Trip to St. George

I missed last week because we were in St. George. The previous week was super busy. I took the lady I help to DI for a couple of hours on Tuesday while Steve was working from home. I had lots of laundry to do and I needed to clean both bathrooms before we left. The girls had parent/teacher conferences (they both are model students, though Mira is much more average as far as grades go. She is either satisfatory or mastered on all of the subjects, though--no below average). I spent time with my friend Gina one night. I had a follow-up appointment with the homeopathic doctor. I had to pack all the girls and myself for a 4-day trip, get the car packed, get the house straightened, work on my writing, do some shopping, and get my parents off to their trip to colorado (Steve took them to the train station at 4am on Tuesday and then was cranky all day).

I find it cute that Mira is so proud of her bed-making skills that she often wants to take a picture when she's done. :)

Another photo from my instagram challenge: favorite genre: YA sci-fi/fantasy, sock Sunday: I just need my feet warm, favorite trope: beauty and the beast, plotter/pantser/other: both, depending on whether I've written anything like it before.

The girls decided I needed a picture of them hugging at parent teacher conferences.

Friday afternoon, we drove down to St. George and stayed until Monday evening. We went to a number of parks, hiked in Snow Canyon on the Butterfly Trail (there's a rock that looks like butterfly wings), learned how to play pickle ball, played a number of board/group games, attended church twice, and ate a lot of good food. Joe and Cindy are so nice for always being willing to host us.

I loved their two geckos. They always peeked their heads out to see who was watching them.

When we got back Tuesday, I went up to BYU to get us tickets to Murder on the Orient Express at the dollar theater on campus. Since I was up there, Mira and Cecily wanted to come with and go bowling. I did pretty good!

I got to hang out with my friend Camber this week, Steve got to play LOTR with Ben, I took the girls to the library, went grocery shopping at Walmart and Costco in the same day (this may not sound that amazing, but it totally is), the girls had a sleepover at Camber's house, her daughter Cassie came and played at our house, Steve and I went on a date (to the movie I got tickets for), I exercised FIVE days this week (I think that's a record), I picked up my parents from their flight home, Steve and I both did some writing, and I played a lot of Ori and the Blind Forest--a video game that is totally addicting. It was busy, but it was a really good week. I think the exercise makes a huge difference in my emotional stability. I felt really mentally healthy this week and really the only difference was the five days of exercise. I'm excited for the week to come!

Introspection

Wilda asked Steve today how our week went and Steve immediately answered, "It was kind of a crappy week at our house, post-holiday." I'm not feeling so negative about it, but I know what he means.

Steve is struggling at work. Not *with* the work, but with feeling like he's needed. His team had slowly been breaking apart during the last part of the year and there are only a couple of people left with rumors that his team leader might bow out soon, too. He's never felt like his team does a job that no one else can do, and he's never felt like he's improving lives or even reaching the "end guy" even though he's on the communications team. So he's been very introspective all week (the whole manly mind cave sort of thing). He's got to figure out if he wants to stay with Oracle or move to a different company/career.

I've been suffering post-holidays depression because I ate far too much wheat and sugar and did far too little exercise for my body to not protest. Today it finally feels like all that is working its way out of my system and I'm coming out of the blahs. It helps that I ate fairly healthy and exercised as much as I could this week (which was still only 3 days, but it's way better than none). I've also been struggling to figure out what I want to do with myself. I've been getting a lot of joy out of creating things (bows and mermaids and hats and barbie clothes and notecards recently), but that's not something that I can really make money off of, and even if I could, I'd probably be making about $3 an hour. Plus, if I could get more efficient so I could make more money at doing crafts, the creativity would likely plummet, taking the joy out of it. So crafting is fun, but it doesn't provide much value for the family past saving a bit of money using a lot of my time. I've been writing for 9 years now and I enjoy that as well. But so far, I've earned exactly $50 and spent over $1000 (going to conferences, entering contests, etc.) so it's definitely not a lucrative hobby either. It pays even less than crafting! ;) And the more I do it, the less I'm sure that I'm up for the marketing aspect of being an author. So do I go back to teaching? Do I just craft and write for fun in my free time? Do I push away my fears and continue to try to publish? Do I risk having another baby at my age so I have something that demands my time again? (That makes parenthood sound lovely, doesn't it?) I've been trying to figure all that out this week, too.

So Steve and I have been complete joys to be around. *Not.*

The writing conference I go to every year is doing an instagram challenge this year. I've participated a couple of days:

Day 2 #storymakers18 #igchallenge : word for this year. I feel like the word "care" is going to play an important role in my life this year. I feel a push to care about and serve individuals I come in contact with this year. I want to make sure I make time to take care of myself. I need to figure out what exactly I care about so I can make and achieve goals that will bring satisfaction, joy, and a feeling of accomplishment to my life. I need to take care to balance my desires with those of my spouse and children. I may have taken this theme too far, but I don't care. Bahaha. I slay me.

Day 4 #storymakers18 #igchallenge : writing space. I use a laptop because my brain works best when I'm comfy. This is my usual spot, and my usual companion, but my bed, the benches at the kids' gymnastics place, the in-laws front room couch, or the splash pad, are not out of the running.

I just found this story Mira wrote. Translation below.

Page 1: The Book of Mermaid Diary. Hi I am Ella. Once I went to a party.

Page 2: And then I turned into a mermaid again. And then I went to the ocean and I was safe.

Page 3: I like to swim. I like a moon [?]. Like my story? YES / NO !

Page 4: I like you. The end.

Monday we just had a lazy day. I had doctor appointments on Tuesday and Thursday (naturopath to get some blood tests done to see if my supplements are working/needed, and my yearly checkup) and I had bloodwork done on Wednesday. The kids had gymnastics Wednesday. Friday, I went to the temple in the afternoon and Mira got the Stand Strong student award at school. Steve worked from home so he could go to the assembly. I always appreciate when her positive qualities get recognized by others. It makes it seem more real than when we or grandparents say it.

Steve and I are entering a video contest for the writing contest, too. I'm excited to show you the end result next week. Stay tuned!

Holidays

Monday was Christmas! I didn't write last week, but this week has been long enough for both of them. This first picture happened last week. Cecily came into our room while Steve and I were talking before he left for work and she slapped him across the face. After she got in trouble for slapping her father, she wailed, "But I just didn't get enough sleep!"

I finished these before Christmas. Aren't you proud of me? I love the way they turned out. But I was right. The girls haven't played with them at all. :( Okay, maybe they've played with them a little bit, but mostly just to bend their limbs and flip their hair around. But it's okay. I knew that would happen. It happens every time I spend a lot of time making a gift for my kids. I still enjoyed making them.

Last Saturday, we hosted Christmas with my family at my house. The Staleys unfortunately weren't able to come, but we Skyped with them as we opened gifts.

On Christmas Eve night it started snowing around 7pm and snowed all night. It was a Christmas miracle. As we drove up to read the Christmas story out of the Bible with Nick and Wilda, we passed two multi-car pile-ups on the freeway. It made me sad for those who were either hurt or worse on what is supposed to be the happiest time of year. It also made me more grateful that all of my loved ones were healthy and safe.

Santa brought the girls lots of fun stuff on Christmas morning, then we had yummy homemade waffles for breakfast and then opened presents from each other. I got so much exciting stuff, too. We were very blessed this year.

The kids went outside with Steve and built a snowman in our newly-fallen snow in the afternoon. And that night, we went to my parents' house and watched the end of Home Alone with the Ben Frohlichs.

Wednesday we bought tickets to go see the new Star Wars movie as a family. I was worried that it would be terrible, or disappointing, or SOUL DESTROYING because all of the bad reviews. But it was wonderful! We all enjoyed it and I thought they did an excellent job with it.

After a 2 1/2 hour movie, Cecily needed to move around for a while, so we stopped at the mall's play area before heading home.

Thursday night, we invited some friends over to have pizza and play games, but the wife got sick and they had to cancel. Instead, we invited three single friends over to play. The kids didn't get friends over, but us adults had fun playing a couple of rounds of Dominion.

Friday, we needed to do some housecleaning, fold laundry, and we put away ALL of the Christmas decorations. It was so nice outside when we were taking down the lights that I had to take my coat off. It's been so warm here that they are predicting drought conditions for this summer because we don't have enough snowpack to sustain normal water levels in the dams.

Saturday, Grandma and Grandpa and our family went to the Utah Museum of Natural History. The big Christmas present we gave our girls this year was a Visit Salt Lake pass that gives us entrance to fourteen different attractions in Salt Lake. The Natural History museum was the first of those attractions and we had a lot of fun. There were sections on geology (we liked the gems), dinosaurs, Vikings, animals, solar power/astronomy, and Native Americans. We were there for five hours, including a VERY expensive lunch at the cafe there. Then Grandpa took us all out for Nielson's custard before we headed home. We were all tired after our long day, so the girls watched a movie and I listened to a book while I finished up some more crocheting.

Today is New Years Eve. I've been thinking about goals for the next year and for my life. I usually make goals every year, but I feel like last year I just didn't have the energy to do it. This year will be better though. I've already got a few in mind. Tomorrow, the girls get to go play at Nana's house for a while and I think I'll take the time to write down the goals for the new year. Tonight, we're hanging out at Nick and Wilda's with lots of good food, friends, and games. Ben's daughter Dylan is staying over night, so it should be a great party for everyone. :)

I love making things, an announcement, and more Christmastime busy-ness

I was in the car a lot this week. For having almost all of my Christmas shopping done last week, I, for some reason still had to leave the house to do some sort of shopping EVERY DAY this week. Cecily gets super annoyed.

Unfortunately, I took almost no pictures this week. So I'll try to keep my words to a minimum.

I helped Cecily and Mira wrap their presents to cousins one night. Mira was SO proud of doing it mostly by herself. I had writing group one night this week, and it's always fun to get together and eat and chat and catch up on each other's lives. Honestly, it's more about that than the writing. We spend less than 1/3 of the time actually talking about the words. :) One night this week, I took the girls to Dollar Tree and DI to pick out gifts for each other. One night this week, I separated all of the legos we have by color and put them in the new bin I bought for $5 at DI while we watched The Grinch (cartoon) and Merry Christmas Charlie Brown. The rest of the family sat on the couch and didn't help me. (I'm not bitter or anything.) One night this week, we all painted Christmas ornaments to put on the tree. It's a tradition we started two years ago, so now we all have 3 hand-painted ornaments on the tree and it's so fun to get them out from the previous year and see how the kids have improved. I love it. Steve goes along with it because I love it. :)

I've continued to keep an eye on the #LighttheWorld initiative. I had so much gusto that first week and was proud that I planned ahead and had activities we could do each day. When I went to look at the calendar last Sunday to plan out the week again, I realized that I'd done each one already in one way or another.

Monday was "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you." —Matthew 5:44 The suggestion was to apologize to someone you may have hurt or offended, or to focus on being kind to someone that is hard to get along with. I do this with my children constantly. I try to apologize to them when I've yelled at them or not taken their feelings into consideration. I try daily to be kinder to them, even when they're at their worst.

Tuesday was "I was sick, and ye visited me." —Matthew 25:36 That day, me and the girls actually did go to a nursing home and sing Christmas carols to the residents with Emilia's Activity Days girls.

Wednesday was "Search the scriptures." —John 5:39 The suggestions were to read scriptures daily with your family, share a scripture on social media, or send a scripture to a friend who you think might need it. We try to read the scriptures as a family every day before school starts. We don't always make it, but we're pretty consistent. I also had sent a scripture to a friend who I thought might need it just two days earlier.

Thursday was "I was a stranger, and ye took me in." —Matthew 25:35 The suggestions were to do something nice for a stranger. Now that I'm looking at it, I guess I could have done a better job that day of focusing on helping someone I don't know. For that day, I thought of the friend we gave all of our extra Christmas money to because their heater had gone out and they were living off space heaters and a small fireplace. They weren't strangers, but we took them in in the best way we could. I also regularly give money to the people begging with cardboard signs at Walmart. Usually just the change I have in my purse, if I have any. But maybe I'll try this week to do something nice for a complete stranger, even if it's just giving them a compliment.

I was frustrated at first because I wasn't participating the way I had been the first week, but I came to a place of peace about it. I think I can be content knowing that I live the kind of life daily that emulates aspects of the Savior. I didn't have a photo op to share on social media, but I think that's okay.

And onto my only photos for the week--Christmas presents. I'm making mermaid dolls for the girls because they've been asking for them since before our trip to Disneyland, and because we got them "experiences" with their Christmas money instead of toys and I wanted them to have a couple of toys to open Christmas day. I work on them every night after the girls go to bed and I'm really excited about how they're turning out. Making gifts is really my happy place at Christmas time anyway, so I'm glad I have an excuse. :)

Last but not least, my announcement.

I found out this week that the short story I wrote was chosen to be published in the anthology I wrote it for and submitted it to. It will be my first published piece and I'm so excited. It was a daunting thing for me to write a short story. I haven't read many short stories and I felt very inadequate and underprepared, but I pushed through those negative feelings and did it anyway. And I got in! I'll even get royalties after the first 200 copies sell (haha! I doubt that will happen, but it's nice to think about.) I'll let you know when it comes out so you can get a copy if you'd like. I appreciate everyone's support of this hobby of mine and always asking how it's going. Yay for baby steps!