Life!

 Where has the time gone? These past two weeks have flown by. We've been doing all the normal things like seminary, school, cross country, baseball, dance and church activities. It was my dad's 86th birthday, Josh had the day off last Friday but the roof guy came and we're finally getting a new roof after years of trying to make it work, Curtis went on a camp out with the boys from church, Brandon has had a couple of baseball games, lots of dancing for our girls and Nutcracker auditions are this weekend so Lily is nervous, we all got our flu/COVID shots one night for family night, we had the sister missionaries over for dinner, I taught Relief Society on Sunday and that was fun and I got a mammogram, which wasn't fun. 

Our ward is doing a food drive as part of the stake Bag Hunger event this weekend. We decided to fulfill Josh's dream and do a pizza pop up restaurant. He can't sell the pizza without making it in a commercial kitchen but we traded it for food items and it worked out really well. Josh made fliers and went around our neighborhood giving them out and inviting people. I posted on our smaller neighborhood page and also the big Wildewood community page and Josh also invited his co-workers. We had an amazing turn out with a great number of neighbors coming by and five of the guys Josh works with came, as well as a few friends from church. We collected about 350 cans of food (even more got dropped off afterwards) that we'll add to our ward stash this week. It was a really cool experience and Josh loved making all the pizza and it was very well received. One guy (turns out he's the father of a girl from Lily's dance class) is Sicilian and he said Josh's pizza tasted just like his grandmother's pizza. That made Josh's whole day! It was a lot of work for Josh but he loved it and we only had two small pizzas left and about half of the big one so of the 16 he made (over 100 slices) we didn't have much leftover. So that took up our whole Saturday afternoon and a good chunk of the evening but it was good to work together and serve together; everyone had a responsibility and it all worked out great. 

 

 

This past weekend was the county fair. I had scheduled dentist appointments for everyone at 9am, which was met with great complaining, but it all worked out. No one had any cavities and Curtis's numb teeth from the baseball injury are still viable so they will hopefully heal and be okay. Hooray! Then we went straight to the fair, met up with the Rays and walked around for awhile. We did some buildings, got funnel cakes and fried Oreos, then Delaney and Michelle left and the rest of us walked around and saw the animals and a silly dog show. Since we're going to Disney in a few weeks I was not willing to pay for rides and the big kids had no interest anyway so we left about 2pm and went home and chilled for a bit before the girls had dance. Josh wanted to go on a date but I'm feeling very cheap right now since we have to pay for our entire Disney trip by next week so I made dinner and we had a fun family evening watching a show about EPCOT and talking about rides we are excited to go on and what we should do at each park.

  

 

 

Saturday Curtis had a XC invitational up in northern MD so he had to be at school by 5am and he didn't get back until 5:30 pm. He said the course was terrible with lots of hills but he came in 94th and got a ribbon and was happy with his time. At some point I would love to actually go to a meet and cheer him on but they are always at the worst times. I'm a better baseball mom than a XC mom, I guess. Lily went to dance all morning and the rest of us went to Brandon's game, which was a little on the painful side. Brandon walked twice and missed a pop fly in center field and twice when he was at first the ball got way overthrown to him so he couldn't make the play. Then Lily volunteered at Arts Fest so she drove over there and the line to get in was so crazy long we had to switch and I dropped her off at a place where she could walk in. She has volunteered a lot at Annemarie Gardens over the past year and really enjoys it so she had a fun afternoon helping kids with chalk drawing. The roof guy came again and I think we're finally set so hopefully that will get done soon. Josh and I went for a nice walk, Brandon went to play with friends for a bit and then I picked up Curtis and he picked up Lily and we had a nice evening together just having dinner and talking. Curtis got this construction hat from the last meet because he had such a great run time and so he earned it for the week and got to write his name on it and keep it until the next meet for "working it". :) 

 

I spent a lot of time this past week planning out church activities and also preparing to play the organ on Sunday since we had a new song that I was unfamiliar with and then I was also asked to teach Relief Society. I love teaching but for some reason I was kind of nervous about this lesson but it went well. It was about the temple and some sisters shared some really beautiful things about their temple experiences and it was all lovely. 

I'm reading the most amazing book right now. I don't usually love non-fiction books but this one is so fascinating to me and it is addressing every emotional challenge I feel like I've had the past few years. It is called The Good Life and is all about how relationships are what actually make us happy and how we can manage and build relationships. It is by two guys who have been a part of the Harvard research project about happiness that started in the 1940s and is so spot on to my feelings and struggles and it has been so enlightening. I just had my turn for book club but I think I will pick it next time and it might have to be my book basket party pick, although I do worry that other people won't find it as amazing as I do. My best friend from when we lived in Ohio is the one who originally read it and gave it five stars on Goodreads so that's why I put it on my list and I'm so glad I did. 

Also amazing was that I guessed wordle in one amazing guess the other day! I couldn't believe it!