Good Morning, Sunshine!

The missionary care package I did for May was YELLOW.
Which translates into SUNSHINE for me.

{the contents}

Note: this was all divided (unequally, with Ryan getting more than the others) to make up

"Sunshine Boxes" for a couple of my daughter's teachers at school for an 

end-of-school-year gift. (my favorite gift idea lately)

{the packed and ready-to-ship box}

The four yellow flaps say:

"Sending you a little box of SUNSHINE to brighten your day as you are brightening ours!!"

"Here comes the SUN.... (A.K.A. Elder Brenchley) ....and I say, 'it's all right.'"

"A dark world aches for a splash of the SUN." (meaning "The Son")

"Always look on the SUNNY side of Life!" (& your mission)

When I had barely sent Ryan off on his mission, another Missionary Mom came to visit and shared with me how she sends her son a package every month because it's the closest thing she can do to giving him a hug.  Her "wisdom" made an impression on me.  I do agree with her - it's a way for me to send my love and hugs.

This was confirmed in my Mother's Day card I got from Ryan with this P.S. at the end of it, "I know you love me, Mom.  If you didn't, you wouldn't send me monthly packages and weekly LONG emails!  Best Missionary Mom Ever!"

(He's learning so much on his mission!)  ;)

**********************************

To see past missionary care packages, click HERE

If You Confuse the Gas Pedal for the Brake.......

......you end up with this:

{And a traumatized teenager.}

It was a "Perfect Storm" that played a part in the "incident":

• The State of Utah says they can get a Learner's Permit when 15 yrs. old....so he's old enough to get a Learner's Permit, but not old enough to enroll in the actual Driver's Ed. class, yet.  (Which means he's just suppose to practice driving with his parents in the meantime.)
• He had only had three practice driving sessions under his belt so far; one in the church parking lot, two on a real road.
• His dad is not equipped with a voice that can carry with enough volume when yelling the word, "STOP!" or "TURN LEFT." OR with a quick reflex, in his state of shock, to reach over and crank the steering wheel away from the brick column.

Oh, the joys of having teenage drivers!
No wonder the cost of insuring a TEENAGE BOY is sky high!

To make it [kind of] a little bit funny.....on their drive (just a minute before the "incident"), they passed one of our son's friends who was walking home, and Matt yelled out the window (jokingly), "Sam, stay off the roads!"
Needless to say, when the brick column tumbled over, it made a very loud noise.
Sam heard it, but didn't see it, from down the street where he was still walking and he (jokingly) texted our son, "What was that noise? Did you run over another curb?" (because that's what happened on a previous practice drive).
Our son later texted him back, "Not quite."

You Can Tell I'm Not a Teenager

Earlier today, I wanted to use my cell phone and I didn't know where it was.
(THAT'S the first clue that I'm NOT a teenager!!!)

I checked all the usual places (purse, nightstand table, car, kitchen counter, charging station, etc.) but it wasn't there.
Oh well, I thought, I guess I won't use it right now.  I had work to do anyway.
(THAT'S the second clue that I'm NOT a teenager!!)

During a break at work, I called Matt on a land line and asked if he knew where my cell phone was.  Nope.  And we talked about the last time he'd seen me with it.  I'd had it at the School Musical last night, but neither of us could remember it since then.  And that had been 16 hours prior.  A whole 16 hours without a cell phone?!!?
(THAT'S the third clue that I'm NOT a teenager!)

I decided to call my cell phone number in an effort to locate it.  And a woman answered, "Hello.  Farmington Jr. High office.  This cell phone was found in the bathroom here at the school.  Whose is it?"  (The performance was held there last night)
"It's mine!" I replied.
Oh, yeah.....I HAD gone to the restroom after the performance, and as a precaution, I'd taken my phone out of my back pocket so it wouldn't fall out and take a "swim" into the toilet.
And, thankfully, an honest soul had found it and taken it to the office!  Alright! Farmington teens have redeemed themselves from their last stunt.
The office staff took down my name and told me they'd hold the cell phone for me.  I told them I'd try to come pick it up sometime that day.
"Sometime" ended up being 2 1/2 hours later.

When I did go claim my cell phone, the office staff & I were joking about how I am NOT a teenager.
The sure signs:
* I didn't even realize it was missing for 16 hours!
* When it's whereabouts were discovered, I did NOT RUSH right on down to get it!
* I had NOT gone absolutely "batty catty" during the separation period we had experienced!
* And, although there were some missed calls and texts that had piled up during my absence, the number of them was still in the single digits!

I'm one of the 6%.

Of Course it Happened That Way

Probably for my first time EVER, I did not dread Mother's Day!  This year, there was actually something to look forward to.
It's because Mother's Day is ONE of the two-times-a-year that missionaries are allowed to call home!!! :)
Christmas is the other day that they are allowed to call.  And last Christmas, Ryan informed us he'd be calling at a certain time.....and then we waited 3 HOURS until he actually did! (When they are at someone else's house, they have to wait until they can set them up on their device - and if they're busy making dinner, it isn't a good time to ask for help, etc.)
So....we were kind of suspecting that his Mother's Day call would be the same; we took the time he told us, then added 1+ hours.

With this theory in mind, we had our children stay at church for Primary.  It is tradition in our ward that the Youth take over teaching/leading/directing the Primary children on Mother's Day, so all the usual Primary workers (many women) have the "day off" and can attend the adult classes in church that day.  Well, Kyle & Haylee got assigned to sit with and teach Brookelle's class.  They were so excited!  Especially Brookelle! 
Kyle & Haylee planned together.
They divided up the sections of the lesson.
They studied the concepts and the scripture stories.
Haylee even put together a bag of props to use in the lesson.
AND they assigned their other helper to bring a treat for the class.
They were ALL set!

Meanwhile, Matt & I returned home, just for the odd chance that he called on time, and set the Skype up.
Before the time he said he'd call, I went upstairs to my bathroom to brush my hair and teeth and put on some lip gloss.....and lo, and behold, he called EARLY!!!
Only Matt was in the room when Ryan's face filled our TV screen.
Apparently, Matt started calling my name, but I can't hear a thing from anywhere else in the house when I am in my bathroom....so I didn't even know he was already on.
When I did come down the stairs, just on my own time (without knowing he was on yet), I heard voices.
This is what I overheard:
Ryan: "Hey, Dad!  How's it going?"
Matt: "Good."  And then....silence.  (Seriously, he said just one word....to our son who we haven't seen in real life for 8 1/2 months!?!?!) 
Ryan: [laughing out loud] "Oh, wow, Dad.  You're still not a man of many words."
Matt: "I need your mother!  Where is she, to help me out?"
(Then I enter the room)
Matt: "Oh, good!  Here she is!"
And then he sat back, and visibly relaxed, and mostly listened to the rest of the [1 hr. 40 min.] conversation!
Hahahahaha hahahahaha hahahaha.

Oh, and I texted Kyle that Ryan had called and to come home now, so he gave his Primary class over to another young man, gathered up his little sisters, and they ran home to see/talk to Ryan!

And they didn't even get to teach their Primary lesson!!!  :(
It's because they were actually prepared.
YOU KNOW if they would've just bagged the lesson, thinking they wouldn't have to teach it, Ryan's call would've come late again, and they'd been lookin' like idiots in front of the Primary children!!

So, the moral of the story....
When you're expecting/counting on something, it doesn't/won't happen.  (I told you my life is governed by Murphy's Law!)
When you're NOT expecting/counting on something, your expectations are EXCEEDED (in this case, an EARLY call).

*****************************
As another interesting side note about the day, my other teenager son started asking me to take a picture with him.
WHAT?!?
Since WHEN does he want to take pictures with me?
When I couldn't get to it right away, he kept pestering asking me to do it.
Finally, I obliged.

Turns out, he had an ulterior motive.
Our photo ended up on Instagram later that day.....just like A LOT of his friends & their moms pictures did.  He can't miss out on what "all the other kids are doing" now, can he?!?  ;)

P.S. Besides the Skype with our missionary, everyone made & cleaned up a fabulous breakfast & dinner (the menus of my choosing), the talks at church were done well, I got a gift I had been wanting for a long time, I had the opportunity to read my book (undisturbed while everyone else was busy), and we stayed home TOGETHER.
I think this was my BEST Mother's Day to date!  ;)
(Lest you think I'm now a different person with a new opinion [or that someone is impersonating me on this blog post].......under different circumstances, my previous recorded feelings about Mother's Day still stand.)  ;)

Just Loungin' Around on the Couch Eating Bon-Bons ~ Take 2

I was talking with a friend today whose "baby" is the same age as my "baby."  As is the same for me, this school year marked the first time for her since becoming a mother that ALL children are in school for the WHOLE day.  That means we're home alone during the day now.  Unlike me, who [idiotically] changed my work hours at my jetBlue job to the daytime and, consequently, ruined all my "discretionary time," she is not currently employed for pay, so I guess others have taken that as the green light to stick their noses in her business and ask stupid questions.
She told me that multiple people have now started to ask her, "What do you do all day?"

What?!?

Like no one could possibly think of anything else one would do besides "punch a time card?"
(So irritating).

I'll tell you what she does:
She runs at least 5 miles a day.
She keeps her house immaculately clean!!  Like we're talkin' you could totally eat off her floors!  Seriously.  And you would NOT find dust/dirt in her window tracks, a ring around her toilet bowl, or crumbs on the kitchen counter!!!  She makes sure of it.  ;)
She shop vacs her garage regularly.  As well as her cars.
(She'll wash and wax the cars' exterior, too!)
She makes wreaths for her front door.
She volunteers in both of her elementary school-aged children's classroom once a week.
She goes on EVERY SINGLE field trip, as a chaperone, with her children's school class.
She makes dinner.  Even freezer meals for future use, when needed for unexpected company, a sick neighbor/friend, or a hectic, busy day for the family.
And she often brings my family plates of goodies......just because!
She serves in the Young Women organization of her church congregation.  (THAT takes a ton of time, I know from past experience!)
She spends a good amount of time on the phone with or at doctor offices due to her children's unique "ability" to break their legs!  ;)  And being an advocate for their care.
Did I mention she runs 5 miles a day?!?
She grows flowers.
She just did half the wedding (planning, shopping, decorating, baking, scheduling, paying for) her younger sister's wedding.
She has six people's laundry to do which includes a plethora a dance and soccer workout gear.  (And it doesn't get left undone like some people I know [me])
Her kids never look like rag-a-muffins (again like some people I know [me]) - with three girls' hair nicely coiffed and donning cute clothes.
Her car goes in and out of her driveway all day long running different errands in order to keep the pantry stocked and the household running.
She goes to the temple.

Man, I'm tired!

And these are just the things that I SEE or know about.....there's undoubtedly so much more she's doing behind the scenes that I don't see.
Oh!  And she runs 5+ miles a day - did I happen to mention that one, yet? 

I'm not doing all that - are you?  Now that I've "shed light on the situation," would people ask her that question still?!?
Probably.
They REALLY don't have any clue, do they?

Her experience reminded me of my own experience I had recently while I was getting a manicure.  (Oh, is that WHY I'm not doing everything she's doing because I spend my time at the Spa?  ;)  Actually, it is a rarity to find me there - I was finally using a gift certificate I got for my birthday, and had already had for over 6 months.)

So, back to the manicure.....the gal doing it was chatting it up with me and she found out I worked at jetBlue.  She asked me if I was full-time or part-time.  When I told her I worked 24 hrs. a week there, she then asked me, "So, what do you do with the rest of your time?"
I replied that I had a family; a husband and five children.
She kind of went, "Mmmm hmmm" and then pushed further with, "So, what do you do?", dismissing that my previous remark had anything to do with her question of how I fill my time.

Well, interestingly enough, after visiting with her throughout the rest of the manicure, I found out that she:

• Is not married.
• Has children who are from multiple different men.
• Is currently trying to get back with the father of her youngest child, but she doesn't want to move into his place because the last time she lived there, whenever they would fight (which was a lot), he'd get mad and kick them out, and then they'd have no place to live.
• Has her mom live with her, and she watches the kids while she's at work, cleans, does laundry, pays for half the home improvement costs, take the children to appointments, cooks dinner, etc.
• Bar-tends a few night a week and gets off at all hours of the morning. 
• Says she does not have good choice in men.

After that conversation, it became more obvious to me WHY she [ignorantly] asked me the question; it was rather telling that she did not know, hadn't figured it out yet, that there is a connection between TIME and Quality FAMILY life.  ;)

*********************
The first of my "Bon-Bons" posts is back HERE

Not to be Confused as White Elephant Gifts

The missionary care package I did for April was WHITE.

{the contents}

Ya....I over-estimated what would fit in a box - I just kept putting all the white things 

I saw at the store into my shopping cart.

And then, when it didn't all fit, some of my kids called, "dibs" on some of the overflow,

but I did have to return some of the stuff to the store.

Did you know that Target just throws away any food item that is returned?

(Because they think I might have poisoned it, EVEN IF IT IS UNOPENED/UNUSED, so they don't want to sell it to someone else.)

At the Returns counter, the "Customer Service" employee 

(I'm using that title very loosely because I think she *forgot* she works in Customer SERVICE when she was "helping" me) 

made sure to SIGH audibly (many times) as she processed my returns, 

and gave me a discourse about the "fate" of the returned food items, 

sneaking in a comment that some people just donate it without asking for their money back.

(I don't think the Customer Service department is a "good fit" for her, what about you?!)

*End of sidetrack*

On with the care package....

{the packed and ready-to-ship box}

The four white flaps say:

"For behold the [WVCH mission] field is WHITE already to harvest..."  D&C 4:4

"You are the 'great WHITE hope' of the WVCH mission!"  :)

"...though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as WHITE as snow..."  Isaiah 1:18  (a great scripture to share with your peeps!)

"Make sure to give "WHITE glove service" to each person you meet!"

*******************

To see past missionary care packages, click HERE

There is Not a Single Pair of Socks in our Entire Household

...ONLY SINGLETONS

Aaaaugh!

Two hours of helping the girls clean their disaster area bedroom, and this is what we end up with!

The "Buddy System" is not working around here!

(Although, more often than not, I don't think the dryer is the culprit.....my kids have this crazy idea that they're suppose to take their socks off in the back yard, in the car, in the garage, while going up the stairs, at the dinner table, while reading on the couch, instead of right by the dirty clothes hamper where they could deposit them promptly into it...but they only take one sock off in the first location, then take the other one off at a later time/different location to make the whole sock situation EVEN MORE "adventurous!")

The Land of Short Street Signs

Thanks to our [infamous] East Winds here in Farmington, our street signs frequently get blown over.  For a few days after a windstorm, all order on the streets is gone as the signs, that usually tell drivers what to do, lay on the ground.  In some lucky cases, the sign is still somewhat close to the location where it belongs and the city workers can use the same sign to put back up and restore order.
But, when they've blown over and the poles have either broken off or are just severely bent at the base, to make it stand up again, they have to bury the *new* bottom of the pole into the ground which results in the sign being about a foot shorter than it used to be before the wind.  (I've read various reports that typical stop signs are anywhere between 7-10 feet tall.)

And then when the next windstorm comes along and knocks over the sign again, they have to go through the same process, which decreases the height of the sign again...

And then the wind blows hard again.....and the knocked down/broken pole/re-bury/put back up series happens all over again!

Until it gets to the point that, if you are driving a van/truck/SUV, you actually have to look down to notice the street signs.  I just can't get used to the short signs around here - no matter how many times I pass it, I totally notice it and think, That looks so weird!   I know! The Wizard of Oz should film in our city!

My son wants to go pose by all the signs (because I think he is taller than them in their shortened, post-disaster shape) and send those photos to his missionary brother to "prove" how tall he is!  Of course, he plans to "omit" the little fact that they are NOT standard height anymore!  ;)

This is Not Going to Sit Well with Someone

Today is Kyle's "half-birthday," and as such, we performed the traditional (and ceremonious) measurement of his height, and marked it on the growth chart.

As you can see, his line is now JUST A SMIDGE higher than his older brother's line!!!
{due to growing 1 1/2 inches in the last 6 months, and 4 inches in the last year}

Now, of course, it's been a whole year since Ryan has been measured since he's been away on his mission for 8 months, and the 4 months before that was one huge whirlwind with High School graduation activities/mission prep/last family vacation/last ever family photo with our family as we know it/bidding farewell to dozens of his friends when they left on their missions.....

So, who knows?  Ryan MAY HAVE grown some more in our absence.
But, if NOT.......Kyle is SO PLEASED with his current standing!  ;)

And he's convinced that he is going to pass up his [6'3"] dad.  Lately, so many people have made comments to him that he is totally starting to resemble Matt, so naturally, he assumes he'll end up as tall or taller than his dad.  Ha!  I seriously doubt that!  Because first of all, he has ME as his mom (a mere 5'3") but also, way back when, I took note of the height predictor test.  (The one where you take a boy's height at age 2 and double it to get their future full height).  And, according to that, he's only going to be 5'8" (which is right where he's at).  According to the "test," his older brother's potential isn't much better at 5'9" but it would be one inch taller than Kyle, so that's mostly what matters in their minds!

I intend to write about this fun little "happening" in my next weekly letter to Ryan......and I already know what the reaction will be!  :)
Horror
Disbelief
Displeasure
Disturbing
Annoyance
Pain
Mental Torment
Justification
Denial


I just hope this news doesn't knock him off his "game" to the point that he becomes disabled in his missionary work!  ;)

***************************
POST-EDIT NOTE:  Ryan promptly replied to my letter stating, "I want to see pics (proof) Kyle has passed me up!"

Did I call it, or what?!?  haha  ;)

In Case I Want to Hang Out on My Porch All the Time....

I'm all equipped with a microwave out there....

...ya know, for popping my popcorn, making hot pockets, melting cheese, and heating water for my cocoa.

Heck!  I'd never have to leave the porch!

But, wait!  WHY is there a microwave on my porch?!?
The truth is....it just randomly appeared there this afternoon.

At first I thought, Oh no!  Is Kyle getting asked to a dance?  He's not 16 yet - he won't be able to go!  (We don't date until age 16).  No, that's not right - the next High School dance is PROM, and that's boy's choice....

But then I saw the tag was addressed to, "Kevin" and I was like, Oh...they got the wrong house!

But then Kyle informed me that he goes by that name sometimes.  WHAT?!?  Well, that's news to me!

So, I'm standing there looking out onto our porch in utter dumbfoundedness, and Kyle is completely amused by it.

He said this microwave was definitely for him.  (Apparently, it's a inside joke.)

It looked all clean and new, though - doesn't somebody need this?  Is some teenager's parent wondering at this very second, as they're trying to make some cup-o-noodles, Hey, what happened to our microwave?

So, Kyle attempted to explain.....it has something to do with him wearing yellow jeans and a whale tie to school, a fictitious business he owns selling microwaves (with a partner), discussions about the proper name to call your boss, and another family renovating their kitchen due to a short in their [faulty] microwave.

{Huh???}
CLEAR AS MUD, right?!?

Anyway, I guess it doesn't need to be returned (he figured out the 3 girls who did it, and they said they don't need it) - so we're now officially the proud owners of a porch microwave to make our house look REAL NICE (said in Cousin Eddie's [from Christmas Vacation] accent/voice!) and white trashy.  ;)