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back-to-school book extravaganza
I have been buying and selling Usborne books for the past ten years or so. I love them to pieces and my children thoroughly enjoy them. They form a big part of our homeschooling adventures and are wonderful springboards to draw my children in to a topic and then launch them onto deeper study.
It is back-to-school time and I have a gift for you!
Ten of our favorite books at deep discounts!
Orders are due by Monday night at midnight and you must Paypal me at mom2bmw@aol.com when you place your order. If we don’t reach our minimums, I will refund your pennies back to you pronto. When you email me your book order at mtmoriahmama@gmail.com, please include the title of the book, how many copies you want, and your snail mail address if you are not local.
See Inside Your Body has long been my children’s go-to book for all things body related. I would recommend it for children from 4-10. Each two-page spread details a different body system and has oodles of sturdy flaps to lift and find out more about that bone, cilia, muscle, or sphincter. Retail: $13.99, Back-to-School Special: $8.50
Art Treasury is chock full of delicious art ideas. Each artist spotlighted has four pages devoted to them. The first two-page spread gives a biography of the artist and presents one of their most famous works of art. The next two pages give detailed instructions for how to create a similar type of art project with your own children. We love this book! Retails for 19.99, Back-to-School Special: $12.00
The Big Book of Things To Draw is 96 pages of step-by-step drawing instructions perfect for anyone ten and up. We have used this to break down the process of drawing and have created some pretty remarkable works of art! Retail: $16.99, Back-to-School Special: $10.50.
Oh my heavens, I love these things! I always have at least one set in the car and in my purse so my little ones can use them whenever we are out and about, stuck waiting for big kids to be done with lessons, at doctor’s appointments, etc. You can choose any of the fabulous card sets…our favorites for the 9 and younger set are 100 Things For Little Children To Do On A Journey, Animal Doodles, and Animal Stencil Cards. For the 8 and older set we love Math Puzzles, Number Puzzles, 50 Brain Games, 50 Secret Codes, Tricky Words To Spell, and Grammar & Punctuation. Retail: $9.99, Back-to-School Special: $6.50.
The Patterns Coloring Book is a huge hit with everyone who sees it! It is full of intricately designed pages ready to be colored in (we like colored pencils best for this) in whatever color scheme your little artist selects. On many some of the two-page spread there are several sections of the same design so your artist can color one section in all warm tones, one in all cool, one in bold/contrasting, and one in soothing/similar tones. It is so powerful for children to see the difference effects of their color choices. This is one of our favorite books to give as birthday presents to our childrens friends. I would say it is perfect for anyone from 6 – 100! Retail: $5.99, Back-to-School Special: $4.00
Fisher and Annes LOVE the Sticker books. Sticker Dolly Dressing Around The World is one of Annesley’s favorite books. She loves all the sticker books and they actually last her several months, so it is a great investment of $$$ on my part too. Each page has a background scene with different characters and then your our little one dresses up the characters from around with stickers organized in the back by page number for each sticker set. Fisher’s favorite is Sticker Dressing Knights. Retail: $8.99, Back-to-School Special: $6.00.
The Phonics Workbooks are super fun for anyone four and up and learning to read. They are full of coloring, drawing, copying, and sticker activities to learn all about the sounds the letters make. Set of Four Books Retail: $31.96, Back-to-School Special: $20.00.
The World Wars is a beautiful, 256 page book that allow youth to learn all about the leaders, battles, political issues, countries involved, treaties, weapons, victims, and survivors of the two biggest wars of the 20th century. The photographs are simply stunning and the text is informative while not being too graphic for youth to digest. This is my a favorite of Fisher and Blythe’s and will always be in our home as a reference book. Recommended for 10 and up, but Fisher is 8 and pours over the pictures for hours and asks us questions about what he is seeing. Retail: $25.99, Back-to-School Special: $16.00
Castles was Blythe’s favorite book for a long time and now Fisher loves it. You learn about all sorts of different types of castles from various parts of the world and different eras of time. The inside, outside, weaponry, staff, gardens, toileting, and much more are presented for each castle type in somewhat of a Where’s Waldo style combined with National Geographic type photos. This is a must-have book for anyone remotely interested in medieval history, weapons, or knights. Retail: $14.95, Back-to-School Special: $9.50.
I Love Words is such a delightful book! it is part writing, part art, and 100% hilarious creativity. Each page has a different writing prompt that draws children in to creating new words, making a talking cake, creating characters for stories, and becoming a fully-engaged writer. Retail: $14.95, Back-to-School Special: $9.50.
If these rock-bottom price selections aren’t your favorite, you can get anything in this catalog for 30% off.
to-do list
We are making progress on our giant to-do list. Slow progress, but progress nonetheless. I wanted to be to this point last Monday, but this broken foot is giving me a great opportunity to grow in my patience levels and to be okay with things not moving as quickly as I want them to. Have I told you we are doing a bedroom rearrangement? Well, we are. Keziah likes rearranging her room (just like her mama) and at the beginning of the summer she asked if her papa would build her a daybed that she could move around whenever her heart took a fancy to a new look (her current bed is a full-size bed with storage drawers under it and it has to be taken apart to be able to moved). She wanted it to be white and couch-like and wooden and cute. She also didn’t want it to take up much room and she didn’t want bunk beds or anything big and bulky. He promised her he would do it and she started looking up bed plans. At some point early on in this undertaking, we decided we should move Annesley out of Fisher’s room and into Keziah’s room…but Keziah refused to have Annesley sleep with her because Annesley likes/needs/wants to rub whoever she is sleeping with ALL.NIGHT.LONG. So, we all decided a trundle bed would be a great solution to that problem. Then Jen offered her metal daybed to Keziah for free. Kez, being a mastermind at earning money and spending it wisely, jumped on the opportunity at spending little moolah. But then she decided she really DID want a wooden daybed. So Richard and I took metal daybed parts and combined it with one of the wooden daybed plans and wrote our own plans with enough room for the trundle underneath and several weeks ago we started building in the wee hours of the night.
In the midst of all this bedroom rearranging we decided we should take Fisher’s (formerly Blythe’s – she lost it in the last great bedroom rearrangement) loft bed down and put Keziah’s storage bed in his room. Our home only has four bedrooms, so there isn’t a dedicated room for guests when they come and we often have a houseful of people all needing beds. No adults can sleep in Fisher’s bed because it is quite a climb to get to it and is only about 20″ from the ceiling. If we put Keziah’s bed in Fisher’s room, an adult (or even two if they are friendly) can sleep in his room, two-three people can sleep in Keziah’s new daybed/trundle arrangement, two-three can sleep in Blythe’s bed, and we have two cots and two couches for the rest. I think this will be a better arrangement for our guests, but boy, howdy is it a lot of work!
While all of this has been going on, I have decided I absolutely must have a clean bedroom and closet in order to keep my sanity. I cannot homeschool these precious little ones another year with my room in constant disarray. Last year was a nightmare, but I didn’t have enough time, energy, or capability to get it done, so we survived. So, I have been cleaning…a little bit every day for the past 21 days or so. Here is our list of what has been done and what needs to be done.
Accomplished/Finished/Solved
- Our bedroom is clean! For the first time in a long time, it is clean. Actually clean, top to bottom and left to right.
- Piles of clothing and household goods that are not needed anymore have been taken to DI.
- Taken Fisher and Annesley’s bed apart AND stored in the garage until Blythe would like to use it for her future children.
- Bought the paint for Keziah’s bed with a $10 off coupon – Wahoo!
- Taken last year’s potatoes out of the crawl space
To Be Accomplished
- Finish Keziah’s bed. Richard put it all together on Saturday, then took it apart again to fill the holes, sand it down one more time, prime it, paint it, then put it back together again. I am thinking this is going to take at least another week.
- Dejunk and clean Fisher’s room
- Move Keziah’s existing bed to Fisher’s room
- Clean sewing room and get it ready for school
- Clean school room
- Finish cleaning my bathroom/closet. This is almost done, but not quite.
- Hang up our maps and timelines for the year.
- Make cover sheets for my Math Alive: Eureka! students.
- Move the buckets of wheat that were behind my bed down to the crawl space.
- Clean out the bookshelf in the wood room, find room for all those books on other bookshelves, and put books on it for this year’s homeschool focus.
- Prepare my lecture on generational archetypes for The Hero Project class I am teaching at iFamily.
- Finish sorting Fisher’s and Anne’s too-small clothes and assess what things they need for the next year.
- Sleep
- Go grocery shopping.
That is my small list…not my everything I wish I could accomplish list, just my small list of things that really, really, really need to get done this week, some sooner than others. iFamily starts Wednesday, so I have to get those things done today or tomorrow at the latest. Fisher’s bed is now removed from his room, so I would like to get Keziah’s bed moved into Fisher’s room tonight when Richard gets home from work so we can start getting his room into some semblance of order. I guess Keziah can sleep with Blythe for a few days until her bed is finished.
Off to work on my bathroom some more.
sacred sabbaths: abide with me
Today was the first time I was able to partake of the sacrament in many weeks. As the bread sunk into mouth, a prayer filled my heart and I started talking to God in earnest. I expressed how sorry I am for my petulance. I told Him how grateful I am for His son’s sacrifice for me. I asked Him to forgive me for my grumpiness and to fill me with His peace.
And He did.
Then in Relief Society (our meeting for women) we sang this song and started crying because this is my life right now…I need Him to abide with me. Other helpers are lovely, but they are not sufficient to give me the peace I need.
Abide with me! fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens. Lord, with me abide!
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me!
Thank you Father. I am so grateful to be thy daughter and to be able to be blessed by your comforting presence.
love notes
Remember the one year anniversary of my hip injury? A few of my friends had a gator bites party to celebrate survival and friendship and laughter and service and sisterhood. They made me this poster, full of words of love and encouragement, which has been leaning on the wall up above my bed for months.
Well, now I am cleaning…ahem, DEEP cleaning my room. It is taking me many, many days to do it because I can’t be up on my foot for very long, but I am doing it. We have already moved out the 34 buckets of wheat that were behind my bed in the corner and rearranged the bed to be at 90 degree angles with the walls instead of the 45 degrees it has been at since 2007. We have cleaned out everything under the bed and made a new rule that nothing, nada, zilch can be under the bed. I have scrubbed walls and baseboards and windows. I have found a pillow at TJMaxx that I love and redesigned a whole new bedding ensemble around it with Kohl’s gift cards. I am on the final day of cleaning…the part I hate most…the putting away of the things that were under the bed that have no place to go, no home of their own (which is why they were stuffed under the bed in the first place)…and it is time to put the love note poster somewhere else.
But I don’t ever want to lose these words. I don’t ever want to not have them to buoy me up. So, I will record them here…then I can reread them even when the poster is buried in the storage room behind brown rice and nine-grain cereal.
I love you Tracy! Keep your head up! Hope you get functioning fully soon! Call me if you need some Deep Blue or anything else! Nicolett
LOVE YOU! LOVE YOU! LOVE YOU! Thank you for everything that YOU do for ME! I wouldn’t be who I am if it weren’t for you. You are such a great friend. Love you again! Love, Kari
You are such an inspiration for all of us! Your trial has built the built the faith of this whole community you have helped to create with endless hours. God loves you, as many of us do! He is building and creating the beautiful you that He sees! Love, Renee
Tracy! You can do anything! You are a great example! We love you!!!!! Love, Joy
We love you SO much!! Love, Annette, Emily, and Rachel
Miss Tracy, I love you so. I admire you so. You are always in my heart. I think you are amazing and even though you often don’t think so, you have handled things with such grace. I am blessed to call you friend. Love, Amy Dawn
Tracy, my dear-larger-than-life-friend, thank you for the celebration! You know how to create joy and enlightenment wherever and however you land. I love you. Sherry
Thank you for supporting me after my mother’s death. In an odd way, loving on you was exactly what I needed to get me through my sad time. xoxoxo Sarah
p.s. Jill says “Are we going to visit Miss Tracy?”
Tracy, SO love you! Thank you so much for your spirit that is so full of light that you share with all of us even though you are in pain. Thank you for not giving up. We all need you. Love, Keri
I can’t believe I am dressed up in public with others who are also dressed up IN PUBLIC! It must be because I love & adore you. Happy Hippie Party hot stuff. xoxo Jessica
Tracy My Love, I am so so proud of you. This past couple of years have been so full of growth and stretching, but keep stretching like taffy! I love you. I am so grateful for everything you are and all that you stand for. You teach me so much. I love you, I love you, I love you! Katherine
I have amazing friends. They are a huge blessing to me and give me strength in so many ways. There are many, many others whose messages aren’t written on this board, but are written on my heart. Friends who have hugged me, loved on my children, brought in meals, cleaned my home, held my hand through prolozone injections, listened to me cry, rant, and rave, prayed for me, sent me emails that brightened my day, supported my efforts to make a difference in the world with Make It For Maggie and other service projects, paid for doctor’s appointments, held me while my body passes out, smile at me across the room, and so much more. Friends have made such an enormous difference during this injury and I want them each to know what a life-line you have been to me. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I love all of you.
porcupine quills
After a long week of repeatedly feeling irritated, grumptastic, and lashing out at people, I have decided a few things. I am a giant ball of crabbiness. I am not morbidly depressed, I am not even a little depressed – no, I am up to my eyeballs in AAAARRRRGGGHHHH. I need Jessica’s porcupine to illustrate this post. Maybe I should order a hundred of them and hand them out to all my loved ones who are getting poked with my quills.
This morning as my dear sweetie listened to me apologize yet again for my grumpiness, he gave me his cute little smile, a kiss on my nose, and these words of wisdom.
“Trace, it is okay. You cannot do what you want to do. You cannot do what you feel you need to be doing to run this home and mother our children. You are in pain and it is wearing you down. It is okay. I love you. Our children love you. God loves you. I think you are doing great. I can’t imagine how frustrating it must be to have a long list of things to do and not be able to do them because your foot hurts too badly. I don’t see how you have kept your chin up for so long. You have been in pain for a long, long time and it is okay if you are grumpy.”
Pretty darn sweet, eh? Also pretty undeserved because really I am one prickly pear lately. But his words have been swirling around in my head today, replaying, being torn apart and put back together, and I have realized a few things.
I have been in significant amounts of pain since mid-April 2011. We are almost at 2 1/2 years of pain. There is one small window from about December 2011 – February 2012 where I was feeling great. The breast lump pain was finally gone and the hip pain hadn’t started. I took up running and early morning strength training. I had a fairly clean house and a fairly good system for keeping it that way. I felt on top of things. And then my hip was injured and it has all been downhill since then.
Sure, I can beat myself up (and believe me, I have been giving myself some good undercuts to the chin) every time I feel irritated with one of my precious children or impatiently respond to them. But this afternoon, I am trying to give myself some love. I am trying to let my logical mind convince my guilt-ridden heart that I am dealing with a lot and I should give myself a break.
I can’t umph my way through this. The pain is too much. I can’t stay on my foot for very long and when it is done for the day, I have to stay completely off it till it is rested. I can’t heal it and I can’t overcome it. I have to live with it. I have to modify my life to cater to my body’s needs. And that is hard. On the days my hip is flared up, I can’t walk hardly at all. It is almost too much to just go to the bathroom. But people don’t see that part of it. They only see me when I am up. When I am dressed. When the pain is manageable. So, it seems I am doing okay. And some days I am okay, not great, but okay. But often, I am not okay. Often I am covered in ice packs and moaning in bed. Often I cannot think straight enough to find the right words (Kat says she always knows when I am hurting a lot because I cannot utilize my normal vocabulary). Often I cannot sleep because my shoulder or elbow or ribs are dislocated. Often I want to scream.
I am an exuberant, joyful person and I have a huge smile on my face most of the time, but truth be told, it is getting harder and harder for that smile to stay there. It doesn’t leap to my face like it used to – drawing the world in and radiating my love. There is a reticence that I don’t think I have ever experienced before. I look at the wrinkles etched deep into my face and I think, “those are from the last 18 months of pain” – for I have aged over the course of this injury. I no longer look like a young lass. I have a plethora of white hairs. I am worn out. I feel beaten down. It is hard to stay positive when I am continually wincing. How did my grandmother do it? How did she keep smiling and loving and laughing when she was in pain?
I have decided to reimmerse myself in my core books of scripture and my relationship with God. I need to spend time every day drinking in truth and hope and love from my Savior. I need to spend more time listening to Him and learning from Him. So, on tap for me is morning scripture study and a dedicated prayer session. All alone. Well, not all alone, just me and God talking together without the distractions of people.
Another decision is to focus on really giving my children my heart during our learning time and not letting myself be distracted by my to-do list. As we are getting ready to start our fall schedule in a few days, I have been pondering how I want our days to flow. A big part of the flowing is my fully-present heart and the softness in my eyes and the gentle excitement in my voice and the magic of a mom and child learning together.
Pain is wearing me down, but it hasn’t beat me. I still have trust. I still have hope. I still have love…all mushed together with some grumpiness…but that is okay, I am going to try to increase the love I am sending out, the gratitude I let my thoughts marinate in, and the words of truth I take in from The Lord. Maybe then the grumpiness will dissipate?
trying to get ready for fall
Miss Cutie-Patootie went to a birthday party last week and wanted to wear something super-cute from her new stack of hand-me-down clothes. Then she asked me to take pictures…she is so funny! She loves her picture being taken.
Are you all busy with back-to-school shopping? We sure have been. My Fisher has grown like a weed this summer and all his pants are 2-4 inches too short. A few days ago I hit the thrift store in town and got him a whole new wardrobe of shirts for about $2 a piece, some new gym pants, and two lovely sweaters. I still need to find him some jeans, khakis, and a new church suit, but it seems the thrift store pants for boys are pretty worn out by the time they get there.
We are also stocking up on our favorite composition notebooks, pens & pencils, our FIAR (Five-In-A-Row) books for the year, lots of WWII books for my upcoming Hero Project class, Shakespeare stuff for Keziah, and getting the school room ready for our learning adventures. It is a lot of work, but oh, so much fun to get everything organized for a new year and to watch my children pour over their supplies.
grumpfest is over
You can all breathe a sigh of relief. My grumpiness is gone. Today I am focused on gratitude and love and contentment and hope and truth and God.
Fisher, Annes, Sadie, Richard, and I all had a sleepover in the dining room. Listening to all their breathing sounds all night long and waking up to see their calm, beautiful faces chased all the grumpiness right out of my heart.
grumpfest
I am in a bad mood. I am grumpy as can be and have been since 7:00 this morning. I hate when I get like this. I have a long list of things I am choosing to be grumpy about.
- I am frustrated with myself for being so incredibly aggravated at Richard this morning.
- I am so tired of being in pain, of thinking about pain, of paying for pain-relief through physical therapy.
- I am ready to throw my hands up and scream at my broken body…and then after screaming collapse into oceans of tears that my ligaments are inept at holding me together.
- I am tired of talking about it. I don’t want to answer questions about my body because I don’t have anything positive to say and I hate being a downer who no one wants to listen to.
- I hate that my toilet doesn’t flush without buckets of water being poured into it.
- I hate that my sink is endlessly clogged.
- I hate that my grass is dead.
- I hate that my dishwasher is broken. Again.
- I am tired of cleaning.
- I am tired of not being able to clean because my foot hurts too much.
- ARGH! My foot appointment was supposed to be $75…what they quoted me on the phone, but when I got the bill yesterday it was $166. I called and asked a frillion questions and got it reduced to $145. I hate our medical system. I want prices posted clearly so patients know upfront exactly what they are getting and exactly what they are paying. The whole payment system is a crock.
- I am tired of sleeping on the floor in the dining room because my bedroom is in the middle of being cleaned. I want to put everything away properly and that takes time. Time I don’t have to give because I can’t be on my foot for the length of time it takes to do it. My bed is covered with every piece of paper from my desk and armoire when I had to empty them at the beginning of the week to find the girls’ birth certificates. They got stuffed away somewhere when Liz straightened up my room during the January seizure incident. After hours of searching, I finally found them (thank goodness – they leave for Canada in just a few days), but my room has been completely taken apart and it is going to take me many days to get it put back together.
- I could scream at our Subaru. Something is wrong with it. It barely made it to GRL and barely made it home. Whatever is wrong costs money and time and effort and I don’t want to give any of those things to a car we thought was a good choice and has turned out not to be and the car we knew was a great choice got hit one day into ownership.
- I am frustrated that I am this frustrated when I know 90% of it is hormone related and I should just curl up with a good book and a hot pack on my cramps and call it a day.
- I am ready to scream at the lack of time my husband has to work on this house. I need him to do something to save the rotting deck, fix the dishwasher, fix the toilet, fix the drain, build a bed, move Annesley into Keziah’s room, plant some grass seeds, pull out the stinky floor in the bathroom and replace it with new subfloor and cute linoleum that actually lays flat and meets the wall, clean the storage room, and fix my car. But all of that takes time and all of it takes money and none of those are in high quantities at our house. I want him to work all day tomorrow on some of those projects, but I don’t think its going to happen.
So, instead of staying in this miserable place, I am going to try to focus on gratitude.
- I am grateful I have a husband.
- I am grateful he loves me.
- I am grateful to have a body.
- I am grateful to have the opportunity to learn the lessons of having a body.
- I am grateful to be in less pain than I used to be.
- I am grateful to have been guided to find my physical therapist. He is doing wonderful things to help my hip.
- I am grateful for my children.
- I am grateful to have a home.
- I am grateful to have running water that comes right into my home and allows me to wash dishes with relative ease.
- I am grateful to have a toilet.
- I am grateful to have vehicles to get us where we want to go.
- I am grateful to still be able to drive. If my right foot was broken, I don’t think I could manage it.
- I am grateful for a camping mattress to sleep on and that it is actually far more comfortable than my bed…just small and offers no privacy when out in the dining room.
- I am grateful for a husband that works very hard day in and day out to provide for our family and that he values motherhood so much he wants me to stay home with our children.
- I am grateful for the zucchini my neighbor brought to us. I will freeze it 7 C. portions and make my delicious zucchini soup all winter long.
- I am grateful to be a woman and have an intact uterus even when it is cramping.
- I am grateful to have outdoor loving children who played outside for several hours today while I wallowed in misery.
- I am grateful for the cheapness of potatoes.
- I am grateful Richard wrapped my foot up today before he went to work. Yesterday was awful with out the bandages.
- I am grateful for Jesus.
- I am grateful for covenants.
- I am grateful for priesthood blessings.
- I am grateful for tears that can be shed.
- I am grateful to have a husband with a sense of humor.
- I am grateful that even after today he will still laugh with me and love me.
- I am grateful to Fisher for making lunch today. He cooked brown rice all by himself.
- I am grateful to Annesley for making breakfast…yogurt and berries.
- I am grateful to be reading Nothing To Envy…so, so grateful I don’t live in North Korea.
- I am grateful for my mom’s efforts to cheer me up. It didn’t work, but I love that she tried.
- I am grateful for refrigeration.
- I am grateful for all the love that is in my life.
- I am grateful for the gospel of hope. Without it I think these kinds of days would come quite frequently and boy, howdy, that would be miserable.
- I am grateful for my cute Fiesta dishes…at least when they are piled up on the counter they are cute to look at.
- I am grateful to be able to teach my children at home.
- I am grateful for duct tape that is holding my vacuum together.
- I am grateful for mechanical pencils.
- I am grateful for water bottles.
- I am grateful for dear friends.
- I am grateful for the power of gratitude to buoy me up. Now I can tackle another day.
yes, it is broken
I don’t think I have adequately announced it to the world…it got lost in everything else…
MY FOOT IS BROKEN
I fell off a barstool back on July 3rd and wondered for the next three weeks if it was broken or not. I finally went in to my favorite foot doctor the day before my scheduled departure for the mountains and he found the break in the 4th metatarsal. I had already been wearing a walking boot for about a week at that point and had been wrapping it up in vet wrap for the two weeks prior, but it wasn’t getting better. If anything, the pain was getting worse by the day. We still aren’t really sure what is wrong because it should be getting better by now and it is not. It is quite possible I have a torn ligament in my foot which is only discoverable with an MRI. Even if I don’t have a torn ligament, it is pretty much a given that my ligaments aren’t doing their job to hold the broken bone together while it heals and thus healing is going to take a lot longer than normal. I have been told (but I am trying so hard to let the fear around this go) that it very well may not heal at all because of the ligament laxity and I will have to have foot surgery and pins inserted to hold the bone together. None of this will be figured our for weeks and weeks more. It is all so discouraging.
My hip doctor was quite nervous about me being in a boot and stressed to me that it is absolutely essential for my hip sockets to be level within 1/16 of an inch or the pubic symphysis will break, the labral tear will flare up again, and my femoral nerve will start short-circuiting my nervous system on a regular basis. Thus started a seven hour search for a shoe that was within 1/16 of an inch of my walking boot height. It was not pretty. I ranted and raved to Kat about it, then got to work going to a gazillion stores and asking shoe fitters to please lie down on the floor and measure the difference between my two feet with teensy-tiny rulers. After about five hours of this and having NO SUCCESS AT ALL, I completely fell apart and bawled my eyes out and called Kat and asked her to rescue me. I hadn’t eaten in all this time and I thought if I had some nourishment maybe some of my brain cells and hopefully some of my determination would return to me. Kat came and whisked me away for some food with her and her children, then she surprised me by taking me in her van to more shoe stores. She said I was unfit to be left alone in my ready-to-give-up-and-melt-into-a-puddle condition. Armed with her confidence and ingenuity we started searching again. By the time we found a shoe that would work we had five salespeople and Kat on the floor measuring, constructing paper devices to accurately solve the how-tall-is-the-walking-boot problem, and me past the point of being able to speak or make decisions at all. Thank goodness for super-hero Kat…I could not have made it through the day without her.
The next day we set off on our trip a day late and many dollars short, but I had my boot, I had my shoe, I had a big stack of books to read, and promises made to stay off my foot as much as humanly possible.
I did stay off my foot very well and it was doing great while I was up there. Since I have been home it has been another story. There is so much to do in running a home and I am up on it much more here than I was while camping. My goal is to stay off it as much as I can for the next three weeks and cover it with oils, BF&C, take my supplements to regrow bone, and pray hard for healing.
If it isn’t significantly better in three weeks I don’t know what to do. iFamily starts. Gym starts. Homeschool starts. I am needed.
grl 2013
Snuggling with grandma in the hammock is the perfect way to spend an afternoon, don’t you think?
Sixteen days of being completely cut off from phones, computers, stores, and busy-ness was exactly what I needed. I was able to lounge around in my magic zero-gravity chair, read six whole books, do a lot of thinking, pondering, and planning, and spend oodles of time with my husband, children, siblings, and mama.
Heaven.
My mom and I and three of my children went up five days before anyone else and we had a grand time relaxing, eating simple meals, letting the kids play in the lake all they wanted, and getting an afternoon rain shower every day. At night we all slept together in my tent because my mom’s tent poles didn’t make it to camp with her.
Here is our dishwashing station.
And here is my tent on one of the less messy days.
On one of the first few days we had quite a bit of rain around dinner time. We all hunkered down in the tent hoping it would stop soon and we could go out and make dinner, but it never stopped and our stomachs were growling, so we covered up in all our rain gear and made dinner. I didn’t want to get my boot wet, so I put Richard’s huge rainpants on and tried to make an umbrella over the boot with the pant legs…it was more than hilarious looking.
Fisher all bundled up for dinner.
Finally the rain stopped and he took his hood off.
Then the family started arriving, a different group almost every day. Scott on Wednesday, Richard and Keziah on Thursday, Mikelle and Logan’s family on Friday, Andie on Saturday, Cameron and Nicole on Monday, Stephen on Tuesday, and Leonard on Thursday. Thursday was the only day we were all there at the same time so we rushed down to the lake to take some pictures before a rain storm hit. There were several cameras snapping at the same time, so we are rarely all looking at the same camera, but we still got some fun shots. The last time we were all together was Summer 2009, so this is a pretty rare event and needed to be recorded for posterity, ha-ha.
All the grandkids in our fancy pyramid pose. It took approximately fifty pictures to get one where most of them were looking at the same camera. The poor girls on the bottom were dying by the time we took the little ones off.
Trying to get Annesley to stop posing for our family shot.
Fisher looking backwards while the rest of us look at the camera…completely typical.
Finally one where we are all facing the camera and looking somewhat normal.
Then we thought we would get creative…hilarity ensued.
The Three Muskateers
I don’t know if I was falling over or what, but we sure look like we are living through an earthquake. Good thing my little sis is super-buff and could hold me up.
Then we decided to get a bit crazy with Mom’s picture of herself with her children. Why not toss her up in the air against her loudly voiced protestations…I mean there are five of us, we can do what we want, right?
Mom and Grandpa Leonard with all the grandchildren.
And finally all seventeen of us together.
My Aunt Carol’s family and my Aunt Diane (Camille’s mom) came with cousins to play with, but we didn’t get many pictures of them.
My little family went on an overnighter backpacking trip, sans Annesley and I. I think they went 10-12 miles. Fisher walked the whole way and didn’t complain a bit. He and his papa are already planning their next backpacking adventure. Here they are setting out.
Love this boy…he doesn’t stop looking at me until he is past the tree. He felt so bad to leave me at camp far away from their fun.
One final wave.
Making a loaf of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches is pretty much a daily camping occurence.
Of course, we spent a lot of time kayaking, canoeing, swimming, and jumping off the bridge. We had kayak races around the island which Scott won with a time of 54 seconds. Logan came in second with 56 sec., Mikelle third with 1:03, and me fourth with 1:05. My legs may not work, but my arms still have a little umph left in them.
Nicole learning how to kayak.
Cameron and Nicole kayaking out to the lake.
Annesley loves to ride on the back of the kayaks…so far she hasn’t fallen off!
Here is cousin Marcus in one of our kayaks.
Blythe, Annesley, and Fisher out on the lake.
Annesley jumped off the bridge all by herself this year! Usually someone holds her over the edge and drops her, but this year she mustered up her courage and jumped herself! Cameron, Eve, Samuel, Marcus, Scott, Logan, Caleb, Blythe, Andie, and Keziah all jumped as well. It is an annual feat of courage that we have to keep doing over and over again to prove we are still made of toughness. Unfortunately I didn’t jump. I promised Richard I wouldn’t and I kept my promise even though I really, really wanted to break it.
Keziah jumping.
Cameron’s splash into the river.
I have no idea what my mama is thinking. It seems like every year she does some pull-up-the-shorts-to-the-sternum-pose and makes us all laugh our heads off. I think this year was the best yet.
We played lots of card games, laid in the sun (I have my darkest tan of my life!), and read and read and read. Here is Miss Oaklyn snuggled up in her daddy’s jacket watching us play cards.
Lots of fish were caught and returned to the river and a few were brought back to camp to be eaten devoured. One night Annesley skunked everyone and she was proud as punch to be the only one to catch one.
Mikelle and Andie kept up their workout schedule and ran around the campground. Here is Mikelle at the top of the hill.
One day Scott planned a big adventure and took everyone to Clear Creek Meadow. Some of the group kayaked across the lake, others canoed, and the ones that were left hiked the three-ish miles to get to the tranquil waters of Clear Creek. They fished, floated the very lazy river, found hundreds of caterpillars, got attacked by a rash & swelling inducing plant, and had a great time. I stayed at camp and finished Perelandra.
Setting out.
Here is Fisher heading out for the adventure with his bug jar in case he found anything interesting. Luckily Annesley discovered the huge pile of caterpillars and he was able to fill his jar up. They are now in their cocoons and getting ready to emerge as butterflies.
My little brother, Cameron, came clear out from Wisconsin, and he brought his sweetie, Nicole, with him.
Cam and Mom.
Cameron and Nicole
They brought their Pudgie Pie Makers with them (I had never heard of these things, but boy, howdy do they transform egg sandwiches into something divine!) and spent a whole evening make the whole group Campfire Calzones, Roasted Chicken Salad sandwiches, and all sorts of other crazy sandwich combinations. I definitely need to get me one of them so I can eat the magical egg sandwiches all year long.
Cooking in the fire, two sandwiches at a time, for our big group took awhile, but it was sure delicious.
My Campfire Calzone (named by Andie after she thought Pizza Pie Thingy was too boring).
Mikelle and her two babes.
Oaklyn has us all wrapped around her little finger. She is so, so busy. So, so cute. She makes me grin with delight.
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Easton is a hoot. He has a huge vocabulary and loves to share his thoughts on everything. He wants to be big and do everything the big kids do. Here he is trying to break the wood in half (notice the headlamp?).
He and Annes get along pretty well, but sometimes they drive each other crazy and need some alone time. Luckily, we caught a few pictures of them having a ball together.
One day all the girls washed their hair and we had a braiding party.
A few days later, the curls were lovely.
Foot washing is even more important than hair washing. Here is Annesley having one of her many dirt removal sessions while Blythe and Andie are disgusted with how dirty the water is from Annesley’s – they refuse to put their feet in it.
Annes and Grandma soaking the layers of filth away.
I made it through six books while my family went on their adventures, but thanks to my mom delivering me right down to the water’s edge, I was able to go on several adventures myself. My mom and I went kayaking one day and then Mikelle and I went a few days later looking for my hikers to come home. I love kayaking. I love how easily they glide through the water, how strong I feel as I paddle, and how I can stop and let the waves take me where they want me while I relax and stare at my mountains. I think I am ready for own kayak that I don’t have to share with my children. If the lower half of my body is going to continue being so gimpy, I can at least use my upper half to see the world.
Reading in my chair – I think this is book five.
Fisher learned how to play Spades and now he wants to play it everyday. He even won one game by a landslide – taking nine tricks on one of the rounds helped him out quite bit.
We celebrated Blythe and Andie’s 17th birthdays with cakes, presents, memories of their lives, and lots of fun.
The girls’ Charlie’s Angels pose.
Blythe’s cake complete with baby Snickers.
Eating the cake…yes, they are goofballs.
Searching all over camp for her hidden presents. Is there one in the wood pile?
Richard was in charge of presents this year because I couldn’t go do any shopping with my broken foot. He thought throwing knives were the perfect idea…super cheap AND our girlie loves all sorts of weapons. They were put to good use by Blythe and all the guys of the camp.
More knives.
Andie just got home from a trip to Nepal. She brought these adorable gloves home for Blythe. I can see Blythe copying the design and whipping up a pile of them for her friends.
Camping wrapping paper = a hat, rubberband, and a flower for decoration.
Andie’s cake complete with oreos.
Andie requested a special piece of Blythe’s artwork. Andie told her what she wanted on it and Blythe spent hours making it for her. Here it is all completed with the girls shouting “I made this for you!” – a line from some movie? Song? Something? I don’t know what exactly, but they giggled hysterically every time they said it.
Rubik’s Cube and freeze-dried ice cream – who could want for anything more?
New nightgowns from grandma.
I can’t believe I have a child this old. I feel like life is slipping away. Soon she will be off on her own, living her own life. This could be the last summer she is with us at Green River Lakes for awhile and in some ways that cuts my heart in two. But I am trying to keep my big girl panties on and be strong and convince myself that my job as a mother is to prepare her for a healthy, fulfilling life outside my home, not to keep my little family together in this stage that is so lovely.
The girls in their matching “I will not moose-behave” birthday shirts from Grandma.
See these rocks? They are magical.
When we were little, all the cousins would play on these rocks for hours. Jumping and racing from one to the other. There are six rocks, perfect for playing tag, having a picnic lunch, or holding secret club meetings. We had so much fun on these rocks as we were growing up. This year Annesley mastered jumping from the frog to the pig (yes, they all have names!).
Andie and Grandma on their tube mountain.
Kez and Fisher hate their pictures being taken – I have oodles (really, hundreds and hundreds) of shots just like this where they are hiding, closing their eyes, being absolutely silly, covering their faces, etc. Maybe if I post them on here they will start opening their eyes and smile more often for the camera?
This girl, however, loves the camera. She is usually posing in some dramatic move or another, but here are some with her arms down and her camera smile on.
And with poses.
Sunbathing?
Filthy, tired Sadie.
With Andie’s help I made it out to the rock in the river…wahoo for me!
Annesley and Easton loved climbing to the top of the big rock in Aunt Carol’s campspot.
Annesley insisted on a picture of her alone on the big rock.
About a week into our trip, several fires stared from lightening strikes. This one was on Osburn Mountain, right above our camp. We wondered if we would be evacuated, but it all worked out with the winds and we were able to stay and watch 500 of our favorite acres be burned.
It was smokey and sad and sometimes frustrating, but by the time we left, it looked much better. We couldn’t see the backside of the mountain to know how bad it is over there, but I am hoping it isn’t too terrible.
I know many of you worry about me going on these adventures, but trust me, I need it. I need to spend time in my mountains each summer so I can reconnect with the deepest parts of who I am, so I can remember my grandparents and the lessons they taught me, so I can feel my grandmother’s deep love for me and try to see myself as she saw me. I need to swim in the waters I have been swimming in my whole life. I need to see my mountains. I need this each time every year…and especially this year. I may look like I am holding it together pretty well, but some days, this morning included, I fall completely apart. I am sometimes scared that my body will never heal and that I will go from one injury to another. I don’t know how to keep on functioning in all my many roles as wife, mother, teacher, friend, disciple, citizen, board member, mentor, and chauffeur when my body is so unpredictable. I don’t even remember what it feels like to be out-of-pain. But this time in my mountains rejuvenates me in a way I can’t explain. It give me strength and hope and calm.
I love this place.
I'm Tracy, a mama with big dreams, crazy ideas, loads of laughter, an insatiable desire to learn, and enormous piles of laundry.
