The Case for Nobody In Particular

This really is the case for me, because I am nobody in particular. I have no grand achievements that will ever be recorded in history by anybody but my own. My education isn't even something to boast about. I don't know or associate with powerful people or celebrities. In short I am nobody in particular.
Recently I have been mulling over different things I have read or heard quoted. The authors generally are well known people who's deeds or work mark them out as some one in particular. People know of them for the exact opposite of the reasons mentioned above, that make me obscure. I like to learn. I think human nature is fascinating. I may or may not agree with what has been said, by persons in particular, but I like to hear what they say none the less. It turns the machinery of my mind which mills the information down to that which is valuable and useful to me. Then it really is enjoyable because it is like finding treasure. It makes me hungry for more. Sometimes though after receiving information from people in particular and the milling has been finished and I find little or nothing of value I begin to think of all the nobodies in particular who have contributed some of the greatest treasure to my collection. The greatest treasures I live by have come from many, dear to me, nobody in particulars. My heart and joy has been shaped by these same. I think the best truths may come from the nobodies in particular out there because they are not famous for any reason and have no necessity to make truth or philosophy for their own profit. So, long live the everyman and no one in particular.

Talking to Myself or Sleeping Beauty

So after such a long time without posting maybe I am blogging to myself but since this is as close as I come to keeping a journal so I guess it's not as bad as talking to yourself. Here are some pictures to give you an idea of what we have been doing here.

Dallin having a summer nap. Rare but beautiful.

Rasberries! Yum we picked these ourselves at Grandma Sharon's house.

Blurry but they were so beautiful and I can't seem to delete the pictures tonight for some reason.The best brother sister combination on the Cross Country team.

Torin's first temple trip. Torin's turns 12! Roan's summer mug shot. '09 Eavan's too. Marin turns six! Thanks Grandma You really know what a girl likes. Pretty Pink and Six. Summer kite flying at the new house.Repeat. Marin- picture hair and clothes done by Kieran. Birthday cake with merry go round on top.Brayden turns 16!!!!!!!!!!!! Dallin gardening with Grandpa. Helping is the best fun. Marin's kindergarden graduation program.Kieran and Torin Hamming it up.Brayden in concert dress at the end of last school year 08/09. Kieran's Seventh grade Orchestra Trip to Lagoon.The First place and Overall Competion first place trophiesKieran in concert dress 08/09 school year.Marin at Kindergarden graduation with her teacher and cousin Maren Nichols.

Happy Today

I feel happy today. For the most part i am not an unhappy person. I like many things and I am easily pleased by a lot of simple things. Lately though there has been some stress in my life beyond the ordinary. Paul being laid off, Paul getting a job for 1/3 less salary, dentist trouble, trying to finish a house without spending any money, car dying, moving, to name a few. These things have been weighing on me even when I am not giving them direct attention. This excess seems to make it easier to let the little things get to me. So each day I work a little harder to maintain my floating boat and I have been getting a little tired lately. Then a week like this one happens. Okay there was one big hairy dentist appointment in it that I thought just might kill me and it wasn't even for me but after that the week has been day after day of good things. The pace has been incredible but I can take it if the rewards are equal to the stress.
Kieran went to competition in Utah with her Orchestra. They took first place in the orchestra division and first overall in the competition. Torin had a concert in the park. They were great. The weather was beautiful and the music took me back to my own band days. Brayden played in the high school orchestra concert and someone gave me an extra ticket wich was lucky cause it was sold out. Yes, they are that good and it was one little bit of heaven after the morning I spent crying in the dentist office. Kieran and Eavan had concerts the next night. Kieran looked like a dream and the middle school ochestra is worth a special trip just to hear them. Eavan was part of a fourth grade area choir concert and they sung some fun songs that I haven't heard in a long time. I had lunch with Eavan and it seems that kids have been giving me a little extra love here and there this week to top it all off . Today I just feel happy. All the burdens are still there but I don't feel them weighing on me as they did just last week. I hope spring has arrived where you are and brought you a happy day too.

Words Can Not Describe

It seems like those word mean something horrible but this time they mean exactly the opposite. I have been sitting here trying to choose words for the title of this post but none seem right. They just don't convey what I saw as I drove away from the school this morning.
Today was Midieval Day at the middle school. The teachers have been preparing us for months. Several notes came home with little blurbs about the mini classes they would be able to choose, small details of what to expect and they always ended with a comment about how appropriate it would be to come in costume. Kieran loves drama and costumes are fun stuff here. But usually just kind of what our creative brain can concoct out of the dress up bin. This time Kieran was hoping for something a little more authentic. We started early looking for items to use from the D.I. (local thrift store). We found one or two things but not a whole costume so we opted for renting something from the college.
The Costume shop on campus is dress up heaven. We had a helper, I can't remember her name, who took us into the shop. She showed us the small period sketches of things typical for the time period . After honing in on the particular era that interested us she started moving racks. Clothes racks just doesn't give you the right impression so let me explain. Each rack was probably about five feet wide, eight feet tall, thirty feet long and so many of them that the open space in the room was limited to the entry and about two ailses of space to walk between the racks. These racks are so large and so many that you would never be able to see the costumes without the motors which move the racks to open the desired ailse down the rack you want to look at. The costumes are put in order by era. We started with the earlier times of what could be considered mideval and or rennisance. Our helper went down the row picking out the ones that would be small enough to fit Kieran. If not for our helper we might still be there. There are so many costumes. Each one she pulled out she would ask Kieran if she liked that one. You might think that any one would do, but you know, not all of those dresses were pretty. So we left the weird or ugly and piled up the pretty ones to try. After our arms were full and the prospects exciting we went out of the shop and into the sewing room where there was a dressing room.
Then the fun really got started. It reminded me of nothing so much as the Chrismases we went shopping for wedding dresses. I would get the dress off the hanger crawl into the top with both hands out in front of me like going through a low tunnel and pile the dress over my arms slinky style. Then I would turn and drop the folds over the top of Kierans head. She would catch the arms of the dress with hers and voila instant renisannce princess. I wish you could have been there. In the end we liked two of the dresses best. One was an orange gold color with red trim and a fur collar. It looked like maybe a viking princess. The one we chose was pink (if you know Kieran's taste in color and clothes you know this is a surprise) The bodice was trimmed in wide flowered ribbon and the sleeves were puffy sheer fabric under the same ribbon woven to make decorative sleeves. It was a beautiful dress.
Kieran took the dress home and hung it in her closet for today. This morning she was up early. She said she couldn't sleep she was so excited. She ate and dressed quickly. Then we started on the hair Kieran has pefect hair it is about waist lenghth. So I started braiding. First I did a braid around the top like a crown but she said no way to authentic (translation: too fancy) Next I pulled it half way out and braided it back from the other side and around till I met up with the braid I had made first. This was much simpler and the two long tails of the braides hung down the back. This was much more what she had in mind. Last we tucked a couple of handkerchiefs into the bodice for modesty sake and she was ready to go. I dropped her off at the school and turned my car around to leave. As I looked back down the side walk and saw my beautiful girl hurrying into school. I got a little teary. I still can't put into words what I saw and felt but I think it does have a little to do with princesses. It was not really about the hair and the dress.
We are busy everday with our everyday lives. The things that need to get done and the things we want to get done fill the hours. I try to choose carefully just what I will put in the time I have. I have been taught that what we do and the choices we make are important. I have been taught that we are all children of God. I belive these things in my heart. Today as I saw Kieran going into school I think I saw these things with my eyes. My own princess went to school today. She was not the only one. I feel like I am always greatful for my family and friends. I love them. I wouldn't want to be here without them but I think because they are always with me and are all brilliant people I can forget how special they are. Today as I watched Kieran go into school I was a little dazzled by her and reminded just how special we all are. Princesses and princes. You really are impotant people.

Night Games and Mourning

Night games, Ghosts in the Graveyard, No Bears, Capture the Flag, any of these sound familiar? Last Saturday the teenagers at our house hosted night games. Twelve youth gathered at our house to play. When they were all gathered they went out t0 the way back and started on the games. Kieran and a couple others came late because of the Young Womens Broadcast. It was above freezing and most of the snow had melted so it is officially spring in Rexburg. There were few trips up to the house for supplies but nobody wanted to quit, even when the drizzle started coming down. At 9:30pm parents started showing up to pick up their kids the group came in happy and excited. The conversation full of instant replays of exciting insidences and near misses I took as a good sign that things had gone well. We had only a couple of minor injuries due to unseen tree limbs or stumps. It was a real treat to see these kids enjoy themselves. They almost sounded like my little one when it's time to go home after a play date. "Do we have to go now?" "Can't we stay a little longer?" It was a fun time even for me. After all the kids were picked up Kieran and Brayden came in to sit on my bed and tell me about the games. It was just so fun to sit with these almost grown up children and share in their excitement. The fun that they had come to share with me! their Mom! I'm so grateful to my children for the love they still give. I will always treasure the memories of them as babies, their soft baby skin and little round sturdy bodies, the baby talk and hugs and wet slobbery kisses. These things are great memories but I am so glad that they are not all. I am glad for the moments we have now that they are big the intelligent observations they make, the desire I see in them to do right, their testimonies, the questions about things that are hard and what it was like for me as a young person, their tall growing bodies, the hugs, the dry kisses and their willingness to still share laughter, happiness and love with me. I am so happy there continues to be more. I love my children.

So where is the mourning? You see it's my cell phone. It went out to the Way Back for night games and didn't return. No it was not new or expensive. It took only marginal pictures and I had no way to send them to any one or down load them to my computer. I even have another one just like it in my sock drawer. So why the mourning? It had the sim card with it that I have had since Arkasnsas. I will never be able to replace all the numbers that were on that card and I am so sad to lose them. It's almost as bad as losing friends. Feel free to call me to console me in my grief, so I can get your number back.

Hibernation

Winter in Idaho is deep and snowy. The more it snows the deeper it gets. It doesn't melt in between times. The boots and the snow pants go to school every day. I enjoy the snow as long as I don't have to drive in it. Lucky for me they get enough of it here that they plan to plough and usually the roads aren't to bad. This winter I have felt like hibernating. Last year not so much. I think with Paul's new job and moving I felt more like the old farm families that spent the winter months busy with activities that would bring them money in spring or restore items that got worn during summer. This winter, not knowing what the spring will bring, I have been an animal of conservation. I am really good at this. This has been my coping mechanism of choice for many years of my life. It has been quite a while since I've used it though and have been a little surprised to find myself hibernating again. In days and times past I was waiting for something bad to happen. I didn't want to be caught unaware and therefore unprepared. If it wasn't necessary it wasn't done. It took some time and effort to overcome the desire to wait and actually discover what I wanted to be doing. Now I am back to waiting but it is not by choice it is one of those circumstances for which I had stopped waiting. When Paul was first laid off I wanted to gather all my resources. I wanted to be done with projects and check all my support connections across the country and be ready for the long winter if it came to that. After Christmas the preparation was over and the waiting had begun. The snow was coming down as if on cue and I was settling in for winter. Now spring is coming. I can see patches of grass in the yard. My Mom was here a couple of weeks ago and we were busy with some projects that felt like waking up a little. Since she has gone home I think I just crawled back under the covers of my den. I just keep thinking "Five more minutes, Mom." I am finding it hard to know what I want to do without having a clear vision of where my family will be. So what have we been doing? Hibernating. The regular things for the kids have continued school, projects, homework, house cleaning, fish feeding and not much else. We must continue to wait for Paul's job situation to work out but I am beginning to think, under the covers, of what I want to be doing. I really can't stay under much longer. But also can't face coming out until I know I have decided what I can and want to do. So I haven't pushed myself out just to sit in the dark and keep waiting. Just Five more minutes REALLY.

Life is Good

Today's my brithday Yippeee! New clothes in the closet, money from Grandma, great book from a friend and French Silk pie on it's way,Not to mention a new e-mail and my own "space" to blog which is pretty sweet! And to top off the cake I'm now an official teenager. Life is Good
P.S. If you want to read my blog please leave your e-mail as a comment or somehow get it to me so I can invite you