Remember how it's really hard to remember things after time has passed? I am looking through May pictures after spending the last 6 weeks in Utah and it seems like an eternity since they were taken. I will do my best. "Full points!"
Is it narcissistic to talk about myself first and most? I just remember these things best. Here is the garden making its exciting beginnings.
Here is a ladybug I tried really hard to convince to stay, but she wanted none of it. Or he. Francis!
Here are all the tiny, tender plants. Left to right, top to bottom, nasturtiums, marigolds, sunflowers, alyssum, zinnias, bee balm.
Root things: potatoes, beets, onions, radishes, and carrots.
And the above ground things: lettuces, spinach, kale, bush beans, snap peas, peppers, and tomatoes.
And here is a dew drop on the BRSL PROTS.
The garden brings me much joy. I love to look out my windows and see it growing!
I love to look out my windows and see other things growing too.
I made some things for Mother's Day this year. Tried recreating a favorite picture of Merrick and Grandma Paula with acrylics. I wish painting was more relaxing for me. It is mostly just stressful
But I like how Merrick's eyes turned out.
I wanted to make a quilted wall hanging of a temple for my mom to take with her on her mission to make her mission home more "homey." I found a picture of the Guatemala City Temple off the internet, sized it how I wanted it, printed it off, then held it up to a window with a paper on top of it and used a ruler and pencil to simplify it into a pattern of straight lines. My friend Carlee let me raid her quilting stash for suitable fabrics.
Then I tried to make myself some paper piecing patterns, but I didn't really know what I was doing. Carlee advised again, as she has made several quilt temples.
My piecing is pretty terrible, but I love how Moroni turned out.
Nothing adds a homey touch like wonky art, handmade with love! There is a little tiny stitch for each letter of the words on the temple. I'd type it out but I am too lazy to go find the n I need for Senor.
Drew wrote me a poem for Mother's Day. When he gave it to me it was 4 times this long, then he decided he only really liked one stanza from it, so he took it back and cut it down. I get to read it every day and love him while I do my dishes.
Let's see, I also made some magnificent oatmeal cookies that turned out exactly like they were supposed to.
And Joann's finally opened its doors to in-store customers again, so I got to go pick fabrics for my patriotic summer quilt that I will probably finish just in time for summer to be over. There's always next year for snuggling!
Twilight looks extremely well-loved next to brand new Rainbow Dash.
I crocheted Twilight's body very tightly, but then she didn't fit her hair pieces very well, so I loosened up for Rainbow Dash and she is definitely a bigger pony. Vivien said she's like a big sister! I am sensing a theme where everything I attempt to make turns out not quite the way it ought, because I don't want to do any practicing first. I guess that's kind of how I have always rolled.
Work is going well enough. Pres asked us to send in a selfie so they could make us a picture name tag so we're not as scary in all our PPE. The patients really appreciate them.
We also upgraded from the N-95 duckbill to the p-100 masks, I think because they are easier for them to reuse and clean. My neighbor sent me this after I posted the above picture on Instagram:
It is not fun to wear the mask the whole shift. My nose always starts running around 3 am when my body says, "Um, why are we still awake?!" and you can't exactly whip the thing off to blow your nose while you're on the unit, so you just have to let it run (heh, sorry, TMI). Every time you want to eat or drink or go to the bathroom it requires going out to our lobby-turned-locker-room and a full change of PPE, which is not only a huge pain but they're trying to conserve materials, so I usually will only take one break in the 13 hours I'm there. It's such a relief to rip it all off at the end of the shift and take that first huge, unencumbered breath. If I don't have my mask fitted exactly the right way, I end up with a big bruise on my nose to take home with me.
Straight home to the shower afterwards and to bed: a recipe for wondrous bedhead.
There was a week where I had a sore throat and fatigue on Thursday and realized Saturday that I would have to answer yes to the screening questions at the door that night and probably be turned away for my shift and leave my team one nurse short. I was pretty sure I didn't have it, but it was hard to be 100%. I decided to go in to work and fudge the screening since I was on the COVID floor anyway. My whole nap I had nightmares about having to tell all the people who I associate with that I had exposed them to COVID, which felt a little like what I imagine having to tell your sexual partners that you gave them an STD does. After my shift I stopped by the ER to get tested. They did the COVID nose swab (aaaow) and a throat swab (hhnnng), and came back with the "good" news that it was just strep. I get it from time to time; it usually isn't too terrible and goes away on its own (it was already feeling better Saturday after showing up on Thursday), and best of all, it wasn't COVID.
The COVID patients are sad to take care of. Since our unit isn't an ICU, we get the patients who have milder cases that don't require a ton of supplemental oxygen, or they came in for something else like appendicitis and just happen to have a mild case of COVID as well. They usually stay a couple days and then go home. But, we also have the patients who are sick enough to be in the ICU but are DNR/DNI. They usually come and stay 2-3 weeks, getting as much oxygen as we can give them, then finally get worn out from struggling to breathe for so long and crash quickly. And since they aren't allowing visitors in, they are doing this alone. I have spent many nights sitting at bedsides in my downtime, holding their hands in my gloved ones and just being present. There are two cases that I keep thinking about. One was a woman from the reservation whose husband had been in the ICU and then transferred to our unit and had been there for about a week (a very needy patient). She was back home, 38 weeks pregnant and taking care of their 3 kids when she also got COVID. Her OB decided to induce her so she'd be able to recover from COVID easier. I took care of her the day after she gave birth via Cesarean section. She had a little pink iPad that enabled her to see her baby downstairs at any time. She was on oxygen and they were trying to wean her so they could send her home as soon as possible, and my heart just ached for her, going home by herself with a new baby, recovering from both surgery and COVID, to take care of her busy family. The other patient was a woman whose mother was two rooms down, both in with COVID pneumonia. They'd been there for about a week already and then her mom started to crash the night I was there. The ICU doctor came by my patient's room and explained the situation, then asked if she wanted them to wheel her mom's bed next to hers so she could say anything she wanted to before they took her mom to the ICU. My patient just started to cry and shake her head and say, "I'm so scared" over and over and wouldn't see her. It's a lot to handle. But I got a sweet letter in the mail from one of my little Primary kids.
It gets me through shifts when the tube system (which we're not allowed to use anyway on the COVID floor) is broken and beeps continuously for 5 hours straight, and we get the call light alerts from the other side of 5100 that we have no access to. So many annoying things!
I made a pretty dinner the other night. I like to see it next to the pretty daughter I made a couple years ago.
Vivien liked it so much when I made her take a bite of the dinner and chew it.
Also, I became the Personnel manager for APO. I had stayed after orchestra to help put away chairs one night and happened to walk by Anne Jones, the previous manager, right as she was lamenting to our facilities director that no one had volunteered to take over for her. They both made disappointed faces, then looked up and made eye contact with me. The guilt! I emailed her that night and said I'd do it. Here I am in a Zoom board meeting. We all miss playing together, but with such a high percentage of our members at risk for serious COVID complications, we can't justify returning to rehearsals. We decided to pay Byron for the season anyway, in hopes of retaining him. He said how much he'd just love to work again someday. Hard time for musicians.
I ordered myself some piano music that Mom has but I don't that I love to play, to help fill the music void a bit. I was very confused when Pride and Prejudice arrived and the book seemed thin, and was missing Liz on Top of the World, and then I realized my mistake.
I made an exercise video for Sister Colette. It is set to hymns and churchy songs. It took a long time to plan it out so it would fit to the music appropriately.
This was my super high tech recording setup.
Here are the drops of sweat after doing it.
Here are my veins that I can finally see again!
What else? I have been using Spanish Dict to practice Spanish vocabulary. I love their picture choice for iglesia.
I also got to go on a hike with my friend who is moving. We brainstormed what we wanted to do together.
We decided on the La Luz Trail. We started a couple hours before sunrise with headlamps so we could do all the uphill drudgery in the dark. When the sun came up we were already into the beautiful forest!
"Beautiful! Wish you were here!"
We got to the top right as the sun started to hit us.
We thought we'd take a different way down. We were supposed to cut across the mountain on a lesser used trail, but we missed a turn and ended up on a non-trail that was getting more exposed by the minute, so we climbed our way back up to the ridge and ended up in the middle of the fenced off radio towers. I tried to squeeze under the fence feet first, but I did not fit. We went over instead.
The "fun way down" we chose turned out to be one of the steepest trails I have ever traversed. I don't even know if I can call it traversing because we made such little horizontal progress that Chelsee's GPS even stopped tracking our pace.
Compare the slopes for our way up and way down. The way down is aptly named "Chimney Canyon."
We were pretty pooped by the end.
But oh what a beautiful morning it was! So many birds! And so many flowers, which I will now subject you to pictures of.
And one more of bark beetle tracks in a fallen tree.
And now just a couple of birds. Here is a road runner we saw at close quarters on our way to play with...
...Sweetie Belle, who doesn't really like to play all that much, but I love Bo so I will go visit her dog while she's out of town.
Road runners are one of my favorite parts of Albuquerque!
As are the quail. There are a bunch of scaled quail that live over by Ocean's house. They have white feathers atop their heads instead of the curlicue of the Gambel's quail. I stopped the car to point the quail out to the kids, and as I was taking a picture of it, a BABY quail ran out. I sent the live photo to Kaitlyn to show her the baby, but I never watched the lived photo with sound before I sent it. She asked if it was me squealing and I honestly didn't know such a sound could escape my body. I cannot recreate it. It is a sound made of pure excitement and joy.
Also, here is a dragonfly that Annie found in our yard.
Ok, enough about me. We finished school! We got into a good little groove there by the end. The kids would wake up and eat breakfast and then we'd read scriptures together while they were still fresh and attentive. Mostly attentive. Vivien needs redirecting at times.
Having this convenient time to read scriptures with my kids was honestly a really big draw for home schooling next year. I even successfully hyped up the mystery of Ether's people so much that Rafe actually cracked the book on his own to find out what happened to them.
We also were able to make sure practicing happened every day.
Here is Vivien in her very last Google classroom meeting.
For the end of school the neighbors in our cul-de-sac decided to do a Field Day together. Michelle made a bunch of pans of colored powder. I came up with an obstacle course. The course permitted two kids at once going in opposite directions, so it kind of turned into a team relay race, which was fun. We had all the parents throw the powder at the kids as they went through the course.
I didn't take these pictures because I was throwing powder, but Krista shared hers with me. Starting from one side they began with a ladder run...
...then a slippery slide (with shaving cream on it)...
...then the sock toss...Allen! Allen! Allen! Allen!
...the feat of strength...
(it was so funny to watch the littles carrying the heavy weights and feeling so proud!)
...a scooter circle...
chalked!
...then the army crawl, which was in the very middle so the two contestants would pass each other in their crawlings...
...a bat spin...
...a bucket hop...
...the balance beam...
...the toadstool forest...
...and last but not least, the skateboard scoot!
We relinquished the blue powder to the littles who were first through the course, to keep them entertained.
Here's Annie after her race.
Rafe really got into it.
Vivien got messy, then cried because she was messy.
Ocean came to participate in the festivities too.
I think Levi won for the most decorated.
When all the kids had gone through we had to use up all the leftover powder. We were going to get Drew...
...but he got us instead.
Then we played some water balloon volleyball on the driveway.
They weren't quite old enough to launch the balloons with towels, so we put them all on one side...
...and lobbed the balloons over to them from the other side to catch.
The little kids just threw them on the ground.
This devolved into a huge water fight, "which was right."
These little crayon guns are amazing.
The Merrick boy had a grand time.
I think this picture is after Drew and I stealthily carried the cooler of leftover balloon water to a spot where we could unexpectedly douse our neighbor's teenage son as he filled up his water gun. Muahahaha!
It was not very hot by the end of the day with the sun starting to set and everyone all wet. Some of the kids laid out on the sidewalk in an effort to warm up.
Our kids just wanted to retreat to a warm bath, but the hose was definitely needed to get them clean enough to come inside.
It was a really good day. I am so grateful for Michelle. She is a fun friend! Here she is lounging comically as we roast marshmallows in their backyard around the fire pit they built.
Let us have a Vivien spotlight! Here she is making all her macarons come out even.
They had them at Costco. It was a fun family treat. Annie's favorite were "the spitachio!" We can't have any more children--so many things divide beautifully by 6!
(Costco requires that you wear a mask or you can't shop there. Other stores have signs up that say things like "masks requested".)
Here is Vivien taking a never ending picture. Or it would have been if it had been a mirror instead of a screen.
Vivien takes a lot of pictures on my phone and the iPad, so I got her a camera for her last birthday in hopes that she would fill up her own storage with moody selfies. But she actually doesn't love to just take pictures. She loves to take pictures using the special features on the iPhone and iPad. Slo-mo and time lapse and portraits...
...decorating the pictures once taken, etc.
She also much prefers to FaceTime her friends than call them audio-only. She was starting to get a lot of calls from Iliana that would tie up my phone for hours. Then I remembered that the iPad is also connected to my number, so she takes her calls on that now.
We had to have another chat about taking 200 screen shots during calls and maxing out the iPad's storage capacities. I'm sure she'd love to have an iPhone. I have mixed feelings about that.
Here is Vivien waiting devotedly for her friend Aria to arrive for a play date.
She loves her friend.
Which is nice, because I love her mom! Here she is teaching me the Korean alphabet.
Here is Vivien showing off a bite from her bad baby brother. When Annie looks at unpleasant things or anticipates unpleasant sounds she puts her hands like that on either side of her face. The most annoying time is in public restrooms when she should be pulling up her pants but instead she waits in fear for the sound of the automatic toilet or the hands dryer, which she thinks are loud and scary.
Here are Vivs and Merrick snuggled in all the soft things on the couch.
Here is Vivien with giant Bella.
Seems a good place to put this video of Bella after a day without water.
Here is Bella perked up for some cilantro sprigs. Bella would happily eat her way through the garden. Annie actually left the rabbit run open one day and Bella went on a spree and ate every single green bean plant along the back wall. We've had terrible luck with that bed this year. There are cutworms that chop down the seedlings when Bella doesn't get to them first.
Two Vivien funnies. She likes to have a BMT when we have BLT's. It stands for Bacon Mustard Toast. Also I made some macaroni salad the other day and Vivien walked into the room and said she could "smell poison." She has a strong dislike for apple cider vinegar.
Rafe time! Often when I am trying to call Rafe I start saying Merrick's name first and it turns into "Ma-Rafie," which then in my mind turns into a southern accent "My Rafie" which then makes me think of Gambit from the X-men comic calling Rogue mon cher all the time. Except Rogue is the one with the southern accent... I make no excuses for the way my mind works. Anyway. I am pretty sure I have a picture like this of every tooth Rafe has lost. It is becoming a favorite series of mine.
Here's Rafe and next-door bestie Elliot. They have spent most of their days together since in-person school got cancelled.
Rafe and Elliott like to climb up the willow tree and drop down onto the trampoline from the branches above. Sadly, they are not the strongest branches.
Vivien tried to give Annie a boost up to get the branch off. She was not tall enough. I had to climb up the willow tree myself and saw it off from a precarious perch.
Here are these 7-year-old boy hands. Rafe likes to fake-punch me with them when I don't let him do stuff he wants to do, like play Roblox all day. He doesn't do it hard, but he does it as long as his anger lasts, which is basically endless. I kind of want to get some boxing gloves so we can just go at it, he can get the frustration out, then do what I say. Do you think that will work?
Mr. Rafe has entered a new phase where he is pretty much always bored unless he is playing online computer games. This is a parenting eventuality that I am completely ill-equipped to handle, since I grew up swearing my children would NEVER play ANY video games. I was never going to buy any gaming system=my children would never be exposed to them or able to play them at home. Ha! Guess what? My children have friends, and those friends love online games, and those friends helped my children set up accounts and had extra computers for my children to play at their house with them. Also, guess what? We have a computer with an internet connection, so there's no reason they can't play the games in their down time at home. Now I have a son who lives, breathes, and eats for the games. Maybe you think that is an exaggeration, but the very first thing he thinks about when he wakes up is when he can have his screen time, he will do any chore to make it happen, and he talks about the games all. the. time. It is actually highly confusing. "Mom, when I save up enough money I want to buy <enter cool gun name> so that I can kill people in 2 shots!" "You're going to do what?! Oh, this is in a game." And, it is the most animated I have ever seen him about anything in his life. He loves it. And he has something to talk about with any random kid we meet anywhere and they are instantly friends. "Mom! He plays Roblox too!!!" I have basically resorted to using the prize of Roblox time to make him do every worthwhile thing I can think of. Here is Rafe practicing soccer passes with his annoying mom that makes him do stuff other than play Roblox.
One more Rafe quote. We were reading in the Book of Mormon about the generation that was too young to understand King Benjamin's words and then grew up to not believe. Rafe said, "What about their parents? Did they believe? Why didn't they teach their kids?" Teaching kids is hard, Rafe, and everyone has their agency. But I am going to try my darnedest to keep teaching you the most important things, even if it means taking your punches and enduring your scorching scowls!
Annie time!
Annie is working hard on her letters.
Here she is hanging out at Michelle's house, playing with the sequin pillow.
I guess that was all the Annie pictures I had from May. Here's one that shows Annie's love of long sleeves and long pants, even when it's so hot outside that everyone's cheeks are red when they come in for snack time.
I think that was after our 3 mile bike ride in the middle of the day.
And now the baby Merrick.
Who is not so much of a baby anymore, and much more of a brother who is fun to play with.
This boy bites his tongue more than any child I have made, and he has since his teeth first came in.
Here he is swinging with NO HANDS in the Sexton's yard.
Here he is during his nightly soak.
And here he is in my favorite shirt.
He's probably my best eater still.
He is always injured, because he climbs everything.
And he's a big hit with the painted ladies.
Ah, his silly face kills me. These two are just a joy to have around.
One more, of his zip-line technique.
Last couple pictures. Scout is the best cat we've never had. He even lets Merrick pet him.
The Richardsons come over usually every Monday to spend some time in the garden. Gabe and Merrick came up with a cool game with the rope Drew bought to help him train for the Spartan races.
The rope has enabled the kids to more easily scale the ash tree (which Vivien named "Thundra"), but it has also increased the number of times children have gotten stuck in the tree and had to be talked down.
The Kona Ice truck comes to our cul-de-sac every Saturday. When I think of him I hear the Piragua guy's song from In the Heights in my head.
Here was another cul-de-sac Memorial Day gathering where we all ate too much food and enjoyed being together. Krista got out her Kindergarten parachute.
Here's a bunch of reading kids on a slow weekend morning.
Here is the big pile of sleeping bags from the night we all slept out on the trampoline.
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