Return of the Boy

 He's BAAAAAACCCKkkkkk......

Okay, here's a confession. I spent the first half of the summer worrying about Chase and hoping that he was surviving his new experience of work and living away from home. Once he started to love it, I immediately switched to dreading the day he would have to come home. I knew how much he was loving his time with his friends at camp, and how hard it was going to be to leave them. And I was not wrong. Coming home was hard! That's such a good thing though. 

Chase had an amazing summer at Aspen Grove. He grew so much and learned so much about himself, and kind of turned a corner in his life. He let us know that he felt very certain about his desire to serve a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and to leave sometime late this fall or early in the winter. He seemed much happier, although lonely without his Provo crew. 

Here he is with one of his roommates and best friends at camp, Cameron, on the day I went up there to pick up all of his stuff. He stayed one more night to be with friends as long as possible, then got a ride home the next day. He also got to spend Labor Day weekend working there, which made him a lot of money and also reunited him with many folks, though not everyone. 

Here is the photo I posted on Instagram the day after he got home, just to express my happiness at his happiness. 

Not that every day since then has been happy - it's definitely a weird time, since he knows he wants to get out on a mission. He didn't start school, though he did start taking a missionary preparation class at the Institute of Religion at the UofU. He's kind of in limbo, in a waiting period between major events in his life. He's been helpful working on some projects for his grandma, but he kind of needs a job. But...he's leaving soon so.... anyway, it's weird. But truly overall joyful.

Here are some closing photos of him enjoying a new prize he bought himself after discovering that working for money can have an upside. Money! Thus....lightsaber. 

I love this boy. I love what he has learned and how he has grown. And I'm pretty sure there is a lot more of that to come in the next weeks, months and years. 

A Very Sweet 16

For what felt like the first time ever, Romney's birthday happened a few days before the start of school. For years it seemed to start on the first day or within the first week. (I guess not last year because school was delayed until the 8th of September, and then another week after that due to the apocalyptic windstorm.) That does not mean, however, that school did not encroach at all into her birthday. Romney is part of the school's Madrigal Choir, and they got a new teacher in the middle of the year last year. He's great - Romney's favorite choir teacher ever. And he has plans for these kids! He even started the year with a two-day "retreat" before school started, having the kids meet up at a church to learn some music, have fun and get to know each other. Of course one of the days was on Romney's birthday. She didn't really mind, though. She really enjoys singing with this group. 

We had to start our birthday celebrations earlier than we would have liked on a summer day, but since the sun wakes us up at like 5:30am anyway, it was all good!

I had so much fun picking out gifts for Romney. She's been talking about wanting a beret forever, and she also loves funny novelty-type hats. I struck gold and found her a beret that looks like an egg. We decided to call it her "beregg." Isn't she just so dang cute?

 

She also got a regular black beret that's not nearly as fun. We got her a mochi ice-cream making set, bacon-shaped bandaids and...something else that I can't remember. But I feel like it was significant. Huh. I wonder what she got - I'll have to ask her! Oh yeah...that shirt she's wearing in the photos above. But still...I think there was something else. 

After a quick breakfast we got her off to her retreat. I popped in at lunchtime with some tasty take-out (no brown-bagging it on your birthday!) and then when the day wrapped up with the choir, she and I went out for pedicures before picking up CupBop and bringing it home so she and a couple of very sweet friends could hang out and watch a movie. I can't remember if she picked HotRod or Hunt for the Wilderpeople, but it's likely that she picked one of those two since they're pretty much her two favorite movies.  Too bad I can't remember anything once more than a month has passed. I really must stop procrastinating my blog entries. And I really must try to take better pictures on birthday occasions!

Just so you know, Romney is just delightful. It is very rare that she is unhappy or grouchy, and even when she is, she never lashes out or takes things out on her family. She includes her sister and goes out of her way to help her along. She's so creative and talented and funny. We really lucked out with this gal! It's so weird that she's 16 now. And just as sweet as can be.

Follow Up - Troy reminded me what the other gift was! And it was the best gift of all! Romney fell in love with this awesome story she found on Spotify - it is a story that sounds like a Scottish fairytale, complete with narration by Billy Boyd (aka Peregrin Took) and is accompanied by an entire orchestra. It is a delightful story. Sadly, it disappeared from Spotify and everywhere else like itunes and the like. My clever husband, however, tracked down a CD on eBay and we got it here in time for Romney's birthday. It was totally unexpected and she was absolutely thrilled! I love when we can surprise our kids with a gift they didn't even know they wanted.

Phew. Thanks for reminding me, Troy.