This stage

Several times in the last year I've been able to spend time with my friend Susan, and each time we've talked about how great this stage is with it's increased freedom and flexibility.  Both of our oldest are married, we both have college kids, she has one on a mission, and our youngest are all in high school.  There is so much to love about this stage.

The funny thing is that I've spent my whole life dreading it, sure that I would be miserable without my houseful of little kids.  Despite the fact that said houseful always exhausted me and sometimes made me miserable!  But change is change, and as I have now come to realize I dread all of it.

This weekend Lindsay and Katie came to visit.  We had a terrific time.  Segways and desserts and rain and waterfalls and beautiful vistas and endless conversation.  Not much sleep at any point, of course.  And then they flew off home yesterday, I drove back to church and taught my Relief Society lesson, and came home to take a 2.5 hour nap.  Then I was actually in bed by 10:30 (a rarity for bedtime-hating me) and decided at 9:30 this morning (still in my pajamas) that I was ready for another nap, which feeling I did not fight.  

When I got up from my nap I ate and then decided to put this puzzle together that's been sitting around for almost a year.  It was easier than I'd realized and went together quickly, and I enjoyed the peace of working on it in the living room.  Still in my pajamas.

I'm loving this stage.  I need to remember this--that the dread turned out to be needless in the end. (This time and so many others.)  That life keeps being good, and in some ways gets even better.  

Family Pictures

We've taken a new family picture and I'm super excited to send it out for Christmas.  There was a good deal on big canvases right when we took it so I ordered it and it's sitting in the dining room waiting to go on the wall right now.  I came into the room the other day and noticed that something was off about the picture.  Apparently not everyone loves it like I do...

For a while there was a concern that someone was putting a hit on Rachel.

Once Mahon saw the fun that the kids were having with the picture he had to get in on it.

Sigh...I don't think I'll ever be able to look at the picture the same!  ;)

Notes

I've written before that I organize my life with post it notes, and I frequently write myself a note and leave it somewhere that I will see it and be reminded.  When we moved into this house there were a bunch of things we needed and other things that I wanted. I was trying to restrain myself and not spend any more money than I absolutely had to, so I made a list of things I still wanted to buy and put it up on an out of sight cabinet in the kitchen.  As I bought things I crossed them off of the list, but the note was still there a year and a half later when Jason got home from his mission.  (What can I say?  There were still things I was going to buy!)

One day after he'd been home for a while I happened to glance at my list while getting plates and noticed that there had been a small addition.

It made me laugh so hard!  Then I couldn't take the note down, because it made/makes me happy every time I look at it.

Then after Mahon and Cindy Lynn visited in February I noticed yet another addition.

I couldn't take that down either, could I??


Last note. I've been planning for a couple of months to go on a whale watching trip right before the kids went back to school but I kept forgetting to make the reservations.  So one night I wrote the word "whales" on a post it and put it on the bathroom mirror.  When I woke up the next morning this is what I saw.

Sometimes the small things sure bring big happiness!

This place, these people, this week

The Place

How could we know (not ever having considered that North Carolina even had a coastline) when we moved here that one of our favorite things about the state would come to be the beaches?  Uncrowded and peaceful, these barrier islands would provide the perfect vacation escape every year as well as many day trips throughout the years.

In 1997 we celebrated our 10th anniversary by renting one side of Big Bertha, a beach house at Emerald Isle owned by our neighbors.  The next year we came with friends for a week in the fall and a tradition began.

This year is perhaps the 14th year that we have vacationed at Big Bertha. We know and love the house as if it were our own.  It's hard to escape the reality that with another marriage we will probably have grown out of Big Bertha. (No, that is not an announcement, and notice the 'probably'--saying even that is difficult.). Last year we didn't know we could come to the beach until later in the year and we couldn't get both sides, so we ended up somewhere else.  That's probably not a bad thing, now we know that we can still have a great week in a different house.  But our hearts will always love Big Bertha.

The People

We first came to Big Bertha with old friends.  They loved it so much that they still came the year we couldn't come because the triplets had just been born.  Then they were unexpectedly unable come come the next year.  I went through the ward directory, determined that I would find someone to come and rent the other side so that we wouldn't have to share the hot tub with strangers.  When I got to the Rs I saw the name of a newer family in the ward that we had enjoyed getting to know and I emailed to ask if they were interested. 

They accepted and a great friendship began.  Throughout the years we have done far more than vacation together: we have shared meals, holidays, celebrations, temple trips, weddings, and always the most interesting conversations.  Our children have grown up together and we have supported each other through some of life's really difficult experiences. 

We lost so much that was precious to us when we moved, but their friendship has remained a constant. In the last 2 years we have also had a Southern Utah vacation and a Christmas reunion, showing that although the beach is our favorite place, anywhere that we are together is wonderful.

Friendships are so tricky.  They ebb and flow with life's changes and challenges.  Sometimes even the best of friends don't vacation well together. I *know* how rare and wonderful this is.  

This week

On Facebook recently I saw a meme: "Live your life so that you don't need a vacation.". That's one of those things that sounds terrific but doesn't square up with the reality of our life, especially when this is our vacation.  We talk about this week All. Year. Long.  

Can you imagine how I feel to think back to that day with the ward list?  What if I'd chosen differently? I could never have imagined this outcome, but as I sit here at the end I of Day 1 of #RRbeach15, I feel so grateful that it all worked out the way it did.

That we are here this week,  in this place, with these people.

It is Late

It is late, almost eleven, but from the room above I hear the gentle murmur and I know they are talking again.  It is late and I know they will be tired tomorrow and yet I often cannot bring myself to remind them that it is time for quiet and sleep.  Sometimes they hate each other and resent their shared lives.  But then there are these moments--when the irritations and annoyances are set aside and for a while they are friends.

My mother always said that the greatest gift she could give her children was each other.  I, in my lofty teenaged wisdom, surely thought that stupid, but how I understand that now.  With every passing year my love and appreciation for those brothers and sisters grows.  Time together is rare and precious, worth travel and inconvenience.

And so I think to my own children; my greatest gift to you is each other.  An even greater gift because of the difficulty of adding each child to our family and the fear that the family of our dreams would never materialize.

It is late, and as I listen again to my dream murmuring overhead, I smile.

Segway Portland

About a year and a half ago I saw a groupon for a segway tour of Portland.  Since we already know that we love to segway I thought that would be a terrific date idea and I bought 2 of them.  Then I went and got concussed on that hike and it was a while before I was ready for our tour.  I worried that the weather would have changed but it turned out to be a perfect day.  The leaves were all sorts of beautiful colors and the temperatures were perfect.  We got to segway all through the downtown, around Portland State University, along the river, over a bridge, along the other side of the river, and back over another bridge.  It was seriously fantastic.



The kids were all sorts of jealous.  What they didn’t know was that we had asked whether the triplets were old enough and big enough to ride a segway because we thought that would be a fun group birthday present this year while Jason was home from college.

Here are some pictures and video from that day.

First the kids had to be taught how to ride the segways, then they got to practice in a square around a fountain.  Jenna was scared in the beginning but after a while they were all confident.

For the tour with the kids we skipped the university, but we still got to go by the Portland Loo, a public bathroom in a greenspace downtown.

We went by several bubblers, public water fountains that were designed and built long ago and are still in use. 

When we went down to the river we passed an apartment building that had a moat around it. 

We had a great view of all of the bridges.

We also passed the smallest park in the world.  Seriously.

When our tour was over we got to ride our segways around a parking garage while the tour guide was putting the first few away and settling up with Russ.  We decided that the cool Portland tour was just a bonus—they were equally fun in the parking garage.

I don’t know when or where our next segway tour will be, but I’m sure there will be one!

Family

Funerals are such an interesting contrast.  A combination of what is sometimes the very saddest event (the loss of a loved one), and what is often the very happiest event.  (Seeing so many people that you love.)  Fortunately Grandma’s funeral wasn’t terribly sad because she has been so unhealthy for so many years and we were grateful that she didn’t suffer.  So we were able to really enjoy getting having everyone together for the first time in a long time.

It was the first time in forever that we had all of our kids together in the van.  I was surprised at how joyful it felt to be together like that.

I’ve always felt so lucky that I married into such a wonderful family.  Here are all of the grandchildren, spouses, and great grandchildren.

The whole group—everyone was there except for a granddaughter and a granddaughter in law who were both pregnant and on bedrest.

Grandma’s Timing

One of my first thoughts when Russ’s mom died was a little dismay about the timing.  She died on the 30th of October and there were two big problems with this.  First that the kids and I were planning to record a bunch of interviews with Grandma later in the month, which she obviously was no longer around for.  And second, since we were already planning to drive to Utah for Thanksgiving that meant that we would be driving it twice in 4 weeks.  Ouch.

But it turned out that there was also some really terrific things about the timing, things I will always be grateful to Grandma for/about.

The girls marched with the high school marching band this year, and their last game was Halloween night.  Their last competition was all day on November 1st.  We drove to Utah for the funeral on the 2nd, so they didn’t have to miss the end of the season.

Our first fall in Oregon Russ & I took a drive into the Columbia River Gorge hoping to see some fall color.  It was a beautiful day and we had a great time but we didn’t see anything that looked like fall.  When we drove through the Gorge on our way to Utah for the funeral it was really gorgeous.  I’d thought I would try to go back to sleep as soon as possible but the colors were so pretty that I just sat and watched and tried to take pictures until we were through the gorge.

In the first day or two that we were in Utah Jason mentioned that he had 2 tickets for his men’s chorus concert that Saturday.  He had told me that he’d have to miss a concert because it was on the day of the funeral, but it had never occurred to me that there would be another performance the next night.  It wasn’t super convenient, but I’ve never had the chance to go to one of Jason’s concerts and this is going to be his last semester in the men’s chorus.  I decided then and there that I was going to drive down to Provo for the concert.  I ended up taking Jenna with me and we totally loved it.  I’ve listened to the concerts every time on the BYU web page, but being there was amazing. Throughout the entire concert I was thinking that it was so amazing to be able to be there and soak it all in.

  Actually, Grandma, your timing was impeccable.                                           

Halloween ‘14

Jared decided that he didn’t want to dress up for Halloween this year but the girls had been planning their costumes for a long time.  They decided to be feminine versions of Thing 1 and Thing 2 and I think it turned out perfectly.  Since the last home football game was on Halloween they all got to wear their costumes to march in.  That was pretty cool—since the girl’s costumes were bright red we could always tell where they were on the field, unlike all of the other games where they looked exactly like everyone else.