk Sister Beck gave at Women's Conference a few years back (2010) that had impacted me greatly: Choose Ye This Day to Serve the Lord. In my quest to find the talk, I also found Emily's blog. I decided to follow it, since I liked her simple and honest style of writing, and her focus on her values and beliefs. Anyway, she posted this yesterday and I loved it.

I love "The Captial-T-Truth is about Life Before Death..." 
It ties perfectly to this scripture in Alma 34:32:
"For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare (TG Self-Mastery) to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors (TG Good Works)."

I found it interesting that earlier this week, Bill shared with me how he felt that people needed to slow down. Look around. Appreciate all that God has done for us. Have a respect for the people and things around us. I appreciated this reminder that it takes a conscious effort to look outside of ourselves. I believe it will help us show greater love to others when we do. I put it into practice today while I was at the temple, and was filled with an overwhelming feeling of love for others attending the session.  The thought that they were all good people, striving to do their best, seeking for strength and help, offering service to others, filled me with gratitude to be there and a sense of unity with these people I didn't know. My next goal is to use this technique while driving (probably a lot more challenging).

Earlier this week, as I was reading this blog, I came across a reference to a talk by Elder Donald L. Hallstrom given at a BYU Devotional earlier this year called Living a Reverent Life.

Here are a couple of my favorite quotes:

"Public worship is when we assemble as children of God, as brothers and sisters, as a community of Saints... In each of these meetings we pray, we teach, we testify, and we edify - all with the purpose of increasing our understanding of our Father in Heaven, Jesus the Christ, and the Holy Spirit. We then have the responsibility to translate that ever-increasing knowledge into wisdom - to continually lessen the gap between what we know and how we live."

Elder Hallstrom also shared a quote given by Elder D. Todd Christofferson:

"The importance of having a sense of the sacred is simply this - if one does not appreciate holy things, he will lose them. Absent a feeling of reverence, he will grow increasingly casual in attitude and lax in conduct. He will drift from the moorings that his covenants with God could provide. His feeling of accountability to God will diminish and then be forgotten. Thereafter, he will care only about his own comfort and satisfying his uncontrolled appetites. Finally, he will come to despise sacred things, even God, and then he will despise himself."

Elder Hallstrom's definition of a reverent life:  a life reflective of our love for God the Eternal Father and Jesus Christ, His Son and our Savior.  He concludes with "Whatever your circumstances, living a reverent life will lessen your load... Today can be a pivotal, even historic day in our lives. It can be the day we make the decision and take the disciplined efforts to become more reverent."

Is it just me, or does this not tie into the "This is Water" clip AND into Bill's comments about slowing down and giving gratitude for our blessings.  Thinking of others before self. Consciously living and making the choice to show charity.

And finally, I came across a talk given by Elder David A. Bednar (I was attempting to listen to the CES Broadcast talk by Elder William R. Walker this past Sunday) called That We Might "Not Shrink".  

Here are a few gems:

"Elder Neal A. Maxwell was a beloved disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. He served as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for 23 years. The spiritual power of his teachings and his example of faithful discipleship blessed and continue to bless in marvelous ways the members of the Savior's restored Church and the people of the world.

In October of 1997, Sister Bednar and I hosted Elder and Sister Maxwell at BYU-I. Elder Maxwell was to speak to the students, staff, and faculty in a devotional assembly... Earlier that same year, Elder Maxwell underwent 46 days and nights of debilitating chemotherapy for leukemia... His rehabilitation and continued therapy progressed positively through the spring and summers months, but Elder Maxwell's physical strength and stamina were nonetheless limited when he traveled to Rexburg... During the course of our conversation that day, I asked Elder Maxwell what lessons he had learned through his illness. I will remember always the precise and penetrating answer he gave. 'Dave,' he said, 'I have learned that not shrinking is more important than surviving.'"

Elder Bednar then shared a quote I love from President Spencer W. Kimball:

"No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God... and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire."

This whole talk is great food-for-thought; but here is a closing quote:

"The potent spiritual combination of faith in and on the holy name of Jesus Christ, of meekly submitting to His will and timing, of pressing forward 'with unwearied diligence', and of acknowledging His hand in all things yields the peaceable things of the kingdom of God that bring joy and eternal life."

I consider it a tender mercy this week to have stumbled upon these talks. They have given me a lot to contemplate and improve upon.

Have a great weekend!

A Haircut, a Potluck, and a Baby Blessing

It's been a day. Not necessarily great, but there have been a few good things thrown in.

Like having Mar's track meet canceled due to weather. I had signed up to to be a finish line timer, and was not looking forward to three hours of standing, especially on a not-so-great day. I'll take it as a tender mercy in the form of rain and a bit of hail.

Nothing cheers me up like reflecting on the good times, so I figured I would take a few minutes to finish up our Utah trip... when was it?... a long, long time ago.

The haircut:

 Taylor has been growing out his hair for a while (shhhhh... don't tell BYU-I)

He has always been a fan of long-ish hair, and had taken the opportunity to let his locks grow.

I think he has a little Flynn Rider in him.

 When we came to Utah, I told him I would give him a trim... a cut... whatever he needed wanted.

When it came time to pull the haircutting equipment out, he still wasn't sure which to go for.

The trim, or the cut.

He asked the opinion of his adoring wife.

"You look handsome with long OR short hair."

He asked me,

"It's up to you."

He asked his Grandpa Syddall.

"You want to know what I told the boys who had long hair in my ward?..."

followed by a pro-short-hair Bishop-type statement that tipped the scales in the cut direction.

 Within the hour, Tay went from long and luscious...

to short and serious.

(On a side note, I said goodbye to my long locks today, which I am currently sorely regretting. 
I will get over it. Hair grows back, right? I should know.)

The Potluck:

Jill and I planned a combined family potluck to celebrate all the good things going on:

Britt and Josh's graduations

Nate's birthday and impending mission departure (he went in to the MTC yesterday, btw)

The new parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents (and great aunts/uncles)... 

with the arrival of Noah.

And Austin and Britt's new puppy Conan.

We hoped for good weather, and were blessed with the perfect day.

(That church in the background is the very same building Bill and I had our wedding reception at. Still standing, after all these years.)

We had a great turn-out from both of our extended families.

The food was awesome (I love a good potluck!)

There was lots of room to run and play.

Bill should have skipped the run part, though. He injured his shoulder in a race against his brother Jeff, and our nephews Hunter and Kade. His pride was hurt, too. 

I'll bet your wondering how you injure a shoulder in a foot race...

Taylor and Lynnea's friends from Texas were in town and came to join the fun.

Ahhh.... doesn't everybody love family pictures?

Conan was showered with love and attention.

And the girls loved the nearby horses, too.

It was lovely. Jill and I decided that if you plan it, they will come.

Simple. Low-key. You just have to give people a reason to gather.

It was really great to see so many family and friends there.

The Baby Blessing:

 The four generation photo.

Parents, grandparents, and greats. 

We were so happy to be able to attend this fun event before heading back home.

What Mar and Hannah did while they were waiting for us all to quit chatting. 

A last goodbye to Nate before he heads off to Moldova/Romania.

After hugs and goodbyes, we were on our way.
Seriously, the best weekend ever.