My friend, Krista, took our family pictures this year. Now I have to decide on some to print. So hard to decide! She did an awesome job.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
October 19, 2008
Got a Flickr account so I don't have to post each picture one by one. Family involved, if you want a copy of any of these, let me know soon. Some of them are still "big" in case you want them that way. Soon, they will all be resized small except the ones I want big. So, if you want one I don't necessarily want big, you better let me know. :)
We had a BALL this weekend. The homecoming was fabulous. Really awesome. Lil' Audra sang a solo for one verse of a French song (with English words, although not even the same song words; it was very cool) that the parents sang. She was so nervous, but she did a great job and was so proud of herself afterward. It was very cool to see my Aunt Ginger. She rocks! Anyway, it was a great weekend all around.
Click here for all the photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/audrajensen/sets/72157608190382816/
My favorites:
Heh heh. Battle injuries.
Cousins really don't get along. They're just pretending. :)
She gets her good hair from me.
Not much has changed in 18 months.
We had a BALL this weekend. The homecoming was fabulous. Really awesome. Lil' Audra sang a solo for one verse of a French song (with English words, although not even the same song words; it was very cool) that the parents sang. She was so nervous, but she did a great job and was so proud of herself afterward. It was very cool to see my Aunt Ginger. She rocks! Anyway, it was a great weekend all around.
Click here for all the photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/audrajensen/sets/72157608190382816/
My favorites:
Heh heh. Battle injuries.
Cousins really don't get along. They're just pretending. :)
She gets her good hair from me.
Not much has changed in 18 months.
Dave Story...
From Dave...
So... For the most part, I get bored doing traffic stops. Most people get a warning because once I find out they don’t have warrants or aren’t at least suspended, I lose interest. I make traffic stops hoping to get someone off the street who needs to be in jail. I really don’t care about giving regular people tickets. But I still do stops compulsively hoping for that one good stop.
Tonight I made that 1 in 1,000 stop that results in a good pop. I was going through a four-way stop intersection. A black 1989 Honda 2-door was going the other way. It was dark, and it had its headlights on. I couldn't make out the occupants. I glanced in my mirror and saw the rear of the vehicle looked completely blacked out. No tail lights. I whipped my car around and followed to check it out.
As I caught up to the car it had all 3 brake lights illuminated. It had its headlights on still. Periodically, the brake lights would flicker off, revealing that the tail lights were not working unless the driver’s foot was on the brake. We got to a stop sign. As the car started to move again, the rear end went dark momentarily. The driver was clearly riding the brake pedal in an effort to prevent me from seeing the equipment defect. The car had 3 white males in it.
I put a stop on the car and went up to it. The driver was nervous and his dress/demeanor just screamed “prison.” He was wearing a light blue jersey with a matching cap that said “LA” on it. He had a silver chain with an “LA” pendant hanging from it. His numerous tattoos included a “310” area code (which can also mean “13” for the Mexican Mafia--Sureno) and a filled in tear-shaped tattoo under his eye.
The other 2 dudes were pretty sketchy too.
I had my driver exit the car, and I patted him down for weapons. He gave me a name (Willis) and said he was suspended. No ID or wallet with him, of course. He could not, for the life of him, give me an address where he is staying, or even a phone number. Right… I called him on the brake pedal thing. He initially denied it, but then admitted he was trying to keep the defect from showing.
My sarge showed up to cover me, and we started to sort them all out. One of the passengers said the car was his. We checked his name out, and he ended up having a BOLO (be-on-the-look-out) indicating probable cause to arrest him for a DV Protection Order violation. The other passenger had ID on him, and ended up with 4 warrants, 2 of them for felonies. That guy is quite busy with ID theft, meth, and robbery.
So, all 3 of these dudes get arrested. As I am about to take them all to jail, my driver, the big, fat liar head, admits he gave me a false name (which is felony since he used a real person). He gave me his real name, Thomas, and it turns out he was wanted for a felony as well. Two warrants for him.
When I took them to jail, it was like a happy family reunion; one of the custody officers looking up and saying “Thomas! Where ya been, dude?” So, in one traffic stop I made 2 felony arrests, 1 misdemeanor domestic violence arrest, with a total of 6 warrants and 2 new charges. I got 3 animals off the street with HUGE histories of arrest for auto prowls, auto theft, burglary, robbery, assault, and drug possession. Didn’t find any dope in the car though.
Then I got to write the report for 2 hours…
So... For the most part, I get bored doing traffic stops. Most people get a warning because once I find out they don’t have warrants or aren’t at least suspended, I lose interest. I make traffic stops hoping to get someone off the street who needs to be in jail. I really don’t care about giving regular people tickets. But I still do stops compulsively hoping for that one good stop.
Tonight I made that 1 in 1,000 stop that results in a good pop. I was going through a four-way stop intersection. A black 1989 Honda 2-door was going the other way. It was dark, and it had its headlights on. I couldn't make out the occupants. I glanced in my mirror and saw the rear of the vehicle looked completely blacked out. No tail lights. I whipped my car around and followed to check it out.
As I caught up to the car it had all 3 brake lights illuminated. It had its headlights on still. Periodically, the brake lights would flicker off, revealing that the tail lights were not working unless the driver’s foot was on the brake. We got to a stop sign. As the car started to move again, the rear end went dark momentarily. The driver was clearly riding the brake pedal in an effort to prevent me from seeing the equipment defect. The car had 3 white males in it.
I put a stop on the car and went up to it. The driver was nervous and his dress/demeanor just screamed “prison.” He was wearing a light blue jersey with a matching cap that said “LA” on it. He had a silver chain with an “LA” pendant hanging from it. His numerous tattoos included a “310” area code (which can also mean “13” for the Mexican Mafia--Sureno) and a filled in tear-shaped tattoo under his eye.
The other 2 dudes were pretty sketchy too.
I had my driver exit the car, and I patted him down for weapons. He gave me a name (Willis) and said he was suspended. No ID or wallet with him, of course. He could not, for the life of him, give me an address where he is staying, or even a phone number. Right… I called him on the brake pedal thing. He initially denied it, but then admitted he was trying to keep the defect from showing.
My sarge showed up to cover me, and we started to sort them all out. One of the passengers said the car was his. We checked his name out, and he ended up having a BOLO (be-on-the-look-out) indicating probable cause to arrest him for a DV Protection Order violation. The other passenger had ID on him, and ended up with 4 warrants, 2 of them for felonies. That guy is quite busy with ID theft, meth, and robbery.
So, all 3 of these dudes get arrested. As I am about to take them all to jail, my driver, the big, fat liar head, admits he gave me a false name (which is felony since he used a real person). He gave me his real name, Thomas, and it turns out he was wanted for a felony as well. Two warrants for him.
When I took them to jail, it was like a happy family reunion; one of the custody officers looking up and saying “Thomas! Where ya been, dude?” So, in one traffic stop I made 2 felony arrests, 1 misdemeanor domestic violence arrest, with a total of 6 warrants and 2 new charges. I got 3 animals off the street with HUGE histories of arrest for auto prowls, auto theft, burglary, robbery, assault, and drug possession. Didn’t find any dope in the car though.
Then I got to write the report for 2 hours…
Saturday, October 18, 2008
October 18, 2008
So, a couple of years ago, I was getting allergy shots. They make you wait a half hour after getting your shots in case you have a "systemic" reaction--AKA it hates you and makes you die. If they catch the reaction soon enough, they know what to do to prevent the full anaphylaxis (is that the right spelling?). Anyway, I had received my shot and all was well, and I went off to my class. It was something like 3-4 hours later, after I'd eaten some sushi rolls, when that nasty systemic reaction started to emerge. Started with a really flush and hot face, then a scratchy voice, then tightness in my chest. I figured it was a reaction, but didn't know if it was what I ate or the shots earlier. I didn't know how serious it could be, so I just drove myself to the ER after taking some Benedryl. On the way to the hospital, I remember it was starting to get a little hard to breathe. But, by the time they got me in, the Benedryl was kicking in, and it was all slowly subsiding. I got a nice (understatement of the year) lecture from my allergist that week about NOT DRIVING cuz if it had been worse, well, you know. Anyway, she wasn't sure if it was the food or the shot, either, because a systemic reaction usually shows up within 20 minutes of getting the shot, and this was 3-4 hours. She actually had me bring in the food I ate, ground it up in a blender, and shot it under my skin to see if I reacted to it. Nothing. So, she wasn't sure.
Fast forward 2 1/2 years to now. For the past month, I finally started getting shots again. Woohoo! This past allergy season was a BUGGER, and I am ready for it to get better again (my seasons were much better after I got the shots, even though I didn't finish the series, until this last year). I've been going in weekly, getting a bunch of shots, to get up to "maintenance" so I don't have to go so often. Last week was my last "big" week of lots of shots, and then I get to start coming in every 2 week and then every month. No big deal. Anyway, after the last shot last week, I was to wait 90 minutes before I could leave; still plenty of time from what they expect a reaction to start taking place. Well, at the 90 minute mark, the gal checking me over to send me home said, "Uh, you look kinda flushed. Do you feel alright?" Oh crap! Yup, it had begun. Same symptoms. Luckily, I was right there, so they loaded me with anti-histimine and watched my blood pressure (drop and then go up again as it subsided) and everything else. Took another hour. All was well, and I went home.
So, the first time it took 3-4 hours to start, this time it was 90 minutes.
Yesterday. First week on the same dose, but this time in the shot clinic (no doc around, just the shot nurses). Oh, you see where this is going, don't you? 20 minutes after the shots, I walk back into the area and say, "Um, I think something's happening." Yup. This time faster and more furious. Internal cramping, breathing difficult, drop in blood pressure. Eek! So, they pump me full of anti-histimine again, some inhaler thing, and then shoot me with Adrenaline! Have you ever had Adrenaline? Man, tripiest thing ever. It's like you just downed a 6-pack of Mountain Dew. And the darn shot hurt (and my arm ached so bad for the rest of the day). Oh, and it made me pass out. Anyway, cramps were really bad (felt like really horrible female cramps, ugh). Took about an hour to start to improve. Dave came and drove me home, and I crashed. They said that would happen--that the anti-histimine would want to make me relax and the Adrenaline would do the opposite, and it would make my body really exhausted.
I got a little cat nap and then headed up to Seattle. All's well now! It was a fun day.
So, I have to see the doc again before the shot nurses will "touch me" (their words; they were really funny).
Now, we're out in Sequim doing the family boogie (my parents' missin homecoming). Back to the grind on Monday!
Fast forward 2 1/2 years to now. For the past month, I finally started getting shots again. Woohoo! This past allergy season was a BUGGER, and I am ready for it to get better again (my seasons were much better after I got the shots, even though I didn't finish the series, until this last year). I've been going in weekly, getting a bunch of shots, to get up to "maintenance" so I don't have to go so often. Last week was my last "big" week of lots of shots, and then I get to start coming in every 2 week and then every month. No big deal. Anyway, after the last shot last week, I was to wait 90 minutes before I could leave; still plenty of time from what they expect a reaction to start taking place. Well, at the 90 minute mark, the gal checking me over to send me home said, "Uh, you look kinda flushed. Do you feel alright?" Oh crap! Yup, it had begun. Same symptoms. Luckily, I was right there, so they loaded me with anti-histimine and watched my blood pressure (drop and then go up again as it subsided) and everything else. Took another hour. All was well, and I went home.
So, the first time it took 3-4 hours to start, this time it was 90 minutes.
Yesterday. First week on the same dose, but this time in the shot clinic (no doc around, just the shot nurses). Oh, you see where this is going, don't you? 20 minutes after the shots, I walk back into the area and say, "Um, I think something's happening." Yup. This time faster and more furious. Internal cramping, breathing difficult, drop in blood pressure. Eek! So, they pump me full of anti-histimine again, some inhaler thing, and then shoot me with Adrenaline! Have you ever had Adrenaline? Man, tripiest thing ever. It's like you just downed a 6-pack of Mountain Dew. And the darn shot hurt (and my arm ached so bad for the rest of the day). Oh, and it made me pass out. Anyway, cramps were really bad (felt like really horrible female cramps, ugh). Took about an hour to start to improve. Dave came and drove me home, and I crashed. They said that would happen--that the anti-histimine would want to make me relax and the Adrenaline would do the opposite, and it would make my body really exhausted.
I got a little cat nap and then headed up to Seattle. All's well now! It was a fun day.
So, I have to see the doc again before the shot nurses will "touch me" (their words; they were really funny).
Now, we're out in Sequim doing the family boogie (my parents' missin homecoming). Back to the grind on Monday!
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Well worth the read...
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/13/war-weary-%e2%80%93-what-are-you-complaining-about/
Rebekah Sanderlin
"Operation Marriage"
If the American military went to war and America went shopping, then seven years later the war wages on but America is home from the shopping spree with her credit cards maxed out and her head aching from buyer's remorse.
The war didn't change and the fighting force didn't change, but the people back home are over it. War, it seems, went out of style in 2003.
In the military community we roll our eyes when we hear that Americans are war weary. Just what, we wonder, are you all weary of? Hearing about the war? Seeing stories in the news? Most Americans don't even know anyone in the military and won't have any direct contact with the war besides seeing uniformed soldiers in the airport. You all haven't been asked to do anything more to support this war than sit back and watch as your tax dollars are spent.
To us, civilian complaints about being war weary sound like the gripes of deadbeat dads: It's a bummer to hear that things are going badly and you're sick of being asked to pay for it, but you're not doing any of the real work yourselves. Many of you believe that fighting this war is optional. You seem to think our nation could make everything okay by just sitting this one out.
And, in a way, that reasoning makes sense. Most of you haven't been on the front lines or on the homefront. You haven't looked into the eyes of the enemy and the innocents and you haven't heard gunshots and mortar rounds in the background during a precious-but-short phone call. You haven't had villagers beg you to stay or to adopt their children. And you haven't heard your soulmate grapple with dueling guilt: Guilt that he's leaving his family for so long and guilt that he isn't deployed more frequently and for longer so that he could do more. You haven't seen or heard any of this, so how could you possibly understand?
It's not your fault. Nobody has asked you to do anything. Our leaders didn't think you would be willing to make real sacrifices, so they never bothered to ask. They let you all think that shopping yourselves into debt was patriotic, that spending yourselves into bankruptcy and foreclosure was enough to keep our nation safe.
You are war weary because futility breeds weariness. When you feel like something is for no good reason and getting nowhere, it's understandable that you'd be over it. But maybe you wouldn't be so war weary if you, personally, had a stake in what was happening "over there."
In the military community, the price tag for this war is much higher but the commitment level is much greater. Our country has not only asked for our tax dollars (and believe me, we're paying monetarily for this war, too) but for our blood, our family time, our futures, our children's happiness and our very lives. We have enlisted and reenlisted – and offered our support to our spouses who sign back up - because, soldier and spouse, we know the commitment level of the people who want to kill us and we know the desperate dependence of the people our nation has vowed to protect. We know that we have to be at least as committed as our enemy or our own children will be fighting this same war.
My husband has spent the bulk of our five-and-a-half-year marriage deployed. He's missed most of our son's life and our daughter has never even heard his voice – not even in utero. We won't know for years what the long-term effects of these deployments will be on him, on us and on our kids. Last year he suffered a serious head injury and he's lost most of the hearing in his right ear, the ear closest to his gun. We don't know what the long-term effects of his injuries will be, either. This year, on his third deployment to Afghanistan, he missed my father's death and funeral, our daughter's birth, our son learning to ride a bike and catching his first fish, and countless other precious moments that cannot be reclaimed. There is no predicting what events he'll miss in the future.
And we are the lucky ones.
My husband has lost more than 20 friends in this global war on terror and I have an ever-growing group of Army widow friends. They are young and beautiful and many have young children. They are also stunted. They hang around Army towns years after losing their soldiers because they say they don't fit in anywhere else. They say they can no longer relate to what they see and hear in the civilian world.
They can't reintegrate into the your world because there the people they meet don't know what it's like to sacrifice everything for something intangible. The widows say they don't feel like they fit in where people don't know how hard it is to break away from that last hug before a deployment. In the civilian world the widows, like all soldiers and military spouses these days, are treated as oddities, something to marvel or gawk at from a distance. People either fawn over us or try to ignore us. Our presence inspires either adulation or discomfort.
So we hunker down in our military towns, where regular pilgrimages to D.C. to visit loved ones at Arlington and Walter Reed are common. In military towns, we can laugh about all the dust and sand that comes into our homes after a deployment, carted thousands of miles from where it was picked up. We can complain about long lines at the post office during our weekly visits to send care packages. We can vent about news of another deployment, less than a year after the last one. If anyone in America should be war weary, it's us.
And make no mistake: We are tired. We are stretched thin. Our marriages and our families are collapsing. Our children are emotionally damaged. They act out at school and cry at home. Everyday we wonder if we have the strength for even another day of this. We're tired from the work, but we're not weary of the mission.
This war is far from over, that's something both candidates for the presidency have acknowledged. Whichever man finds himself in the Oval Office come January will be in a position to decide our fates in the military community in a way more personal and immediate than most Americans will experience. The next president will determine how much my husband and I will see each other for the next four years and whether or not he will have the tools and policies he needs when he is in harm's way. The next president will determine our odds of continuing to be the lucky ones.
This war is far from over – that is an obvious truth in military communities. But our reality seems so very different from yours. For the last seven years our elected officials haven't thought enough of you to ask you to pitch in. They haven't, so I will.
My husband and I know that this is not his last deployment and we know that his odds of returning home get worse with each trip. The only way our family and other military families will get a break is if more Americans sign up to join the fight. News reports these days are full of stories of lay-offs and the high cost of health care. Well, guess what? There are no pink slips in the military and our excellent health care system is free.
So sign up. We want you. Your nation wants you. And we in the military community need you. My family deserves a break.
Her blog is interesting. It's http://blogs.fayobserver.com/operationmarriage/
Rebekah Sanderlin
"Operation Marriage"
If the American military went to war and America went shopping, then seven years later the war wages on but America is home from the shopping spree with her credit cards maxed out and her head aching from buyer's remorse.
The war didn't change and the fighting force didn't change, but the people back home are over it. War, it seems, went out of style in 2003.
In the military community we roll our eyes when we hear that Americans are war weary. Just what, we wonder, are you all weary of? Hearing about the war? Seeing stories in the news? Most Americans don't even know anyone in the military and won't have any direct contact with the war besides seeing uniformed soldiers in the airport. You all haven't been asked to do anything more to support this war than sit back and watch as your tax dollars are spent.
To us, civilian complaints about being war weary sound like the gripes of deadbeat dads: It's a bummer to hear that things are going badly and you're sick of being asked to pay for it, but you're not doing any of the real work yourselves. Many of you believe that fighting this war is optional. You seem to think our nation could make everything okay by just sitting this one out.
And, in a way, that reasoning makes sense. Most of you haven't been on the front lines or on the homefront. You haven't looked into the eyes of the enemy and the innocents and you haven't heard gunshots and mortar rounds in the background during a precious-but-short phone call. You haven't had villagers beg you to stay or to adopt their children. And you haven't heard your soulmate grapple with dueling guilt: Guilt that he's leaving his family for so long and guilt that he isn't deployed more frequently and for longer so that he could do more. You haven't seen or heard any of this, so how could you possibly understand?
It's not your fault. Nobody has asked you to do anything. Our leaders didn't think you would be willing to make real sacrifices, so they never bothered to ask. They let you all think that shopping yourselves into debt was patriotic, that spending yourselves into bankruptcy and foreclosure was enough to keep our nation safe.
You are war weary because futility breeds weariness. When you feel like something is for no good reason and getting nowhere, it's understandable that you'd be over it. But maybe you wouldn't be so war weary if you, personally, had a stake in what was happening "over there."
In the military community, the price tag for this war is much higher but the commitment level is much greater. Our country has not only asked for our tax dollars (and believe me, we're paying monetarily for this war, too) but for our blood, our family time, our futures, our children's happiness and our very lives. We have enlisted and reenlisted – and offered our support to our spouses who sign back up - because, soldier and spouse, we know the commitment level of the people who want to kill us and we know the desperate dependence of the people our nation has vowed to protect. We know that we have to be at least as committed as our enemy or our own children will be fighting this same war.
My husband has spent the bulk of our five-and-a-half-year marriage deployed. He's missed most of our son's life and our daughter has never even heard his voice – not even in utero. We won't know for years what the long-term effects of these deployments will be on him, on us and on our kids. Last year he suffered a serious head injury and he's lost most of the hearing in his right ear, the ear closest to his gun. We don't know what the long-term effects of his injuries will be, either. This year, on his third deployment to Afghanistan, he missed my father's death and funeral, our daughter's birth, our son learning to ride a bike and catching his first fish, and countless other precious moments that cannot be reclaimed. There is no predicting what events he'll miss in the future.
And we are the lucky ones.
My husband has lost more than 20 friends in this global war on terror and I have an ever-growing group of Army widow friends. They are young and beautiful and many have young children. They are also stunted. They hang around Army towns years after losing their soldiers because they say they don't fit in anywhere else. They say they can no longer relate to what they see and hear in the civilian world.
They can't reintegrate into the your world because there the people they meet don't know what it's like to sacrifice everything for something intangible. The widows say they don't feel like they fit in where people don't know how hard it is to break away from that last hug before a deployment. In the civilian world the widows, like all soldiers and military spouses these days, are treated as oddities, something to marvel or gawk at from a distance. People either fawn over us or try to ignore us. Our presence inspires either adulation or discomfort.
So we hunker down in our military towns, where regular pilgrimages to D.C. to visit loved ones at Arlington and Walter Reed are common. In military towns, we can laugh about all the dust and sand that comes into our homes after a deployment, carted thousands of miles from where it was picked up. We can complain about long lines at the post office during our weekly visits to send care packages. We can vent about news of another deployment, less than a year after the last one. If anyone in America should be war weary, it's us.
And make no mistake: We are tired. We are stretched thin. Our marriages and our families are collapsing. Our children are emotionally damaged. They act out at school and cry at home. Everyday we wonder if we have the strength for even another day of this. We're tired from the work, but we're not weary of the mission.
This war is far from over, that's something both candidates for the presidency have acknowledged. Whichever man finds himself in the Oval Office come January will be in a position to decide our fates in the military community in a way more personal and immediate than most Americans will experience. The next president will determine how much my husband and I will see each other for the next four years and whether or not he will have the tools and policies he needs when he is in harm's way. The next president will determine our odds of continuing to be the lucky ones.
This war is far from over – that is an obvious truth in military communities. But our reality seems so very different from yours. For the last seven years our elected officials haven't thought enough of you to ask you to pitch in. They haven't, so I will.
My husband and I know that this is not his last deployment and we know that his odds of returning home get worse with each trip. The only way our family and other military families will get a break is if more Americans sign up to join the fight. News reports these days are full of stories of lay-offs and the high cost of health care. Well, guess what? There are no pink slips in the military and our excellent health care system is free.
So sign up. We want you. Your nation wants you. And we in the military community need you. My family deserves a break.
Her blog is interesting. It's http://blogs.fayobserver.com/operationmarriage/
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Tagged
Only cuz it was from Anna Marie...
9 Things that Happened Yesterday
9 Things that I'm Looking Forward to
9 Things on My Wish List
I won't curse anybody, but if you're so inclined, I'd love to read yours!
9 Things that Happened Yesterday
- Visited with my buddy Carla who I haven't seen in what feels like FOREVER on our way to Roloff farms.
- Saw Matt and Zach Roloff.
- Updated data notebook for one of my kiddos.
- Planted about 75 flower bulbs.
- Took a bath cuz my female parts were hurting me.
- Took a shower cuz I was smelly from working in the yard.
- Went on a date with hubby and ate authentic Indian food for the first time I can remember.
- Saw a really stupid movie (don't know why I let him talk me into seeing An American Carol, ugh).
- Fell asleep watching Food Network.
9 Things that I'm Looking Forward to
- People to stop freaking out about the economy.
- The elections to be OVER and to stop having to see all the stupid commercials and hear all the stupid vote-for-me double-talk.
- Anything with chocolate.
- My resurrected body with no acne or cottage cheese thighs.
- Paying off debt.
- Grandkids.
- Going to Hawaii (ah, some day).
- Dinner (Dave's making Tuna and stuffed mushrooms and rice pilaf).
- Not the rainy season.
9 Things on My Wish List
- A million bucks.
- Paid off house.
- Dog that didn't shed.
- Husband home each evening.
- Non-moody daughter.
- Kids finding their perfect soul-mate that I like and Dave can tolerate that will give me pretty and perfect grandchildren.
- Lush grass that I don't have to treat or trim.
- No allergies.
- Musical talent.
I won't curse anybody, but if you're so inclined, I'd love to read yours!
October 12, 2008
Let's see. Last weekend, we made a surprise trip out to Sequim to surprise my parents who just got back from their mission in the Caribbean. It was great fun! Ah, those two look just like I'm sure I did when I got back--a bit of deer-in-the-headlights look. You can't really explain to someone who hasn't gone on a mission the intense "weirdness" you feel when you come home. For 18 months or two year, you have spent every waking minute in the service of other people. You have studied, taught, served, in many cases lived life in a different language and culture. Every moment of your life is scheduled and busy. Even your "P-day" (day off) isn't a day off as you have to, in that one day, do all the day-to-day stuff you don't have a chance to do the rest of the week like laundry and cleaning and shopping. Oh, and most P-days you end up having real missionary work to do, too. There is no rest day! But, it's so full of fulfillment and purpose and you love it. Then, all of the sudden, you come home, and BAM! There's nothing. Oh, there's still plenty to do, but it's different. It feels... almost wrong. Like you're doing something you're not suppose to. It's an eery feeling. It goes away, and soon enough you're making all the dumb, selfish, and trivial mistakes you used to. It's actually suppose to be that way. That's really life--not mission life. But, it's still a real adjustment. Anyway, my parents are in the midst of it. It was *great* to see them, though! And we get to go back this coming weekend to be at their homecoming.
This week, I had my usually busy work week plus an extra Seattle trip for someone's IEP. I have one very challenging client that keeps me up at night, but for the most part, I love all my families and, of course, adore the kids I get to work with. It's a lot of work, but it's a labor of love. I really feel like I'm doing something meaningful and full of purpose. Kinda like the mission!
I've been getting allergy shots each week. It's a series of a ton of shots each week over 4 hours so I can get through the series sooner and not drag it out. I'm quite a ways into them now, and my arms are bruised and sore to show for it. This last one didn't like me so much, and I started to have a "systemic reaction" which I have had before when I got shots a few years ago. Long story short, I was glad they did make me stay that long period because they knew what to do to prevent a bad reaction, and I was just fine. But, that means they are going to have to slow down my injection plan a bit and go slower, so I will have to go in more often and for longer than I had wanted to by this time. Oh well. By next Spring it won't matter, and I'll pretty much be done either way, so it's fine.
Kids have fallen into a nice weekly pattern with school, piano lessons, lil' Audra's choir, Activity Days, and Swim Team and Isaak's chess club. I continue to hear good reports from school. Math teacher says he's been doing great (he has above a 100% grade right now) and has only shown his anger once. :) Isaak has become quite laid back and cooperative over the past few months. I'm sure it's a combination of the right medication and maturity, but whatever it is, it's wonderful! He's a piece of cake now! He went on a Scout campout this weekend solo and sounds like he did just fine other than some cold toes in the morning.
Yesterday, lil' Audra and I went with best buddies to the Matt Roloff farms to pick pumpkins. Have you seen that show on TLC "Little People, Big World?" Well, that family's farm is just over the border, so we went. LONG car line to get it, but we waited it out, and it was a ton of fun! We saw some of the guys from the show and the cameramen following them around. Lil' Audra thinks she's "famous" now because they were filming once when Matt was driving his little golf cart thing past us. It was really fun. Then, Audra and I came home and planted a bunch of Spring bulbs. We'll see how they turn out next Spring! It was a fun weekend.
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