It Turns Out I'm Not Getting More Patient

I've posted a lot in the last year about the changes in my home life as my children are growing up. It's strange how quickly and suddenly you can find yourself worrying more about your children's Internet habits than their toilet habits.

So as I get ready to embark on an empty household in September, I have found myself feeling older and wiser--one of those moms with sage advice for women still dealing with preschoolers and potty-training. I'm feeling more calm and patient every day.

And then I took the kids back to school shopping.

By myself.

All 4 of them.

At the same time.

I guess it's been a while since I went anywhere by myself with all of my offspring because I was caught completely by surprise when after 14 minutes of shopping I was ready to abandon every last one of them. Seriously. I looked in my purse to see if I had any paper with which to make "child for sale" signs. I could only come up with a crayon and a gum-wrapper. Dang.

Now just the day before I watched some poor lady at the grocery store wrestling 3 little boys...one was crying, one was fighting, and one was attempting to set the deli on fire. I chuckled to myself about boy how glad I am those days are behind me. Then I patted the 1 child who was with me and told them since they were being so good, the could pick out a candy bar.

I guess some people can humble themselves; I, on the other hand, much prefer being compelled to be humble.

So after 5 hours, 4 stores, 2 potty breaks (I guess you never really get a break from their toilet habits after all), and $450 we are nearly done. No one got a candy bar, although I did hear Zachary at one point telling his siblings to "act like little angels" in the next store in hopes of a reward. Alas, they misinterpreted his well-intentioned speech and behaved exactly like little angels of darkness.

So much for all my smug thoughts that I was really learning to be a more patient, careful, soft-spoken, and compassionate mother. I wonder if there were any moms of older children watching my spontaneously combustible family and chuckling to themselves about how they remember those days. If so, they better watch out. Karma is not a patient lady either.

How To Host A Family Reunion

Step 1: Choosing When to have the Family Reunion

Start looking for a date that will work for everyone in January.

In February, when only one person has gotten back to you about summer dates, send 143 emails and phone messages to pin down the rest of the family.

In March, just give up on some of these people ever getting back to you and go ahead and set a date.

Tell everyone the dates and location and give them 24 hours to respond before the site gets booked and paid for.

Now they will all get back to you.

Make another 487 phone calls and discover that your family is just way too busy for this to ever work.

Pick a date anyway.

Be prepared to hear a lot of moaning and complaining about this not being a convenient time. Ignore it and move to step 2.

Step 2: Pick a location

Camping sounds fun...fresh air, beautiful surroundings, communing with nature....$9 a person.

Internet search for group sites and choose one that will accomodate 23 people, 7 cars, is less than 30 minutes away from modern conveniences, has plumbed bathrooms, a firepit and is breath-takingly beautiful.

Do this all site unseen and cross your fingers that what looks good online looks good in person.


Phew!!

Step 3: Make assignments

Assign each family 1 meal and 1 activity. Be prepared for more complaining about convenience. Just smile and hold firm.

The food will be wonderful. Every family will pull out all the stops, and you will eat until you are sick. And as an added bonus, on your night for cooking your brother turns out to be a "foil dinner" control freak and will take over all of the work to make sure it gets done "right." Sit back, relax and eat up.

Step 4: Gather the family

If they're all gathering at your house...here's a piece of advice. Don't waste your time cleaning up before they get there.

Step 5: Pack

Set aside at least 12 hours for this step. Pack and load everything it might be conceivable you will need. After 12 hours, discover you need at least 3 more. Give up and just throw everything in the back of somebody's vehicle. Get up to camp and discover 14 things you forgot. Congratulate yourself for choosing a site only 10 miles from home.

Step 6: Set up Camp

2 schools of thought on this:
Method 1-Work together as a family...discover you may have too many chiefs and not enough Indians...after a little dysfunctional fun, manage to get a tent up and sleeping bags unrolled.

Method 2-Help unload all the gear to the site, put one person in charge, send everyone else on a hike.



Step 7: Social Director

Discover that everyone expects you to have every minute of this trip planned.

Go for hikes. (Drag your 60-year-old father up the side of a mountain to view a hidden alpine lake)

Plan easier hikes for the younger set. Drag them up a series of switchbacks to see another hidden alpine lake.
Prepare some campfire activities.

Set up crafts for the restless natives.

Bring lots of games and firewood. Lay in a supply of not-too-scary ghost stories.

Have a wonderful time! Come home and spend 3 weeks unearthing your demolished home and digging out from a mountain of laundry. Vow that next time someone else will be in charge.

Where I've Been and What I've Been Doing

Tie-dyed 65 first-graders' t-shirts...check.

Helped out in 3 field days...check, check and check.

Dragged my sixth-grader to the end-of-the-year finish line..complete with a successful country report...just barely.

Present and accounted for at said sixth-grader's awards assembly...check...sniff.

Welcomed all 23 members of my family into my home over the 4th of July weekend...check.

Fireworks in Provo...totally overrated, but check.

Cousin's baby's blessing...whoops...but I did make it for the potluck afterwards.

Spearheaded Frey Family reunion at campgrounds in Tanners Flat...check...worth every filthy piece of laundry!

Attended last day and night of Girls' Camp...check...although I think the term "camp" is being thrown around pretty loosely here.

Home, showered, packed and on a flight to Monterey, CA...check.

Attended wedding of high school friend, Jon Pabico...check...thanks for the mini high-school reunion, Jon!

Flew home from Monterey...flight cancelled.

Unplanned drive to San Francisco Airport...check.

Flew home from San Francisco...check...it was touch and go there at the end.

Welcomed both my sisters and their families to my house...check.

Started overwhelming task of digging out my house...check.

Emotional meltdown...check, check and check.

Cub Scout Day Camp...tomorrow and the next day.

Youth Conference...Thursday through Saturday.

Prepared mini-class for Youth Conference...yeah, right.

Relaxed and enjoyed summer "vacation".........................

When I Was Your Age

We spent a few hours working in our backyard this weekend. We didn't run out of work. In fact, we are likely less than 1/4 of our way through weeding alone. We didn't run out of time. It was the one and only Saturday of our entire summer that isn't already planned. We just ran out of room in the garbage can.

We also did not run out of character-building, back-breaking, whine-inducing labor for our children. Oh, how I love to torture them. And to make the time go faster, I found myself telling them, "when I was your age stories." You know the type...walked uphill 5 miles to school, was expected to be seen and not heard...your basic childhood fables. Imagine my surprise in discovering that I had actual real-life memories for the respective ages of all four of my children! Boy did that make me feel old. So I tried to choose my most vivid memory from each of their ages. This is what I came up with.

When I was 5 years old, I couldn't wait for my very first show and tell in Mrs. Ringer's a.m. Kindergarten class. Although I was painfully shy (I swear this part is not fabricated. Ask my parents if you don't believe me.) I eagerly anticipated the chance to show the Indian-head penny that my grandfather had given to me. In our class, on show and tell day, you put your items on the show and tell table at the beginning of the day. Then, in the afternoon, after naptime...(again I'm serious...I can't believe they took this out of the Kindergarten curriculum) our teacher would call children up one at a time to take their item from the table and share it with the class. As the grand event approached, I shyly (seriously!) raised my hand and waited my turn. Mrs. Ringer called on one child and then another and then another. Finally she called on a little boy who found his way to the show and tell table and then dawdled there for several minutes, fingering this item and that. Finally, after some coaxing from the teacher, he picked up my Indian-head penny, marched to the front of the class and told everyone some fascinating story about his penny! I was filled with rage and disappointment, but when Mrs. Ringer asked me if I had something to share, I was too submissive and quiet to stand up for myself, so with tears in my eyes, I told her no. At the end of the day, I picked up my penny and took it home, so at least the villain of the lie didn't go so far as to steal my penny...just my moment. And for nearly 30 years, that little boy got away with it...but today I will finally take back my right and name names. That's right, Aaron McClelland, I know who you are! And by the way, your show and tell story was so obviously contrived...you weren't fooling anyone!

When I was 7 years old we went to visit my cousins in Utah for the summer. I have a cousin who is exactly a month older than me, and although we were always good buddies when we saw each other, there was an edge of competition that tainted our every interaction. The first day at his house, we went outside where he grabbed his bike ready to ride the half block to his grandparents' home. He asked me if I wanted to go with him. I told him I didn't have a bike. He told me I could ride his sister's bike, and then in what I interpreted was a taunting manner asked, "You know how to ride a two-wheeler don't you?" Ooh, the challenge in his tone! Well of course I told him I could ride a bike...never mind the fact that I had never up until that moment been able to ride a two-wheeler in my life. He was NOT getting the best of me. He wheeled the bike around, I climbed on...and took off down the road with an air of nonchalance...even boredom. I guess I can pinpoint my competitive streak and stubborn nature to this exchange. I rode bikes with him that whole week. The only down side was that I never got to show off to my parents, "hey, look, guys! I'm riding a bike!" because such a display would undermine my whole triumph.

When I was 9 years old, I saved the quarter my mom put into my lunch for milk money every day. Then at the end of the week when I had 5 quarters, I would walk down to the 7-11 at the end of our street and use my $1.25 to buy 3 candy bars. I don't know what part of this memory is the most disturbing...the fact that I basically stole money from my parents every day or that I walked down a busy street to a convenience store completely by myself at the age of 9.

When I was 12 years old, my mom picked me up from school early on my birthday. As a surprise, she drove me to a beauty salon to get my ears pierced. The lady at the shop showed me a basket of different stud earrings to choose from for the piercing, and I really wanted the diamond ones. However, my older sister had gotten diamond earrings when she had her ears pierced and I knew that she would somehow lord it over me if I chose them. Besides, at this age I hated having the same things as everyone else around me...I wanted my own thing...so instead I just grabbed a random pair out of the basket. They turned out to be topaz which I hated. I didn't like orange at all, but for the next 6 weeks, I wore them and swore to anyone who might question my selection how much I loved topaz. The day I could change my earrings for the first time, I took the topaz studs out and never wore them again. As I remember this, I can't really verbalize my reasoning for this life choice...I just sense that there was a feeling of self-sacrifice implicit in it somehow. Weird, huh?

Anyway, for what their worth, the stories got us through 2 hours of weeding. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go find my college textbook on psychoanalysis. It appears I'm completely neurotic.

Ragnar Repeat

I don't have any pictures to post of our relay race yet, but just wanted to shout out to the blogosphere that I survived and had a great time despite the fact that my definition of "fun" includes 12 people running for 30 hours straight.

Here are my personal stats.

Leg 5-7.4 miles up Avon Pass. Hot. Dusty. Dirt road staight uphill. 1 hour 19 minutes.

Leg 17-4.4 miles. Gradual incline. Beautiful outskirts of Morgan. Rolling fields. Cooler early evening air. Every step I've taken this day has been uphill. What's the deal? 41 minutes exactly.

3 hours of sleep.

Leg 28-3.8 miles. 6-ish in the morning. Cool storm-clouds ahead. Had to swap an injured runner. Wasn't planning on this one. First 2 1/2 miles straight down mountain at Jordanelle. 8% grade. Pound. Pound. Pound. 32 minutes, 20 seconds.

Hurt everywhere. Loved every second.

Home. Showered. 13 hours of sleep. Not running again for a week.

The Wall

My husband has been working 18 hour days for the last 4 weeks. This usually means he gets home after I am asleep and leaves again before I am awake or while I am out running in the morning. I pretend he's out of town, but the illusion is hard to stick to when I'm still doing his laundry and cleaning up his breakfast. He is finishing up his trial this week so hopefully by the weekend he will exist in our lives again, but for now I am officially finished with this whole single mom business.

I should probably be feeling more compassion for my poor husband. After all, he's working horrible hours including every weekend for the past month. I should definitely have more respect for women around the world who are single mothers for every day of their lives. At the very least, I should be more understanding of my children who are desperately missing their daddy. But yesterday I finally hit the wall. So although I know I should buck up and count my blessings, I'm giving myself the next 2 hours (and 2 minutes) to wallow in my own self-pity. That's how much longer Anna's friends will be here playing with her and filling her social needs. Then it's back to the "All Mom, All the Time, Variety Hour."

The months of May and June have been overflowing with "extras" in school, sports, piano, dance and my Young Women's calling. I have been the taxi, cheerleader, coach, whip-cracker, teacher, CEO, and nurse. It feels like there is nothing left of me to give, but I know that in 1 hour and 54 minutes, I have to put my smile back on and head out to the store to pick up the eclairs for Zachary's oral report on France, the cleats for Noah's track meet, the groceries, snacks for field day, a prescription, presents for two birthday parties, and something for Father's Day not only for my husband, but for my dad and my father-in-law. And when I get back I get to look forward to yet another afternoon and evening of getting kids where kids need to be, motivating (translation yelling at) them to get their homework and chores done, getting them fed and in bed at a reasonable hour without any hope of assistance or even grown-up conversation.

It will all be fine. I know this because it always has worked out before, but knowing this doesn't make the moment of the trial any easier. In 1 hour and 46 minutes I will wipe away my tears and put on a cheerful face and will acknowledge all the ways my Father in Heaven has blessed me today and every day of these challenging weeks. But for now I will count down the minutes left until this weekend when I get to "escape" for 24 hours in a 180-mile relay race. To many, my whole running obsession probably seems like a lot of hard work. This motherhood business is much, much harder. Today I say: Give me a marathon! 1 hour and 37 minutes to go.

Worry Bird

Here's Anna's recital for Grandma to watch. She's the worry bird on the far right. She's a natural performer. The closer we got to the stage, the more excited she became.