bird watching

I told Nathan that now I’m not only looking at birds, but taking bad pictures of them, I feel like I’m half a step away from qualifying for an AARP card. Which wouldn’t be a bad thing if I was anywhere near qualifying for one. But I’m not.

Also: who says I can’t be a young bird watcher?!?! There have to be a few, right? It’s just the only ones I’ve ever met are grandpa-aged.

Ring necked pheasant, just across the street.

Really bad out-the-kitchen-window photo of what we’re pretty sure is an ash-throated flycatcher.

Oh, school special projects, I don’t adore you.

Jacob has to dress like a Roman on Friday for school. Once upon a time I might’ve thought it was super cute and fun but this week I’m in the “oh please” camp. One more thing to do. I think we’ll do a toga because white flat twin sheets are $4.50 at WalMart and that just seems easy, right? It better be. The link sent out by the teacher had information on proper underwear, but I think if I mentioned “loin cloth” to Jacob, he might turn red.

Maybe I’m kind of bugged by this because the week before spring break was spirit week where they dressed a certain way each day. And then in the next couple weeks we’ll be having the 3rd grade Wax Museum, where Jacob will be transformed into Abraham Lincoln. That actually sounds kind of fun to see all the different kids.

While Jacob’s class has been learning about “while in Rome…”, Josh’s has been doing all things Egyptian. He came home with this last week.

He had a snake head from something else – another part of the hat, maybe? And after he was done demonstrating his best mummy pose, he was chasing around the dog, telling him to “LOOK AND LIVE” while shoving the snake in his face. Seamless transition from mummy to Moses.

Goodbye, Civic!

Yesterday we sold our Civic. I bought it new in July 2000 and was determined to have this be the car my grandkids drove. You can do that with Hondas. A couple weeks ago we upsized to a new (to us) Accord and it took TWO weeks for me to list the Civic.

Here’s the thing. I’m kind of prideful about not being really attached to THINGS. Ironic, right? But I was surprisingly attached to this little car. Part of the reason it took us two weeks to sell is because I knew that before we sold it we should replace the dash and radio, and get an oil change and maybe a tune up.

The car got broken into two or three years ago and the mean creeps not only stole the radio but totally messed up the dashboard thing. We’re just feeling so behind on life the last couple months that we didn’t make time to take the car in to get fixed or tuned up last week.

Yesterday I decided to list it on KSL anyway with full disclosure and a nice discounted price. The first guy that came over was kind of a jerk and we decided we didn’t even want to sell it to him if he had offered to pay more. I am so happy the second guy took the car. A nice man with a cute family who needed a commuter car because he just drove his 95 Civic into the ground after more than 300,000 miles. Yes this car we were selling was almost 13 years old but it only had 92,000 miles. That’s so good, and he knew it. I hope he gets to drive this for another 10 years.

I kept thinking about that little car last night, and told Nathan “I wish WE were going to be the ones to drive it into the ground with 300,000 miles!” He just laughs at me, surprised I care. It’s silly to be attached to a CAR, but we’re thankful that we’re able to have reliable cars to get us around.

Friday!

Last week I had decided that Friday’s don’t mean anything good when you’re a mom. But this Friday has been GREAT! When I’m stressed and anxious I tend to retreat but the past couple days I’ve been able to spend time with some good friends, get out of the house a bit, and it’s helped me get to a really happy place.

Ainsley and I went on a bike ride! It’s insane how much work it is taking to feel like I can just walk around the block without getting tired. Sitting down for 8 weeks straight can do that to you. We just bought one of these

for Ainsley that hooks up to my bike. Bless her heart she is so darn slow on her bike and I think because she’s so slow it affects her balance – so she’s not been able to ditch the training wheels yet. With this she can learn to go faster – and we can ALL go faster.

On our ride we stopped and talked with this nice man who had a spotting scope by the wetlands just behind the house. I asked him the name of “that small bird in the mud with the pointy beak” and he asked for more detail. And then more detail. Finally he just pulled out his book and showed me pictures – I guess that describes four different birds in the mud in the lake right now. Apparently, our neighborhood is one of the very best places in the state to bird watch right now, and people are coming from all over. We’ve been excited that the pelicans are back, and the seagulls have been extra loud – but I didn’t know that we have 4 (or 5?) different kinds of gulls right there. The man showed us a list his friend compiled of all the birds in that same area yesterday – over 50 varieties. Isn’t that fun? He told us more about his birding organization and invited us to come. I don’t know where we’ll find time in the next few months, but with all these birds in our own backyard, we really should find time one of these years.

By the way, that bird I was asking him to identify is an Avocet. So pretty.

special needs kids

So I recently learned that some parents of special needs kids hate the term special needs. I’m not even going to try to understand that one. Because while we have at least two special needs kids, sometimes, especially on extra hard days, I’ve looked at Nathan and said “doesn’t it feel like all of our kids are special needs?!”

But, really, think about it. What child does NOT have special needs? Even my typical children (side note: in the special ed/special needs world, our normal/average kids are called typical…vs the sibling(s) who are atypical) have specific needs that can be different than their siblings.  My job as mom is figuring out who needs what when. And woo boy…what a job. Sometimes I worry that my typical kids get lost, especially on the days that dealing with the atypical kids takes up so much time and energy…and then I feel like I need to prioritize the needs of the typical kids even more the next day, making their needs special, making that kid feel special, reminding them we love them and want to focus on THEM, too; we want to focus on the normal and good as often as we can, too.

I go back and forth trying to decide whether to talk about our atypical kid(s) here…part of me needs the vent I sometimes get, part of me feels like explaining helps you all understand us better, or maybe understand a family/child in your neighborhood better. But more, I worry about protecting the kids. We’ve got to know that whenever you hit “publish” it’s out there forever. So when my dear kids are searching for jobs or applying for college one day will the employer/recruiter google and find this silly little blog and learn things about the kids from 10 and 20 years ago that are maybe old and outdated but enough to make them weary of hiring or accepting that child? While I’ve learned over the years that it’s better to be open about my mental illness and brain issues, I still don’t know how I feel talking about a lot of aspects of it relating to my KIDS.  I’ve been thinking about this for a few months, and obviously I still haven’t decided anything.

Did any of you see this op-ed on CNN over the weekend called “Let’s Stop Keeping Mental Illness a Secret”?  Amen and amen.

 

What I learned on butt rest

Not to be preach-ety preachy and all, because how many times have I already learned these lessons and how many more times will it take…but mainly for my own reminders…a little list of a few things I learned on butt rest.

1) Being able to serve others is a gift. Seriously – even just your daily tasks at taking care of a family – that’s service. When you can’t do it, you realize what a blessing it is to be able to at all.

2) Take care of yourself first. That whole thing about putting on your oxygen mask before you stick the kids’ on. I know, you’re all “sure. whatever.” Well, I first got hurt just before Halloween. And was “too busy” dealing with a couple kids who had very real and immediate needs, so I convinced myself I couldn’t make time to go to the doctor for me. So when I finally went 3 months later, I had to deal not only with the initial injury, but the fact I “traumatized” (doctor’s words) the injury by walking on it that much longer – and now I’ll be paying for it over a much longer period of time with a small AND a large surgery instead of just a small one. That was dumb.

3) Learning to receive graciously is critical. That goes for even things as small as compliments, friends, but largery things, too.

4) Sometimes I do put too high a priority on cleaning, I think. But in the long run, systems and routines and a tidy house makes our family happier and life run more smoothly.

5) All you need is less. The more stuff you have, the more time you spend managing the THINGS instead of enjoying the PEOPLE and TIME you have to share with them.

6) Rest and be thankful. There’s a bench in a small church garden in Carmel, CA engraved with those words. I had them engraved on a sign for our home some time ago. So important.

7) Be your own miracle. So in Judges 6 Gideon is complaining to God that they’ve not seen the miracles they heard about from the time of the Israelites, and “hey, God, we need to be saved from the Midionites…where is our miracle?” And God looks on Gideon and says “have I not sent thee?” Hey, Gideon – you’re the miracle…go DO the miracle. My lesson was to not just sit and stew in the hard…find things we could do to lighten our burden ourselves as much as we could.

8) Then go be the miracle for someone else. We have been the recipients of amazing amounts of love and service. People who might’ve said “hey, their life is really hard right now…where’s their miracle?” Then they heard that still, small voice whisper “You can go be the miracle.” A lot of people would say “oh, it’s nothing” when we thanked them. A lot of times it wasn’t practical help as much as it was lifting of spirit type help. I had gotten myself into a bad dude mood type attitude that didn’t allow me to hear the Spirit, or let me access the comforting gift of the Spirit that I needed. When people helped lightened my mood and Spirit, I was able to feel that comforting Spirit again that I needed so much. Anything you do for someone else to help them, to lighten their mood and allow them to feel the Holy Ghost just a bit…that’s not a small thing.

BYU Saturday

We headed to BYU Saturday for their Ballroom Dance show. We drove by the Provo Tabernacle/Temple before hand to look at the construction, then chased ducks on the south side of campus before the show started.

I straightened Em’s hair for the first time Saturday…not very well, and it didn’t last overnight.