The End of School

I didn't record the end of school here, but it was a happy time.  I love getting my kids home for the summer!  Check out these cute little faces.  Maybe they aren't being so cute right now!  This will be the first summer vacation for the twins, and they aren't really happy about it.  Freddie will not miss walking home after school every day.  But they think they will miss their friends, and they love going to school.  They don't understand why they have to stop going to school for a few months.  I'm glad they have had a good experience in kindergarten.

David just finished his last year at the junior high, and Eddie his first year there.  I loved just sitting back and watching the two of them flip through the junior high yearbook together.  I don't think either of them budged for hours.

I didn't get a picture of our girl, but her world is falling apart!  She is in mourning for her little friends that she won't be able to see all summer long!  You should hear her lament.  With a pouty face, it's "alllll summer loooooong!"  Like they were dying or something.  Pretty pathetic.  I'm sure she'll manage, because she's not generally looking for drama, but her friends are important to her and she loves being with other people.  Like her daddy, she is.

Here is the biggest change at the end of this school year.  Chris is done - oh happy day!  He has not been fond of being in high school, and really couldn't wait to get done with it.  I'm glad he managed to finish all of his requirements anyway.  He hates having me take his picture, so this is a splendidly pleasant face.  It will be fun to see where he chooses to go in his life.

And that is the end of the school year.  Some summers are full of goings, some are more lazy.  As much as I would love to just relax and vacation at the beach this summer, I know it will be more on the busy side.  My oldest three boys will be working, Ben will be coming home, we have a wedding coming up, and at the end of the summer, all three of them will be moving out.

This is our last summer together, and I plan to cherish every little tidbit I get.  We will have 11 people living in our house for a few months, and after this, the whole dynamic of our family changes.  Not in a bad way, but change is often fun and melancholy at the same time.  Who knows what we will look like next summer?

Announcing an Addition!

Alec has been busy since he got home.  He had to renew his driver's license, get a job, find an apartment, figure out what he was going to do for college, find some transportation...  Whew.  Adulting is a lot of hard work!  High on his list of priorities was getting back to this pretty gal he hadn't seen for two years.  It's a long time to be apart.

Unwilling to be apart any longer, they didn't waste any time to become engaged and start planning a wedding.  

Yeah, ring-buying is another one of those adulty things than takes some good decision-making skills and grown-up amounts of money.  I'll just be a wee bit flattered that he wanted a small amount of assistance from Mom.

I read something somewhere that said the purpose of a parent, when dealing with children, was to introduce the children to new things and help them figure out how to deal with those new things.  Short of having his own children, I don't think there is really anything new of significance to introduce to this boy.  So good luck on your adulting!  Have a happy marriage!  Be a responsible human being!  I'm pretty excited for them to learn all kinds of new things - now together.

It's fun to watch your kids grow up (especially when you get to continue calling them "my baby" in secret.  Shh!).

P.S.  I'm not dealing very well with the idea of becoming a mother-in-law.  I have two of the sweetest, kind-hearted women for my mothers-in-law, so that helps.  But it just sounds sinister, doesn't it?  It seems only a small step down from "wicked step-mother."  I hope I can be a reasonably good mother-in-law.  I do like my future daugher-in-law - I think she's just what my boy needs!

And I miss my mom, who could help introduce me to this new thing and help me figure out how to deal with it well.  We never outgrow our mothers.

Mission Monday

I've saved Monday for missionaries for over two years now.  Here we are, at the end of these missions, and I'm not sure what to think about it.  I'll not miss staying up late on Sunday nights and writing letters to them.  But I will.  That was a constant time I could spend on loving my boys.  I look forward to a hug and getting to see a smiling face.  I am enjoying watching the constant growth toward responsible adulthood.

Here is Ben's next-to-last letter.  He has been working in the mission office for the past few weeks, helping with the administrative responsibilities of running a mission.  He has also been able to still work with some people in his area, as well as traveling to the different parts of the mission with the mission president.  He has loved it all, and I'm sure he will miss it dearly.


Wednesday was back in my area with my companions. I went with Elder Covey and we went looking for families. We found one. Then we taught our fantastic recent convert family that got baptized last week. They are doing great! They have their baptismal certificates framed in their living room and they were raving about the blessings of the Gift of the Holy Ghost. There's nothing like that.

On Thursday... we (went) to go pick President Foote up from the airport, he was coming back from Fort Dauphin and Toliara. So we drove him home and talked to him while we waited in traffic. For a very long time. I love President! He's the coolest guy in the world!

Sunday we went to church. I love church. Then we taught and tracted and found a new family. J. is from Fianarantsoa and is a retired soldier, then his wife, M.L. is from Toliara. They were so inviting and brought us into their house before we could even introduce ourselves. Then they felt terrible that they didn't have any food to give us. People are so GOOD.


Yes, people are so good.  What a beautiful lesson to learn.

Read the rest of his week here.

Colorful Blessings

It's nice to have good food.  Sometimes, I open my refrigerator and I suddenly morph into Mother Hubbard.  Even if there is lots of stuff in there, it often is food I cannot eat.  I feel like I'm dying of thirst in the middle of a waterfall, where there is plenty for everyone else, but not for me.  And it's easy to feel just a little shade of grumpy about it.  It's also easy to get an awful lot grumpy about it and melt into a poor-me pity party worthy of a toddler who didn't get an extra piece of candy.

In reality, we have plenty.  Of everything.  And getting the food I need to keep me from getting stomachaches, or feeling bloated, or having to spend the rest of the day in bed is as easy as going to the store and picking it up.  I don't have to special order anything.  I don't have to wait for it to grow.  I don't have to go great distances.  We are so blessed, really.  It's easy to forget that.

I went to the store and went bananas in the produce section.  I should get one cart for my produce and another one for everything else.  Getting enough fresh things to feed a large family takes up lot of real estate in the cart.  I like unpacking all the bags when I get home and seeing all the colorful fruits and vegetables lines up on the counter.  They look so delicious!

How lucky we are to have so much good food so easy to get!  I need to remember what a blessing that is.