Summer Update on Glen!

I recently did a whole series on what my family is up to this summer and never got to Glen, so here is his update... (Other updates can be found here...   Ellie,   Adam, Emma,  Cami , Spencer)

Glen had a birthday in June and Emma made him this beautiful cake!   

White chocolate raspberry is one of his favorite flavor combinations and it was quite tasty!   

Most of my family are big Brandon Sanderson fans and Glen is no exception.  He doesn't have a lot of spare time for reading currently, so it took him a good 6 months to get through his latest, "Wind and Truth."  Glen was very proud and happy to finish up that 1500 page tome!  

Back in mid-June, Glen's family had an impromptu family reunion in Colorado!  His parents are both in failing health and when his family realized that a couple of the out of town siblings were going to be there at the same time, they decided to make it an official gathering and see if they could get the whole crew at once.   Most of his five siblings don't love to travel, so it had been 7 years since the last time they were all together and there was no way Glen was going to miss that!  He flew straight from a business trip in San Diego to Colorado for approximately 36 hours.  

They spent time at both their Mom's and Dad's homes...

And even recreated this iconic G family pyramid picture...old person style!   

Here's a grandkid version of it from the early 2000's.   

It sounded like the trip was a great experience and a joy for them to be all together again.  

In addition to the work and church stuff that keeps him busy on a day -to -day basis, he also still loves to fish, play Magic the Gathering with Spence and Adam (and Garrett when he's in town), go golfing when he's got a buddy to play with, play disc golf with Spence, and play Pokemon Go.  He's been playing Pokemon Go long enough that he's reached the top level and is basically an expert.   He also walks with me most mornings, which is a habit/tradition that I love...time to connect and exercise together at the same time!  

Glen's a good one and I'm glad he's mine!  

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Life Update (April 2022)

For years this blog was my place to post cute pictures and tell the world about the adorable or obnoxious things my kids were up to.  Now my baby is 17-years-old (as of a couple months ago) and kiddie antics have been replaced by teen angst and our mid-life woes. In other words, nothing very exciting, unless you're a therapist trolling for clients. 😂  That's okay though. As I mentioned in my last post though....my family loves this blog.   So here I am again, posting an old-fashioned and super boring life update that absolutely no one (including my own mother) will care one iota about.    

Glen--  Glen has recently passed the year mark of working at HS1 and, happily, he still enjoys his job.  It's one of the better functioning companies he's ever worked for and that makes the stress seem that much more manageable.   His mom has been in failing health recently, so we took a quick trip to Denver for Spring Break to visit and to lend a little help.      It's hard watching our parents get older! 

   

Lara--  Speaking of aging parents, mine have both had falls in the last month or two.  My mom tripped over an uneven part of the sidewalk and broke her pelvis.  My Dad got displaced from his recliner and walker by Mom's acute injury and, being out of place and off-balance, he fell and hit his head on the coffee table. Several staples later and both of my parents are quite hobbled currently.  On another note,  I am still very much in the throes of a mid-life identity crisis, where I've been for the last few years.  I feel like, at my age,  I *should* be working or doing something more productive in the world, but I also really feel like I need to be home for Ellie right now.   Now that she's in school part-time, I really need a creative hobby or a work-at-home job, but I'm having a hard time figuring out what that looks like. I keep hoping I'll find the "next thing" and get excited about it, but right now that passion seems elusive to me.  I really like to do things with design, but then I remember that I'm self-taught and really not that great at it, so I can't imagine anyone wanting to pay me for what's only been a church based hobby up to this point.    And no one here knows that I like to do it anyway, so I'd have to toot my own horn... something I'm not great at either.  I keep thinking I have a better chance at succeeding at writing for a job, but writing requires concentration and time, both of which are in short supply with Ellie's back and forth schedule at school this year.  Not to mention, I have no idea what to write about.   So there you have it...I'm aimless and lost...and stressed about getting older.   Feel free to inspire me! 

Spence-- Spence is working a job that pays his bills, but that's about it.  I think he wishes for something  with more growth potential, but he is still working on figuring out what that looks like and he has some exciting ideas up his sleeve.  His dog, Kiwi, is a year old now and she is very much attached to Spence.  She's mellowed out a bit, but she's still quite a handful and the house gets quite loud when they visit.  We love living close enough to him to see him regularly.   

Cami, Garrett, Lucie--  Garrett graduated from medical school a few weeks ago and he was matched with an internal medicine residency program at the University of Alabama--Birmingham.  We were disappointed that it wasn't in Utah, but we're happy that they'll be somewhere affordable and close to family (Garrett's brother and his wife and daughter are at the dental school there at UAB as well).    Cami  still has a semester of nursing school left after this one {yes, she's had a long circuitous path in her education!}.  Blah!  I'm trying hard not to be anxious for them living separately for 10 weeks while she finishes up.  I wish I could just swoop in and make it all easier for them, but, alas, I never have mastered the Easy button in life...plus I still have a kid at home that needs me here.    

Emma--What can I say?   It's been so much more lively and fun around our house since she returned home  from her mission.   Ellie is in heaven to have a sibling home again and I love how the house is filled with loud singing, much giggling, movie nights, and better food!  She's been working part-time and recently finished a phlebotomy certification training, so now she's looking for a job to put that to use.  She plans on taking a class or two at BYU this summer before she starts full-time in the fall.  . 

Adam--Adam finished up his freshman year at BYU, got hired as an FSY counselor for the summer, and received his mission call to Portland, Oregon.   He made some great friends at BYU and is super excited  about the other adventures he has coming up.  He is in the middle of FSY counselor training right now (June 2022)  and is loving it.  He may have been a tiny bit disappointed that his mission call wasn't to a foreign country, but that disappointment was fleeting and he is very excited about serving in Portland starting in August. 

Ellie--Ellie finished her junior year up at a local private school.  I wasn't sure about sending her to school after so many years of homeschooling, but it seems that it's  been a good fit for her and I'm frankly not sure I could have handled another lonely year like we'd had in Pennsylvania.  Finding  homeschool connections is NOT easy and I didn't have it in me to put the effort in to start from scratch yet again.  She went to prom with a friend and  Ellie is looking forward to an exciting summer ahead with a week at FSY and two weeks in Malawi for an HXP trip.

In other happenings-- My sister, Kristina, and I  flew out to Birmingham to househunt with Cami.   We were hoping to find a house that would be our first foray into owning an investment property that Cami and Garrett would rent, but, alas, while  the market is much more affordable there, it is still insane.  We did enjoy spending the time together exploring their new city. 

A couple weeks later, Cami and Garrett surprised us with a visit to Utah.  They had come for Garrett's sister's graduation from BYU, but we were happy to be close enough to enjoy the visit as well.  We were excited to introduce Lucie to my parents and grandmother, meaning we had five generations gathered together in the same place!  

We love our little Lucie! 

Leaving Home....

Once upon a time there was a sweet little baby girl...

who grew up way too fast...   

and decided to go to college far away from home!

One day (August 7th to be precise), it was time leave home.

She said her goodbyes to the dog and the house and we all piled into our very full van.

Over the course of a couple of days, we trekked about 1500 miles and arrived to the land of her father's hometown...Denver, Colorado!  

We spent a day with Glen's long lost brothers, including Ryan....

his dad and brother Kurt, whom he hadn't seen in over ten years.  

We spent time with Glen's mom...

and just enjoyed spending time with this branch of the family we don't see anywhere near as often as we'd like.

It was only the beginning of our adventures of dropping our Cami Rose off to BYU...

but it was a great way to get started.   

Stay tuned for lots more adventures in the West!  

Rocky Mountain High!

Yay! We finally made it home and I can not deny that I've been feeling a little blog deprived on two fronts--reading all of your blogs and keeping up with this one. I think Glen has been a little worried that I may go on a serious blogging binge, but I have exercised a tiny bit of self-control and finished unpacking first. Of course laundry is another matter...but I'm not quite that patient.

Our trip was a little too long and my picture taking a little over-zealous to confine to one blog post...so I'm going to have to break it up into installments.

Here's the first installment: Colorado!

After leaving DC at midnight (I will concur to the fact that we may have been addled with a touch of insanity for starting a 30-hour trek in the middle of the night)...we were very happy to stand on solid ground again in Glen's homeland of Golden, Colorado. My brother Nate, who had just barely moved to Denver, was nice enough to come hang out with us at Grandma Sandy's house and do his usual niece and nephew benchpressing exercises.


All summer Emma had been begging me to teach her to crochet and knit. She quickly mastered all of my primitive crocheting skills and started checking books out of the library on how to knit. Unfortunately I'm more of a kinesthetic learner and studying the knitting diagrams in a book may as well have been a foreign language for me...so I did what any good mother would do--I passed the buck to Grandma!

Emma was an eager student and Grandma Sandy a patient tutor. I was shocked at how quickly Emma picked it up and soon had a very nice little scarf going. Thanks Grandma!


After a mere 12-hour break from interstate travel we got back into the car for a relatively short trip (only 5 hours) to Grand Mesa Lodge in the mountains near Grand Junction...where lots of cousin/Grandma/Grandpa/uncle/aunt bonding took place!

We were rudely reminded at how badly Glen and I stink at Trivial Pursuit. We are always optimistic that the latest version may prove an easier task for us...but it just doesn't matter. We stink!

Dropping objects through a hole in the ceiling became a favorite past-time for the younger kids. We learned to be careful where we stood, so as not to be impaled by the onslaught of falling objects.

What would a trip to the mountains be without a good dose of fishing? For Glen...it would be heretical! He had a grand time being the family fishing guide and hopefully got his fill until our next time.
Thankfully we don't suck at Scrabble as badly as Trivial Pursuit.

There was a healthy dose of chillin' going on (and code talking about the latest plot twists in "Breaking Dawn").
Playing catch proved popular with young and old alike!

We had a wonderful time at the family reunion and thoroughly enjoyed our time together in the fresh mountain air. We are grateful to Grandma for all the planning she did to make it a great time for all...you're awesome!