Eclectic

As we finish off the year, I just wanted to mention a few things that have not made it to the blogosphere.

Daniel auditioned for our district’s youth symphony playing clarinet (which he had only been playing for about 9 months) and got in. It has been a great experience for him, exposing him to a lot of different music. He has really enjoyed it so far. In the school band he is dividing his time between saxophone and clarinet. He has been teaching himself to play the flute as well and is confident enough that he played one song with the ward choir at Christmas.

Matthew played flag football again this fall. He really loves to play but he has a hard time keeping up with the other kids just because his legs are half the length of theirs. He always seems to have a ball in his hand and a number of his balls have been grounded because he is determined to throw them in the house. Throwing footballs indoors is definitely a no-no, so we have had a number of clashes on that point…

Matthew and Malia played “Adobe” for about a week while Matthew was off-track. They have played this way periodically since Kev started working for Adobe, but this time Matthew (with some guidance from me) made laptops out of file folders. Malia looks just like Kev does when he is scrutinizing something on his computer.

Nathan has had art this past semester and he has loved it. He is sad it is almost over, but he is super excited to be in choir next semester. He is also excited to audition for the school musical. Auditions aren’t until February, but he is already prepping. I have to say that I’m kind of excited to have a kid that enjoys the same things I did when I was in school.

I was released from my calling as primary chorister in November so instead of having three callings (choir director, primary chorister and nursery music leader) I am back down to one. When I was released, they told me they didn’t have another calling in mind for me yet. I just laughed and told them I was really, really fine with having just one calling for a while. I did, however, feel like the bishopric member I was talking to was understanding about how wearing it can be on a person to be called to the same callings over, and over, and over again. He told me the primary president had already asked for me to be officially called as the nursery music leader (previously I was filling in for a sister in the ward who was diagnosed with cancer and passed away earlier this year) and that the request had been denied. I’m really thankful for him. Honestly. A chance to do something besides primary or music (and usually both) would be great.

And so another year passes much too quickly, leaving in its wake a few bigger kids, a bit older mom, and a plethora of memories.

Year's End

As another year comes to a close, I find myself thinking about what the past year has brought to us.

Kevin has been at Adobe for over a year now. He has too much to do and not enough time, but he seems to be valued by many of the people he works with. He spent ten days in India in October meeting and working with the team of Indian employees he works with on a regular basis. He has discovered that like all jobs, there are pros and cons.

Daniel has grown a lot in the past year, both literally and figuratively. He is now taller than me and takes great pleasure in that fact. As an eighth grader he is firmly ensconced in middle school, is doing great, and still loves school. Knowing that high school credits begin accumulating in ninth grade, he is already making plans for the classes he wants to take so he will be able to participate in the programs that interest him.

Nathan is also looking ahead. Over the course of the past year he has grown from a little boy into a young man. He is excited to start seventh grade in the fall and with registration coming up in the next month or two, he has already decided what his electives will be.

Matthew is still as energetic as ever and although I still struggle to understand him, we are having fewer conflicts. As always, some days we get along better than others, but every bit of progress is good. He has grown at ease in his new school and is striving to gain independence in as many ways as possible. He is getting braver in many ways and little by little he is learning to deal with his fears and anxieties.

Malia has crossed the line from being a toddler to a preschooler. She loves school and is making friends of her very own. She makes me laugh regularly and I love her company. It seems that she is growing up far too quickly, but she'll still sit in my lap while I read stories and I intend to hold on to that for as long as I can.

As for me, the headaches are fewer in number and less intense. I continue to search for ways to make things even better and although I'm not where I would like to be, I'm grateful for the time I've regained and the days when I'm headache free. As my children get older, our days have become more hectic and I spend a good amount of brainpower making sure everyone is where they need to be when they need to be there.

Overall, I feel we've been very blessed in the past year. Like everyone we've had our struggles but relatively speaking, they have been very small.

Celebrity Sighting

Kevin has been at his job for nearly a year now and we have discovered that there are some perks to working for Adobe. One of the many is the occasional family movie nights they host. They blow up a big inflatable screen and play a movie outside. They provide treats and it is just a fun time. Last night was one of those movie nights and somehow they got permission to play “Frozen.” Don’t ask me how. Last year they tried to get permission to show “The Incredibles” and were turned down. Anyway, Kevin took all the kids to see the movie and I stayed home to get some peace and quiet and to baby a migraine. Daniel was inclined to stay home as well seeing as he is 13 year old boy and not a 3 year old girl and therefore not completely in love with “Frozen,” but Kev made him go so I could have a little me time.

They did not actually end up seeing the movie because it was so windy they couldn’t set up the screen, but the night was not a total bust because Malia got to me a couple of very special people:

When they got home she told me, “Elsa hugged me!”

Musings About the Passage of Time

As I sit here looking back at 2013, it strikes me once again that time seems to pass more swiftly with each year. There are days, and even weeks, that seem interminable but I blink and I’m a year older, the kids have grown that much more, and I’m replacing the calendar yet again. Within those rapidly passing days, we have had a pretty good year. In spite of our trials, or perhaps because of them, we have been blessed. There have been changes for all of us, mostly for the good and for that I’m immensely grateful. Here’s a look back at what this past year held for us:

-Kevin got a new job at Adobe. It was a hard change for all of us for a variety of different reasons, but Kev is settling in there and I’m hopeful that it will be a good thing for him and for our family.

-Spurred on by the overwhelming frequency of the headaches, I’ve made some changes and started some new routines that seem to be lessening the intensity of the ever present headaches. They are still a force to be reckoned with, but at least I’m having a few good days now.

-Daniel is thriving in middle school. He is happy, loves school, is discovering new talents and making new friends. He is doing better than I could have hoped and adjusted to the changes in his routine quickly. He is already making plans for what classes he wants to take in 8^th and 9^th grades

-Nathan is discovering who he is and what he wants. He has finally quit choosing activities and interests based on what Daniel has done. He is finding joy in music, playing piano with far more talent and skill than I have. He has become very responsible with his school work and has realized that he likes to complete things early so he doesn’t have to stress about it at the last minute. That’s a huge skill to learn, especially for a 10 year old.

-Matthew has adjusted to first grade. It has been a rough road, but I think he is finally settling in to the routine. He has been an allergy rock star in taking charge of his own safety and has successfully learned to navigate the school lunch room on his own. He also showed great courage in agreeing to his first ever food challenge and is now able to eat almonds which has opened up a whole new world of breakfast cereal to him.

-Malia has come out of her shell and let the rest of the world see the funny little thing that she is. She was so shy with other people for so long that others had no idea what she is really like. Her personality is larger than life and she keeps us on our toes. She knows what she wants, is fiercely stubborn and has reached the stage where she wants to do things by herself. She is healthy and curious and a joy to have around.

I find myself considering where the next year will take us. I know there are more changes in store, some anticipated and some that have not even occurred to me as of yet. Hopefully they will lead us to an even better place than this past year has.

My Crazy Life

This post is basically going to be a rant about how stressful things have been around here for the last few months so if you want to skip it, I won’t be offended. On the other hand, if you want to get an idea of why I’ve been enormously absentee from social gatherings, blogging, and life in general, stick around. Ready or not, here we go:

In mid-June Kevin applied for a new job. He was in no danger of losing his current job, but he saw an opportunity to take a step up professionally and decided to throw his hat into the ring. Twelve hours after he submitted the online application, he got the first phone call. Within a week and a half he had six interviews and at the final interview he learned that things had been narrowed down to only two candidates, Kevin being one of them. The job was for Adobe and the whole company pretty much shuts down for the entire week surrounding the 4^th of July which is great for them but not so much for the guy who just completed a bunch of interviews and is waiting to hear back about whether or not he got the job. Needless to say, the waiting was stressful.

Good news is that once the waiting was over he got the job. He gave notice at his current job, giving them three weeks so that the health insurance on both ends would give us the coverage we needed. He had planned to complete a big project during those three weeks, but once he told them he was quitting they decided they didn’t want him to do it. So instead he spent three weeks twiddling his thumbs waiting for the new job to start. It made him crazy and made those three weeks seem loooooong for him.

Once he actually started at Adobe, it took a few weeks for him to feel like he had any idea of what he was doing and to have enough work to fill his days. Now he is getting into the swing of things and is feeling pretty good about the whole thing.

Matthew has been a huge stress bomb as well. During all this job stuff, he was getting ready to start first grade. First grade is a big deal, especially for a food allergy kid who will be eating lunch at school. He was really stressed about his teacher knowing about all his needs and it took us a good week of trying before I was actually able to talk with her and help dial back some of his concerns. He was also worried about whether or not he would know anyone in his class. And he didn’t know his teacher so he was worried about what she would be like. He was in tears nearly every day about all this.

And then we dumped the “Dad is quitting his job and going to work for Adobe” bomb on him. It really shouldn’t have been a big deal, but it totally freaked Matthew out. It was so bad that he started having nightmares. Things like Kev and I were on a vacation and Nathan and Matthew were left home alone and they didn’t have a phone number to call us. Another one was about going to eat lunch with Kev at his new job and when we arrived the entire building was gone. They pretty much reeked of abandonment issues and as much as we reassured him that nothing would be different at home, he just couldn’t stop panicking. He freaked out when Kev was in Washington D.C. for an entire week earlier this year and I think part of his panic was that Kev would be gone like that again.

Nathan was stressed out because he was in limbo land about who his fifth grade teacher would be. Because we are in year round school, they only had three weeks between one school year and the next which you would think would not be enough time to work up a real stress attack, but you would be wrong. Our school definitely doesn’t help that. The new school year started on July 25^th. July 24^th was a holiday and our school didn’t post teacher assignments until 4:00 p.m. on July 23^rd. I know they do it because they don’t want to deal with all the parents who are unhappy about the teacher their kid was assigned, but honestly it is ridiculous. They are either going to deal with it the week before school starts or on the first day of school. Just postponing letting everyone know which teacher they have doesn’t make that go away. But it made Nathan super stressed out for three weeks. At least once he know which teacher he had and knew that he would have a few friends in his class he was able to calm down.

Daniel just started 7^th grade and although he didn’t actually admit it until a couple of days before school started, he was stressed out to. Seventh grade is a big change and although he was excited as well, there was a lot of uncertainty about how things would be. And he had a whole extra month to stew about it once the other boys went back to school. He was also headed to the weeklong scout camp for the first time so we had to get him all ready to go. He only had some dehydration once at scout camp and luckily for him (and us), his leaders knew what they were dealing with early enough that they were able to get him rehydrating without needing medical care.

Malia did pretty well, being too young to comprehend the stress of her whole family. She did however, get sick twice and have that instacare visit when she whacked her head on the counter.

As for me, when all this started in June I was at the point where I was having headaches every single day. So in addition to trying to keep my entire family from going bat crap crazy because of stress, I was trying out a variety of new treatment methods and changing some routines in an attempt to get the headaches under control. I was also neck deep in paperwork trying to get all the forms Matthew needs to get the care he needs at school, for Matthew and Daniel to be able to have their meds at school, to update insurance info everywhere, to allow Daniel to go to scout camp, etc.

Now overlay on top of all that the pox we’ve all had (the week we all had a cold was Kev’s first week at Adobe, Nathan and Matthew’s second full week of school, and Daniel’s week at scout camp and the second round of sick was the week just before Daniel started school with Malia’s sick lingering into his first week), a new mortgage (we had an opportunity to refinance at a lower interest rate which meant a lower monthly payment) and the fact that Daniel is now on a traditional school calendar while Nathan and Matthew are still on a year round school calendar which leads to scheduling chaos and you’ve got a pretty good picture of how we spent our summer.

We are finally at the point where I feel like we are getting back into a routine and I cannot tell you how good and ready we all are to have hit a new normal. My daily life, as crazy as it can be, is a welcome relief compared to what we have just survived.