I don't even know what to say about August. It was hard. My mom declined so fast in a matter of two weeks. She went from laying in bed, cuddling Darcy, and chatting with us, to being almost comatose. I will talk more about that on the post about her funeral.
As for the month of August, I spent a lot of time driving to Ogden. I wanted to be there when she passed. I drove up pretty much every other day for a couple of weeks. It sure made me appreciate how precious life is. I shouldn't let driving somewhere stop me from spending time with those I care about. Inconvenience is the price you pay to make memories and be apart of each other lives.
For the rest of the things going on, it was pretty surreal. I felt like I was walking around in a fog.
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| Still planning on going on our Kauai trip. Darcy's wet suit is so cute and fits just right. |
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| Trying to spend some quality time with the kids while we were home. One sweet moment was when Ellie got home from FSY, and she told us has never felt the Spirit that much. |
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| We got a huge order of bulbs. I planted them one day before driving up to Ogden. It was hot, and there were so many to plant. To add insult to injury, almost none of these bulbs grew. Maybe they could feel my grief as I planted them. |
One thing I really appreciated about this time was how unified I felt with my siblings. My dad was so checked out. He really couldn't handle it. He spent this time going through his home and trying to get rid of mom's stuff. I guess you could call it decluttering, but it was only her stuff he got rid of. It was pretty hard to watch, but the stuff had to be cleared out, so what was I supposed to say. Anyway, my sister, two brothers, and I stepped up with caring for her. We stayed with her 24/7. We administered her meds and made sure she was comfortable. While Kayla was helping my dad clean out some food storage, they found some pretty old mix. It was pretty funny. I helped my dad clean out the toy closet. It is interesting how the only things that matter are what you have memories with.
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| Rich in food-energy sugar! |
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| One day I harvested my garden before heading to Ogden. I think this was our first big harvest. Later in the month we had our first corn harvest. We got 8 freezer bags of corn! Also, not our harvest, but we started buying boxes of peaches in August, and it is my favorite. Maybe even more than fresh oranges?? I know, that is blasphemy, but they are so so good. |
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| Miriam really wanted to come up and be with me. |
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| Campfire to try to do something fun. |
We were plagued with Yellowjackets right next to our patio this summer. Some good friends really took it upon themselves to help us figure that out. It helped a lot, but they never could get eradicated. The hive was in a massive old cherry tree and was impossible to get at in the trunk and limbs. We tried spray foam to block the entrances. We tried diatomaceous earth to help kill them without pesticides. We tried normal wasp bee spray. We also ended up hanging up bee traps. All of these things were tried many times, and together they worked pretty well but didn't get rid of them completely. They were so aggressive we couldn't take food at all out on the patio. The friends who helped us out with the Yellowjackets also taught us how to play pickleball for the first time this month. It has been such a fun hobby to pick up. They are so kind to play patiently with newbies at the sport.
I tried to be more mindful this month also. I did a yoga flow that reminded me to have self love, compassion, acceptance and confidence in who I am.
I got called to be in another RS presidency! It was fun to meet the new presidency members. I love serving with people that I can be friends with. My first assignment was to think of get to know you questions for a RS lesson. We did an assortment silly and serious questions. I felt pretty dumb though that all of the silly questions came my way, and the other presidency members got the more meaningful ones. There were women sharing their testimonies and crying, and then I got "What's your secret ambition?" or "What's your most embarrassing moment?" Ha! I actually love those kinds of questions, especially asking my kids those questions, but the juxtaposition of one vs the other was so stark. Yikes! For the record my secret ambition is to live in a house with a secret passage or secret room. Not likely in my cookie cutter, suburban home, but maybe someday!
On August 8th at about 10 pm Mom died. I will talk more about that later, but it was a blow even though we knew it was coming. The next day I took Holland to meet the teacher. I wanted to be there for that, for her and for me, but there was no way I was acting normal. Ha, I wonder how crazy I seemed.
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| Her new seat! |
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| Holland checking out this school's playground. |
Mom didn't want a normal funeral. She really didn't want a normal burial either. She wanted to be cremated. At some point I got her to agree to a gathering of friends and family with main dish salads and pie. We didn't have the main dish salads, but we ended up doing a community gathering with pie. It was so nice for the RS to help with that. We had the funeral on the Monday, August 14th, and the girls went back to school on Wednesday, August 16th. I needed another week in there to process and be able to focus on the new school year, but it was not to be. It was bananas to try to fit in a swim team meeting, while also trying to plan my mom's memorial service.
Each girl started at a new school this year. Miriam started her first year of middle school. Eliza started as a freshman in HIGH SCHOOL. And Holland started her fourth elementary school. It was insane that we juggled all of that along with the death of my mom days before. I met someone from the ward at the middle school and word vomited about how crazy things are. She was so sweet and kind to listen to me that out of gratitude I signed up to be on the PTA. Turns out that halfway through the school year, I haven't done anything to help. Yeah, still feel guilty about that.
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| First day of 7th grade |
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| First day of 3rd grade |
At Holland's new school the PTA set up a red carpet and balloon arch for them to walk through on their first day. It was so fun. It is so nice that Holland can walk to and from school now. This is the first time any of my kids have been able to do that. I was hoping she could walk with some neighbors, but she mainly just walks by herself. Holland is in Mrs. Clifford's class who is such a gem. Holland loves her so much! One day Eliza had her first period cancelled, and so she hung extra with me that day. We all walked Holland to school. I love walking Holland to school (at least while the weather is nice).
One crazy aspect to this whole situation was that my brother, David, had just come home from a cruise to Norway when all this went down with my mom. Unfortunately they also brought covid home with them. So we all got covid from all being around each other. We were all ill together. It gave me a good excuse to just have a lie in bed kind of day after meeting with the mortuary. I couldn't see the people who dropped off flowers, but I was surprised at those who did. That was so kind. Erica sent cookies. :)
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| An exciting day for me! Tossing my glasses!!! |
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| Holland's craft from activity days. |
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| Ellie's first day of high school! |
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| I went with her to freshman orientation. It helped her feel better about starting at the huge school that is half under construction. |
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| Holland's old activity day leaders dropped by a last gift for her. They were so sweet to her. |
Unfortunately not long after my mom's funeral (that weekend), John had to take a work trip to Toronto.
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| I had a daylily bloom from a rooting. I have had so many of those not grow that it feels amazing to find one. |
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| Darcy with her balance bike. |
John and his work buddies shared an Airbnb in Toronto. He got the top suite, which was nice because it included a private bathroom. He didn't love the expectation that he needed to spend so much extra time just hanging out with his coworkers. One funny thing about this Airbnb was that there was a coat closet that had been converted into a bathroom. The door was still a closet door (no waterproofing at the bottom). The shower head was directly above the toilet and the toilet paper was in the shower niche. The sink was above the toilet tank, and the drain was exactly in front of the toilet. So so funny!
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| Interesting dog fountain. |
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| Fancy, shmancy conference space. The Queen of England visited here when she came to Toronto. |
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| Fancy shmancy hotel in background. |
One of John's favorite things about work travel (maybe definitely his favorite thing) is all of fun food he gets to have. I don't know what this is, but it is making me hungry to look at it.
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| Another flower that grew from a rooting--a clematis! |
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| Turns out we have had so so much better success with transplanting. |
Erica was a gem and hung out with me a few times now that the kids were back in school, and we had less juggling to do. We went to the West Jordan Conservation Gardens. It was so fun to see Darcy and Brielle play together. Plus, it is just fun to hang out with my friend. We didn't really take time to read through and absorb the exhibits, but we could tell they were well done and so pretty. I loved seeing these 3 year olds and their imaginative play.
I also reached out to my friend Jenessa from the last ward and started hanging out with her. It just started with meeting at the park, and then they came and swam in the pool. She has a little boy, Samuel, who is about a year younger than Darcy, and it about as cute as could be. Later that night our family swam in the pool too. We tried having a holding your breath contest for how many times across the pool. It was hard!
The next day, I felt like a total champion when I figured out how to get rocks for our retaining wall instead of getting them delivered. I saved us about $1400! We ended up paying $40 for for all of those rocks, even though we needed to go pick them up ourselves.
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