Revisiting Matthew

Our Matthew celebration was so special this year. We missed having Chase with us the past two years and relished being all together again. This year would have been Matthew's 18th birthday - hard to believe that this little baby boy would have been entering adulthood.

The evening was quite chilly, and we weren't in the mood for leaving the house or even being on the porch. Instead, we ordered what we were just certain would have been Matthew's favorite food - Mumbai House, right? I mean, is there even a question? Considering that everyone in the family, from Emma to Chase, our two extremes in the food-variety department, absolutely loves Indian food, we're pretty sure Matthew would have too. And just in case we were wrong about that, we also got a few pastries from Gourmandise because who wouldn't love that.

We built a fire and enjoyed eating together in the cozy living room. Of course we wrote our notes and sent them to heaven by tossing them into the stove. It's always such a reverent activity. And then we did something we have never done before - everyone sat together and listened while I re-read every entry about Matthew I have posted on this blog. Chase remembers just a little from the time of Matthew's passing, and Romney was only 20 months old and doesn't remember anything. Of course, Emma wasn't even born. There was a lot they didn't know. And truly, we all just wept. Believe it or not, that felt amazing. It was so cathartic to cry together, to re-read poems and remember other years. So sweet to remember the tender things each kid thought and said over the years. I don't know that we will do that every year, but I'm sure we will from time to time. It really brought Matthew so close.

I'm so so very grateful for my family. I'm grateful that Matthew has drawn us closer to each other.

All the Chicken Stories

Time to face the music. Of our 11 new chickens, 5 of them were roosters. Interestingly, we got 6 bantam breeds and 5 regular-sized breeds. All five of the bigger girls were hens, and 4 of the 6 bantams were roosters. I really do love those cute little bantams, especially their feathery little feet. But every year we give away more roosters than hens we get to keep and it's a bummer. It's also a problem...this year we figured out that getting rid of roosters is harder than it used to be. 

The first two roosters discovered were two of the three Mille Fleur D'uccles. They had the CUTEST little crows - they are truly tiny little guys but they'd stretch up on their tippy-toes and crow their little hearts out:

We were so sad to send them away, but as always, there really just wasn't a choice. So I got them, put them in a bucket, and made the drive to IFA where they let me know that they no longer take roosters. This was very bad news. What the heck was I supposed to do with them? I returned our two very confused roosters to the yard and began hunting for a place for them because as you know, I can not bring myself to just do away with them. We found a couple of farms that take old chickens, but they said no thanks on the roosters. I tried putting them on KSL before figuring out that I think some people want them for illegal fighting. Maybe I'm wrong, but I had such a bad feeling about it that I removed them from KSL immediately. 

In the meantime, Troy and I agreed it was time to take our elderly ladies to a retirement farm. We got up very early one Saturday morning and fetched Sissy, Tuck, Marie and Chrissy. Into the laundry baskets they went and off we drove to Provo. We have one remaining elderly chicken - Mean Francine. Chase and I decided that she's so small and we love her so much we could keep her. She is small, it's true, but she's also very loud. She may still find herself in a car on the way to a farm in Provo in the near future. 

Yeah, it was kind of sad to just leave them. Tis the life of a tough-hearted old farmer like me.

We still needed to find a spot for the mini-men. I sent another message to the same farm and this time they said sure. I have no idea why they wouldn't take roosters one day and would the next, but a second trip to Provo happened. Chase and Romney made this trip.

PHEW. Found a place for all those chickens! Except....pretty much the day after Fifi and Prim were gone two of the regular D'uccles started crowing. Noooo!!! Not Ripley and Sigourney! They were the extra fluffy ones, of course. So...I made a THIRD trip to Provo. (We are truly ridiculous.) Here's me with Ripley. That's one of my favorite names ever. We will have to use it again, I think.

Anyway, we are down now to a somewhat-reasonable chicken count of 11. Most of them are the biggest chickens we have ever had. They got pretty skittish around the older chickens so the kids and I, mostly Chase, have been working hard to get them more used to us and letting us hold them. This mostly involves sitting in the grass with a bowl full of dried worms. They will now climb all over you and let you pet them just as long as they can have their favorite treat. Lizzie and Jane are still the most skittish, our big Easter Eggers are the least. We still have one D'uccle and one Mille Fleur, and they are so teeny tiny. None of the new girls are laying yet but I hope so soon.

Obviously I have a chicken problem. My coworkers are starting to notice. Every time they give me a gift it's chicken-themed. Every time they find something with a chicken on it in the child life storage area they grab it for me. It's fun. It's a LOT of chicken memorabilia around me. I should start to let them know I like other things too but I'm not sure I'll be very convincing. 

Easter and a New Assignment and Why I'm an Idiot

You know, getting through school and passing that child life certification exam were really stressful things. It was a tough winter! And what a relief to get it over with. So I found it hilarious that just as I was finishing all that up my bishop asked me to come speak with him on a Sunday afternoon. I could feel in my gut what I was about to get asked to do, and I wasn't wrong. I got called to be the new young women's president, and if I accepted, I would begin my service the day after I sat for the child life exam. Isn't that so funny? I mean, in some ways, it was just perfect. I had been praying for help for months, and feeling like I was getting it! And then immediately it was my turn to pass that help along to a great group of teenage girls in my neighborhood. Also...out of the frying pan and into the fire, right? But in all honesty, I was excited to take on this new (and old, since I did it already 25 years ago) position. 

Here is our young women's group on one of my first Sundays. It was delightful because somehow we were all on the same brainwave and we all dressed in green. We have four leaders and normally five girls, but this week it was just four.

One of the first activities we had was going bowling at the union building up at the UofU. For some reason I just love bowling shoes. We are silly.

Next topic - Easter. And this is weird but the story begins with Halloween. Many years ago I saw an instagram post by my friend which showed off her Halloween decorations. And it was like a light switching on in my head. I had always wanted to get into the fun of Halloween but always really hated the decorations I had, and couldn't find stuff I liked. Then I saw Tawnee's creepy collection of things from nature and I suddenly knew what kind of decorations I liked. Now I really look forward to getting out our stuff each year. 

Kind of the same thing happened with Easter. I'd like to be making a bigger deal out of Easter. It's an important holiday in our family, and I want to do a better job of making it special. Only...I really detest most Easter decorations. I'm just not a pastel and bunnies kind of person. But I had inspiration hit one day as I was doing some dusting and was cleaning up my inherited collection of painted wooden eggs my parents brought home from Russia. They are all sorts of deep red and black colors, and....

I just realized something. This is actually such a dumb post. Who cares about my Easter decor. I'll just say that I figured out what I like, and it's dark red eggs, like Greek Orthodox-style eggs. 

Sigh. I'm so silly.

We invited Troy's mom over and we made a Middle-Eastern-ish feast, with grilled chicken, hummus, sweet potatoes, flat bread, cucumber chickpea salad, and chocolate. Naturally. I think that's my vibe. Mediterranean/Greek/Middle Eastern vibe for Easter. I like it. 

Okay and here's why I'm an idiot. (Besides writing posts about holiday decorations.)

Like I said, I'm the new young women president in our ward. And I like to think that I'm a good fit for the job - I'm experienced with kids, I'm really organized, and I like to get things done. You'd think I'd be perfect for this. But instead I'm learning a lot about myself and where my weaknesses are. Ain't that just the way. That's kind of what callings are for sometimes I think. We are given new and challenging responsibilities that stretch us and force us to grow. Here's my problem - I'm way too controlling and stressed out. I want everything to be perfect and I'm willing to do the work. But that's not what is really needed. What is needed is for me to trust other people, both the leaders and the kids, and to really show up for them and not worry so much about perfect details. Those things will work out.

This point got driven home HARD in the spring when we had a fundraiser dinner to collect money for a summer trip for the youth. The kids were in charge of making objects that could be auctioned off. The organization of this event occurred just at the changing of the presidency, and it felt like the details slipped through the cracks a little. But don't worry, I'd SAVE IT!

First, I decided to gather items for some crafts I thought would be cute, and have the girls create them at an activity. Not only were the items not as cute as I was hoping, in fact they were awful, but I only had one girl show up to the activity. I panicked and made all the crafts at home by myself. Then I proceeded to mentally stress out about the auction having no actual auctionable items. 

What do you think happened? First of all, all the kids showed up with plenty of things to add to the auction. Some were great, some were funny, some were a little wonky, but they were there. And they all sold well at auction. And my items? An absolute flop. No one bid on them, except one lady who felt bad and bid $3 on all of them. So pathetic. And...a perfect example of the lesson I need to learn in this calling. Trust the kids. Don't take everything on myself. And never never make home decor crafts again because my ideas were truly laughably hideous. I was giggling to myself (with a pretty good blush) all night long.

Lesson learned. Hopefully. Actually now that a few months have gone by I can tell you that I have continued to have these joyous "learning experiences" but I'll get it figured out. Someday. Probably just in time to pass my job on to the next person!

Spring Updates

The snow melted for the last time, and spring started to make its way into the valley. We had a few fun things here and there  -

For one thing, a very cute gal that Romney met in pre-kindergarten got engaged. Her name is Katherine, and she and Romney stayed buddies through several years of elementary school while she lived in the neighborhood. Then they moved to St. George, where they eventually landed in the same neighborhood as my brother Peter. So we have stayed in touch. I am especially fond of her mom, Marsha. So it was a real treat to get invited to a SLC-based shower for Katherine, although Romney and I did have quite the adventure when I thought I typed the correct address into google maps. I did not, in fact, type in the correct address and Romney and I ended up in a literal gravel pit in the distant hills of the middle of nowhere, USA. So we were a bit late to the shower. 

Also in March was our trip to see The Prince of Egypt. That was a Christmas gift I had a lot of fun with. Instead of just tickets I got everyone a funny Egyptian pen and a little trinket of some kind. We all enjoyed the play a lot, although maybe not as much as we were hoping to. I think our expectations were a little high.

 

The thing I may have been the most excited about was discovering that one of the General Authorities of our church was seated a few rows behind us. He's a wonderful man and I kind of wanted to go talk to him, but he was being slightly surrounded already, so instead I just snuck a little candid photo of him. Like a weirdo.

For ages and ages I have been promising Emma that I would make her a quilt. We finally had a chance to go fabric shopping over spring break. She picked out everything, including the pattern and every last color of fabric. I was very impressed. She had a very clear vision of what she wanted. I guess she loves gardenias, so she picked out a pattern that had some large star shapes on it. She wanted the large stars to be white like gardenias on a background of blue, with lots of tones of green and purple. She did a great job picking everything out. As I type this it is early July and I'm almost done with the quilting, then all I have to do is the binding. I'm excited to get it finished up for her.

I think I mentioned in an earlier post that Emma also got her first job - she joined the performing arts crew at This is the Place Heritage Park. She spent the whole spring going to weekly rehearsals, memorizing music and dances, and getting fitted in pioneer garb. She has been loving it so much. It's just her vibe. Romney worked there all spring as well, but moved on to other jobs early in the summer. (It's a long story...and not a pleasant one, but she's much happier now.) I'm sad Emma's perma-ride disappeared but I'm happy for both girls to be working in jobs they like so much.

 

Lastly, our family has found ourselves at the movie theater a lot lately. It feels like our theater attendance has plummeted since 2020, and it's in part to the fact that we just haven't been interested in most of the movies coming out. Of course there have been a few like Dune and a new Marvel here and there, but definitely not all of them. But some great stuff has been coming out this spring. Sadly, Emma is almost always completely uninterested in joining us. In fact, I think she loves it best when we all leave the house and she gets it all to herself. 

I think one of the most fun movie outings we saw was a re-release of Raiders of the Lost Ark. So fun to see it on the big screen!