Fun with the Bartels

Over Spring Break we went on a couple adventures with the Bartels--Lina and her kids Lars and Sarah, who are the same ages as our kids.

Lars invited Wade to go ice skating with him and his family in Bakersfield one day that week, and, boy, did they had fun!  It turned into a full day of skating, pizza, and mini-golf!

Then the next day the kids and I joined them and other families to go "bouldering" at Wagon Wheel, near Trona.  After living here since 1999, it was about time I experienced this cool place!  It was surprisingly close, too.  We had fun, and Mom didn't break the truck getting there, haha!

Today is a gift

Today has been a lovely Easter Sunday.  Church was nice.  One talk in particular, by our friend Lora Evans (who just got back from serving a mission in the Des Moines Iowa area), was very powerful.  She talked about the Atonement and it was amazing!  I wish I'd recorded and taken notes. 

After church we delivered "Easter dinner to-go" to our friends Howard and Sandi.  Sandi had just had foot surgery, and we were happy to stop by for a few minutes and say hello.  

This weekend we had a family date to see Batman v. Superman--it was a dark movie, but we enjoyed it.  We sure do love our super-hero genre movies!!!

That same day we had a Girls Night-Guys Night, too.  Rhiannon and I joined other ladies at Kristin Hawkins' home to eat and watch the Women's Session of conference.  The boys went out to Classic Burger in Inyokern!

This week Wade has a band concert and Rhiannon has a drumline competition.  We are feeding the sister missionaries on Thursday night, too.  The rest of the week is pretty normal, the usual fun! 

I'm looking forward to General Conference this weekend, too!

Happy Easter 2016!

We've all had the day off on this Good Friday--it's been nice.  Rhiannon has been the busiest of us all, taking on a babysitting job and now partying up at a friend's 5-hour birthday party (whew!).  Both the kids pulled lots of weeds for me today, too, which I really appreciated.  Wade's Scout camp-out got cancelled, so he's enjoyed a lot of video game time!

Our Easter baskets are very simple this year.  We have a tradition of doing the baskets on Saturday morning, to be able to focus more on the Savior on Sunday, instead of candy, candy, candy.

Instead of buying gobs of candy like I've usually done, I just bought a couple things and then filled plastic eggs with little strips of paper on which I wrote either love notes, coupons for fun things or acts of service, and a favorite Easter scripture (Matthew 28:6).

I even gave myself a few love notes, such as "Remember to enjoy the magic of ordinary days!"  I feel really good about the baskets and hope they will be received well, haha! :)   Idea for the Easter love notes here:  http://growingupgabel.com/easter-baskets-idea-for-kids/

Jason was out of town Monday thru Thursday this week and got back yesterday afternoon.  He is still not 100%, but feeling a little better each day.  Tuesday was an absolutely crazy insane day (Wade gone to Disneyland from 5am to almost 1am the next morning), drumline for Rhiannon, institute class and a sub job for me....but we made it through!

Institute class was magical this week.  I came prepared to teach several highlights from the whole book of Deuteronomy, but we spent almost half the class time talking about temple marriage.  In fact, the class joked that it was a "Face-to-Face Event with Sister Cushing."  One of our class members said something to the effect of, "Well, here we are talking about temple marriage and there's only one person in the room who's been married in the temple.  So, Sister Cushing, mind if we ask you some questions?"

It was an incredible experience for me.  Everyone appreciated that I set my lesson notes aside and just rolled with it.  They asked me how a temple marriage had blessed us, what Jason and I did to strengthen our marriage, etc, and then they all thanked me for taking that time with them.  There was an amazing spirit in the room, a feeling of openness and hope and love for each other and our potential.  I can't remember half of the things I shared, but I do know I came home and texted Jason about what had happened, told him I loved him, and appreciated all he did for me!

Not every lesson is like that.  This one was special, and, I felt, particularly guided by the Spirit, Usually I glaze over anything having to do with "marriage" because these young single adults hear it over and over and over, ya know?  But it was meant to be that night, and we were all blessed by it!

Spring Break so far!

Right now I'm upstairs with our dog Oscar, listening to Rhiannon and friends laughing downstairs.  Wade is hanging out with them, too, having a good time.  I encouraged Rhiannon to have some friends over during Spring Break.  I said, "I think it's your turn!  You're always getting invited by others--why don't you do the inviting this time?"  She planned a board game get-together with snacks and put a little worry and thinking into it.  She cracks me up, so considerate of who gets along with who and the "chemistry" of the group she wanted to invite.  It's been very interesting watching her plan.

Interesting, but not surprising.

A couple nights ago I came downstairs and the kids wanted me to take a personality test.  "You've just got to do it, too, Mom!"  We had such a good time sharing what our "types" were, according to this silly (but crazily accurate) website:

https://www.16personalities.com/

Jason is "The Commander," extroverted, intuitive, thinking, and judging.
I'm the "Defender," leaning toward introverted, sensing, feeling, and judging.
Rhiannon is the "Advocate," a personality type shared by only 1% of the population.  She leans towards introverted, intuition, feeling, and judging.
Wade is the "Consul," leaning towards extroverted, sensing, feeling, and judging.

We laughed and laughed about it, but also had to agree there was some accuracy in our "test" results!  Lots of fun!

So far this week we have:

--slept in a bit
--celebrated Pi Day with pizza, pie, and ice cream sandwiches
--watched some DVR shows
--played Rock Band a lot and made videos (Rhiannon and Wade)
--taken care of the neighbors' dog
--traveled to Lancaster for a Costco and shopping trip; we made good time to get back for the dog-watching
--Rhiannon participated in a service project with friends

Jason is planning to take a couple days off, and that will be fun.  Even if we're not doing a whole lot, it will be wonderful to be together chillin'!

First Saturday of Spring Break

A couple days ago I read this very simple, powerful article online about productivity and self-worth. The author insisted that our worth shouldn't be attached to a massive to-do list or accomplishments or how busy, busy we are.  Instead of valuing productivity, the author suggested that we focus on hard work (and relaxing after a job well done), living with heart and eyes wide open (engaging in LIFE), and remembering that a person's worth isn't based on results.  She closed with "My worth just is--and yours is, too."  I loved that!  I've been thinking about it a lot.  You can read the article here:  http://nosidebar.com/detangle-productivity/

Jason got some bad news earlier this week.  Last Saturday he woke up in terrible pain--his foot hurt and the inside of one of his knees felt like it was on fire.  After lots of time at urgent care, back and forth to an imaging center, the pharmacy, and the podiatrist, he learned he had a triple whammy:  painful blood clots in his leg (not deep), a torn plantar fascia, and a knee issue that will most likely need surgery to correct.  He took two days off trying to figure all this out and then hobbled into work for 2 days.  He's resting up and taking it easy this weekend.  It is no fun at all and we all feel so bad for him, hoping that he will continue to rest, not push it too much, and heal.

This was our sunrise yesterday, on the last day of school before Spring Break.  We are so happy for a week off from early-morning seminary and school, haha!  We'll have a stay-cation this week and have a few fun plans here and there.  The kids are caring for our neighbors' dog across the street 3+ times a day for the entire week--they started today and are excited to earn some money doing it.  

We made a small list of things we'd like to do for the week--get new shoes, go see the Zootopia movie, walk the new walking path up by the college, plant the garden, watch a BUNCH of DVRed shows, etc.  Rhiannon is having a few friends over on Wednesday for games and food, and Wade is going with a friend to Bakersfield on Thursday to go ice skating!

Tonight Rhiannon is going on a "date" with her dad for dinner; Wade and I will do something similar.  Life is good!

March winds blow!

Happy Sunday!  It is very windy today!  I love listening to the wind, but I'm sure glad we don't have to be out in it much today.  We are fasting today for various things, going to church, and then joining the Johnson family (Scott and Marie) for dinner at their house.  Then the kids will go to a stake fireside.  A busy Sunday!

The rest of our weekend has been fun, too.  On Friday night, Rhiannon went to the high school's Mr. BHS pageant with friends, and Wade went to Halle Evans' birthday party (he has been to a lot of bday parties lately!)

Then yesterday Wade went with his Boy Scout troop to the Trona Pinnacles for a fun morning hike and lunch.  Rhiannon spent a LOT of time working on homework, Jason worked hard out in the backyard redoing sprinkler lines for the garden area, and I went to a Women's Conference at the stake center.  That night Connor Litton invited Rhiannon and Wade to go play games with a bunch of young single adults--they were some of the youngest kids there but had a good time.  It was nice of the Littons to pick up Rhiannon and Wade--I went and got them about an hour later (both kids said they didn't want to stay long because they were TIRED, haha!)

I also wanted to mention the kindness of neighbors this weekend.  Kristin Hawkins brought over some divine chocolate cookies to thank me for helping with her friend that she'd brought to Women's Conference.  She had to stay in the gym the whole time helping with the service projects, and she'd been worried about what to do with this new acquaintance who wanted to come.  Jesse was great and easy to talk to--it wasn't a big deal at all, but Kristin sure was grateful.  What a sweetheart!   That afternoon another neighbor, Margo DiDomenico, came by with some wrapped "puzzles" for the kids.  They were boxes of Cheez-It crackers, haha!  The kids were ecstatic and I sent them straight out the door to go thank her.  Margo had seen a funny post I'd put on Facebook about how the kids were down to their last box of crackers, haha!  What a thoughtful, funny thing to do!

We are all counting the days to Spring Break--one more week!  We don't have any big plans set--Jason has to work much of the week--but we are all looking forward to some down time and a family camping trip that Friday and Saturday.

A side note:  I complained about the early-morning barking dog on Facebook, and the next day it stopped.  I have had decent, uninterrupted sleep since Thursday and I feel like a rock star.  Sleep is good for my soul, haha!