Shoes...or what a husband does while he's home sick

I was really feeling sorry for Steve this morning and I tiptoed around getting ready for work.  He had not felt well most of last night and I had thought he might have to miss work today.  He went out in his new kayak on Saturday to go fishing in Lee Creek.  He got his legs sunburned quite a bit, but had fun.  Of course there was the story of the "one that got away" and broke his line.  Of course, Steve.

We went up to Mary Beth and Jon's on Sunday after church for a cookout.  (more photos later on that)

On Monday, we went house looking again to no avail.  When we got home, Steve decided to go try a new bike trail north of Van Buren.  It was pretty hot, but he really wanted to go.

When he got home, he was so hot that he had to rest a while before even going to take a shower.  He felt pretty bad after that.  Not sure what it was, but at least he is better tonight.

And TODAY he was better because he found my shoes after much digging around!  I had been saying that I guess I was going to have to go shopping because I couldn't find all of my flip flops and sandals that I love to wear in the summer.  I thought maybe they were in a tub in the attic.  I even had four "singles" without a match.  One pair was my favorite Razorback ones!

Well, today when I got home, Steve had dug around in all of the upper shelves of my closet and found the missing matches as well as the rest of my summer shoes!  Imagine that!  He then decided it would be funny to lay them out on the rug in the bathroom for me to see all 24 pairs when I got home.

Oh yeah, I was tickled.  But has that really ever kept a girl from shopping???  I think not!

He had fun with it at least.

Someone else's daughter

A daughter is the happy memories of the past, the joyful moments of the present, and the hope and promise of the future.  ~Author Unknown

This last week has been a busy one with helping a friend and her daughter prepare for her wedding today.  Caitlyn was just a little bitty thing with the biggest blue eyes you have ever seen, when the family moved onto our corner of the neighborhood.

Last Saturday, Mary Beth and I hosted her bridal luncheon for her mother, grandmother, bridesmaids, mother of the groom and flower girls.  It was a lot of fun to get everything ready for it and decorate everything with Mary Beth.  Steve pitched in with the house cleaning and taking the pets "away" while the luncheon was going on.

She is using a peacock theme which came in handy since Mary Beth had used that same idea and we had lots of peacock feathers!

Mary Beth and Caitlyn played constantly on the weekends and during the summer.  Greg played with her younger brother, Zack.  The Coltrains had an above ground pool that they all loved swimming and playing in together.

We never went out to eat or had them over for dinner.  We've never gone to a movie with them or taken a trip with them.  But they were some of the best kind of neighbors....we shared lawn care tips, mowers when ours weren't working, went trick-or-treating together, borrowed cooking ingredients frequently and helped move furniture.  After our children got older and lost touch as ours went off to college, we didn't see them so much but knew they were always there.  Cindy and Caitlyn were faithful to help out when we needed pet sitters and someone to pick up our mail when we went out of town.  After we moved to Van Buren, Caitlyn was our house sitter when we went to Rachel's wedding in Florida for a week.

All of this said, my thoughts came last night as I sat at their rehearsal dinner.  We were invited, I suppose, because we are friends.  It was very nice and the food was yummy.  

But, I had the strangest awareness as I sat there watching everyone of my own daughter's weddings and how very different it is to just "attend" one.  I found myself thinking back on the wedding week and particularly the "day" of the weddings.....so many last minute things to do and so many happy tears.  

As I hugged the mother of the bride last night, I told her that it is important to take a deep breath and enjoy every moment because it will be over way too soon.  And you want to have those memories because it is so important to remember.

Along with a million photos, I'm thankful to remember today.

Thursdays are the best..almost

Today, like every Thursday, I spent seeing patients at my private practice.  It is always an interesting day, although typically a long one.  It often makes me exhausted but also gives me the satisfaction that I am doing a good job.  It is SO very away from the teaching special education that I did for 29 years!  I think it was definitely time for a change.

For the first time in months...and I mean months....I actually have a bit of cushion in my business account.  I am almost afraid to type that for fear that some huge thing will happen and drain it before I can even think about it!  I like being able to do nice things for my family...which is totally why I work anyway.


Today our house officially went back on the market.  I have VERY mixed feelings about it and have to admit that when I have thought about it late at night the last couple of nights, I feel very sad.  I have always gotten attached to my homes.  I don't know what it is particularly, but it just happens.  I always remind myself of the usual things like "its the people that make a house a home" and "you'll find another one that you will love just as much or maybe MORE than this one"....but it just doesn't always make me feel better.
This home was a dream for me.  It is the home I wish that I had been able to raise my three children in, with plenty of room and a neighborhood to be trusted.  But that just wasn't meant to be.  
We moved on Halloween weekend 2009 during the rain that didn't end.  At the time we had been living in the Marriott Residence Inn for SIX weeks after the sale of our home and were really anxious...no, desperate....to find a house to move to.  This house was the last of five we saw that particular evening and I fell in love with it immediately.  Even with the "country" theme that the former owners had going, I knew this one could be amazing.  
At that time I was working for an agency where I was having a great income and things were "under control."  Of course, you know what they say about it when you begin to feel like that...God has a sense of humor.  Wasn't so funny when I lost my job 3 months later and went to one that paid 1/3 of what I had previously been making.  Thank heavens it was a job, though!  
I've never been through anything quite like that in my life.  I hope I never repeat it.  It was quite horrible in the details of it and, shall I say, very "personal" in the way it went down!
By this time, Steve had decided that he definitely was not happy with our move.  He had gotten used to riding his bike in all kinds of weather to work and home.  Now we were too far. The only solution was for him to drive the XTerra to my office on 18th street and then ride his bike from there.  He was not thrilled.
Steve is typically a pretty "easy to please" kind of guy, but with the financial pressure turned on full blast, he began to believe there was no solution but to sell this house.  We put it on the market last summer with few looks and no offers.  Then the holidays came around and I knew that I didn't want to have it sell during that time!  
As our financial situation has finally begun to recover, I have decided that maybe it will be best for now if we move back into Fort Smith.  It seems silly to live away from where you work, shop, go to church and all.  I think we were both too spoiled to living right in the middle of everything and being 5 minutes from it all!
So, now we start the search again.  Hopefully this process won't land us in a hotel stay again. I don't know that we would survive it.
I HAVE put in my two cents to request a lot with trees so I can enjoy the birds and squirrels again.  We'll see what the future holds.  You never know.
And it all began on a regular Thursday.

Music

I suppose that music has always been a part of my life.  When I was just a preschooler, my mother decided to take piano lessons.  She bought a piano (which I still have today) and started lessons from Miss Louise Coffin, the organist for the Methodist Church in town.  So each week, while my brothers went to school and my dad was farming, my mother and I went to town to Miss Louise's home for the "lesson."  

Now this house was no ordinary house for a little girl to be left alone for an hour.  Miss Louise's older brother, Clarence, was always there....sitting in his favorite chair by a window seat that overlooked their gardens.  He ALWAYS played solitaire.  I mean, ALWAYS!  He was a sweet fellow and was very tolerant of me and I'm sure my millions of questions about what he was doing.  This widowed, elderly brother and his single, elderly sister seemed to make a nice home together.  It was filled with a lovely grand piano right inside the front door, with antiques and breakables in every spot of the home.  The front porch was large with a big swing on it.  I was allowed to sit out there and swing on pretty days.  Oh, I felt so big and grownup!  They lived on a quiet street across from their other brother's home and flower shop.  Such a quiet, seemingly simple life. I dreamed of what it would be like to live there with the high ceilings, the swinging kitchen door and everything in its place all the time. 

 I remember how the wood floors creaked as I walked over them.  I remember one glass item she had (that NOW I cannot believe I dismissed my mother's directions to "NOT TOUCH" ) which was like a set of hands in frosted glass that were together as if waiting for a bird to land on them.  I would put my hands beneath this and enjoyed thinking that my hands would look like this someday.

All the while this adventure was going on, Miss Louise and my mom learned the scales and notes of the classics that they both loved:  Beethoven, Bach, Brahms and more.  Miss Louise had an elegance like no other and ALWAYS wore a dress with jewelry.  She smelled of lavender water and her white hair was always in a neat bun.  I knew her from that point through my high school years and she always looked the very same.  How does someone seem so ageless?

As mother progressed, she was eager to learn to play the big pipe organ in the Methodist Church in town.  Our little church in the country was nothing compared to this new, big church with a balcony in town!  They had rows and rows of pews to investigate.  A true delight for a little girl!!!  

And all the time, in the background, I listened to my mom learning the old hymns on that beautiful old organ.  

I remember pretending that I belonged to that church.  I was delighted to make my way into the balcony and pretend that I was in heaven with the angels because it seemed I was up so high.  Funny to imagine that now.  Years later, when I moved into town I joined that very church and always had good memories about it.

When I started first grade, my own piano lessons started.  Miss Louise would drive her car to the primary school, pick me up during my recess and take me to her house to take my lesson.  Apparently recess time was much longer then than it is now!!  She would some days let me stop at a little candy shop near her home to buy a piece of candy before going back to school.  I SO looked forward to choosing my special candy that I would return to school with.  All of the old candies were there:  jawbreakers, banana taffy, tootsie rolls, and on and on.

I'm so grateful for those many years of lessons.  Music opened so many doors for me.  I was then able to give that gift to my own children, just as I'm sure they will for theirs.

I'm going to close my eyes now and take myself back to that comfy old home that belonged to Miss Louise, climb into that porch swing and soak it all in for a bit....

Sometimes I worry about you...

There's a saying that I used to use a lot that was "Sometimes I think everyone out there is crazy except for me and you...and sometimes I worry about you."  

That always makes me laugh because sometimes that's exactly what it seems like!

Today was a beautiful day.  Things could have gone so right!  Would have been a good one to have been home working in the yard or scrapbooking.  But, alas, I was at work.  I have actually been trying to make it home before dark more often, which helps.  

The reason that the above mentioned statement came to mind is because it was just that kind of day.  Tuesdays always tend to be a bit wacky because I do three larger groups in therapy plus an additional one or two individuals afterward.  Needless to say I am usually zapped by the end of the day.  Today was more stressful than usual because the conference room in my building, that I typically utilize for groups, was being used by the preschool book fair.  What?  So, my 30+ clients had to be transported a couple of miles down the road to another one of our office buildings that has another conference size room.  The logistics of getting 30+ adults with developmental disabilities together and moved t three different time frames to a different facility was a simple nightmare.  And it doesn't help when people (the ones I identified in my first paragraph as crazy) decide to tell ME how to do my job.  That would be the people making minimum wage in a job they obviously hate.  Now I'm not a snob about my education or my income...honestly....but it bugs me to death when someone like that decides that they know best what a client of mine needs!  Are you kidding?  One guy informed me, while standing and shaking his hands, that one of my clients was basically hanging by a thread with her behavior.

It was all just crazy.  

Fortunately, I had planned a lot of good therapeutic activities and discussion about how we communicate (funny about that) and so the sessions themselves went well.  One really fun thing was that I asked them who could give "good" verbal directions to making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?  Of course they all thought they could.  I told them I would make it EXACTLY how they told me.  It was too much fun as they realized what they were leaving out or not explaining clearly.   I think they got it.  

Maybe I should bring in their staff folks to teach them the same lesson about the importance of good communication.  Oh, nevermind....I'll just go ahead and worry about them.

Time for Blogging

It is funny when you finally slow down in life for a minute and take a look at what you've been missing.  While doing that recently, I realized how much I have been missing posting photos and thoughts on my blog.  I had a long four hour nap this Sunday afternoon after getting home from church, so I think I have a bit of energy left tonight.  I had a choice to work on insurance billing and paperwork or to blog.  Guess which one won!

Things have been hectic as usual.  I have been re-evaluating my entire job thing and believe, without much doubt, that working 10-12 hour days is not conducive to my sanity.  It certainly plays into my ongoing fatigue and health issues.  Steve and I have been talking and trying to plan some alternate solutions.  Will keep you posted on that.

I will post later about the big family gathering at my parent's home last weekend.  I have tons of photos to show for it....I know we will all be glad we have those in the years to come.  

We are listing the house for sale again, starting this week.  Just what I needed...added stress of having to be sure everything is perfect when I leave each morning in case we get a call.  We are trying something a little bit out of the ordinary--sort of a combo realtor/sale by owner thing.  We pay out less and do more of the work ourselves.  Steve just really wants to be back in Fort Smith.

As for me, I have really grown to love this house.  When everyone is here, it is wonderful to have room (for the first time in our married lives) for everyone.  I do hate driving that 15-20 minutes each way to go do most anything that we do at all....work, shopping, eating out, church and everything else.  I have never just been in love with the yard which doesn't have the trees that I love so much.  I miss the squirrels and birds that we had in our other yard.  

It is funny how, regardless of our resistance to change, we seem to always find change occurring in our lives.  Always.             

Tonight I feel full of gratitude for my family, my dear children and their spouses and my grandson that is busy growing until his arrival in September.  I am grateful that I have the security of a job, a degree that keeps me available for jobs and teacher's retirement to keep the lights on at the house.  I am grateful for friends...the true ones and even the ones that often annoy the heck out of me.  I'm grateful that after so many years, Steve and I found a church that we love going to and feel that we leave there with good things to improve our lives each week.

Now, for another Monday and staffing.  They are so much less painful than staffings at my former job.  I'm just ready for mornings to not be so difficult to get out of bed.  So, I better get going right now!!!

I promise to be back sooner than two months....