A promotion and a public service announcement.

I got a new job at church.  For the last couple of years I was working with the cub scouts.  A year and a half with the Webelos, a year with the Wolves, and a whole week with the Bears.  I hadn't even made it to a den meeting when they released me. 

John answered the phone when they wanted me to come into church to talk about my new job.  What John told me they said was that I was "under strife".  He thought it was an odd comment, but maybe someone was starting to think that after 2 1/2 years, it was starting to affect me, and someone was concerned.  Which I was truthfully a little upset about.  2 1/2 years is a long time, but I thought I was handling it.  It takes awhile to get the hang of things, and I was enjoying working with Zach, as a middle kid he doesn't get much one on one.  Besides, I'd get moved around every year or so, so that was keeping it fresh, and I was about to work again with some boys that I already knew and loved, and they are a great group of boys.  Really fun, cute, kids.   So while my excitement has definitely wained over time, I thought I was at least cheerfully doing my job, and I was upset that somebody thought I wasn't.  I expressed my concern over this.  I apologized if anyone thought so, to which the reply was "No, I said you 'earned your stripes'.  You're graduating. Not being fired."  Whew!  What a difference a few letters make!

So, graduating.  I'm working with the Boy Scouts now.  My official title is something to do with the words "Advancement" and "chair"  I'm still fuzzy on it all.  But at least I am getting a quick crash course in it.  My big job is to put together a Court of Honor to hand out all the Advancements and Merit badges.  And there's a bunch of other stuff that goes with that, like learning new software, and paperwork, and purchasing those little badges and stuff.  I'm a little stressed, but not totally freaking out.  There have been plenty of people offering support and help if I need it.  (The problem is not getting help, it's figuring out what help I need.  Hopefully it won't be too late by the time I figure that out).  Anyway the next C of H is in 6 days.  No pressure.  (wish me luck)

On a related note- I'd like to give a public service announcement to all the kids out there (even though the only two who actually read this, have already gotten this lecture)  Kids- don't do stupid stuff.  Like getting arrested at 18 for trying to get a fake ID.  It will follow you FOREVER.  Last night, as I was filling out my Boy Scout application there was a line "Have you ever been convicted of a crime?"  and I had to fill in the little "yes" bubble. And then on the line "If yes, please explain" I wrote "Fraud. Forging gov't documents -1994".   I'm not that worried.  They let me be a cub scout leader after I put that on my application.  But still.  FOREVER, I tell you.

who, me, freaking out? no way.

So, a few weeks ago, on the way home from church, John casually mentions he signed us up to attend the ward adult dinner group. (We go every year.  We always have fun and eat good food and meet new people who go to our church) To which my reply was something along the lines of "What?!?  No! No! No!  That wasn't a list to ATTEND the dinner, that was the sign-up sheet to HOST the dinner!"   Sure enough, John put our name down to invite 40 or so people into our home on a particular Saturday (three days from now) for a sit-down dinner.

Instead of trying to weasel my way out of it, I put on my big girl pants and a smile and started e-mailing and calling people.

So far, only about 1/4 of my list can make it (I still have yet to hear from a few people- but as it's this Saturday, I've pretty much written them off)

So, you know, I'm busy with planning menus and shopping and cleaning. and stressing about things like my grody carpet, and centerpieces.  As a rule, I don't do centerpieces.  In fact, I don't know if I've ever done a centerpiece in my life. I'm usually too busy worrying about the food...

And I broke my glasses today.  I set them on the bed, and squished them. And when I tried to bend the arms back into place, one broke off. 

They're still usable. I just look stupid.

Of course they are my only pair.  And they are probably at least 4 years old. So, yes, it was time to get new ones, but I just don't have time this week to see an eye doctor, and I'm not thrilled about looking stupid until the new ones come in, and I hate picking out glasses, and I can only go to Target or Sears cause that's where our insurance says I can go, and so I'm just gonna throw it out there that if I have any girl friends interested in hanging out with me at the mall and helping me pick out glasses in the very near future, that would be really awesome.

Except maybe not until Monday.  I have this big party I am freaking out about on Saturday...

just for you, Dave

Apparently John got chewed out on his weekly phone call to his dad this morning.  Apparently my father in law is not happy with the lack of blogging going on over here. 

The problem is, there isn't much going on at all over here.

I do plan on blogging about a trip to the lake, but once I do that...

Yes, I have more time to myself these days.  But that doesn't mean I have anything to blog about.

I've been cleaning a little.  (but just a little though. Apparently I can't get thrilled about cleaning out closets)

Reading.  Right now I am in the middle of the Count of Monte Cristo - (1400 pages) book club for that book was last week.  Book club this week is the book "The Devil in the White City".  It looks pretty interesting.

I've gone to the gym and walked on the treadmill while I listened to an Italian language program on my mp3 player.  It's not the best to get the heart rate up, but what can you do? I can now say the alphabet, and I think I can say "Hello, my name is Kirsten" without totally massacring it. 

I've run a few errands,

and I've napped.

Then after school it's all driving around and getting kids to and from their various activities and trying to make sure they've done their homework, practiced, done their chores, etc.

So you see, not much blog material these days.

John did go to St. Louis this week, where they once again tried unsuccessfully to get him to move there. (Technically speaking that's where his actual place of employment is.  I think he even has his name on a cubicle.)  On his way back to the Marriott (home away from home) he spotted a sign by the freeway (I told him to take a picture as this was the closest thing to blog-worthy we've seen in a couple weeks, but he wasn't able to get one).  Anyway, it was a sign advertising All Day Kindergarten for only $3600 a month.

I had to double check that I heard that correctly. (John said he "triple checked" to make sure he read it correctly)

 Kindergarten. Three Thousand, Six Hundred Dollars Each and Every Month.  Over 30 thousand for the school year.  For one kid!  KINDERGARTEN.  For that much money I could send a couple kids to college. Well, BYU or ASU.  Harvard will run me about 60k. Inconceivable.

Apparently the public schools there aren't that great, so private schools are a big deal.  Anyway, given that we currently send our five year old to all day kindergarten where he gets all sorts of individualized help, and door-to-door transportation FOR FREE,  not to mention we have three other kids currently enrolled in the comparatively-superior-to-St. Louis-public-schools here in Gilbert Arizona, we would need the mother of all raises to convince us to move to Missouri. John reminded him of that, and then the extra $ they spent on a plane ticket and a hotel room doesn't look so bad...

So there ya go, Dave.  And yes, I have a couple more to write up - a lake trip and a birthday, but then after that?  I'll try and do better.  But no promises. I suppose I can go dig up some old retro pic from my childhood or something.

Back to School

I've been eagerly anticipating the arrival of the school year. 

Don't get me wrong, most of the summer was great.  Lovely.  Wonderful.  But, the last couple weeks have left me feeling a little frazzled and claustrophobic.  I couldn't take one more minute of the noise, and the messes, and the whining, and the arguing.  It was too hot to send them outside and so we all just stayed in.

Anyway school!  yay!  I was pretty excited.  It's my first year being home all alone all day long.  Last year I got 2 1/2 hours to myself, 4 days a week, for a total of 10 hours. This year Christopher is in all day kindergarten (pretty much a requirement for special needs.  I'm good with that though, I think it is truly what he needs) so between the hours of 8 am and 3 pm, Monday thru Friday, I am a free woman.

SOME of my plans for the next year include- cleaning, decluttering, and organizing my house, getting more exercise, joining a THIRD book club, have meals mostly prepared before the kids get home, learn to bake bread, learn a new language (Italian Ü), work on those scrapbooks/photo albums (I'm only 5 years behind), paint and redecorate some rooms, maybe take a class or two....

Any way- here's the kids and their "First day of school" pictures-

Nick- First day of HIGH SCHOOL.  Can you believe it? I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around it.  He seems to be LOVING it.  He's taking drama, orchestra, seminary, PE, math, science and we're going to put him in an online English class.  And he joined the cross country team.  We're just worried how he's going to fit everything in.  He may have to give up EVYS on Thursdays.  They have those boys running 6 days a week.  He comes home exhausted and hungry!

Madison- 6th grade.  She was nervous about going to 6th grade, but I knew her fears were unwarranted.  She has Miss Faber, Nick had her as well.  She's going to love her.  Besides, she's got to enjoy it while it lasts, next year is jr. high.  (so not ready for that!)

Zach- 4th.  I think it will be a great year for Zach.  He has Miss Rogers, (Madison had her in 4th as well) and several of his friends are in that class.  Miss Rogers is super nice, she plays the guitar, and teaches the kids all sorts of cute songs to help them learn things like the capitols of all the states.  I just hope she's not too nice.  Zach's a smart kid, he just needs a kick in the pants every once in awhile.

Christopher- Kindergarten.  Or as he says it "Candy Garden".   I mentioned he's in a special "SPICE" class- I forget what that stands for, but basically it's their cute way of saying "autistic".  Guess how many kids are in his class?  THREE.  Three special little kids, one teacher, and two helpers.  Also there are therapists and others in and out working with my kid.  He does get to spend much of his day in a regular classroom with about 24 kids, doing regular stuff, but he takes his teacher and aides with him and still gets one on one most of that time.  AND they are pushing the toilet training. They seem hopeful.  Hopefully (cross your fingers)  he just needs a different environment.  He's been fighting me tooth and nail for 2 years now. 

 So, I mentioned how ready I was for the kids to go back to school?  How I was practically counting down the hours?  How when people on facebook were boo-hooing because they were going to miss their kids, I would leave comments like "Is it wrong that I am not sad at all?"  How my to-do list for the next year is a mile long, and I couldn't wait to get started?  Well, for some inexplicable reason, the doors on the school bus weren't even closed yet, when out of nowhere, I totally burst into tears.  It wasn't pretty. Apparently I am not as happy about Christopher being gone all day as I thought I was.

My knights in standard-issue body armor

Two days after we got back from Utah, traveling over 700 miles, and only minutes after I had dropped my two older kids off for their music lesson, my tire totally blew out.

Like not just flat, but a giant gaping gash in the side of it.

I put on my hazards, and my poor car limped several yards to where I could safely turn off onto a residential street.

John, of course, was on an airplane headed to Chicago at that exact moment.  I was on my own.  Unless you count Christopher.  In this case he was more of a liability though.

 It had been a long, long while, but I was sure I could figure out how to change the tire.

First item on the agenda - find out where the spare tire was (and praying we had one in good condition)

After a few minutes of searching, I located the tire attached to the bottom of the car.

Second item on the agenda- figure out how to get said tire off the bottom of the car.  (seriously! what's wrong with sticking it in the trunk like every other car?!?)

It probably goes without saying that the weather wasn't all that pleasant outside either.

Grabbing the user's manual out of the glove box, I was about to start flipping through it when I noticed this had just pulled up behind my car.

Never was I more relieved to see one of those!

I didn't consider myself a damsel in distress, but I was super happy for their help.

Gilbert's finest going above and beyond the call of duty, battling the dragon that is Chevrolet's design for spare tire storage.

Within an hour I was on my way, and was on time to pick up my kids with an exciting tale to tell.  (Who knows how long it would have taken me on my own?)

But at the end of the day, I can't help but feel that someone was looking out for me.  Tender mercies and all that.   Too many thoughts running around in my head like "good thing I wasn't in the middle of nowhere....good thing I was driving pretty slow at that exact moment, I hear blowing a tire while going freeway speeds can be dangerous....good thing I had already dropped the kids off so they wouldn't have to miss their lesson...good thing those cops showed up so quickly..."

Home Sweet Home

I love the way my house smells when I come home.

But I have to be gone a week or more to notice it.  Unless I have a candle burning, or someone forgot to flush, or there is a rotting diaper in the kitchen trash, I usually don't notice how my house smells when I get back from running daily errands.

But when I get back from a trip, there is a lovely scent awaiting me as I walk in the door.  Fruity and floral, my house seems to welcome me home and I am happy to be there.

( of course that only lasts for about a minute, and then I am standing outside unpacking the car, at night, after the sun has gone down, and yet I can still feel it's oppressive heat, like standing in front of an open oven, and I am already missing the cool summer nights I'd been enjoying for the last month or so...)

The rest

I just thought I'd hit the rest of the highlights and little things I left out in one last major post.  I didn't seem to take very many pictures.   

I was lucky enough to attend not one but two family reunions this year.  It seems most years we miss the annual Peterson Family Reunion (my mom's mom's side) for whatever reason.  Somehow in all the eating and talking, I didn't get any pictures taken.  These are always held at the house my grandmother grew up in in Payson, Utah.  The food was good, the weather was lovely, and the company was the best.

And we had the rare opportunity to make it to another reunion on my dad's side of the family.  I got to see aunts, uncles, and cousins that I hadn't seen in a very long time. My dad was excited to see both his brother and sister at the same time.  Busy lives, you know.   The next night, my aunt Helen (my dad's sister) brought her one and only grandchild over to play with my kids.  I think she was the glue that held my dad's family together for so many years.  It was important to her that her kids know their cousins, and so she hosted the annual Christmas party every single year.  Then we all went our separate ways.  Now there is another generation of children and she wants the same for them. 

I got to spend the better part of a day with a couple of my cousins, Jill and Britt and their kids.  Lunch at Bruges, letting the children soak themselves in the water feature at Gateway, then on to Brittney's house to hang out while she babysat for another cousin. This is the one picture I have of that day-

Britt holding Natalia, her niece (baby girl of Dan and Mia- Dan is my cousin too).

Unfortunately, Jill and I couldn't get our schedules to coincide much this summer.  We just had the one day.  I usually get to see her more.  I'm afraid this is a sign of things to come with kids and their schedules... Britt and I were able to meet up for lunch one other day.  Her two kids James and Hannah, really get along with Zach and Maddie. 

I got together with a couple of long-lost friends. 

Beverly and her family live in New York, but she was visiting Salt Lake the same time I was.  (This is the same friend who also happened to be vacationing in Orlando the same time we were as well)  We had a short picnic at the park, it was a little hot out, and Beverly was on a schedule, but it was good to see my old friend.  I still think it's amazing that even though we sorta ran in different circles before she moved away to Mississippi in jr high, years later we would find each other through the magic of in the internet (facebook and blogging), and become better friends than when we lived down the street from each other.

It's been a few (3? 4?) years since I've seen Bonnie.  Her little (okay I guess 14 isn't exactly little) girl Natalie was Nick's very first friend.  Their friendship was magic from an early age.  But as it always seems to go, life (and several hundred miles) gets in the way.  Once again I have facebook to thank for the reconnection, and so we made a date to get together in Utah. 

We went to a water park called Cowabunga bay.  My only complaint is that the water was freezing.  Other than that, if I had to choose between Seven Peaks (including Raging Waters which is now owned by Seven Peaks) and Cowabunga Bay, I'd choose Cowabunga bay.  For starters,  the parking was free, and the tubes were free. And it wasn't as crowded.  And my favorite part was that the waterslides didn't end in pools.  you just came to a stop in several inches of water.  Genius.  This was awesome to me because now Christopher could go on any of the rides and I didn't have to worry about him drowning.    

Anyway, Bonnie and I went on a couple slides, and then just hung out and chatted.  Miss her.   Of course, Even though this was not my first opportunity to swim, it was the first time this whole summer I actually planned on putting on a swimsuit,  Of course, I accidentally sent home my top half with John (he had to run home for a quick meeting) and so we sent him with stuff we didn't need (new school clothes and the like).  Apparently I didn't think I needed the top half of my swim suit.  So there I was, all white-trash in my swim suit bottom, sports bra, and t-shirt cover up.  (my farmer tan this year is awesome!)

And yes, Nick and Natalie still got along famously. 

On one of the days John was in town, we headed up to Park City to go on the Alpine slide.  (a must for the kids) 

we also went on the Alpine Coaster for the first time ever.  SO MUCH FUN!!!  Christopher's cries of "Woo-hoo!!!" could be heard echoing down the canyon (okay maybe I exaggerate a little) .  But we all loved it.  Except the part where John lost his favorite hat.  That part kinda sucked.

That's pretty much it for Utah.  The weather was lovely, the kids played with the neighbor kids down the street, and made videos using their flip camera.  (playing outside, getting fresh air, and using their imaginations?!?!? gasp!)

Sadly, all good things must come to an end.  School would be starting in a couple weeks, and we needed to head home to get ready.

On the way back to Arizona, stopped in St. George to see some friends and spend the night.  As usual, we ate  at the Bent Fork, their restaurant (which has sadly now closed, due to the fact they lost their lease).  Jayson surprised me with my favorite green chile ribs as a daily special on the menu.  (There were more ribs on the plate, I ate a few before thinking to take a picture)

There's a story behind those ribs, it goes something like this-

Way back when, when I was 5 months pregnant with Zach and Shelly and Jayson were only dating, Jayson was hosting a pay-per-view party at his house.  Boxing.  I really could have cared less about who was punching who on the TV, I was there for the food.  And eat I did.  (I mentioned I was pregnant?)  There were these amazing pork ribs, and I must have sucked down like 20.  A couple years later, I got up the nerve to ask Jayson for his recipe.  "There were these ribs you had at a party a couple years ago?"  "The green chile ribs?" "No, I don't like green chiles.  It was when you lived in that apartment?"  "Yeah, the green chile ribs."  "No, I don't like green chiles.  It was a pay-per-view fight party? I was pregnant."  Those were green chile ribs. "  "Huh. weird. I don't like green chiles, but I LOVED those...."

After dinner we headed back to Shelly's house, Her sister, Sheri, met us there with her two girls. The kids (7 of them) ran around in the house, and the adults hung out on the back porch, and talked late into the evening. 

The next day, we made it back to the Valley of the Sun without incident, but very grateful to have the opportunity to reconnect with friends and family that we might not get to otherwise. 

I always feel conflicted when I leave Utah.  It's where my family is.  It's where my childhood memories are.  I loved living at the base of the Wasatch Mountains.  They made me feel so safe.  I love the fact that it's a small city masquerading as a big one.  So many things available, so much variety, but in a condensed space.  Phoenix is so spread out, I tend to stay in my little town of Gilbert, rarely venturing beyond it's boundaries except when I have to.

But at the same time, it's not my home any more, and I know that. I hate introducing myself at my mom's church.  The church I grew up going to.  A few faces are familiar, and many turn and smile with recognition and warmth when  I say my name, but so many are complete strangers to me.  

No, home is Arizona.  And it was time to return.  (for another 11 months at least)

At the lake with Pa

It's become somewhat of a tradition that my dad and I take the kids and a couple boats- (usually a raft, a canoe, and a kayak) and let the kids paddle around a lake for an afternoon.   We've been doing it for years.  There's a lake we usually go to (I forget the name) up American Fork canyon.

But this year, we decided to try a new lake.  It was fairly close, and would only take a few minutes to get to.

At first glance, the lake seemed pleasant enough.  The location wasn't as lovely as the one we usually go to, but different can be good.  When we arrived we stood on the shore, and decided it might be a little too windy.  Kayaks and canoes are hard enough to handle for kids when the wind isn't blowing. 

As we were mulling over our options, I took a few pictures of the kids, and after awhile I noticed some debris in the water that the wind had blown our direction.  At first glance it just looked like sticks and stuff, but then I was like "Hey! Look!  That's a dead fish! Oh! And there's another one. And that looks like a dead raccoon floating belly up.  Ew, gross!  I think that is a dead raccoon!"  And just then a giant rat scurried along the rocks near where Madison was sitting, and we decided we had enough and left.

Sometime later, we found ourselves on the shore of the lake we usually go to.

The older three had fun paddling around. 

Christopher refused to put on a life jacket and had no desire to get in a boat anyway, so he and I hung out on shore and threw rocks into the lake.

 He ate most of the fruit by the foot snacks I brought, and even managed to convince Maddie to share hers with him.

The only incident came when my dad lost his balance trying to get into the canoe that Zach and Maddie were already in.  My dad managed to jump to dry ground, but dumped the whole canoe in the process, and thereby soaking the kids and giving the neighboring fishermen a good laugh.