The Big Dig

One of the things I really really wanted to do in the springtime was to better prepare our garden spots for the growing season. We kind of have two - both on the north side of the house, on either side of the fence between the front and back yards. The dirt there is pretty bad and besides was way to high above the borders of the plots. So I did some searching and found a company that would deliver a dumpster to our house and let us fill it up with dirt to a certain height and wasn't too pricey. So we ordered it up, and had a week to fill it up.

Here's the very depressing start:

Whelp...dirt is way heavier than you'd think. I dug. And dug. And dug. And carted it with the wheelbarrow over and over and over. It didn't feel like I made much of a dent. Troy pitched in when he could, and with his help we started making actual progress. We finally got the two plots pretty level and even were able to remove some of the dirt clear in the back of our yard on the east fence. There's a long way to go back there but, there is at least a dent. Chase was even coerced into helping us dig on our last day. 

Here's the funny part. I got a little mixed up between the depth of the dirt we were allowed to put in, and the weight of the dirt we were allowed to put in before we had to pay an additional charge. We definitely had to pay an additional charge. But hey, they took it away and it still cost less than I expected it to be when I first started looking. The amazing thing is that they told us how much dirt we had loaded into the dumpster. That would be SIX TONS, ladies and gentlemen. We moved six tons of dirt into that thing, and it was a little hard to tell where we had taken the dirt from. 

And the garden is better this year. Not great, yet. I think our dirt still needs a lot of love. But I did do some composting there as well as adding some soil pep. Next year we will add a LOT of soil pep and keep composting. (Yay for chickens!) Why do I love composting and making dirt happy? I don't know. But I do. We had some pretty sad looking tomatoes and the peas didn't do very well. But now that we have figured out a better watering system there are a few plants like pumpkins, tomatillos and a couple of the tomato plants that are going crazy. It's so much fun. I love gardening. I wish I was better at it. 

Romney's Disney-rific Adventure

The 2021-22 school year was plenty busy already, believe me. But things seemed to reach a new level just in time for the 4th quarter of the year. It started with a trip for Romney and her madrigals choir. The choir teacher, someone I’ll call Mr. Logan, is a great teacher. He’s the most dedicated choir teacher either of my girls have had, and though he’s very young (when asking what year I was in a choir at the UofU, I had to reveal to him that it was the same year he was born), he’s very serious about creating a quality program, being taken seriously, participating in the community, and carrying on traditions that have been around at EHS for a long time. So he reinstated the spring Madrigals trip to California to participate in a competition and also go to the beach and Disneyland. When I was at EHS, the trip was for the entire a'cappella choir, which was much bigger than the little madrigals group Romney is a part of. I didn’t go, since I wasn’t a part of the choir. Talk about major left-out-itis. All my friends were away. And I was home alone for the whole spring break. But…I digress.

Romney’s trip didn’t take place during spring break. My guess is because with it being such a small group going, family vacations might take away too many of the students during the actual break. So instead, they took off on the Wednesday after break and got back on Sunday night. 

I had actually volunteered to go on this trip as a chaperone. It sounded pretty fun to be a part of. I don’t think Romney was particularly excited about that idea though. (When I say ‘particularly’ I mean ‘definietly totally was not’.) Mr. Logan let the parents know that too many of us were willing to go and he needed some of us to opt out. I declined my spot, but I don’t think Mr. Logan got the message. I was later on the list of chaperones even though I had made other plans to take Emma to St. George to see her cousin in a play. I was sad to turn it down! Romney was not sad. At all. 

We got her all packed up and took her to the school on Wednesday evening around 9, and she set off on quite the adventure. I really should have her write about it because of the fact that I wasn’t there. But that is not something that will happen, so I’ll summaraize as well as I can. 

Here are the highlights I can remember:

* I think her night on the bus was rather terrible. 

* The first day was a beach day and then dinner at Medeival Times that night, where the kids enjoyed wearing paper crowns, watch hot guys pretend to be knights fighting in a jousting tournament, and telling the announcer that Mr. Logan was celebrating his 30th birthday that day (even though he wasn’t and is in fact only 36). 

* The Next day was a morning spent in the choir and orchestra competitions in Los Angeles, and Romney said it was a little crazy but they felt good about their performances. 

* That afternoon the group went to California Adventure where Romney discovered that she adores rollercoasters and had an absolute ball running around with a huge group of friends and her teacher. She felt like people did a great job of including each other, and the cirlces of kids kind of ebbed and flowed into each other. She loved loved loved it and they stayed late into the night.

 

 

* The final day was spent entirely at Disneyland, where Romney hasn’t been since she was 5 or 6. She adored every moment of it, especially watching her friend Max nearly weep when he was finally able to eat a much-longed-for creamcheese-filled pretzel. Her madrigals group of friends bonded more than ever. Romney loved Disneyland so much that she later declared to me that she was going to be a Disney-Adult, even to the point of wanting to go there with just herself and her Aunt Sheri, the official Disney-Maniac. 

* Best moment of the day -Romney was in line for I think the Thunder Mountain Railroad and she saw in line behind her a man wearing a button down shirt that was the same print as the swim trunks she brought with her on the trip. After being dared by her friends, she gathered up her courage, and just as she was about to get onto the ride she asked the man how much money it would take for her to buy the shirt off of his back. Turns out it was $25. She gave him the cash, got his shirt (luckily he had a shirt underneath it), put it on, hopped on the ride, and zoomed away and laughed her head off for the rest of the day. 

 

* Actual best moment of the day - there was a ceremony in the evening for all of the participants in the competitions to hand out awards and such. The EHS orchestra did well and I think got 3rd place in their category. The EHS madrigals did even better and got first place in theirs! It was very exciting. But the excitement wasn’t done. At the end of the ceremony a special award was given out, sort of like a “best in show” type award. I just remember getting a phone call while I was in St. George. It was from Romney, and when I answered the phone, all I could hear was a lot of screaming. Then Romney, who was basically sobbing, gushed out, “Mom! We won the whole competition and we are going to New York!!” Then she hung up. Needless to say, I was anxious for more information. So basically, the EHS madrigals choir did win the overall gold medal award, which was a huge honor. (Yay for Mr. Logan!) And there is an available trip to New York. HOWEVER, it’s not like an all-expenses-paid trip. No, it’s like an opportunity to join the next level of competition sometime in the next school year, and will cost like 3 times as much as this trip did so it will probably not happen. But still, it was pretty exciting. 

* Sunday was a long day of travel, and the bus didn’t pull up infront of EHS until 10:30 or so, which made the next day of school a very bleary one for our daughter. But it seemed totally worth it. The trip was one of those things that high school memories are based on, and I’m happy to say that Romney seemed to love hers, to grow even closer to some wonderful friends, and to recognize in herself the love of roller coasters and the wonderful world of Disney. 

Epilogue - Romney's friend Daffodil heard about the choir's exciting win, and in her honor, made her this cake. Isn't she the cutest?

I Vaguely Recall What Blogging Is

I vaguely remember blogging. Long long ago, before my ability to keep up with life came to a crashing halt late in the month of March when the activities of my children became so intense that all I could do was try to tread the waters of life. Forget about writing about anything. Just keep swimming. And swimming. And swimming. I look to Dory as my spirit animal/role model. 

This kind of non-blogging has happened before. Many times before. Sometimes to catch up I have blogged a lot all at once and then backdated the posts so it looks like I have been keeping up just fine. And other times I do what I’m about to do. Commit myself to two solid days of writing, leaving the dates as-is so anyone can tell that I’m playing a marathon game of catch-up. This is going to be fun. I’m sure my memory of all the events of the past six or so months will be perfectly intact and I’ll have a lot of creative ways to express how busy everything as felt. I’m sure of it. 

Rich in Friends

Life definitely has its ups and downs but something that makes the journey so much more enjoyable and easy to bear is really wonderful friends. I consider the many amazing people I call my friends to be one of the great gifts of this life. Over the past few weeks, despite the lack of photo evidence, I've had some ample opportunities to reconnect with the dearest of old friends, gather with new friends, and enjoy the company of people I just adore.

First of all, my sweet friend Misty turned 50 and her husband found the most fantastic way to celebrate her! He set up a day jammed with all of her favorite things and then invited her friends to be a part of each thing. We started with an early appointment for manicures and pedicures. This is a treat that always feels like I'm getting spoiled, but then to be with Misty and meet a couple of her life-long friends just made it better. Following the toe-treatment, we made a quick trip to our favorite soda shop, Swig, to get lovely beverages and say hello to Misty's daughter Paige who works there. Then we zoomed down to SLC (from Bountiful) for lunch at a lovely little bakery downtown. After that was an afternoon movie that frankly I was amazed I stayed awake for after eating such a yummy lunch. What a great day and fun way to celebrate a wonderful person.

I would have stayed with Misty even longer but we had an important meeting to get to! Maybe it won't sound that exciting, but two times a year we meet together for Stake Conference, meetings on Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening and Sunday morning involving a group of wards that are all part of the same area or stake. I truly love hearing from the great people who lead our stake. This was an especially important conference as our current Stake Presidency had been in service for 10 years, which is about a year longer than the normal timeline. We would be hearing who had been called to be our next presidency. The actual calling and sustaining came on Sunday morning, and it turned out to be one of our dearest friends, who is just a year younger than I am. Troy and I were very sobered and touched, and grateful for the service our friend Ben is willing to give. I had wondered if he would be one of the counselors, but my jaw dropped when I heard his name called as the president. He's such a wonderful person, and over the past month we have had three other opportunities to spend time with him and his family as we have gathered for dinner, for our poetry group, and for another dinner welcoming a cool new family who has moved into the neighborhood, whom Troy and I knew in college. The conversations we have had that have lasted late into the night are still on my mind and I just feel this depth of love and gratitude for each of these people. 

Before all of these dinners and gatherings, back when Emma was just getting ready to perform in Frozen, we had a different set of friends get together. The Durhams were in from Seattle, the Gardeners in from California, and that always prompts a dinner together with as many of the old high school friends as possible. My cup is always filled to overflowing when I see these people. I was especially tickled that Emma and Marsden were the only two kids there from the Preslar/Durham families. Usually it requires all six kids to really get into that P/D flow, but the two of them sat there talking and laughing for a long time. It was really cute.

One of the couples from this gang used to live in our ward. John and Amy now live in Provo as John is a professor at BYU. We got together a little bit while they lived here and I always just absolutely adored and longed to spend more time with Amy especially. They have had many adventures taking them to Texas and other places, but now that they have landed in Utah County I do get to see them from time to time. As often happens when this group of friends gather I find myself in a long conversation with Amy, and this time we decided that it just wasn't long enough. We made plans to get together soon, and though it took a few weeks to happen, last week I took a little field trip to their house where we went for a good long walk through the hills of Provo. It was an absolute delight and I hope to do it again soon. Maybe I'll take a photo or two next time. 

Another sweet reunion occured recently. One evening during Emma's play I was working behind the concessions counter when I suddenly found myself getting a big hug and looked to see who it was. It turned out to be Courtney - someone I went to highschool with but didn't really get to know until a couple of years later when we reconnected through other friends and pretty much instantly became absolute best friends. I loved her so much. And we were friends through a pretty rough time of my life before I went on a mission. She saw me make some choices that were total mistakes and for a long time I felt really embarrassed that she had seen that side of me. But every time I see her I'm just so joyful. So I got in touch a few weeks ago and we got together to talk and do our favorite thing - knit! The hours absolutely zoomed by while we caught up on so many things. I love her even more than ever. 

So yes I'm just overflowing with love and joy and gratitude for the wonderful people that fill up my life. There are so many more that I haven't even mentioned here. I love my people!

Also look - this showed up on my doorstep last week. I have no idea who it was, but I do indeed feel loved. 

Hair Report

This is kind of dumb. But I have to give a report on the coifs of my kids. 

Emma's hair is going sproingier and sproingier. Just look!

 

And also her big brother. He has hair down past his chin now, unless it's wet and then it's practically longer than mine. Needless to say he gets quite a bit of attention about it.

Awww. What a face. 

And cute Romney - her hair is not the coily curls of her sibs but it has the most delightful wave. She loves cutting it. For several years she just grew it longer and longer until it was this heavenly waterfall down to her waist. But last spring she begged for a cut and boy was it choppy and cute. It grows quickly though and by the winter it was down past her shoulders again and she wanted a fun change and went for curtain bangs. We doubted her judgement, especially considering that she had a friend do it for her, but after it was done I saw what she was going for and it was really cute in a Farrah Fawcett kind of way. But it wasn't too long before she was hounding me for another cut, even shorter than last spring. She has a good eye and I get the fun short style she was going for. 

Ok this was kind of silly. But with the amount of hair products I keep around the house, hair-dos seem like a pretty big deal at the moment. Let's not talk about the bathtub drain though. 

Snow. Yay! Boo!

During just the 2nd night of Emma's play, I remember hearing about a weather report saying that we were going to get a storm that night. But Emma and I were in a hurry to get to her performance and the afternoon was mild and breezy and I wasn't thinking about it. I think I wore open-toed shoes. Like an idiot. Definitely no coat. 

As we all were zooming around the school getting kids ready and everything set up, I did notice that some rain was coming down. And then the play started. I spent the duration of the show behind the concessions table in the front entryway and had a great view through the windows of the ever-increasing precipitation. The rain turned into slush which then turned to snow. The snow was coming down in massive sloppy poofs, and by the time we were done and ready to go home, our car had at least six inches of snow on it with more falling steadily.

It was a slow trip home, and I was grateful that we had new tires on the van. There was no way we would have even gotten out of the parking lot otherwise. The best part was trying to clean off the car in my sandals with no coat and no snow scraper. That was fun.

The good thing about this storm was the fact that our state is still in the throws of a massive drought and we really really need snow. Lots of it. So I was grateful. I mean, you can't pray for moisture and then be mad when it's snow. But there was a down side. The fact that it was raining hard before everything froze meant that the slush under the snow was super heavy. It caused a lot of damage around the city. Definitely not as much as the great wind storm of September 2020, but there were downed branches all over the city, even some entire trees. We ourselves lost a lot in the backyard, including one of the last major branches of our poor old apple tree which holds our tree house. The neighbors lost a lot too. Even a month later the city still has branches strewn around on the parking strips and there are still stumps that need to come out. It's a pretty big bummer. I feel like our city has lots a lot of trees recently! 

This lovely orange traffic cone, however, had nothing to do with the storm. I actually have no idea where it came from or how it got into the depths of our backyard. I just came home one day, saw something weird back there, and went out to discover this big thing just stuck in our lawn. No footprints around at all. I guess someone just chucked it into our yard, but honestly I don't know how they did it. It was kind of funny. 

In happier late winter/early spring news, I finished another sweater! I have named this sweater The Rosey, after my Aunt Rosanne. She gave me the pattern a couple of years ago, and I've always wanted to make it. Then she gave me a gift card for our favorite local yarn store and then I had no other reason to delay. It looks really tricky - the cable pattern was actually really easy to get the hang of. Some of the directions were a little harder to follow - definitely written for people who have knitted many sweaters already. But it came together, and fits me much better than my previous creation, which I now call The Hagrid. I'm very happy with this and wear it constantly, and my girls wear it too. Yay for knitting.