2011 - Let's do this!

I'm only two Sundays behind on the new year's resolution to blog on Sundays! Yay, me! I've decided I've been subconsciously paralyzed in my blogging by the fact that both my husband and yes, my 11YO son, now have my blog in their readers. I'm just going to push past it and expect the barrage of teasing (DH) and questions (DS) to begin.

In sum, we have had all sorts of trauma, trials and plagues, evil enslaving pharaohs, miracles and sea-partings, and we're still in the wilderness wandering, we hope, toward our promised land.  Probably just like you. 

My painfully private husband has had to go pretty public with his current preparations to take the Utah Bar, in part because we needed prayers (and still do, keep 'em coming).  He also is still working, which adds up to 18 hour days.  He now lives in a cave downstairs where I take his meals when my watch alarm goes off thrice a day, then I sneak out quickly. Only Words With Friends keeps us connected (iPhone Scrabble).  

We are almost in the middle of our 11-week ordeal right now, thus the radio silence--we were burned out and exhausted within the first week thanks to a perfect storm of Bar application demands and Christmas. I'm sad to say I kind of missed Christmas this year--I went through all the motions to try to make it fun for the kids but the stress levels were so high. As I took down the tree, I had that relieved feeling of checking off a big box, which really is sad. Next year, hopefully, I'll internalize a little more Christmas.  

So, David takes the test on my birthday, 2/22 and 2/23, and at this point, everything revolves around that. 

In my relatively single-mom state, I still have much to do, both to bring in additional needed income and to keep the family going. The Children's Choir is going wonderfully, I am enjoying it so much and hoping to expand it this year. I wanted to keep it very inexpensive, and I end up putting most of the money back into the choir anyway, so it is much more hobby than job, but it is very fulfilling and I hope to be doing it for years to come.  

I'm also applying to the U to start more music study in the fall. I keep telling the Lord it is not a good time but keep feeling like I need to move the process forward.  Our AMAZING piano teacher  is a great example to me, as she also has kids, just finished her Bachelor of Music and is going back for her Masters.  

The Utah Chamber Artists will be back in session at the end of the month, with our Winter concert happening just after the Bar. I LOVE being part of the UCA, it is a huge blessing in my life.    

The rest of my time that I'm not preparing or cleaning up meals or taskmastering the homework/chores/piano daily drill, I'm working on marketing jobs to pay the bills.

Benjamin is just plugging away at life, getting ready to progress to his Deputy Black Belt III in Tae Kwon Do, enjoying scouts and technology class and really excelling at piano as he prepares for AIM reviews in March.  It's a pleasure to hear him play, unless it is 6:30 a.m., but some days that's what has to happen to get those five days in--our teacher is very strict on that!  He's excited to start taking a C++ programming class at school and dutifully goes out and shovels the driveway at the crack of dawn anytime it snows--without a single request.   On a busy night, I can just say, "Ben, can you take care of dinner?" And he'll jump to it, providing a great meal, vegetable included, a well-set table and sometimes even a decent cleanup job, too.  

Sophie is enjoying school, piano and choir, and is still in Tae Kwon Do and progressing quickly, although her attention wanders often and now she wants to go back to gymnastics and try out for a community play of Annie. We're in a contract for TKD through the summer and I really want her to get to black belt before quitting, but we'll deal with it when we get there. She is really starting to enjoy cooking, too, and can make several things independently.  She is very good at math and seems to be enjoying Latin at school also. My mom is teaching her to sew and she made her very own Christmas stocking with a great deal of appliquéd work. Overall she seems pretty happy these days.

I'm so grateful for Capitol Hill Academy--what a great find that was.  That on its own may be why we are supposed to stay here in Utah--we still aren't really sure why, but we feel it's the right thing for now.

So it may seem strange that I actually ended up pulling Noah from the CHA 3-day kindergarten this month and just kept him in his afternoon public school kindergarten program. But, it saves us a third tuition payment, and we still plan to send him next year.  He loves it, and is such a fun, mischievous little squirt and still has the kissiest fat cheeks.  He is begging to go back to gymnastics too, and hopefully we'll be able to do that soon. His reading is coming along nicely and, when they are not fighting, he is best friends with Lucy and can be so considerate of her.  

Lucy is a sweet little partner to my days. She's so observant and constantly comments on what we're doing (and my own inconsistencies) in such a remarkable way. Yes, I'm not yet 40, but she already feels like the comfort of my old age. She's not doing any extra-curriculars these days, although she also dresses in her "monkeynastics" clothes often and begs to be taken, which again I hope to do again soon.  Oh yes, I added a 5-7 music class to the choir for them and some of their friends and it's so much fun, so she has that. I'm trying to remember all the fun things I did when Ben and Sophie were where Noah and Lucy are now, I want to give them a taste of that pre-burned out mommy era.

This has been a rough few months, and we are facing at least three more rocky ones ahead. I'm frankly very tired.  Some of you are not going to believe me when I say this, but I very much would like less drama in my life. Or at least, I would like the drama I bring into it myself, like the choirs and kids and music study, but less of all the other stuff.  But that's not how life works, and apparently I came for experience and am getting it. 

Today I was preparing for my lesson next week on the prophet's talk on Gratitude and was struck when he said gratitude was the key to the windows of heaven. I realized that complaining really limits the Lord's hand in my life, no matter how much I may feel I have to complain about, and it's becoming easier to see how amazingly blessed I really am.  It has been interesting in past weeks to see so clearly the hand of the Lord working miracles in our lives, and although our long-term requests still need to wait on the Lord's timeline, it has been such a comfort to see Him so close. When I am grumpy and make a concerted effort to count blessings, it really is an instantaneous transformation.  There are people in the direst of circumstances who have tapped into the divine power of gratitude, so in my warm home full of kids and food and clothes and the gospel, I should be able to do no less.

I was recently reminded by Chantelle in the UK about a post I did a while ago on gratitude, where I said that I'd specifically told the Lord, "Don't change my attitude, change my crappy situation!" and He went ahead and changed my attitude anyway, because apparently He felt that was the crappy situation. If it's going to be the way it's going to be, why not be happier? It's just a constant effort. And, since gratitude was the keynote issue of the prophet in this last conference, trying to "follow the prophet" these days really takes some work on the inside. But that's always the case when trying to follow Christ--just who knew that "becoming a new creature" process really is as painful as it looks in the werewolf movies!

Well, next Sunday should be shorter now we're all caught up, and I have several pics I need to upload from the phone, so forgive the long, pic-free post.

Love to all.

Valerie

Grumpy Farmers

After finally finishing the West garden beds Friday and Saturday, Saturday afternoon was potatoes, potatoes.

Most store potatoes are sprayed to not sprout, but your normal, non-agribusiness mutant potato, you just cut a piece off with 1-3 eyes in it, plant it 4" deep with the eye pointing up, tend, and voila! A potato plant with little clones of your seed potato underground.

Even though you should have a decent piece of potato to feed the eye, my book says many an impoverished farmer has pulled a potato crop from peelings alone. Now there is proof of a God.

We planted the first half too close together before I read further. Oh well, I anticipate a lot of learning the hard way this year. When they pop up, I'll see if I can carefully thin and transplant. Intensive gardening (rather than row gardening) is a little different on spacing.

Saturday found mom and I up late with a camping lamp putting in onions, bush beans and peas. In my typical obsessiveness, I was sure they would certainly die if they had to wait until Monday. Mm, probably not.

Sunday started off ok. I went to Sacrament meeting where David was sustained as a Gospel Doctrine teacher and I was put in as (as David calls it) "co-assistant to the primary pianist page turner," which really is a calling to be one of two pianists (too many people in this ward).

There were more of our weekly tears over how the church is less true here and how we totally love Utah six out of the seven days, but that is more for missing the enthusiasm, unity and love of East Pas more than any poor reflection on here. Well, I guess I don't really need to say that, since no one here reads my blog but Paw-in-law, and he's already told me to "get over it." :) I love my grumpy Paw-in-law, must be that same gene that makes me love my grumpy husband.

Anyway, things went downhill from there when I found out my mother's day present was a stomach flu and there was various unpleasant barf-related activities the remainder of the evening.

But really, my mother's day present was a fabulous, hand-made compost tumbler from my husband. He explained that I should see it as a symbol of our relationship--an unattractive thing filled with garbage and other things no one else would want ("Why would you want to keep that?" They would say). Yet, I am strangely compelled to love it and be excited about it. Oh, David, you don't stink that much.

Today I went to add more chicken litter to the bin (Elaine still has 'em, but is bringing me the poop), and it was actually hot and steamy! The little microscopic critters are doing their business and it should be ready to put on the gardens in two weeks.

Monday I was in bed all day, wrote half a book on the computer while lying down, then decided it was lame and dispensed with it. Baby didn't feel well either, she was whining or laying on me most of the day. This stomach bug has run through or is running through most people we know.

Much more stress was piled on both Monday and Tuesday relating to non-blog-appropriate concerns, which kept me up until 2:30 last night trying to find solutions. Calling all prayers!

Today I still felt queasy, but stumbled through the day, finishing the onions, putting in carrots, and preparing to do beets and chard (mainly for Aunt Anita and Uncle Bob, who bought the seeds) tomorrow. David is still working on the coop and almost finished framing today. Elaine also came over today and we talked logistics and commisserated on the joys and sorrows of living with the Saints in exile (no, this is not Zion, remember? We're in the wilderness here).

The West garden is almost full, but the pasture hasn't been plowed and we are having a hard time finding a tractor to do it. Since I'm sick, I'm not caring as much as I should. Things need planting in the next two weeks and that's the only place they can go, but I feel weird asking strangers in the ward for such a big favor, renting is just too expensive, and the tiller will take a full three, laborious days and risk of loss of toes (versus one hour with a tractor and fewer limbs lost).

I know I owe everyone pictures, David will be out of town this week so at least one night should be free to blow on my own pursuits. This is a very rambling post, but that's what you get for reading my boring journal. How about I end on a more elevating thought?

"We are instructed to 'come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny ourselves] of all ungodliness' (Moroni 10:32), to become 'new creature[s]' in Christ (see 2 Corinthians 5:17), to put off 'the natural man' (Mosiah 3:19), and to experience 'a mighty change in us, or in our hearts, that we have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually' (Mosiah 5:2). Please note that the conversion described in these verses is mighty, not minor--a spiritual rebirth and fundamental change of what we feel and desire, what we think and do, and what we are.

Indeed, the essence of the gospel of Jesus Christ entails a fundamental and permanent change in our very nature made possible through our reliance upon 'the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah' (2 Nephi 2:8). As we choose to
follow the Master, we choose to be changed--to be spiritually reborn."

David A. Bednar, "Ye Must Be Born Again," Ensign, May 2007

Wacation in a Winter Wonderland

Our trip to Utah was wonderful. The fact that Mom and Dad Christensen's house is big enough for us to lose our own children, that we weren't on top of each other, was a vacation in itself. In line with tradition, I got terribly sick, but this time only at the very end, so I could bring it home with me and extend the vacation two more (much less comfortable) days in bed. I love my sweet husband!

Here is a rundown of what we did and some photographic evidence that this trip actually took place:

http://web.mac.com/davidchristensen/iWeb/Site/Library.html