January 11th-January 16th

Cheerleading love from somewhere in that week. I included this screen grab from a video to show that it was a tough season a lot of times. The girls work hard and stunting can be dangerous and I’m so proud of them for pushing through the embarrassing and scary moments and working hard. 

Delaney got her new ballet bag from sissy for her birthday. ❤️

Ok, this is kind of funny and kind of embarrassing. I had just been drinking some fiber because my tummy hurt because I hadn’t had a bm in a few days. 🤣 And then we played jackbox for a family night activity and I was the sneak, which means everyone else answers a different question than I answer and I try to play it off like I’m a regular like them and they try to figure out the sneak. So I copied Matt’s annswer which was like, 2, or something, annd then immediately they knew it was me. 🤣🙃🤣

So January 11th was the day after our. If conference and I was exhausted, but it was my last relief society Sunday and I really wanted to make a visit. So I went to LP and Pax because I could not make myself drive anywhere. In my journal I wrote “still riding yesterday’s high.” I was pooped, but happy. And I hadn’t poopef, and I was still happy. 🤣

I met with Lana on the 12th since she’s the new relief society President in LP. She’s so wonderful and knows what she’s doing. It was a weird limbo I was in as I always talk to my presidents about how my presidency operates, but really that didn’t make sense in the case of the 2 presidents i oriented that last month. 🤷‍♀️ I also de-christmassed all day because of our visitors coming that week. In my journal I wrote “no sleep till Brooklyn, I’ll rest after the 25th.” 

I skipped Inklings on Tuesday because I was exhausted. In my journal I wrote “I am so tired. I know I’m so blessed, but so tired.” I know I keep saying it, but I was real real busy. Wrapping up the holidays, the regions conference, my calling I love, catching up on all the things, phew, I’m so glad I’m happily blogging away in my nice clean house and only reliving these weeks in the telling. 

So as I was taking down my outside garland I was being lazy and just grabbed a stool from my kitchen and not the step ladder like I should have. And I scraped the crap out of my face. 

I stepped up on the stool and as I was hoisting myself up I scraped right along the edge of our (who knew it was so sharp?) outside light. 

I gently washed it and cried a little because a) it stung b) why wasn’t anyone there to help me (big emotions!) and c) it was so ridiculous. 

I had to share my stupidity so I updated the crew each day on the progress of my playground scratches. But then the worst thing was that *no one* asked about it. I thought that was the weirdest thing. 🤷‍♀️ Zoom meetings, basketball games, church and Sunday meetings, I mean I don’t expect a stranger at the store to ask me, but even friends. My crew did as soon as they got home. And by that point I’d kind of forgotten about it and then they’d be like “wow! What happened to you?!” Anyways, super fun. 

It’s so ridiculous and scary and sometimes you just have to laugh. This was after the poor woman gave him her Nobel Peace necklace and he gave her nothing. 🙄🤣🙄 I sent it to my siblings as all my brothers participated in many a pinewood derby. 

The rest of the week was more of the same. I wrote in my journal “how busy I’ve been is really preparing me to be released. Heavenly Father is answering my prayers.” 

On the 16th I wrote “Phew! I got it all done - the house de-christmased and deep cleaned in 5 days. Plus a draft for our ward council training and a little work on my almost done talk. Frankie’s basketball game tonight and then the Seagrove’s came to town. Yay!”

Sleep training

 One of my resolutions (that I really started working on in February) was to have a better relationship with sleep. I’m being mindful of my water intake before bed, stretching (legs up the wall is supposed to be a good one), and not checking the time if I wake up in the middle of the night. And if I can’t get back to sleep after about an hour, though it’s hard to tell when you don’t look at the time, I get up. Which is what happened today and why I started my day at 5:30 and had a headache all day. Because remember my Lent goal is also no naps, which I am acing but is sah hard without a good nights sleep.

I trip planned a lot of the day. I made a couple healthy new recipes and exercised and PTA’d. Adi talked me into letting her stay home to study for several tests tomorrow. She still went to seminary, so did she really win? 🤷‍♀️

In my trip planning excitement I realized I want to be caught up on my blog so I’m going hardcore. Also because I have the time, I’ve just been pacing myself. We leave 3 weeks from yesterday and since I’m on week one of my 4 week cleaning schedule, that means I’ll deep clean the house before we go too. Although I have made an intentional decision as an adult to never be precious about having to have a clean house before a trip. Of course I would always like one, but I don’t get twirled up about it. I know too many people that go a little cray cray and get a little mean and that’s one promise to myself that I’ve always kept that I won’t be that way. 

Adi made 2 top notch pizzas for dinner. She put a little curry powder on the one I tried and it was actually really good. She’s quite the cook, I’m always impressed by her. 

Frankie stayed after school for conditioning, and then asked if we could take a friend home to wildwood, so I picked them up, dropped d at dance, dropped her friend at home, and then annoyed Frankie because I wouldn’t drop her at home too. Our car pool buddy is out of town and I wasn’t about to drive back and forth for an hour and a half class. 

When Frankie was in kindergarten she learned a cute alphabet song where she sang the letter and then some letters had cute phrases, like “AB - C you later! DEF - G, I’m gonna miss ya!…” and at the end it went “Z - Zats all!” And Alexis and Christian loved it and still say it all the time. So anyway, zats all. 

January 17th-21st

Amy and crew came down for Max’ birthday on the 17th. The had fun playing on bubbas Nintendo switch.  

On Saturday we went up to the activity center in Prince Frederick to play laser tag. 

They were still working out the kinks, but I for one had a blast! I also won, so that helps. 

After that the kids did the laser maze, which is like in the movies when a bank is being robbed and they’re evading the lasers. 

We were able to watch the video feed of the maze goers and it was some kind of funny!

After that we popped into Walmart for birthday provisions, then on to Yummys for birthday boy sushi. I had to send Joni this picture from when the visited and we met them there. ❤️

Delaney shared some ramen and just look at these cute cousins!

Max was treated to a fancy Sports Clips hot towel haircut and scalp massage and then on to home. Amy sent me this precious Adi baby picture from when she visited us in California and we dressed Adi up. 

We played a lot of jackbox, and this was a fist for me!

We made chicken piccata and chocolate chip pie and it was a fun day and evening playing games. 

The next day I had my last stake council and then Capitol Ward got a new president and I a) knew Julie would like some guidance and b) wanted Brenda to have a little breathing room before having to rush to training. Julie makes 18 presidents I trained over my 5+ years. ❤️

In stake council I was able to share about our regional women’s conference and then Elizabeth and I shared our testimonies and it was a really wonderful last meeting. 

Amy and I stayed up till 2 that night because we are dumb. 

The next morning we slept in till 10 and then shared our Yum Box with them. They are perfect for sharing! It’s a fun experience and then if there’s something we don’t like we don’t feel like we’re throwing away a ton because we’ve shared. And with this many people, usually someone likes it. 

They left on Monday around 2 and it was a fun and quick trip. Yay for living close enough that that is possible. 

I will say, I was running, running, running all this time. I had been so busy from before Thanksgiving on. And with Amy and crew coming, I really needed to de-Christmas and deep clean my poor neglected house, and then hosting is so fun, but also a lot of work. I can say I was very busy then because I’m not very busy now, so it all averages out. 

I made a digital flyer for my staff appreciation event. I usually pawn this job off on one of my girls, but I had procrastinated and needed to get the word out. 

And this was cool and a good feeling to know that I know our sisters in the Suitland stake. As we were planning our regional conference there was a lot of debate about sharing the broadcast link. A few of the ladies felt like if we shared it broadly that no one would show up. I knew our ladies would come! I wanted to share for those that really couldn’t make it, because I knew so many wanted and needed to be there with other women. And Suitland stake showed up! We had the furthest to drive and the most sisters. Muscles 💪🏻 I love our stake. 

I don’t know? A light dusting of snow? Leftover snow? 🤷‍♀️

On the 20th Matt left for his business trip. I worked on my talk and my testimony and other householdy things. Elizabeth and I chatted, which I know because we had to schedule it and I just checked my calendar. Being released like this with a friend is really the way to go. I also dreamed about my dad that night. I know that because I wrote it in my line a day journal. Oh how I miss my mom and dad.  

January 22nd-January 25th

Another picture of Christian and Jeanne’s visit with the McCombs. He got to hold baby Kira!

Some posts from our big storm. 

And then that Sunday night when SMCPS made us wait until every other Maryland county had cancelled.  

Working our way backwards. 

We had at home church and broke out our 2020 sacrament tray. At home church every once in awhile is lovely. 

On Saturday I met up with Steve and Ralph and we rode to the stake center for the leadership training. Josh, Steve, and I did a ward council training - our last hurrah. It’s always fun working with those two and we’d had several meetings and texts and emails coordinating our lame, but not super lame role play. The training went well and was a relief to have done. And our odd carpool had good conversation on the way up and back, so there you go.

Matt had been out of town for work and got home late Friday, so he spent Saturday working on our generator that we’ve never used. My dad split the cost with us because he wanted us to have that peace of mind. ❤️ Matt thinks he can fix it, but he needed more than just one day. 

Friday brought another fun basketball game. For most of December, January, and February Frankie had practice every day till 6:00 and games Wednesdays and Fridays. Busy busy girl!

Big sigh of relief when they pulled this one off! A few weeks before this one of the flyers fell and brought the whole routine down with her. It was bad and the girls spirits were super low. 

On the 22nd I had my soup lunch day for the pteachers. Only, they had basketball games all day so many of the didn’t come to the workroom and also didn’t check their emails? I’m not totally sure where the disconnect was, because I asked Pinots Liason to email out the notice as usual. For this next event I’m gonna print out a few flyers and post them in the workroom so that didn’t happen again. I normally leave all our leftovers, but I didn’t really have a way to leave 10 different kinds of soups and finals didn’t want to leave all my bowls and spoons, so we brought home a lot of soups and got to sample them all. Perks of volunteering. And then I got to deal with the aftermath of cleaning, then returning 10 crockpots. 

U

January 26th-28th

 We were all very excited when school was cancelled for Monday. And then we were excited for Tuesday. And then we were excited for Wednesday. And then we were excited for Thursday. We knew we already had Friday off, so then that left us with a whole week out of school. And Ruby was all ready for valentines on her fashion adventure. 

It was the weirdest snow. I can’t remember the order, but it snowed, rained, then snowed again, or something like that, so that after the first few busy hours if you hadn’t stayed on top of it, it was a thick layer of ice. Like, many inches thick. We were watching the ice take over the bay a little more every day. 

The girls went out a little, but they were literally slipping and sliding - it was so funny! We stayed on top of our driveway and sidewalks, so that wasn’t bad. Neighbor Alex was out of town, so he hired the girls (+Matt) to shovel, or pick ax away at the layers of ice so everything would be ready for when they made it home. We also helped another neighbor down the street. Our side of the street gets more sunlight that across the street, so our wasn’t quite as bad, but this family we helped hadn’t stayed on top of things at all. It went like this. Chip away to break the ice with either a spade or something else sharp. We used our this metal pole thing we used to break the ground when we dug our French drain. The neighbor we helped hadn’t two guys out there, so the 3 guys (including Matt) worked to break the ice up and I shoveled/threw the pieces they’d broken up. I’ve never seen anything like it. It was pretty though because it was so smooth. 

Also, Survivor 50 just came out and they put out idols in all 50 states and I recognized ours as a tower in Baltimore pretty quickly. 

Matt and I could have gone up, but I’d have been so sad if we drove a full 2 hours out there and had the line be too long to make it. It’s tough being so far away from like everything. 

Anyways, we had a lovely quiet week off and it was a nice break, and then they added those days to our year at the end of summer. So that stinks. 

The baby bug turns 14!

 And gets a phone! That involved Alli finding us a good used phone, which went to Adi, Asia phone down to Frankie, and Frankie’s phone down to Delaney. And 2 hours on the phone with the most patient and wonderful T-Mobile operator ever. With so much shuffling it took forever to make sure everything transferred over to the phone before wiping the next phone and making sure everything transferred over again. 

Anyway, when that was finally done, we wrapped up her new phone and let her open it. 

Matt was in a meeting, so we gathered around him and sang to her for the first time that day and she was so surprised by her gift. 

This was our 4th snow day, but our roads were all clear. We gave the phone to her early because she wanted to have a sissy day and go shopping and get lunch, so we let her have her phone for their festivities. 

She got a Crumbl gift card from her young women leaders. ❤️

Hot stuff. 

Adi said she remembered pictures at Crumbl but then forgot the rest of the day. She tried. 🤷‍♀️

D asked for Adi’s pizza for dinner and crepes with Nutella, whipped cream, and strawberries for dessert. I don’t know what it says about them that they put Nutella and whipped cream on them, but it can’t be good. 

We tried our best to put a few candles in her crepes. 

Good enough. 

I can’t believe our baby is 14. And then again, I can. She’s so fun and funny and smart and moody. She’s the best. 

And she likes really weird gifts. 

Like this plague doctor stuffie. 

So for her birthday she got a whole week off of school, Henry cuddles, and a new phone. Not a bad haul for a fresh 14 year old. 

March 3rd-4th

We had Inklings yesterday. Donna lead the discussion at Sarah’s house. Donna is one that I’ve had next to no actual conversations with and it was nice to get to know her a little bit. I love Inklings and I love that ladies have been hanging out for a bit after. It’s so wonderful to talk big gospel ideas (and small ones too!) and be buoyed up by righteous women.

Alecia and I walked after. It was sprinkling and I would have called it, but Alecia said we should walk and I’m glad we did. It feels good to be outside, even in the cold rain sometimes. 

Frankie loves the teacher academy and is really thriving there. She got a Grit Ticket postcard for her hard work and she was so surprised and happy. 

Made her cute little day. 

Sarah and I (and Ezra) went walking today and the weather was much nicer. It was downright balmy! We went to the 3 different parks and let Ezra play and we caught up and it’s nice to have friend time. I’m getting used to this free time thing. 🤗

After ballet I bought red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple tablecloths and balloons. My staff appreciation event is next week and I’m getting ready!

For young men’s, the priests practiced making phone calls, specifically to girls, and Boshop Wiest asked if I’d be one of their recipients. I fielded a call for a hair cut appointment and 2 dates and they were all cute and respectful and funny. Then when Matt got home I got all the background and it was even more funny. These cute boys and cute ward family.