Closing Day

Today we signed the closing papers and sold our house on 25th Street -- almost exactly 15-years after we bought it.  What a perfect place for us to start our family and meet so many amazing friends.  We could have never predicted the way the story would go.  We thought we would flip it within a year or two.  I'm glad it worked out this way instead.

Right after we closed, our friends called and invited us to spend New Year's Eve with them at their cabin.  So . . . it was pretty much the best day ever.

In other news -- we have finally resolved the bedroom situation with Sophie.  

Three years ago, when we first moved into this house, we made a plan to someday finish two bedrooms downstairs.  One for the boys and one for Sophie.  Now, it turns out we will finish three bedrooms downstairs so the boys can each have their own.  But, I digress.

When this plan was first presented to Sophie, she fought it tooth and nail.  We assured her that as she got older, she would appreciate having her own room and the added coolness factor of being downstairs.  She was sure she would not.  In desperation, Brian promised her any bedroom she wanted.  After he agreed to install hardwood floors and paint the walls whatever color she chose, she agreed that she would someday move downstairs. 

Three years have passed and she is chomping at the bit to get her own room and be downstairs -- no bribery needed.  But, the promise still stands.  And, it has stirred up so much drama in our lives.

She insisted that Brian paint all four walls in bold neon stripes, six different colors, with white stripes between each color.  Brian, bless him, tried all sorts of compromises, but she would not budge on this point.  She had other demands, like a custom bed.  And, the desire for hardwood floors stood firm.  

Back and forth and back and forth we have gone on the paint issue until Brian had an idea.  He told her to pick a bedspread and we would work out a paint color from there.  After a painful meander through a few hundred bedspreads on the internet (she hated all of them), we found the ONE.  It has bold neon stripes of color separated by white stripes.  When I agreed to buy this bedspread, she said, "You can paint the room any color you want.  I don't care."  

Just. Like. That.

There were some complications to work out for the hardwood floor.  But, Brian ordered the materials today.

I'm still not sure about the bed.  Does anyone have a loft bed they are not using?  

I am so relieved that everything is falling into place.  I have a feeling 2015 is going to be our luckiest year yet and the beginning of the luckiest times of our lives.  

Christmas 2014

The Thursday before Christmas, my mom, dad, Katie and I saw Sophie perform with her junior high choir.  It was fun and they sang carols with the audience at the end.  That night Katie also lost her first tooth!  I can't believe it.  My baby is growing up.

The Friday before Christmas, the whole family got to go to a Voicemale concert at Weber State.  They talked about how they have been together for twenty years.  Twenty years!  And, I first saw them perform at Utah State at some sort of LDS Institue event twenty years ago.  Who knows?  Maybe that was their first performance.  Anyways, I will always remember those guys blasting onto the stage with so much energy.  I could not believe they were making all of the instrument noises WITH THEIR MOUTHS.  It was the first time I had seen anything like it and I loved them.

Twenty years later, I finally got to go with my whole family to see them perform and it was a night we will not forget.  My kids keep repeating the jokes (instagramps, snapchaps, "It always gets quiet after I say what I do for a living," and, "He's no longer the primary chorister, now he is the secondary chorister") and talking about the different songs they enjoyed.  There were many highlights of the evening.  One of them was the rubber ducky song.  We got to see our friend John sing while dodging hundreds of rubber duckies being thrown on-stage.  Say what!?

Another highlight for me was "O Holy Night."  They performed it so beautifully and it is one of my favorite Christmas songs.  I took a moment to look up and down the row at my family and think about how perfect my life was right in that moment.

After that, our Christmas vacation was in full-swing.

Saturday started with a 7 a.m. soccer game for Isaac.  Then we headed to our church for a pancake breakfast with Santa.  After that, we drove to Bountiful for a family Christmas party at Brian's parents' house.

There was good food, sugar cookies to frost and gift exchanges.  My sister-in-law made pillows for our living room couch.  She got the colors perfect!  They are so fun -- one has the state of Utah with a heart over Ogden and the other has China with a heart over Tianjin.  I would never have thought of doing that.  I love homemade things and appreciate the talents other people have.  Brian's mom made necklaces for the females and the grandson's got new ties.  Brian got a gift card that will come in handy with our home improvement projects.

Then, we went home to change into fancy clothes for a third Christmas party (we decided to skip Ian's 5:30 p.m. soccer game, or things would have been seriously insane).  This year, our ward got a little crazy with the Christmas celebrating.  The pancake breakfast was a fun event, but the planning committee also put together an elegant evening dinner later the same day.

The Sunday before Christmas, the junior primary performed the Nativity.  Isaac was a shepherd and Katie was the cutest Mary I've ever seen.  After church, we went to dinner at my mom's  house.  She made a delicious roast and she bought peppermint bark from Costco that I couldn't keep my hands off of.

The Monday before Christmas, Sophie performed with her choir at a fundraising event.  My very favorite teacher at my kids' elementary school lost her daughter to cancer in November.  Her daughter was the mom to five young kids.  It is so very sad and reminds me of all I have to be grateful for.  We attended a fundraising event a year and a half ago to help raise money for her medical bills.  This time, the event was to raise money for the kids.

After that, the whole family went to a neighbor's house for hot chocolate.  I love their "neighbor gift" tradition.  They choose a night to serve hot chocolate to anyone who wants to come over (they offer several flavors and lots of different toppings).  And, everyone who comes brings food to be donated to the food bank.  What a great idea!

This year, like every year, I was dreading the task of getting my neighbor gifts together because 1) I always have trouble thinking of what to do and 2) it's always one more thing at such a busy and expensive time of year.  But, then, I remembered how much I actually love giving neighbor gifts.  It's that one time of year when you have a chance to get out and say "Thank You" to all those people who make your life wonderful in big and small ways by being part of your tiny neighborhood community.

So, on the Tuesday before Christmas, I finally stopped putting it off and ordered bags of red and green popcorn from my favorite popcorn supplier.  On the Wednesday before Christmas (Christmas Eve), the kids and I went around delivering popcorn and, as always, it was SO MUCH FUN!  We even stopped by at the home of the neighbors we had on 25th Street (we always do).  There was Claire, sitting in his front room, wearing his suspenders and plaid shirt like he always does.  I love that guy!  Who knows when it will be our last time to see him and his wife Bonnie and their daughter Connie--who taught Sophie and Ian in the 4th grade before she retired.

That night, we had molcajete from a favorite Mexican restaurant.  Brian said, "Maybe eating molcajete on Christmas Eve should be our tradition."  And, it made us all think about how we sat on the hardwood floor of our 25th Street house eating molcajete with my parents after an utterly exhausting day of moving out three years ago.  And, that made me think about how Brian and I sat on that same hardwood floor right after it had dried from being refinished, eating our wedding cake from the freezer on our 1-year-anniversary almost fifteen years ago.  And, that made me think about how we wrote up the offer to buy the house on 25th Street on Christmas Eve fifteen years ago.  So, it seems fitting that we would find out on this Christmas Eve that our closing date has officially been set for Monday, December 29th.  Hooray, hooray, hooray!!!

Christmas morning came.  Somehow, it came.  The kids all opened their Christmas jammies the night before.  As a wiser mom than I was in the past, I sent them all to bed early and told them not to come into our room until 7 a.m.  I was so far behind on everything this year, it seemed.  But, in the end, all of the presents were wrapped and looking magical under the glowing tree.  The stockings were stuffed full of boxes of cold cereal (Brian's family tradition), candy, and little gifts.  Somehow, despite being so far behind, we pulled off Christmas 2014.

Sophie got the iPod 5 she has been begging us for.

Ian got a laser pointer, a Wii game, a soccer ball, a basket ball, an air soft gun, and some other random gifts since we couldn't think of one big gift for him this year.

Isaac got a motorized scooter that we was determined to save his money for (since, I don't know how many years it would have taken him to save for it). He also got some fun games.

Katie did not get the frozen castle she asked Santa for at the last minute -- where did that random request come from?  She must have heard the other kids at school talking about it or something.  But, sigh of relief, she didn't mention it and, instead, said it was the bestest Christmas ever.  She got a blonde, blue-eyed ice-skating doll named Katelyn, or Kate for short.  She got frozen themed jewelry and a frozen themed watch and a new scooter since her pink scooter broke.

The older kids got ski lessons again--starting in January.  When we went to my mom's house later, the family got season passes to Lagoon again like last year.  And, the kids all got soft blankets to snuggle in.  My mom put out a big spread of food for lunch and we watched The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.  I don't think I will ever get tired of that show.

Then, we headed to Bountiful to visit with Brian's family and eat more food.

It was an amazing day.  And, I haven't even written the part about the weather.  We have had the most beautiful weather.  Warm and sunny.  I know every time I say how much I have loved it, someone is ready to chastise me for not thinking about our desert climate and the drought.  But, I LOVED IT.  Seriously, I enjoyed every minute of it.  I can't control things like droughts.  But, I can appreciate the heck out of a gorgeous day of sunshine in December.

When I ran errands on the 23rd and 24th, I didn't even wear a jacket--that is how nice it has been.  Meanwhile, my kids have been itching for a good snowfall.  Every day they are talking about how much they want it to snow.  Then, they started saying it wouldn't be a good Christmas without snow.  So, sometime in the night while we were sleeping, the snow started to fall.  It fell, and fell and just dumped about 10-inches all over everything!  It was one of those magical snowstorms.  And, it was on Christmas!  I think it was the best white Christmas ever.

Wiring

Every time I watch Brian wire something, I can't believe it.  How can he possibly know how to do that?  It seems so complicated and so critical -- like if one thing goes wrong, will our house burn down?

When he wired our first house -- it was built in 1916 and he re-wired the entire thing -- I was pretty worried about the burning the house down part.  But, it all went beautifully!  And, saved us tons of money.

He is at the point in our basement where he has been wiring lights and plugs for all of the new rooms.  Since the entire basement is gutted, he also wanted to re-wire the upstairs while he has access to everything.

It has felt like things have really slowed down on the basement because 1) Brian has had to spend some of his time doing actual work for money instead of going 100 MPH on our basement every day and 2) there is not near as much visual change from running wires as there is from knocking down a wall (or, putting a new one back up).

Still, I know this wiring phase is important.  I can't believe how handy this husband of mine is.  When we moved in, he completely replaced all of the plumbing in the house.  Now, he is doing the same for the old wiring -- this house is much newer than our last one, it was built in 1949.

Things are still moving ahead to close on the sale of our old house by the end of the month.  Crossing my fingers for so many reasons -- not the least of which is that we really need to sell the house in 2014 for tax purposes.  The closing is scheduled for the 29th.  So close to the end of the year!  But, I have a good feeling it will all work out.

Sophie had a choir concert tonight.  It was lovely.  She looked so beautiful.  Ian played piano in someone's home while the relief society ladies took a tour last week.  They are both so talented and growing up so much.

I can't believe Christmas is less than a week away.  The weather has been gorgeous!  It doesn't even feel like winter (knock on wood).  I have loved every extra day of sunshine.

Bathrooms

Our home has two bathrooms.  It is a pretty big home for just two.  One of them is the master bath -- built in an era when "master bath" had a completely different meaning than it does today.  It is accessible from the master bedroom.  It is small, with a tiny shower, a toilet and a pedestal sink.  Not one single cabinet for storage.  And, most shocking of all, not one single outlet.  For this reason, it is Brian's bathroom and a back-up bathroom when the other one is occupied.

The other bathroom is the one that I, all four kids, and house-guests use.  It is larger than the bathroom in our old house.  There is beautiful tile work, a roomy oval tub with a shower, toilet and, of course outlets.  I really like this bathroom and there is just one problem.  The vanity.  It's obvious that when some of the previous owners -- there were two or three sets of owners between the original owners of the house and us, one of those owners ran a tile company and tiled the heck out of this place -- tiled the bathroom, they purchased what appears to be a nice vanity.  It's pretty to look at.  It has cabinets in the front and drawers down the sides.  But, here is the problem.  It's poorly made.

As soon as we moved in, three of the four drawers broke and became unusable and the cabinet doors fell off.  Brian has fixed the drawers and put the doors back on several times.  But, every time, they break again within days.  For most of the three years we have lived here, we've only been able to use one drawer for storage and it doesn't look super classy to have the doors missing from the front of your vanity when guests come over.

A good friend of ours is a master cabinet builder.  He does such beautiful, one-of-a-kind work.  We got a bid on the vanity soon after we moved in and, let's just say, there was no way we could afford him.  But, thanks to my husband being so talented, he was able to do a few drywall jobs for this friend over the past year and instead of getting paid for his work, he said, "Let's just do a trade."  Now that we are moving full-speed ahead on remodel projects, we are finally ready to tear out this vanity and get a new one!  Our friend brought his lovely wife and six kids over last night to take measurements and eat cookies.

I just want to say that I am SO excited to have a piece of his work in our home.  He is expensive, yes, but the quality of his work speaks for itself.  I don't know if we will be able to afford him for future projects (like the downstairs bathroom we are building?).  That remains to be seen.  But, at least we will have this one little gem of fine craftsmanship in our home for decades to come.

Tis the Season

It has been an eventful few days and a great kick-off to the Christmas season.

I loved that the kids had an entire week off from school for Thanksgiving.  It was such a nice break from the regular routine.  It was kind of sad to go back yesterday.  But, I keep thinking that it's only three weeks and then they will have a break for two weeks--hooray!

We got the Christmas tree up and all of our decorations.  This year, I put the lights on and then I let the four kids just go for it.  When they were done hanging the decorations, I didn't move or adjust even one.  I didn't even feel like I wanted to.  I think someday I will miss this time when one branch has like seven green ornaments on it and another branch has five red ornaments all lumped together.  It's nice to have my kids decorate the tree.

It's nice to sit in the living room together after the sun goes down and look at the colorful lights on our tree.  And, I love driving around town with the kids, seeing all the different lights and decoration.

On Friday, the Egyptian Theater had a free screening of The Polar Express.  I took my girls.  There was a drawing for a bunch of board games and a bicycle.  I had a feeling we were going to win that bicycle.  I'm feeling lucky I guess.  We didn't win.  But, we still had a great time.

It is a fun movie to see on the big screen with all of the roller coaster effects.

After the movie, we walked over to Christmas Tree Jubilee to see all of the elaborate trees that are decorated and auctioned for charity.  How would it be to buy one of those amazing trees?

Friday night, Brian and I dined at Rooster's in downtown Ogden.  It was nice to have a date night.  We celebrated by getting dinner + appetizers + dessert and their homemade rootbeer.  It was a lot of food to eat the day after Thanksgiving.  But, it was so yummy!

Saturday night, Brian and I took the kids to an electric parade and lighting of Christmas Village.  We hadn't been to this event in about 10 years, and I guess it has really grown in popularity.  The newspaper article said there were more than 10,000 people in attendance.  It seemed like way more than 10,000!  

The parade was awesome.  We got hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls at Karen's Cafe.  Even Sophie said she had a great time when it was over.  Fun for our whole family. 

We came home in a happy, festive mood and watched Elf together.  I forgot how funny that movie is.  

Then, I thought, "Well, we've already watched two Christmas movies and visited Christmas Village and it isn't even December 1.  I guess we can just sit back and relax until Christmas now."

Because it was so crowded, we only saw a few of the houses at Christmas Village.  So, tonight my mom and I took Katie and Isaac back.  Sophie and Ian are going with the young women/young men tomorrow night.

Never have I seen anyone so excited for Christmas Village!  Katie and Isaac ran from house to house just squealing with happiness and shouting all of the things they saw in each one.  They had crazy high energy.  At one point, they kept rolling down a grassy hill and running back up over and over.  We were there for two whole hours.  The weather was nice too, so it was a really fun night.

Brian has been going full throttle on our basement every day from the time he wakes up until he goes to bed.  After he finished Ian's room, he demolished every inch of the rest of the basement.  He took down every wall and even ripped all of the sheetrock off the outer walls.  Today, he framed in a room for Sophie and wired a bunch of lights.  I can't wait to see it all come together!  What a fun Christmas this is for us.

New Space

A good friend of mine is a real estate agent who sells new homes. One day she made the comment to me that, even though new homes are pricey, the money evens out when you consider how much you are going to sink into making your existing home the home you want.

I was eyeball deep in re-model projects when she said that, and it rang true. It is easy to sink $20K+ into even the most basic changes, even when you are providing all of the labor yourself! Sometimes, it feels like all of our time and expendable income will be going into this house for the next twenty years (and way more than $20K).

So, when we put our other home on the market in August, I had a great idea. Why not sell both of our houses and use the equity to build a new house?

My friend was kind enough to walk us through her models. I fell in love with the Pleasant View development--such a gorgeous panoramic view of the mountains!

Here is what I learned.

#1 New homes are way pricier than I was expecting. We were looking at a minimum of $300K for a smaller home on a smaller lot.

#2  Everything I loved about the model was an upgrade and the upgrades are 2-4x's what they would cost to DIY. As we would go through the home and the agent would say, for example, "That door in the walk-out basement is a $4K upgrade." Brian would say, "What!? I could easily do that myself for $1-$2K." And, pretty soon we had a list almost as long as my current list of all the changes and upgrades Brian would be making to our hypothetical new home. It kind of defeated the purpose. I was dreaming of what we would do with all of our newly discovered free time!

#3  Maybe it was just this particular builder, but I had a really hard time finding a floor plan that I liked. The houses we looked at all had an amazing great room and 3 bedrooms upstairs plus a full basement. The house that had the square footage I wanted had two 10x10 bedrooms and the master seemed a little on the small side. The great room also seemed just a tad squishy. When we moved to the next model up, the two bedrooms were 12x12 (nice), the master was just right and the great room was perfect. But, the basement was massive and the overall home was way too big. Three more bedrooms downstairs in both models. What are we going to do with six bedrooms? Ideally, we would have had the smaller plan with one bedroom eliminated to make the other rooms bigger. But, there was really no way to make that work.

#4  I was surprised by two things that got me really excited when I looked at the new houses. First, when I saw all of those bedrooms and imagined my kids in their own spaces, I couldn't stop thinking about how much they would love that. Second, I was overcome with visions when I entered a giant pantry that ran the whole length of a kitchen (behind a super cool secret door too). I loved that pantry! (BTW-a $4K upgrade).

This exercise taught me a couple of things. First, I had a renewed sense of gratitude for my current home. Second, I decided that we should make an effort to give our kids their own bedrooms. We were planning to make the boys share a downstairs bedroom and convert the one they shared upstairs into an office (it has a window, but no closet, so it isn't technically a bedroom anyways). That meant Ian couldn't have the Queen size bed he'd had his eye on.

Third, I realized just how badly I wanted and needed a bigger storage space and that helped propel our thinking into the idea to expand the basement square footage for this purpose. I am excited for all of our plans for the basement, but, oddly, I might be the most excited about the storage room.

The thing that really sealed the deal about not getting a new home was when Brian rattled off the list of things he would insist on doing to our current home before we could sell it. I was thinking, "If we got all of that done, I would want to stay!" Haha.

Now, we've started on that long list. I hope it won't be too, too long before we've made a lot of headway.

On an unrelated topic, Katie just brought me this note she found that she made for me in preschool last Mother's Day.  It says:

The thing my mother likes best is:  ME!!!
My mom is 60 feet tall and weighs 80 pounds
While I'm at school my mom:  Works (never was that more true than last year!)
Her favorite color is:  Pink, purple and turquoise (actually these are Katie's favorite colors)
Her favorite food is:  Soup (this is funny because Katie has declared that she hates 'soup'--kind of a broad category, but if I tell her we are having any kind of soup, she automatically dismisses it. She thinks I love soup and she once said a prayer with the words, "I'm thankful that we can like soup when we grow up.")
The best thing she cooks for me is:  Ramen noodles (how she loves these! I have to buy them infrequently or she would beg to eat them every day)
My mother says this to me the most:  "I love you."
If I had a million dollars I would buy my mom:  New keys (when I questioned her about this, she said she would buy me another set since I always lose mine-priceless!).

Nicholson Thanksgiving

Oh how I love Thanksgiving!

We switch off every other year celebrating with Brian's family and my family.  Two years ago, when it was suppose to be our year with Brian's family, his parents were on their mission in the Philippines.  We ended up eating in a restaurant.  And, halfway through the meal, we realized our two youngest kids were coming down with something and had fevers. 

But, this year, our traditions with the Nicholsons were back in full force.  

Brian is the oldest of nine children.  Most of his siblings have children on their own.  There are 30-something grandchildren.  So, it's quite a grand affair. 

We met at his parents house where they had several tables set up in their living room on their new bamboo floors. 

There was so much food!  Turkey, ham, rolls, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, candied yams, Dutch oven potatoes, brussel sprouts, green bean casserole (from my sister-in-law's garden!), salads, special drinks and more.  Then, there were oodles of pies.  I ate so much food.  All of it was delicious.

After the meal, we sat around and visited with each other while the kids went crazy with a game involving marbles.  Brian's mom and sisters all had knitting and sewing projects to work on.  We watched football and Chicken Run.  Katie and Kaylee swung on Grandma and Grandpa's tree swing.  The weather was gorgeous -- almost 60-degrees.

Now we have officially kicked off the Christmas season.  I don't love winter, but I do love this time of year.

A New Room For Ian

Last night, Ian slept snuggly in a Queen size bed.  He sunk deep into the memory foam pad, and, he loved it.

Brian has been working non-stop on our basement since last Thursday and last night, he finished Ian's bedroom.

Much of the work had already been done -- large window cut and installed, walls framed, walls and ceiling drywalled, mudded and sanded. This past week, he finished the wiring and installing the lights, hung the trim, completed the installation of the built in bookshelf, had the carpet re-installed and painted everything.  Ian chose a nice green called relish.

Part of the deal for finishing the basement is that I had to move everything out.  There is nothing like a vast home improvement project to help with going through stuff and getting organized.  It turns out, a family of six can accumulate quite a bit of unnecessary junk when there is a giant unused basement to stash everything instead of actually deciding what to do with it.

It's been a tremendously busy week for me.  Every time I think I'm about to get the upstairs halfway presentable, I bring another load of things upstairs that needs to be sorted and organized.  We have gotten rid of a lot -- and, that feels good.

Last night, Brian and I hunkered down in the basement and we wouldn't quit until every last thing was cleared out.  Every last thing from the main area that is.  He still wants me to (gasp!) empty the storage room so he can tear into that as well.  It's going to be tricky trying to assimilate everything into our upstairs living space until the work is complete (the garage is already full).  

Ian's room is finished and I couldn't be happier with the way it turned out.  He is ecstatic!  He loves finally having his own space for the first time in his 12-year life.  He and Isaac get along surprisingly well given their complete opposite personalities (I'm so thankful -- I always hope and pray for my children to be close to each other).  But, this is a much deserved perk.  He has put up with a lot.

Last night, Brian ripped out all of the walls, so aside from the storage room, Ian's bedroom and the furnace room, everything else is wide open where there use to be a bedroom, playroom, mud room and common area.  It looks awesome.  We kind of wish we could leave it open like that forever.  Mostly, it will stay open, except that he's going to frame the bedroom back in for Sophie's new room.

Sophie is unbelievably specific in her requirements for her new room.  Brian has already agreed to lay hardwood flooring, build her a custom bed and paint two of the four walls in multi-color neon stripes to her specifications.  Yet--this does not meet all of her requirements and her lamentations on the subject are endless . . . It's very frustrating.  

Last night, Brian realized he has to re-wire the upstairs of the house before he goes to town on the basement (while all of the basement ceilings are ripped out and he has access to the wiring).  Maybe this will give Sophie the adequate amount of time to see how very reasonable and accommodating her parents are.  Or, as she thinks will happen, maybe this will give her parents enough time to see reason.  Ha!

When the downstairs is complete, we will have two bedrooms (Ian's and Sophie's), a bathroom (it's going in where the storage room is currently) and a large game room/family room.  We want to have a couch and TV with gaming console and an assortment of games, like foosball and air hockey.  We pretty much want to be the house where our kids and all of their friends hang out.  This is a wonderful thing.  However, I am learning that one unintended consequence is a sharp upswing in the grocery bill.

Behind our furnace room, we have a large unfinished area of our house with a dirt floor.  We decided that we are going to pour cement about 18-feet back and frame it in to make a giant storage room.  I am SO excited!!!

I am thankful for Brian, his handyman skills and his willingness to work harder than anyone I've ever known to make our dreams for our home come true.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Headed Into the Holidays

(Brian and I had a little fun on Halloween)

It turns out, having your fridge break down is a great incentive to clean it out. You have to remove all of the food and put it in coolers until the repair guy comes, so you're halfway there.

Our fridge stopped working unexpectedly two nights ago, but a repairman replaced a part and we are back in business and squeaky clean.

For Halloween, Sophie looked darling as her favorite book/movie character -- Tris from Divergent.

Ian wanted to be dry bones (the skeleton version of the turtle) from Mario Bros. With a little help from my sister, who made him an awesome shell, he was a cool looking skinny skeleton turtle. Or, as he joked on his way to school when I first did his face make-up weird (I was trying to draw a jaw line for a snapper turtle, but I made it go over his lip and it looked like a mustache) -- he was an awesome looking Italian-black-and-white-skeleton-ninja-turtle.

Isaac was a construction worker. Last year, his best friend was an army guy. We got him an identical costume and they were both army guys. They love to play army--perfect. This year, they both wanted to be construction workers. The love playing construction and want to own their own company someday--again, perfect. We got him a tool belt with real tools and safety glasses. Lots of people commented that the best part of his costume was the giant drywall bucket (which he carried around to gather treats).

My mom and I had high hopes that Katie would be either Minnie Mouse, Aurora or both (one for school by day and one for trick-or-treating by night). I got her the Minnie dress and my mom splurged on a Disney Aurora pink dress with wand, crown and painted parasol for her birthday last May.

Unfortunately, those dresses have not gotten a lot of use, although we did get some fun pictures at the park.

As Halloween approached, Katie raided the costume box for various pre-Halloween parties and events. She was a cowgirl, a dragon and the transformer bumblebee. That was all fine with me, but, I kept prepping her for the big day. What would she choose? Aurora or Minnie?

When the big day got here, guess which one she picked?

Spiderman.

An old Spiderman costume that we bought second hand when Ian was five. Isaac has also worn it.

I'm not surprised. She loves princesses, but she loves super heroes equally. Or, maybe more?

The nice part is this--since she is my fourth kid, I didn't really care. My mom and I both laughed about it.

Ian 11, Sophie 13, Isaac 9, Katie 5

Sophie invited her junior high friends over for a party. We decorated the family room all spooky and rigged up an outdoor movie. The weather was warm and perfect! We had a fire for s'mores, tons of treats and root beer over dry ice. Brian took the other kids trick-or-treating and my mom was kind enough to come pass out our candy while I supervised the party (nicest group of kids ever).

November has been an interesting month. Right after the 5K on the 1st, my Dad and Brian headed to Montana for a construction job my dad lined up. They were gone for a week, back for 4-days (during that time they were working non-stop to build metal frames to take to the next job) and then they were gone for 11-days!

Brian is a trooper. He has worked so hard. And, Montana was like -17 degrees every day, so I am glad it was him, not me, who was there.

For the kids and I, the only hiccup was the van breaking down in the middle of the 11-day stint. Everything else went great! I didn't know what it would be like having him gone for so long. It made us appreciate each other more. He sent me a giant bouquet of flowers the day he came home. It was like we were long-distance dating again (he always sent me huge bouquets of flowers when I lived in D.C.).

Here is the best news of the month so far. We've been trying to sell our 25th Street house. We finally got an offer! But, it was a lease-to-own offer. In some ways that was fine. I was trying to be optimistic. It will be paid off in 10-years. So, I guess if we lease it long enough--that could be pretty sweet. Bigger pay-out. Delayed gratification.

But, a lot of things are going to happen in the next 10-years of our lives. Braces for FOUR kids. College. Maybe mission(s). Maybe a wedding. My oh my, our Sophie will be almost twenty-four and Ian will be twenty-two. Leasing the house and paying it off is a sweet idea. But, getting some cha-ching right now is even more tempting.

So, we were ecstatic when we got another offer, this one to purchase, and put the house under contract yesterday! YAY! YAY! YAY!

They seem like solid buyers. Full-price offer with a few concessions. They want to close in four weeks. We are crossing our fingers.

This has opened our minds up to entertaining some dreams about finishing our basement. Brian and I walked through and discussed all of our plans tonight. I was giddy! I never imagined I would live in a house like this one, with a yard like this one and neighbors who are beyond the best. We love it. However, it does need a lot of work to truly be our dream home. (It is the shell of our dream home now and the beginnings of our dream yard). I really hope the sale will go through and things will really get rolling for us.

Indoor Soccer

We arrived at the complex for Ian's first indoor soccer game.  Before me, I saw a comp team and they looked serious.  They had snazzy reddish orange uniforms that matched from head to toe.  Their coach looked tough and organized.  As soon as the field was clear, they hustled into a formation and started warming up with coordinated precision.

This is my first year signing my boys up for indoor soccer.  Isaac's AYSO coach wanted to sign his team up.  When Ian found out, he wanted to do indoor soccer too.  But, his coach wasn't signing up.  So, I asked the complex if Ian could play?  "Sure," they told me.  They put him on the house team called the "Misfits" a group of U12 boys who all wanted to play but didn't have a team to sign up with. 

There they stood against the wall.  Mismatched uniforms with white pennies over the top to help identify them as a unit.  No coach.  These boys had never played together.  They had never even met each other.  They were too shy to even say "hi" to each other.

I drew in a sharp breath preparing myself for an absolute blow-out.  I called to Ian, "Remember it's just for fun!  Playing comp teams will help you get better."  But, inside I worried he would never want to come back and finish out the season.

I took my seat and the buzzer rang.  Right from the get-go, those boys, that team of Misfits, ran onto that field and played soccer fiercely.  I couldn't believe my eyes!  I knew Ian was good (at least, I always think he has some of the best moves on the field), but it turned out that whole team of boys who were willing to sign up to play just for the love without the support of a team or a coach were on fire!

Within the first two minutes, they scored the first goal!  The other team had a superb goalie, but, our boys kept that ball on the right end of the field for most of the first half.  At halftime, the score was 1-1. 

Then, the employee who was directing our boys on what positions to play sent Ian in as goalie and my knuckles went white.  My boy had never played goalie.  I'm sure the comp coach didn't play any of his boys as goalie who had never done it before.  The other team snuck in two goals before Ian could get his wits about him.  But, then he pulled out some ninja goalie moves.  By the end of the game the score was 5-5.  It felt like the most intense soccer game I've ever been to.  I was so proud of the way they played.  I love watching my kids play soccer and basketball more than any pro game I've attended.

  

Yesterday, Ian and I left the house at 10:30 a.m. thinking we would be home in one hour.  Sophie was home alone with Isaac and Katie.  I needed to drive straight home, feed everyone lunch, and take Sophie to the school for her matinee performance of High School Musical (by the way it turned out darling and she did an amazing job).  When I was driving to the game, I noticed that my brakes were very soft.  I had just had my oil changed, so I figured I would swing by Jiffy Lube to have the brake fluid topped off on my way home.

By the time I arrived, only my back brakes were working (this is a scary way to drive a giant van in case you are wondering).  That is when they told me that 1) they don't top off brake fluid because if it is low it means there is a problem that needs to be addressed and 2) I would need to drive 25 blocks to their other location to have the brakes looked at.

I didn't know what to do.  It didn't feel like the safest choice to drive there, but with it getting worse by the minute, I didn't want to drive home and wind up needing a tow truck.  We drove about 15MPH the whole way and made it.  I guess in my mind I was thinking it might take like 15 minutes or something for them to fix it.  I was so wrong!  It was over an hour before they could even look at it and it was 5.5 hours before I got it back (still not completely fixed so I have to take it in again tomorrow).  

The first thing I did was frantically make phone calls to all of my neighbors to see if anyone could give Sophie the message to eat lunch and get ready for her musical.  I think it was the first time I truly regretted not paying $40/month to have a cheap 3rd line cellphone to leave at home.  Finally, I got through to a friend who also has a daughter in the musical.  She was so sweet and totally saved me.  She went to the house to pick up Sophie and an x-ray of my foot.

My heel has been in extreme pain since I ran Ragnar last June and, after trying every home remedy I can find (prescription dose anti-inflammatories for 3-months, rest, ice, a night splint, massage, stretching, wearing running shoes with orthodic inserts all day every day), I finally relented and started seeing a podiatrist.  I waited so long because -- expensive + no insurance.  I have plantar fasciitis and a giant heel spur.  She started me on a round of cortisone shots two weeks ago and I was overdue for my second shot. My appointment was at 1:30 p.m.  I had gotten an x-ray from another clinic that I was suppose to bring to the appointment.

My friend dropped off Sophie, brought me my x-ray and took Ian and me to the Dr. appt.  Then, she had to rush back to the school to see her daughter play the lead role of Sharpay in the musical.  Meanwhile, my awesome brother dropped whatever he was doing and picked up Katie and Isaac so they wouldn't be left alone at the house.

At 2:30, my mom came to the rescue after she finished up at a baby shower for her best friend's daughter.  She brought lunch to poor Ian who hadn't had any access to food since breakfast.  We stopped and got an ice pack so I could ice my foot while we drove around (a requirement for two hours after the shots).  We picked up Sophie and bought her dinner before she would have to be back at the school at 5 p.m. to prepare for the evening show.  

I finally got my van back at 5:30 p.m. -- seven hours after I thought I had left my house for one hour.  

The amazing part about this adventure is two things.  First, I felt so loved by everyone who pitched in to help me out of a bind and by everyone else who was on standby (I made so many phone calls.  It was scary being stranded).  My dad and Brian are in Montana for eleven days.  They are the ones who usually fix the cars when they break down, so this was a truly new experience for me.  Second, Ian was such a trooper!  Here he was trapped all day in cars and waiting rooms, unable to change out of his soccer clothes and cleats, no jacket on a freezing day, and nothing to eat or drink for hours on end.  And-that boy did not complain one time.  I love him so much.  He is unbelievable.  

A-Bombs

The other night, when I was putting Isaac to bed, he said, "Some people in my class think germs are the smallest, but I know that germs are made up of atoms so atoms are the smallest."

"What is smaller than an atom?" I said.  And, we thought and thought about that.  Then, we talked about the parts of an atom.  Then, I said, "What if you tried to take an atom apart?  What if you tried to split it in two to make something smaller?"

He thought for a minute or two, then he said, "It would explode."

I was amazed at his answer and I said, "How did you know that?"

He said, "I don't know, I'm just guessing.  Why?  Is that right?"

I was surprised because I don't think I would have thought of an atom causing an explosion all on my own.

So, we talked about atomic bombs.  And, then we got on the computer and researched atomic bombs.  I learned so many cool things.  I know atomic bombs are horrible.  But, they are also intriguing.  Did you know we have exploded 2,000 a-bombs for testing?  I would have thought it was more like 50.

We watched tons of youtube videos of a-bombs being detonated.  They are so fascinating to watch.  The most amazing one was the Tsar Bomba -- the largest atomic bomb ever tested.  It was made by Russia and detonated in Siberia.  It was 3x more powerful than any a-bomb the U.S. has ever built.  They said it had more TNT power than all of the bombs used during every battle of WWII.  The cloud of smoke rose 40-miles in the air when it exploded and the shock wave was still measurable on its third trip around the world.  That is what it said on youtube anyways.  Of course, that is horrible.  But, it is so crazy to imagine.

Last night, when I was laying with Katie, I had a memory from our summer that I wanted to record.  She is so excited to ride the big rides.  But, she is not tall enough for many of them yet.  One that she is tall enough for is the Tidal Wave -- a giant ship that swings back and forth.  We had so much fun riding that together.  I couldn't get enough of the look on her face when it would really get going and the way she would scream, "My stomach is getting so tiny!!!"

That was her way of saying "I have butterflies."

Autism Spectrum

I just came across this post that I wrote at the end of last January.  I did not have the courage to publish it then, but I am publishing it now, nine-months later.  I feel like it is helpful to share my story in case anyone else is struggling down a similar path.  Spoiler alert -- Isaac did receive the ADOS testing through the school district last May, nearly two years after we requested help from them and seven years after we first turned to professionals for answers.  His results did show that he is on the Autism Spectrum, what is sometimes referred to as Aspergers.  This information has been helpful in moving forward and creating a better life for him and for our whole family.  Here is what I wrote in January of 2014:

So many things are so good in our lives right now.  Preschool, freelance jobs, teachers, friends, family, health, love.  These amazing people that I get to spend my life with!  Life is good.

We've recently decided to be more aggressive about finding answers to some of our son's quirky behaviors.  I feel like we are being really blessed right now after a lot of dead ends over the years.

I have hope that finding answers, even when the realities are difficult, will lead us to more peace for our son and our family.

As a baby, he was the sweetest, most content, blue-eyed, curly blonde-haired infant.  At age one, he began displaying some behaviors that made us take note.  By 20-months we had him in an early-intervention program for speech delay (because he had words before age 1, but at 20-months he had none).  By age 3, I worried that we were being too paranoid and I took him out of the program (he was speaking by then).

He started half-day Kindergarten one week after he turned 5 and I hoped going to school would help some of the behaviors that concerned us.  When it didn't, I took him right to the pediatrician who then (and always) down-played my concerns.  We found a child psychologist who also proved unhelpful.  In an effort to jump to a diagnosis, he handed us evaluation forms for ADD/ADHD at the end of the session.

I sat holding the forms, paralyzed in my chair.  The psychologist asked me what was wrong?  I couldn't fill out the form.  I couldn't give one to his teachers.  This didn't seem right.  I didn't want him to be labeled.  I didn't want him to be medicated.  And, most of all, I didn't want anything to be wrong with my precious child who I loved dearly.

I agonized over each question before carefully marking my answers on a scale of 0-4.  He was only 5 after all.  I think I am a person who has a very broad expectation of a 5-year-old boy.  He had behaviors that concerned me, but it wasn't like I expected him to sit there with his arms folded all day either.  Who was I to say what was "normal"?

His scores came back elevated enough for them to recommend a medication.  With much reservation, I filled the prescription and I gave it to him twice.

It was a 3x/day medication.  I didn't give it to him 6x, I gave it to him 2x.  One pill one day and one pill the next.  Each time, his behavior got worse and more alarming.  When I reported this back to the Dr. and psychologist, they recommended different medication --anti-anxiety medication -- something I was not willing to try on a 5-year-old.  So, we stopped everything right there and I hoped time and increased maturity would solve things.

Time went by, and some things improved.  Progress was slow, but if I looked back at where we had been, I could see it.  The problem was that he kept getting older, and my expectations were increasing at a faster pace than his behavior was improving.

He finished half-day Kindergarten, and since his birthday is late in the summer, we opted to put him in another year of Kindergarten.  During both years of Kindergarten and his first-grade year, I had lengthy conversations with his teachers and his pediatrician.  But, none of these long conversations brought me any closer to understanding what was going on with my son.

I tried everything from rewards to punishments to ignoring the situation and mostly I tried lots and lots of patience and love.  I read books and talked to people and researched everything I could think of in more detail.  But, none of it provided the answer we were looking for.

In November of his second grade year, after several phone calls from the school, we decided to try ADHD medication again.  I didn't know what else to do?  The pediatrician was not helpful.  The psychologist was not helpful.  I had made multiple requests to the school for testing and help, starting at the beginning of his first grade year.  I was told as long as his academic scores were good, there was nothing they would do.  He is a very bright child.

A very bright child who needs help.

A very bright child who was becoming increasingly sad and down on himself.

I finally made a phone call that, after speaking to several people, put me through to a clinic at the University of Utah.  Suddenly, we had an appointment with a psychologist there.

We waited a month for our appointment (which, seemed incredibly fast). He took the ADHD medication while we waited for the appointment -- partly so we could report how it affected him. The only change in his behavior we could see was loss of appetite, increased difficulty sleeping and nausea.  I watched my poor son stop playing so he could throw up in the bushes more than once.  So sad.

It was such a breath of fresh air to meet with a nice psychologist who spent nearly 2 1/2 hours learning about our son.  I have never felt that he is hyperactive because he can sit still and focus for hours at times.  This psychologist helped me to see that many of his behaviors are "sensory seeking" -- the way he tips his chair over repeatedly at school, has periods of non-stop movement at times, takes off running from me at a dead-sprint in crowds or parking lots for no apparent reason (so scary), dumps all of the toys and puzzle pieces into one maddening pile before he begins to play with one thing, and other behaviors that have perplexed me over the years.

We discontinued the ADHD medication that day and I was glad.

We started him on another medication.  It is hard to see my child suffering from other side effects (it is very sedating for the first few weeks) as his body adjusts, but I hope that we will eventually be led to the answers that will help him suffer less in his life than he has before we started down this path.

The psychologist believes it could be one or a combination of a number of things causing his quirky behavior, but one of the things on the list that matches with his "symptoms" is autism spectrum.  This is what I have been asking the school to test him for since the beginning of last school year.  After contacting a clinic to see about getting him tested (it costs between $1000 - $1400 just to start), I was again told what I had been told 15-months ago -- that the school district can and should be doing the test for free.

When I met with the principal to discuss this again, she apologized and said because she was new last year she feels like she misunderstood the process or my request and may have not followed through with the testing the way she should have.  She was very sorry -- and, it is all fine, as long as we can move forward from here.

Friday, we signed a form that means the school has 45 days to complete their assessments.  I hope it will lead to Isaac receiving the ADOS test for autism and autism spectrum.  In the meantime, we will continue to try medications and meet with the psychologist in Salt Lake.

I feel really thankful that we are getting the help we have been searching for.  If he had more severe behaviors (I am so thankful he does not), we obviously would have figured things out by now.  It is hard when you know something is off, but people make you feel like you are over-reacting to the situation or maybe you have just spoiled your child/been inconsistent/are a bad parent, etc.  

The Past Six Months

I've gotten so far behind on posting . . . but, there are so many wonderful memories I want to write down.

Something really cool happened back in May.  A friend from my neighborhood asked her husband for a "girl getaway" for her birthday.  So, he booked this amazing vacation home in Ogden Valley that had a giant living room, tons of beds, a hot tub and its own indoor pool.  Their family went up alone for one night, then he took their kids home and she invited all of her girlfriends to stay the next two nights.

It was a beautiful, relaxing time.  We had a bunco night, movies, games, delicious food and lots of down time for a giant group of lovely ladies.  I felt really blessed to be a part of it.

Our summer started out with a bang!  As soon as school got out, Brian and my parents and I loaded up the kids and drove to Disneyland for four unforgettable days at the park and an equally extraordinary day at the beach.  This will be fully memorialized in a separate post complete with pictures.

Our amusement park fun continued as we enjoyed our Lagoon passes. Around the beginning of August I heard Ian tell a friend that we had been to Lagoon 20-30 times with our passes.  We hadn't been anywhere near that many times, but I LOVED that he thought we had.  I was able to take the kids to Frightmares twice.  I knew the second time would be our last visit for the season.  But, it was so much fun it made me wish we could go one more time.  The next week, my mom surprised me by taking Ian and Isaac on a weeknight (they were open weeknights leading up to Halloween).  I couldn't tell who was more excited about the short lines and all of the rides they were able to get on -- them or her!  I love my mom and how much fun she is.

Another exciting event in our summer was when Brian's parents returned from their two-year mission to the Philippines.  So great to have them back!  We celebrated with family gatherings, including a sibling/spouse dinner at Maddox Steakhouse -- one of my most favorite restaurants.

Here is a tender mercy story I want to share.

When we bought our house three years ago, instead of selling our old house we carried the financing for lease-to-own buyers.

When Brian's parents left on their mission, they generously offered to let us drive their natural gas 12-passenger van.  This was great for so many reasons.  For one, I loved having all of those seat belts.  For another, it allowed us to sell our silver Honda minivan (which we owned) giving us some needed equity to start on the many home improvements our home required.

Of course, life never goes quite the way you plan.  Just when we were looking into buying another van, our lease-to-own buyers called to tell us they were moving to Colorado. Adding an extra mortgage and a car payment to our list of expenses at the same time wasn't sounding good.

As I recorded earlier, my Pappa (Grandfather) passed away in July.  When I went out for the funeral, my mom and her three siblings were discussing what to do with all of his vehicles, and it turned out my dad was able to drive one of my Pappa's vans from Kentucky to Utah for Brian and I to use!

My parents arrived back in Utah with the van the same night Brian's parents returned from the Philippines.  It makes me feel really blessed when I think about it.

Now we have a 7-passenger van.  It's about the same size as the 12-passenger, so there is lots of leg room.  Watch out for this Nicholson family and our vans!  I can't wait to take it on a road trip.

Summer was really special this year.  My kids were old enough that I wasn't completely exhausted (13, 11, 8 and 5).  But, they were still young enough that they thought Disneyland and hanging out with the family were cool.

I tried to soak in the moments as much as possible.  Really, I did.  There were two times that I got to take the kids to Lagoon-a-Beach (Lagoon's water park).  Katie and Isaac wanted to stay by me in the giant lazy river.  They don't make them like that anymore -- twisting around the entire park, through a cave, and with giant waterfalls along the way.  Isaac had his own tube, but, Katie was my motor.  She was so cute, hanging on to the handle of my tube steering me around.  I wanted to bottle up how much love I felt for those two in those moments and savor it forever.

It is one of those seasons of my life where I wish time would pause.  I'm really enjoying the journey right now.

We missed out on Moosehorn -- the annual Nicholson reunion in the Uintahs.  It's the first time we've completely missed it since the first year it happened, when Sophie was a few months old.  It fell during a particularly busy week in August, right when our buyers moved out.  We were hoping to go up for one day, but, in the end we decided to put all of our efforts into getting our old house ready to be listed.  We had high hopes that it would sell that month!  Now it is November and it's still listed - haha!  But, it's alright.  We feel optimistic and we have adjusted our price so that it will hopefully sell quickly.  Before Christmas would be nice.

We did, however, make a quick 24-hour trip to our favorite cabin on the beach at Bear Lake.  It was exquisite as always.  I will miss that cabin so much!  It will be sold soon and we will have to make a new Bear Lake tradition.

Right before the kids went back to school, Brian and I were asked to create a 65-page publication for the National Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Convention that was held in Salt Lake City in September.  It was a very exciting project.  I am so proud of how it turned out.

Working on it made me feel like I did when I had a newborn.  No time to shower or take care of myself at all.  The house was a mess and I barely got any sleep for a three-week span.  I wrote all but three of the stories and Brian took almost all of the photographs and did the layout and design.  It was exciting to talk to so many successful business owners in Utah about why this is a great place to live.

I agree.  I'm kind of a nerd when it comes to thinking Utah as a fabulous place.

As soon as I awoke from this whirlwind of winding up summer, getting the kids back to school, celebrating Isaac's 9th birthday, and completing the magazine, it was already a week into September.

I forgot to add that right before we finished the magazine, we spent a couple of days with some friends at a cabin in the Uintahs.  It was a much needed change of pace for us.  I felt like I was breathing and drinking in the relaxation.  Completely unplugged.  We suddenly had some very serious business of putting together 1,000 piece puzzles and watching our kids on the zip line.  Absolute heaven.

So--it was September and I desperately needed to start getting dressed again instead of wearing my version of sweats (workout clothes) all day every day.  My house needed lots of attention.  My kids needed lots of attention.  There were many things to focus on, yet I somehow found myself planning a 5K fundraiser for the junior high.

Well--because I am the PTA president this year and the school needed money and although I tried hard to make it go away, it didn't.  So, in the end, Brian, I, and a handful of volunteers just put ourselves out there and did it.  The run was on Nov. 1 and we were able to raise more than $4,000 for the school.  Even though I was so stressed about how we would find the time to make it happen (and, I even had my first real life chest pains where I thought I might be having a heart attack in the middle of the night right after we said we would go ahead and do it), I can now say that it was an awesome experience and I am glad we did it.

It was very heartwarming to see so many sponsors from the community hand over support to our school.  It feels good knowing that a few of us who didn't have the time and didn't know what we were doing were able to rally and raise money that was needed.  I think we may even have to do it again next year.

The other thing that happened in September is that I kind of, sort of, got laid off.

I mean -- freelancers can't really get laid off because they aren't really employed.  But, I have had a very regular gig with the Standard Examiner as an entertainment writer for the past 15-years.  For the past year, I was pretty much the only entertainment correspondent and the regular writer for the restaurant and theater beats.  They even listed my name in the front of the Friday entertainment section with the regular staffers for the first time.  But, there have been a lot of weird shake-ups at the newspaper. Things have been especially turbulent for the past year and a half.  There have been a lot of lay-offs and cuts and this time they had to cut the entertainment freelance budget due to advertising cuts.  Now, I only cover a dining story once a week.

It's the way things are for the print newspaper business these days.

My emotions about this are hard to put into words.  For months leading up to this news, Brian and I had actually had numerous discussions about feeling like I was more needed in the home.  I felt it strongly in my heart and Brian agreed.  Our home, our kids, our family needed more of my focus and attention than I was able to give as long as I was running a daycare five days a week and writing 5-6 stories every week.  It had been so very long since I had had a single day, including weekends, when I didn't have to work on stories.

That is probably the biggest reason I am never available to update this blog.  I like to write -- But, I'm doing it all day every day people!

We even met with the bishop and I told him the desires of my heart.  I mostly expected him to say, "Pull your head out of the clouds darlin'.  Those kids need food on the table, not some daydreaming, idealistic mother who reads them bedtime stories and takes them to the park."  But, he didn't.  He said I needed to really listen to those feelings.  I was so relieved by his advice.  I left his office feeling calm and happy.  But, then what?

Was I suppose to quit babysitting?  Was I suppose to quit writing?  It didn't feel right to just quit when we had not plan B in place.  Plus, I love the kids I watch and I love writing for the newspaper.  It's interesting though, that when you take a lot of different things that you love and try to do them all at the same time, it can be hard to love any of it.

So, really, when the newspaper told me, it felt like the right thing.  I mean, it could not have possibly been more unexpected.  It blindsided me.  It was,  in many ways, devastating.  For about a week, I didn't know what to think.  Was I suppose to look for another job?  Was I suppose to celebrate?

In one way, it was a relief to no longer have to go, go, go every single day.  But, in another way, it was hard because, of course, I want the newspaper to be like, "We love you so much and we can't live without you and we would be crushed if you didn't do what you do every day."  That would be nice.  And, paychecks are nice.

I know the editor I work for directly was sad.  It was something that came from higher up, from people I have never met and who don't know me from a complete stranger.  So, whatever.

Heavenly Father knew what I needed.  And, after I had the adequate amount of time for that to wash over me, life has become so beautiful.  We still have two mortgages and it's a little bit scary to lose that pretty substantial paycheck.  But, everything feels so much more peaceful and balanced and I am optimistic to see what is to come.

Ninety-One Years Almost

            James Galloway survived so many things.  He was one of the younger children in a huge family during a time when baths were given by filling up a metal washbasin and placing it in the middle of the kitchen once a week.

            He always wanted to work a little harder to make something better out of his circumstances.  If he could make 25-cents a day by working 8-hours, then he would work 10 and put the extra nickel in the bank.  That is essentially how he saved up for his first motorcycle – one of his great accomplishments and joys of his youth.

            He left his family at a young age to work and send the money home to help feed and clothe everyone.  He worked so hard, and then he was drafted into World War II.  There he fought and saw things that were so terrible he didn’t speak of them for 50-years after he came back.

            He met my Mamma and had a double wedding with his brother who was marrying her best friend.  He has been so poor at times that he didn’t know where his next meal was coming from.  He told my Mamma he wasn’t a rich man, but he would work hard and someday they would have everything.

            He stayed true to his word and each little purchase along the way was a celebrated victory in their journey to a better life – a life that included indoor plumbing and eventually so much more.

            My Pappa, as he came to be known once grandchildren such as I entered the scene, pulled double shifts at the coal mine day after day, week after week, year after year.  He loved to tell the story about how the superintendent of the mine shook his hand one day and told him he had worked more hours and subsequently made more money than anyone, even the superintendent, one year.  He approached him asking, “Are you James Galloway?  Well, I just want to shake your hand.”

            He was loved.  When he was later offered a higher paying job as an instructor at a different mine, the mine where he was already working refused to match the salary to keep him.  So, his students pooled their money and offered to pay the difference to convince him to stay.  He took the higher paying job, but it was a sweet gesture that showed how much people loved to have him around.  He moved his family from Kentucky to Illinois when my mom was in high school.

            In the early 70s before I was born, he was diagnosed with black lung from spending so much time in the coal mines.  But, it would take more, so much more than that to take down a man as great as my Pappa.

            He had survived the Depression and the Great War.  He took the black lung diagnosis in stride and never let it bother him.

            My Pappa was strong and had great health.  Sometime in the 80s he retired, a status he would enjoy for three decades.

            He had a nice home, a motor home, motorcycles and multiple vehicles.  He and my Mamma travelled all over the United States together by road and he loved to remind her of that promise early in their marriage by saying, “See, I told you someday we would have everything.”  And, they did.

            They had raised four wonderful children (one of them was my mom) and they were on their way to what would eventually be fourteen grandchildren and nineteen great grandchildren.

            Tragedy struck in the early 90s when one of his grandchildren died.  That was one of the hardest things my Mamma and Pappa had to go through in their lives.  But, he was strong and he survived.

            The other hard thing was my Mamma’s failing health.  He helped her recover from open heart surgery and their love for one another grew.  In the fall of 1998, when she went in for a routine surgery and never woke up, I thought his heart had broken for good. 

            It was some of the worst grieving I ever saw and I felt so bad for my Pappa as he struggled to move beyond his loss.  But, he was strong and he kept going.  He was back to his positive self before long.  He was attending dances for older singles and dancing the entire 3-hours away.  He was full of life and spunk and energy.

            He was always surprising us by showing up on my mom’s doorstep after traveling by car from his home in Illinois to Utah – usually without even stopping to sleep.

            Loud.  He was so loud.  He had the loudest voice with a Southern accent and he loved to tell stories.  He loved to make people laugh and his eyes would light up as he approached the punch line.

            He was so adventurous and rode motorcycles and 4-wheelers long past the age that he should have been able to do those things.  Once when he was visiting us in Utah (in the 90s, shortly before my Mamma passed away), he rode one of my dad’s 4-wheelers up one side of a hill and right off an unseen cliff on the other side.  After soaring through the air several feet, he rolled down the rest of the drop with the 4-wheeler entangled with his body as he went.  He was hurt terribly in that accident, but we could hardly get him to see a doctor.  He found a way to mend himself over the months and got through it just like everything else.

            We knew my Pappa was getting older, but he seemed to be cheating time by the way he could still drive across the country and talk circles around everyone he met.  He loved to come out and prepare us wonderful Southern feasts.  He loved to treat us to meals at restaurants.  He loved taking care of people.

            After a colorful period of dating following my Mamma’s passing, he married Marie and moved to Kentucky in 2005.  I knew he needed her because he could not stand living alone.  And, he felt she needed him.  It was a challenging relationship.  At least they kept each other company. 

            In 2009, we thought the end had come.  Our beloved Pappa who seemed too strong to be taken down by anything was in a motorcycle accident.  Can you imagine that he was almost 86-years-old and still riding a motorcycle?

            I had just given birth to my 4^th child right before it happened.  My mom and dad rushed along with his other children to be by his side.

            He was driving across a bridge when a boat passing by caught his attention.  He admired it and took his eyes away from the road for too long.  The car in front of his stopped abruptly and he ran smack into the back of it.

            The pain in his neck was excruciating and he figured out he could alleviate it by literally holding his head on.  He put one hand on each cheek and walked around holding his head up this way to relieve the pressure on his spine.  People begged him to lie still, but he walked around this way until he was finally transported by ambulance to a hospital.

            After the x-rays were developed, the doctors became more vigilant about keeping him still and immobilized in a neck brace.  They learned he had a severe fracture in his neck, in the same vertebrae that left Christopher Reeve paralyzed from the neck down.  But, it looked like even this couldn’t take my Pappa away from us.

            He struggled to recover from this massive injury that would be difficult for even a young person to heal from. He developed a serious blood infection and we thought his life would still end even after the crash had not killed him.

            Miraculously, he lived.  He endured months in a rehabilitation center undergoing physical therapy after the infections were gone and the break had healed and he had had a metal rod fused into his neck.

            He said the therapy was difficult and painful, but he showed up and did it every day, just like he had done everything else all of his life. 

            He loved to joke about how he had finally re-learned all that he needed to – walking, bathing, dressing – and they were ready to release him.  But, when he went to sign the forms he realized he couldn’t write his name so he turned around and went back to rehab so he could learn that too.

            He recovered and before anyone could stop him he was back to climbing ladders to clean leaves out of the gutter and taking care of his yard.  The one thing the doctor said he could never do again was drive (for one thing, he couldn’t turn his head from side to side to look over his shoulder).  But, Pappa would have rather died from that accident than to be told he couldn’t drive, so he did keep his license and learn to drive again.  And, soon he was back to dancing the night away with friends and making the long trip out west to visit us again.

            I was so excited the next time he showed up on our doorstep.  I had almost lost my beloved Pappa and now I had a second chance to enjoy him.  That was a wonderful visit the spring that my baby turned one. 

            He told his stories and this time I hung on every word.  I recorded them.  I wrote them down.  I couldn’t imagine a world without this great man and his stories and his funny isms like “Learn all you can and can all you learn (to preserve it).”

            I had always loved him and he had always been special to me, but during this trip, I finally learned a little better how to show him what he meant to me.  The kids and I took him to the Kennecott Copper Mine to visit.  It was a really memorable day.  I was so grateful for the gift of time.

            One day, we were sitting on my couch just the two of us and I got emotional and told him I would never be ready to say “goodbye.”  I knew somewhere deep inside of myself that I would never be ready for a world without my Pappa and the great energy he brought to it.

            He put his arm around me as we sat there and comforted me telling me that he had had a good life and he was ready to go at any time.  He missed my Mamma.  And, he was at the dying age he said.

            One of his favorite things to say was, “You know what is wrong with the younger generation?  I am not a part of it.”  He knew he was an old man and he knew his days were numbered.  He was just so healthy and had dodged death so many times, it didn’t seem possible that his end could actually be near.

            That summer I made one of the smartest decisions I’ve made in my life.  I put myself and my one-year-old on a plane and flew to Indiana for a family reunion.  I didn’t usually go to these unless they were in Utah or Idaho because it was too far and too expensive to travel. 

            It was one of the most special weeks of my life.  My Pappa was so happy to have all of his children, a few of his grandchildren and that one precious great-grandchild with him.

            Everywhere we went, he would get the attention of anyone who would listen and exclaim in his loud Southern accent, “Look right here, you are looking at four generations!” as he lined up himself, my mom, me and my daughter up for them to see.

            I loved being with him that week and listening to him and his children reminisce about their annual family vacations at Kentucky Lake with their ski boat.  He use to ski all over the lake with my mom and her sister on his shoulders.  From a distance, people thought they saw a giant when that tall man skiing with little girls standing on his shoulders holding an extra ski rope passed by. 

            He was always larger than life.

            It was a fantastic, full week of memories I will always hold dear in my heart.  We spent a day on a gorgeous lake in Indiana and we visited my Mamma’s grave in a picturesque cemetery in Kentucky.  We saw the tombstone that already had his name engraved on it.  He joked in the final days of his life that everything was all ready for him to go, he even had his name and date of birth engraved on his tombstone and he would have had the date of death already engraved there too if he knew it.

            In the summer of 2012, my Pappa made the trek out west to attend another family reunion.  This time we all gathered in Utah and headed up to one of my favorite spots, a cabin at Bear Lake. 

            I loved him so much and I kind of gave up thinking, “This might be the last time I see him,” every time we said goodbye because it is an emotionally exhausting way to exist.  I would never be ready for our final goodbye.  But, it turned out that one was our final goodbye after all.

            I loved him so much, but I rarely called him on the phone.  It just wasn’t the relationship we had during my adult life.  I remember vividly all the times he asked me as a child to show him my million dollar smile through the phone (in the days before facetime and skype mind you).  I always did and he always pretended he could see it.  His voice sounded like my smile made his day.  It made me feel so special.

            Sometime after that reunion in 2012, we got the news that my Pappa had an aggressive form of skin cancer.  Somewhere deep inside me, I knew this would be the thing to finally take him down. 

            It was still hard to imagine after all he had been through.  I forgot to add congenital heart disease to the list of things that ailed him but never got him down.

            For nine-months my Pappa would endure surgery after painful surgery that would eventually result in having almost his entire scalp removed from his head.  They kept cutting, but the cancer was still there.  Once they stopped cutting, they planned to perform plastic surgery to graft the skin back.  But, he never got well enough for them to get to that point. 

            Before they were able to remove all of the cancer through surgery, an aggressive tumor grew in his cheek that had to be treated with chemotherapy.  So, he underwent round after round of that, getting so ill, but only wanting to talk about the good days that he had.

            During that time, most of his skin on his head grew back on its own and the doctors were amazed saying that almost never happened.  That was how strong my Pappa’s body was, even at 90-years old while battling cancer.

            Slowly, we knew my Pappa was slipping away.  We knew the times we had enjoyed were gone.  We planned one last family reunion and hoped the man who was nearing 91 would have enough stamina left in him to join us at a cabin near a lake in Mississippi.  My flight was scheduled to take me there on Saturday, July 12, but instead I attended his funeral on Friday, July11.

            It was sad to not get to see him again.  But, when he took a turn for the worse a week before our planned get together, I just wanted him to be able to pass quickly and avoid any extra suffering.

            Darn the cancer and all it had put him through.  He was already gone before his spirit slipped away.

            I was so grateful that my mom and dad were able to be with him in his final moments and that my mom whispered in his ear just before he passed how much I loved and admired him.  It was so hard for me to pick up the phone and just tell him that at the end, but I hoped he knew.

            The following days were a blur.  He passed away in the evening of July 8^th and the funeral was early on July 11^th.  I quickly changed my flight and went out to be with my family.

            It was my first time visiting the house where he and his second wife lived in Kentucky.  My dad told me how Pappa was so proud of the place with a cute little yard, a deck in the front and the back and two huge garages to shelter some of his many vehicles.

            Emotion overcame me when I walked inside.  I could see him standing in that tiny kitchen cooking fresh vegetables from his garden talking about the bounties of the earth and all of his blessings.  I could hear that loud, high, Southern voice and see that twinkle in his eye as he thought up a story that would put a smile on someone’s face.  I could see him there wanting to welcome us all into his home and being so glad we came. 

            Except, he really wasn’t there. 

            Somehow, we laughed and joked to keep us from feeling too much sorrow.  We sat at the house and waited for the time to go by so we could go to his funeral the next morning.

            The service was lovely.  It really was.  Friends and family stood up to tell their stories and my cousin Tara who was especially close to Pappa shared a moving talk about her memories.  She said, “The man I once thought of as immortal is gone and the world is no longer whole because of it.” 

            That is how I feel.  It seemed like he would be around forever.  There can never be anyone like him.  I miss him so much and even though the times I got to be with him were few and far between, I miss that energy that he radiated – a force that was always there even when the miles separated us.

            I am happy that he is with Mamma again and I am relieved that he is not suffering.  I am thankful that he was strong right up until the end.  I hope he will be one of my angels from the other side.  I can’t imagine anyone else I would rather have looking out for me.

            Rest in peace Pappa.  Thank you for all you did in your life to shape our family for the better and for being our pillar and showing us how to be strong and keep going even when things are tough.