Tag: Garden 2024

Busy with Harvesting

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Last week’s decision to have little goals to work towards each day was a great success!  I felt like I was going to be physically ill at the end of Monday and Tuesday from the effort, but by Wednesday I could do each thing each day with relative ease. Unfortunately, I caught a cold from one of the kids and the symptoms began manifesting on Thursday evening, so I didn’t get much more done after that point. I felt much better by this last Monday and have been slowly ramping up efforts yet again. It’s nice to actually do stuff again!

Cooking

This week’s meal plan:

  • Monday: Pizza (Michael)
  • Tuesday: Corn & Zucchini Soup, Whole Wheat Rolls
  • Wednesday: Beef & Pumpkin Stew that turned out terrible, so I converted it into a Beef & Pumpkin Curry that was more than decent
  • Thursday: Pork & Tomatillo Stew
  • Friday: TBD
  • Saturday: Marry Me Pasta, Salad
  • Sunday: TBD

Clothing

Just trying to get strong enough to handle doing laundry again. The goal is one load a day and I’ve met that goal once thus far this week.

Cleaning

Cleaning is still a little strenuous for me, so I’m doing light tidying. The kids don’t like that I’m noticing messes now and I’m coherent enough to keep on top of them to clean up after themselves. They’re good kids, but geez, if they aren’t going to be nagged to clean, they are not going to do it. I could worry unnecessarily about this, but I was the same way when I was their ages, and I got my act together at some point.  I’ll just keep nagging and hope they sort themselves out in the future.

Caring

When I was cutting up garden vegetables for freezing, I took the time to dice up some of the green peppers, and added some onion and garlic to the bag so Michael could have a ready-to-go bag of diced veggies for when he makes roasted potatoes for breakfast on the weekends.  It’s a little thing, but I hope it makes him feel loved.  He hates chopping things because his hands are better suited for brute strength activities and not so much for fine motor things like dicing vegetables.

Creativity

I did not finish a penguin block last week because I got sick. I also realized that I’ve been having a hard time with this quilt because I’m making it out of flannel, which I’m not enjoying piecing with at all. I’d like to sit down and calculate whether or not it’s feasible to finish this quilt before Christmas decorating season this year—if it’s not feasible I might move onto something else for the time being.

Oh…I will need to move onto something else for a little while. The decorations for the band’s big fundraiser are looking more than tired and we’ve decided to replace the table runners this year, which I’ll be sewing up. I ordered the fabric today, so I don’t know when it will get here, but I’ll start working on those once the fabric arrives.

I also need to keep going on the secret Christmas knitting. I was supposed to be 50% done with one project last weekend, but I’m only at the 25% mark.  Eek. I do have a fabulous excuse, but still…I like to finish my projects no matter what.

Gardening

There was a Freeze Warning issued yesterday and I made the decision to just harvest everything in the garden, ripe or not, seeing that it’s the end of October and true freezes can legitimately start happening now. I had hoped to focus on getting caught up on office type things this week, but Mother Nature forced my hand and I’ve been processing produce for storage.  Mostly chopping and freezing things because canning feels like it would be too much at the moment. I think I will try to can up some Green Tomato Mincemeat tomorrow, though. I’ve read good things about the recipe, and there’s a lot of green tomatoes sitting on my counter. I’m absolutely chuffed over the garden’s output this year. It’s easily my best year of gardening ever; I just wish I had been strong enough to can a lot of the veggies because that’s one of my goals in life. I aspire to have the pantry full of jewel-toned jars of homemade yumminess lining the walls. It’s always such a beautiful sight.

See that huge zucchini in the box? It yielded twenty-two cups of shredded zucchini! That’s a lot of future zucchini bread!

Celebrating

The girls are helping with the church Halloween party and Renaissance cut down my corn stalks after we harvested the corn and she’s planning to tie them up nice so they can be placed on the front porch as decorations. Rachel ordered herself a costume from Amazon and Nathaniel has come up with the laziest costume that will still work for him, so we’re covered on costumes. Yay, Halloween. Should probably buy some candy to hand out.

Community

Ward Choir: We’re changing our meeting time and I’m meeting with my pianist this week to discuss Christmas music. I was not able to attend our last/first rehearsal because I wasn’t feeling well, so a friend ran the rehearsal, for which I’m very thankful. I am really hoping to be done with feeling poorly and get these Christmas rehearsals going!

Band Boosters: We had another fundraiser planning meeting this week and made a lot of decisions. So much work to do! Music programs in our schools do not happen on their own, folks! I am thisclose to creating vinyl lettering for my van’s rear window that has a Venmo QR code for people to donate to for the band. People donate to bachelorette parties, why not music in our schools? I truly wonder if that would work…?

Top priorities this week:

  • Processing the garden harvest. Ren and I have ploughed through a lot of it already, but still need to figure out what to do with the tomatoes that are over-ripe, under-ripe, and green. We also need to puree a pumpkin, and I want to oven-roast the green cherry tomatoes to have on-hand for adding a handful to soups for extra flavor, etc.
  • Ward Choir logistics.
  • Band Booster everythings.
  • Walks. They stopped happening while I was feeling unwell, so I need to get back in the habit.
  • Secret Christmas knitting, because I’m behind on it, but also because it forces me to take a break during the day and I can feel that I’m sometimes a little more tired than I should be due to the harvest processing.

I wish you all a happy and productive week! It’s so nice how good you feel when you’re able to dig in and just get some work done! Ren and I worked hard this morning in the kitchen and while we were eating lunch she sighed and said, “It’s just a good day. I did work that matters and that I like doing, and I’m eating a lunch that tastes good. That’s a good day.” I just looked at her and felt so proud. She gets it. Life is a lot of work, but a lot of the work is really enjoyable if you let it be enjoyable. Hopefully this beautiful time of year brings you numerous opportunities to enjoy the work that’s being asked of you!

Surgery Update

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Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear my friends, there’s been a lot that’s happened in the past couple months. I mentioned “flare-ups” quite often in my Domestic Diary posts—flare-ups that started up two or three years ago and would sometimes land me in the emergency room because the pain was so intense. At first they were every few months, then every other month, every month, every three weeks…it’s been truly awful.

We started to get the ball rolling in March to get me in for a surgery to make the flare-ups stop, but my insurance denied the surgery until I’d tried alternative methods to manage the condition. Three months later, the alternative methods hadn’t made a dent AND I’d racked up two more ER visits, so they finally approved the surgery.

Which led to the next problem of trying to find someone to perform the surgery. There’s a doctor shortage here in Washington, and also a huge backlog when it comes to surgery because there’s not enough surgeons and their calendars are so full that they’re scheduling procedures two to four months out. Michael got sick of the wait-and-see and took a day off of work in July to phone every surgeon within twenty-five minutes of us to try to get an appointment with them. He phoned thirty-something offices, left messages with each one, and only one office got back to us. (I am amazed at the level of unprofessionalism that exists here in Washington State; it’s not just the medical industry that acts like that, it’s almost everyone.)

However, as luck would have it, the one doctor that phoned us back was the doctor that was #1 on Michael’s research list of surgeons, so we were pleased to go meet them and get things moving forward. It turned out to be a great decision: While the surgeon I was already working with was predicting a surgery date of late October through early December, the new surgeon said they’d definitely get me in by mid-October. Then their secretary called me up in early September and said that something had come up and a spot had opened up in mid-September and did I want it? I enthusiastically said, “YES,” and our family launched into surgery prep mode with about a week’s notice. We were too excited to care about the condensed timeline. Mom might be able to function as a normal human being soon? We were all in! Yay!

My surgery date came and went with all the normal happenings. Getting cut, removing things from your body, and getting stitches hurts, so I was in a normal amount of pain as I set off to recuperate at home. Most of my friends who have had this sort of procedure said they were feeling pretty normal again with a week or two, so I set my sights on feeling more like myself in that time. Unfortunately, I started feeling a little worse on Day 5 of post-op, and then worse every day after that until I was just lying around feeling lethargic and nauseous. On Day 9 of post-op I finally spiked a fever that necessitated a trip to the ER, where we discovered that one of my organs had exploded. I was taken into surgery to do what could be done to clean up the damage.

I started my healing process again, only to go back to the ER four days later with early signs of sepsis. (That was a scary experience that I might talk about later, or I might not.) I was pumped full of antibiotics, watched over carefully through the night, and released in the morning to once again recuperate at home.

So I’m on Day 19 & 10 of post-op, and Day 5/6 since the mini sepsis scare. As we were driving home from the last ER visit I received a spiritual prompting, weirdly, to not recuperate in my bedroom because the stairs would be too much for me. So we’ve set me up in the front room on our hideaway bed and I’ve spent the last week watching movies and desperately trying to rally the strength to do, well, anything. I’ve never been this tired and worn-out in all of my life: On top of everything else, I’ve become severely anemic, which has me feeling like I just don’t have any gas in my tank to do anything.

But as always, there’s glimmers of beauty and love amongst the pain and despair. Michael has turned himself inside out on a daily basis with caring for me. I’ve no shortage of snacks, drive-thru runs, clean clothes and all the needed supplies to help me heal. He’s taken over my carpool duties as best he can while still going to work, with other members of the carpools unhesitatingly covering any leftover deficits. He’s set up the projector to cast my movies onto the ceiling so I can still watch something when I’m too tired to sit up enough to watch a normal TV screen. The kids love the whole “TV on the ceiling” experience, so you’ll find us laying on our backs on the front room couches most evenings to continue working our way through the “White Collar” television series. There’s been such sweetness amongst all the bitter.

Friends have come out of the woodwork to help with everything. And goodness, when did everyone get so good at cooking? We have eaten like kings as dear friends have dropped off dinners and treats. Our refrigerator (cup) overfloweth…what a wonderful problem to have. I’ve had visitors to help pass my very empty time, and I just feel so loved and seen.

Even the prompting to set myself up on the couch bed has paid off, too: I simply don’t have the energy to go up and down the stairs multiple times a day, so it was a very good decision to set me up downstairs. An extra bonus is that, from my couch bed, I have a view of my garden. My garden may not end up being processed into food storage this year, but goodness me, does it bring me joy, and it continues to bring me joy as I gaze out upon it longingly as it flourishes and ripens in the golden autumn sunshine.

With me being situated near the front door, the kids are able to interact with me a whole lot more as well. I was feeling rather lonely during my time recuperating in my bedroom. It’s nice that your kids will figure out how to solve their problems on their own while you’re healing, but lack of human connection can really make a person feel down. It’s nice to be right there when they get home from work and school; they’ll sit down and talk with me for a few minutes as they take off their shoes and it lifts my spirits to connect and know what’s going on in their little worlds even while I’m not involved in my normal capacity.

And now my medication is kicking in and it’s becoming a little difficult to piece words into sentences, so I’ll end here for now with the hope that I can write some more in the upcoming weeks as I (hopefully) continue to heal through completion without any interfering events.

Dog Days Debriefing

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I don’t know what it is about summer that makes it difficult to stick to a schedule. Is it the lack of places to be, the pull to dawdle and “waste” time, the fact that I have large chunks of time to work on things without being interrupted, or the heat? All of them? None of them? Perhaps we will never know. Regardless, I have time in my schedule to write two blog posts a week this summer, and I often find myself so busy with other things that I choose to do the other things rather than sit down and write. It won’t hurt much in the long run, but I do enjoy re-reading posts and I’m robbing myself of that future pleasure by putting off the writing each week!

Rather than write a regular end-of-the-week kind of post, I figure I’ll do one big swooping review of summer thus far…

Cooking

I’m doing my best to cook things using stuff from the garden, but we had a ton of leftovers after Renaissance’s graduation party, so we ate leftover for 2-3 weeks. Now that we’ve worked through the leftovers, there’s been more garden cooking. The herbs are really starting to come into their own, so I need to remember that they’re available to use!

Renaissance baked up a ton of stuff for her party, and then made some really cute patriotic cookie arrangements for the Fourth of July.

Clothing

One of my goals is to teach the girls some basic clothing sewing over the summer so they can have a better understanding of how clothing fits them and also because it’s a great skill to know. I just taught Rachel her first lesson today and she seems to understand it pretty good.

Cleaning

Graduation party cleanup is taking forever because I bought serving items that need to be assimilated into our household and it turns out our household is pretty full of pretty serving ware already. I think we’ve officially gotten to the point where we need to do a major house purge. Makes sense; the kids have all graduated to new levels of childhood/adulthood, and the life we are currently living is very different from how things were three to four years ago. I don’t know if I should do a full-on Marie Kondo-esque purge, or just attend to the most troublesome spots and make do…I’m leaning towards the latter because I just don’t want to deal with too much. I feel like I can’t handle a Marie Kondo purge this summer.

I did institute a new thing: Catch-up Fridays: For two hours each Friday afternoon I work on the most overdue tasks on my to-do list app. I finally framed up some prints I bought last autumn and was even set to hang them up, but someone walked off with my nails and picture hanging supplies so I’m stuck until I go on my errand run next week and buy some new nails. Hmph. I think Catch-up Fridays will help me feel way more productive by the end of the summer. Crossing those severely overdue tasks off the to-do list just feels so satisfying!

Caring

The girls cannot find jobs. I have them applying to a bunch everyday and they don’t get any kind of responses from the companies. Emily’s been invited to two interviews that didn’t result in anything, and Ren and Rachel have been on one interview each that didn’t pan out either. A lot of people are saying that teens are having a hard time finding jobs because minimum wage pay is so high here in Washington that adults are staying in minimum wage jobs instead of moving up the career ladder and opening the minimum wage jobs back up for the kids. Maybe that’s what it is, I don’t know. I just know that between college tuition rates being out of control and my teens having a hard time finding any kind of employment, post-high school education is becoming very difficult to fund. Ren is hoping that once she turns eighteen next month she’ll be a better job candidate. Fingers crossed.

Creativity

I altered a flower girl dress for a friend and it went well. Now that it’s done I’m trying to learn tambour beading. It turns out that setting up a slate frame takes forever, so I’m stuck on that step until I’m done with it. And then I don’t know what I’m going to bead after, so I feel like I’m flailing at the moment.

My creativity mojo is kind of non-existent at the moment. My instinct is to freak out when that happens, but I’ve had bouts of no creative mojo and I know all will be eventually be well. It’s just a supremely uncomfortable feeling. I feel like I can’t commit to anything because I’m really anxious about the future and whether or not I’ll actually have time to work on projects. And I have completed quite a few really big projects this year already, so maybe I just need a rest. It’s feeling pretty good to be cleaning up the house and working in the garden, which are both areas I had to neglect over the last two years while I did my master’s degree, so maybe this summer will just be about straightening all the home and garden stuff out?

Also, I was just called to be our ward’s new choir director and I feel like I’m not entirely on top of that just yet. We’ve had a couple rehearsals and we’re working on the newly-released hymns, and I kind of resent that my choir pieces have essentially been chosen for me with all these new hymns coming out and needing to be performed before they can be used as congregational hymns. I need to find time to work on my own piano and vocal practice so I can pitch in some more with church music, but…the fire isn’t there right now. Music just feels so stale right now; just more of the same things I’ve been doing for twenty years. It will be nice when this heavy cloud begins to lift.

Gardening

The garden is a source of joy for me this season. I’ve been really good about consistently maintaining it and the effort is definitely being repaid in terms of produce, flowers and beauty. I harvested the last of the lettuce this week and tore out the spent pea plants. The Napa cabbages are almost ready to harvest, the mini carrots are also getting close to picking, and the rhubarb keeps producing. The squashes are all starting to vine and bloom, which is exciting! I have some corn plants popping up, and my peppers, tomatillos and tomatoes are blossoming a ton as well. There’s a lot of potential brewing in that little space in the backyard!

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I planted green beans and winter squash in the newly-vacated pea plant bed this morning, and planted random sunflowers in any blank spaces that I felt needed something growing in them. Sunflowers have had a tough year contending with the slugs, as the slugs love newly-sprouted sunflower greens. I’m thinking about getting my starter trays out again and starting the rest of my sunflower seeds so that I can put them in once they’re bristly enough to deter slugs and then I can have a plethora of sunflowers for autumn color. I also want to start some broccoli.

The nasturtiums are blooming so wonderfully, the Shasta daisies are starting to bloom, the marigolds are growing leaps and bounds, and the aforementioned herbs are scattered throughout and give off the best scents when you brush by them. Rachel harvested the French Lavender this morning and we’ll make wreaths from them this week for the doors. I love the smell of lavender wafting through the house!

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Celebrating

The Fourth of July came and went. I made patriotic Jell-O and it was wolfed down in a matter of hours. It’s so good! Nom, nom, nom.

As far as celebrating summer goes, we’ve not done much. Maybe I should come up with some ideas.

Community

Renaissance and Nathaniel signed up to be in the orchestra for a production of “Guys & Dolls.” I’m worried that it’s too much for Nathaniel’s ability at this point. Renaissance is straining to keep up, as she’s playing three different instruments for it. I’m hoping that this is a “sweet spot” of difficulty for her that has her coming back for more when it’s all over, and not a “that almost killed me and I’m never doing it again” kind of difficulty that turns her off of musical accompaniment in the future.

Ward Choir is still in its infant days. As always, we have way more women than men, so I think I’m going to have to morph into recruitment mode and stalk dudes, which I really just don’t want to do. Maybe I’ll wait until school starts? Summer is often so hit and miss with families going on vacation anyways. We’ll just plough through new hymns throughout the summer and it’ll be enough. We’ll set our sights on making choir magic in the fall?

I want to start some sort of social group that meets once a month or so. A couples’ potluck group, or a creative women’s group, or something. Or just invite some ladies over one evening. I’m feeling the loss of all the regular socializing at school events and I’m feeling pretty isolated. I feel like friends are a necessary ingredient to an enjoyable summer. Every season, really, but this season–without its enforced socializing that school throws at us in autumn, winter and spring–needs shared laughter and sweet drinks in the sunshine with favorite friends.

Maybe everything is in a “nearly ripe” stage at the moment, and after all the hustle and bustle of school’s end, graduation and Ren’s recital, normal feels a little flat in comparison? I may be feeling a little off-kilter, but the weather is beautiful and we do get a lot of free time for reading, naps, and daydreaming, which ain’t that bad. There’s a couple of things planned in August that should be fun, so I’ll just keep showing up and cleaning up the cobwebs that have formed in the past couple of years and hopefully feel better for it. I would really like the Creative Mojo to come back, though. It’s so unsettling when I’m not up for creativity. It will return, I know that. Maybe I’ll read some more on the hammock in the next week. Chill out some more.

Best wishes to you as you go about your summer experiences and memory-making!

</graduation> <summer>

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While I am very pleased that I didn’t throw Renaissance’s graduation party until two weeks after graduation, I also feel like our summer vacation didn’t really get to start until now after the party is finished because we were so busy with putting the party together. I spent this past week trying to summon up the will to do anything and then just gave up because I figured it was my body’s way of taking a break after many, many months of non-stop activity. All good things, of course, but it’s been a lot and recovery is an important part of the wellness cycle. I’m hoping I slowed down enough and rested enough that I’ll be good to go for the rest of the summer.

I have missed my little weekly posts to begin and end each week, and I’m hoping I can get back into a routine that includes writing them. The past six weeks were really busy! Here’s the plan for the next week, as we really sink into our true summer schedule:

Cooking

This week’s meal plan:

  • Monday: Chicken Shawarma (Emily), Cherry Tomato Salad w/ Burrata & Pesto
  • Tuesday: Grilled Chicken, Cantaloupe Soup, Grape Salad, Breadsticks
  • Wednesday: Cheeseburgers (Because Rachel has been asking for them repeatedly), Shaved Summer Squash & Peas,
  • Thursday: Hot Dogs, 4th of July Jell-O, etc.
  • Friday: Ribs, Potato Salad, Corn on the Cob
  • Saturday: French Bread Pizza, Caesar Salad
  • Sunday: Panzanella

Clothing

Laundry is pretty caught up on the daily stuff; I still need to fold and figure out some of the other season stuff and do a wardrobe rotation to make sure all the cold weather clothing has been put away and all the summer clothing is out and in use.

I’m altering a flower girl dress for a friend’s daughter and it’s going pretty good thus far. I’ve basted all my alterations into the dress and the girl came over today to make sure everything was fitting correctly before I put in legit stitches, and it looks really good! I just took the very top of the side seam in a little too far and it’s going to rub her underarm too much, so I’ll let the alteration a wee bit there. Time to get going with permanent stitching!

Cleaning

  • Finish cleaning up the graduation party, which will require:
  • Decluttering and cleaning the pantry so I can find space to put the new chafing dishes and drink dispensers that I purchased for the grad party.
  • Let’s be honest here, those two things would be absolutely amazing to accomplish in just one week, so I’m going to keep it at two items on this list.

Caring

  • Driving lessons for Emily & Rachel, scheduled and everything
  • Spelling lessons for Rachel & Nathaniel, because that’s what we do in the summer
  • I’m teaching the lesson tomorrow for Family Home Evening and I’ll be walking the kids through the “Getting Things Done” filing system. I’ve come up with a great way to help them keep track of their incoming mail and schedule their stuff and keep track of their chores. I’ll write a post in a few months if it actually works well.
  • I need to find out more about the Fife & Drum Corps that I want Renaissance and Nathaniel to join.

Creativity

  • Much of my creativity time will be taken up by the flower girl dress alterations. I’m glad I’m doing it, but it also reminds of why I generally say no to these requests—I don’t have a lot of creative time and I’d like to use it for myself. No regrets on this particular commission, but it’s a good reminder.
  • I will be teaching all three girls the basics of garment sewing this summer with the end goal of Rachel being capable of stitching her own homecoming dress. I’m excited about this prospect because…
  • I am going to be learning a new skill over the next couple of months that should take my dressmaking abilities to new heights: Tambour Beading. Tools arrive today and I’ve made a promise to myself I won’t start playing with them until I’m done with the flower girl dress, so hopefully I can speed through the alterations this week so that I actually get to start learning how to do this beading technique ASAP. I am SO EXCITED!
  • I need to check in on the various quilt blocks I sent out into the world for Ren’s Signature Graduation Quilt. There were a handful of last-minute cancellations on attending her party as well, so I might reach out and see if they want quilt blocks to sign.
  • I need a Crafting-in-the-Van project because summer music lessons will be starting up this week or next. Obvious options include: Smitten Quilt, Beehive Embroidery, Roses Hexagon EPP Quilt, and the Star Spangled Diamonds Quilt (I think this is too big for van crafting, though). My heart wants a new project, preferably embroidery and/or historical costuming-related. I am really not in a quilty mood right now, or knitting, either.

Gardening

It is looking so beautiful. I am so glad for every hour I’ve spent out there to get it ready this year because the view is absolutely worth it. I take a thirty minute break every morning after I wake up the kids to sit in the backyard and watch the birds flit about and feel the sun on my face. I love summer mornings.

  • Keep harvesting the peas, which are coming fast right now. The peas I planted on President’s Day weekend are massively producing, and also starting to fade a bit. The peas I planted near St. Patrick’s Day are ramping up production and will take us through a few more weeks I think. It was a good experiment with those dates. The peas I planted in April haven’t amounted to much at all. I’m not sure if I’ll get any pods off of them.
  • The lettuces and spinach are producing marvelously right now, but we also have so much cut lettuce left over from Ren’s graduation party that we’re not using the garden lettuces at all. Hopefully we can plough through all the leafy greens before everything goes bad or bolts.
  • Everything else is in the growing/maturing stages: Zucchini, Summer Squash, Tomatoes, Roma Tomatoes, Cherry Tomatoes, Eggplant, Tomatillos, Hot Peppers, Sweet Peppers, Bush Beans, and lots of herbs.
  • There’s also some corn coming up, along with some pumpkins. I’m really excited for these two crops. Corn is always fun to grow, and I bought a purple variety this year. Hopefully it’s tasty. And pumpkins are just delightful.

Celebrating

  • Still cleaning up graduation stuff, but it’s coming along
  • Happy Canada Day today! I don’t do anything for it anymore because I have a lot to do for the Fourth of July, but I still like to wish people a happy Canada Day when it rolls around.
  • Fourth of July Jell-O preparations will commence tomorrow. I need to make sure we actually have everything we need, but that’s also something that can be remedied the day of if need be.
  • Pioneer Day is coming up and I’m not sure if we’re doing anything for it. Church is having a potluck or something and I think I saw something about a pie-making contest, which I’ll need to mention to the girls because they will absolutely commit.
  • Renaissance’s eighteenth birthday is coming up in a little over a month. No idea what we’re doing, should probably get on that.

Community

  • Ward Choir is on my mind as we get it started up. I like to have them perform once a month, so we’ll be hitting the rehearsals hard. I’d also like to start figuring out the Christmas program ASAP so I can get music ordered and have everything ready to go in September/October, depending on the difficulty of the pieces.
  • Hymns have not been chosen for July because sacrament meeting topics weren’t chosen when I was looking yesterday. A reminder text was sent.
  • Need to do July contacting with ministering sisters. My two companions are both moving out of state this week, so I’m also waiting to hear who my new companions will be. I’ve asked for it to be my own daughters, so we’ll see, I guess.
  • I have a couple of books about decorating and entertaining that I like to read from time to time, and I just read the summer chapter from The Collected Cottage and I’m all revved up to do some summer entertaining, but I don’t know what to do. That beautiful chapter just makes me want to have friends over and enjoy the beautiful weather while we can, but it’s a leap to invite new people over and everyone is so busy with travel and houseguests during the summer. I guess I just need a mentality of “Just keep asking until someone says yes?”
  • I’m sure there’s Band Booster stuff I should have my eye on, but I gave myself the last week off and am uninformed at the moment. I’ll have to reacquaint myself and start touching base with the other band moms.

Top priorities this week:

  • Finish cleaning up the graduation party, which will require:
  • Decluttering and cleaning the pantry so I can find space to put the new chafing dishes and drink dispensers that I purchased for the grad party.
  • Flower girl dress alterations.
  • Fourth of July preparations. Mmmmm, Jell-O.
  • Ward Choir prep.

It’s the time of year for enjoying the weather, and thankfully, I’m solar-powered so the sunshine helps me get loads of stuff done. Happy North American Country Day that you celebrate, if that pertains to you, and I’ll talk to you again soon!

It Begins: Graduation Week

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Big week ahead!  I’m starting to feel really worn out by everything, but I’m trying to ignore the feeling and just enjoy everything that’s going on.  Next week will be much less busy and I’ll make sure to take some time to rest and recover, but until then I just gotta keep going!

Cooking

This week’s meal plan:  Don’t judge me, it’s going to be an extremely busy week where I’ll only have about thirty minutes to throw dinners together.

  • Monday: Costco Chicken Alfredo & Mac ‘n Cheese, Green Goddess Salad, French Bread
  • Tuesday: Waffles, Eggs, Bacon
  • Wednesday: Pizza
  • Thursday: Hot Dogs
  • Friday: Salad Bar
  • Saturday: Citrus & Honey Chicken Breasts, Cilantro Rice, Broccoli, Strawberry & Spinach salad
  • Sunday: Chicken Tostada Salad, Fajita Veggies

Clothing

  • Everyone needs dresses hemmed for some reason
  • I cannot find Michael’s khakis, which he needs for graduation.  Where could they have possibly gone?  Super annoying.  I’ve looked in all the places they should be and in places they could be and nope.
  • Continually monitor the wrinkly-ness of Renaissance’s graduation robe after each thing she needs to wear it to this week and re-iron as needed.

Cleaning

I didn’t even get to the toaster last week, so…don’t hold your breath on any of the other things!

Caring

All eyes are on graduation this week, so everything that isn’t that has been rescheduled for dealing with next week. Oh! Michael and Nathaniel needs haircuts before graduation. They look like shaggy dogs right now.

Creativity

  • The graduation signature quilt blocks are halfway assembled and they may stay that way through the graduation party.  What’s done so far is enough for them to be serviceable at the party, so I’m going to spend my time on more pressing things and circle back to finishing these blocks when I have time, which may not be until after the party.
  • I need to start sewing up the bunting for the grad party decorations.  I just think it will add the nicest touch.
  • Other grad party decoration preparations will probably wait until next week when I have more time.

Gardening

  • I need to kill some slugs.  As predicted, they’re gobbling up the petunias.  If I could just remember to buy slug killer at the store, I could easily move this problem to a much more positive outcome.
  • Still need to get the Three Sisters planted, but we’ve got an atmospheric river pouring on us right now and the weather’s not set to clear up until graduation ceremony day and I will be beyond busy during that time.  Maybe I can get to this on the weekend?  Same to the front porch plantings and figuring out what the heck I want to do with the front yard plantings.

Celebrating

There’s so much going on this week—Baccalaureate ceremony, a choir concert, and graduation!  There’s still a lot that needs to be done for some of these things, but we should be OK.

Community

  • I can push most of this stuff to next week and I am actively trying to do so.  I did reach out to my ministering companions to try to set something up for next week and one of them has gotten back to me, so that’s a start.
  • With the release of the thirteen new hymns I have some work to do on the music front at church and I got a bit of a start on it yesterday with good outcomes.  Someone recommended that I join the “Music Callings Resources” Facebook group for good ideas, but so far it’s only seemed to be a big bunch of squabbling complainers who are personally offended that the Church didn’t pick their favorite song for release, and if it’s not that kind of person, it’s the super annoying “I know more about music than you do” people who enjoy flaunting their musical knowledge and elevated opinions.  I’m hoping it’s just a little agitated over there because of the announcement, but I’ll leave the group if, after my 30 day snooze wears off, it’s still a lot of the same a month from now.  What an absolute downer of an experience.

Top priorities this week:

  • Graduation and all of its associated events
  • Keep everyday life afloat in the midst of all the graduation stuff

Graduation is really here! I remember my mom friends being all “it’s going to go by so fast!” at the beginning of the school year, and while I think we kept so, so busy this year with all the fun that a senior year brings, it is weird that graduation is actually here. I think I’m still recovering from the epic prom dresses, so graduation feels like it popped up out of nowhere! I was telling Michael this morning that I’m so glad there’s all these graduation warm-up events before actual graduation because, based on how much I’m tearing up at these pre-graduation events, I don’t think I’d make it through the actual graduation ceremony with any sort of composure if I was just thrown into it without any of this other stuff happening first. Emily’s graduation was a big deal, don’t get me wrong, but I wasn’t really involved with her activities and peer group because we were still kind of new to the area, COVID was still impacting things a bit, and she wasn’t involved in as many things as Renaissance is. Graduation feels so much bigger when you actually know the kids who are graduating and have a lot of memories with them. My cup runneth over…see you on the other side of this week!

Enjoying the End of Year Festivities

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This week was full of fun activities—the end of year film festival for Rachel, Nathaniel’s final middle school band concert, and the senior honors night for Renaissance.  It’s so much fun to see the culmination of everyone’s hard work at the end of the year, and, in Ren’s case, at the end of her K-12 school career.

Top priorities this week:

  • Graduation & recital clothing
  • Graduation quilt progress
  • Party decorations & ordering progress
  • Planting last of plants in garden
  • June’s hymns

Celebrate

Graduation party preparations are going well.  My credit card fraud department gave me a call this week to make sure my card hadn’t been stolen because I’m ordering large quantities of things from businesses that I don’t normally do business with, so that was a funny little moment.  We will have shelter from the weather and ways to keep the food warm.  Excellent party prepping.

I made a lot of progress on the signature quilt as well; all pieces have their top and bottom borders.  I’ve had a number of requests to mail blocks to people who will be unable to attend the party, and I need to get those out in the mail.  I ordered more of the white fabric because I think I’m going to have to either make a bigger quilt or incorporate some signatures blocks into the backing, which is an awesome “problem” to have.  It’s so nice that people want to share their good memories and well wishes with Renaissance.  She’s such a kind soul.

We went to a graduation party for Renaissance’s friend Riley on Saturday. We’re really there! Graduation things are happening! It was such a nice event; there were all sorts of band families there and lots of great people who are involved with the school in some fashion. Riley’s mother, Chrissy, has been involved with everything forever and wow, does that ever create a fantastic village for your kid when you do that. Good food, good friends, and the best picture wall I’ve ever seen done. It was lovely.

Gardening

I haven’t planted my remaining plants in the garden yet because budgetary constraints dictated that I wait until next week to purchase the planting containers and extra potting soil.  It’ll be fine.  Nathaniel is so pleased that we’re going to have raspberries and Rachel is really looking forward to her strawberries.  It makes me so happy to stoke their interests in gardening; it’s such a great hobby and skill to develop for their adult years.

It’s rained a lot this week, so the plants are well-watered and I haven’t been out to check on anything too much.  From my kitchen window it doesn’t look like the slugs have been getting to anything, so I’m optimistic that we got the majority of them killed whilst weeding over Memorial Day weekend.  Fingers crossed!

Community

I haven’t touched anything church music this week, which is OK because I always post a month’s hymns through the next month’s Fast Sunday, so we’re fine.  I’ll get June’s hymns finalized and posted during church on Sunday.

Highlights

Nathaniel’s concert was so great.  I am just so impressed with our music programs in our school district.  Proud to be a part of it all.  Nathaniel had a big part in one of the songs they played where it looked like his arms weren’t even connected to his body because he was drumming so fast.  So proud of him.

Renaissance participated in the elementary school walk through this week where the seniors go to their old elementary schools in their caps and gowns and parade about and talk to their old teachers, which I think is the cutest idea ever.  Since she didn’t attend elementary school here she decided to go to the elementary school where she volunteered and read to children last year, so some of the teachers knew her anyway.  It was even topped off with the PE parachute being brought out for the seniors to play with one last time.  Because honestly, gym parachute was peak elementary school enjoyment.  What a fun week for her.

At the Honors Award Ceremony Renaissance was awarded cords for a high GPA and having 50+ hours of community service, and she received her stole for National Honor Society.  A wonderful surprise that evening was the announcement that she’d been awarded two $1,000 scholarships from our community’s scholarship foundation!  Those scholarships will cover her expenses for her first quarter of pastry school!  We are so grateful for our community’s contribution to her post-high school education, and proud of her for doing all the work to earn those awards.

Renaissance will be playing her flute during Baccalaureate next week, and so she was flipping through our church’s hymn book and all the flute books for church and asking me if specific hymns were LDS-oriented only or if they were well-known in other denominations, and it was nice way to spend an hour together.  I was pressing quilt blocks and making my guesses and she was confirming with some internet research, and we learned a lot about different songs, some that I would have guessed were only known to the LDS church and then we’d find out that it’s been around since the 1600s and we’d laugh at our silliness.  I’ve missed doing church music stuff with my kids—I’m proud of their work in the school bands and choirs, but church music was where they started and I’ve always enjoyed doing that with them.  We figured out which hymns would be recognizable to people of other Christian faiths as well and she created her program from those choices.

Lowlights

I have a smattering of ant bites on my left wrist and hand from a Memorial Day gardening mishap and they have swelled up angry and red and they’ve itched and ached all week long.  I look like I have some sort of communicable disease. 

Rachel asked that her final film project NOT be shown at the film festival. She was heartbroken over how all it shook out. She loves making films, but this was a group project gone sour. Thankfully, her teacher respected her wishes and didn’t show the film.

The five-year-old dishwasher developed a hole in one of its hoses and leaked all over the kitchen and ruined the wood floor we had installed just a few years ago from when the fridge developed a leak and ruined the wood floors.  This is bad for three reasons:  1) The floor is warped and absolutely ruined, 2) We’re hesitant to make another claim on our homeowner’s insurance and risk our rates going through the roof, and 3) Our family must handwash the dishes until the replacement dishwasher shows up next week, and a family of six creates a lot of dirty dishes.  It’s been a moderate source of stress.  One of my work arounds has been to have whoever is on dish duty to start working while I prepare dinner.  I like the results so much that I may keep this arrangement going in the future.  *silver linings*

Another week done and dusted! Oh, next week will see me on the verge of tears pretty much every day…I’m so proud of my girl, but so sad that her little childhood is ending. I have absolutely loved being a mama to these sweet people. I’m excited to see where adulthood will take them, but do I ever miss pigtails and brown paper bag puppets. There will be new cool things! I just don’t know what they are yet, and that’s ok.

I Feel Graduation at my Back, Breathing down my Neck

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Alright friends, we are gearing up for the true craziness of graduation and end-of-school season.  I’m a little jealous of my Utah friends who are already done with their kids’ school year, just as I’m only really beginning to get going with the end of ours.  At least all the work is comprised of good things, right?  It’s busy, and busy isn’t a bad thing.

Cooking

This week’s meal plan:

  • Monday: Memorial Day BBQ
  • Tuesday: Orange Chicken bowls
  • Wednesday: Pork burritos
  • Thursday: Leftovers/Something easy
  • Friday: BBQ Chicken
  • Saturday: BBQ, etc.
  • Sunday: Warm Goat Cheese and Chicken Salad

Clothing

  • Just keep trying to get on top of the laundry
  • Tailor Rachel’s new church dresses, if I can find the time
  • Go through bag of boy clothes that I found in closet and see if they’ll fit Nathaniel
  • Rotate out cold weather wardrobes, if I can find the time
  • Make sure everyone has clothes for graduation
  • Check fit of Ren’s recital dress, make plans for tailoring if needed

Cleaning

  • Clean oven
  • Clean pantry
  • Clean toaster (Let’s be honest, this is the only one that has a shot at being completed this week!)

Caring

  • Try to do more drives with Emily, but the schedule is super tight this week
  • Caring will be accomplished simply by making sure everyone is fed and showing up to things on-time this week

Creativity

  • I’d like to be 25% done with Renaissance’s graduation quilt by the end of the week.
  • I need to start working on the bunting for her grad party decorations
  • I’m learning how to make graduation leis as well, and would like to finish three of them to hand out at graduation next week.

Gardening

  • Goodness, am I glad we did all that work over the weekend.  Good job, Memorial Day Weekend Brooke Family!
  • Need to plant the berries in containers
  • Need to plant corn and beans.  I might throw pumpkins into the same patch to test out the whole “Three Sisters” idea.  Kids are onboard to find out if it truly works.
  • Need to play front porch containers.
  • Lawn feeding

Celebrating

  • Renaissance will get a lot of opportunities to wear her graduation cap and gown throughout the next week.  I didn’t realize how many different things she was going to be doing in that getup.  I’ll have to stay on top of steaming/ironing the gown so it doesn’t look wrinkly.
  • I need to do a lot of ordering of supplies for the grad party.
  • Get creative work done now so I can free up time to work on food later.
  • Taskify food preparation
  • Submit rental orders
  • Respond to people who have offered to lend supplies
  • Get recital program squared away

Community

  • I’m about to have another calling in the next week or two, whenever they officially call me, and I’ll need to organize that.  I’m going to ease into that calling rather slowly because I am monstrously busy right now.  I should have told them I could launch into the calling following Ren’s grad party and to hold off until that date, but I wasn’t thinking at that moment.  Sigh.
  • I need to get June’s hymns squared away and posted
  • I have new ministering sisters and assignments and I need to make contact and figure all that out
  • Band Boosters follow-ups
  • Check on available water bottles for graduation

Top priorities this week:

  • Graduation & recital clothing
  • Graduation quilt progress
  • Party decorations & ordering progress
  • Planting last of plants in garden
  • June’s hymns

Alright, off I go to do all the things!  I wish you a productive week as well.

The Month of May Churns Away

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I cannot believe that it is still the month of May.  So much has been going this month that is seems like it’s been two months in one.  What a busy, fun time of year!

Top priorities this past week:

  • Get grad party invitations out
  • Get Christmas tree down
  • Garden
  • Cleaning
  • Laundry

Celebrate

Graduation party invitations are almost all mailed or delivered, yay!

The Christmas trees are officially dismantled and stored away until November.  For future reference, Future Cara, it only took an hour to take down the giant Christmas tree, so stop dragging your feet about it in the future.  And also, Future Cara, you are freakishly busy from January through May for the next four years, so take down the Christmas stuff before the New Year.  Just do yourself that favor.  Please.

Garden

It’s radish season!  I need to spend some quality time with my mandoline slicer in the next weeks.  We’ve not eaten a lot of radishes as a family, but boy howdy are my kids going to get some exposure in coming days!  I purposely planted a purple variety in the hopes that it will make Rachel happier about eating them.

One of my big plans for the Memorial Day weekend is to get the garden and yard cleaned up and we spent a big chunk of yesterday doing that.  There’s still so much work to do, but we got a lot of the worst of it done so I’m hoping that tomorrow’s work will see it through to the end of everything. 

There are so many signs of potential in the garden right now from the little bits of work that we’ve been doing up until now.  It’s so exciting to watch spring burst onto the scene.  I really, really love seasons and how everything changes and has signs about new parts of life on the horizon.  There’s so much excitement in nature!

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Cleaning

Prom preparation messes have been cleaned up.  I also ordered a storage box for fancy hair accessories so we can store them out of the way during most of the year and be able to find them easily when the next dance rolls around.  Ren and Rachel have amassed a beautiful collection of formal hair accessories over the years, and it’d be a shame to lose them.

Prom dress construction has almost been cleaned up.  I just need to clean up the leftover fabrics and I’m dreading opening the tote bins of apparel fabric and potentially finding out there’s no room for the prom dress scraps.  I’m making myself write that down because it’s such a silly reason to be avoiding a task, and hopefully, by writing it out and acknowledging how ridiculous it is, I’ll be extra motivated to just bite the bullet and get this rather simple task done.

My back was hurting a lot this week from overdoing it in my Tuesday workout, so I didn’t get a lot more cleaning done.  I traded off for getting a lot of office work and grad party planning done.

Clothing

I made a little bit of a dent in the looming folding pile.  It’s nice to reclaim the space that’s been storing the laundry bins of clean clothes .

Highlights

Nathaniel had his last Cross Country meet this week.  All season long he has consistently run his 2 miles in 15:55-16:05 minutes.  All season long.  After his last race he quickly logged on to the website that reports their times and a look of disbelief and then joyful surprise crossed his face:  Somehow, even after having to take a week off of practices due to being sick all last week, he shaved off an entire minute and finished his race with a time of 14:55!  He was a very happy boy for the rest of the evening.

Renaissance had her final band concert and it was such a great evening.  She had a solo in jazz band, the entire concert was fun and upbeat and sincerely impressive with the music each group was playing, and then we had a reception afterwards with cake and treats and a tear-inducing slideshow of the seniors throughout their band years.  I really, really love being a band mom and I’ve really enjoyed all these years of helping her make music with her friends.  It is incredibly sad that this part of her life is over.  I think the only thing that keeps me from being downright depressed about is seeing how excited she is to begin the next phase of her life and her pastry chef training.

Emily and I went out for lunch on Thursday and had a great conversation about her future plans.  I don’t want to get my hopes up too much too early, but it feels like she’s starting to get to the end of working through some of the hang-ups that have been plaguing her for the past couple of years and is getting ready to surge forward into adulthood.  Sometimes you just need a little extra time to sort stuff out, right?  It’s scary to allow that time to take place, but we might be getting to the end of the tunnel.  At any rate, she seems to be less anxious about things, which is such a relief.  The high schoolers that were in the thick of it during COVID have really struggled with a lot of stuff ever since.  Perhaps normalcy is starting to catch back up with them finally?

On Wednesday, when my back was twinging the worst, I gave myself permission to go down a research rabbit hole, partly because I was in too much pain to think logically and partly in the hopes that doing crafty research would help me relax and send the message to my muscles that they could also relax.  I spent multiple hours tracking down as much information as I could about bead embroidery and beaded embellishments because I want to continue making formal dresses, but I’m finding that even if you make a gorgeous dress it often needs a little dose of embellishment to truly make it sing, and I think the skill of bead embroidery would be absolutely fantastic to fill that void.  I’m thinking about dedicating time over the next year to learning the skill so I can apply it to next year’s prom dresses.

Lowlights

  • Wednesday’s back pain.  Totally did it to myself because I was enjoying my workout on Tuesday and decided to go for far too long in it.  Consistency and moderation win the race, not frenzied extremes.  This is a battle I fight in my soul on a daily  basis.
  • I hit a flock of baby birds with my van as I was driving to work on Friday.  Not my best Disney Princess moment.

It was a really good week, despite the few setbacks. This really is a lovely time of year and I’m excited for what’s coming our way in the upcoming weeks! End of school year is exciting, exhausting, and fun.

Summer is just around the corner…

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Hello and happy new week to you!  I’ve got a rather normal week ahead of me, which is a very nice thing after all the stress of prom dress sewing, and I’m hoping to just get chores and laundry caught up.  There’s a few end-of-school-year events sprinkled throughout, but they mostly just require me to show up and watch; not a lot of work required on my part.

Cooking

This week’s meal plan:

  • Monday: Thai Spicy Chicken Enchiladas, Peas, Lemony Quinoa
  • Tuesday: Meatloaf, Lemon-roasted potatoes w/ oregano, Green Bean Salad w/ Mustard seeds, Herbs & Baby Chard
  • Wednesday: Spaghetti, Caesar, French bread/garlic bread
  • Thursday: Leftovers
  • Friday: Baked Potato Bar, Broccoli Slaw
  • Saturday: Warm Goat Cheese & Chicken Salad,
  • Sunday: Chicken Satay, Stir Fry Veggies, Rice

Clothing

  • Get the laundry under control, yet again.
  • Wardrobe rotation

Cleaning

I think I’m going to change my daily routine and put cleaning first thing because it’s not getting done very consistently when it’s scheduled later in my day.

Caring

  • The girls need haircuts before graduation.  I wonder if I’m up for cutting their hair myself?  It worked fine when they were younger…
  • Driving lessons

Creativity

  • Need to start working on Renaissance’s graduation quilt
  • Need to start working on a few decoration items for Ren’s graduation party

Gardening

  • Behind on planting seeds, so need to catch up on that
  • Need to assemble hanging baskets
  • Weeding, as always
  • Transfer tomato and pepper seedlings into larger pots because they’re not quite ready to go out yet, but they’re outgrowing the starting trays

Celebrating

  • Take down the last Christmas tree this weekend.  It’s a two-person job and Michael and I have not been home and well at the same time on a single weekend since before Christmas to do it.  This is, by far, the longest I’ve ever had a tree up and it’s driving me insane.
  • Finish up addressing and sending out Ren’s graduation party invitations

Community

  • Nathaniel’s last Cross Country meet is this week
  • Renaissance’s last band concert is this week

Top priorities this week:

  • Get grad party invitations out
  • Get Christmas tree down
  • Garden
  • Cleaning
  • Laundry

Alright, forward we go! I should be able to accomplish a lot this week, given that the forecast is pretty rainy and I’ll be forced to work inside the house most days.

Rhododendron Parade and Graduation Party Preparations

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Top priorities this past week:

  • Summer School Registration
  • Garden
  • Laundry
  • Cleaning
  • Graduation party planning

Caring

Oh my goodness, summer school registration is cutthroat in our district.  I arrived thirty minutes before the doors opened to the counseling center and the line was almost going out of the front door of the school.  I was successful in securing Nathaniel a spot in the classes he’ll take over the summer to open up the rest of his schedule to accommodate four years of band in high school.  Whew!

This week has felt like it’s been all about Nathaniel!  He came down with something Monday night and has spent the entire week just hanging out with a 103-104˚F fever.  I ended up taking him to the pediatrician on Wednesday because he was looking really awful, even for being sick, and they tested him for a ton of stuff.  All the rapid tests came back negative, so we’re waiting on cultures.  This has been a rough illness.  I made Michael stay home from work on Friday so someone could be with the boy while I was at work because I was worried about him. Thankfully, his fever broke on Friday and he was feeling a lot better, so he could join the marching band in their last parade of the year on Saturday.

Gardening

I put in a huge day in the garden on Monday and cleared the weeds out of two big areas of the garden.  This made my back extremely unhappy for a few days, but it was worth it.  I also planted a few of my started seeds—zucchini, summer squash, slicing cucumbers, pickling cucumbers, cilantro and a lot of marigolds—and direct sowed some bush green beans, more cabbage than we’ll ever need, zinnias, cosmos and some more sunflowers that the slugs already ate.  Clearing out weeds helped me find a number of slugs so I could send them to their eternal torment of an afterlife.

It’s so fun to see things coming up and blooming!  The peas are doing well, the nasturtiums are definitely coming along, and the radishes and lettuces are starting to gain some steam.  The carrots are slow starting and slugs keep getting my sunflower sprouts, so I’m keeping an eye on those crops.

Clothing

Some laundry has been done, but not the amount needed to truly make a difference.  I did wash Rachel’s choir dress, so it’s ready for whenever she needs it. 

Cleaning

I did a good job on getting the kitchen reset and the girls have been doing a pretty good job at maintaining it.

All my birthday stuff is cleaned up.

Celebrating

I took it a little easier on a few days this week just to make sure I fully recovered from the stress of the prom dress crunches.

I’ve addressed and mailed about half of Renaissance’s graduation party invitations.  I really hope people remember to RSVP.  It’s so nerve-wracking to depend on RSVPs.  I once received zero RSVPs for one of my kids’ birthday parties, so I made plans to do something else so my child didn’t have to wait around at home for no one to show up.  I left a note on our door that said we’d received zero RSVPs and so we had made other plans, and came home to wrapped gifts left on our doorstep.  I know I was in the right with my actions, but I still feel terrible about it.  It’s not hard to RSVP, DO IT.  I even made it super simple and put a QR code on the invite.  I am still terrified that I’ll get three RSVPs and then eighty people will show up.  I think this will be a situation where I will definitely have to phone around two weeks before the party and nail down the RSVPs myself because food-wise I could be in a lot of trouble if I don’t have a definite head count.  People just always make you feel so pushy and high-strung when you do that, but what else should they expect?  Ugh, this is one of my soapbox topics.  Just RSVP, people.  The same day you get the invitation.  We all have our calendars on our phones, so we already know whether we’re available or not.  Yes or no, I don’t care; I just need to know how many people I need to feed.  RSVPs save the sanity of the hostess.  Be kind to the hostess.

I’ve almost got the menu planned out; I just need to check in Ren to see how involved she wants to be with food prep so I can decide on the desserts.  When you have an aspiring pastry chef in your family, their involvement greatly influences what you offer for desserts at a gathering.

Decoration plans are good and supplies should be arriving soon.  I need to come up with some activities as well, mostly to keep people’s younger children occupied.  Space might be at a premium, though, so judicious planning is needed.

Community

I don’t like to publish where my kids are going to be ahead of time because that seems unsafe, so another thing we had on our plates this past week was the Rhododendron Parade. It’s quite the drive from where we are and we invite our middle school’s eighth graders to also participate so they can see what all the fun is about in the hopes that they’ll continue with band in high school, which meant, for the only time ever, Nathaniel marched in a parade in the same band as Renaissance.

In years past the eighth graders have also gotten to wear a high school marching band uniform, but the decision was made in the days leading up to parade that we were going to stop doing that this year, so my hopes of a picture of Nathaniel and Renaissance in matching uniforms together was dashed. Sigh. Our little school district is growing rapidly and it costs $22 to dry clean each used uniform at the end of the year, which hasn’t been that big of an expense in years past, but we had forty eighth graders this year, which would have added $880 to the bill and that’s a pretty big expense for such a small amount of wear.

Luckily, though, we decided to open up the “Band Gear” store to the eighth graders ahead of their freshman year so they can have band swag before the football games start in the autumn, and we were able to deliver their new band gear to them at the rehearsal prior to the parade, so many of them were wearing those items, my son included. Adorable.

I really enjoy being involved with our band program and am so thankful that the booster president approached me at tip-off two years ago to see if I’d be interested in helping out. It’s been a great way for our family to spend time together and serve together. It’s sad to see Renaissance’s band days come to an end, but we still have four more years of Nathaniel in band! And I’ll be dragging our family along for the ride the entire time because I was elected to be the band booster president this next school year. Get ready for even more band booster craziness, y’all!

We have a big end-of-the-school-year BBQ at a nearby park after the parade, and I was able to get some really photos of the kids and even one of Michael while we were there:

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It was a good and busy week, thankfully, and I hope to keep pushing forward and getting everything put back together in the house.  There’s so many good things coming up in the weeks ahead! What an exciting phase of life! See you next week!