Superpaige's Pad

The Trials of a Busy Mom

Author: Superpaige (Page 22 of 180)

Family Reunion

July 15, 2013 / / 0 Comments

This weekend marked our family’s 10th year of family reunions at Payson Lakes.
070 The group camp site is reserved from Thursday to Saturday, but for most of the group, Friday is the day to come up and play. We hang out at the lakes, fishing, swimming, and canoeing. But some years, the elements do not cooperate. One year there were fires in a nearby canyon, and we spent the day (and night) wondering if they would evacuate us. Last year we took Marie, our French exchange student with us, and she was excited to go camping and catch a fish. Huge rains drenched our tent and we sacked the idea of camping overnight, but she did catch a fish. This year we weren’t even planning on staying overnight. Ryan won’t sleep where he can’t plug in his sleep mask, and Natalie and I both had to get back for our respective plays. Unfortunately, this campout usually coincides with the opening weekend of Alpine Community Theater’s summer play, so that’s been a conflict for the past several years.

Friday dawned RAINY. REALLY rainy. Ugh. Because of the rain, we weren’t quite so quick to pack up our stuff and go, but we did get to the camp site by about 11:00.
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With three different canopies set up, it kept us pretty dry so we could play some card games.
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The kids were happy to spend some time with cousins, even if it was cold and rainy.
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Eventually the sun came out! Ryan and Megan had stayed at home to get some work done, but they brought 12 junior frosties from Wendy’s with them in a cooler when they came.
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It’s just fun to get together with family.

Shortly after the sun came out, Natalie and I had to leave. We had to get Natalie ready for her play..Opening night! and her call time was 5:00.
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We did some makeup for her and braided her hair (luckily it doesn’t have to be curled or anything difficult like that) and got her some food and took her over to the school. I cleaned up a little bit and then went to my own rehearsal. Thankfully, I didn’t have to stay at rehearsal super long, so I was just getting home by ten so I could pick Natalie up from the play.

Ryan and the kids didn’t get home until nearly midnight, and they brought an extra! Jenna was thrilled to have her cousin Kaylee come and stay with us for the rest of the weekend.

Short, but sweet. No time in the lake, no canoeing, but we still had fun. And since I brought my camera home with me, no pictures of the festivities for the rest of the afternoon and evening, but they came home just as dirty as if they had been there MORE than just a day. (Not sure how that happens)

Just Hang on

July 13, 2013 / / 0 Comments

JULY.

July is typically the month when things slow down and we languish in the heat of the summer.
Not this year.
Where do I start. Well, Natalie is in Alpine Community Theater’s production of Peter Pan. Tonight is Opening Night! I wish I was in that play with her, but we will go see it tomorrow.

So, for the past two weeks, she’s had a rehearsal every night, with the last three going past 10:00. It’s actually a relief when the show opens because then you just do the show, and you go home. That show runs until June 22.

This week, we pick up two Chinese exchange students. We’ve had fun with this program in the past, and the family was excited to host again, even though I am seriously so busy in July, I don’t know when we’ll do anything fun with them. They will be here from the 18th of July until Aug 5. They have to be to their program in Orem every weekday. We drop them off at 8 and pick them up around 5. Thankfully, I got a call yesterday from another lady in Alpine who wanted to carpool, and we’ve worked it out so that we can take 6 kids from 3 families. Of course, that interferes just a little bit with my three girls who are doing a buddy program with them. They are buddies, and they go 5 different days with the Chinese students. (These aren’t this year’s students, but Vivian and Coco from two years ago)
They get to go to a ropes course, 7 peaks, and also help with a talent show. There’s also a family barbeque closing social that we all can go to. Luckily, Megan could drive the three of them to Orem on buddy days if we can’t squeeze them into the carpool. The last time we did this, I just about went crazy. The girls were nice and sweet, but the DRIVING back and forth to Provo, through the construction EVERY SINGLE day, (sometimes twice a day) was killing me. I didn’t have a good carpool, and that makes SUCH a big difference.
Hopefully we can squeeze in some fun with them.

Meanwhile, I am in full swing rehearsal mode for the Scarlett Pimpernel. That show opens August 2, which is just a couple of weeks away, and I have NO idea how we will be ready in time. But guess where I’ll be every night? Yep, at rehearsal.

To add to that, I have a lesson to teach this Sunday for a class I’m subbing, and then a RS lesson NEXT Sunday. I think if people know you are in cub scouts (my new calling), that means “please call this person to sub for you because they don’t have a Sunday job”. Oh, and cub scout day camp is this week. hooray (said in a dead pan, very small voice).

Oh, and yes, I’m still playing bells. Every Wednesday, although I have to miss one for a dress rehearsal. Thankfully, at the Scera, they don’t do shows on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, so that means I can stil go to bells through the month of August, even though I’m doing a play. Except, did I mention that after we do the show at the Shell, we are also performing it at BYU every night for education week? Yes, we’ll get to do the show in the deJong Theater, so if you are attending education week, COME see the show! I’ll have to miss bells for that week, too.

I heard that we’re performing some song for a Music and the Spoken Word broadcast sometime in August, but since I can’t be there on the Thursday night rehearsal, I think I’ll let someone else take my spot and step aside for one broadcast.

My mother was kind of chastising me for being so busy, and she doesn’t understand WHY in the world I would want to fill up my whole summer with a play. I guess if you don’t do theater, you don’t understand the draw. It is a ton of work, and many times I ask myself WHY I do this, but it really is fun. Talk to me when it’s over and we’ll see if I think it was worth it or not.

So, we are going to hang on for the next month and just hope I can schedule everything just right so that we fit it all in, with no screaming panic attacks and no stress eating. Wish me luck.

Why are you …so…old?

July 10, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Being in a play with a bunch of young people. Hmm.

My first impression of this cast was, WOW, what talent. Seriously, the first time we sang Madame Guillotine together, I was blown away by how we sounded. And there was so much LESS time wasted, without a bunch of little kids. Those choral rehearsals were really great. But as I looked around, I thought that only a couple of these people looked old enough to be married, let alone have children. Let’s face it, having little kids is not really conducive to spending almost every night at rehearsal. Why do you think it took me until I was nearly 40 to try out for community theater? Family. I’m not sayin I don’t love my family, I DEFINITELY love my family more than anything in the world, and if they would do theater with me, I would LOVE that. And isn’t it great that I can still do theater even after spending all those years as a stay at home mom?

Anyway, I digress. A lot of people in the cast are high school or college kids. While waiting out a scene or learning blocking, they CANNOT a-sit still or b-shut up. Honestly. For a ball scene, they put me with this one guy, I’ll call him E. He and this other guy, who we shall call B, talk, talk, talk, through the whole scene. And not just talking, it’s Lord of the Rings impersonations, acting out light saber battles, quoting lines from OTHER movies that I couldn’t place, and all manner of other things. They are entertaining, but if I’m trying to listen or learn dance steps, it’s annoying. The director came by and said, “Does he EVER stop talking?” I shook my head no. He’s probably bummed that he has to have ME as a partner, when there are so many cute girls that he COULD be flirting with, had he only been paired up with them instead. Oh, well. He did talk TO ME long enough to mention that he had met a really neat girl at the singles ward the other day. I asked if he had asked her out and he said he did. Then he said she came over to his house and they talked. I was quick to remind him that hanging out at your house (or your parent’s house) is NOT a date, and he needed to take her somewhere to do something. Not that he asked for my advice or anything, but as a mother, I figure it’s my job to point that out to him.

Speaking of dancing, I was actually pleased that the choreographer at least PUT me in that scene. As she was assigning everyone places for the ball scene, she came by and said, “Are you ok to dance?” to me. Really? I know that I’m old and fat and out of shape and I didn’t do great on my dance audition, but I CAN learn the simple steps to a ball dance, thank you very much. I was afraid that she would purposely NEVER put me in a scene with any dancing. The other big group number, Madame Guillotine, they have me as a prisoner heading to the guillotine, while almost everyone else does this amazing dance and sings the song. We prisoners don’t even get to sing the song, and it’s the best song in the show. Darn. But, I shouldn’t complain, it’s time on stage, right? I was afraid that she totally hated me and wasn’t going to put me in ANY dances at all, but thankfully it’s not that bad.

There’s one other guy who is older than me. Did I mention that I knew him from BYU? I got a chance to chat with him a bit last night, and he did remember that we went out a couple of times back then. He even brought it up, so that’s good to know he does remember me. When we were learning the ballroom scene, he actually spoke up and said that she was going too fast for him to remember all these steps, and could she make sure to say the counts. I was glad he said something, because I was feeling the same way, but was far too insecure to pipe up and say anything like that.

Last night we were blocking a scene where Percy and his men help some prisoners escape. It’s all set to music, no singing, and the director and choreographer had to figure out what was going on when, place everyone, rehearse, etc. I am not a prisoner in this scene, rather in the “mob” that is there to watch the execution. We mob members don’t really do much in the scene except give Percy’s men a place to hide, so it was really boring for us. And I got to stand near some OTHER young people and listen to their conversations. It’s so weird to be transported back to the drama world. Theater people are a unique brand of people. They want to be funny, likeable, and the center of attention. I don’t really fit in with them, as again, I’m old, but I do join in their conversations sometimes. I’m trying to learn people’s names each time I go to rehearsal. Most of the girls seem nice, and the boys are the ones that are always goofing off and never stop goofing off. Last night seemed like a huge waste of time to everyone who was in ‘the mob’, but at the end, the director had us all sit and said, “THANK you so much for your cooperation. This was a difficult scene, and we were so worried about getting it right, but you’ve all done a marvelous job, doing what you were told, and not complaining. I think you are a marvelous and talented cast, and I really enjoy working with you.” Wow. He must not have heard all the complaining that was going on in back in the mob.

So, while it is fun to be a part of this show, I am not really feeling like a part of the show, yet. I still feel quite like an outsider. An OLD outsider. But hopefully that feeling will go away as I meet more people. Maybe I’ll make them some cookies.

TREK

July 7, 2013 / / 1 Comment

week Megan and Natalie went on Trek. After a whole month of prep, they left on Monday morning. I had t get them to their respective churches by 5:45 am.
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It was a relief to have them drop off their stuff on Saturday, because it just felt like we were NEVER done getting the stuff! We had bonnets, but I sewed two skirts, two aprons, altered some shirts, sewed elastic in some pajama pants for bloomers, and we borrowed or found the rest. After buying the tick spray, the hiking socks, the dishes, small Book of Mormons, moleskin, bug spray, sunscreen, vasaline, etc, etc (times two), I probably spent over $200 outfitting these two girls for their roughing it experience.
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I woke them up around 5 so we could leave at 5:30. I took Natalie to her drop off church first, and she was the first one from her “family” there.
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Both girls had great “families” and had had a few activities with their Ma and Pa and family to get to know them and feel comfortable with them. I am SO THANKFUL for all the wonderful people who worked so hard as Mas and Pas to make this experience a good one for our kids.

Then I took Megan to her drop off point, which was our church, and I asked if they had gotten their ancestor cards. NO! said Megan. WHAT? Each person walking on trek was supposed to find an ancestor who actually crossed the plains, make up an ancestor card and have it laminated. They would wear that ancestor card while they walked. And they had forgotten them. Ugh. Time to race back home. We got home, Megan ran in and grabbed those two cards, looked for her sunglasses that she had forgotten, and then I took her to her drop off point. Because of our detour, it was a little past 5:45, but she wasn’t the last to arrive.
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(There’s her cute Ma, waving to us)
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Then I had to race over to the church where Natalie was, and bring her that ancestor card. Mission accomplished, and all by 6:00 am.

Then I came home and fell asleep on the couch, I’m not going to lie.

I thought about them all day, worried over how they would do with 13 miles of walking that day, if they would get sunburned, if they would get along with their families, praying for them to have good attitudes and not get blisters. It seemed quite without them, and quiet in the neighborhood. All the teens aged 14 and up were gone, as well as several sets of parents..all on trek. I texted my neighbor and mentioned that I wondered how the kids were doing. She texted me back and forwarded me a picture her husband, the bishop, who was there on trek, had sent her of her girls. The message read, “Girls say hi. L–hello we love you. E–We’re in hell.” That made me laugh, and was a little bit reassuring to know that they were alive. The next day he sent a message for me. “Ericksons–Blisters, but everyone has blisters, great and brave on women’s pull, great attitudes.” I don’t know if he was sending updates on every family, but I appreciated that little bit of info to know that they were working hard and hopefully keeping a good attitude.

Thursday, it was lonely without three of my kids. I couldn’t help thinking about Cole, and wondering what he was doing for the holiday, and hoping the girls were ok, too. The four of us went to the This is the Place Pioneer park to have a little fun.

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Even though it wasn’t the hottest day of the week, it was still WAY too hot to be wandering around dirt roads acting like a pioneer. Hmmm. And the girls were doing that for four days.

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To face the heat, we had root beer floats. Very American, right?

WE came home in the afternoon, and the girls got back around 3:00. I thought they would be SO tired, but they were full of energy, talking and laughing about how dirty they were.
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Megan said, ‘Look at my tan!’ and showed me her brown legs. They were indeed brown, until she wiped them off with a wet wipe, leaving a streak of white leg where the dirt had been.
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I kept telling them over and over…’Go TAKE a SHOWER!’, but they were telling me about trek and laughing (getting dirt all over). Finally I got them to both take showers. Long showers.
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Party

July 3, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Happy 50th Anniversary to my Mom and Dad!

Whew! 50 years! Can you believe it? That’s a long time together..a big milestone.

When I asked my parents what we should do for their party, they said, “Oh, we don’t need a party. We just took a trip instead.” What? I just couldn’t accept that. What happens with the other aunts and uncles have THEIR 50th, and they they are thinking, “Hey, we should have done a party or something.” So, we discussed this with the siblings. Feelings were mixed, because, after all, they did say they didn’t want a party or anything, right? But it’s FIFTY years. We had to do something.

So, I planned a party at my house, invited all the relatives, but didn’t really tell my mom and dad, I just invited them over.

Things we had to have
-cake
-a photo book or a slide show type thing to share pictures of them throughout the years
-a collection of letters to them congratulating them on this accomplishment
-music
-food
-flowers

And the unwritten requirement that really is the most important thing would be SHADE. Since they cut down the big old junk trees and put in a lovely fence, we have virtually no shade in our backyard, and that ends up being a problem when we want to have parties. We only have three umbrellas (strike that…two umbrellas since one of them got broken in a wind storm) and we have lots of wind.

Ryan’s sister Julene was such a dear to lend us some shade canopies. They actually have a lot of things like that. They have a LOT of parties, and he is the president of the Chilean association, so the association also has some canopies, too. Saturday night we started setting things up, because we would be at church on Sunday, and couldn’t set things up in the morning. It was about a million degrees as we were setting them up, and tempers were short. Oh, and did I mention we had been getting things ready for trek all day and had to turn in the girls buckets and sleeping bags that night by 6:00 and it caused quite a bit of stress? Well, we did.
Thankfully, I did NOT take any pictures of us setting this thing up, but we did finally get it set up, attached a couple of the hanging curtains, and VIOLA! SHADE! Amazing! We set up one 30×10 shade thing, and one 10×10, and with the hanging curtains, that was enough shade at 7:00 or later in the evening. We had TWO of the big white ones, but I convinced Ryan that we didn’t need to set up both of them.

It was quite dark by the time we were done, and, proud of ourselves and happy with how the backyard looked with the tables and chairs and canopies, we went to bed. I don’t know if it was an especially windy night, or if I was just AWARE of it being a windy night, but I heard every howl of the wind. Seriously. Crappy night’s sleep it was for me. In the morning, a sense of dread settled over me, but I had to look. That big white canopy was twisted and definitely not in same place where we had set it up. And we had staked it and everything. Why, oh why, did we leave it up overnight? This is Highland. There is ALWAYS wind. What were we thinking? We went out to discover a few bent poles, but nothing too serious. We put everything back, staked it again, found more tie downs that we should have used in the first place, staked those down, and went inside (because even though it was about 9 in the morning, it was already so hot.)

When we got home from church, we realized that canopy was blowing in the wind AGAIN. What a pain. SO HOT, and SO much trouble with the canopy. Should have done this thing inside.

Cake– I had asked my friend Janeen to make a cake for me. I told her my budget and said she could do whatever she wanted to do. Really.
Well, she came through for us, and even delivered this cake to me on Sunday afternoon.

Isn't this a pretty cake?

That 50 on the top is out of modeling chocolate, and she used her new airbrush to stencil on those swirly designs. So pretty.
And when we cut into it and tasted it, it was SO YUMMY!
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When my parents arrived, they thought we were just having my sisters and families over, they didn’t know we had invited the WHOLE family, and they were surprised that this was an actual party.

We had flowers,
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lots of food, music (Ryan had installed outdoor speakers for this and future parties, isn’t he awesome?) and even had them cut the cake a feed it to each other.
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It turned out to be a lovely party, even though it was too hot. By 8:30, it was perfect out!
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I”m so thankful for these wonderful parents of mine. I’m glad that we could throw them a party. I hope it was a great anniversary for them, and i hope when WE reach 50 years together (we’re at 21 this year, so only 29 to go…) our kids will throw us a great party, too.

Something about why do I even try…

June 27, 2013 / / 3 Comments

Summertime.

It’s all about FUN family memories, together time, and bonding as a family, right? In my mind, that was what we were going to do.

It was a relatively FREE day. The first day of the week where we didn’t have lessons of some kind or a babysitting job or work to clutter our day, so I could do something fun with the kids. I had big plans. I had to go to SLC anyway to pick up some prizes from radio stations, so why not take the kids and do something fun in the city while we were there?

The day began with one child asking, ne..BEGGING to go to lunch with her friend who had invited her. It was her late birthday present, after all. But child, I cajoled, we are going to do something “Fun”. She chose her friend over us. Sigh. One down, that still left three of them, and we would do something fun. We could go to a museum, go to City Creek and shop, or maybe bowling. When the kids heard bowling, they cheered. Bowling it is, then. But FIRST, we need to do our jobs and clean up the house.

I was busy making 4 quiches. Why was I making quiche at 8:00 in the morning? Because I had to take a dinner in to a neighbor, but we already had plans for the evening, and if I’m going to do any baking on a 100 degree day, it will darn well be in the morning. So, there I am, making a mess in the kitchen at the SAME time I am asking them to clean up. Hypocritical? Yes, actually. But I was WORKING, and wanted them to be working, too.

A certain 9 year old decided he wasn’t going to work and was going to be rude and obstinate with his mommy. It’s kind of a pattern with that boy. Without going into the lovely proud parenting moment details, let’s just say we got into it, and that boy is going to shape up or not have ANY fun this summer. At all. Ever. So, after an attitude adjustment and some work and an apology, we were nearly all ready to go.

Lunch date girl’s friend cancelled, so NOW she wants to go with us, again. Fine.

Get snacks, look up where the bowling place is, get water, use the bathroom, and ….

grabbing my water bottle to get out the door, the lid is not screwed on properly and I drop the WHOLE thing on the floor. Small stubborn boy was actually the one who helped me clean it up.

We got out the door later than I had planned, but I still had high hopes.

It takes a while to go to three different radio stations. They are not centrally located, and with traffic downtown, before I knew it it was 1:00 and the kids were hungry. Drive through McDonald’s solves that problem, but where in the world is this bowling place? Not everyone in the world has a GPS, so I was just trying to find it by the address, in an area of Sandy I don’t often drive. Oops, turn around…AGAIN. Found it! We went inside, and we learned that
a-FREE with your pass does not mean free. It means it will cost you $3.75 per person to rent SHOES.
b-There is a wait of 20-30 minutes before we can bowl.

Looking at the clock, I realize that we don’t have 20-30 minutes to wait because oldest daughter has to work at 3, and here it is already 1:15. And I promised them FUN! Hoping they don’t revolt at the compromise, I suggest we get a redbox and ice cream cones and go home. Luckily, they went for that idea, with only a tiny bit of whining about not being able to bowl when I promised them TWO movies. So, instead of a FUN outing with the kids, I dragged them around in the car for hours, only to get a redbox and ice cream cones that we could have gotten 3 minutes from our house. Together time? Whatever.

All I know is that we are all hot, tired, and cranky. My attempts at fun fell flat, not to mention some unpleasantness over the doing of jobs.

So, now, one kid went to work (oh, let’s not even discuss the drama we had there over shoes and the inability to find them), one kid went to play with friends, and two kids are lounging on the couch watching those movies, and I’m going to trudge out in the 100 degree heat and make sure my chickens have water and are not frying up in the sun.

We call this summer.

Happenings in the House

June 25, 2013 / / 1 Comment

I haven’t posted pictures of our home improvements lately..WHAT? Well, I had book club here the other day, and I decided to host the book group downstairs, since it’s nice and cool down there (and it stays cleaner than the upstairs family room).


I bought these two chairs at a yard sale. I went out with Robin, and when we found these, neither of us had enough cash on us, and when I went to the bank to get cash, I realized that my ATM card had expired, so it was kind of a process getting money, then I had to call Megan to bring the truck down to Orem to pick up one of these chairs because I couldn’t fit them both in the Suburban, but it was worth it. These are the COMFIEST chairs!


I moved the treadmill over to this corner. I really don’t like having this big old treadmill that you run into RIGHT when you come into the room. I like where they are now, and we’ve been putting it to good use. The girls are going on pioneer trek next week, and I’m trying to get them to walk the miles every day. Today they need to walk 5 (yesterday was 4, tomorrow will be 6). Natalie’s been doing her walking, but I don’t know about Megan. Silly girl always says she’s too tired after working.


The fooseball table is here in the tiled area. Someday that will be a counter, but for now, it’s open area. See that yellow wire? Ryan ran a camera to the back of the house, and I’m not sure how long that yellow wire is going to be running across the floor…

I took these pictures when Larissa was trying to pack.

Poor girl could not fit everything in, and she was upset and didn’t want to be in pictures, but I tried. We ended up with quite a bit of stuff that I need to mail to her. Have I done it yet? No. I’m TERRIBLE about getting to the post office.

I’m really encouraging the kids to do things to MAKE their own money this summer. I’ve got John delivering eggs to sell. He gets $1 for each delivery. It’s not much, but it’s a little bit of cash for him. He can also wash the car and do extra jobs. Jenna has gotten a regular babysitting job where she does goes at least twice a week for one family. She would like to do more babysitting, and so would Natalie, but they have to get their name out there. Natalie is now my chief lawnmower, and she does get paid for that. She’s also done some animal feeding when people are out of town. Megan has started teaching her summer art class again. She taught it last year, and it ended up being a class for only 2-3 kids, but it was almost every week. This year, she made up her flier, and I gave it out to friends, and she had 8 students come over. At $6 per class, that’s quite a bit of money if they all come. Jenna and John come, too, but they do not have to pay.

The first week she gave them all their sketch pads, and they drew some different kinds of doodles. This week I think there were 9 kids (including Jenna and John) and they worked with clay to make sculptures. They will let the clay air dry and then next week they can paint them. It’s nice that we can set up the tables in the basement, and they can do their class there, instead of on my kitchen table like they did last year.

Jenna heard about her cousin who made 1,000 paper cranes and the legend that if you make that many cranes you will get your wish. She’s decided she will do that herself.

If you were looking for ME in the house, you might find me in one of these two places…
Sewing

or with my chickens.
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I’ve been buried in fabric and projects in my office. Trek clothes! I have sewn two skirts and two aprons, and altered three shirts for the two girls. All I have left to sew is the bloomers. I’m getting sick of it, I tell you. And BUYING all the stuff for trek has about broken the bank. Moleskin, bandaids, tin cups, socks, tick spray, sunscreen……

The chickens are always fun. If I open the back door, they hear that noise, they see me, and they come running. Especially if I am carrying the chicken bucket, where I keep all my scraps and food for them.

Now that we have the back yard fenced in, I let them roam through the yard for several hours each day. That way they can find more bugs and weeds to eat, and fertilize more of the yard than just their pen. We also have these mini chickens.
The small chickens stay in the old small coop inside of the run. That way they can be outside with the other chickens, but they are protected from the pecking and bullying that goes on with the bigger chickens.

I’m not sure how long I have to keep them separate, but for a while yet. The chicks are about two and a half months old now. They are getting pretty big, but not big enough to hold their own.

The kids like to take them all out and play with them.

So, yes, we are enjoying our summer break so far. How about you?

It’s Play Time

June 18, 2013 / / 5 Comments

I began my approach to Ryan with “Now don’t freak out, but…” He quickly chastised me and said he never freaks out, but he WOULD be freaking out if I started a sentence like that again. I began again, “I know it’s crazy and I probably won’t make it, but…I want to try out for ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel’ at the Scera theater.” There, I had announced my intentions to the one I love, I HAD to do it.

When I went to the Scera to audition, I was scared spitless. Really. Who did I think I was auditioning for the Scera? This isn’t just our friendly neighborhood community theater. But I had said I would do it, so I signed up, went in there and sang my audition song. I was shaking with fear and relief when I came out of there. I had done pretty well, but I was still not sure. When the kids asked me where I had gone, I just said, “nowhere”.

Much to my surprise, I got an email inviting me to audition a few days later. I was to prepare to sing two pages of the song ‘Madame Guillotine’. So, I practiced, learned the words to the song, and tried to prepare myself to go to the call backs. There were singing and dancing call backs, and I was auditioning for a spot in the ensemble. I was again terrified, even MORE so than the regular audition. This time we had to sing that song in front of everyone else who was there auditioning, then we had to learn a dance and perform that in groups of 4 or 5. I really suck at dancing, and I felt SO OLD and FAT. Really. I was there with a bunch of 20 year old skinny girls who can sing up a storm, and who all seem to know each other from other plays they have done together. I felt about as out of place as I had at my first summer theater audition, back a few years ago. Somehow I made it through without tripping or falling flat on my face. One lady came up to me after the dance part (or should I say..pure torture), and said, “You’re doing a good job.” I just about cried. “Thank you so much”, I said, “I just feel really old.” She assured me that they need all ages for a play like this, and I should feel proud of myself. I asked if she was auditioning, and she said, no, she was here for her daughter for morale support, not to mention she was her ride. Thank you, unknown lady.

I went home sweaty and feeling conflicted. On the one hand I was proud of myself for doing such a hard thing, on the other hand, I wondered WHY I had put myself through that. The next Saturday they held the auditions for Peter Pan, which is at Alpine Community Theater. I hadn’t heard if I had made it into the Pimpernell thing, so I auditioned with Natalie for Peter Pan. I rocked that audition, I must say. I sang Madame Guillotine, which I had been practicing, and the dance for that audition was so much easier, and I didn’t have trouble with it. Maybe because I wasn’t nervous, I felt more like I was among friends.

I went home and opened my email and saw..
Dear Paige,

Thank you again for auditioning for The Scarlet Pimpernel at the SCERA.

We would be happy to have you in our cast & would like to offer you a role in the Female Ensemble.

Please respond to this email ASAP to accept the role.

Our first rehearsal will be on Monday June 17th at 7:00pm. We will be working through music and the costume designer will be there to take measurements! Please make every effort to be there! We will have the full rehearsal schedule made at that time.

I look forward to working with you!

Thank you!
What?! Wow! I had made it! But now I wanted to be in Peter Pan! But I had tried for the Scera because of the scheduling (they don’t perform on Wednesday nights, which is my bell rehearsal night, and they didn’t start rehearsal until mid June, so I could get through concert season and the end of the year stress of May), so I really had to go with that one, even though I kind of just wanted to ditch them and stick with Alpine Community Theater, where I have friends.

I had to tell the Alpine people that I couldn’t do their show, but they must not have gotten my message because I was called back and cast as a pirate, even though I didn’t go to the call backs. I hated having to tell them I couldn’t be in their show, especially after they cast Natalie in the show (she’s an Indian rhythm dancer).

So, Natalie will be in one play (PETER PAN!) and I will be in another play (THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL).

I went to my first rehearsal this week. We start with music rehearsals so we can learn all the songs. They actually gave us a lot of the music at a pre-rehearsal meeting a few weeks ago so we could look it over and start learning. Although I didn’t know anyone, it wasn’t totally uncomfortable. I recognized some of the people from auditions, and one sweet girl named Erica introduced herself to me (there are 3 Erica’s in the cast). There’s actually a guy I knew in college in the show. We went out a few times back in my sophomore year, but apparantly I wasn’t very memorable, because when I said, “I think I know you from BYU”, he didn’t remember me, but just said, “I thought you looked familiar. Were you in my voice class?” It was German, but that’s ok. I don’t expect everyone to have my stellar memory. (ahem–hopefully you realize I am joking, I can’t even remember what we had for dinner last night, but I didn’t go out with that many guys in college, so I do remember most of them).

I am only in the ensemble of this play, so I won’t be on stage a bunch, but it can’t be less than my two appearances, no lines in Cinderella a couple of years ago. I am excited to be a part of this show. There’s so much LESS time wasted without all those kids! And the quality of the voices! Wow! I’m already blown away. I can’t wait to hear the soloists sing, and see how it all comes together.

So, that’s what I’ll be doing for the next two months. And if you are in the area between August 2nd and the 17th, I hope you will stop in and see the show!

The story of the chainsaw and the neighbor

June 13, 2013 / / 1 Comment

The chainsaw.
It’s been in our garage for about a year, since Ryan used it to cut back the Russian Olive junk trees the bordered our back yard. His dad called and asked for it back, as he had some projects of his own to work on. But before he returned it, Ryan felt he should make good on a promise to our neighbor to cut down the dead tree that is on the edge of their yard, right off our driveway. This tree has been dead for some time, and with the wind in Highland, it’s just been leaning more and more to the South. Last year some time, this neighbor asked Ryan if he could borrow the chain saw, or maybe just asked Ryan if he would cut it down next time he was using the thing. I don’t know the details.

But Monday night we were planning to go visit Ryan’s parents, and return the chainsaw. But first, he decided to cut down that tree. He fired up the saw, and went at it, hacking down that tree.

Unfortunately, he did not inform the neighbor’s wife that he would be doing this. There she was, making dinner or whatever, when she hears this LOUD sound, and goes to the window to see what it was. To her HORROR, she sees what looks like an angry neighbor who is fed up with looking at this dead tree every time he pulls out of his driveway and is taking matters into his own hands. She went out and was flustered, until Ryan explained that he had talked to her husband and had agreed to take out this tree.

She said to me later, “I was SOOO embarrassed. I thought you had reached the point of frustration with us and the dead tree. It took every ounce of courage I had to go out to go out and talk to him. Seriously, I was mortified!”

Silly husband. Always go talk to the wife before doing work in other people’s yards.

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