giving blood

So I went last night to give blood, and my iron count was the lowest possible acceptable number (38).  So I started taking iron last night.  Anyway the gal doing the needle poking stuck it half way thru my elbow - I swear!  It burned like fire, then I started to feel like I was going to lose my lunch.  That has never happened to me before when giving blood.  I felt pukey for a couple of hours, and draped myself dramatically around the house. 

Then I went to a piano lesson parents meeting but not STRAIGHT there, oh no.  I had written the address down wrong, couldn't program the gps properly, forgot my phone to call home for better instructions, and drove like a bat out of hell all over, ALL OVER the weird up and down parts of Lehi.  At one point a woman out in her front yard saw me looking frustrated and made a "can I help you?" expression.  So I drove back and asked her where that address was.  She said that one doesn't exist, but who are you looking for?  I told her, and she walked around her corner and pointed out the right house!  What a tender mercy!  I love living in Utah, let me tell you.

However I probably should not have taken the post meeting trip to Walmart, because the do it yourself register just absolutely freaked out.  Slowly, in a way that took an eternity.  Alternate time-line freak out.  The lady ended up telling me that I was probably charged for my purchases, but she couldn't produce a receipt, was that ok?  Well, since it's 10:15 pm - sure.

But the toughest thing has been watching my one of my offspring deal with the consequences of choices.  My heart just aches, and that makes my throat hurt too. 

some knits

A gift for a very long awaited baby, Asher Brandligt.  I just need to mail it off before he grows up!   I bought the buttons in Alaska while on the cruise. 
Yarn: Knitpicks swish, superwash wool, color "Truffle"

I knit this tie to the length of his other x-long ties, then had to shorten by 6 inches cuz it grew in the "tying." Now he has a tie to match his socks.  
 Yarn: Schoeller & Stahl, Fortissima colori superwash sock yarn
 color: Mexican? or Mexicali? something like that, but the ball band doesn't say.

 Now!  If people would quit having babies (I LOVE to knit for babies) and if the days would quit flying by, I could just catch up to my 2009 Christmas knitting list!  I can see I'm gonna have to knit X-mas presents every other year.  This once a year thing is too dang fast!

that's how it goes sometimes

So, I went to a wonderful series of classes by Anthony Sweat, on how to teach with the spirit, how to involve the students, and how to ask inspiring questions.  I prepared the heck out of the lesson, only to get to primary, and find they had recieved that same lesson last week.   Sheesh.

bullet points

Boy, I know bullet points are lame, but some days/weeks are like that.


(Ha!  Now that I think of it  I don't even know how to make bullet points in blogger)


Weekend before last Roger took Brandon, Ethan and Toby camping/hiking up the canyon.  Pictures to follow.


Roger hiked Timp with the boys this weekend.  It was quite the story, which I want him to journal here. He can be a guest blogger.


Got called to be the Valiant 8/9 boys primary teacher.  I've never taught a boys only class in primary.  I've done scouts, which always gives the buffer of "doing or making something,."  so I hope I do ok.  I know and like all the boys involved, and am glad to be in primary.


Breanne got her new, beautiful bag that Aunt Bonnie made her, stolen last night along with: $60, credit/debit card, drivers licence, etc.   She's pretty sick about it, reported it to the police, and cancelled everything.  (Bonnie, that bag was the envy of all her friends.  It's the part she most cried about)


I am hosting at BYU education week this week.  It has been so AWESOME!!!!!  How I'm kicking myself for never attending before.  How? Why? Are you kidding me?  So lame.
 I read the announcements for (yesterday) James Oniel Miner, and today Marvin Goldstien.  His music was so moving, I started bawling for the day, and then it got weepier from there.  The classes are just incredible.  Thank you, my G & T friend, Leslie, for making me to do this.


The crying has given me a headache, and all the knitting I got done there has cramped up my right hand.  But I feel so inspired; now to turn it into action!


And may I say, that campus is so very beautiful.

Another Tuesday

Whoa, a week really rolls around fast!  Saturday, the big Relief Society Mother/daughter activity that we've been working for awhile came and went.  It was pretty successful, and I wish I had some pictures of the happy, absorbed girls and women sitting and making things for "the orphans."  At least that's how I kept trying to explain it to little Sophi sitting next to me who slaved over her little beaded gecko, and kept lamenting how badly she wanted to keep it. 


My incredible Aunt Pam spends every Wednesday at a Stake Center working on these humanitarian projects, and when I went there one day (not knowing this was the same place she was at) it was so cool to see her and Uncle Lamar.  When she heard I was trying to set up some humanitarian activities for this RS activity, she IMMEDIATELY (and with all the warmth that any of you who know her know what I'm talking about!) offered to sew some of the dolls she makes for my group to stuff!!  I was blown away!  She sewed, clipped and turned over 40 doll bodies!  I'm so grateful, you can just imagine.  It was by far the most popular activity that day, and the stuffing flew!  Sadly, someone was a really good sewer-upper, and I'm having to unpick some really teeny invisible stitches to re-stuff some of the dolls for quality control purposes.


Well, no good deed goes unpunished, and Sunday our RS presidency was released.  We'd been warned earlier last week by the Bishop, so it wasn't a shock, but it is pretty bittersweet.  Our president's life had become untenable due to (a really LARGE boatload of reasons beyond her control that I won't go into)  and the first councelor just had her 2nd operation on her arm as a result of a fall at the start of the summer.  If I EVER start to feel I've got it tough, I just picture Gayla, with her shattered shoulder in a flimsy little sling, sitting in her easy chair for 5 DAYS waiting for the hospital to "fit her in".  Criminal.  oohhh, the hate mail I want to write.


ANYWAY, their husbands are, respectively, the 1st councelor and the bishop of the ward, so I'm surprised the situation carried on as long as it did, but I'm glad it did, because I really really enjoyed this calling and serving with those women.  So. 


And anyway, babysitting was going to become a real problem for me, cuz Breanne moved out!  I didn't think she actually would, but she made it happen and she really did.  Let's pause a moment to be sad for me. 
Yes, she's pretty excited.  We moved her up, and it didn't take 2 FULL car loads, more like 1 1/2!  I'm relieved at the niceness of the place we found, cuz we had looked at some scary places, I tell you.  We found the address on the institute bulletin board, and the place is mainly members, which is pretty unusual in University of Utah territory, and they rented out 1/2 a room like they do here in BYU-ville, which is pretty unusual up there again.


I may never sleep again knowing my daughter is walking home from the bus stop just 2 blocks away from trolley square at 11:00 at night. 

Tuesday?!?

Ethan played coach pitch this summer and enjoyed it very much!  He is the proud winner of the only dollar bill the coach had to part with!  He had promised it to anyone who caught a fly ball.  That face?  It is the only camera face he knows this summer.

Have you met Toby?  I'm alot more fond of this expensive mutt since he has POTTY TRAINED!!  I'm so PROUD, so very inordinately proud when he toddles off to do his thing.  He still has all his manic puppy energy though, and is cuter than cute.  Holy Cow.  He loves Roger best, and I feel like I should get them a room when Roger comes home from work.  The Looooooooooove!  He hardly barks at all, and follows me around the house, shredding any piece of paper he gets.  My back yard is currently carpeted with shredded paper plates, my bedroom with toilet paper.

These are the fireworks that Uncle Rick bought.  When Roger got a job in time for the 24th, the FIRST thing he bought was MORE fireworks. It's a sickness.   (I admit, I ran out and bought some yarn.  a sickness, I tell you!) 

Ethan lovingly took about a thousand pictures of the firework aftermath, so I felt I should include one for journaling purposes.

Here starts the Yellowston pictures.  What you can't see here is a mother elk stomping the everyloving hooey out of some poor campers tent.  Roger has a video, I'll try to post it, but not today.  Baby steps.

Roger has discovered he is sensitive to fire smoke, and usually gets a migraine and a miserable snotty night out of the deal.  Thats a heck of a note for a serial scoutmaster, no?  Anyway, he loves his propane stove.

The handsome happy campers! 

This is what any walk with Ethan looks like.

Ethan had his hat inside out in every picture.

Right after this picture, the buffalo rolled over and plopped down so dramatically they thought he died.   It was anticlimactic when they later saw his tail flick. 

A study in handsome.

Handsome, AND goofy.

This cracks me up.  Even though the colors of the Mammoth Falls have really dried up,  I guess Ethan can be enough color for everybody.

Yep, this is the camera face for the summer. 

Oooooooookaaaaay.

Brandon told me he was terrified here.  But he jumped anyway!