Where does the time go? (And who reads this anyway?)

Well, I got Miles' mission blog updated, created Jotty's mission blog and then set aside my determination to update my blog and now.....really? I haven't updated since then?
So, I guess I will have to do a "Reader's Digest" version... again.
MAY Alright, the big news was that Jotty finally received his mission call! He will serve in the "Mexico, Mexico City South Mission". He is totally jazzed!
Also in the end of May, the pool liner got replaced. I was amazed at how fast these two guys got it done. Apparently, the bullfrog living either under the sand on the bottom or behind the foam on the wall of the pool was surprised as well. About a week after the pool was filled, I noticed something on the bottom, where it meets the side of the pool-at about 5 feet deep. The shape was darker than the liner...and shaped strangely...like a..FROG!? Yep, he was stuck under there with the weight of all that water on him. Dead, but not flattened. So, I called the pool company and then email them a picture... because it is OBVIOUS that there is a frog under the liner. In the end, we struck a deal and got a few hundred dollars off the original price of the job (suggested by Royal). I told the owner, "How about you give me a discount so that I can just pretend that I like that conversation piece down there?". He agreed. Afterall, I was making it easy on him...they wouldn't have to drain the water out,remove the frog, and put the liner back in again...and we wouldn't have to lose use of the pool for another week or more.

Le Frog
JUNE & JULY I didn't quite get things put away from doing costumes for the college's production of "Big River", before I was knee deep in fabric again. First I was commissioned to make a "Queen of Hearts" costume and then did the costumes for "The Depot". This time I was working for a new theater company in Enterprise called "Southern Broadway". They have done small dinner shows so far but decided to "The Depot" in the huge, wonderful, state-of-the-art Performing Arts Center at the new Enterprise High School. This production was actually the first theater production done on that stage and the first time most of the equipment was used. VERY nice to have a proper and roomy stage and FOUR dressing rooms!! They had a "costume shop" too but were using it for other stuff so I used a dressing room to hang the costumes in instead. It wasn't a problem because each dressing room is very spacious and each has a shower, two bathrooms, two long counters, a sink and 3 very big mirrors. For the production, we had a men's and a woman's dressing room, a make-up/hair room and my costume room. The show is an original script by one the the owner's of Southern Broadway and played 3 shows. The mayor has asked them to put it on next year too. It is a great story and was well done. The guy that has done the scenery for each show I've been involved in really outdid himself...fab-u-lous! I designed and made a few dresses, and made or put together the rest of the costumes. Oh, and this company PAID me! Whooo-hoo!
Summer was great and I even went swimming several times...
probably more than I've been for many years. Part of that was because I didn't work this summer. The average temp of the pool water was 94 degrees. Lovely, as there was no "shock" when you jumped in.

AUGUST-Royal and his family came to visit for a couple weeks and we had a blast with them! The kids behaved well and are cute (of course...I don't have a grandchild that ISN'T cute)! One of the most fun things I've done in a long time was go on a "Pirate Cruise" with them down in Panama City. Real ship that goes out into the ocean for a 2 hour trip. A captain and his pirate crew keep the kids busy for the whole trip. Absolutely delightful! The weather was great too. We all came with "pirate gear"...scarves and earrings. Mae was mostly entertained by all the action...she even got her "sea legs" fairly quick. I am so glad they invited me on that adventure!

Royal, Elizabeth, Grace, Sienna, Jimmy, & Mae

August also brought the beginning of school again so back to work I went. Jotty and I also worked to finish getting his stuff together for his mission. At the end of the month Jim and I took Jotty to the Birmingham temple and Kira and our friend Dan came along(we went in Dan's van). Jotty loved it and was on a "spiritual high" until we came out of the temple and Jim listened to his phone messages. One of the messages was from the stake President, saying that the MTC had called him and let him know that Jotty would NOT be entering the MTC on September 14th as previously instructed. Instead, he would be part of a pilot program and would enter the MTC on October 5th. (The pilot program is a 5 week training in the MTC instead of the current 8 weeks). Jotty was soooo bummed-because he was sooo ready to leave-NOW! He snapped out of it soon enough and a "pro" to leaving later was that he can take me to the "Weird Al" concert in Montgomery on Sept 29th.
SEPTEMBER has arrived much too quickly and I am now starting into costumes for the college's production of "Nunsense". Lots of costumes but easy...15 Nun's habits. Before I start sewing, we are going to check to see if Dothan's theater group has any we can borrow. The nuns in the Catholic churches around here don't wear tradition habits.
Now, we are just two weeks before Jotty departs and 7 weeks before Miles returns from his mission. Lots of conflicting emotions are going to be experienced by all of us. Miles thinks his mission president will allow him to call Jotty before he goes into the MTC and I hope he's right.
I hope I won't take too long to return and blog again. Until then!

I sew, I sew, it's off to the stage I go....

March was mostly uneventful as we continued to take care of JaNae and Jeremy's kids on weekdays and cook dinner for all of us. It's kind of nice to have more than just the 3 of us for dinner...and I am sure Jim and Jotty like it because I am actually cooking more!

The big news was Brice's baptism! Brice turned 8 on St.Patrick's day and Cian turned 6. They had a great time when they all went down to Grayton beach for the weekend. Anna's oldest,Karina, was down from Augusta and she and I went down too. J & J had rented a cabin at a state park so we all had access to the private beach there. Very nice and not crowded. The weather was perfect but the water was cold so yours truly only got in up to her calves. The kids jumped right in...crazy kids!
That Sunday (the 20th) was Brice's baptism. It was so pleasant and spiritual and he had all of his grandparents there and all the family that live in the area.

April was a very busy month for me because I spent most of my time making costumes for the college/community production of "Big River". Before anyone wonders...no,I did not get paid for it. I volunteered since it is a hobby of mine. I enjoy creating costumes even though it is sometimes stressful for me(self-induced stress). There is a great satisfaction of seeing my "creations" on stage and I won't pretend that I don't like to hear, "good job!".

Some of the costumes I put together from other items I had or acquired and others I selected the fabric and created from beginning. This year there was a lot more total constructing done. I made 12 dresses,6 skirts,5 shirts,and 4 shawls. There was 72 yards of fabric,and approximately 10,000 yards of thread used. I don't remember how much trim. Most of the costumes for the males were put together from used clothing to create something that looked like it might be from the 1840s. Each skirt or skirt part of the dresses required nearly 4 yards of fabric. And then there were all the ruffles... The fabric and anything I bought at thrift stores were paid for by the college.

I was only really frustrated by my machines...my serger blades were out of whack so they wouldn't cut and I didn't have time to get the serger repaired. I was finally able to borrow a friend's extra serger but neither of us could get it to do a rolled hem. Then, my ruffler was fickle as to when it would work properly.

There were the occasional alterations and repairs but the kicker was two different NEW zippers broke! The first broke on the 2nd wearing and I had time to replace it. But the second zipper broke on the 3rd wearing so I had to sew the poor girl into the dress for the Saturday shows because I could not repair it. By the time the matinee was done, the ONLY place I could get a zipper was closed so she got sewn in a second time. She was very patient about it.

On the day of the 2nd show (Friday), I abandoned all of that and took the time to join Jim in being Tour Guides for the Atlanta Temple open house. What a great day and wonderful opportunity! We really enjoyed it. I especially love all the new artwork they added...some of the pictures I had never seen. And there was also murals added to one room. It reminded me a bit of the inside of the Newport Beach temple.

For the last two weeks my kidneys have apparently been on the fritz. The edema in my feet and lower legs was an average of a minus 3. Even after being in bed all night, in the a.m., they would still be swollen, yet my blood pressure would be fine. Now I have time to go to the doctor. Being on my feet all day work,sitting at the sewing machine for hours, and 4 hour rides to the temple and back didn't help but what can you do when you have to get things done? Funny thing...the worst edema was on Sunday, after I was done with everything...a minus 4! Weird.

I also received "battle wounds". I tripped (as did several others) on a problematic prop backstage in the dark. Only I did it best...I went flying (from the momentum of my speed and weight) and hit several parts of my body: my head, arm, legs,neck and back and bruised my ego terribly. Everything is fine but I have some big, ugly, bruises on my legs. JaNae said to me, "Mom, you're getting old...you're bruising easily." yeah, thanks for rubbing it in. LOL

Hope I can get a slide show of my costumes on the blog...but don't hold your breath.
We are on spring break this week and I hope that soon our pool liner will be be replaced so we can be ready for summer. I certainly am ready for this break from school!
Happy Easter to you all!

Where was I?

Oh yes, ignoring things I ought to do and comparing them to my list of need to do and want to do. They all lost!
This why I do not succeed at writing a journal. I either can't keep it up or get so bogged down with everything else I need to do, that it is relegated to the bottom of the "list". And I fail to understand how anyone would find this interesting in the first place. However, it is as close as I am going to get to a newsletter OR a journal so I continue to add to it.
I didn't find out until after my mom died, that she used to keep journals/diaries. If she continued to keep them after we were around I haven't found them. I did find earlier ones and dream of one day transcribing them so that my kids and grand kids can read them one day. Of course, it's only a dream. It will never happen because I can't manage to even update a my blog or Miles' blog on a regular basis. So, what's new you ask? Nah, you don't ask because if you KNOW me, you know that it is one of my biggest faults.
As for the goings on of our family: On a daily basis, life coasts along and day in and day out our lives seems to be the same. On the other hand...there's always something unexpected to shake things up a bit. Isn't that pretty much how your lives go?

This Thanksgiving, for the first time in my life, I did not have a thanksgiving dinner to host or attend. It was odd, but okay. We were asked to go up to St. Louis for Grace's birthday and baptism so we did. Jotty couldn't get off work so just Jim and I went. We rented a car and were fortunate to spend a few days with Royal and his family. The baptism was lovely with all her grandparents there (plus a few extras) and Grace was radiant with all the attention.
Royal took us to the area that Jim is from and he showed us the houses they lived in, the school he attended etc. He was surprised at some of the things that hadn't changed in all the years he'd been gone. Another day, Elizabeth and the kids took Jim and I to the St. Louis arch. Elizabeth graciously bought us tickets and convinced me to go up in the arch with dad (something I swore I would never do after listening to his stories for 20 years). I loved it! The view was everything he said it was albeit the arch swaying tremendously in the wind. When we were at the top I asked the worker there if it often moved so much. Wide-eyed, he replied that he had NEVER felt it sway so much! Earlier, Elizabeth, the kids and I walked around the free history museum under the arch while Jim walked all the way back to the car to deposit his belt. Seems that there is security you have to pass through and Jim realized he had on his belt with the buckle that is a knife. A very sharp knife, sheathed in the belt... NOT something that passes through security these days.
All in all, we had a delightful time visiting with Royal and Elizabeth and our "St. Louis grandchildren". It was so nice to connect with them and play with them. Little Mae charmed "Ponka", having wrapped grandma Jan around her fingers earlier in the year. And "Little Jim" just loved playing and getting to know Ponka better. We arrived back home on Thanksgiving day. Grace and Sienna were such big helpers the whole time and loved having their pictures taken.

Then on Saturday, Michelle and Mila arrived from California for a visit. Jason had gone to Japan to do more training in ninjitsu so Michelle decided to come see us. We are so glad they did! We had a great time and it was so good to see them again and let Mila get re-acquainted with us. Unfortunately, both Jim and I had to go back to work so we didn't get to spend as much time with them as we would have liked. Mila is a cutie with an inordinate amount of dramatic flair. She loves to sing and dance in particular. I like to tell people that Jason is now an RN and a Ninja.

The next few weeks brought the Christmas holidays and we were able to get visits in with most of the kids and their families. Ian and Jessica came from Mississippi for a short visit with Ava and Riddick, their two huge Great Danes. Big, but sweet and gentle. Then they went up to Birmingham to see her folks. Jessica recently graduated and is now working as a counselor. Ian is unemployed now, his last job drying up as the oil spill got cleaned up. It was so good to see them as they had been very busy the past few months.
Anna and her family arrived the day after Ian and Jessica. They didn't get to stay too many days either as Toby couldn't take much time off of work. The kids had grown so much since the last time we'd seen them. That's when the house inevitably became very busy and noisy...because all the other cousins wanted to come over to see and play with Anna's kids. We had a lot of kids playing here and enjoying each other's company...and Jim sleeping through most of it. Don't know how he does it. It was unseasonably cold the whole time so there wasn't the option of playing outside as they had done in Christmases past. Of course we also saw the local families: JaNae's family, Jacob's crew, and Kira's bunch. It was a very enjoyable Christmas!!

January continued to be freezing as we got back to the grind. Then we got word that Jim's brother David had passed away unexpectedly. We left immediately for Texas, this time with Jotty in tow. We stayed with Jim's dad and his wife Mary. No matter how unfortunate it is to lose a loved one, it does offer the opportunity to reconnect with others you haven't seen in awhile. Not only did we also see Jim's sister Donna and her husband Carl, Jim was able to see a niece and nephew he hadn't seen since they were small, and we got to finally meet Mary's children and their children. It was such a treat to meet more family, and get to know Mary so much better. She is such a lovely, lively, and sweet woman. No wonder dad married her! The funeral for David was at the National Cemetery there in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. It was held in an outdoor pavilion and it was cold and windy that day! I was ever so sorry that I hadn't grabbed a hat to take. Jotty had one, but of course had to remove it for the service. He'd gotten a haircut right before we left on the trip so his head was mighty cold.
So things are now, kind of, back to normal. I have JaNae and Jeremy's kids each day after school and we sometimes even get homework done! The weather is finally starting to warm up enough that the kids can play outside again and I see little green sprouts here and there in the lawn and garden. Soon, it will be time to give a little attention to the garden and break out the lawnmower.
Jotty is completing his mission application and really only needs to get his wisdom teeth removed so he can submit it. He is anxious to finish it all but the appointment with the oral surgeon can't be moved up.
Until next post....