Fun Dreams

Not to brag or anything, but I had pretty insightful dreams last night.

For example, I had to refinish high school at a 3rd school. At this new school I had a gym class where I had to iron table cloths and I hate ironing table cloths. BUT! Not only that, I couldn't find an outlet where the iron would reach so I just ended up yelling at the teacher and looking like I'd lost my mind (because I had) because I couldn't just tell her I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT WAS GOING ON.


Anyway. It's important stuff.

Once upon a time in my awake life, on my first day at PR I had to go to gym class and I had no idea where the gym was. I asked a boy in my church class, because those were the only humans I actually knew, where it was and he told me to go away (true story!) he did not want to be seen talking to me. Later I found out it was his first day too and he also had no idea where the gym was. I just didn't know he was also new. (Also, he just really didn't want to be seen talking to me. Pretty sure he didn't want anyone knowing he was a church boy.)

Sidenote, I have absolutely no idea how I eventually found the gym, but man would my experience have been better if I never had. Although, good with bad and all, I did make some friends from those horrible gym classes (perks of misery!). Although as a secondary although, I also once got held after class for the teacher to yell at me for not trying hard enough at frisbee. Apparently the gym teacher thought to be as awful as I am at athletics meant I just wasn't trying. Sorry lady, I'm actually just THAT atrocious, and my particular brand of atrocity only gets worse with effort. Then she and I got locked out of the school and after getting that lovely verbal smackdown I had to spend an awkwardly silent 10 minutes with her while we tried to find someone to let us into the school. Really great memories.


So anyway! Those are the super fun and painful memories I'm going to be rapid fire remembering for the next couple days. Thanks Unconscious Self, don't know what I'd do without you!

not yet as Job, so that's a plus

LET ME JUST RECAP THE LAST MONTH OF MY LIFE


January
7 - Zoey's eyes begin to hurt

8-18 - Zoey mysteriously vomits most mornings

19 - Zoey goes blind

21 - Eye doctors, trauma, no brain tumor!, spinal tap, ambulance ride

22-27 - Hospital stay

27 - Zoey comes home from the hospital...begins coughing on the drive home

28 - SAM BEGINS VOMITING (it's cool though because my brand new rug is basically vomit camouflage), Zoey continues coughing and being congested

29-31 - THE VOMITING CONTINUES (now with added fever!)

February
1 - Sam stops puking, replacing it with the congestion Zoey brought home from the hospital

2 - Zoey begins puking with fever (favorite moment includes her [for unknown reasons] standing on the kitchen bar puking into a bowl over the sink while the puke splashed my face). Good times.

3 - Sam begins breathing rapidly. We do a FaceTime Dr visit and are sent to the ER (WE'RE REGULARS NOW, FOLKS!) They thought flu, but he was negative, maybe pneumonia, but chest x-ray showed some weird little benign sticky lung collapse, but it opened when he coughed so IT WAS JUST FINE OKAY SO GO HOME. Also, a shot of antibiotics in the leg for an ear infection.

4 - Sam is fine. Zoey has stopped fever/puking but has ear pain, a dr visit shows she does not have an ear infection in addition to the throwing up. I have cleaned the toilet so so many times. We get a call from the hospital in Little Rock and Zoey has tested positive for the last of the awful possibilities. We don't know what it means and will have to meet with a neurologist to figure stuff out. I spend the day, aside from toilet cleaning, staring at the wall, ignoring my kids, being depressed because WHY NOT.

5 - I declare it is time for EVERYONE TO GO BACK TO SCHOOL and I disinfect ALL THE THINGS 15,000 times. Decide not to be depressed about Zoey anymore, because at least it's not as bad as it could have been. On the way to drop Mia off at school she yells I CAN'T DO IT PLEASE MY STOMACH HURTS I JUST DIDN'T WANT TO STRESS YOU OUT (very considerate). Comes home, vomits, develops a fever.

6 - Zoey returns to school. About 11:30 at night Sam comes downstairs crying that his eyes hurt. Adam and I look at each other with terror in our own eyes.

7 - Alllll the stomach virus. I HAVE CLEANED THE TOILET MORE THIS WEEK THAN THE PREVIOUS YEAR AND I WAS PRETTY GOOD ABOUT CLEANING THE TOILETS IN THE PREVIOUS YEAR. Special plus, I have laundered every blanket in America. Sam clearly develops pink eye (which, in this scenario is a relief)

8 - Mia is still sick. But hopefully on the mend? I left the house for 15 minutes to take Zoey to school. Which basically felt like a vacation at this point. Sam's eye is disgusting. But it's fun too because I get to hold him down and torture him with eye drops several times a day.


Anyway, this is all just to say that we're doing completely fine and who needs to ever leave the house anyway and we have lots of different illnesses if you want to come get one of your own!


There's been some good stuff too. Like I've done a really great job working on Mia's jeweled cat mosaic she got for Christmas. Like, wooo. I've got talent. And I've heard some new songs I like, and I do, after all, really like songs I like. And also I haven't been sick yet, which I HAVE NOT YET SPOKEN OUT LOUD BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM CURSING MYSELF AND WILL BECOME SICK JUST IN TIME FOR THE WEEKEND.


Thank you for your time. (And don't worry, I'm not actually going as crazy as that sounded. Just like 15% of it. THIS TOO SHALL PASS and I laughed a lot while writing it. And I needed a laugh.)

a day.

TMI ALERT! THERE BE TALK OF BLOODY VOMIT AHEAD!


The Backstory

The day before school started back from Christmas break Zoey started telling me her eyes hurt. I knew it was legit, but when you're working with a 7 year old it's hard to know exactly what that means. The first day she really complained about it I called a doctor, because there was something very unnerving about the way she was describing it and acting, but, the doctor didn't have any openings that day and by the afternoon she was acting fine, so I let it pass. Later she'd tell me, "It still hurts, I'm just learning to get used to it now."

The next morning she was acting funny when she woke up, said her stomach hurt, but she got ready for school. I thought maybe she was just hungry so I convinced her to take a bite of breakfast but that sent her running to throw up. Aside from the one tiny bite of breakfast her stomach was totally empty,  but she dry heaved so hard she was vomiting up mucusy blood (not straight blood or I would have taken off for the ER). Of course this was terrifying for her, Mia, who happened to see the whole thing and me.

As soon as the Dr. office opened I called and the (dumb) office was like, oh yeah we don't have space for you today . . . uhhh okay cool, thanks guys, very useful. But while I looked for a different doctor to see I got a call from the nurse who was like THEY TOLD YOU WHAT? (Which I'm learning is usually how it works. Just don't ever talk to the office, go straight to the nurse. #lifelessons)

Everything checked out fine at the doctor so he thought maybe she was having a lot of anxiety about going back to school.

On and off throughout the week she'd throw up in the mornings and then be completely fine a few hours later. I thought maaaaybe it was possible she was anxious? But she was also excited and WANTED to go to school on the days she didn't throw up. She also threw up on Saturday and Sunday when she didn't have to go to school.

I KNEW something was actually wrong. I started worrying about diabetes with headaches, eye pain, nausea, but she didn't show some of the more typical symptoms. (Didn't stop me from obsessing over it though!)

One night our Relief Society President brought over a kit so I could test her blood (which...poor Zoey letting me learn to use that on her) but it did test fine, so I started to obsess a little less about that.

We went back to the doctor and he said everything was checking out fine neurologically (and I realllllly wanted that to be true) so he suspected she was dealing with migraines. It still just felt off to me, but I thought it was possible. I also thought maybe it was cyclical vomiting syndrome (which can be related to migraines), because the symptoms all seemed to fit.

We started doing things like giving her a high protein snack before bed and making sure she got to bed on time and the vomiting seemed to ease up.

BUT

On Friday she was like...I've been copying off my friends' work because I can't see the board (she'd passed an eye exam just a couple months before) but I learned if I cover my left eye I can still see things!

Then on Saturday I was reading with her and realized she was holding the book RIGHT up against her eyes and really couldn't read all of a sudden. Then I realized she couldn't even see big things a few feet away. Somehow this didn't totally freak me out? I was just like OH GOOD ONE MORE THING TO MAKE ME FEEL LIKE CRAZY MOM AT THE DOCTOR (selfish much? I know...). The BIG SCARY in my mind was . . . all of this sounds an awful lot like a brain tumor. Thoughts I'd been fighting for weeks.

I got her an eye appointment for Monday. I'd been having regular panic attacks over this for 2 weeks straight so I just continued to feel really on edge and like something was really up, but tried to suppress it and get to a doctor.


Monday
Monday morning we went to the eye doctor at Sam's Club (who is now one of my top favorite people in the world) and I was one step away from psycho panic. He started talking to Zoey and doing some tests and figured she was faking it so she could get glasses. He showed her all the biggest things and would ask her what she saw and when she said nothing he was like. . .riiiiight. When she started to consistently not be able to see the three foot E five feet away with her left eye, he got serious. Then as he continued the test he started to get more and more bothered and decided to dilate her eyes.

Once her eyes were dilated the doctor quickly was like, I can see something is putting pressure on her optic nerve. With the history of morning vomit he was like, you need a brain scan ASAP. He couldn't order one so he got us in that day at a nearby ophthalmologist.

I called Adam to come meet us and he was able to grab a coworker to come give Zoey a blessing. Zoey was in full panic mode (and she was not alone...we were all a huge ugly crying mess) but after the blessing she really calmed down and was just like, I'm fine! I'm not actually blind guys! I continued to be an absolute disaster. All the worst of worst case scenarios were running wild in my mind.

The ophthalmologists did some tests and sent us right over for an MRI and lumbar puncture at the Children's Hospital near us. We went to the hospital, got a room and we sat. AND we sat. AND WE SAT. For about 7 hours. In a very very freezing room on very hard awful chairs. While mentally going through total what if hell.

We were just grateful they were willing to squeeze us in for the MRI since we'd been told it was unlikely they could get us in that day. Obviously they felt like it was an emergency situation enough to get us in that day though (which did nothing for my nerves).

Finally they did the MRI and Zoey was just amazing. She was perfectly still, without any sedation. Even though she told us later she was freaking out about being packed into the tunnel and the noises being really loud. We couldn't help but be proud of how awesome she is.

After the MRI....More waiting while they reviewed the results.

Finally a doctor came in and was very nonchalantly like, "Good news bad news. No masses in the brain lahdidadidahblahblahblah"

And we were like shooting off cannons in celebration and who even cared about the rest of what she said because THERE ARE NO BRAIN MASSES! Whatever else was going on, was like Christmas morning compared to the what ifs.

They did diagnose her with Optic Neuritis, with her left eye much, much worse than her right. It's really pretty treatable, but the big question is, WHY? She's super young to have this happen and doesn't really fit many of the other categories for it. Over the next two weeks we'll be waiting on test results to consider many awful things, mainly MS and something called NMO but I can't remember what the real name for it is (and I am staying far away from the google machine THANKYOUVERYMUCH). Or it could be another autoimmune disease, or, if we're just really really lucky, it's a fluke, they find no reason and it was probably triggered by a virus. So, I like to joke that we're just praying we get no answers. But, like, I'm not joking...we really are.

Also, in her doctor's defense, even the eye doctors all thought things looked very normal from the outside. The extent of the damage kind of hides in her in ways it doesn't normally.

Post diagnosis, there were more hours

Then a lumbar puncture. That garbage is awful. Poor, poor Zoey. If I had to pick one thing she's hated the most about this whole thing, it would be that whole experience. They have a group called Child Life at the hospital that works with the kids through the crappy stuff they have to go through, and the child life specialist asked her if she'd like to listen to music during the procedure. Her choice: Sam Cooke. Because Zoey is actually secretly 65 years old. I've always said she looks like she should have been born in the 50s and now I need no further evidence that this is true.

Sam sang us some Change is Gonna Come (which felt very appropriate since this was all on MLK day.) While Zoey became probably scarred for life. Maybe I'm scarred for life? Probably both, with a little extra her way.

The doctor and nurses all appreciated her good taste. One told us she kind of felt like she was at a swanky dinner party, not a spinal tap. I wish Zoey felt that way. . . (Also I wish I could take some credit for Zoey being ridiculous cool, but she accidentally discovered her friend, Sam, on the Alexa)

This all wrapped up around midnight, when they stuck Zoey and me in an ambulance (finally I got to sit on a seat that wasn't hard plastic!) And shipped us off for a 3.5 hour drive to Little Rock for treatments.


And where we are now

We're still unanswered, it will probably be a week or two before test results come back. On Tuesday morning Zoey saw a pediatric ophthalmologist and we found out she was pretty much blind blind AND color blind. Even if she insisted she wasn't (on both count. "Guys, I'm NOT blind, I CAN SEE") They're now giving her a high dose of steroids every 6 hours and I'm VERY pleased to report that every day she's gotten some of her vision back. Today she could pass more of the color tests too. Before the treatments she could see about 3-5 inches from her face only. By Wednesday she could see the clock across the room and a TV with her right eye. Today her right eye could see some of the 20 line with her right and she could see the doctor's fingers five feet away with her left. As long as they're seeing improvement, we're going in the right direction. And that's just so so great. The steroids definitely have their side effects. The most fun one being she's pretty ragey, but I can't much blame her. I'm willing to let her pretty much get mad at anyone she wants.

She's also just really homesick and lonely to be around kids her age. She interacts with them and they have an awesome kid's room and they do so much to help the kids feel okay here, but it's still so isolating. We also realized she's had times where she's been away from us, but being away from Mia and Sam has been the hardest thing for her. Which...is actually great news, because sometimes as parents it's hard not to feel like your kids (maybe just my kids?) hate each other.

And we're so grateful.

Can I just shout it from the rooftops how absolutely, unbelievably grateful we are right now? We are SO SO SO SO SO SO SO grateful that right now we're not worrying about all the things that could have been. We're in the neurology unit at the children's hospital and to walk around and see so many little ones who are in worst case situations is just devastating and my heart is so full for the parents and for all those who didn't get the good news we did. I can't help but feel a little guilty, but also, just so grateful for our own miracle.

We're grateful to feel more aware of how lucky we are to be parents and have these great kids. We always said it and thought we knew it, but really, just nothing else feels like it matters right now.

We're sooooo grateful to family and friends who prayed for and with us and walked a really hard, awful day with us so we weren't alone. We had so much support and it made all the difference. My parent's drove out the next morning to help us with the other kids so Adam could come down to Little Rock and be with Zoey too (which has been really amazing, since she's made it pretty clear she's a little sick of my face being in her business. Except when she wants to snuggle, then I'm acceptable.) Our FrakesFriends went from watching our kids while I took Zoey to the eye doctor to crisis parenting them and keeping them overnight.

Our ward has been incredible. We've had so many offers to help and everyone has been more than willing to jump through hoops to do anything they can for us. We've even had several people offer to DRIVE TO LITTLE ROCK to bring stuff, which is niceness at a level I can't begin to understand. Our Bishop and his wife got us a bag of snacks to take on the road and it had seriously kept me alive for all the times I forget to eat during cafeteria hours. He also reminded us to pack a bag before they shipped us off, which sounds pretty obvious... but honestly neither Adam nor I had even had one thought about actually having to do things like wear clothes or brush our teeth, etc. It's amazing how helpful a suggestion can be when you're in crisis mode. Our Relief Society president has been great, and been along for the ride the whole time (From diabetes crisis Becki, to Worst Case Scenario Becki, to telling me she had to live at this hospital for 10 weeks so when I think I feel like I'm in a prison and need to escape I just remember I do not have to be here for 10 weeks and then it feels a little better...)

People have sent Zoey gifts and videos and helped her feel loved and remembered. It's really just amazing to see how charitable and good human beings are. I would never want to relive Monday, but I don't ever want to forget how amazing people are. And basically we need to write ALL THE THANK YOU CARDS. (Which, I apologize in advance I am SO BAD AT because I write them and then fail to send them...there are literally 20 in my kitchen cupboard waiting for addresses. (I'm sure I just bruised my mom's soul a little when I admitted that, sorry Weeze). But I will get to it!


And maybe someday I'll add pictures more pictures to this, but for now, you get The Text Wall of Dreams and this picture of Zoey completely sound asleep, sleeping, as she always does, with her eyes open.

She's a little goofy, but we sure love her and are happy to keep loving her goofy self forever more.

An old lady has music nostalgia.

Last night I dreamed I was talking to my 11th grade chemistry teacher. It was a weird and also fairly boring conversation. But, regardless of how dull it was, it's put high school on my mind today. And then tonight I heard Teenage Rockstars for the first time and it made all my teenage brain memory neurons light up.  

So, if you don't already, you should know that Teenage Rockstars from Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness' new album is the perfect anthem for the grown up Emo Kid. 

There are reasons. 

Like it's nostalgic, but not in a I'm 35 and haven't moved on kind of way, but a sure do appreciate the present and love the memories that got me here, kind of way. 

There's that chorus. "We were teenage rockstars. We taught ourselves to play. And we played loud"

Then the Las. THE LAS!

When I scream sing those las in the shower my brain is right back to the emo scream/sing-alongs we called shows back in high school. Man. That was SO. FUN. Other teenage stuff was notsofun. But that was magical.*

I guess that was the thing about the music scene then. The singers in the bands were basically our age and they were all so far from professionally trained, but they said it all like they meant it, and it meant something to us. And it really was so loud. It was a weird time of music, you kind of connected with it, or you didn't, but if you did, you REALLY did. 

And like, remember when Andrew McMahon refused to sing Konstantine (Konfusing!) even though everyone went to his shows HOPING tonight was the night he'd just stupid sing the song? Just so we could scream along for all 9 minutes and release all the insane angst of being a teenager?

I bet the death of emo is why kids have so much anxiety now. They never get to scream sing Konstantine and the Heroine version of Punk Rock Princess in the car driving home late from their friends houses. (Also because they don't learn to drive.) (Also because they don't go to their friends' houses their friends just live on a screen) (I digress.) 

And then once upon a time, when my heart was a little broken and I just needed to MOVE ON there was Jack's Mannequin's La La Lie! "Guess what? I'm done! ...So this is the first verse, it's not very long but I'm ready to move on." And I was! And I did! Thank's Andrew McMahon for evolving into Jack's Mannequin just when I needed it!

Also hilariously perfect, the time at a Jack's Mannequin show in Salt Lake when Andrew yelled at the crowd? Then came back and apologized? Not sure what that was about. But good times. Definitely good times. 

I got old. Got Married. Had babies. (The old part may have come after the get married, have babies part) and I just forgot about music. Who had brain space to have feelings and who had time to entertain dealing with those feelings through song? Not me! No thank you!

Funny thing about doing that is one day it might just break your brain. When my brain broke, guess what I found? Synesthesia. Right on, Mr. Andrew. He grew up right along with me. Here was a song all about all the good things of life and life mellowing out that I needed to hear. RIGHT. THEN. So I played it on repeat for 4 years. Have you been in my car? Well then, you've heard it too. It sits atop my best ever playlist "Becki Likes" [for songs that make me say, I like this! every time I hear them.]

Not only did I just like it, but, like Something Corporate once did for me, it told me there were songs still to like in the world and it made me love other music again too. A gift to my musically starved self! So many good songs I would have missed.  

Of course, there was also Cecilia and the Satellite to make us all cry over how being a parent is pretty freaking sweet. But then, remember when we moved, like 3 months ago? Remember that? When we were deciding to move, just then Ohio was released. It speaks to me. If you ever find me wandering around the house with my hair piled on my head with mascara all over my face muttering "Better on the west coast. Better on the west coast" as my personal mantra that someday all the agony of moving (I AM NOT DRAMATIC ABOUT THIS AT ALL...except I am a lot) WILL ALL PAY OFF, just know I'm going to eventually be okay. 

And then here we are. Teenage Rockstars. It was a fine time, the time of teenage rockstars. I've appreciated growing up with them. More so than any of the others, Andrew McMahon has a special place in my heart (#fangirl #IamNotaStalker). His music seems to have evolved with me, and I love how it reflects the growth and change of actually growing up. I mean, I'm going to die still loving those few perfect Bright Eyes songs, but there was never any growth going to happen there.    

Grown up life is a good thing. I don't miss being a teenager, but in a sea of awkward, confusing memories, the music was a bright spot for me. I wouldn't be sad to be able to go back to ooooone more show, screaming with all my favorite friends and strangers, all of us sweaty from jumping up and down for hours (with one hand raised...I don't even know what that was and I still want to do it all the time) and all just so. so. emotional.**  And then running like crazy people to catch the last train back home, because one of the great mysteries of my life is WHY WERE WE ALWAYS RUNNING LATE TO THE TRAIN??

*** most magical was the time Ben Gibbard dedicated Sound of Settling to our group because we knew how to properly enjoy a good dance tune.
**** I would probably rethink this if it also meant the return of the Accidental Mullet

maybe unlucky, but certainly blessed

I've been thinking about luck the last few days. We watched this amazing video of Mike Leach explaining how he picked his team captain (Spoiler: He picked the luckiest guy on the team). Apparently that captain's record for winning coin tosses was "something incredible." 

So it makes me think. Is luck a real thing? Are some people just born with an unseen gift of luck the way some are born with musical gifts or love of art? I had one friend who claimed an unusual amount of luck (winning radio contests, drawings, etc). So maybe? Maybe it's a thing? I'd like to conduct some coin toss experiments on people claiming to be lucky and see what exactly does happen. 

Once upon a time (2009) in a far away place (a canyon in Salt Lake City), I was several days overdue with Mia, Adam had recently been laid off from the job he got fresh out of graduation and finding a new one was a rough road. (again, 2009) All of my family was together for Thanksgiving snowed in at a vacation rental where the kitchen was apparently filled with mouse droppings. I only knew the good stuff about that trip. And, to me, it was very good. Even if I was completely panicked the whole time that I would go into labor and be stuck on icy canyon roads trying to get to a hospital. But I didn't and I wasn't. 

Right before we left, my very unemployed Adam and my very, very pregnant self were standing outside the house with my parents and one of my brothers. My mom had the wishbone from the Thanksgiving turkey and it was decided that Adam and I should wish on the wishbone. The thought process, of course, being that either way the luck went, we'd both win. And we really, really needed some luck. 

We stood in the snow, I took one side and Adam took the other. Ready. Set. Go. We both pulled. 

In a complete mockery of all physics I've ever witnessed, the top of the wishbone FLEW INTO THE AIR and landed off in a snowbank. Our two, unlucky selves were left with equally small pieces. 

This is 100% a true story. I couldn't create it if I wanted to. And at the time I really didn't want to. I was a little horrified at the message the universe seemed to be sending us at that moment. Could it be more clear? There was obviously no luck left IN THE ENTIRE WORLD for us. 

But we needed something more than luck. We needed divine intervention. 

In the end, that's exactly what we got. 

Mia (EVENTUALLY) arrived healthy and happy and changed our lives forever for the good. Adam, after a string of unbelievable bad luck (that I'm now, 9 years later, ALMOST ready to laugh at) was hired in the middle of a hiring freeze into a very stable, comfortable job and that set off a chain of events that led us to Chicago and there, through straight up miracles (but never luck) he found a job and career path he never could have dreamed up. 

When we were considering moving to Ar-kan-SAUWCE, Adam and I went to the temple trying to decide if we could leave our most perfect life. For real. Family, friends, a ward we loved, a job he loved an insane amount, comfort, ease, schools we liked, on and on. It was a really, really good life. While we were at the temple I felt strongly that I shouldn't worry about it. 

And I was like. I don't know what that means. 

Worrying is basically my job. Only I'm way better at it than I am at my actual job. 

So I settled into thinking that to not worry about it meant that I wouldn't WANT to worry about it. Moving would feel easy and right and uncomplicated. Moving would be a simple process, because clearly that's the only way I, Captain of team worry, would not worry about it. 

Well we did it. We moved. And nothing was simple, nothing seemed to go right, none of it made sense, nothing didn't feel complicated, breathing hurt all the time for weeks and I just cried a lot. 

We had a lot. 

A LOT. 

Of bad luck. 

It's hard to really get into all the craziness that went on. From weird stuff with the moving process, to changes with the job, to my kids being shuffled to a different school because 3rd grade was full at our school, to having no cell service in our house and really terrible internet for a while, to EVERYTHING IN THE HOUSE BEING BROKEN OR BREAKING (including a doorbell that about every 8 times it rings just buzzes until it gets rung again, but of course I didn't know what was buzzing and I thought the house was going to blow up for a while there), to my inability to socialize like a normal human being (including a night full of awkward interactions EVEN IN MY DREAMS [also, one of those was with Mitt Romney, which was . . . different]), to just STUFF. 

And there's also been a lot of good. And things are genuinely fine, so STOP WORRYING ALREADY, but the general message is, a weird amount of bad luck. And most of it extremely comical. So I promise this isn't meant to be soooo dramatic. 

Anyway, today, I felt really calm. I realized that with everything that's gone wrong, nothing is actually broken and that's a huge relief. Things feel bad sometimes. Things felt bad in 2009, but everything really worked out to be miracles in the works and took us down really amazingly cool paths we couldn't have found if we went about life the normal or expected way. I realized I really really don't need to worry, not because things are simple and just seem to be "working out," but because, while I don't know if lucky is real, I know that God is. I know that things are working out well and we feel really divinely supported right now. And things will work out better than we deserve, because somehow that's how things go when I CHILL OUT AND LET THEM. We aren't especially lucky, but we are weirdly and insanely blessed beyond belief and that's something more than luck. And that's really how I feel about everything. Things are good. And things will be good some more.

So yeah. It was unlucky for Adam to lose his job while I was 7 months pregnant, but I sure am thankful for it. I probably won't ever be THANKFUL the dishwasher broke 16 thousand times the first few stressful weeks we lived here, but hey, at least it's funny to me now. I'm starting to realize that all of the best things in my life have come from being unlucky, so, today I'm thankful not to always be lucky.

Besides. When I finished jotting this down this song turned on. So it's probably a sign.

Also today an old guy at the store called me darlin and it warmed my icy heart and I was like. Yes. Now I can happily live here and that seems pretty lucky too.  

Sometimes we weekend.

There are boxes everywhere in my house. Also a lot of flies. I hate them both equally.

Here is a story.

Once upon a time I was in Jr. High and it was terrible. But good sometimes too. Because, Jr. High.

Jr. High included some really attractive styles, most importantly, plaid capris, slip-on platform sketchers (they were so ugly and everyone had a pair and, boy howdy, I thought they were so cool and I think they probably made me 6'5 and even less proportional than my strange pubescent body should have been. The memory is a burden I must carry.) and all the overalls.

I was in the midst of friending Sarah Ann StringHAM during these awkward days. And I (correctly) became convinced that our friendship was meant to be because we pretty much, always unplanned, showed up in the same outfit every day. This is not an exaggeration, so Sarah, if you have any memory of this please give me an amen in the comments.

Anyway.

There we'd be walking down the halls in our matching Gloria Vanderbilt overalls (from Sam's Club, of course) and our platform Sketchers, or our skin tight plaid capris with the slit at the knee so they formed little ugly flaps. I don't know what was going on, but I'm not even a little sad there aren't more pictures to document these dark times. But whatever. It was the craziest thing. I shudder now because there's no way people didn't think we were just weird enough (we probably were) to have planned this insanity, but it was a true coincidence as far as my (foggy) memory serves.

But alas, this isn't a story about me. I have children to think about, people!

This is all just an excuse to show you some cute pictures. Because on Friday night our awesome friends (those responsible for us living in Arkansas, which is a thing I still don't understand how it happened) invited us to join them at an event in downtown Bentonville where we were given lots of free frisbees and Sam yelled at everyone because HE WANTS TO GO HOME, OKAY. We showed up and Mia and her buddy were twinning so perfectly it reminded me of those blessed 8th grade days I had otherwise blocked out. But the cuteness, oh, it was just too much. I love that these two have become fast friends.

Also. This is Sam. He struggles sometimes. Especially at hungry, tired times. Which is always lately. 

Little dude did perk up, however, when given a blue balloon. He let his first balloon fly away, so he was actually given 2 blue balloons. And this is also the reason Mia is balloonless in the following future album cover for their first band.

Even with the uptick in Sam's mood, we left around 6 to get some dinner and go home to see Adam J321 (because in this house you better believe we call each other by our email addresses.)

BUT BAD NEWS! Some jerk amazing human full of limitless potential decided it would be amazing to parallel park right behind my van! Which was just amazing. An executive decision was made and I thought the local crepe joint was just a couple blocks away (cue sad trombone because IT WAS NOT ACTUALLY THAT CLOSE). Off we walked to get dinner while dork face a real good guy finished his time downtown and then moved his car. (/rage)

Our walk took approximately 13,000 years. Sam screamed the whole time and because my back is the weakest of all the sauce he begged me to hold him, and I tried but I was becoming more and more crippled by the minute. So he trudged and SCREAMED the entire 20 minute walk and then, joy of joys

The sky opened up. 

And it began to pour. Intensely. And no one was happy. 

But then . . . crepes!

And then everyone actually was happy. 

Except the other patrons, who probably weren't in love with my son who only knows how to yell. Even if he is happy. Sorry dudes.

Eventually, many delicious crepes later, the rain stopped and we trekked back to the car hoping we would could, you know, DRIVE HOME.

Look! Photographic evidence of happy, full children walking back to the car! Everything is good! (Not pictured, one very cranky mother)

This picture is called, The Middle Child:

Fixed it!

We did get back to the car and, don't worry. The problem car still hadn't moved. Luckily the kids were good to sit and watch a movie in the car while I silently screamed at every passerby. 

Eventually the kids saw someone come open the trunk and lo and behold the car's owner was standing in a parking lot right next to us the entire time and I loathe him, except for I shouldn't because Jesus said love everyone and stuff like that. So I love him now. But around 8pm we did, finally, make it home. 

Saturday I ate squirrel meat. Because this is my life now.

Mia, our resident carnivore, let us know she'd rather become a vegetarian than ever eat a squirrel. She firmly abides by the law of only eating animals that are not "cute."

Sam got his first taste of funnel cake. It went well. 

And then, these friends of ours, who I can't even understand why they are so nice to us, came and saved our faces by unpacking and organizing more than we've gotten done in days. Bless you Frakes. 

Finishing out our weekend travelogue . . . today was Sunday and Zo dressed Sam for church. How'd she do?

Sadly, an outfit change was required. 

Anyway. All this is to say. We're adjusting and life is going well. Even if I need to deal with my rage issues. . .

So you want to birth a baby.

I'm really happy to report that I've birthed another human. It's a great feeling to have a baby on the outside instead of crowding out my insides.

Here's how it all went down. If you don't like talk of cervixes or uteri or generally birthy things, now is your chance to escape.

My body dilates early. So at 36 weeks I was dilating, 37 weeks still dilating and I got to a 3 and 50/60% effaced and just stayed. Because that's what I do. After that NOTHING changed. Ever. And if you've been pregnant you know that somehow, despite the overwhelming evidence that everyone eventually does go into labor, you believe you will be the ONE who is pregnant for the rest of your life. So 40 weeks came and my back and body and especially my mind were oh so done with being pregnant. However, I am not a fan of intervention on this front. I really prefer my body to be in charge, so I was willing to wait.

On my 40 week level up day (as I've come to call it) I went to the doctor. She was tired of seeing me, and I her. Here you can see what I look like when I'm pretending to smile and really want to scream:

Adam decided he should come to this appointment with me to listen to the doctor since he knew I wouldn't. (I'm everyone's favorite patient!)

They did a non stress test and everything was hunky dory. They weren't thrilled with how I was growing. Apparently they thought the growth should be in my belly and not my hips. But I know I don't really grow out much at the end I just get incredibly uncomfortable while the baby rides high and low and stretches out.

Next the doctor turned away from me and just talked to Adam. Pretty much she wanted to induce me and I wanted her to go away.

Her concerns:

1-I wouldn't get to the hospital in time. This is actually kind of valid to me. I think I would wait a really long time because laboring in a hospital is so not fun and then have a baby in the car.

2- I was dilated/effaced enough that I should be able to go into natural labor without any issue once they got me started.

3-She pays a ridiculous sum in malpractice insurance and likes babies out better than babies in after 40 weeks and really doesn't care if that means getting them out via c-section should the induction cause issues (she didn't say this, but it's true)


Anyway. Normally Adam just goes with me on these things, but in the days leading up to this 40 week mark he had been getting increasingly anxious about getting the baby here and that's just not very Adamic. He's always a cool cuke. I, however, am always a mess. Add pregnancy into the mix and I'm a hot mess. So I figured if Adam, the reasonable one, felt like we needed to do this, I could go with him on that.

So we decided to have a baby. That day.

My mom already had Zo and Mia was at school so we ran some clothes and whatsits and whoosits to my mom and then went to the hospital.

I was really not excited.

The deal with labor and birth is I really prefer it to start on its own so I don't have to make this decision. What kind of crazy person just says I WANT TO GO THROUGH THIS TODAY! No. Bodies are supposed to force us to do it.

But I felt pretty calm (that never happens) and ready to have a baby man so we checked in and sat. and sat. and sat. I thought maybe they were going to send us away but an hour or so later we got checked in and at 3 pm they broke my water.

I have a lot of opinions about the way my birth goes.

I've been induced and hated everything about that, except the actual delivery. I hated the way I was totally ignored when I was like ENOUGH WITH THE PITOCIN I'M IN LABOR NOW. And I still shudder when I remember getting the epidural. My back is fused RIGHT where the needle needs to go, so there was a lot of trial and A LOT of error in getting that. Ohhhhhh the shuddery feelings I have remembering that. But I felt it was necessary since the pitocin continued to be cranked up every 30 minutes until it was just unbearable.

Then with Zo I pretty well got what I wanted. It was a pretty quick labor, I didn't have to labor a really long time in the hospital, I could move however I wanted since there wasn't an IV holding me into one uncomfortable position the whole time. But oh, oh how the actual delivery sucked.

This time I decided to be more dedicated to my hypnobabies practice to help out with the delivery, but I really didn't want pitocin because I wanted to have the labor go more like it did with Zoey's.

Again, doctors love me. (I really do try to be as unobnoxious as I can about it, but I can feeeel their rolling eyes)

So yeah, they broke my water and wanted to get me on pit, but I asked that they put in a saline lock instead and wait to see what would happen. After a while I could feel the contractions starting, nothing too regular, but they were coming.

This of course wasn't good enough for them. But I learned with Zoey that gravity is my friend in labor. So when they started on my case to get pitocin I'd ask to stand up and walk around instead (one nurse said: That doesn't really help, if you're in labor you'll stay in labor and progress in bed. I say: you should go back to school or something because you're wrong). So I walked and we watched tv while I paced around the room and Lo and Behold! I progressed! Surprise!

They had to get me back on the monitors every 20 minutes or so, so after my pacing they hooked me back up. And everything stalled again.

Then 15 minutes later they wanted to start pit again so I got up and walked around again, this time through the halls.

Gravity people! I'm telling you, it's the best invention! It got things going again. After this I laid in bed and listened to my hypno tracks and just let those sweet sweet contractions come.

It was pretty funny at this point because I was dilated to a 7 or 8 and the nurses were a little weirded out. They could see I was having contractions but they didn't really believe I was having strong enough ones (and they were never especially regular..again why they wanted me on pit) because they thought I was asleep. Adam told them to just touch my arm and I'd respond, but I was hypnotized. They thought he was joking... Anyway, when they checked me and I was really progressing they finally left me along about the pitocin and realized things were coming along fine.

Things went like this for a while. I really have no memory of time through all of this. It's kind of a bi-product of the hypnobabies. I remember it being 9:15 and thinking, since Emmie Fitzgerald, the great wizard, predicted I'd have the baby that night at 9:24, I could go for that time.

Then came transition. I can tell when I'm in it because I feel like I'm going to throw up. It's really nice.

Then I start to shake really bad. Also great.

At this point no one doubted I was in full on labor mode anymore. I remembered the nurse when I had Zoey telling Adam to apply counter pressure to my back and thinking that was really helpful. My back was on freaking fire so I had Adam push against my lower back and it was MAGIC. Holy crap helpful.

I started thinking I felt pushy and the nurse checked me and said I was still an 8. I might have been discouraged here, but I knew 8-10 can happen in a second when the body's ready. That's what happened with Zoey, so I didn't lose hope.

A few minutes later I pushed my call button and yelled "HELP!"

Nurse came in and didn't want to check me because she was afraid I still wasn't dilated and wasn't ready to push. I told her to get the doctor in NOW because checked or not I was pushing.

I pushed. I felt that sweet sweet ring of fire and knew my baby was close. The doctor said "you're crowning now" and I thought YOU DON'T SAY! But I didn't say that. Instead I puuuuuushed.

Then there was a head. And I was pretty done with the whole thing. But they told me to keep pushing because apparently babies have bodies too. More puuuushing and at 10:01

A baby!

That slurpy feeling when a baby slops out is the absolute weirdest and best feeling that exists in the entire world. I'm convinced of it. 

They plopped his purple slimey self on my chest and I was just so so glad to meet him. It was such a relief. I loved hearing him cry and having him officially here and part of our family. I think it was the most emotional I've been at the birth of one of my babies. With Mia I was just riding high on what a great time delivering completely without pain was and with Zoey I was pretty ticked at how much pain I was in, but this time I just felt relief and peace to have this baby. 

We bonded, nursed, all that good stuff that comes with baby production. Then they got him cleaned up and Adam got to have some man time with him.

I can't speak for all men, but the ones I've discussed this with find birth pretty scarring. The above picture is Adam's face of total relief that was over. He's also pretty jazzed about this man child. He's even decided he really does like newborns more than he thought he does (he says that every time).

He's been a pretty great baby. He's very very blonde and very much looks like his dad. We even suspect he may have blue eyes. The doctors and nurses all liked to tell me how big his head is. Which felt quite validating after birthing said head. But really it looks pretty normal to me, so maybe my mother goggles just can't tell that he's a bobble head. Big head, small head, I think he's a delightful looking child.

Even when he pees all over me in the middle of the night.

Mia and Zoey have been over the moon in love with him.

Still, it's definitely been a transition for them. Some days are like this where sweet zoey sat and read to Sam:

Other days are like this:

When scary terrorist Zo with crazy hair won't stop screaming and Adam has to take her out for some one on one daddy daughter time. (She came home a very reasonable and delightful person)

Mia is 1000% smitten with the baby. The problem here is she's waking up extra early to see the baby (Unrested Mia=craaaazy times) and feeling ultra clingy to him and me. On Friday this meant a call from the school nurse who was convinced our actress had a terrible illness. When she got home and was clearly 100% fine I asked what was wrong and she said:

"Well, when I bend my knee it shakes!"

But I suppose sometimes we all need a day off school...so long as it doesn't happen again.

All in all though, we're adjusting nicely. My mom has babied us to a really wonderful degree so I haven't had to do laundry or clean bathrooms yet, so I guess it's easy to adjust when you don't have to do the normal things in life! I'm sure sleep will eventually come and we'll get into some kind of rhythm, but for now I'm just really enjoying loving on this sweet baby and kissing his really soft cheeks.

don't do drugs (unless your doctor tells you to)

I always like to tell the kids at church "don't do drugs!" it's basically the new aloha. It's hi, it's goodbye and often it works for everything in between.

I like to think it's just sound advice. It really is! You've got nothing to lose by not doing drugs, so why not not do drugs? Think about it.

Now, at the risk of sounding like I'm going to use my blog to tell you alls about my medical woes, I have decided to do a drug. Well, less decided than was told to by my doctors. But anyway, I've been on synthroid (for hypothyroidism) for several months and HALLELUJAH friends and foes alike! It turns out taking thyroid medication is like finally being awake for the first time in a couple years.

When I first found out I needed to go on something I was super paranoid about it because I've seen the commercials! I know every drug out there comes with side effects (compulsive gambling my favorite among them). It's like, this medicine will heal that weird spot on your left toe, BUUUUT it will also kill you. So I was pretty skeptical because yeah every day of my life felt like I was trying to swim in jello and doing absolutely anything at all felt like running a marathon, but I'll pass on the compulsive gambling.

Anyway, someone with some experience on the subject talked me into giving it a go (turns out there just aren't a lot of side effects for synthroid) and I am so so glad. I'm not sure exactly when it happened but one day I woke up at 6. IN THE AM. That has never EVER EVER EVER happened to me without the help of 4 alarms and a screaming child. And now I regularly just wake up in the morning like it isn't the hardest thing in the world to do. And if you know about my sleep habits (I'm sorry for you) you know that's a modern miracle. All this time I just thought I was suuuper lazy and hated myself a little bit for it. Turns out, I just needed drugs.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say here with this medical history is that I've decided to start making my bed every day.

You follow?

You don't?

That's weird.

Earlier this year I started seeing a lot of articles about the benefits of making your bed every day. And I was like, that's dumb. I don't believe in making my bed. But then I was like, I will try it and see. So it became my New Years Resolution. That's it. The only one I made. It was very possible and if that's the only thing I was trying to hold myself accountable for I could do that one little thing.

And I'm a believer now.

I make it even though I don't feel like it and even though it seems pretty pointless. I'm not like crazy weirdo about it, there are days it just doesn't happen (hello morning sickness) But 9.5 times out of 10 I do and when it happens I just FEEL better. I decided it was better just to do it than to do it so it looks perfect and that seems to be a pretty good formula. The effect on my brain with a imperfectly made bed is the same as a perfectly made bed so it's not worth too much hassle.

Anyway, bed making is the new drug. So with the combination of the drug drug and the new drug I just feel a lot less funky about life. When I make my bed. I Get. Stuff. Done. And I like that. I also like that it's less embarrassing if people are walking around my house and see my room. I'm like an adult now or something. I make my bed!

Besides, bed making side effects are pretty awesome. It somehow helps my dishes get done, my laundry washed and my children dressed before noon (not me, my children. I don't believe in wearing something other than pj pants unless something fancy is going down. Who do you think I am, the queen?) Like I said, more just gets done when the bed is made. And I like it.

So I've decided from now on I'm going to make really little resolutions. Little things that are totally doable and then not guilt myself over them, but just do them and not freak out if I don't do it perfectly. Also, I'm just really really grateful to feel like I have some energy to be a human again. Maybe it's just the combo of bed making, drugs and nesting and it will all go away when this baby comes and I don't sleep for a few years, but I'm really enjoying it for now.

Ikea Angels like cheap ice cream too.

We have a couch in our basement! It's really exciting. Our basement has lacked real furniture since we moved here. Well, we've had some camping chairs and who isn't excited to settle in and watch all 6 Star Wars movies* in a mice infested basement in a folding camping chair??? I can't imagine anyone wouldn't be.

(PS I don't THINK it's still mice infested. We can get to that story later)

*Did you know Yoda DIES? I didn't. Because I'd never seen the old Star Wars movies before. I had a lot of sadness. Also, all this talk about Anakin still having some good in him. Yeah no. May he burn. Eternally. You don't just get to go around blowing up whole planets of people (not that Leia seemed to mind 10 minutes after everyone she'd ever known and loved was destroyed...) and be redeemed because you didn't kill your son. It just doesn't work out. It may actually make you a worse person. OH AND this whole Luke can't fight back because he would be letting anger win and then he's on the dark side. Completely unacceptable. SO JUST LET THEM ALL GO BLOW UP MORE PLANETS FULL OF PEOPLE SO YOU DON'T HAVE TO FIGHT IN ANGER. How could good ever win if they couldn't even fight? Just terrible. Also. I actually really liked the movies, so I'll stop now.

Right. We bought a couch. We actually bought the perfect amazing awesome best deal everrr couch back in May. We were going to put our current giant couch in the basement and the new couch of dreaminess in the family room. Sadly, the shipping got delayed on it and whatever and when it was about time to get the couch we tried taking our upstairs couch down our weird split stairs and one severely bleeding messed up Adam toe later... we learned the couch could never ever go to the basement. Even sadder...pretty much no couch could. We then understood why when we bought our house the previous owners only had a loveseat down in the basement. The dream couch was cancelled just in time and I settled on keeping our current couch upstairs.

This left us with 2 options for the basement.

1-Love seat. (Not really an option since I want to hang out in the basement with my whole family and not just my love. Smooch smooch. PS Facebook tells me Adam and I got engaged 8 years ago yesterday. More smooches. And what would we do without Facebook to tell us these things?)

2-A couch that comes in a box and can be assembled in the basement.

That was really the only option. And that pretty much meant we had to get something from Ikea. Which...I will never complain about making a trip to Ikea. SALT LICORICE FOR EVERRRRYONE! (Ok, just for me, since everyone else [is wrong] thinks it's horrendous).

What am I even talking about anymore? I really have no idea. Ikea. Couches. That's right, let's go on.

We went online and picked out the dark gray FRIHETEN sofa bed, which is way less terrifying than the name sounds. And it also becomes a bed. Now we can have visitors sleep downstairs with the (probably not still there) rodents! Lucky you! Come see us anytime! Not really though. Don't come for a while. I'm going to have a baby soon and I just don't and won't have it in me to worry all night about mice nipping at your toes.

On Saturday we went to pick up the couch and well, the boxes were way bigger than they looked in my mind after I looked at the package measurements online. Luckily my brother's family had kindly taken our kids so we had a prayer of fitting it all in the van.

There were three boxes. Two we were able to tetris into the car, the third had to go on the roof. It was so exciting. We are not exactly scouts when it comes to tying knots and securing things to the roof of a car. But we had to do what we had to do. Luckily we had some Ikea angels show up.

I'm serious. Ikea angels are a real thing now.

There we were trying to get this stuff in and on the car and just as it was time to get the box on the car there were these two burly African guys sitting on a bench in fancy hipster clothes ... eating ice cream cones.

Doesn't that picture just make you smile. Two grown men, hanging out at the Ikea loading area having some delicious, low fat, frozen vanilla yogurt cones together. It was so precious. It was also awesome because they finished their cones and I was able to just settle my 9 months pregnant self into the van and let the men do the work to get the couch secured. They were angels! At Ikea! Ikea Angels! They just jumped right up and started helping. Always good to see there's nice people in the world.

Adam claims they were detrimental to his efforts and their knot tying was even worse than his, but I still believe they were heavenly messengers sent to keep me from barking at my husband while I stood in the cold being annoyed at everything because I'm an extremely pleasant human. Instead I did no barking and happily ate my way into a salty black licorice coma.

And I'm sorry you've read this far, because this post doesn't actually have a point. We have a couch! There were ice cream eating angels at Ikea! Yay!

Oh and the mice. 6. We've killed six mice in our basement storage room. But it's almost been a week since the last one bit the dust. Soooo they're either all dead (oh please let it be true) or they're a lot smarter than they were a week ago. And my kids think dead mice are SOOOOO CUTE CAN I SEE IT PLEAAAASE?

They are wrong. It's just gross. Not cute. Not at all.

it's evil.

I have blog posts written and never published about things like:

fire drills ruining the world.

or

pregnancy induced rage.

and of course

how school shopping lists killed my love for back to school supply shopping.

But the thing is, I could never really bring myself to publish them. They just seem so stupid. and angry. and really very stupidly angry.

Because what's on my mind isn't really what I write stuff about. Because I write stuff about nonsense. Pens and pencils and pie and sandwiches. Super deep. I know. The problem here is I'm not still 16 like I was when I started a blog about nothing so I wouldn't feel quite so alone after moving across the country in a pre-facetime (but post-letter writing) world. It's just that that's not really still the same stuff I think about. I mean. I do think about it. I think about it a lot. (Especially the sandwiches) I even like writing about it, but the nonsense just seems so...lame.

Because you live and learn and you find out that there's a lot more to think about.

Several years ago I read a historical fiction book (that I assume had a title, but have no memory of) that replayed the decade or so leading up to the Holocaust. It was the most FRUSTRATING thing I've ever read in my life. I was angry at the book, at my house, at my children, at my husband ... basically everything because HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?

I mean, I always knew about the Holocaust, but it's those little details that led up to it that just made me want to set someone's hair on fire (not a solution to your problems, kids.) It was all the blindness. The post WWI fear of war and total apathy that turned everyone's brains off and let straight up, flat out EVIL rampage. And I didn't understand it and I couldn't believe it.

The same time I was reading this things were getting bad in the Syrian civil war. So I started reading about that and realized...we're doing it again. We're so afraid of MORE war (and hey, trust me, that's not what I'm looking for...just the opposite) that our society has just clicked off our brains that these are real people living real lives where their government may just use chemical weapons to mass murder them. Back then there were kind of solutions, there were things we could have done, ways we could have been involved without fighting, without provoking more war (just like we could have before WWII).

And then things just kept getting worse. Then enter ISIS, or IS or ISIL or WHATEVER WE'RE CALLING IT THIS WEEK. I don't care. Let's not pretend I'm smart enough or know enough to really explain what was then or is now going on in the Middle East. Let's not pretend I even know proper terms or all the ins and out and nuances of this that and the other.

But I do know what evil looks like. And we're watching it on YouTube. The old evil secretly took people to prison camps and mass murdered them. That was evil. And it kept going, because evil doesn't reach a goal and stop. Evil just keeps getting worse.

Today evil openly posts videos beheading, drowning, and burning innocents. Evil throws gay men off buildings and rapes and enslaves women and children and says it's all in the name of God. Evil throws acid on the faces of women that dare think they may like to go to school. That's evil. And they aren't hiding it. And we know about it. But we don't talk about it. I don't talk about it. Because...you know, pens, pencils, pie and sandwiches.

It isn't going to stop though. Evil hasn't changed really. It doesn't stop. All this madness will eventually sit in front of our faces and we won't just be able to pretend it's not there anymore.

I don't really know my point. I don't know what I'm trying to change. I will still post my semi-annual nonsense I'm sure. I doubt the world really needs another half educated blogger to opine on these things. But I do think we have to see what's going on. We just can't be as willfully blind as past generations. We CAN'T just keep letting history repeat. (And if you don't think history repeats I encourage you to listen to this [but buy it through audible for the sake of your wallet]).

There are charities helping refugee families get out of Iraq and Syria or to send them clothes and supplies. There are things we can do to help. For me I feel like we have to donate something. I don't know what you need to do. I only know nothing can really change until people pay attention. If you need some suggestions on how you can donate, I'd be happy to tell you my opinions.

Denns Prager wrote a book called Why the Jews and he talks regularly about evil. He explains that we often think about evil as darkness, but the truth is evil is so bright it's hard to look into it. We can't bear to see it because it's just too hard to handle. It's just so much easier to look away.

I guess I want it down in writing that I am not willing to look away, even though I really really want to. Usually it makes me sick and always it makes me ragey and mostly it makes me feel completely helpless. But I have to know what's going on. I have to see the evil and make sure my children know that I am not okay with it.

Now I need to go make dinner and Adam just got home and wants me to go look at his "dual-nerding" monitor set up (men?)  because I'm so very very absurdly blessed and my life keeps marching on in a safe place with good people. In a world full of evil, I am so grateful for a life so good that I have time to think and write about trivial things.

I'm in time out.

And I have every intention of staying in time out for the next 30 minutes, at which point I will begin the mad rush to get Mia to school on time and then get after everyone because WE'RE GOING TO BE LATE and then get to the school 7 minutes early and have to sit in the car until the preschool door is unlocked while Mia rolls her eyes at her mom's crazy time management skills.

I deserve all the eye rolls in all the land.

I really have nothing to say right now. I've had a lot of bloggable thoughts lately. Most about Home Depot and sandwiches, but I'm not really in the mood to get into that right now. Because...well, I'm in time out.

But I seriously do love sandwiches. And I think about them a lot. If I hired a chef I'd be like...Chef! Bring me a sandwich! For every meal.

Instead of Home Depot and Sandwiches, let's talk about the 2 board games I played with my littles today (and after that feel free to eat a sandwich...at Home Depot, if you like). I'm hopeful that airing my FEEEELINGS will help me work through the quiet rage that landed me in this self-imposed time out.

Up first

Candy Land.

I love Candy Land! It's the greatest. Super easy to play. Quick, fun, woooo...Great idea children, yes we can play Candy Land.

Candy Land is not always fun.

Now I know.

It was fun at first, for like 5 minutes, which was how long it took me to win. Which was pure luck, because that's all Candy Land is. I was feeling really good about things. I won, the children were taking it in stride, accepting their loss, good things were happening. So I was like, yessss of course you can keep playing until you both finish too! This will be sooo familyfunish!

THIRTY FIVE MINUTES LATER

I was bald from pulling my hair out because EVERY TIME someone was about to cross into the candy castle they were sent basically back to the beginning of the game. Both children had lost focus and were constantly bouncing around the board moving the pieces, bending the cards and, really, if you don't know Mia well you won't fully understand how accurate this is, but she is a kangaroo. A whistling kangaroo. And when she loses focus she bounces around the room like an eternally moving, giant bouncy ball. Special bonus, the longer the bouncing goes on the less aware she becomes of anything in her path. (This is not especially ideal board game playing behavior)

It's exhausting. Yet lovable. But not when it goes on and on and on.

Which it did, because my darling kangaroo, is a whistling kangaroo and kangaroos only learn to whistle at her level of expertise by being EXTREMELY persistent about never ever ever stopping a task at hand no matter how uninterested the kangaroo has become in doing the task.

So, to stop the game would have saved my sanity, but only for about 2 seconds when my sanity would have been swallowed up in an epic fit of crying for the next two days about stopping the game before it was over. Parenting is a game of choosing battles and I decided to not battle the fit, but to deal with the kangaroo.

12 gray hairs later Mia passed finish and another 10 gray hairs passed and Zoey finished too, because apparently she's going to be able to whistle soon too.

I had promised them 2 games. WHY DID I DO THAT? I DON'T KNOW.

The kids insisted I keep my promise, even though there was no chance in this world of lovely worlds that they were going to have the attention span to do anything like play . . .

Super Why ABC Letter Game.

First of all. I hate this game. The spinner is terrible. SO TERRIBLE. The spinning part doesn't hook in so every time the kids spin it it falls off and they have to start over. ALSO. WHILE I'M HERE COMPLAINING IN ALL CAPS. The spinner includes: 1, 2, 3, and Spin Again. (I think. maybe there's a 4 too. If you care, YOU go look.) WHHHY is there a spin again? Why should I spin again? Why not give an answer now? Miss a turn may make sense. Spin Again? NO.

Mooooving on.

I feel like the kids could learn some valuable skills from this game. But whenever I've played it Zoey (3, as a reminder, also this game is for ages 3 and up) gets cards asking her to spell entire words. She is three. I don't even want her able to spell words yet. Mia, on the other hand (5) gets cards asking her to find a capital V, while the card shows a lowercase v. That is not hard. Not for Mia, not for Zoey, not for a puppy.

It's just luck and it's just random, but it happens EVERY TIME. So Mia gets all the cards and Zoey gets exactly none of them, unless I cheat AND I DO EVEN THOUGH IT GOES AGAINST EVERYTHING I BELIEVE IN.

So it was terrible. But the kids are happy and everyone lived through the experience. I stayed calm and immediately put myself in time out so I wouldn't scare anyone with the anger in my soul.

But now I need a sandwich.

bye.

A Utah Trip

Before our quick visit to Utah this summer I hadn't been there since the Christmas after we moved to IL. So. Math. If we've lived here 2 years, carry the 3, minus 11 times three quarters of 9....it had been a year and a half and some change. Making that the longest I've ever not been in Utah in my entire life.

We went out there for the wedding of Brett, one of our very favorite people in the world. I am a crazy paranoid (did you know that?) about traveling without (also with) my kids. So, I reaaaaallly really wanted to go because I didn't want to miss that wedding for anything, but I also didn't see how it was even a little bit possible for me to set my crazy aside and travel without the tots.

Of course, I dealt with this problem by ignoring that the trip was coming up. I pretty much had decided there was no way on Earth I was going, so I let everyone think I was and then I'd just never show up to the airport.

But then I kept feeling a little nagging thought that I needed to JUST DEAL WITH IT and go. It was this constant idea that there was something I needed to hear in Utah, so I should go. Because this idea  wouldn't back off, I did, somehow, manage to pack a bag like 15 minutes before I had to go drop our kids off at my parents' house.

I did it. I got on a plane. I flew away from my kids (I'll save you some time - Yes my arms did get tired from all the flying) and didn't melt down even twice about it.

We had a bit of parking drama and it quickly became a miracle that we even made our flight, but I know you don't want this story to go on EVEN longer than it's about to, so I'll spare you that tale. Gird up your loins, we're not even close to done with this.

So anyway. Utah.

I think it's The Stranger where the dude is always ranting about how a person can get used to anything. Eventually anything will seem normal. And I think he's right. Sometimes ole Camus really gets things spot on. Unless I'm remembering wrong, in which case, whoever else wrote it gets the honors. But, the point. It's so easy to forget how green NotUtah is. All the trees and just, greeness becomes so normal that it's still pretty, but just how things are. It was a little shocking to me to realize how dry Utah really is. All those summer news reports from my childhood about drought and I was like, whatev, this is normal, and now I'm like HOLY DROUGHT. 

Reference pictures (also note, IL has terrible roads because we now pay our taxes by walking straight up to a politician and sticking the money directly in his pockets instead of even pretending the state uses the money for anything real):

IL in July.

UT in August.

But it really just reminded me that different things can be really pretty in their own way. I don't think the yellow Utah summer is ugly like I once would have. Now I think it's actually kind of striking in its weirdness. 

Once we were in Utah it was a crazy whirlwind of trying to see as many people as would accept us last minute (we love to plan.) as we could. We bounced from house to house and saw so many friends and family and friends that feel like family that at the end of the day I would just stare at the wall from being so socially overwhelmed in the best way possible. It was just so good. 

I had three non-people seeing goals for our trip. 1-Eat garden fresh Utah tomatoes (no one in IL lets them get ripe...angry feelings) I went to see my cousin Heidi and my aunt Allyson and BAM. Allyson fed us tons of garden tomatoes. A great visit plus tomatoes. They know what's up. 

The #2 thing I insisted we do, was go to the Ogden temple open house. I love the Ogden temple so much. It's where I first did baptisms for the dead and I went to all my stake conferences before I was 16 in the tabernacle next to the temple so I have so many pleasant memories there. When the church announced that they would redo the temple I couldn't think of a more deserving temple for a total overhaul than my home temple, but I always felt sad I wouldn't be there to tour the finished product.

Well. Good news everyone. We happened to be there. The new temple did not disappoint. I've been in many pretty temples, though I'm hardly a temple expert. Before Ogden I thought nothing could compare to the the Nauvoo temple. Ogden blew it out of the water. I have never seen anything quite like it. Every window, every door, every wall deserved to be stopped and stared at. Plus. The Celestial Room. Geeeeez. I wish I had words. 

I am a flawed picture taker...so of course I have none, but I did steal one from Sarah! Hi Sarah! 

We also saw Adam's sister, who drove in from Nevada, at the temple and had a nice visit with her and her 5 tots. Including Miss Aria, who(m) I had never met. 

Now. The whole reason we took the trip.

The wedding.

Remember how Camus and I said you can get used to anything? I am used to the tiny-ness of the Chicago temple and it's itsy bitsy rooms. It had been so long since I'd seen the Salt Lake temple that I forgot how GIGANTIC it is. I couldn't even fit it all in the picture without becoming less lazy and you know...backing up.

 Then I stood at the very bottom and took a picture up. Which means nothing to you (BUT LOOK AT IT ANYWAY) because it just seemed so much taller than I remembered. I cannot imagine what it took to build this temple, but after spending so much time in Nauvoo this summer and reading family history and becoming more familiar with all the trouble the early church members went through, I love how permanent the Salt Lake temple is. I think it would have taken a lot of faith, after bouncing around from place to place for so long, to say, we are going to build something so enormous that it will take 40 years (prolly, they were less than aware of that going in...doesn't matter) to finish. FORTY YEARS. That's dedication.

We also learned that this temple is built like a fortress, with pylons (I have no idea what a pylon is, did I just invent that?) 40 feet deep. It's even built to withstand cannon fire. It makes sense, the pioneers probably were legitimately concerned about having somewhere to be protected, spiritually and physically, after the awful fest they'd endured. But, again, I love that faith. It's like they built a sign that said, we are done running and we are not going anywhere any more. The prophet told them, and they believed it and put something out there to show their faith. It's hardcore.

But. The wedding. This wedding will probably forever be the most amazing sealing of all time. I told you I had this feeling that I needed to go to Utah to hear something. I kept wondering when that would happen and after sitting in the sealing room for 10 minutes I got my answer. 

We were sitting, waiting for things to get started when I looked up and saw the sealer walk in. The man I saw looked an awful lot like . . . this:

Or...exactly like him. I saw Elder Holland come in, but most people hadn't. Right after walking in he turned his back to the majority of the room to talk to Ashley's (Brett's now wife) grandma. I didn't really want to talk, so I started punching Adam a little bit and squeezing the death out of his hand with my non punching hand. Because, hello. LOOK UP. Finally he looked at me and said WHAAAT and I motioned over and that was about the time the rest of the room noticed and there was an audible noise of surprise from the room. 

Everyone settled down quickly and Elder Holland began to talk. Fast. And for a long time. He said a lot of interesting and thought provoking things. He cracked a couple funnies and he taught some valuable marriage advice. All of that was good, but it was not something I'd fly across the country for. But what I would go further away and longer from my kids for is to hear him testify of Jesus Christ.

We're taught that apostles are special witnesses of the Savior, but I don't know how much I had thought about that before. Elder Holland didn't say anything crazy or reveal anything new, but I understood better how special it is to hear the testimony of an apostle. I had been in a room with Elder Holland once when my dad was put in the stake presidency, and after that I remember how I felt, which is summarized by my non-LDS friend, Kyle, who afterwards said "I don't know why, but I'm just so happy." This was the exact same feeling. After comparing the experiences and how different, but both great, I realized what I was feeling. 

My main thought is that I really don't think it would have felt even a little bit different to sit with Peter, Paul, or any biblical apostle and hear them teach about the Savior. I really believe these are men called by God to teach about His Son. I think it was exactly like this in the New Testament. I wasn't gathered around him on a hillside or some weird amphitheater, but in a room in the temple. But why wouldn't God want us to learn just like the people in the New Testament did? The same feeling comes with General Conference and the testimonies there, but it's even more effective when it's in a smaller setting and more personalized for the people there. Again. There really aren't words, but I feel incredibly blessed to have been invited to Brett and Ashley's wedding and to have felt the spirit I did there.

Plus they are just really a fantastic pair. When it comes to being blessed, we're beyond blessed to be friends with so many good good people. I hope someday we can get to know Ashley, but we love her just knowing Brett picked her and because she has to be awesome to have picked Brett. There was so much love and such a solemn feeling of goodness at this wedding. If I could bottle the feeling I'd spend every dime we'll ever make on getting some for all of you.

Also, the whole reception was book themed. So. Pretty freaking awesome. It was just the cutest thing in the world. 

#3 on my list was to see BYU. I love BYU. Have I told you that? Because I LOVE BYU. We have so many many many happy memories there. Even the unhappy ones seem happy (like every day of every winter). We took a picture. One. It's not good. But. BYU! We were walking across the street and I was like WE NEED A PICTURE BEFORE WE LEAVE! And Adam was like, ARE YOU ON THE DRUGS AGAIN? So anyway, we had .2 seconds to get a picture before we started getting hit by cars. Success

And then we traveled home. Got home at 1am. Chatted with Jan-o until 2am, I went to ward council at 7am before the kids even woke up, which was the sadddddest thing in the world. I really wanted to wake up these babies. But that's just asking for a cranky day. But eventually! I got to see them again and all was well in the world again.

It was a crazy trip. But fun and amazing and I am so so so glad we went.