Letter - Preschool Graduation, Our Rental House SOLD!!, Creation

Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Tomorrow is the last day of school for my kids.  I’m looking forward to summer and a more relaxed schedule.  Last week was good.  I got a big YM YW activity off my plate and it turned out well, Marlee graduated from preschool, and we closed on our rental house—Hooray, Hooray, Hooray¹⁰⁰!!!

Monday, the 19^th was my brother Doug’s birthday.  I can’t remember what I did that day.

Tuesday was a marathon day for me!!  I had several appointments that happened to fall on the same day.  I had almost the whole day booked.  After I took the kids to school I ran out to Brenda’s house to get some luau decorations for our big YM YW grad night dinner that night.  Then I went back to the school to register my kids for the next school year.  Then Marlee’s preschool graduation was at 11:00.  It was so cute.  She and her classmates sang some songs for us, which included a sign language song and a song they learned in Spanish!  That makes it sound like her preschool was really cutting edge or something, but really it was just for fun and Marlee’s teacher was so nice.  We are really sad that Miss Cher is moving and Tilly won’t get to go to her school.  Marlee was so sad that her teacher is moving, she cried off and on throughout the afternoon when she would think about it.  She’s got such a tender heart.  After the graduation we came home for a quick lunch and then had to run over to Tempe to sign papers for our rental house closing.  Then Tilly had swim lessons at 4:00pm after which I came home to make Hawaiian haystack sauce for our YM YW luau and dinner that night.  The dinner was a big success.  We held it at the Lamoreaux’s house.  The kids swam and ate and then we showed a slide show of the graduates at the end.  I was so proud of the slide show I learned how to make!!  I felt like learning how to make a slide show was a blessing from my calling in YW’s.  I love learning how to do new things.  After the luau I had a camp meeting with the YW’s leaders.  We opted to meet after our activity rather than leaving our kids and arranging child care a second night during the week.  Our camp meeting ended up being a little stressful.  Some of the ladies didn’t see eye to eye on a particular issue.  I came home stressed because I don’t like conflict and I kind of had to make the final call since I was presiding.  The next day I talked to both of the women and things worked out.  I don’t think there are any hard feelings for which I am grateful.  I got home from the meeting around 10:30pm or so.  Surprisingly I wasn’t exhausted.  I was glad to be home and to go to bed though.

Wednesday morning the little girls had Grammy days and then on the way home from picking them up I decided to get the older kids out of school and take them to get a slushy at circle k.  I told them they could skip school for the rest of the day, Bryant and Karalee took me up on the offer but Spencer wanted to go back so he could finish his country report in class.  He’s so responsible.  I love it!!

Thursday afternoon Tilly had swimming lessons, Marlee got invited to her friend Redd’s birthday party, Bryant had a football pizza party for our whole family at the park, and after the party Chad took Spencer to do baptisms for the dead. 

Thursday after Bryant's pizza party I took the kids to iceberg to share a shake using the gift certificate I got for my birthday.

Friday our rental house finally closed and recorded!!  It was such a relief to me.  I didn’t enjoy being a landlord.  When we bought the property back 2005 we planned on flipping it and paying down our home, but ended up renting it out instead.  Then the housing market crashed and we had to keep renting it out until the house value went back up to more than what we owed.  While the investment wasn’t good monetarily (think of the movie The Money Pit), we sure learned a lot.  Chad learned how to do many household repairs and we learned a lot about dealing with people in a friendly way even when we owed money on a mortgage and they hadn’t paid yet.  But it was stressful.  I hope to never need to do that again.  Friday night we kicked off the long weekend in a good way.  Brandon’s and Amy’s families came over to swim in our little pool and do our slip n’ slide and then we grilled hamburgers for dinner.  It was fun to visit with them while our kids played.  Josh and Mary stayed the night at our house that night. 

Tilly went poop in the potty for the first time on Friday so she finally earned her candy bar!!

Cameron

Sally Ann

Sleep over with cousins

Bright and early Saturday morning Chad went golfing with a friend from work.  He hasn’t golfed in a really long time.  I think he enjoyed it a lot.  After he got home we took the kids and Josh and Mary swimming at the Lamoreaux’s.  I gave Josh and Mary a swimming lesson.  They did a good job and know how to swim pretty well, but they are pretty scared of the water.  My mom stopped in at our house that afternoon.  She drove down from Snowflake for my cousin Lynae Taylor’s wedding in the Gilbert Temple and got in town a little too early for the wedding so she came to rest and visit us until it started.  After the wedding she drove back to Snowflake.  My Mom’s amazing!!  I guess I get lots of my independence from her.  I was lucky to get more visitors after the wedding.  Uncle Steve and Aunt Sharla, Aunt Dixie, and Aunt Ruth who all rode together called and asked if they could come over to visit and wait for the wedding reception to start.  It was such an honor to have them in our home and to let my kids meet them and get to know them a little bit.  Chad and I attended Lynae’s reception that night for our date night.  It was a beautiful reception.  Everyone was so excited for Lynae.  She is about ten years older than I am and has never married, until now.  She and her husband Tom make a nice couple and Lynae looked so beautiful and so happy. 

Sunday was a nice day.  I love Sunday’s when we have a Monday holiday the next day.  Chad is so much more relaxed knowing he doesn’t have to go to work the next day.  His job is so stressful.  He handles it well though and he hopes that he will be able to retire early or something.  We feel like his current position is where he is supposed to be at this time.  It is a great opportunity and is giving him good managing experience even though it is so stressful for him.  Sunday night Brenda, my brother Tyler and his family and Chad’s brother Devin and his family came over for a “lawn sit”.  It was nice to visit with them and to play games.

I’ll close for tonight with a quote from Elder Oaks’ talk The Keys and Authority of the Priesthood.  "The greatest power God has given to His sons cannot be exercised without the companionship of one of His daughters, because only to His daughters has God given the power ‘to be a creator of bodies … so that God’s design and the Great Plan might meet fruition.’”  One morning several days ago as I woke I had this quote on my mind.  I could picture the creation part of the temple ceremony and then I pictured what the creation process is like as a child develops in its mother’s womb.  They seemed so similar.  I am so grateful that Chad and I have been able to take part in the creation process and that I was able to create a child within my body.  However, I’ve been feeling pretty inadequate as a mother lately.  I worry if I am teaching my children in the right way.  I worry that they will grow up and resent the way I’ve taught them.  I am doing my best to teach them what will bring them happiness and what Heavenly Father’s plan of happiness is all about.  I hope they know I love them and want them to know that I know that I’m not a perfect parent but I’m giving it my best and I want them to be happy and feel loved and valued and secure.

Love,

Mindy