Hello Blogging World

Its been a while since I have posted. To be honest, I'm not sure if I really want to continue to blog. I have two main reasons for this. The first reason is, I find it hard to take the time to write and thus it is one more thing in my life I feel like I'm neglecting. The second reason is, I have a hard time sharing my thoughts with others in many ways. I often feel like I never do a good job explaining my own thoughts and feelings. I often feel emotionally vulnerable after sharing.

But here for now, is a short list of what has been going on on my life and things I had thought "oh I should blog about this"  but then never did.

 My friend invited us to a party to celebrate an Indian holiday. The holiday celebrates the rice harvest and the fact that the days start to get longer and warmer once again. There was great company, dancing, panting of rhythm sticks, great food, and talk about Indian culture and customs. Great fun!

 

 Tristan and Garrett both received their baby naming and blessing at church. Brian, Grandma Doris, Grandma Baskin, Grandpa Boehm, Aunt Heather, and 3 cousins were able to come. It went really well. Tristan received his blessing during Sacrament by one of our home-teachers and Garrett received his blessing after church by our other home teacher.

 That same day, I received a new church calling. I'm now on the board to help plan and implement our church's weekday activities for women (formally called the Enrichment Board.) At the same time, Girl's Camp prep is underway! We are now planning our fundraiser for the year (another babysitting night for the members of our church.)  

 Brian went on his annual 10 day business trip to St. Louis. I decided to take a trip to visit my brothers and nieces in PA for a few days. We stayed in a hotel this time because the baby still tends to cry a lot at night. It was a great visit. I also got to see my best friend from my childhood, Cindy and meet her new baby. Sadly, my brother's (who has a different mother)  mother became sick unexpectedly and then passed away the night I left for home.

 

  

 After my trip to PA and while Brian was still away, my (newest) dryer died. My dad came over and diagnosis-ed the problem. Brian came home with 10 days worth of dirty laundry before the dryer was fixed. A few days later my dad repaired it. But something must have gone wrong in the process of putting it together and now it still is sort-of-broken. It only works sometimes! And it only dries small loads. Its been very frustrating and I still have not had it completely fixed.  Ugg! In this process as well, my washroom has been torn apart as well which is kind of good because its forcing me to purge and organize my craft\kid corner. 

 My dad was in a car accident. I'm sad about this. It makes life complicated for everyone. But he is ok besides a really sore back.

We had a meeting with Child Find to discuss getting Garrett evaluated for speech and his fine motor skills. It went ok. Kind of weird. I don't' think they are going to be able to help us. 

 Last week was just a crummy week. One of those weeks things just don't go well. But we had a fun trip to Port Discovery and I meet another like-minded mommy there! I went to a LLL meeting which was great and meet a new lady who is about to give birth with my midwife in attendance. I talked to a mom on the phone who recently had a loss and was able to support her a bit. We had our first meeting with the YW to plan the camp fundraiser and that went great. So it was a bad week but I meet 3 new friends and we did some fun stuff.

 After the Y.W. meeting I locked Tristan in the car by accident. First time that has happened. It was snowing. Luckily Brian was at home and I was jsut about 15 min away at church. So Brian came to the rescue. Tristan cried himself to sleep in the van while I waited. How sad. But hey, it could have happened earlier in the day when I was in Baltimore! Now I"m aware of how it happened which will help me be conscious to not let it happen again.

I woke up 2 days in a roll with a plugged up ear. I was also not feeling too well. Turns out I had a cold and an ear plugged with ear wax! The doctor irrigated my ear out. That was weird. Not exactly painful but not fun either. We all have colds, including the baby, but at least it is not too bad.

Snow! Two big snow storms. Storm #1 Brian was in D.C. for the weekend. I managed to dig a small spot for him to pull into once he came home. He make it home Sunday night but it was a very long process to make it from D.C. to our house. Been in the house a long time and yet my house is messy and I"m not getting much of anything done. I wish I could go sledding. Brian has had no work all week so far.

Brian is working on a book project that isn't going too well (not his fault.) He is busy with a demanding school class. Basically he is home but still working all the time and not available.

I'm still spending a lot of time and energy trying to figure out our homeschool style and trying to get into some sort of routine for me and the kids. I"m enjoying finding all kinds of (free) "living books" to introduce Garrett too. The routine thing is such a hard thing for me. Starting today we are working on following a specific evening\bedtime routine for the next 6 weeks as a family. Pray for us! haha.